Alisa Krasnostein is World Fantasy Award winning editor and publisher at Twelfth Planet Press and part of the Galactic Suburbia Podcast Team. She was Executive Editor of the review website Aussie Specfic in Focus!.
Currently working on a PhD in Publishing, in her spare time she is a critic, reader, reviewer, runner, environmentalist, knitter, quilter and puppy lover. She is a fulltime Mum.
I’ve had a ripper of a reading weekend this weekend and just finally finished the last 7 pages of The Female Man which I didn’t manage to do in time for the Spoilerific Russ Podcast.
And so I only just read the closing. And didn’t get to go all “awwwwww” on the podcast. Fave quotes:
Go, little book … Do not scream when you are ignored, for that will alarm people, and do not fume when are heisted by persons who will not pay, rather rejoice that you have become so popular. Live merrily, little daughter-book, even if I can’t and we can’t; recite yourself to all who will listen; stay hopeful and wise. Wash your face and take your place without a fuss in the Library of Congress, for all books end up there eventually, both little and big. Do not complain when at last you become quaint and old-fashioned. when you grow as outworn as crinolines of a generation ago … do not mutter angrily to yourself when young persons read you to hrooch and hrch and guffaw, wondering what the dickens you were all about. Do not get glum when you are no longer understood, little book. Do not curse your fate. Do not reach up from readers’ laps and punch the readers’ noses.
Rejoice little book!
For on that day, we will all be free.
I was all: No! Joanna will still love you and understand you! Oh. Wait. …
Secondly, Galactic Suburbia got an absolutely awesome review over on Hoyden About Town on Friday. I think what I love most about this review is how much it captures how I see the podcast and how well I think we are meeting what we hope the podcast to be:
And I love it that the three of them are coming from different places in the SF world – authoring, publishing, and consuming – though of course they’re all fans as well. And that they are fans of different aspects of SF, from ‘hard’ engineering science fiction to magical fantasy. And that you feel like you’re hearing part of their life, instead of actors in a studio: sometimes the baby cries, sometimes the dog barks, sometimes they need to take a break to take care of things. And most of all I love it that it feels like I’m sitting in a living room with them over cake and cocktails, and talking and joking and ranting and arguing about the cultural and fan world that simultaneously captivates and frustrates us immensely.
We love feedback to the podcast! Please keep sending it! We love hearing that you argue with us, laugh with/at us, read along with us. We love reading your stories about feminism and SF.
This morning I wake up, stumble out to where C is playing a video game and spot the puppy lying in his bed (which normally resides in the back bathroom) next to him.
Me: Did you put his bed there or did he?
C: He did. Last night.
Is that not the cutest? He pulls his bed and then he lifts one end and gets under it and wears it like a tortoise shell to take it places. Sometimes it looks like a tank marching to battle: To cute!
(Course right now he is Bitey McBite Bite puppy and not at all cute. Sleepy Puppy is my favourite persona. He doesn’t yet to Snuggle Pups.)
So I moved in with my boyfriend. You’re up to speed on that. And I’ve been grappling with downsizing my possessions, sorting, culling, organising and fitting all of my stuff inside his house. Moving in with your boyfriend is a big deal. And I rushed into that last time, partly due to circumstance, so I was determined not to do that with C. He asked me to move in with him at the beginning of the year and we finally did it by June. The timing was much better that way.
But it’s still felt like a really big deal to move in with him. And maybe that it didn’t last time is an important thing to note. But even so, I’ve joked about whether we were ready to merge our CD and book collections and cull the doubles. And we’re not. That’s like such a huge thing to do. You know?
The thing is. I got burned once before in my life. It’s hard to explain exactly what I mean by that in hindsight. But. I think that I felt like once I’d moved in, it was a done deal. I acted and behaved and assumed like my life was decided and I got … comfortable? Is that what I mean? I took it for granted – that the happily ever after ending was implied. And. That’s not even really a fair thing to say because I wasn’t happy in that relationship long before we moved in together. I just wanted the prize. I thought that would validate me as a person. If someone, anyone, wanted to marry me. And have babies with me. And all the rest. Well then that would mean I was worthy.
Which is, of course, highly screwed up.
Then I did that whole being on my own thing. Discovered I earned enough money to be independent and start a small business and look after myself and stuff. And I found my way back to myself. And I don’t ever want to be in a place where I am relying on someone else, that I feel like I can’t be in the big, wide world all on my little old ownsome. That I’d be too scared to do what I need to do. If I need to. And I think maybe I feel now like nothing is guaranteed. That the ending is not implied, or maybe, the ending that you want is not the only possible option.
