The Bard Queen - Part 1

(Cross Posted on the Modern Myth Makers)

"Reality hates me"
- Kalayna Price

Once upon a time, a young slavegirl lived in a faraway land called Reality. This slavegirl, like all the slaves of Reality was known only by her function - Office Wench. If she had a name, she did not know it. Office Wench lived a normal life in Reality. She picked at her Real food, slept fitfully in her Real bed, and trudged to her Real job every morning.

One day, while Office Wench crouched over her keyboard, she overheard an argument in the next cubicle.

"You should come with me," said a voice Office Wench recognized as Data Entry Maiden. "We'll all suffocate here if we stay any longer."

"Stop talking like a baby," said Office Wench's neighbor, the Keyer of Edits. "There is nowhere else to go."

"I can't take another day in this place." Data Entry Maiden lowered her voice to a whisper, forcing Office Wench to press her ear against the padded wall to hear. "I leave tomorrow morning, meet me at the water cooler at 9 a.m."

The Keyer of Edits laughed. "You won't make it out of the office. Get your head out of the clouds."

This last statement was a favorite phrase of the slaves of Reality, for there were lots of clouds to get one's head stuck in. Reality was an odd country. The people walked with their gazes fixed to the ground straight in front of them. Therefore, they could see only what was right there, in full view.

If their gaze ever crept upward, they saw nothing, for the entire land was covered in a haze that floated just above the ground. The fog was thick and still and windless. Walking through Reality felt like walking through vaporous rock. Nothing stirred Real air.

The well acclimated often bragged about how "Real air is heavy. Only the strong truly appreciate it's full weight." Then they would throw out their chests and swallow huge gulps of the stuff, choking all the while.

Office Wench went to fetch water at 9 the next morning, as she did every morning. Data Entry Maiden stood in front of the water cooler rocking back and forth on her heels, a rucksack over her arm.

"Where are you going?" asked Office Wench.

Data Entry Maiden glanced back and forth down the halls before answering, "To find Truth."
"But everyone knows that Reality is all there is."

"That's not what the Sage says." Data Entry Maiden turned her back on Office Wench.

"The what?"

"The Sage who lives in the dungeons. He is from Truth, and he says there is a way to get there."

"Did he tell you the way?"

"Like I need some crazy IT Guy telling me what to do!" She muscled her rucksack higher on her shoulder and walked past Office Wench. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have somewhere to be."

Office Wench could not focus on her keyboard that day. She kept imagining Data Entry Maiden walking out of the fog, finding Truth. But the next morning, Office Wench was disappointed. For there, in her padded cell, sat Data Entry Maiden curled over her keyboard.

"What happened to Truth?" asked Office Wench.

"Get your head out of the clouds!" Data Entry Maiden said without lifting her eyes.

***

Continued in Part 2

Into the Commons

C.S. Lewis, in his book, The Four Loves, describes the birth of friendship as sounding something like this, "What? You too? I thought I was the only one." When we find a common way of thinking, a common emphasis for our lives, Lewis says the love of friendship, or phileo, blossoms. Lewis goes on to write, "Lovers seek for privacy. Friends find this solitude about them, this barrier between them and the herd, whether they want it or not." To enter the commons with a friend necessitates a separation from the rest of society not for the sake of separation, but in order to seek out the shared thought. Often, when I'm with my writer friends (the Modern Myth Makers), one of us will stop the conversation and say something like, "I wonder what people would think if they heard us discussing the after effects of a ninja raid on Greenwich Village in the early 1930s."As writers of fiction, we see things differently from the rest of the herd, and our common thoughts make us friends.

If I lived in Sydney, Australia, I think I would be friends with singer/songwriter Brooke Fraser. My brother, Dave (The We Love You Project), gave me a copy of her CD, "Albertine," two weeks ago, and I had Lewis's classic friend reaction of "What? You Too?" Her lyrics speak my heart's cries better than anything I could write about them. Sometimes it takes someone else speaking what we dare not for us to have the courage to admit, "Yeah, that's me." Here is a glimpse of my journey into the commons with Brooke.

It's getting tougher to be single with every passing day. I've been waiting 26 years for the love of the right man, for eros, and I'll keep waiting. It's a firm choice. But being settled in a choice, even one between you and the God of all flesh, doesn't make the wait painless. Some days, my mind and heart and body all start screaming at once. I found a friend in Brooke's song, "Love where is your fire?" In it, she sings, "I've been sitting here smoking away / Making signals with sticks and odd ends and bits, but still there's no sign of a flame / Impostors have been passing, offering a good-feeling glow / But I'm holding out for what you are about - an inferno that burns to the bone / Some urge me to be temperate, but lukewarm will never do." I've struggled with discouragement in this area over the last few months. It seems that everywhere I look, the world urges me to temper my hopes, to either cave to my desire or kill it. Neither is an option. Brooke's song encourages me to admit that yes, I burn, but I'm going to use that longing to somehow glorify the One who put this fire in me in the first place. My will rests in God's Will and I will not moderate that choice.

