One of my goals for this year was to take a social media retreat for one week a month. Today is my first day back from my first retreat and I have to say, it was fabulous. I missed my friends on social media, Twitter especially, but holy crap you would not believe the difference it made in my productivity and, more importantly, my focus.

I thought that I would see an increase in my productivity because I wouldn’t be spending time reading, posting and surfing social media, and I was right. What I hadn’t counted on was how much more focused that time would be. Since none of my attention or thought process was going into thinking about social media or the news from social media or anything like that, I was so focused. I’ve tried to multitask less over the past few years because I feel like I’m working harder and longer and getting less done. I’ve read the studies, I am passingly familiar with the debates about whether multitasking is good or bad for us. I don’t have any big answers but I do know that, for me, single-tasking is better. I can do more, faster and better if I focus on one thing at a time than if I have to keep shifting my attention from thing to thing. I hadn’t realised how many of my resources (emotional, creative and just straight-up attentive) were being used by social media even when I wasn’t actively on those websites. It was astounding.

Don’t get me wrong, I still love Twitter and I’m not leaving it, but I expect to spend less time there than I have been. In fact, I’m thinking of expanding my social media retreat to two weeks a month. That’s right. I’d be off social media for 50% of the time. We’ll see. I’m not making any changes just yet, but it’s something I’m thinking of, for sure. If you were intrigued by my social media retreat and considered trying it for yourself I definitely recommend it.

On a pseudo-related note I am participating in A Month of Letters again this year. A Month of Letters, or LetterMo, is the brain child of Mary Robinette Kowal. In 2010 she took a month off the internet (not just social media) and invited people to write her via snail mail if they wanted. She was surprised by the number of people who did, and that inspired LetterMo. The challenge at the heart of LetterMo is this:

1. In the month of February, mail at least one item through the post every day it runs. Write a postcard, a letter, send a picture, or a cutting from a newspaper, or a fabric swatch.
2. Write back to everyone who writes to you. This can count as one of your mailed items.

I participated in A Month of Letters last year and I found it to be extremely rewarding (blog entry about it here: A Month of Letters). In part it’s about the same thing as my social media retreats — slowing down and focusing on one thing (or person) at a time. Plus it gives me an excuse to buy pretty new paper from my favourite stationary store.

If you are doing A Month of Letters I go by the shockingly creative handle of Rhonda over there and I would welcome your friend request (though I won’t actually use the website a whole lot). Also, whether you are participating or not, if you would like for me to write you during the month of February I would be very happy to do that Send me your snail mail address whatever way you feel comfortable with (reply here, message on the Month of Letters site or via email at rhonda@jofigure.com) and I will send you something in February. It may be as small as a postcard or as long as a multi-page letter, depending on how many addresses I receive and how talkative I’m feeling when I sit down to write, but I will mail you something. Also, while I’d like to think it goes without saying, just for the record, I will never give away or sell your address.

<3

I’d meant to spend some time this afternoon working on a blog post that was looking back at the year, at what I’d accomplished, what goals I had achieved and which I hadn’t, that sort of thing. But then, life got in the way. Again.

We had to take our cat, Indiana to the kitty emergency room. Again. I think today’s trip was the fifth we’ve made to the EVEC with him. Five. Five exhausting, stressful, traumatic and expensive trips to the animal hospital in about as many weeks. It is unfun and complicated by the fact we don’t own a car so all these trips are made via cab or bus. It’s been frustrating and, did I mention stressful? And I have begun to feel pretty sorry for, not just Indy, but us, too. When I think about it, though, we are pretty lucky, even if it doesn’t feel like it.

It was four hours tonight between the time we left our home with Indiana and the time we arrived back home again. Four hours. Three of which were spent in the waiting room at the Edmonton Veterinarian’s Emergency Clinic. During those three hours I watched three families leave with tear-streaked cheeks and empty animal carriers. Three families who were going to be missing a furry member. And that is not counting the people who were leaving living animals behind for treatment or observation.

Sadly we have been spending a fair amount of time at the Veterinarian’s Emergency Clinic so I know that this was an especially busy and sad period for them, but still, we’re lucky. We still have Indy with us. What’s more, we’re lucky that the Edmonton Veterinarian’s Emergency Clinic exists, and that there are people who are willing to work there. I would not be. I couldn’t do it. They are not like an ordinary veterinarian who sees our pets for check-ups and shots from 9-5. The people who work at this clinic only see animals when they are in crisis. When there is an emergency. And they are open 24/7 365 days a year. That is awesome. They are awesome.

