taking on a new perspective

To follow up from last week, we really enjoyed The Desolation of Smaug. I certainly have a few bones to pick with parts of it [mainly, I feel like the small changes and additions they made to the first movie started getting out of hand a bit here] but by and large it was a really fun experience. There was a little boy sitting behind us for both films and while he and his father spent the majority of the first up and about, it was super adorable to hear him asking his dad questions about the characters and the story. Happily, Tim survived work the next day. Surprisingly, he often does better on less than 6 hours of sleep than with 6 or more. Weird.

Some major brainstorming happened with my story yesterday and I am so stoked for the new ideas that have come into play. I have the tendency to get stuck when I write. Something isn't coming out on the page like I wanted it to, things feel disjointed and I'm not sure how to fix it, big questions are looming and I don't know how to answer them, etc. I've been dealing with all of these the last few weeks but last night, thanks to a fabulous friend and a wonderful husband, I think I made some breakthroughs.

I had decided on the general arc of the story, the main conflicts, etc. but I was running into difficulties because I want my characters to all be complex but I was clinging to my desire to write the story from one person's point of view. Now, it is very hard to convey the complexity of several characters if you're only seeing things through one person's eyes. This problem had left me at a standstill, grabbing at straws to try and invent ways to make each character's struggles more apparent and compelling. Every time someone asked me if I would be writing from multiple perspectives I would respond with a quick and definitive no that may or may not have made some people feel like they'd offended me at the suggestion. Tim told me something last night, though, that made me more open to considering an alternative.

Tim kept coming back and back to why I wanted to keep the perspective with one person. He told me that in all the big, acclaimed fantasy books, the story is never told from one person's perspective exclusively [yes, I'm sure there are some exceptions]. Very gently, he admitted that when I first explained my intentions to restrict my POV for the story, it immediately became an unimpressive YA fantasy novel in his head. While that admission stung just a little bit, it made me think. I have never strictly billed this story as a fantasy, but it does have a lot of things in common with that genre and the complexity of each character is one of those elements. I'm relatively new to the fantasy genre as a reader so I hadn't realized the perceived difference between stories written from one or multiple perspectives and, believe me, the last thing anyone sets out to do when they start to write is to create mediocre stories.

I had dug myself so far into my determination to have the story told by one character that I had never considered adding other perspectives as a means of solving many of my problems. But the more I'm thinking about it, the more things are clicking into place. By adding perspectives from three other characters, gaps that I was having difficulty filling are already being written in my head. The complexity of these characters will be visible and the intricacy that I'm trying to build into the plot will be more integrated now.

Guys. I'm seriously stoked about this.

So, moral of the story this week? If you're running into road blocks with your writing, try looking at things from different angles, even ones you never thought you'd use before. Try out different POVs, from different characters. Sometimes this may feel like it's adding a lot of work for you, and it does take time and you may not use all of what you write, but by exploring options you may keep yourself from asking "what if"s down the road. And if your experimenting reveals something that just makes everything click better, won't you be better off than if you tried forging ahead with something that didn't feel like it was working?

Writing is work - anyone who tells you differently is lying. But it should also be fun, a time and place where we can play with out imaginations. So have fun with it :)

a book review and other ramblings

On a recent trip to Barnes & Noble I caved and bought two books. Generally I try to keep my defenses up when I go to B&N because if I didn't I'd probably end up going into serious debt. It had been a while, though, so I decided to treat myself to something new in The Looking Glass Wars and Under My Hat: Tales From the Cauldron [an anthology of tales about witches and such].

I picked up Looking Glass Wars because I had heard a good deal about the series and I've developed a liking for most things Wonderland [Has anyone seen Phoebe in Wonderland? Awesome movie]. I really enjoyed the TV mini series "Alice" that aired a while ago as well as Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland so I figured Beddor's series would be a good pick.

While I can't say the book was terrible, because it wasn't, I was rather underwhelmed. The premise of telling the true story of Wonderland is one chock full of potential, most of which I didn't find to be realized. As one reviewer on Amazon wrote: "It's just that Beddor hasn't a clue who his audience is or where he wants to go with this series." This encapsulates how the book felt to me. As a new writer Beddor seems to have struggled with concrete world-building, designing a Wonderland that is fantastically advanced [all of our greatest inventions on Earth supposedly come from there] but at the same time historically quaint, which was hard for me to reconcile and really picture in my mind. Some of the terminology that Beddor invented also tripped me up a bit, again because I was trying to picture a fantastical Wonderland that also semi-resembled our, more demure world. It was hard for me to take some things seriously even though the characters took the existence of certain bizarre creatures and foods as a matter of course.

The feeling of the book kept oscillating between middle-grade and YA and I think the main cause for this confusion was the way Beddor approached and developed his characters. For the most part, I enjoyed all the characters. I think he created a good cast without  any really unnecessary characters and there's something to be said for that. However, for me, a big difference between middle grade and YA is how in depth you get with characters, how intensely you feel their emotions and struggles. Beddor seems to have created YA worthy characters who hint at complex backgrounds, motives, and desires, but he treats them like middle-grade characters, only skimming the surface of their thoughts, actions, and feelings. I kept waiting to get more intimately involved in Alyss's grief over losing her parents and her world, her huge decision to shut that all away in order to survive on Earth, her reorientation to Wonderland, and how she finally accepted her role and strengthened herself to take back what is hers. There was just so much potential here for a truly compelling story with characters that you root for but, try as I did, I couldn't really get attached to the characters because it felt like Beddor just skimmed over everything. Nothing made me feel like the stakes were high or that characters were really struggling with their decisions, they just did 180s and moved on. Part of me wants to take this book and rewrite it, not to change the plot, just to flesh out the characters.

So I'm not really sure if I'll pick up the next two in the trilogy. I don't think I could read them if the characterization remains this two-dimensional.

In other news, Tim and I are going to the double feature for the new Hobbit release tonight. This will either be a wonderfully stupendous experience or a slightly suicidal one since we both still have to work tomorrow. The game plan is to go to bed once we get home and sleep for two hours in the hopes that we can mitigate the amount of sleep we'll be losing. I'll get back to you on whether that's effective or not.

In random-personal-experience-moment-of-the-day: It's amazing to me how many times personal trials have enabled me to connect with people who are struggling with the same thing. Most of the time these end up being struggles that are intensely personal for me and that I don't share with anyone aside from Tim. So this morning when a friend started telling me about something she recently learned and is struggling to figure out how to comes to terms with, I was blown away by how almost exactly similar her situation is to what I experienced about three years ago.

This was a topic that I had figured I would never talk to someone else about because you don't just start a conversation about that sort of thing but here I was, having found myself in a situation where this friend needed advice and assurances that most people wouldn't be able to give, but I could. I debated whether or not to tell her my experience because I could feasibly give appropriate advice without divulging my own story. But I could remember how much I would have appreciated someone telling me what I know now those three years ago and hearing it from someone who has been there - how things can work out - would have helped give me the strength and hope I may have felt I lacked.

