So I applied to Clarion today. I finished editing my second story early this afternoon, paid my application fee, proof-read my essay, and did it. It was absurdly stressful.
I’m not anxious about getting in–I assume I won’t, and even if I do I’m still not sure I could go because of the expense and the very narrow window they give you to come up with tuition. This wasn’t about getting in. It was about applying, because applying was something I’ve wanted to do for years.
Getting into Clarion is a long-term goal. It’s on my five-year list. My short-term goal was getting a couple of stories together that I believe are my best work, making them as good as I can get them, and clicking the damn button.
So. That’s done then.
I’m going to go eat a steak, open a Bogle Petite Syrah, and watch Star Trek.
Thank you to all of my awesome writing friends and Twitter acquaintances who critiqued these stories and encouraged me to do this. You guys are the best.
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February 16th, 2010 Posted 2:04 am
Matt wrote an excellent post on why StarShipSofa deserves a Hugo nomination. Go read it. Please. :)
I keep starting blog posts and then discarding them. I can’t seem to find the right way to talk about what’s going on.
January was quite a ride–thrilling, exhilarating, inspiring. February is much the same, except that it just dawned on me that I can’t see the track ahead. I thought I was boarding the Jungle Cruise, full of sights and sounds and laughs, and found myself on Space Mountain instead. It’s dark in here, and I’m pulling some serious Gs, but there are lots of twinkly stars and day-glo asteroids to look at*, and the comforting presence of someone who has been on this ride before and knows we’re not going to die. I’m just living in the moment, not knowing whether I’m about to turn or climb or dive, and taking whatever comes next in stride as best I can.
Which is my oblique way of saying that things are changing.
Honest to Crom, I work all the time now. After the day job I intern for the podcast, I read slush for a magazine, and I’m doing some other unrelated stuff for an editor, which it’s easiest for me to think of as another internship. I’ve put in almost 20 hours on those things this week, and I’ve loved every minute of it.
Well, that’s not strictly true. I haven’t loved every minute. But every minute was worth spending, every task worth doing. I have asked for all of it, and when I’m done I ask for more, so I do not get to complain. I am human, and sometimes I get tired, sometimes I wish I were working on something of my own, but I’m starting to find a balance there.
Other things are changing, too. I started working from home for the day job, and that meant making some changes to the household structure and also to my day. It became more important than ever that I get out to the gym and use my body, because I now sit at one desk for eight hours, and then go to another room and sit at a different desk for four more. That didn’t strike me as healthy, so I stuck the gym in between.
Another side effect is that alcohol is much less a part of my life than it was. Some of the stuff I’m doing requires intense focus, and ultimately it’s someone else’s name and reputation at stake, so there is no room for carelessness. It’s one thing to sit down with a glass of wine and edit my own stuff, or try to bang out some new words, but I can’t do that when the product is for someone else.
I am healthier and happier, and have a lot more energy than I did a couple of months ago. I laugh a lot these days. And with all the intensity of my commitments I find that my time off matters more, and the time I do spend on my own projects is more focused. That time has become minimal, though, and most of the time I don’t miss it.
That part is honestly a little bit alarming.
Someone recently commended me on “taking full advantage of an opportunity,” and cited his own experience with volunteering and where it led for him. For a moment I was taken aback and felt misunderstood–the words “taking advantage” really hit me hard, because there can be a negative connotation to that. I don’t want to take advantage of anybody.
I did not take any of this on with an outcome in mind. I saw it all as an opportunity, yes, but an opportunity to help. The happiest, most fulfilled times of my life I have spent in a support role, supporting the success of someone I deeply respected and truly believed in. I’m lucky10 enough to find myself in that position again now.
It only took me a moment to realize that wasn’t at all what the guy meant, and then also realize that it’s not actually a bad thing to look at it in terms of what I’m getting out of it all, or where it could lead. It’s not particularly comfortable for me, but thinking about it doesn’t make me a bad person.
In the 90s (and probably still today) in the programming world there was a process by which a novice programmer (or Linux user) became proficient. They would cut themselves off from the world for a time, and do nothing but eat, sleep and breathe the new language or operating system. After a little while they would emerge changed, the process complete, the goal accomplished–they were a full-fledged wizard. In the Hacker’s Dictionary this is known as the “larval stage.”
I think that’s what I’ve done. In raising my hand for these assignments I effectively went larval. The metaphor doesn’t include the pupa stage, which to me feels more accurate. I’m in my chrysalis of commitments and words.
I’m morphing in here. My priorities are changing. I went in a writer–but I’m beginning to suspect that in time I may emerge as something completely different, something that I never even knew I wanted to be.
* I have not been on the rebooted version of Space Mountain. This is how it was in its first incarnation.
It’s only been 19 days since I started slushing for a Publication Which Shall Not Be Named. I have not seen the level of dreck that I had been led to believe slush piles are full of – what I see is a lot of mediocrity, and I certainly recognize my own work as being in good company at that level. There is much to be said about the content and technique I see, but today I want to talk about the math.
