Sensitivity.

I was wiping the espresso machine in my coffee-stained apron when I wondered to myself if I should start the cleaning process.  “Julie, is it too soon to start closing up?” I turned to ask my boss.  She wasn’t in sight, so I poked my head around the doorway into the back room.  There she was on the floor.

“Julie! Are you all right?”

“I’m having a seizure.”

From there, what started out as a perfectly good, rainy day unexpectedly turned out to be terribly stressful.  The paramedics, our supervisor, and another café worker arrived quickly, and I volunteered to help close.  As they were helping Julie onto a stretcher I started the closing process, but found myself repeatedly interrupted. 

Apparently, seeing a woman on a stretcher in the middle of the room isn’t enough to indicate when a café is closed.

Person, after person, after person came up to the counter doing that dazed menu-scan business.  Slightly irritated, I told them “We’re closed.”  Only a group of three women, obviously regulars because they knew Julie by name, had the courtesy to even ask what was going on. 

I’m not sure if these people were oblivious, selfish, or just insensitive…  but I can’t help but feel that this situation reflects some of the negative characteristics of our modern culture.   Working in the café I see an everyday disregard for other people.  So many customers don’t even take the time to look their server in the eye –or worse, they fake friendliness.

When did “How are you?” become a rhetorical question?

In a world where someone cares more about their convenience than the person in front of them I think these are questions worth considering.

I think we’re all aware of how much technology probably plays a role in this cultural shift.  How many times a day do I text while someone’s trying to talk to me?  Ignore a message on Facebook?  Block my roommate out because I’m listening to my ipod?  A lot. Technology affects relationships.  This is an obvious fact, and already much-beaten dead horse. 

But going a step beyond the technology itself, let’s consider the presentation of fiction within the media.  I discussed in my last blog post how easy it is to get caught up in the story our lives, and how that can cause us to misperceive our world.  However, there’s an even bigger danger here than our own misperceptions: glossing over seemingly unimportant details. 

In the grand epoch of your life, does it really matter if that woman was ok?  Probably not -the movie wouldn’t show that scene.  But in real life it matters.

In real life the person that got shot matters more than the chase for the criminal, but all our crime TV shows won't tell you that.

"Dying to Entertain," a report written by The Parents Television Council recounts a number of particularly violent and disturbing scenes presented on television.  In February 2006 an episode of C.S.I. aired called "Pirates of the Third Reich" in which the dectectives' investigation takes a particularly bizarre turn. In one scene they find a basement lab with a Nazi symbol on the wall, and the words "Arbeit Macht Frei."  It appears as though the two men, who are already suspects in a murder case, have been conducting experiments on humans. Confirming their suspicions, the detectives find "two Asian men in a bare room on the floor in their underwear.  They appear to be sewn together along the spine.  One of them is dead; the other, barely alive.  There are some sheets over them. They are barely alive."   

Sick.

And yet, you'd be hard-pressed to find a person that hasn't watched an episode of a modern crime show or an action movie of the same nature.  Even if we ignore speculation about the effects these types of stories are having on crime statistics, one thing remains glaringly obvious: we are so engrossed in the extreme, thrilling, fabricated fictional world that something like a seizure seems unimportant, and unfashionably inconvenient. 

I hate to discredit fiction, because there is so much good in it.  I hate to bash technology and the media because it feels cliché. Yet, I wonder, how did this all get so out of hand?  When did our world of fiction become a force of its own, rather than something we have the ability to create, control, and enjoy?  And, even harder to answer: are we concerned enough about these effects to alter our behavior, or will we just continue to be entertained and desensitized?

Lost [between the] Lines.

Have you ever heard of an actor getting too caught up in their trade?  One that gets so stuck in a particular role that they forget who they are?

Did you ever think that maybe a writer can do the same….?

It’s a heinous sort of feeling, getting caught up in your own story.  One that, I’m afraid, I’ve got right now. 

I’m not here to air out my dirty laundry, even though it might interest some of you more than what I’m about to say. But I will give you a glimpse into my notebook, something I hold as sacred as the right to breathe.  This morning I wrote the following:

I’m tired of story-book significance that fades at the next plot twist.

[Insert sentiment here] because I don’t know what I’m supposed to feel anymore.

There feelings aligns with the line of a song by Motion City Soundtrack that’s always resonated with me: “The coup de grace that set me off would have made for decent fiction”

The French phrase “coup de grace” means “A finishing stroke or decisive event.”

Have you ever felt the significance of a moment that wasn’t meant to be significant?  The possibility of a bright, engaging storyline that just drives you crazy because its simply not meant to be? The strain between what you're hoping for, and what's actually happening?  

I have…
and it gets me into all sorts of trouble.

My preoccupation with fiction seems to have sentenced me to a particular sort of doom that I know everyone experiences, but seems to be especially problematic for me.  I will plunge head-long into a scenario, envisioning in my head every minute detail of how it ought to go, and what everyone involved is supposed to feel…. And then it doesn’t happen.

One of my absolute favorite movies, 500 Days of Summer, addresses this very issue.  In one poiniant scene, the main character, Tom, goes to a party that he’s been invited to by Summer, the girl he wants to love him back.  Throughout the scene there is a split screen, one side labeled “Expectations,” and the other “Reality.” Needless to say, the two sides differ significantly.

