Today, I did something that I had been putting off for a while now. It was something I thought maybe I'd do one day, but didn't know if I was quite ready to make the commitment. No, it wasn't redoing the outline for my novel (which has been screaming to me for the past few days). No, it wasn't rearranging my closet (which, believe me, also reeeeeaaaalllly needs to be done sooner than later). So, what was it?
I joined Facebook.
Now, to most people, this very well may seem like an insignificant thing, like cleaning out the lint trap each time you use the clothes dryer, or buckling your seat belt when you get into your car--a no-brainer--but for me, this was taking a plunge. There were decisions to be made: what photo to put up, how much info to include in my profile, things like that. As for the photo, well, I haven't liked photos of myself lately (I'm in the middle of a struggle to get in better shape--the word "diet" is off-limits), so how to decide to visually represent myself to people coming across my profile who may not have seen me for 20-plus years? I finally settled on one that I'm okay with, but still wish it was better. I haven't put any detailed info on there yet (how to decide what I want to convey will take a while, I'm sure), but what has sent me into a tizzy is trying to find people and "friending" them. So, I may want to see what the person who used to fall asleep in ninth-grade Earth Science is up to these days, but I can't view their profile unless I make a request to be added to their "Friends" list. Which means I can be rejected. Which is not good for my ego (there's a reason I write books for teenagers).
Also, I am the kind of person who, only when I got to college, did I grudgingly give up on the idea of trying to keep in touch with everyone I'd ever tried to keep in touch with, including people from summer camp and elementary school. Only, now I can try to find them again. Which means hours ahead of me trying to look up every name from my past that pops into my head. Which is a lot of names. A lot. I'm not trying to brag, I'm simply stating a fact that tons of names get stored in my brain and stay there (ask Mr. GJ), often much to my dismay. So there I was on Facebook this afternoon, finding such people as a guy I had a crush on in middle school, a guy I was inadvertently mean to in middle school (can't give any details, since I know I'll use it in a future book!), a girl I sat behind in chemistry, and people I did indeed go to summer camp with (none of my bunkmates, though--darn!). And then I typed in the name a girl whose name popped into my head because it was so distinctive, and though I think I only went to school with her for a year (maybe her family moved?) and she probably wouldn't remember me, suddenly her photo was onscreen. There she was, the same face I remembered from 30 years ago only older, and my brain almost exploded. Even as I'm typing this entry I've been intermittently checking names as I think of them.
Add to this fun-but-sometimes-mind-blowing activity the fact that decisions must be made, and I think by tomorrow I'll be on full overload. Here's the thing--my brother encouraged me to join, but he's the kind of person who would probably try to "friend" pretty much everyone he knows and not even think twice about it. I, on the other hand, find a name and mull it over, wanting to contact people I knew in high school, hoping they're over the high school "thing" and would be more tickled and curious to hear from me than repulsed. Not people I wasn't friends with at all (like people who were mean to me--yes, there were a few), but maybe people who were on the fringes of the "in" crowd (you know, that crowd I wasn't in), who I sat with in Spanish and were chatty with me in class if not outside of it. Or a few people who weren't necessarily friendly with me while we were in high school, but when I'd see them while I was home on break from college, we'd at least smile and say "hi" in recognition. If I tried to "friend" them, would they be past all the high school crap, or would they go running to their other friends and say "can you believe who just wanted to 'friend' me? Hahahahaha!" As if I wasn't anxious enough checking my email to see if the agency responded, now I get to also anxiously check to see if people have accepted my friend requests. Great.
Am I overthinking this? Probably. Am I thinking in this sort of detail about social relationships based on high school behavior even though we've hopefully all grown up from that because I'm a children's writer? I don't know...am I?
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
What I Love About Today
I love that it's 75 degrees today. In January.
I love that I didn't have to be home in front of my TV today to watch the inauguration (and that when I did watch it, I could shorten the 5 hours of coverage if I wanted to--though not by much, since I was fascinated by a large part of it, including the Carters' snub of the Clintons...cool!).
I LOOOOOOVE my DVR (or, the generic name for TiVo). LOVE IT.
I love that not only did I get goosebumps when I watched Obama get sworn in, but also when they showed Hillary Clinton getting seated. Say what you will about her, but think about it: this is a former First Lady who is about to be our Secretary of State. I may not love all her politics, but GO HILLARY! I really hope I get to see a woman elected as President in my lifetime...
I love that when I led a tour at the Museum of Tolerance this morning that I had an exceptionally diverse group of kids--Native Amerian, Russian, Korean, African-American, to name a few--and got to teach them about the importance of heritage and family stories in the "Finding Our Families, Finding Ourselves" exhibit. And that the teacher was telling me the things they were doing in class to further those studies and discussions. We have such a wonderfully rich tapestry of cultures in America...