I'm sorry if that made no sense to some of you, but I thought I'd share. It's such an amazing feeling and experience to see something that has been a trial for you turn into a positive influence for someone else.

struggling to put thoughts into words

I know I don't usually use this blog for very introspective things and fear not, that's not changing. I was just trying to think of what to talk about this week and what came to mind isn't writing-oriented but I can't shake it tonight.

I typically stay out of discussions about various topics that are prevalent right now. This stems from personal ignorance [like with politics] as well as a desire to avoid offending others or just getting into angry yelling matches [as often seems to happen whenever religion is brought up]. To even say you're religious is to draw criticism much of the time, forget about identifying as a member of the LDS church [Mormons], so I usually keep my nose out of heated conversations.

I have a lot of friends who are not members of my faith and I love them all dearly. They're wonderful people that I'm blessed to know and I hope they've never felt that I've tried to impose my beliefs on them, as Christians are often accused, and sadly guilty of doing. When I think of these friends, I like to focus on what brought us together and the things we share rather than our differences, but sometimes I'm reminded just how differently we see the world.

With adults, sometimes all it takes is a difference of opinion to spell the end of a friendship but, aside from distancing myself from toxic relationships, I hope to never use that excuse. Not because I'm determined to "bring everyone to baptism" [though I wouldn't complain :P], but because I know my life would suffer for losing those people. The older I've gotten and the more I've come to understand and evaluate my own beliefs, the less these differences of opinion make me angry as sometimes happened when I was a teenager. I don't enjoy getting into shouting matches where each side is ignoring the other person's point of view. I don't like the feeling of anger that so often comes with the choice to be offended. Oddly enough, these differences make me sad, and I don't mean in a condescending way. My heart hurts.

I have seen so much pain, and struggle, and suffering happen in friends' lives that might have been different, better, more bearable if they knew what I know and saw the world the way I see it. I'll be the last Mormon to claim that my life is free of suffering because of the doctrine I believe in. While my life has not seen the hardships that many have had to endure, I have had, and continue to have my own trials - many of which have threatened my mental and emotional well-being in very real ways. No, struggles, and suffering, are a part of life. But when I look back on the things I've gone through and those of my friends, mine feel like they were less - not because they weren't hard, but because I see things differently and it is amazing how much perspective can change your trials without taking them away.

So many of these arguments that are taking place in our country, in our world, right now - the debates about abortion and gay marriage - I hesitate to join in because I feel like people aren't focusing on the central disagreement. How can I explain why I believe what I believe about these issues when your argument is based on one idea and mine is founded on something deeper that changes the context of the problem entirely? It is hard enough to communicate with someone who is willing to honestly listen to what you have to say, how much harder when you're almost talking about separate things? Perspective. So it's easy to get frustrated and upset when people broach these topics and you feel like they aren't listening. I just wish we knew better how to communicate.

Okay, that's it.

suspension of disbelief, not all reason

Suspension of disbelief is an inherent part of genre fiction from fantasy to mystery. The term was originally coined in conjunction with the idea that if a writer could develop a sense of reality in setting and plot as well as humanity in characters, the reader would suspend judgement about the potential implausibility of the narrative. Over time the responsibility for suspension of disbelief has fallen largely on the reader instead of the writer.

Anyone who has read a book or watched a movie or TV show has been in a situation that requires this suspension of the implausible, though the degree to which one must stretch the suspension of judgement varies depending on the genre and the particular piece. Also, some people are more willing to suspend their disbelief to a greater degree than others. This can be a conscious choice or something that occurs because one person is more ignorant of facts that another.

For example: I am not an expert on space and astronauts. I do, however, have a fundamental understanding of some aspects of space, such as the lack of sound and gravity, how an extended stay in space will cause atrophy in ones muscles, etc. Considering these things, when I saw Gravity in theatres recently, I really enjoyed it. What I know as solid, factual things about space [such as the silence] were honored to my satisfaction and my ignorance about other things kept me from getting hung up on potentially problematic aspects of the film. On the other hand, we have Neil Degrasse Tyson who, while he gave the movie a positive review, apparently had a harder time not being pulled out of the narrative due to scientific mistakes that he, as the world-renowned scientist that he is, could easily identify.

Now, in writing, as in film, you are never going to be able to please everyone. There will always be someone there pointing out what you "got wrong" no matter how well you research or world-build. It doesn't mean you've done an awful job, nor does it meant that the readers should just swallow whatever you decide to invent. I disagree with the current trend that puts almost all of the responsibility of suspension on the reader/viewer. We are creators of these stories have a serious responsibility to our audiences to write stories with believable characters and with situations and plots that, while they may often be wonderfully fantastic in nature, can still pull a reader along without requiring them to throw all common sense out the window. Readers need to be willing to lay aside what they may take for granted, or assume is true about the world, especially in fiction and fantasy but we as writers cannot write a load of poppycock and expect readers to bear the entire burden of making it believable.

I have read plenty of books and seen plenty of movies where I felt the writers could have done a better job making the story and characters believable. I have also read and seen several where I recognized that my own knowledge of certain topics or my own stubbornness has gotten in the way of enjoying the work because I couldn't stop nit-picking. [This is always the case with movies made from books I've read. I cannot seem to get passed the incongruities no matter how hard I try. It's a serious problem :( ] Creators and consumers share this responsibility and if you are unsuccessful in suspending disbelief as a writer and/or reader, then at least be willing to accept your own short-comings. It's the only way you'll ever learn to improve. [I really am trying to like movies made from books, guys. I really am.]

As a writer, I'm perhaps overly critical of myself as well as other creators for failings in this department. Struggles and near-misses I can understand but this weekend I encountered an example so awful that it completely offended me. My husband has been playing the most recent Call of Duty and finished the campaign mode this weekend. I wasn't home when he got to the end but he told me that, while watching the closing scene, he had the distinct thought that it was a good thing I wasn't present to see it. [He knows my pet-peeves so well] This, of course led into a discussion of what had happened and I'll try to lay it out as well as I can remember for you. [I apologize in advance for any confusion. I'm not a video game connoisseur in my own right.]

The whole game, your character and his brother are hunting down an ex-member of their team who was lost and then turned against you. At the end of the game you have tracked him down and are fighting him on a train which ends up derailing and sinking into the ocean. As you sink, your brother gets the villain into a headlock and tells you to shoot him [the villain], which you do. Your gun is a .44 magnum, a very large caliber handgun which is [according to my husband] completely capable of shooting through the right side of the villain's chest, through your brother's shoulder, and through a window in the train, as it proceeds to do. As the train car fills with water you manage to grab your brother, who is injured, and make your way to the surface and the beach where you rest and contact people to come and get you.

After you have radioed in for pick up, the villain appears on the beach walking toward you. He proceeds to beat the snot out of you and your brother. The scene ends with him taunting you, telling you that you will be turned against your cause as he was and you'll become his partner in eeeeviiiiillllllll [dramatic emphasis added], and then dragging you away down the beach by your leg, your brother left behind, too injured to help you.

If the reasons for my outrage at this are unclear, bear with me as I list them.