So this is my defence for being completely incapable of actually parting with a bunch of my stuff that we have doubles of. My washing machine has been sitting in the carport since the day I moved in. And the other day, C raised the option of selling it. And then yesterday he mentioned a second person who was interested in it. And … well … what if I need it some day? Likewise my second TV – we loaned my good TV to my parents cause noone needs 4 TVs in a 2 person house. My second TV I just don’t want to part with – I bought it with a job that I particularly sold my soul for and I’ve had it for a very long time. Sure it’s an analog and very clunky but …
So yesterday C asks me if I want to sell my washing machine or if I’d rather he got a truck to pack all the things I might need if we break up and he can store it out the back. I think I feel like I’m being overly assuming if I do happily part with all the doubles we have. But um, I’m not sure what else I think I should be doing/feeling in this situation. Since, we do live together now.
Does this make any sense? Or have I flipped channels?
I’m gonna sell the washing machine. It leaks. And we have one. And I know. But still.
And the thing is this: I was sitting down to write this and we exchanged silly banter across rooms relating to something that happened earlier and I thought, life is gonna be a lot of fun together. I think mostly I’m pissed that one person can rob you of all your trust in happy endings and people telling you the truth.
I woke up disgustingly early this morning because my boyfriend is a sailor and sailors get up very early and my sailor checks his email before he gets out of bed. And he woke me up with the unbelievable news that the World Fantasy Awards ballot was announced and:
Special Award, Non-Professional
Stephen Jones, Michael Marshall Smith, & Amanda Foubister, for Brighton Shock!: The Souvenir Book Of The World Horror Convention 2010
Alisa Krasnostein, for Twelfth Planet Press
Matthew Kressel, for Sybil’s Garage and Senses Five Press
Charles Tan, for Bibliophile Stalker
Lavie Tidhar, for The World SF Blog
I keep having to check back because it seems so hard to comprehend. I never even dreamed I would be on the WFA ballot and to be on one with such outstanding company in this category is such a great, amazing honour. I’m blown away, excited and unbelievably grateful to everyone who has ever helped me out, contributed to book buzz, bought a book, given me advice or mentored me so far on this journey. And to the Twelfth Planet Press Posse who work so hard behind the scenes and Amanda Rainey who makes every book look fantastic.
And that thing? Where’s it’s so good just to be nominated? It’s really really true.
I had just paid for my tickets to go to San Diego as well so I’m overjoyed to be there and to be going with the Aussie contingent this year. And that, um, dream big? Anything is possible. *grin*
The rest of the ballot is exceptionally great this year too. Check it out (Via Locus):
Best Novel
Zoo City, Lauren Beukes (Jacana South Africa; Angry Robot)
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, N.K. Jemisin (Orbit)
The Silent Land, Graham Joyce (Gollancz; Doubleday)
Under Heaven, Guy Gavriel Kay (Viking Canada; Roc; Harper Voyager UK)
Redemption In Indigo, Karen Lord (Small Beer)
Who Fears Death, Nnedi Okorafor (DAW)
Best Novella
Bone and JewelCreatures, Elizabeth Bear (Subterranean)
The Broken Man, Michael Byers (PS)
“The Maiden Flight of McCauley’s Bellerophon”, Elizabeth Hand (Stories: All-New Tales)
The Thief of Broken Toys, Tim Lebbon (ChiZine Publications)
“The Mystery Knight”, George R.R. Martin (Warriors)
“The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers beneath the Queen’s Window”, Rachel Swirsky (Subterranean Summer 2010)
Best Short Fiction
“Beautiful Men” , Christopher Fowler (Visitants: Stories of Fallen Angels and Heavenly Hosts)
“Booth’s Ghost”, Karen Joy Fowler (What I Didn’t See and Other Stories)
“Ponies”, Kij Johnson (Tor.com 11/17/10)
“Fossil-Figures”, Joyce Carol Oates (Stories: All-New Tales)
Amongst the graphic horror of the weekend, unfolded a much quieter horror of its own – Amy Winehouse passed away, at just 27. I’ve been reading/listening to what has been said about her on Twitter, on various internet websites, on Triple J and this great piece by Russell Brand, and just now, as I sat down to write this piece, The 7PM Project have told me that she was both Jewish (I didn’t know that) and inspired Adelle, Lady Gaga and Duffy.