I love that I could walk to the Post Office..because I wanted to, not because I had to. Not only do I live in a suburban area that allows a proximity to things like the post office and the grocery store, but I also get exercise while I drop off my Netflix envelopes.
I love that my car is 15 years old and has less than 96,000 miles on it.
I love being able to walk into different rooms of the house today and finding sleeping kitties spread out (you'd never know how much trouble they can get into when they're awake by looking at their adorableness when they're sleeping!).
I love that thanks to the Internet, I've been in touch with someone I went to elementary school with who is planning a reunion of sorts for the small private school we went to...and that I actually want to go! None of the insecurities (I feel old, I feel fat, I haven't done anything exciting with my life...) that made me NOT want to go to my high school reunion.
I love knowing that my husband is in the next room working from home today (even if he's watching a James Bond movie REALLY loudly!) and that I can just poke my head in there and smile and make him wonder why I'm poking my head in and just looking at him...
I love that despite a couple of things about my current critique group that I would love to be a litttle different (it takes me almost an hour to get there with no traffic, and we meet once a month, which is not great for deadline-needing me--see previous post about my Goldfish Theory), but they are incredibly intuitive, honest, and supportive. One person whose opinion I really value wrote a note that I didn't see until I got home which said "I think you've got a publishable manuscript here." Editors may not agree, but at least I'm feeling more confident about where things are going with my writing and with the writing itself. The manuscript isn't perfect yet, but it sure feels closer to being ready to send out than it ever has.
Hooray for today!
I love that I didn't have to be home in front of my TV today to watch the inauguration (and that when I did watch it, I could shorten the 5 hours of coverage if I wanted to--though not by much, since I was fascinated by a large part of it, including the Carters' snub of the Clintons...cool!).
I LOOOOOOVE my DVR (or, the generic name for TiVo). LOVE IT.
I love that not only did I get goosebumps when I watched Obama get sworn in, but also when they showed Hillary Clinton getting seated. Say what you will about her, but think about it: this is a former First Lady who is about to be our Secretary of State. I may not love all her politics, but GO HILLARY! I really hope I get to see a woman elected as President in my lifetime...
I love that when I led a tour at the Museum of Tolerance this morning that I had an exceptionally diverse group of kids--Native Amerian, Russian, Korean, African-American, to name a few--and got to teach them about the importance of heritage and family stories in the "Finding Our Families, Finding Ourselves" exhibit. And that the teacher was telling me the things they were doing in class to further those studies and discussions. We have such a wonderfully rich tapestry of cultures in America...
I love that I could walk to the Post Office..because I wanted to, not because I had to. Not only do I live in a suburban area that allows a proximity to things like the post office and the grocery store, but I also get exercise while I drop off my Netflix envelopes.
I love that my car is 15 years old and has less than 96,000 miles on it.
I love being able to walk into different rooms of the house today and finding sleeping kitties spread out (you'd never know how much trouble they can get into when they're awake by looking at their adorableness when they're sleeping!).
I love that thanks to the Internet, I've been in touch with someone I went to elementary school with who is planning a reunion of sorts for the small private school we went to...and that I actually want to go! None of the insecurities (I feel old, I feel fat, I haven't done anything exciting with my life...) that made me NOT want to go to my high school reunion.
I love knowing that my husband is in the next room working from home today (even if he's watching a James Bond movie REALLY loudly!) and that I can just poke my head in there and smile and make him wonder why I'm poking my head in and just looking at him...
I love that despite a couple of things about my current critique group that I would love to be a litttle different (it takes me almost an hour to get there with no traffic, and we meet once a month, which is not great for deadline-needing me--see previous post about my Goldfish Theory), but they are incredibly intuitive, honest, and supportive. One person whose opinion I really value wrote a note that I didn't see until I got home which said "I think you've got a publishable manuscript here." Editors may not agree, but at least I'm feeling more confident about where things are going with my writing and with the writing itself. The manuscript isn't perfect yet, but it sure feels closer to being ready to send out than it ever has.
Hooray for today!
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Three Things...
57 days...
When I look at the time gone by since I last wrote an entry, I cringe, so I'm not even going to discuss it. Well, maybe for a second. I mean, there are people who don't blog for even longer periods of time than that, but because I wanted to be able to write a blog entry every time I worked on my book, then that number represents the amount of time that I've neglected my revision (changing a word or two and adding a comma notwithstanding). And that's when the guilt sets in. In the meantime, though, I've made some forward progress, so it's time to blog--yay!