1. If you were shot through the lung while inside a sinking train car, you would not survive.
2. Barring that, if you managed to get out of the car and onto land, you could not be in any condition to walk anywhere and would most likely bleed to death.
3. Barring that, if you could survive the death trap and your body was able to push through the pain and damage of a collapsed lung, you would not win in a fight against two people who have survived the same death trap and are less injured than you.
4. Barring that, if you managed to beat those two up, you are attempting to drag away the less injured of the two by his leg which allows him his other leg as well as both arms to put up any kind of fight [which the character does not do in the game].
5. Barring that, if you were able to drag the character away, before you arrived they had contacted people to get them and when they show up the brother will tell them what happened and these people who have managed to track you across the globe the entire game will track you down again, get the character back, and kill you even if it requires cutting your head off and burning your remains.
6. Barring that, if you get away with the character and no one catches you, this character knows what happened to you, the torture and mind games that were used to break you and turn you "to the dark side." The most effective defense against torture and brain washing is knowing what your captors are trying to accomplish by it. From what you know of the character, he would die before he broke and turned on his family and his cause.

For these reasons, this has got to be one of the most obnoxious endings I have ever heard of. The fact that the developers of this game thought this was an acceptable ending and that it would be at all believable is downright offensive to all of my sensibilities as a creator and a consumer. How stupid do they think their audience is that they think this would be viewed without complaint? Apparently these games have tended more and more toward dramatic endings as they've gone on, which is fine, but this is not dramatic. This is preposterous.

Please, please, please do not do this with your writing. You deserve better, your characters deserve better, and your reader certainly deserves more respect than that.

restlessness, cold, and a satisfactory rebuttal

Have you ever looked around your house and decided you hate half the things in it and want to either throw those things out or just set them on fire? I was struck by this desire last night as I looked around our living room with its horrendously mis-matched couches [yay hand-me-downs!], make-shift tv stand, and general clutter. I started out trying to figure out where we would set up our Christmas tree when the time comes and ended up wanting to cart most of the room to the dumpster. I settled for a little bit of cleaning and rearranging.

Don't get me wrong, I know we are very blessed to have the furniture we do considering it hasn't put us in debt and the pieces are functional. Sometimes I just get fits of aesthetic dissatisfaction that make me long for a day when we have a home with matching furniture tastefully arranged in relation to the available space. I suppose it's a good thing for me that Thanksgiving is next week so I can force myself to remember all the important things I have in my life and resist the urge to go into unnecessary debt in order to obtain an ideal that isn't important.

This is how I've been feeling in the mornings:

In all seriousness, though, our heater hardly ever turns on and it is still roasting in our apartment by the end of the day. Our downstairs neighbors must have their heat cranked and they're more than welcome to keep paying for our heat in my opinion.

It can still be more of a struggle to get out of bed in the winter so I bribed myself with 20 minutes at a library book sale before work to get up yesterday. Anyone who has ever been to such an event knows that there is very little organization involved so I was pretty pleased to snag a Calvin and Hobbes that we didn't have yet as well as the third book in the Hollow Kingdom trilogy. I even managed to enjoy the irony that that's now the one book I own of the three and it is my least favorite. Maybe I can convince Tim to buy the first and second for me for Christmas... I hate having an incomplete set.

I have long been aware of the high-brow/low-brow line drawn between literary fiction and genre fiction. It's an argument I completely disagree with the critics on and generally stay out of because the level of sheer snobbery that can come into those conversations is stifling. I'm comfortable with writing what I like and ignoring whether or not someone is going to think it's ground-breaking but I was recently made aware of an article that attacks [yes, I say attacks] Mormon writers specifically and claims that we as a group are incapable of writing "good" literature because we tend to write genre fiction. I was torn between disbelief and indignant anger by the end of the article for so many reasons that I can't coherently list. However, a friend wrote a wonderful post in response to this article that articulates my feelings almost exactly. You can read it, and get a link to the original article, here. I highly recommend it. The current trend of placing post-modern, literary fiction at the top of the writing totem pole isn't permanent, as none of the hierarchies before it have been permanent and I for one cannot wait until people figure out that genre fiction, as well as Mormon writers, have a lot more depth to offer than they're being credited for right now.

It frustrates me to think about the number of people who may never have tried to follow their writing dreams because someone told them they weren't "qualified" to be a writer. The idea that you have to have had an unhappy childhood in order to convey a true sense of pain, loss, suffering, and struggle as a writer is completely preposterous. The wonderful thing about writing fiction is that you don't have to have experienced everything your characters do yourself. If you did, imagination would be useless and unnecessary and it would be a sadder world for that. A true writer is not necessarily someone who has been abused and mistreated and embittered, but a person who has the capability of taking the emotions they have felt and building on them, extrapolating them out into different situations and contexts that they've never lived but are made to feel real because they are founded in real emotion. Everyone has felt the range of human emotions, we are all able to convey sadness and joy. Don't let anyone tell you differently.

it's only november but...

The holidays are fast approaching, whether we want them to or not!

Gift giving has always been a point of mild anxiety for me because I can be super particular about the gifts I get for people. They have to be just right. Since knowing Tim, my stress level about Christmas and birthdays has gone way up from pure desire to please. I've been lucky though. My husband is really pretty easy to shop for. He actually wants things and talks about them so all I have to do is pay attention and mentally note anything he seems really interested in. This has made things easier for me, whereas he's stuck getting presents for the girl-who-doesn't-ever-voice-a-preference-for-anything.

One problem I've started running into, though, is that when Tim wants something, or gets excited about a game, he wants it now so I get to play a delicate game of sounding interested when he talks about it but not too interested otherwise he'll get it before Christmas. This issue has come up again this year as there are a few games coming out next year that he's geeking out over. I had fully intended on surprising him with one for Christmas but I finally caved last night when he asked, for the hundreth time - joking but not, if I was okay with him pre-ordering it. Sigh. One Christmas option down, hopefully I can hang on to the other ideas I have, haha.

In other news, I managed to sneak another book in amid my Wheel of Time marathon. I borrowed River Secrets from my sister-in-law's friend [practically forced to since she saw  me ogling her bookshelves] as I lost my university library privileges before I could get my hands on the third book of this wonderful series. Anyone who's read this blog before knows that I am a huge Shannon Hale fan. I keep finding more and more things to admire about her work and I hope that doesn't end soon.

I was a little hesitant to start River Secrets as I had enjoyed but didn't love Enna Burning and I was somewhat worried that the series would continue downhill for me. I shouldn't have worried. River Secrets is probably my favorite book in the series now. This book made me laugh out loud more times than I can remember from pure humor and witty surprise. Hale's whimsical and quirky narration is a strong presence and makes what could have been an average story wonderful to read. Razo wasn't a character I really attached to in the first two books but I was excited to see how much he grew on me and quickly became my favorite character out of the bunch.

There have been a lot of articles and blogs talking about the female stereotypes in literature and I have no qualms with the issues they raise, for the most part they are completely valid, but I think that male characters suffer from their own gender stereotypes pretty frequently. I think the main reason the majority of my book collection is composed of heroines instead of heroes is because I get tired of these overworked molds - the hero who is perfect in every virtue, especially humility and a lack of desire for personal glory - the anti-hero who broods over everything and doesn't want to take responsibility but suddenly discovers that he's actually a wonderful person - the macho hero who thinks only in terms of physical force to get things done but it's okay because it's not malicious and it's all in the name of justice! There are many many others but we see them over and over again in literature. This doesn't necessarily mean they're bad. They all have their place but I get tired of them and this is why Razo was so fascinating to me.