So, I’m not writing a blog today looking back on a year of writing and life, but about a clinic staffed by awesome people. They have saved Indy’s life a couple times already and while I would very much like to never have to see them again, I feel a whole lot better knowing that they are there just in case we need them. Again. I couldn’t do what they do, but I’m so very glad that they can.

<3

Like most everyone I know, I spent a good part of yesterday watching the news, crying and feeling useless. The massacre at Sandy Hook is crushing. It, and the reactions to it that I saw on my social media feeds is what has inspired me to write this blog, but I’m not going to talk about it specifically. I want to speak in generalities because the topic I’m going to address is not specific to Sandy Hook and I don’t want to make it about that one specific incident.

“She’s so sick! I hope she burns in hell!”

“What kind of sick bastard could do that? Death is too good for him!”

These are some of the reactions I notice from people each time something tragic happens that can be blamed on a person. Those events always involve hurting other people often in large numbers or in especially brutal ways. I get it. When someone does something horrible, especially something that hurts other people, we hurt for them. It angers us and we want to vent that anger. What’s more we don’t understand it and that scares us. Or, it does me anyway. But here’s the thing… if someone is sick, can they truly be blamed for the results of that sickness?

If you believe in evil and you can dismiss a person and thus their actions as being evil, that is one thing, you might very well want them to burn in hell or think death is too easy a fate for them. However, if you believe someone is sick then how fair is it to blame them for things their illness causes them to do? No really, this is not a rhetorical question, I really want to know what you think because I’m still struggling with the answer myself.

No one would blame a person with a physical ailment for things that ailment causes, so how different should it be for people with mental diseases? People don’t chose to be sick. The same way no one chooses to become diabetic  no one wakes up one morning and goes “You know what I’d like? I think I’d really like to suffer from paranoid delusions.”

To be fair, multiple sclerosis (just picking a random physical ailment here) has never, as far as I know, caused anyone to shoot another person. Or stab them. Or kidnap them. Or rape them. Hurting other people seems to mostly belong to the domain of mental illness, but still, if we are willing to accept that mental illness is an illness don’t we then have to accept that ill people can’t be held to the same standard as well people? Shouldn’t that increase our empathy for them, not decrease it?

It’s freaking tough though because who wants to feel empathy for someone who has done horrible things, whether or not we believe they are fully responsible for their actions? Um, not me. But, when I think about it for long enough, part of me does.

Part of me, a big part, is still filled with anger, confusion, fear and hate, but part of me, a small part, really does feel bad for the perpetrator of these sorts of things. What we see is the explosion that happens once a long fuse has burned down, we don’t usually see the struggling, the pain and the unhappiness the perpetrators have dealt with because of their illness often for years and years.

I was hoping that in writing this blog I would come to some clearer answers about how I feel about these questions about empathy, culpability, responsibility and tragedy, but I haven’t. I’m hitting ‘Post’ on it even more conflicted than I was when I started. I do know one thing though, the world has more than enough anger and hatred in it, so in the future, when horrible things like what occurred at Sandy Hook Elementary school happen again I am going to try to respond, not negatively toward the perpetrator, but positively toward the victims. How about you?

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’ To this day, especially in times of ‘disaster,’ I remember my mother’s words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world.”

~ Fred Rogers

Last year I wrote a letter to Santa on my blog and I thought it was a lot of fun, so have decided to make it an annual tradition. I am not writing this to request anyone buy these items for me, this isn’t that sort of wishlist. It’s just meant to be fun.

Dear Santa,

This year has sucked. Not everything about it, of course, but overall it’s been pretty tough so surely I can be forgiven for the times I wasn’t ‘good’? I mean, even when I was bad it was usually only to myself. That ought to count for something, right? With that in mind, this year for Giftmas I would like the following:

• Pretty much any of the cameras from the Lomography website. Really. I’d be happy with any of them. That being said though, I do especially have my eye on the Diana Baby 110 camera with the 24mm lens. So far I haven’t been able to get my IR filter to play nicely with my DSLR so if you were to couple that with some IR film I would think you were the most awesomest bearded dude evar.
• It’s really quite scandalous that as the publisher of an e-zine I don’t have an e-reader yet. That, coupled with my insomnia has inspired me to add a Kobo Glo to my wishlist. This, despite the missing w on the word glow. I picked the Kobo because it is only an e-reader. It’s not a camera, browser, game console, etc. etc. I don’t want to be more plugged in to online or play more games, I just want to be able to read a book in bed without waking up Jo.
• I kinda want to spit in a test tube. No, really.
• As you know, Santa, I am in the process of refinishing our dining room table which is a family heirloom. I would very much like to find chairs that fit it. Since we’re using an unusual color of stain I will give bonus points if the chairs are unstained, so I don’t have to sand them before I stain them to match the table. Not that I’m lazy or anything you understand…
• Lastly, Santa, do you remember last year when I asked you for “some baseboards and riser thingers for my bathroom and kitchen. If we don’t finish them up soon they are just going to blend into the background and we’ll never get them done.” Well I could still use those baseboards and riser thingers.

Thank you Santa.

Love,

Rhonda

I’ll leave you with one of my favourite performers performing one of my favourite Christmas songs ever (even if it does make me cry these days):

<3

See this little guy? It might be difficult to tell because of all the snow, but this is a statue of a beaver. He’s sitting on a bench and holding a hockey stick (he used to have a mug in his other hand but it vanished about a year ago). This little dude lives just down the street from me and I have very warm feelings toward him. I pat him on the nose every time I walk by and I smile at the sound that resonates through his hollow body.

What you can’t see in this image is that people have obviously been letting their dogs pee on his bench. The snow beside him is yellow and gross and makes me sad.

Don’t pee on other people’s art.

You shouldn’t do it, you shouldn’t let your dog do it.

I mean that literally as well as figuratively.

Even if it’s something you don’t personally feel connected to, something that doesn’t move you at all, you still shouldn’t piss on it. Someone put thought, energy and emotion into it. It may not matter to you, but it matters to them.

I had a rule, back when Niteblade used to do book reviews and that rule was ‘If you can’t find anything to like in a story, don’t review it’. Bad reviews are okay but tearing someone’s work to pieces just because you can is not. That’s pretty simple, pretty black and white. Sadly, there are so many different shades of grey involved as well.

For example, how many times have we all seen someone post something on social media (or elsewhere) that they think is amazing, that they have spent time and energy creating and the first comment is ‘Lawlz, you have too much time on your hands’. How dismissive. How rude. How painful.

How easy to do.

It’s ironic, perhaps, that I’d been planning to make this blog entry for a couple weeks now but hadn’t gotten around to it and then today I pissed on someone’s art.

I didn’t really mean to. It was an unthinking thing.

A friend on social media put out a call for people to ‘Like’ one of their friend’s photographs so they could win a contest of some sort. I ‘liked’ the photo and then commented on my friend’s wall about the three things I really liked about the picture and… the one I didn’t. The person in the photograph saw my comment and was hurt by it. She is not (as far as I know) a professional artist, not a pro photographer or model used to having her work critiqued. She is just a lady who modeled for a photograph (she may also have taken it, I’m not sure) and who missed the positives I said about the picture and focused on the negative.

It’s understandable. There is no reason she should have built up a thick skin to these sorts of things. She probably only expected friends and family to see the picture and find all the good in it and it was a photograph to which she had a strong emotional connection to.

*sigh*

I feel bad. I should know better. I really should. I considered before I made my comment whether I ought to share my opinion and decided to because I thought ‘It’s an entry in a contest in a public arena. Surely that means it’s okay for me to share my thoughts, especially since they are mostly positive’ but you know what? Not so much. I assumed a lot by deciding to post what I did, and that’s not fair. I pissed all over that lady’s art.

NAME REDACTED, if you happen to see this, I am sorry. It really is a beautiful photograph and beyond that I ought to have kept my opinion about it to myself.

It’s a tricky thing, I think, to find the balance between discussing art and pissing on it. I’m obviously still working on getting it right.

What about you? Do you have any sort of rules or tools you use to gauge when it’s better to hold your tongue?

(Photograph courtesy of  Amanda Cornell)

ETA: I took the name of the person off my blog in response to her request in my comments.

My mom has been diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer. She is trying to stay positive and so am I but my success varies from moment to moment. Sometimes I do very well, but I can fall apart in the blink of an eye. That means my blogging, writing, emailing etc. may be sporadic and random for a little while. I’ll also be canceling my trip to the World Fantasy Convention. I know you’ll understand.

