New site!

For the past couple of weeks, I've been working on a new site, and it's finally done. You can find it at AmandaAndonian.com. I'm going to continue blogging there, but also post full-length stories. My first finished short story is now up there, and there's more to come!

Thanks for reading.

Amanda

Don't Let It Ruin Your Day

This morning, as with all mornings, I was in a rush to get out of the house. Not because I was late for work, but because I'm always in a rush when I'm going somewhere. Juggling my purse, a grocery bag, my jacket, my Netflix DVD, and my cup of coffee, I shuffled down the hall and out to my car as fast as I could without dropping anything. Why am I in such a rush? Again, no reason; this is just how I operate.

Trying to get everything into my car, I leave my coffee cup on the roof so that I don't spill it as I struggle with shoving my bags into the backseat. Grabbing my phone, I hurriedly dial my coworker's number as I get in the car and buckle my seatbelt. She answers and I let her know that I'm on my way, turning on the engine and opening the garage door. I pull out into the street slowly, making sure I don't scratch my bumpers on the narrow opening anymore than they are already, and I speed up as I clear the driveway.

Then there's a loud thump and a muffled shattering sound from outside as my coffee mug falls off the roof of my car onto the street.

I don't think I can accurately express how disappointed and angry I was with myself in that moment, but let me try. Setting aside the fact that I'd taken the time to make myself a vanilla soy latte, setting aside the fact that I finally had the chance to try this soy that I'd spent weeks going to grocery stores in order to find, and setting aside the fact that I was denied my caffeine fix for the morning, I berated myself for destroying my awesome coffee mug.

It didn't matter to me that it's just a mug, easily replaced (which I've already done, thanks to Amazon!); and it didn't matter that I could easily just go to Peet's on the way to work and get a latte. I was so angry at myself for forgetting, I was angry at that waste of time, money, and effort as a result of my inattention, and I couldn't stop berating myself for being so careless. I knew it was useless to be angry about it, but I just couldn't help it. A part of my mind understood that this anger was useless and that I shouldn't let it ruin my day, but other part of myself was so upset that it wouldn't listen.

At some other time in my life, I might still be angry and upset; but after concentrating on the drive, getting myself a mocha to feel better, and ordering a new mug from Amazon, it just didn't affect me as much anymore. Sure it's good that I let it go, but I don't like that I was so upset in the first place. It was embarrassing, of course, but it shouldn't have elicited such a strong reaction from me.

The sudden feeling of not being able to control my emotions always concerns me. I feel that I should be able to rein these things in, but I don't know how. I guess I handled it fine since I was only upset for a little while, but it was more intense than the situation warranted. My mom always says, "Be a duck," as in let it roll off your back, but I've never been very good at that. I suppose I would have taken it much worse in years past, but I would prefer to have more control over my emotions than that.

China Hates Fiction

I heard today that China is outlawing any and all time travel stories because they're "disrespectful towards history" and "many stories are totally made up and are made to strain for an effect of novelty."

Wow.

Alright, let's put aside the fact that they apparently have just realized what the word "fiction" means and instead talk about what kind of impact this may or may not have on the way Chinese people think from now on. The author of this article states that time travel dramas are growing in popularity in China, so obviously they are successful and widely watched. How is a viewing public of hundreds of thousands (perhaps millions) going to react to their government outlawing their favorite form of entertainment? Presumably, they'll just take it and not start an outcry, otherwise the Chinese government probably would not have done this in the first place.

The way the article is written gives way too much credit to the Chinese government. The author talks about how they have "a good reason to go against the genre" just because it takes liberties with history and historical fact. Of course it does! It's. Not. Real. It's a drama created to entertain people and make money. Additionally, "many people complain there’re too many mistakes on history facts, making it unbearable to watch"? Welcome to the world of television and movies! If it was completely faithful to the source material, it wouldn't be as interesting to watch. If you don't like it, why don't you just refrain from watching it? I refuse to watch television shows and movies that I know will piss me off due to inaccuracies for that very reason.

But, this is missing the point entirely of why China's governement is doing this. They don't want it to exist because they want to control the type of information that their people consume. It's not such a huge step from this to outlawing fiction entirely, or at least fiction that is only approved by the General Bureau of Radio, Film and Television. When that happens, what will become of an entire country's ability to think independently and creatively? What will happen to the people's ability to lose themselves in a form of entertainment they enjoy? If America outlawed science fiction for some bizarre reason, I would be devastated. Not only am I barred from enjoying this genre when I want to relax, I can't even write in this genre without fear of being brought up on some sort of felony charge.

As a creative person, I can hardly wrap my mind around the reality that the Chinese people live in. If this is an indication of the direction that Chinese censorship is moving towards, how far is it actually going to go? I don't believe that it's possible to wipe out story telling completely, but they don't need to do that; all they need to do is to control the stories that do exist. Will that result in a country of people who can't use their minds, who have no sense of imagination or independent and creative thought? What kind of country will that look like?

Perhaps I'm making more of this than there actually is, but as much as I hate reality television, it would never occur to me to outlaw it if I possessed that power. People should be allowed to make their own choices in the products they create and consume, yet China moves in the opposite direction every day. Anecdotally speaking, I was once warned against typing the word "Tibet" in a chat screen to my friend in China because she thought that perhaps there was a chance that even that line of communication could be monitored, and she didn't want her Internet shut down in that unlikely event. Whether her fears were well-founded or not is beside the point--that fear exists for people.

