my failed olympic dreams

I have not blogged for several days. My excuse? The Olympics. About three hours of my day is automatically sucked up into a complete and utter vegetative state on the couch. Watching people do impossibly cool things with their bodies while I eat M&Ms by the handful. And then being guilted about not doing productive things when TV ads about athletes' immense dedication pop up.

It's funny because watching the Olympics, I remember how many things I tried before I finally settled on writing.

Soccer: Because my first name is Ryan, the little league coaches assumed I was a boy. This is how I ended up the only four-year-old girl on a team full of not girls. According to my parents I was very protective and nurturing whenever one of my teammates got hurt. I was also terrified of the ball and ran in the other direction every time it was passed to me.

Basketball: Another not so great foray into the world of team sports. I remember very vividly getting scratched on the arm by a girl on an opposing team. And getting floor burn. I was not a fan of such senseless pains.

Horseback Riding: I actually really enjoyed riding horses. I don't remember why I quit. Probably because I couldn't buy my own horse. I have fond memories of riding bareback through cotton fields. This skill came in handy when husband and I rode off into the Mexican sunset on our honeymoon.

Random life skills pay off. Sometimes.

Gymnastics: I liked gymnastics. A lot more than I liked ballet (which I tried three times because every time I quit I convinced myself it wasn't as bad as I thought). I loved cartwheels and handstands and walking the balance beam. My claim to fame is that I actually combined two of those by doing a cartwheel on the balance beam. My undoing was the vault. The idea of running full speed at a springboard and hurtling my body at a massive solid object was enough to end that Olympic dream.

Synchronized Swimming: This was the sport I stuck with the longest. I was a speed swimmer for a while (only in summer leagues), but the only problem is that I wasn't fast. Not only was I not fast... I was usually last. But I loved the water so much that I decided to try synchronized swimming. Thus started five years of sequined bathing suits, Knox gelatin hair-buns, nose clips and lots and lots of waterproof makeup. But don't be fooled by the sport's glittery uniform. It's hard. Our coach made us tread water for minutes holding full milk jugs over our heads. We had to do laps underwater without breathing. And then laps with our legs sticking up in the air. Those were the best abs I've ever had in my life. In the end, I was not passionate enough about the sport to take it to the next level. I did, however, acquire this life skill:

The "stick your leg out of the water and impress your friends" life skill!

By the time I quit synchronized swimming, I realized that perhaps sports were not my ultimate calling in life. Neither was piano or dancing or guitar. None of them really punched me in the gut and drove me the way storytelling did. My desire to succeed was not strong enough to get over the fears and the long-days of training and putting my body through pain. It was also around this time that I was getting serious about my writing (ie. enrolling in an arts school and becoming a creative writing major). My passions pulled me in that direction, and in the end, it was okay that I quit all of these sports. Without drive, without passion, it's not very likely you'll succeed in something. It's also a lot less likely you'll do well.

Talent, without drive, is useless.

Plus I'm pretty okay with just sitting on the couch and watching other people sweat. 

an obscure life post that i somehow relate back to writing.

I am bad at talking on the phone.

I don't know why. I just am. I get the sweats whenever I have to call people and ask for things. This doesn't really apply for friends or people I know. It's more for appointments. Like doctors or hair salons. Or, in this very applicable case, fixing one's car.

I was minding my own business, having a perfectly lovely Friday evening eating delicious/gourmet tacos when my car decided that it no longer wanted to run. I got into the driver's seat, turned the key and.... nothing. After going through all the necessary checkings (Is it the battery? Is the car set in Park?) I came to the deduction that the car was, well, dead. And that I had to get it towed.

Just the thought of calling a towing company was enough to set my teeth on edge. (Is there an actual term for phone paranoia?) But I did. And it was the worst of ordeals. This is how it went.

Saturday: Called a towing company. Waited 2 hours for them in a parking lot. Chickened out/had to go on a day trip out of town.

Sunday: Oh Sunday. Called a different towing company (as I took the fact that 1st towing company's no-show as a loud and clear, "We don't want your money."). The man on the other line told me he didn't want to drive as far out as I was from him. Called another different towing company. Man tells me it will be an hour. I bike to Taco restaurant to wait for them by my car.

An hour and a half goes by. I call back. Man confesses that he lost my number. Tells me tow truck will arrive in 5 minutes. Another half an hour goes by and I'm about to break out into hives because this entire ordeal is driving me close to insanity (Apparently my personality type doesn't "deal well with day-to-day" things. Which in my opinion involves employing tow-trucks.). Man calls back and tell me truck will arrive in seven to eight minutes.

Truck arrives. I ride along with my car to the car shop. The driver, who introduced himself as "Squirrely," then proceeds to inform me that their credit card machines are broken and he will only take cash. Car shop happens to be in the middle of nowhere. And I, flustered, explain that he must take me to an ATM.

Squirrely proceeds to drive me two miles further into the middle of nowhere. Here there be strip clubs (where Squirrely tells me there was a great knife fight the night before) and a gas station of a doubtful nature. I go inside and withdraw money from the ATM. I take the cash to Squirrely, who then proceeds to tell me that he has no change for the wad of 20s I have to hand him. I then return to the inside of the gas station, where the attendant searches for the watermark on my twenty-dollar bill before he gives me change.

Squirrely takes the money and then leaves me and my bike in the middle of stripclub/knifefight wasteland. I bike 4 miles back to my apartment.