Kindness is one thing that seems to make me crumble right now, so if I take a very long time to reply to your comments, it’s a safe bet that’s why.

Also, while I am an atheist my mother is not. If you are someone who believes in prayer I’m sure she would very much like to be included in yours.

This is tough.

Fuck cancer.

I bet you’ve seen these pictures already:

A combination of three documents provided by the Centre de Estudios Borjanos on August 22, 2012 shows the original version of the painting Ecce Homo (L) by 19th-century painter Elias Garcia Martinez, the deteriorated version (C) and the restored version by an elderly woman in Spain. AFP PHOTO/ CENTRO DE ESTUDIOS BORJANOS
(Text and image from The Toronto Sun)

In case you hadn’t seen them before, this is a painting of Jesus that is over a century old. It became water damaged and some lady decided to restore it. The result of her efforts can be seen in that last picture there — it’s ruined. I’m sure that the woman who wanted to restore the painting had good intentions, that is evidenced by the fact she turned herself in once she realised (far, far too late) that she wasn’t making the painting better, but the fact is it’s ruined.

This painting was created 102 years ago by a man named Elias Garcia Martinez. It is his art. His creation. And now it’s been destroyed. I find that incredibly sad. The lady who attempted to restore Ecce Homo wasn’t working on a reproduction or a copy but on the original painting. The original painting. And it is very likely damaged beyond recovery.

If someone did that to my art, no matter how wonderful their intentions might be, I would be devastated.

I really wanted to submit something to the Masked Mosaics anthology. I first learned about the anthology from my friend Beth. She writes a fair bit of superhero stuff, but I’d never written a superhero story in my life. It sounded like a fun challenge so I got to work.

By ‘got to work’ I mean I went through all my story idea notes, post-its and such to see if there was anything there I could put a superhero spin on. There wasn’t. So I started brainstorming. Eventually I came up with an idea and wrote a first draft. A very ugly first draft. I let it sit a while, then revised it. Something was wrong but I couldn’t figure out what. So I sent it to Beth to critique. She helped me identify what (at least a few) of the problems were and I started revising again.

The deadline for submissions was getting closer and closer, and my progress on the revisions was getting slower and slower.

Usually when a story fights me as much as that one was I take it as a sign I need to let it rest a while longer and come back to it with a fresh mindset, but I couldn’t do that, I had a deadline!

To cut a long story into a shorter one, three days before the deadline I decided to let the story I’d been working on rest and to write something new for the anthology. Something that would fight me less. Something short.

While taking a walk with Jo I was sorting through ideas, trying to come up with something that would be a good story, and short enough I could get it done in just a few days. He asked what I was thinking so hard about and we started talking. We brainstormed ideas back and forth until we settled on a concept and plot I thought would really work. There was just one problem. Jo had contributed just as much as I had to the idea’s development. It would feel wrong if I took all the credit for it.

So I suggested that we write it together and share a byline.

And then the magic happened.

In less than a day and a half we went from rough concept and story idea, to a polished short story that I’m super proud of. I’m a fairly good writer, and Jo is an awesome one (You can read his short story The Sickening Thud at the End of it All by clicking that pretty link right there. Go ahead. I’ll wait. You won’t be sorry) but when we worked together we created a story that is, I think, better than anything either of us could have written on our own.

Working with Jo brought out the best in me. I wanted to make each word perfect and wonderful because I wanted to show off for him. And the parts of the storytelling where I’m the weakest? Well, those are areas he’s strong in so he was able to carry me a little. And, I’d like to think, the opposite is true as well. We complement one another well, in writing as in life. How awesome is that?

The story, sadly, though fantastic (even if I do say so myself), earned us a (very awesome, personal) rejection letter from editors Camille Alexa and Claude Lalumière, but I’ve since sent it off elsewhere and I’m optimistic it will find a good home in time.

In the meantime, Jo and I are planning on working with one another more in the future and I am using what I learned working on that story to make all my future solo work better. And someday I’ll even go back to the original superhero story I’d been working on and figure out what’s wrong with it and how to fix it.

Have you ever worked in a collaboration like this and had lightning strike, or magic happen? I’ve done quite a few collabs in the past (I love them.) but never anything quite as fulfilling as this one. I’m curious to see how rare it is in other people’s experiences.

I’ve also had some disasterous collaborations LOL but that’s a subject for another day, eh?

Dear ________,

I’m struggling a bit this week. At first it felt like the beginnings of a slip into depression, but then I figured it out. I’m addicted to exercise.

