I'm sorry this will be gross

You know what I really want for Mother's Day?

1) Peace on Earth,. Or at least in my house. No fighting for one whole day. No crying. No bossing and angry tattling.

2) Whoever poops, flushes. And if it doesn't go down, they use the plunger.

3) Quiet. Not totally related to "peace" necessarily, but for them to not be making noise for an hour, even happy noise.

4) Cake.

5) Or brownies. Brownies are fine.

6) Chores done without nagging.

7) Kisses.

8) Or hugs. Hugs are fine and there's less contact, especially for squeamish teens.

9) Someone to make my meals. Someone to take the initiative to start a meal and choose what to eat and make the meal. Whoa Whoa! That's asking a LOT.

10) Go play outside. Really. Sunshine, not too hot, you need the exercise. GO.

So anyway...

Happy Mother's Day to all you people who have fulfilled a maternal role in the life of another person! Or animal! All you nurturers out there :)

And to all those who had awful moms, I wish you peace.
And to all of you who wanted to be moms, but couldn't for whatever reason, I wish you healing.
And to all of you who did your best, but your kids went off the rails somewhere along the way, I wish you love.
And to anyone whose child died...there are no words, no healing power of mine strong enough. Love, peace, healing.

Diversity (again???)

I've been thinking a bit about how I write diversity, coming from the direction of a white person with non-white and gay friends and family. And yet I don't have many non-straight, non-white people I hang around with. To be honest, I don't have many people I hang around with. I'm a total introvert, have social anxiety, and maybe a touch of prosopagnosia.

Oliver Sacks wrote this article for the New Yorker back in 2010.
You can argue that he was a brilliant man, but apparently he wouldn't recognize you, no matter what you argue.

Or else my social anxiety makes it hard for me to look at faces long enough to remember them. Or maybe my social anxiety makes it hard for me to retain the faces, since my brain has already gone bye-bye before time comes to store anything in long-term memory. Heck, I can't even remember someone's name three seconds after the introduction. Doesn't matter what you look like.

ANYWAY.

It seems like I don't know very many minorities in real life. Is it because I come across as uninteresting? Or because I come across as disapproving and possibly racist? I'm totally not, I promise. I'm well aware that people have different pasts and upbringings and challenges to face in life, sometimes based on exterior signs of difference. So I'm not color-blind. I try to be nice to people, but I'm weird and awkward. With everyone. So if you're nice to me (but not too nice until I know you better), I'm nice to you. Otherwise, I'm probably staring like a deer in the headlights. and I'm either silent or talking too much.

I've just been thinking a lot about all the characters in my Work in Progress New Adult novel, who are mostly white. The main character (because in spite of the ensemble nature of the cast, there is one), is part Puerto Rican, but she doesn't much claim that part because it's her dad, who has had almost no contact with her ever (yet he shows up in the middle). A couple of the main cast are gay. Some minor characters are POC (People of Color), but they're minor. And I feel bad about that...

I loosely based this book on the Big Chill soundtrack and even more loosely on the movie, with its ensemble cast of college friends. Talk about lack of diversity. Jeff Goldblum is Jewish and....Glenn Close has curly hair? Even the few minor characters we see are white. Anyone who has any aspect of their sexuality shown is straight.

Essentially, I feel like I'm going to mess up the representation of people I don't know enough about. I haven't had long talks with my non-white non-straight friends and family about race and how they've lived with our US society with its deeply-ingrained racism and anti-gayness. I think Twitter has given me as many things to think about (or more) than real life conversations. Maybe I don't engage on a deep enough level.

Or maybe I'd rather ask: how are the kids, what are you up to these days, how's it going, and OMG did you see this?

So I feel like a fraud. What else is new?

Essentially, I feel like I should be writing more diverse characters, but I also feel like I don't know what I'm writing about and don't want to be insulting. And people discuss this sort of thing on Twitter all the time and yet I don't know what to say when I'm actually writing. I'm too self-conscious, I guess.

(Not so fraudulent: I have two French 17th century historical romance novels out, The Indispensable Wife and The Honorable Officer. And another one coming...soon I hope. We're on galleys now and I have a pretty pretty cover for it.)

Bravery

This is an article for my local RWA newsletter. I've decided to get braver and publish more articles. I know the editor has an open policy about publishing just about anything the chapter members throw at her. And, uh, I am the editor so why would I turn down my own work when I am happy to get things from others?

Do you remember the first time you sat down with the intention of writing a novel? Wasn't that brave?

Or maybe over-confident and naive?

There have been a hundred moments of bravery in my writing career. A thousand moments.

When I finally finished a book at about the same time I joined the RWA (bravely admitting I wanted to be a real, live romance author), I was so pleased with myself that I pitched to an agent who presented to the chapter. I haven't looked back at the story in years and years, but she probably read the synopsis and the first few pages and said, "Oh HECK no."

I queried some other agents and edited that thing and had my brand new critique partners read it. And eventually, it and the two sequels (one of which I really want to glean the story line from and rewrite) went in a drawer. They're archived on a thumb drive somewhere.

Sometimes after a rejection, negative comments from a critique partner, or bad review, it is an act of bravery to get back to writing.

And then another act of bravery to show it to your critique partners. And another to query agents and publishers. Or to send it to an editor of any sort. This might be the bravest thing any writer does: showing their work to an industry professional.

And then, there's a chance that it will be published. Your mother/daughter/sister/best friend/worst enemy might read it. And they're all judging you. And then you send it out for reviews and many of them don't even open it. Most never review it. Then someone does and....they don't like it.

("Don't read your reviews!" they all say. But when you have exactly three reviews, which is a problem in itself, you might take a glance...)

But we bravely--or naively--keep writing anyway. "Maybe this next one, I'll figure out the essentials of the main character before I reach the end and have to edit them all in!" "Maybe this time I'll get the plot points in all the right places before the third round of edits!" "Maybe this time they'll love me!"

Aye, there's the rub.

Because all our acts of bravery and creation and more bravery and distribution are supposed to lead to someone reading what we write. And we all want to be loved. Or at least we want to be read.