First things first: Recent productivity--combination of new stuff and reinsertion of old stuff, for a total of six pages. This was done yesterday, as I scrambled to submit to my critique group, which concretely proved why I need a critique group--because I need deadlines!! For me, time management has sort of been like a goldfish; the more room you give a goldfish, the bigger it supposedly grows, and the more time I have to do something, the more time I take (Mr. GJ was recently amazed when on vacation I took less than half the time to get ready that I usually do at home--which seems like it should be the other way around). If the only commitment I have is to myself, I don't seem to get things done. There's a lack of accountability that would be there if someone else was involved. Which I'm sure was the idea behind a little exercise we did at the Schmooze the other night, which was to break into small groups of three people or so and tell each other the writing goals we'd like to meet by the next Schmooze. This way, even if you don't end up in a group the next time with the same people, at least your goal is out there for someone (including yourself) to know about. My goal? To revise at least two chapters a month. With the mode I've been in lately, I really think that's do-able.
Which leads me to my second thing: the Schmooze. I am a recovering shy person, so at first it was extremely difficult for me to go to an event full of strangers where sometimes it seemed like everyone in the room but me was engaged in conversation. Now that I've been going to them on a fairly regular basis, there are people I recognize and say "hi" to but are not sure of their names (it's mutual), and there are a few people I know by name now, too. Sometimes even when I don't feel like the topic directly applies to me, I go anyway, if not for the social part of it than at least because maybe I'll find out about a great new website that someone mentions or something like that. If nothing else, it makes me continue to feel connected to the writing world and other writers even when I'm not particularly writing, and goodness knows I at least need that. Repeat after me: I am a writer even if I'm not published yet. I need to keep reminding myself...
My third thing: I sent a submission two days ago--WOO HOO!! Thanks to the encouragement of a couple of people at the Schmooze (see, this is why I continue to go to Schmoozes!), I submitted to an agency. A small step, but a big one for me, especially considering I've been working on novels for over 5 years now and have never sent anything out (I sent out a couple of picture books before I started novels, but I try not to think about those... *shudder*). Now I have to really get my butt in gear and crank up those revisions!
I told Mr. GJ that I felt like I wasn't quite back into the swing of things, that I felt like I was on the onramp about to get onto the freeway, but I wasn't at full speed just yet. I sure hope my car accelerates steadily--and soon!
When I look at the time gone by since I last wrote an entry, I cringe, so I'm not even going to discuss it. Well, maybe for a second. I mean, there are people who don't blog for even longer periods of time than that, but because I wanted to be able to write a blog entry every time I worked on my book, then that number represents the amount of time that I've neglected my revision (changing a word or two and adding a comma notwithstanding). And that's when the guilt sets in. In the meantime, though, I've made some forward progress, so it's time to blog--yay!
First things first: Recent productivity--combination of new stuff and reinsertion of old stuff, for a total of six pages. This was done yesterday, as I scrambled to submit to my critique group, which concretely proved why I need a critique group--because I need deadlines!! For me, time management has sort of been like a goldfish; the more room you give a goldfish, the bigger it supposedly grows, and the more time I have to do something, the more time I take (Mr. GJ was recently amazed when on vacation I took less than half the time to get ready that I usually do at home--which seems like it should be the other way around). If the only commitment I have is to myself, I don't seem to get things done. There's a lack of accountability that would be there if someone else was involved. Which I'm sure was the idea behind a little exercise we did at the Schmooze the other night, which was to break into small groups of three people or so and tell each other the writing goals we'd like to meet by the next Schmooze. This way, even if you don't end up in a group the next time with the same people, at least your goal is out there for someone (including yourself) to know about. My goal? To revise at least two chapters a month. With the mode I've been in lately, I really think that's do-able.
Which leads me to my second thing: the Schmooze. I am a recovering shy person, so at first it was extremely difficult for me to go to an event full of strangers where sometimes it seemed like everyone in the room but me was engaged in conversation. Now that I've been going to them on a fairly regular basis, there are people I recognize and say "hi" to but are not sure of their names (it's mutual), and there are a few people I know by name now, too. Sometimes even when I don't feel like the topic directly applies to me, I go anyway, if not for the social part of it than at least because maybe I'll find out about a great new website that someone mentions or something like that. If nothing else, it makes me continue to feel connected to the writing world and other writers even when I'm not particularly writing, and goodness knows I at least need that. Repeat after me: I am a writer even if I'm not published yet. I need to keep reminding myself...
My third thing: I sent a submission two days ago--WOO HOO!! Thanks to the encouragement of a couple of people at the Schmooze (see, this is why I continue to go to Schmoozes!), I submitted to an agency. A small step, but a big one for me, especially considering I've been working on novels for over 5 years now and have never sent anything out (I sent out a couple of picture books before I started novels, but I try not to think about those... *shudder*). Now I have to really get my butt in gear and crank up those revisions!
I told Mr. GJ that I felt like I wasn't quite back into the swing of things, that I felt like I was on the onramp about to get onto the freeway, but I wasn't at full speed just yet. I sure hope my car accelerates steadily--and soon!
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