On Anger

 What's tickling my ears: The Offspring-- Self Esteem


I'm a pretty mellow person.

 I don't break things, or call people names.

 I don't throw tantrums, because yes, even adults throw tantrums--I've seen many a grown man rival the Munchkin when 'upset'.

It takes a lot for me to get riled, but it hasn't always been that way.

When I was younger I always knew I'd inherited a few things from my father: My grey eyes, the inability to deal with the stupidity of most people, and a temper to rival a dictator of a third world country.

 It's possible at one time or another in my youth, we'd both been confused with Hitler when angry.

Time, education, self control, and emotional growth--or maybe just distance from my hometown-- have calmed my angry impulses, and have kept me out of the arms of anger management classes.

In fact: I hate fighting, and I hate altercations.

I'm not abusive, nor am I interested in making people feel small.

Tears are my weakness.

Not mine--others'.

They tear me apart.

But, I digress.

Even though I don't get angry often, there are times when enough becomes enough, and the mellow woman meekly recedes. The temper we spoke of earlier fights to the surface, and all those hard earned years of control strain to a breaking point.

It's days like that--like today-- when I feel gross inside.

If you've ever seen the movie Fern Gully the Last Rainforest you'll remember the antagonist was an oily, gloopy, shapeless mass of evil slithering around.

His name was Nexus, and I'm pretty sure he's renting space inside my body.

Probably not something an author looking to get herself published should be setting free on the internet, but it's who I am.

I'm a real person.

I have feelings, emotions, and plenty of issues to open a Magazine company.

I'm not usually good with sharing my feelings, and by the time I'm ready to, Nexus is redecorating my heart and soul-- and it's possible black tendrils are snaking out from around me.

What might be worse than having a nasty, oily villain co-oping my body...

Knowing even the men I've created in my worlds aren't good enough to get me free.

Have no fear. Tomorrow will be another day, Nexus will be evicted, his keys confiscated, and his mug shot hung up in the security office.

I'll be happy again, the streets will be made of gumdrops and lined with lollipop trees, and the sky will be dotted with marshmallow clouds... and men--real and fictional will no longer be on my shit list.






What do you do to combat your own Nexus?
Would love to hear.

R.S.

On the Twitterlution

Tweet! Tweet!

Awww, now isn't that cute??

For those of you who don't recognize the happy blue bird holding the 'follow me!' sign, he's the cartoonized mascot of the ever growing, ever popular, and to me at least, ever confusing Twitter.com-- or Twitter as those in 'the know' call it.

I've been trying to get a handle on all the facets of Social Media, and I'm pretty sure each of them will end up with their own WTH?! blog post.

Today's is obviously Twitter, and its status updates known universally as 'Tweets'. Now as I stated in my self-promotion post, I'm trying to get my name, and thereby my work, out 'there'. Apparently the only way to do that is by becoming not only a member of Twitter, but actually becoming a actively productive member of the 'Twitterverse'.

I get that it's similar to blogging, and to the status updates on Facebook (more on FB in a later post), but seriously, don't I spend enough time talking to myself without having to add another site and/or app on my phone?

On top of that, I currently have a whopping 10 followers, and some of those I think set it up to automatically follow me when I followed them. At least, I think that's the case. I don't really know, and I haven't actually found a helpful site to answer my questions.

Questions like: How do I get more followers, and Why doesn't anyone respond to my 'tweets'?

Of course, if I have followers I'll have to actually tweet, and that is one more responsibility heaped onto my already towering plate o' responsibilities.

Gotta love being an adult.

If anyone has any suggestions for how to go about finding my 'twitter groove' in this new and confusing world where everyone is a member of twitter including my OBGYN, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Maybe it isn't too late to get involved in the  'Twitterlution'.

Now, Go 'Follow me!'!

R.S.

On Learning the Art of Self-Promotion

I remember the first time I had to stand in front of a room full of my peers. It was kindergarten, and it was show-in-tell.

It sucked.

Embarrassment flamed through my body like it should have been a vintage race car a la Grease, and we were racing for pink slips.

I hate being in front of people, explaining something, talking about myself, or in other words, pretending to seem intelligent and interesting.

Most of the time I don't feel like I'm any of those things, and I especially never felt that way as a kid.

Now, I'm an adult, a mother, a wife, a photographer, and an author of two separate novels. One YA and one contemporary.

And I have to promote myself.

That means I have to put myself out there, stand up in front of the proverbial class and explain something, share something, and this time it's even more important and embarrassing than it was the first time all those years ago. Now it's done not just in person, but across dozens of different Social Network platforms. It's done via blog, Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, Email, LinkedIn, and others I can't even remember.

I'm not just sharing something I was given or bought. I'm sharing a part of myself. Hours of worry, sleepless nights, late dinners, and sweat. A part of my soul, my heart, my hopes and dreams, all combined into something a person could say, 'Eh, not interested. Not good enough."

 It's a terrifying prospect.

But, I have to do it, and do it well.

I don't want to push myself on people who won't be interested or will be turned off by the salesman's approach, but I don't want to be so lax nobody will take me seriously. There is such a fine line, and I'm not sure where it even begins, but I know I'll find it.