A lot of things automatically set Razo apart from major male stereotypes. The most noticeable is his stature, or lack thereof. Heroes in this genre tend toward the large and powerful type or the strong silent type. Razo defies both categories with his good-humored, self-depreciating approach to his size as well as his constant stream of random dialogue and jokes. He's a class clown minus obnoxious shows of bravado. Razo does attempt bravado at times but his personality and lack of experience with tact and women always end up making the situation relatably and humorously awkward. Razo is the kind of character you want to like, that you cheer for. He's much more relatable in his imperfections than other character types and his part in the plot plays on the fact that he's not who you would pick out to be a leader or a hero. All in all, Razo was a refreshing hero and one that I am eager to add to my bookshelves. Maybe I should just give Tim my Amazon wish list...

Last bit for today: if you haven't seen Despicable Me 2, you definitely should. Tim and I made a random date night of going to see it in the Dollar Theatre yesterday and we were not disappointed. Good clean laughs abound and my favorites came from Margo's crush on a charming, dark, exotic, skater/emo boy which completely encapsulated the kinds of infatuations that come with young adolescence. I completely lost it at one point when Margo, totally smitten, tells him "you're so complicated." Honestly, that line keeps popping into my head and I crack up every time because it is so perfect!

november is a jerk - and other random thoughts

I've decided that whenever I have my own house I want bookshelves to be one of the first things visitors see upon arriving. I'm sure I'll go through lots of decoration ideas and my own funky version of feng shui with furniture and layouts but bookshelves will be a must. You can generally tell a lot about someone when you first walk into their house and I love the feeling when I go over to someone else's place and see bookshelves stuffed full fit to bursting with books. Even if I don't know the titles on them or have a particular fondness for ones I do. Books have a way of making a home feel more welcome and cozy. But maybe that's just me, haha.

It's already the seventh of November and I can't believe it. It's honestly like October didn't even happen. Part of me wishes I'd tackled NaNoWriMo this year but 50,000 words in a month seemed a little to ambitious with where my story currently stands. Some people can just write away without creating a framework first, of any kind, and I am in awe of those writers but that's not really me, not at this point anyway.

Which begs a question. I know that, as writers, our procedures and styles will change a little over the years as we grow into our craft and our voices but how much change really occurs? Has anyone ever started out as a super structured writer and then shifted to a more free-flowing, spontaneous style of writing? I think sometimes we aspire to be a certain kind of writer, from one of these schools of thought or one of the countless in between. Can we teach ourselves to write a certain way. I mean, to make that form of writing feel natural for us. Even if order and planning isn't our natural strong-suit, could we practice long enough that  writing with that kind of discipline feels more natural, comfortable, and inspiring that anything else? I'm not sure. I think one of the hardest things is to find what your natural style and pace is. None of them are bad but you need to know what your groove is before you can get it on.

I don't think I've nailed down my writing style to a tee yet but I know certain things like: I write better on paper than a word processor and I usually need an environment with minimal distractions directed at me at least to get started. You'd think I would have realized stuff like this right off but I can't tell you how many times I have tried to make myself write on a word processor instead of by hand, largely because, for whatever reason, I though that was the "better" way to do it. Don't get me wrong, word processors are amazing and once I have a first draft of something I'm happy with I'll take it to the computer [esp. Ommwriter] but there's just something about doing the roughest rough draft long hand that I connect better with. The thing to remember, if you're working on your style, is that there is no "better." I have read a lot of interviews and articles about big name authors and how they go about their writing process and each is so unique. Some I honestly don't understand how they could possibly be helpful or productive but it works for them. So if trying to arrange the "perfect" writing procedure is keeping you from writing then maybe it's time to take a break and just try it however you feel comfortable. No one's watching you  :)

In other random news, I've decided to try yoga in the mornings in an effort to put some semblance of physical activity into my life. A friend recommended a youtube channel done by a woman who's not the creepy-intense kind of yogi and I tried a few videos for the first time yesterday. I felt pretty silly sitting on my living room floor and doing stretches and such but it felt good to be doing something. It's too early to tell if this new morning routine will have that much of an impact on my physical well being but I feel a little less guilty for being genetically twiggy if I'm not just sitting around my house.

Isn't it interesting how different people have such different reactions to the same thing? You could collect a room full of girls with my body type and I know that each of us would feel differently about it. Some may never have really thought about how genetics have blessed them while others might be upfront in gloating about it and showing off their effortless figures. I would be in the weird group of girls who feel almost apologetic for what they couldn't help but inherit from their parents. I can't tell you how many times I have censured myself in conversations with other people because I though that something I might say could potentially offend someone because it came from a skinny girl. I suppose high school has that sort of conditioning effect, the place where girls learn to be harsh and disapproving of anyone - how to give and assume offense in the weirdest places. Girls that are naturally skinny may not have to worry about exercising to moderate their weight but they run the risk of offending people just by being what they are as much as girls who struggle with their weight feel they do. That, right there, is something I would never have said in high school. My point [you didn't think I had one, did you?] is that it is utterly fascinating how one actuality, problem, or trigger can result in a myriad of reactions and some more complex than you might think.

Think about how you react to certain things in your life. Why do you react that way? How do your characters react to things? Do their reactions feel real and specific to them with all their complexities? When people talk about how important it is to build your character's background even if none of it is in the story, this is what it's for. So you know how they will respond to different things and why, how their history makes their responses unique and maybe even somewhat unpredictable.

promises kept - some Halloween treats

So we got our bowls back from the pottery place on Friday and I have pictures like I said I would this time! See? I'm getting better at this, haha. Before I get to that though, I just wanted to share my excitement for the scene I'm working on right now. My two main girls are arguing over whether or not to let a new character stay with them and while it's still rough I'm really loving the feel of the scene. Sometimes your characters take you by surprise and I was definitely not expecting the one on the "yes" side of the argument to elevate to yelling but it fits so well and her little explosion is by far my favorite part. She's not usually the dramatic one but it seems she has more invested in the argument than I originally thought. The honesty is a bit harsh but more wonderful for it. Anyway, yay!

In other procrastinating news, I'm about 2/3rds through the second book in the Wheel of Time series [which is apparently getting new cover art! people rejoice! because...seriously, they need it] and still loving it. One thing I've noticed is that the reviews on the books always have at least one that mentions how Robert Jordan did a great job exploring Tolkien's world and, oh, isn't it nice? Hold the phone. I don't think I've ever been so offended on behalf of an author before. Jordan and Tolkien both wrote fantasy but that is about the only thing their works have in common and casting Jordan in Tolkien's shadow is doing Jordan a major injustice. For one, Jordan's books don't happen in even close to the same setting as Tolkien's do. Yes, it's fantasy but saying that Tolkien has some sort of claim on creating the genre so everyone after him is just copying or expanding upon his work is wrong on top of being seriously egotistical. Also [prepares to be potentially assaulted by Tolkien fanatics], I think Jordan is a better writer than Tolkien. [Shouts from her fortress: I regret nothing!] I'm not saying Tolkien isn't a good writer, he is, a very good one. I just think that what Jordan did with the Wheel of Time is more impressive.