I wasn’t actually a big fan of Amy Winehouse’s in that I didn’t have her music and I didn’t pay all that much attention to her. I thought her voice was amazing but recently her coverage in the media has been less than complimentary. I wasn’t surprised to hear of her passing this weekend and I think that has made me sadder. That really, in a way, we all looked on and watched but she never really got the help she needed.
I was noodling round the internet this evening because I wanted to write this piece on her and it turns out it was really really hard to find Youtube clips of her like the one below where she was performing at her height, where you can see her talent and hear her amazingly rich and timeless voice.
Most of the clips were of her drunk and behaving disorderly on stage, which was what was going on in her life in the last few months. There were a few dedicated to her looks, in the least complimentary way possible. And a few News clips discussing the drunken behaviour that kicked off her last, as it was to be, tour. Rather than reporting her clearly personal distress in presenting in such a way in her shows, these clips of News reporters were mocking, disgusted and appalled and how much she had wasted other people’s money by showing up drunk and not giving the performance these people had paid for. I was watching those clips with the hindsight to know how the sad story ends but it has definitely gotten me thinking.
When Princess Diana was killed, everybody blamed the paparazzi and they blamed their readers. And I thought long and hard about this and I decided, that if my reading all those magazines and looking at all those photos had in any way contributed to her death, then I would no longer read them. And I haven’t read one since. I take my own books to places like doctors waiting rooms and the hairdressers. I never ever read them. And as an aside, OMG you feel so much better about yourself when you give up that trash. I almost never see what those mags are covering but in the last couple of weeks, I’ve caught the covers whilst waiting to pay for fuel or in the line at the canteen and they are currently reporting how utterly disgusting some starlets look being uber thin. And I keep thinking – you fucking fucks! Those women can never win. When they look too fat, the covers say “Put on WEIGHT!? Look how FAT she is/ Throwing away the diets!!!” (see the latest reporting on the Kardashians for those stories) and when they heed and try and look better, presumably for the press, they get the shots of them in awkward poses leaning over to get something which shows all their bones poking out so that we can get disgusted at their skeletal thinness. I would not trade for that kind of scrutiny for all the lovely things in the world. Those women are scrutinised to such an extreme that I only hope they don’t read that stuff. And I still don’t understand the point of those magazine articles which are written by women for women and make this horrible commentary on what women are supposed to care about and what they are really valued for.
Recently, Lady Gaga visited Australia. And here was another woman whose work I am not overly familiar with other than the random headlines I might catch here and there – I don’t listen to pop music much anymore and I don’t read the mags, see above. So my opinions on her are formed entirely by what might be reported on random news shows I catch in passing (I had kind of liked the sentiment behind her song to do with eating disorders). And then I watched her interview on Channel 9 when she was here and thought, hey she sounds like a really interesting person. I think she has some idea of what it’s like to be me. And I heard a bit about what she’s done and why. And then the other day, maybe two days ago?, I heard a man describe her and those sitting in her pop niche in the world as “shallow Gaga”. I realised something really important, and it comes back to what we are always saying on Galactic Suburbia – both that we are all default conditioned to live in the patriarchy by the patriarchy and that once you see something, you cannot unsee it. And for me, it’s still a constant process to remind myself to deconstruct kneejerk reactions or acceptances of value judgements. Because Lady Gaga is not actually shallow at all. (I had a similar realisation about P!nk too a while back). And that man was calling her that because of her performance stunts – except, she is a performer, that’s what she’s supposed to do AND a lot of her ‘stunts’ are fashion related and we all know that fashion is shallow because it’s a woman’s thing and football is deeply esoteric and spiritually meaningful because it’s a man’s one. Basically, I had allowed myself to be pulled along in the tide of what other people, mainly men, think about women and women’s art and women’s expression and most importantly, women’s messages.