In those 19 days (I started January 3,) I have read 133 stories. Of those, I have recommended about 20 to the editor, though I deeply loved only three of them.
Of those 20, Editor has requested one rewrite – one of my three favorites, I was gratified to know – and accepted none.
None.
Sounds bad, doesn’t it? Guess what: it’s worse.
That’s just the part of the slush that I see. Not the part that Editor reads while I’m busy with my day job, or the part that other slushers are reading. I dropped Editor a line early this morning to see if I could get some real numbers.
Editor has actually received 460+ stories in the past 21 days, and has accepted none of them.
That, my friends, is what we’re up against.
Those three that I loved kind of plague me. One of them came in last night, and I pushed it to Editor full of hope for that author, because I thought it was a beautifully written story that deserves readers. I was disappointed when it was rejected. I hope that someone else will see in it what I saw, and print it.
This information has been messing with me, I’ll admit. One second I’m overwhelmed, knowing how far I have to go before I could possibly attain the level of skill and originality that is required to get picked off the slush pile. The next second I’m ready to go wage war against mediocrity in my own writing.
The odds against us are just staggering. What lengths are we willing to go? How hard are we willing to work?
How bad, exactly, do we want it?
Neglecting the blog again, because life is changing swiftly, and if I say that something is one way today it may be completely different tomorrow, so it seems like I should mostly just shut up for a while. It is all weird and wonderful, though, which is exactly how I prefer life to be.
A couple of updates are in order, though.
Clarion application update: I finally finished a draft and am in Deep Editing mode on “And If They Have Not Died, They Are Living Still.” I have my crits back on “Habitat” and know how I’m going to change it, and I think it will not take long to fix. It’s TALS that is the time sink. This is because it is the most sophisticated story I’ve ever attempted, which may not be saying much, of course. I’m muddling along, trying to make it work the way I think it should. I have no idea whether I’ll succeed. Adam is waving his red pen at me from across the miles, which helps. At least I know I have backup.
Slushery: Wow. Learning a lot. Considering my own reasons for rejecting stories makes it easy to see why others are rejecting mine. The biggest thing I’ve learned so far to look for is tension, a reason to move on to the next paragraph or turn the page. I’d say at least half the stories I see simply lack tension.
Podcast: Have you been listening? The interview with Paolo Bacigalupi that aired on Monday was amazing. If you haven’t checked it out yet, here’s what you’ve missed (still available, forever and always, at the Tor.com site):
Episode 1: Zombie, Video Games, and the End of the World! Guest: Chet Faliszek
Episode 2: Bacigalupilooza! Guest: Paolo Bacigalupi
Upcoming episodes:
Monday January 18, 2010: Episode 3: Robots! War Machines! Robolobsters!
Guest: P.W. Singer
Monday January 25, 2010: Episode 4: Comics, Romance and Mermen
Guest: Marjorie M. Liu
Monday February 1, 2010: Episode 5: Untitled
Guest: Brian Dunning of Skeptoid
Episode 6 is Still a Secret, because the guest hasn’t been confirmed yet, but if they get who they plan to get, the Podtern will squee.
Life: This weekend brings the teenager’s birthday party, recompense to the wee one for putting her through a terribly boring weekend two weeks ago, and yard clean-up in anticipation of El Nino, which is supposed to kick California’s ass over the next three weeks. And I *hope* some recording, slushing, editing, general minioning, and who knows, maybe watch a movie or play a video game, but I’m not holding my breath. Family first, commitments second, creative outlet third, R&R last.
Life just turns on a dime sometimes. And really, it’s all very weird. And very wonderful indeed.
The dog woke me up at 6:00 this morning to the most amazing sunrise. It wasn’t a sunrise limited to the horizon – it was everywhere, like the very air I was breathing was diffused pink and gold light. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.
The whole day was like that – light suspended in air. I took this picture around 5:00 p.m. outside my house:
(Click here for a larger version.)
On a day like that it’s easy to write about fairy tales and magic.
I learned earlier this evening that the man I learned about fairy tales and magic from is coming to Santa Barbara next month. I will finally get to see and hear Neil Gaiman speak, and if I’m lucky, meet him. Needless to say I had ordered my ticket within about 30 seconds of getting the news.
As one friend noted just now, the number of good things happening is really getting unreal. You know what, though? I’ll take it. And I’ll try to take good care of all of it, and not take any of it for granted.
It occurred to me today that I may be deeply dense when it comes to certain things.
I think of myself as utterly forgettable. Yes, even with pink hair and the nearly super-human ability to make an ass of myself at the worst possible moment.
And I think that if people I don’t know well are nice to me it’s because they are exceptionally kind and tolerant people. I think very highly of them for it. I consider them polite, poised, and confident, and judge them as having conducted themselves with inscrutable etiquette in the face of my opinions/jokes/small talk/questions. I assume that once we’ve parted they either dismiss me with an indulgent chuckle or forget about me entirely. I am not hurt by this idea. Usually I just hope that I haven’t come across as obnoxious and that they don’t actively dislike me.