Le'me esplain...No. There is too much, le'me sum up. [remember, personal opinions here, though they may not be popular]

1. There are no elves or dwarves or hobbits or other typified fantastical races in WoT.
     I assure you, WoT is still fantasy despite lacking these stereotypical characters but I'm not hating on elves and such. My point here is that Jordan's characters, with one exception, are all human. The reason I think this series is more impressive because of that is because I think that elves, etc. can become kind of a crutch for fantasy writers due to the fact that the public already has a general idea of what those races are like, their customs and behavior. So when you write them, it can be hard not to follow the template that's already present in our culture which provides a lot of the character development for you in a big way. Jordan, in restricting his characters to almost entirely human, set up a different challenge for himself. He couldn't rely on groups that people already know and can fill in details about on their own. Instead, he created dozens of different cultures and political climates and religions - each unique to different locations. Guys, that takes a massive amount of work and skill to pull it off successfully and I am repeatedly blown away by how completely he does succeed.

2. Tolkien is generally raved about for having created a whole history for his world. But...
     Creating a history is a necessary part of world building but some people do it to different degrees depending on need and awesomeness/craziness. Tolkien has written a history for the LotR world which is pretty fantastic and I give major props where they are due. That being said. Jordan has also written a massive history for the WoT but his is integrated into the story whereas you have to read a separate book to get the context for LotR. Now, that could simply be a stylistic decision on the author's part but, my standpoint as a writer, it would take a lot more time and planning to completely integrate a history into the series than to write it separately and choosing to do so makes a more holistic reading experience from the reader's perspective. LotR is exciting and fun to read with great battles and drama and such. WoT is like reading the best history book ever written. It honestly feels like reading a history book, but not the awful kind they give you in school. This history book has been written and is being written as you read. The reader is pulled into the making of history which is an exhilarating feeling.

Anyway, I could obviously go on about this for at least a week so how about we put down the elvin-made swords now [okay, LotR fans?] and get on to the pictures that this post is about anyway!

Behold, or, as the Italians say it - Ecco:

 I [obviously] went with a birch tree design which served as a nod to both one of my favorite trees growing up and the aspens that I now enjoy out here in the west.

 I'm really super pleased with how the leaves turned out as I wasn't sure if I'd put enough green for it to really show up but I'm happy with the balance. And the black and white reminds me of Calvin and Hobbes which is an added happy bonus!

 If you're wondering: yes, I am showing a full 360 of the bowl, and yes, these pictures were taken upside-down. I don't have fantastic lighting for this kind of thing and, right-side-up, the sides of the bowl become really dark on camera.

 Okay, one upright that at first glance I thought was taken with drape-y fabric behind it even though I know full well that that's our front door, haha.

So, yes! A successful, awesome time well spent and well rewarded. Man, I love that place.

In parting, because this post is already obnoxiously long, I'll share my newest little friend. No, I am not a My Little Pony person. I was just wandering Wal*Mart with my sister in law and saw these little mystery MLP packages that are created with the intent of getting you to spend all your money in the attempt to collect all the figurines but in fact they've only actually manufactured like half of them. I am powerless against such small, adorable mysteriousness so of course I bought one. Apparently his name is Comet Tail.

Happy Halloween!

to read again

Last weekend it became very apparent to me that I would not survive long during the down times at work simply by rereading all the books I own, most of which have already been read numerous times. So far I generally have at least a few solid hours of sitting time at work so I needed something beefy to fill that space in a satisfying and exciting manner. While puzzling through this dilemma I hit on a wonderful idea. The Wheel of Time. I've been saying for as long as I've known Tim that I want to get into this series at some point but the fact that I was almost always reading something else and the series is 14 books long [each at least 650 pages long - and this doesn't include the prequel or the graphic novels that have spawned from it] and I've never really ventured into fantasy deeper than what you find on the YA shelves at Barnes & Noble. This series has been on my "to read" list for ages and on Saturday I realized that I had the perfect opportunity to shove all my excuses to the side and finally sink my teeth into this beast. And it's been so worth it!

Tim's brother kindly brought the first book down for me to borrow on Saturday and thus far I have been consuming around a hundred pages a day. Consider the fact that I am not an early riser and I am now working part time and even I'm surprised at how fast I'm tearing through this. The funny thing is, I couldn't even read for long stretches at a time when I started the book. I'd read a few pages then have to put it down for a moment before reading more because the reading was exhausting in the best way possible. I think I had forgotten how much work good reading can be, how you have to build up your endurance to take in everything the author is giving you. It's refreshing.

Having almost finished the first volume, I stand ready to recommend this series to anyone who enjoys a good read. I think in the fantasy genre at large it's hard to find stories in which women really have a viable part outside of being villains and damsels in either idiocy or distress or both [usually both] but Jordan's story sets up a world where fantastical abilities are found in men and women in the complimentary and conflicting ways in which the genders relate in reality. The One Power is TWoT's "magic" source and men and women can both channel it but in very different ways and both are needed which is not to say that sexism on both sides often mars their chances to work together. I am continually blown away at how well he has captured the dynamics between men and women, different political and religious groups and factions - Tim put it perfectly when he said that reading TWoT is more like reading a history that a novel - because it feels so real and relate-able. Most of this is due to the mind-blowing world building that's gone into this series. Jordan keeps a lot of scenic details that people will recognize, like the names of trees, but he'll also throw in one or two names or species of his own making which gives the setting a sense of familiarity as well as discovery. The narration jumps around between characters and while there are a central three, if you had to pick, the full cast of what I think qualify as main characters is pages long. With so many characters to keep track of there is always a ton going on but it never feels unmanageable or unwieldy. I've been told that the first book is slower than the rest [aside from book 9, by general agreement] but even though this volume might not see as much explosive action as the others, the pacing is expertly done and I never got bored which, considering how much of the book is just characters traveling, is saying something for me. There are characters I love, ones I can't stand, ones I can't figure out whether or not I should like them, ones that I can't wait to see grow up, and ones I can't wait to see more of than the brief glimpses so far.

Basically, if you have ever read anything remotely fantasy [Twilight and those paranormal romances don't count. I'm sorry. They just don't.] or have never really considered the genre but enjoy a book that makes your mind work in all the best ways, I highly highly recommend The Wheel of Time be put on your book list. It may not be something you pick up right away, a series this intense requires time and commitment, but it is definitely worth keeping in the back of your mind for some day when you need something like it  : )

first week of new job

Hello hello! I know it might seem like I'm slowly slipping my blog day to Friday but while a move may be in order at some point this post's tardiness is due to a sudden, unforeseeable computer issue that we ran into yesterday that will hopefully be soon remedied.