Which brings me to my next favorite song on Brooke's album, "Faithful." Dave told me this was his theme song right now, but he'll have to wait in line. It's been my theme for my whole life, I just didn't have the right set of words until now. The song is about a different kind of longing than a desire for eros. "Faithful" is about a spirit-longing for union with the Father of the universe. It is about having faith that God is, "and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him" (Heb. 11:6). The chorus says the hardest words I have ever had to tell God, "When I can't feel you, I have learned to reach out just the same / When I can't hear you, I know you still hear every word I pray / And I want you more than I want to live another day / And as I wait for you maybe I'm made more faithful." I have to live this song every day. I have always in a way dared Jesus to step into my life in a tangible way, to prove he loves me by finding me where I'm hiding and giving me a huge hug. But I have reached a point where even when it feels like I'm only embracing air, I will embrace air anyway, because that is all I can do. He is God, I want Him, and I remind myself that He chose me first. But the desire seems like all I have.

My new friend, Brooke, also brings me back to the truth that all these unfulfilled desires are in fact my surest hope. In "The C.S. Lewis Song," Brooke quotes my favorite author (another thing we seem to have in common): "If I find in myself desires nothing in this world can satisfy, I can only conclude that I was not made for here / If the flesh that I fight is at best only light and momentary, then of course, I'll feel nude when to where I'm destined I'm compared /... I will sigh and with all creation grown as I wait for hope to come for me." This idea that unfulfilled longings somehow hint at the existence and nature of heaven is a strong theme in the writings of Lewis. And this beautiful reminder from Brooke gives me reason to hold on to my desires. I must make another choice then. I must choose to long for life as it should be, while all the time recognizing my desires can never come to fulfillment in this broken world, nor should they.

What I would really love now that I have broken this vessel and poured out my deep soul, is that someone would read this and respond, "What? You too?" We can walk the commons together. But if you don't feel that right now, don't worry. We can still be friends based on other thoughts, like finding ninjas in Greenwich Villiage. :)

Obsess much?

My friends (the Modern Myth Makers actually) came over for a visit last week. In the course of the evening, I gave them a "home tour" of my room (I had just cleaned it, so I needed to show off the miracle). They took one look around and asked "Where is all your stuff?" It's strange how that phrase has stuck with me. It's true, I don't collect things (no book obsession if you can believe it). It might be because my family moved a lot when I was growing up and I got used to having enough. Some overly pious (stupid) person will probably say that I am somehow a better person to be so detached from material possessions. I think it's because I just don't like to spend money.

Similarly, I don't really have any consuming hobbies or activities either. For example, writers are supposed to have to write. It's something so deeply necessary to their existence that they are not alive without it. Notice I use the word "they" and not "I." Truth be told, I'm pretty sure I could live just fine without ever writing a novel. This begs the question, "Am I really a writer?" But I don't even care about the answer to that one anymore either. My question has for some time been "Do I have any passion or am I just living asleep?"

I envy passionate people. I love to listen to someone describe something they really love -- whether it be a new song they heard, a new book idea they are working on, or a piece of art glass they bought in Venice. Watching their eyes light up is a beautiful thing. I, on the other hand, always adopted other people's passions and obsessions when I was growing up. It has only been in the last few years that I have tried to find my own. I'm still looking. I know several things that I am good at, some that I am very good at and even enjoy to a degree. However, there is no consuming passion in my life. I truly seem more passionate about the idea of being passionate than I am about anything in particular. It's like being in love with being in love rather than with a living, breathing human being.

That last sentence implies that I have been playing around in the safe world of concepts and ideas without venturing into the reality of life. Maybe so, maybe not. I have pushed it many times and stepped out to try to use the "gifts" God has given me, to write that novel, to go to grad school, to make a movie. To get off my duff and do something with my life. Hey, even in this infant blog I have already made grand statements of the writing I will force myself to do. But my attempts at drumming up passion for passion's sake have all ended in disillusionment. Does that mean I should keep trying, keep fighting, keep pushing? I don't know.

I wish (and have prayed) that God would give me some clear purpose to move toward, but he doesn't. Instead, He keeps pestering me to choose to respect people at work even when they do something that annoys me. I try to drum up some grand passion for a cause and he reminds me to forgive my Dad for saying something stupid when I was hormonal. I beg him to help me write the great novel, but he keeps dragging me over to sit with him under the trees and listen to the wind. I keep asking be in love, and God keeps sending me the living, breathing human being.

I know, I know, I'll shut up now and get myself a hobby. Knitting sounds good.

A Riddle

I come once a moon, not always at full.
Sick as I make you, you're not really ill.
I attack all the ladies and torture their men.
Oft' as I leave you, I come back again.
I don't take the pregnant, the young or the old.
Warped as I make you, you will soon unfold.
I ruin your week and make you feel lazy.
Mad as I make you, you's not really crazy.