Maybe I hope that I’m forgettable.
I remember them because they made an impact, but I assume they forget me. Clearly there is something wrong with my thinking.
I’m nice to people I meet, too – sometimes because I’m being polite, but I generally don’t talk to anyone for an hour without thinking they are interesting and/or awesome.
It just doesn’t occur to me that they may be talking to me for an hour because they think I’m interesting and/or awesome.
I seem to need to be beaten over the head before that occurs to me, sometimes for months, and when it finally does I am utterly astonished, both that it could be true and that I didn’t think of it before. It wasn’t just a nice thing to say, the thing that person said to me, they actually meant it.
I really try to avoid this kind of post on the blog these days, but this was such a revelation, and I thought someone else out there might relate to it.
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January 6th, 2010 Posted 1:37 am
It is January 5, a mere five days into 2010, and last night I had to put together a Book of Win to record all of the Awesome that is happening in my life right now.
In addition to the Podtern gig*, I also picked up a Slusher** gig yesterday. I think you could hear me squee as far away as Oregon.
I really wasn’t expecting to add anything to the Book of Win today – I mean, who’s that lucky? And then I got an email from Tony C. Smith, Sofa Commander, with a request for a narration. I cannot tell you good people how excited I am about reading this story. I mean, this is just… holy crow, it is going to be SO fun to read. I can’t wait for the weekend so I can dive into this.
Even the day job didn’t suck today.
As I asked on Twitter yesterday… what should I wish for next?***
* Just WAIT until you hear Episode 2. It’s even better than Ep. 1. The interview is AMAZING.
** For the uninitiated, this means that I read unsolicited submissions (the “slush”) for a periodical publication and pass on the things I think Most High Editor might like. It is wonderful experience for an aspiring writer, and another opportunity to support an awesome project.
*** Bearing in mind the Monkey’s Paw**** Rule: any immodest wish will backfire in the more horrifying possible manner. The trick is to keep ‘em within reach.
**** This was the first horror story I ever read.
***** Just kidding. I just liked the twinkly effect of the asterisks.
Today the Geek’s Guide to the Galaxy podcast debuts over on Tor.com, featuring John Joseph Adams and David Barr Kirtley. In the first episode they cover post-apocalyptic video games and fiction, and interview Chet Faliszek, lead writer on the Left 4 Dead games.
John emailed me yesterday to let me know that I would be credited as the “podtern,” which is a wonderful title and means I don’t have to feel weird about talking about it directly here. Yay!
The most immediate result of all of this for me personally, apart from the satisfaction I get out of helping out on something awesome, is that after listening to the podcast a few times I downloaded DOSBox so I could play Wasteland. :)
Congratulations to John, David, and everyone at Tor.com on their launch!
In the continued spirit of Booklife by Jeff VanderMeer, I put together my Short-term Goals. I had already started this process back in November, when I hit the Reset button by going to WFC, and I’ve been grooming them ever since.
They will change as things come up. But here we are in the first week of the year, and this is what I’ve got. I’ve organized them in four-month trimesters, ending on October 31 (when I will be at WFC once again!) Here are my goals for November 1, 2009 – February 28, 2010:
General
Increase number of active submissions to 8 by the end of the year (ending October 31, 2010. Now an even neater trick, given that we’re starting from 0.)
Get a mentor
Subscribe to RoF and Weird Tales; renew Locus Subscription
Blog at least once a week on topics germane
Read everything I got at WFC2009 before WFC2010
November 1, 2009 – March 1, 2010
Register for WFC2010 – done 11/09
Apply to Clarion
Sub Habitat to critters – Adam, John, Matt x, Wendy x, and Robin x
Complete TALS – list of problems made, editing begun
Sub TALS to critters
Revise Habitat per suggestions
Revise TALS per suggestions
Write ‘what I hope to accomplish at Clarion’ essay – 0 draft complete, draft 1 begun, draft 2 complete, proof-read and finalize
Complete Scholarship application
Complete Clarion application
Complete and submit TALS
TALS – find market and submit
Complete and submit SAG
- Complete first draft
- Revise draft
- Critique
- Revise for final draft
- Find market and submit
Read Booklife – completed 12/13/09
Read Self-Editing for Fiction Writers
Complete first draft of Sirens
- Research
- Plug existing scenes into Storybook
- Write the rest of the book
Make trunk stories available as MP3s
- Devotions
- Proxy
- Sweetwater Kill
Accept and complete all SFWA tasks
Accept and complete all SSS tasks
Accept and complete all show notes for Unnamed Podcast
- ep. 1
- ep. 2
- ep. 3
Accept and complete all critique requests
- John – complete 12/15/09
- Matt – complete 12/17/09
- Wendy – OWED
So, how about you? What are your goals?