This has been my first week at my new job and despite the little bumps and snags that I've run into with bus schedules and such it's been a great week overall. I am loving this job. It has a lot in common with my old job which provides some comfortable familiarity but the changes are only good ones. For example: on a day to day basis I have less to process/review than I did working at the library. However, unlike the library, I can read/study when I don't have work to do. This has been both exciting and difficult to get used to because, while this is something that I completely agree with and am ecstatic about, 4 years of habit does not die easily. It might take me a little while to be fully comfortable with pulling a book out while at work but it's something I'm eager to adjust to, haha. The buses have honestly given me the greatest trouble but I think I've figured them out at this point. I got my staff ID today as well so hopefully I can start using the bus pass on that instead of my debit card within a few days. Without a bus pass each ride costs $2.50 so I'd be spending $100 a month whereas the bus pass is $70 for a year. Yes please, I'll take that one.

My body is starting to adjust to the new sleep schedule, primarily by becoming suddenly dead tired around 10pm which is weird but a good sign I guess. Isn't it weird how you sometimes make a better use of your time when you don't have much of it than when you have an entire day to get things done? I'm not super efficient or productive in the mornings yet but I'll be working on that and I already feel more balanced which is primarily what I wanted out of this job in the first place. Being too busy can hurt you but so can having too much time. I've even written a few time within the last week which is an improvement. I keep going back and forth on which project I want to work on but right now I'm trying to tackle a difficult conversation between characters that comes up early in the story line. I'm sure this is something that I'll come back to edit hardcore later on since there is so much I can feel isn't sitting quite right but I need to get to know these characters a little better before I know quite how to fix it.

Tonight we are going to Creativity [one of those paint your own pottery stores] and I am psyched. I have been wanting to go for the almost 2 years since we last went and I've been sitting on a coupon./voucher for about a month which made my reaction a little explosive when Tim asked if I would want to go tonight. I've painted a tile and a bowl so I'm trying to decide if I want to do another bowl, a mug, or maybe a plate or something, along with what I will actually paint on it. I have to keep myself from becoming the "paint ALL the things!" person but it's hard to suppress that. For some reason painting pottery is really therapeutic for me. I'll work on posting pictures after the pieces have been fired as long as mine doesn't turn out to be some kind of monstrosity.  : P

a rainy, congested sort of day

Because that's what it's been. Seriously, there was non-stop rain today which didn't exactly help with my sore-throat-turned-runny-nose. Gross, I know, but we've all been there. I haven't really gotten much done this week. My biggest goal has been to get out of bed before 9 which has been eons harder than it should be. Today was the first day I managed it which makes me feel sad and successful at the same time.

BUT GUESS WHAT. I got the job!!! If you come to this blog via facebook, you've known that for a few days now but you guys, this has been the best thing that's happened to me in over a month. I figured that I would enjoy about a week or so of my post-student life with very little to do and then get bored. But if I'm being honest I was bored from day one and things kind of just kept devolving from there. I started sleeping in later and later and just not really caring about anything. Eating gradually went by the wayside [I've always been bad at eating consistently in general since I left for college] because making food, even something as simple as toast or microwaving a bowl of soup just sounded too strenuous. Monday was the worst my sleeping has been. I slept through my alarm [I used to be able to count how many times I'd hit snooze and how many were left before the alarm shut off but I can't anymore] and when I finally roused myself to check the time I was startled to see that it was almost noon. The worst part was that I knew full well that I could keep sleeping - and not the kind of sleep where you're forcing yourself to stay in bed and your eyes kind of start to hurt and you start getting uncomfortably warm under all those blankets because your body has woken up. That scared me. So I resolved to try getting up earlier but that's hard to do if you don't have something to get up for. Thankfully, the Lord is mindful of me and I finally got a call back from UVU on Tuesday extending the job offer to me. I start work on Monday and I am so stoked about it, though it may not look like it. It's just a part-time position which is perfect. I'm not a career-oriented woman. I just don't enjoy working that much. So this will [hopefully] be the perfect balance between being home and getting stuff and writing done here and being out of the house for at least a few hours every day. I didn't realize how much I would miss being outside even just for travel until I didn't have a cause or a means anymore.

So yays!

The other amazing upshot to this week was hanging out with my best gal-pal on Tuesday. There are few things in life as relieving as talking to someone who understands what you're saying even when you don't know what it means. We made a sweet B&N run where I finally got my hands on a copy of Extremely Load and Incredibly Close, which I have finished already, of course. Which means I need more books. Again. Well, hey. I did just get a job... Anyway. I am a huge fan of the movie adaptation of this book - measured, obviously, by the ridiculous amount of sobbing that I did while watching it. The book has some pretty significant differences from the movie [to be expected] but somehow the essence of the stories are the same and much of the plot and characterization was carried over almost exactly. Foer's writing style takes a little getting used to [a conversation in dialogue happens all in one paragraph mixed in with exposition and the very rare tag] and each character's narration [it's told by Oskar, his grandmother, and his grandfather though Oskar is writing to the reader, his grandmother is writing to Oskar, and his grandfather is writing to Oskar's father] differs in format as well as voice and the accounts, while they sometimes cover the same information and events, do not occur in strict chronological order so you have to be paying attention to know who is talking and what/when they are talking about. I don't mean to say that it's a difficult read, just different. I really enjoyed the read, especially the back story for Oskar's grandparents that comes in bits and pieces. The book provides so much more room for the development of those characters than the movie could. I kept coming across phrases and ideas that made me stop and want to mesmerize them because of how true they were, or how poignant. There are a million stories about loss and tragedy and how we cope with it but nothing is quite like this book. Oskar's voice is detached and analytical even when he's being emotional and that somehow brings out whole new layers of pain from a character who should be too young to have to feel it but whose story needs to be told and read for all of those who have felt that pain and haven't been heard.

two projects come to a close

I made these for youuuuu!

Okay, so technically I made these for me but I'm making this post for you as I've been long overdue finishing these. Remember that shirt I told you I was making from scratch? Well, after not touching it for over a week, I committed to finishing this beast today. And believe me, as tame as it looks, this was a beast.

I used left overs from two of my sewing class projects as well as some new bias tape. I was happy to find that I had just enough green fabric to do the top, though sadly not big enough pieces to do it without that center seam but hey, it's not so bad. I'm ecstatic to have those side seams finished because that means no more pesky threads! I love that poke-a-dot fabric but man is it a pain sometimes. I need to tack down the ends of the bias tape I used to finish the sleeves but other than that, it's done! And my sewing machine still works and I still have all my fingers, haha. 

And a picture of me "modeling" my creation because it looks different when you're wearing it and, hey, I can't remember the last time I've been in a picture.

 So I recently acquired a new sweatshirt as the temperature plummeted unannounced recently and my old sweatshirt really isn't up to another season. I bought my old sweatshirt at the end of my freshman year just before flying home for the summer and, bored as I was at home, one day I randomly decided to embroider the left sleeve - pictured below. When I first did it it looked a lot better and there weren't so many visible ends poking out but the last three years have demanded a lot from this poor garment, so much so that it's almost see-through in certain spots now.

"Time is making fools of us again."

Of course I decided that this new sweatshirt should be christened in a similar manner but I chose to go after the back this time because it gave more room for possibilities. The hardest part of this process is always selecting the quote and I agonized for a day or two over a list that I made. I finally settled on this one because I thought the whimsy lent itself well to the style of embroidery.