I don't really know what I expect of the world in general, or what I want to happen instead, but hearing that silly time travel stories are being outlawed concerns me. This isn't something that threatens society or social mores; it's not vulgar or dangerous to delicate sensibilities. If they're intent on getting rid of dumb TV like this, how much further is it going to go?

The Known Universe

This video actually came out over a year ago, but it came to mind recently, so I thought I'd share:

It had quite an impact on me when I first watched it. Seeing just how small and tiny we are compared to the vastness of the universe is simply mind-boggling. And this is only the parts of the universe that we know is out there! Where some might see that vastness and despair, I look at it and am filled with an intense desire to know what fills that space. I think maybe that's why I find science fiction so fascinating; it posits what might be out in the universe and imagines what it's like. Things like this also make me wish that I knew more about the universe and how it worked. My younger brother is a fledgling mathematician, so every once in a while I talk to him about science. Though his focus is math, it gives him the foundation to explore physics, astronomy, and other scientific fields that I can barely comprehend since my foundation is in the arts.

While I wouldn't trade my education for anything, I do wish that I had had more of an inclination towards science. It opens up a whole other way of thinking and seeing the world that is somewhat closed to me since my thought processes are pretty much hardwired towards a certain manner of perceiving things. There are things that I couldn't possibly imagine that are posited in the field of science, and I wish I could be a little less hindered by the boundaries of my knowledge. However, just hearing about the sorts of classes my brother would have to take in order to get his Masters in Astronomy sends my mind reeling, so I don't know if I could have handled such an intensive field of study.

Though I don't think I would actually enjoy living for thousands of years, I kind of wish I could just so I could see the kinds of advances that science will make hundreds of years. I suppose since we've made such incredible strides in the space of fifty years, I can expect to see even more wonders before I die; but will I live long enough to actually know whether we can travel to other planets? Will we ever encounter other life in the universe? If we do encounter life, will it be hostile and completely incapable of communicating with us, as Stephen Hawking believes? Or will it actually be something like the aliens we've invented in books, movies, and television?

Those are the sorts of things I think about when I see a video like the one above. I wonder what's out there and whether we'll ever have a chance to know. On the one hand, I hope I do get to see it. If we're going to get wiped out by aliens, though, I think I'll pass.

Writing Insecurities

I know I'm not working very hard on my writing right now (and by 'not working very hard', I mean 'not at all'), which I am reminded of whenever someone asks me how my novel is going. At first, I feel intensely guilty because I'm not giving my work the attention it deserves. Then, I feel like a fraud because pretty much everyone in my life is aware of the fact that I aspire to be a writer, but I haven't written any fiction since November. Finally, I remind myself that it took my favorite author, Patrick Rothfuss, over a decade to finish his first book. Here's what he says about it:

I wish I could go back in time and talk to my poor, lonely, confused teenage self and say, “Pat, things are not going to go smoothly for you over the next couple years. You will make terrible mistakes. You will spend a decade getting your college degree and writing a unmarketable behemoth of a fantasy novel. Most people, even the ones that love and support you, will think that this is a pretty stupid thing to do, and they will be right in thinking that.”

Then I would lean forward and say, “But if you keep writing, you will finish that book. And if you keep revising it, a publisher will buy it. They will pay you money for the story that came out of your head. And once that book is in print, there are people who will love your book. They will love it beyond all reason and expectation. They will love your book to such a degree that beautiful young women will strip naked and adorn their bodies with the image of your book, and then they will send you a picture of it!”

The original post is here, if you'd like more context for why naked women are adorning their bodies with the image of his book. I enjoy reading his everyday thoughts on the blog because even though his prose is so incredibly well wrought that I despair of ever crafting sentences as beautifully written as his, he's so down-to-earth and willing to share his insecurities with his readers.

Knowing that he struggled for years to write his novel provides me with some valuable perspective. He had a life, and a serious girlfriend, and even a baby for the last couple of years; so of course writing his novel took a long time. Even though he made it his full-time job, the second novel took him four years to complete. Keeping this in mind, it helps me beat myself up less over the fact that I'm not working as hard on my novel as I could be. I know what it will take to be deadly serious about my writing, and I don't know that I'm ready to make those sacrifices yet. Having a full-time job means that 40 hours of my life every week are already spoken for, and I like devoting much of my free time to friends right now. I've spent so much of my life holed up by myself, I'm not ready to go back to that yet.

Most importantly, I know that I can make the time. Every year, I take a month to set aside an average of two hours a day for my writing, and it completely works for me and gets my creativity rolling, though it isn't always easy to churn out the 2000 word quota I set for myself every day. That time exists there if I'm determined to pull it out of the ether, so knowing that it sits at the edges of my life is comforting. I am perfectly capable of doing it, so it isn't a question of ability.

Perhaps, that's the thing I worry about the most--am I truly capable of producing a worthwhile work of fiction? Maybe that's what stops me much of the time; I don't feel like I've found the story that I want to tell. However, I'm not going to find it if I don't go looking for it...