When I do, I'm going to rock that line like an Earthquake.

So where do I begin?

Any ideas? I'm open to suggestions.


R.S.

On Cloning Myself

Have you ever had one of those days where you realize you're drowning? Maybe not physically, but metaphorically?

I have.

In fact, I've had several, and many of them were this week.

Granted, it's only Tuesday, but there are twenty-four usable hours in every day, and my weeks tend to blend together. The calendar might say Tuesday, but I'm pretty sure it's really Thursday... of next week.

 I'm one of those people who need to constantly be engaged. No, not to a man-- I'm pretty sure my husband would disapprove of that hobby, but mentally. I rarely watch  television or movies because they can't hold my attention for very long, but books I can sit for hours engrossed in.

Why? Because they're engaging. I'm thinking, I'm feeling, I'm actively involved.

This is also true of my 'real' life. My husband has pointed it out--as have others who know me well-- that I tend to overextend myself. I'm not truly happy unless my proverbial plate is so full I can't see around it, and it's threatening to topple over.

How right they are.

Most of the time, this mode of living works well for me. I thrive under the ever changing responsibilities. I grin at the pace, and sleep well at night.

Not always though.

Sometimes, like this last week, the pressure gets to be too much, my heart starts to pound, my head starts to hurt, and I'm afraid the black demon locked inside me is going to escape.

It's a scary thing.

I laden myself down with new and exciting responsibilities; writing a short story, editing and polishing two novels--one YA, one contemporary, a new dog, a summer writing program, shameless self-promotion (that I truly, truly, hate), a training program that requires 90 minutes of working out a day--every day-- numerous blogs, writing groups, and Writers Organizations (RWA, YARWA, SinC, etc) that in order to be useful and worth the yearly dues, need to be used and participated on... the list seems endless, and getting longer.

Days like today, when I feel like I'm drowning, and there is no visible way out of the deep end... I wish I had a clone.

Just not an exact clone.

One who has more patience than I do, is less easily frustrated, and more understanding of her own limitations.

Or maybe I need to learn moderation.

When do you wish you could clone yourself? Or at the very least have more arms?

Speak out. I want to know!

R.S.

On First Jobs

Today my niece takes the next step in becoming a productive member of society.

She begins her first job.

It got me thinking about my first job, and the long line of employment opportunities that came after it.

I've had...well, let's be honest... a lot.

From my first job the summer of my junior year, to finding myself as a writer, I've done just about everything. Honestly, I had a hard time sticking to any job for longer than a couple of months. I'd get bored, annoyed with the stupidity of my coworkers, or I'd find something better.

There was always something better.

My longest job lasted two years, and I was twenty-three. I was a tech-department and cell phone representative for Circuit City--before it went belly up. I stuck with the job for two reasons. One: I needed the money to pay bills, and Two: I felt like I owed them. Not because they were an amazing company to work for, but because when I was at my lowest, the management and my coworkers, had my back.

When I got married, and my husband and I got transferred to Hawaii, I continued my day job. At least until it came time for his first deployment, and I wanted to actually see him before he left to a war zone for seven months. Who knew that large corporations didn't care about things like that?

Art is subjective, and art school was expensive. 

I've worked as a telemarketer, a pizza maker, a soldier, a pageant princess, a substitute teacher for special needs, a dating service counselor, a make-up artist, a model, and my personal 'favorite'--a housekeeper for a small, low class, hotel chain.

I spent five years as a professional photographer, providing tangible memories of weddings, graduations, births, and military reunions-- only to realize my passion for photography was outmatched by my need to not be a portrait photographer. I loved the art of photography, not the cookie cutter, conveyor belt version most of the population expects. After more and more military wives with their new cameras opened up shop as photographers, I threw in the tripod for the focus of photography as art.

I'll never make it rich that way, and I'm okay with that.

After the birth of my daughter I realized something in my life was missing. Not family, or the love of a good man; I had those. I was missing a part of me I hadn't seen since I was eighteen.

The writer.

I was first published in junior high at the ripe old age of thirteen. Nothing spectacular, just a few dark, angst filled poems about the usual teenage drama--though my prose might have been just a tiny bit darker than average. Once I graduated and got away from the hallowed halls of purgatory, I tried to write my first novel.

It was a colossal vat of failure.

Not because it was rejected by publishers, but because I never finished it. I had the story idea, but not enough know how or understanding to complete it.

I found it recently, and it wasn't half bad.

After the demise of my potential writing career I put the dream away for over a decade until one amazing bundle of joy brought that spark back.

You know what? I learned a lot about books in a decade.

I've written three novels in the last year and a half. One needs extensive work before I'll be willing for it to see the light of day, and two of them are going through editing. Whether or not they get picked up via a traditional publisher or I decide to self publish, I know one day, not too far in the future they'll be available for others to enjoy.

It took a while, but I've finally found something I can stick with, and I'm sure, someday, my niece will find her calling too. Until then, I'm proud of her for taking the first step in figuring it out.

Congrats, T-Dawg, you're an adult now.

R.S.