What am I?
Leave your guesses on the comment page.

Surviving the Day Job

(cross posted on Modern Myth Makers)

There is no money in the arts. I discovered that fact a long time ago. Knowing such truth though -- like being an artist -- does nothing to pay the bills. Therefore, creative souls usually end up indenturing themselves to a day job of some form. The lucky few will find jobs that feed their creativity, but most of us spend our 40 something hours a week cultivating a cube farm. Others find themselves hunched up in front of a cramped desk in a closed room, whose windows give a grand view of the hallway. We live our lives surrounded by dirty-grey walls and lumpy, commercial-grade Berber carpet. The day job begins to overtake our personalities and sap our creativity. We feel trapped. Here are a few simple suggestions to help you remind yourself that yes, you are a human, not a secretary (or a business analyst).

Say it with a smile
You can get away with venting a lot spleen if you make a joke out of it. Emotional outbursts that might frighten the calmest cube dweller can be fully vented if accompanied by a grin. In fact, the more severe the outburst, the more willing your audience will be to allow it, because they will think you are exaggerating for their amusement. For example, you can tell your coworkers that the light from your monitor is burning a hole in your corneas. This may be true, but no one will notice if you laugh while you say it. Or, you can inform your boss that you will not live through the project she has assigned you (to make your complaint even more acceptable, describe the mode of your impending death in all it's gory detail), and if you season your woes with a pleasant lilt to your voice, she will not feel it necessary to fire you.

Embrace your gremlins
For the past three months, I have been working on three massive data entry projects for my boss. Two of the projects are copying books of data in order to save my boss's boss money by not buying the electronic copies from the people who compiled the books in the first place. I have learned through this process of time-altering boredom to enjoy the database gremlins who visit me every day. Don't get me wrong, I don't enjoy the databases themselves. That would be creative suicide. No, I enjoy the gremlins. They have such interesting personalities. There's Fred, Ned, Gred, Jed, and Alphonso. At first, I was kind of weirded out by the giant vacuum cleaners with which they suck my soul, but now I have come to appreciate the grems for their great senses of humor. Gred likes to stick the vacuum hose up his fat nostril and suck his head inside out. It makes a great party trick. Playing with the gremlins in your head makes the day just fly by.

Take notes
Office workers are amusing creatures. They have intense emotional connections to the strangest objects. I have witnessed the extremes during my time haunting offices -- It varies from wild cursing over a paper jammed in the copier to wild elation over the arrival of purple highlighters. I understand that no one likes a paper jam and purple highlighters are admittedly very cool, but the often violent reactions they engender can be food for survival of the creative soul. You get that many people trying to work together on mostly mundane and meaningless tasks and exciting stuff is bound to happen. When it does, write it down. You'll be able to look back and laugh about it when you finally quit your day job.

Got any more ideas for day job survival?

Angsty Poetry

Every time I try to write poetry, it ends up full of middle-school angst (maybe that's why I write YA fiction...) . Here's one attempt I came across while cleaning up my computer. I don't remember when I wrote it, but it was definitely post-college even though it sounds pre-highschool. I had a lot of fun playing with the line breaks, though.


Sleeping with shoes

Look at me, I’m
Invisible.
I live in molecular purgatory.
I see you, laughing. I want to join
In the fun, but I can’t
Breathe color into my veins.
I kick and scream. I grab your arm. I plead
For you to notice and come and
Take me away.
But you don’t. Look at me, I’m
Invisible.
I delve deep into shadowed places where only
Dust bunnies live. I hide under
The bed. I sleep with the shoes
In my closet.
I watch and pray. I hold my breath. I wait
For you to notice and come and
Take me away.
But you don’t. Look at me, I’m
Invisible.
But I will change that. I will
Tattoo your name on my transparent flesh. I will
Recreate my atomic structure. I will laugh too
Loud, cry too little, and hope that someday
You’ll finally take notice and come and
Take me away.
But you won’t look at me.
I’m invisible.

Narnian at the Con

As I wrote last month, I sewed a costume for the Chronicles of Narnia Premiere. The movie was great, but I was one of only two people at the theatre who dressed up. I felt a little out of place, even though it was fun -- especially when Susan came out in my outfit.

After the movie, I didn't think I would have any more reasons to wear my Susan costume before Halloween, but last weekend, my Tri Mu buddies and I went to Con Carolinas - the local sci-fi/fantasy conference. In the midst of Klingons, Storm Troopers, Pirates, and various cloaked medieval-types I looked pretty normal dressed as a Narnian. It was a blast, wandering among nerds of all shapes, sizes, ages, and obsessions.

My friend Vikki, wore my dryad costume from the first Narnia movie. She looked beautiful and got a ton of complements because she was actually unique among the all the uniqueness. There were plenty of knights and renaissance dresses, but no other dryads.