Don’t get me wrong. I still don’t like exercise, but I’ve gotten to the point that if I don’t do it I’m groggy and unfocused and just plain bleh until I do. Unfortunately it took me until yesterday to figure that out so my week was not nearly as productive as it should have been, and the productivity I did manage to pull off was largely unrelated to my Camp NaNoWriMo project.

Sadly, I also have a lot of commitments this weekend that are going to keep me from being able to play catch up. In fact, they are pretty much guaranteed to make me fall further behind LOL

I’m not giving up though. I’m going to try to sneak some words in this morning before my sister comes over and I’ll steal time away to write whenever I can this weekend too. I expect by Monday I’ll still be significantly behind where I’m supposed to be for Camp NaNo but I’ll keep chugging along. Hey, if I have to I can ‘go to camp’ again in August to finish this up. Every word on the page is a victory, right? Just, ya know, a really small one

And the week hasn’t been all bad by any means. I finished the first draft of a short story (if you call 8,000 words short, I’m tempted not to LOL) and had one of my zombie poems published. So, ya know, not all bad. Not all bad at all

Love,

Rhonda

Warning: This post doesn’t have anything at all to do with writing. I have Danica’s permission to share this story about her.

This is Danica. This isn’t the most flattering photograph I have of her, but she looks angry in it, and that makes it the most appropriate photograph for this post.

Thursday was Dani’s track and field day. This is ungood for a few reasons

- Like her mother, Danica isn’t much into sports. That includes track and field.
- Dani’s birthday is in October, which means she has to compete against kids a grade higher than her
- We, as a family, haven’t really had a very active lifestyle until recently which means we’re all somewhat out of shape.

So, Dani was not looking forward to track and field day, but, like a champ, she sucked it up and was going to make the best of it. Still, she did call me from the track and field day to complain about the weather, and then again in the afternoon to tell me that the event had been canceled on account of snow (gotta love springtime in Edmonton, right?) and would be continued on Friday.

Then she came home and wanted to talk to me. There were tears in her eyes.

She cried as she told me about how the people who were measuring and raking for the triple jump event had made fun of her performance.

*sigh*

I was furious. Mean people suck. And people being mean to my kid, well, they suck even more than most.***

One of the worst parts of the whole situation was that she would have to go back to school the next day (Friday) and compete in two more events.

Could I force her to do that? Turns out the answer is no.

I know we can’t shelter her from everything, but I asked myself, what would she learn from going to the track meet that would make it worth the anxiety she’d feel and the potential for having to deal with insensitive people. In the end I couldn’t see any valuable lesson to be learned other than ‘sometimes you have to do stuff that sucks’. I decided she’d done that when she’d participated in the track meet on Thursday, I couldn’t force her to go back on Friday.

Jo and I discussed it and we agreed. We decided that if Danica asked to stay home on Friday we’d let her. She did, and we did.

My point?

“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”
~Plato

It’s something I sometimes struggle with** and maybe this was life’s way of reminding me, so I thought I might help spread the word, in case I’m not the only one who could use it.

~*~

On a sideways-related note*, Danica has decided to get into better shape and so she and I have commited to doing the Couch to 5k program starting today. Monday, Wednesday and Friday will be our running days. We know it’s really going to suck at the start, but we’re determined to stick to it.

That’s one reason why I’m making this blog post, actually. This is going to be hard. Super hard. I would have a difficult enough time keeping myself motivated to do this. Now, not only am I going to have to push myself to do this, I’m also going to have to push Danica.

Did I mention that it’s going to be tough?

Yeah. So I’m hoping by sharing this it will not only provide a little accountability, it will also give me a whole bunch of people who will be able to remind me that I’m doing the right thing. The right thing for myself and for my daughter.

Yeah. I’m definitely going to need that.

*The kids at the track meet were just the proverbial final straw, not the sole motivation for this. It had been a long time in the making.

**As evidenced, I suppose, by the fact that when I originally wrote this post I referred to the children who mocked Danica as jerks. Not very kind there, Rhonda, not very kind at all.

***It could be that those kids are actually good people who are usually very nice. It could be that they didn’t know she could hear them. But what they said was mean, and she could hear them so whether they know it or not, they really hurt her feelings. I grant you that there is a huge difference between intentional and unintentional meanness, but when I’m in ‘protective mother’ mode I don’t clearly see subtleties like that.