Now, I don't want anyone thinking that I might have free-handed this. I didn't because I can't even write in straight lines on blank paper and I didn't want my whole design to come out completely lopsided. Of course, I totally spaced process pics again but I just took a piece of tissue paper, cut it to fit the back of the sweatshirt, then drew a center line and lines for the text which I penciled on in big, simple script. When I finished that, trying to keep the type as centered as possible, I pinned the whole she-bang to the sweatshirt and threaded my embroidery needle. Happily, I had the exact color of thread that I had wanted to use but I still needed to buy another skein of thread to finish the whole design, even having split the thread in half to 3 strands [which I would advise anyway because the full 6 would be way to chunky for my liking]. I just stitched through the sweatshirt and tissue paper, making up the style of the script as I followed the proportion and spacing of the penciled type. I don't love how every letter turned out but overall I'm pretty satisfied with the end result  : )

 "I know who I was when I got up this morning but I think I must have been changed several times since then. - L.C."

[Bonus points to whoever can tell me where both quotes come from without googling them.]

As theoretical and academic as my pursuits generally are, sometimes you just have to do something with your hands, you know? 

In other news, I had a job interview on Monday for a part time position that was pretty much exactly what I've been looking for. I feel like the interview went super well but I was told that I would hear back by Wednesday and I haven't heard anything yet... I'm trying not to panic. A friend works in that office and she doesn't think any decisions have been made yet, for whatever reason, so I guess I just have to be patient. That can be hard for me though as I've long believed that it's better to know - even if it's bad news - than to not know. At least then you can react, haha.

september has been somewhat sporadic

Heeeey guys. Last week life decided to land me with a mysterious case of the stomach flu that put me out of commission for the majority of the week. But while I was sick I learned a few things, aside from the fact that I would still rather have a cold for a week rather than throw up even once. For example: graham crackers do not make a suitable substitute for saltines - let that be a word to the wise. The worst thing about throwing up is how paranoid it makes me of eating any food at all. It probably takes me an additional day or two to recover every time I've had the stomach flu or food poisoning because it takes me ages to be willing to eat anything other than saltines and chicken broth, though ginger ale and sprite are a heaven sent substitute for straight water ><

Anyway, as a result, the shirt still needs finishing, though I did get bias tape on the neckline which goes a long way to making it look better. What I really need to do is finish the side seams and do the bottom seam since that fabric frays more than I shed but I can't do either until I've settled on the sleeves which is the big hang up. I can't decide on length and I'm getting tired of sticking myself in the arms with pins as I try to visualize the different options.

It's been almost a month since I started my school-less, job-less life so I suppose it's pretty sad that yesterday was the first time I've left the house during the day for something more extensive than checking the mail. Tim takes the car to work so I'm left with the bus system if I want to really get anywhere and let me tell you, I do not trust the bus system. It's a great program but they recently changed their routes and times and it seems like every place you look for route info gives you a different schedule so you can bet I planned the crap out of my little adventure yesterday and even then I was paranoid that while I was on the bus it would start taking a different route and how would I cope with that, huh? How?! Despite my barely controlled panic, I made it safely to and from campus. How old am I again? >< I went in to pick up my final short story for the writing class I had at the start of the summer and the fact that I couldn't remember what it had been about meant that I didn't argue with the B+ the professor had given it. We don't always write things we like, haha.

Autumn never lasts longer than a month here and if you were to judge based on the weather yesterday and today, it only lasted two weeks this year. The start of September gave us serious heat and sun but yesterday the temperature plummeted down to low 60s, high 50s with a cold wind. I love fall so I hope it doesn't disappear on us entirely but I hate that it means winter is coming [hold the GoT jokes, please] because winter is my least favorite season. Yes, it can be beautiful and all but it typically drives me permanently indoors because I can't handle the cold and with as wet as it's been this year, forecasters are predicting that this coming winter will be the worst that we've seen in years. I finally replaced my old sweatshirt last night which should delay my inevitable decent into popsicle-ism. We also got a hair clipper set as Tim was long overdue for a trim. Considering I've never used one of those trimmers before last night, I'm pretty proud of the fact that his head is still attached!

I had been running into mental blocks, trying to work more on my fantasy WIP and I was starting to despair about ever making headway when my brain suddenly switched gears on me. So I've been doing some research for another story idea that's been sitting on my back burner for a long time. I need to do some digging around and find those files/pages that I had worked up the last time I wrote for it but starting here with a somewhat fresh slate is also giving me the opportunity to look at the story idea and characterization with new eyes. The plot is about a kid who has been delivered on the doorstep of an uncle he never knew after his mother's death. It sounds so stereotypical when laid out like that but I am excited about the characters and how easily I'm connecting with them as well as their various struggles. I don't always feel like I have much experience to draw on when it comes to realistic fiction - my life just hasn't been that long or exciting. Sam, David, and Emi, however, feel very much like people I know and theirs are stories I'm confident I can tell.  : )

belated, busy, fingers crossed

Guys, I'm making a shirt! I spent my whole day yesterday making [yes, making] the pattern from scratch, cutting out the fabric and sewing all the main seams. I realized too late that I should have taken progress photos to show you guys  : /  I've had a ton of the nice fabric I used for my sewing class's final project left over and I've always intended to make a shirt from it so I'm super psyched about this. I decided to use some fabric from the button down shirt project we did too and I like it a lot better in this pattern. I feel kind of bad for wasting it on the class project as that's not a dress shirt I'm ever likely to wear but the fabric is getting a chance to shine here. Because both fabrics are wovens, I went with a kimono-style shirt [or, as apparently some Americans call it: a lampshade-style. really? why would you ever equate a piece of clothing to a lampshade?]. I've got all the main seams sewn and now I'm having to make some adjustments to the side seams to fix the sleeves a little and I am feeling a desperate need for marking chalk. Seriously you guys, if you ever do any sewing, marking chalk is the best thing I can ever recommend that you get as far as sewing tools. Hopefully I'll be able to go over to Joann's tonight and grab some so I can finish the shirt this weekend. Then pictures, I promise.

So, in typical style, having reported my good writing behavior last week, I haven't written much of anything this week. I am ashamed. On the bright side, I did get a lot of awesome feedback from my lovely friend Chelsea about the stuff I wrote last week which will be super helpful in preliminary editing. I also found my thoughts turning to an old short story from over a year ago that I wanted to turn into a book but haven't spent much time on. Thus, whilst my epic job search journey continues, I have much to do, hurrah!

I've been keeping tabs on a friend's [and by friend I mean an awesome lady whose blog I've been lurking around for a while now] posts about Dragon Con and the fantastic cosplays she saw there. Super nerd confession alert: I have wanted to go to a convention and cosplay since junior high. As some Utahens know, Salt Lake held their first ever Comic Con this month and while finances and nerves were road blocks for going this year I really really really want to go next year and I'm hoping to have a costume as well. Hey, I have a sewing machine and an imagination, why not? I'd love to have people to go with or see there as it's not really Tim's type of geekery so if anyone is thinking of going next September let me know!