I do not ever want to tow a car again.

The moral I will take from this ridiculous venture (besides the fact that all my paranoias about talking on the phone/setting up appointments are true!!!) is that in life and writing there will always be setbacks. Things will be late. Things will break down. People will only take cash and then not give you change.

The key part is you always, always have to keep going.

fending off the SNIS (shiny new idea syndrome)

As I have written many a time before, perseverance is the key to becoming a published writer. This rule also continues to apply after you have "made it" and gotten a publishing contract.

Right now I'm bushwhacking my way through the second draft of my SouthernGothicNovel. Yes. Bushwhacking. With proverbial machete and all. I'm hacking away scenes. Splintering them beyond repair (at least, right now it seems that way). Bushwhack revising is depressing and discouraging. Bushwhack revising sometimes makes me want to cry. (True confession).

And it is exactly times like this, that the SNIS starts tracking me. Ready to pounce and take me away at a moments notice.

SNIS. Shiny New Idea Syndrome.

So I'm standing, staring at this absolute mess of my novel in progress, thinking of all the laborious sweat filled agonizing hours it will take to make it reparable. And a shiny new idea sidles up to me.

Me: Oh, hello.

SNI: Look! I'm so neat! And new! And exciting! I have an amazing plot and flawless characters and awesome settings! Write me! Write me!

Me: You do look nice.

SNI: No one will know if you write a page or two. Come on. Leave this work for later, explore my worlds!

Oh, readers. This is so temping. The siren song of the shiny new idea.

There is a problem though.

You see, I have a queue of WIPs. The second round of edits of LUMINANCE HOUR, the revising of SouthernGothicNovel, the completion of CutthroatNovel, and the second book of LUMINANCE HOUR which has yet to be born. Adding one more would be insanity.

So, I did what any self-respecting author might do. I wrote the first two pages of SNI and a synopsis. I'm really excited about it. It's a good idea. A good one. But, I took those 2 pages and synopsis, saved them into a file, and buried them, deep deep deep into my computer.

It could take years before I make it to SNI (which I suppose then will be a SOI, shiny old idea). But at least it will be there. Waiting.

For now I have to keep bushwhacking.

"and that's why they called me 'the terror'"

Okay—so you guys know that I love to talk about perseverance (the man with the whip anyone?). I do this for good reason, but I fear that sometimes such abstract talk can make the reader sleepy or disinterested. I’ve decided to draw from events in my own often strangely eventful life.

It happened last week. Last Tuesday to be exact. I had just arrived into work, and although it was 9:45 in the morning I was rather sleepy, steaming lattes and dealing with disgruntled customers (To be fair, many of the customers I deal with are quite pleasant. But there’s always one or two that get under my skin because of their utter ridiculousness.) I was just settling into operating the espresso bar when the morning took a terrible, awful turn.

Our coffee shop is on the edge of a major highway. We often hear sirens speeding by and get a lot of traffic at all times of the day. I suppose it was only a matter of time before a major accident occurred directly in front of our store.

It was bad. Really bad. A dump truck lost control of its brakes, plowed through a line of cars sitting at the red light, ran into a tree, burst into flames. All work stopped as people ran out to help.

Only one person died, which was in itself a miracle, since the dump truck had crushed eight cars almost beyond recognition. One woman jumped out of her car just before it hit. Another was pinned under the car and rescued by onlookers. One man threw his van into reverse and backed out of the truck’s path just before all of the cars around him were smashed to bits.

Needless to say, we were all in shock. The police, ambulances and firetrucks came. They roped off a good two miles of our highway for their investigation. This meant that no cars could come in and out of our store, which drastically cut down business (and by that I mean no one came in. At all.) For some reason my manager decided to stay open, and I was the lucky barista who got to guard the store in case of looting. I spent much of the day cleaning and restocking while the police documented each piece of glass that flew from each individual car.

The road had been closed for almost three hours when my manager ran back inside and said, “Oh my God! Bob is crossing the street!”

Every coffee shop has its regulars: the people who come in every day and buy the exact same beverage. Many of them are colorful characters. Such is Bob. I’m not quite sure how old he is, but by my best estimates he’s in his late 80s or early 90s. Bob was a veteran of World War II. He walks with a cane embellished with a silver duck’s head and sports aviators.

I ran to the door and looked out. Sure enough, there was Bob with his wife. They had ducked under the swaths of police tape and were crossing the accident scene in what could only be described as a dodder. He even stopped at one point to yell at the police for blocking off the road.

We stared in amazement as Bob and his wife ducked under the opposite side of the police tape to enter our store. I brewed a fresh batch of coffee just for him, since he was the only soul who’d been ingenious and plucky enough to walk across a restricted accident scene to get his coffee.

Later, just before they were preparing to cross the road again and return to their car, Bob leaned over to me.

            “That’s why they called me “The Terror” in Ireland during the war,” he said with a grin, “because when I set out to do something, it gets done. This morning, I set out to get a cup of coffee and I got it.”

            I blinked and relished in the significance of this statement. Here was a man who knew what he wanted. Even in the face of catastrophe, when police were blocks all visible paths, he made a way through. Now, whenever I see Bob, I get inspired. If a 90 some year-old man can persist like that. Then I can too.

            Never give up, even if it’s for something as small as a cup of coffee. (But don’t be mean to your barista, please! We hate that!)