Later in the movie Tom makes a speech about the nature of what we feel and express, claiming that most of it is unreal, created only by the great sense of sentimentality that exists in our art.  In a meeting at the greeting card company where he’s employed, Tom says:

“We’re liars. Think about it, why do people buy these things? It's not because they wanna say how they feel; people buy cards because they can't say how they feel, or they're afraid to. We provide the service that lets them off the hook. You know what? I say to hell with it. Let’s level with America at least let them speak for themselves, right? I mean look, look. What is this? What does this say…with all the pretty hearts on the front? I think I know where this one’s going. Yup "Happy Valentines Day sweetheart.  I love you." Isn't that sweet? Ain't love grand? This is exactly what I'm talking about. What does that even mean, love? Do you know? Do you? Anybody? If somebody gave me this card Mr. Vance, I'd eat it. It's these cards, and the movies and the pop songs, they're to blame for all the lies and the heartache, everything. We're responsible. I'M responsible. I think we do a bad thing here. People should be able to say how they feel, how they really feel, not ya know, some words that some stranger put in their mouth. Words like love, that don't mean anything.”

Somehow, the emotionality of our society that Tom so eloquently explains here, with our Hallmark cards, valentine chocolates, and all of the romantic comedies with happy endings have just left us… with what?  This sense of being stuck in an alternate world... reality. Flowery words and fairytale-esque scenes don't belong here.

And I have been worse than anyone.  As an observer, an actor, and a teller of tales, I have forgotten what meaning actually means. It’s left me disillusioned like Tom, and wondering if maybe, it really is a bad thing that we do.  I don’t suppose I can make the judgment that realism is the only medium we ought to use in art, but I feel a renewed conviction to keep my feet planted on the ground.  And I’m wondering, If my writing doesn’t leave the reader prepared to engage the real world again after they’ve experienced it, what good is it?  If I ever become just one more voice creating hype, and impossible expectations, then I, like Tom, am bowing out.

A Control Freak's Technique

A few years ago I noticed an apparent contradiction in my personality.  Although I thrive on having time to create, I also really enjoy stupid, simple, menial tasks.  

When I was small I remember my mom giving me jobs like tearing the perforated pages out of Sunday School books.  I remember us setting up an assembly line for making baby shower favors where my job would be nothing but to put a hundred dots of glue on some object someone was going to throw away a week later.  Every fall we would have a huge Harvest party at our house, and I adored dividing up the various pieces of candy and putting them into bags.  And I still do. 

Something in me didn't quite understand why that was until I started to get older, and began piecing together other aspects of my personality.  Now, the answer is quite simple: I'm a control freak. And, somehow, there's just something therapeutic about doing something of no consequence just because it's in my control. 

Writing, unfortunately, is almost never like that.  Words and ideas tend to swarm around in my head like bees that have the ability to give you an uncomfortable tingling sensation, a nasty sting, or that awful freaked-out feeling you get when they buzz up right between your eyes. Often, when I'm working on something, even if it's small, I tend to get overwhelmed with the block of words on a page.  Sometimes, I just don't know what to do with them.  

Recently, I discovered a technique that helps me out when I'm trying to decide whether something belongs where I've put it.  It helps me decide how to organize things, and distinguish if they'd flow better if something was moved or deleted.   What I like to do, when I'm really stumped, is to print out what I'm working on, and start to cut the papers into units.  How small the units are depends on what my focus is.  Sometimes the chunk consists of several paragraphs,   but occasionally just a few words.  Then, I like to sit on the floor with the pieces and rearrange them like flowers in a bouquet, trying this one here, and that one there.  A lot of times I'll delete something altogether, or maybe I'll leave it exactly like it was because I decide that I'm satisfied with it.  But if I can get my hands on it, sometimes it just feels simpler -more like I own it, even though, let's be honest, usually my work owns me.  

Below is a picture of what my floor looked like yesterday.  I was working with a few random samplings of things I'd written, trying to decide what was worth keeping, and what I ought to just scrap.  Luckily, I noticed that two of the poems I'd written had the same theme.  I started cutting, and moving, and piecing together an entirely different piece of work. Of course I'm not entirely satisfied with the end result, but having the ability to have my words in front of me in a tangible way allowed me to play with my work when I got stumped, instead of just staring at a computer screen. 

Yes, that is a bowl of saltwater taffy.

“Don’t touch the demon box. You might not like what you find.”

My process as a writer often ends, and sometimes even begins, with an object, rectangular in shape, except for the top, the lid, which is rounded.  It has hinges on the back and a metal fastener on the front.   Both are black, as is the fair trade paper which covers it.  The paper is covered in silver flowers and scrolls, and has a thick, rough texture. 

I always place it somewhere in my room where it can see me, but someplace where I can’t always see it, because, you see, the not so secret truth is that it contains things that scare me.  It is full of scraps of paper littered with words about all sorts of things –the boy that I just can’t get out of my mind, how angry my mother made me that time, what any given moment might have felt like, and deeper, darker things I don’t care to discuss online. 

I stow pieces here when I don’t know what to do with them.  It holds the random spurts of my mind and soul that can’t be filed away into neater divisions.  Sometimes, there is a need to open this box full of demons.  Just the other day I was frantically, searching for an old poem that I wrote, and I had to take it down from the shelf.  My roommate watched me with peaked interest.  “This,” I told her “Is my demon box,” jokingly.  “Don’t touch the demon box. You might not like what you find.” 

Today, one of my professors presented my class with a quote from Robert Frost: “All I would keep for myself is the freedom of my material –the condition of body and mind now and then to summon aptly from the vast chaos of all I have lived through.”  Now I found myself faced with a question, laced with a challenge; can I spread those terrifying pieces of paper out in front of me, and face them with the courageous stillness of an artist’s heart, and use them to create? Can any of us?