This post hasn't been very writing-y, huh? I am seriously in reading withdrawal. I've had only access to my own, thoroughly read collection for two weeks and I'm craving new things. I did just reread Til We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis. I first got this book for an unconventional research class over a year ago and it was so wonderfully rich that I wasn't prepared to tackle it again until now. For those not familiar, Til We Have Faces is a sort of retelling of the myth of Cupid and Psyche, told from the POV of Psyche's oldest sister, a wonderfully unreliable narrator. I can never criticize Lewis's writing - in fact, his books are the few that I get so excited about that I will actually underline certain lines and passages [this is a big deal for me, as I'm sure some of you avid readers can relate] - and I understood so much more this time around that it blew my mind all over again. If you've never read C.S. Lewis before, I highly recommend this book as well as The Screwtape Letters if you 're interested in a sort of reverse-psychology about Christian ideals. [Lewis is renowned for the Christian themes in his writing as well as his straight up writings about theology. The themes are much less blatant in Till We Have Faces, though, so if you aren't feeling the Christian thing, I still recommend it as it can be read without getting into all of that if you'd rather not.]

jobless but not purposeless

This has been my first week in four years without a job and while the ability to sleep in has been welcome, sitting around the house all day has been less awesome. That really just means that I need to get my rear in gear and work on those projects that I know I have with what's left to unpack as well as other things but motivation has been a bit hard to come by. I've been less and less of a couch potato as the week's gone on, though, so I have hope for my productivity.

My biggest achievement this week is that I have written, at least a little, everyday which hasn't happened in an embarrassingly long time, let me tell you. It definitely helped that I had promised to show you guys something this week. I've been going back and forth as to what I should share because, while I love feedback, I don't want to give everything away, besides, it's not nearly polished enough for that yet.

In order to understand this and further bits that I share, I'm giving you some context for the story to hopefully explain terminology. As always, comments and questions are welcomed and encouraged.

This first part is a section out of a sort of prologue I have in the works. I'm not sure if I'll keep it or not, getting rid of it would require a lot more exposition in the first chapter and I don't know if I want that there.

        People are born with their destiny written in their skin. Marks like black tattoos aren't visible at birth but reveal themselves after the onset of puberty. Each person has two marks, one that indicates a primary talent or skill and a second that divulges a person's defining character attribute. The exact timing of their manifestation, their position on the body, and their order are completely unpredictable.

      Citizens are required to record all marks in the public record for census purposes but this procedure also identifies those that manifest marks that identify them as a threat to others and the community at large. In a proactive effort to ensure the safety of the community, individuals with such marks, called Malmarks, are banished as soon as their threatening mark is known regardless of age or situation.

This second bit is a peep from the first chapter. The speaker, Mona, is reflecting on her family's reactions to finding out that she is a Malmark.

        When a Malmark is found, no one is to speak to them, even their family, but my father's expression, and not his silence, was the only proof I needed to fully realize what I was. The look on his face cut me to my center though I don't have a name for the emotion I saw there. He blinked once, then let go of my arm. The absence of his touch, warm and always gentle, seemed to wake me up and I started sobbing in full force. I tried, through my tears, to apologize for hurting them all, for bringing this embarrassment on our family, and countless other things that I wasn't even sure I was responsible for. How could I be? I hadn't done anything. I was apologizing for my future.

grand adventures

Apologies for the extended radio silence. Between graduation two weeks ago and our trip to Idaho last week to visit my brother and his new baby I've been a little short on internet time. To make it up to you, I have pictures! My mother always complains that my pictures don't have people in them which is largely true so most of the ones I took are of our trip to Yellowstone but I think they're pretty cool.

 Oh look, a graduate!

 I spent the majority of my time in the library in the last four years
[seen behind me, including the skylights]
But for work. I never studied in there if I could at all help it :P

 On our way up to Idaho there was a fantastic sunset.
Unfortunately, I don't have a cool enough camera to really capture it
but I'm pretty satisfied with this one :)

 My brother took us out to some lava tube caves
which necessitated a very long drive
off road which later necessitated a car wash for our new Impala.

 It was pretty hot out that day so I was blown away to feel the frigid air coming out of the cave even just on the walk down the slope. It felt like winter in there and I immediately wished I'd brought more than my poor excuse for a sweatshirt but it was really fun to stumble around in those nature-made caves and I'm completely serious about that!

 After our adventure. A picturesque bunch, haha.
Carrigan and Spencer

 Spencer again and Tim

And Jake, an ever obliging model.

 On our way out to Yellowstone we could see the Tetons!
We were about 2 hours away from them so they are massive.

So many hot pots in Yellowstone! This one was putting off so much steam that
walking around it was like being in a sauna!

 The colors around these geysers and  hot pots from bacteria
and minerals are amazing in their vibrancy.

 So many opportunities for big scenic shots :)

 And you can't go to Yellowstone without seeing Ol' Faithful!
I took a video of it going off so this picture was taken as it was starting to trail off.
The geyser was at least three times higher at it's peak.
It wasn't as epic as I was expecting considering it doesn't really make much
noise at all but it was still fun to see.

 This is the Yellowstone Grand Canyon.
Most of it is comprised of rock the color of that section toward
the bottom which explains why Yellowstone is called Yellowstone.

 There are a ton of other colors in the canyon too.
Each indicates an area where a hot spring was at some point.

 How many hats does it take to shade the youngest
in the family while she takes pictures?
Three, apparently.

We made the 600ft decent to the top of the falls pictured above.
The hike was demanding but the view and the
cool spray from the falls were worth it :)
Tim and my dad. See, sometimes I get people in my pictures.

So tomorrow is my official last day working at the library on campus. I find this distressing for several reasons.

       1. Come Monday, I will no longer have a job. I hate job hunting.

       2. I will no longer have access to the over 10 million books in our collection. [to be honest, getting a library card at the public library may be higher on my priority list than finding a job...]

I have been on the job search for about three weeks now and I can't say that I'm enjoying myself. For one, I have a very limited range of experience having never worked in sales or retail or anything which are the majority of the open positions here. Seriously, telemarketing companies are everywhere. So I'm not sure what I want to do but not much that I've come across sounds appealing. Alas, that we must work for our bread. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a decent part-time job because I don't need to work full time and that would give me more time to sort out our apartment and to write.

GUYS. I downloaded Ommwriter to our desktop and so far I am loving it. I felt kind of silly explaining to Tim why I wanted to use this program instead of Word or Onenote but I'm glad I found it. The absence of distraction is awesome and as close to writing long hand as I've ever gotten on a computer which is great since that's my preferred mode of writing but I can type faster. As a note, Ommwriter doesn't have spell check like other word processors so if you use it, make sure you eventually transfer your work to another program to make edits when you're ready. My only complaint is that the keyboard and mouse are at wonky angles but that's because the computer is currently in the living room so I'm holding both on my lap but hopefully we'll get it moved to the desk in the course of organizing the apartment.

I've been writing pretty consistently this week so far and I want to push myself to really dive into this project. Ideally, I'll be posting little snippets of the WIP here as I go - I'm shooting for one a month. Hopefully I'll have the first bit ready to go next week! I'm excited and nervous to share this with you guys so I hope you like it. As always, I welcome any feedback and questions as I firmly believe that addressing both will help me make this better than it would be otherwise.