The realisation about Lady Gaga has kind of made me angry. And then to find out that Amy Winehouse is one of her inspirations, it’s clicking some interesting pieces into this new puzzle I am solving in my head. But more importantly, having suddenly changed the way I listen to the commentary on Lady Gaga means that I am hearing the commentary about Amy Winehouse and her passing differently too. Because here was a truly gifted woman, with so much potential yet to be realised who we have lost. And we will never hear sing a new song ever again. And that is a a great tragedy. But all everyone wants to say is “I am not surprised” or “Well we all knew this was coming” – yet we didn’t do anything about it and more than that, we give no validity or interest in the causes that brought it about. There is no discussion of her illness, of the way the assistance she did seek, and was offered to her, was not helpful. And more than that, there is very little discussion of her addiction, and beyond the substance abuse to the root core. It’s just “yet another tragic addition to the 27 club” – a club which, actually probably would welcome her more than we ever did because it’s filled with people who understand. There’s this glossing over how the rest of the members got to join the club too.
Yes, yes, it’s all tragic and tomorrow’s weather is …
Here’s a clip of her singing her song Rehab:
And these lines jump out at me:
He said, “I just think you’re depressed”
This me, “Yeah baby, and all the rest”
The reason she didn’t wanna go to rehab was it wouldn’t have fixed her problem. And if we as a society don’t try and understand that addiction is a symptom of a greater problem, we’re never going to be able to offer the help that is needed.
Amy Winehouse wasn’t any kind of traditional definition of beautiful. She was eccentric and she didn’t conform. She struggled with her demons the only way she knew how. I wish I’d enjoyed her music more when she was alive. I’m immersing myself in it today. But today, with just these recordings left behind, the world is a less shiny place. I’d like to think her story might change the way we think about the glamour of rock and roll and fame but I don’t think we will. It certainly doesn’t look like we have, judging by the commentary.
So I’ll finish with some of what Russell Brand had to say:
Now Amy Winehouse is dead, like many others whose unnecessary deaths have been retrospectively romanticised, at 27 years old. Whether this tragedy was preventable or not is now irrelevant. It is not preventable today. We have lost a beautiful and talented woman to this disease. Not all addicts have Amy’s incredible talent. Or Kurt’s or Jimi’s or Janis’s. Some people just get the affliction. All we can do is adapt the way we view this condition, not as a crime or a romantic affectation but as a disease that will kill.
We need to review the way society treats addicts, not as criminals but as sick people in need of care.
Ian Nichols gave Sprawl a lovely review in The West Australian last Tuesday:
Taking its inspiration from Shaun Tan’s Tales From Outer Suburbia … There’s a lovely poem from Sean Williams; a piece of insight from Simon Brown; and smart intelligent pieces by Stephanie Campisi, Thoraiya Dyer and Kaaron Warren … what is better or worse will be in the eye of the beholder, because the general quality is so high.
I know I had resigned myself to the iterative process that is my moving in. I mean of course it was going to be like this and I’m making into a bigger operation because instead of just wedging my stuff into C’s house and then slamming the door and hoping it all fits, I’m also finally dealing with (various stages of ) my past and rationalising my possessions. And consciously choosing to let go of some of my baggage. Metaphorically as well as literally. And that doesn’t happen in a weekend.
This weekend we made our most recent pilgrimage to Ikea. Cause this process is iterative. And I get that. I really really do. But that doesn’t stop me from getting annoyed with it. I can hear my mother telling me – the thing with you, Alisa, is you always want to run before you’ve learned how to walk. Which is like, yes, so? I know it’s supposed to be about the journey and not the destination but still. So we’re in Ikea, and it’s only one of many things we had scheduled for Saturday and we’ve already revamped the plan because it’s up first instead of the preplanned last item on the list. And C shepherds me to exactly the Billy bookcase section because we are familiar with this section and it is the place we are supposed to be visiting on this trip and he knows I love picking up random other (USEFUL!) stuff from Ikea. And we select the exact item I came for – Billy bookcase in white with glass doors (with flowers on them). And I also grab some nearby cane boxes to go inside for organisational purposes. We complete our prescribed mission. And I get sad. I suddenly realise that there are several more Ikea missions to come and my house is not miraculously going to be tidy and clear by the end of the weekend.
It’s silly and yet quite painful and drawn out. It makes sense that this has to be iterative – that I need to unpack everything, group and sort it, get rid of what I’m not going to keep and then figure out what storage I need. And I can’t figure that out at the beginning or even in the middle because it’s freaking iterative! Buy storage, fill storage, figure out how much more storage we still need, and then where that will go and then what it will be. Re-fucking-peat.
I think it’s because I am used to just getting stuck into a task. If it was only a matter of spending one full weekend or a week and just getting it done, I could do that. But this iteration thing is just beating me down. Because no matter what we bring home, it’s just one bookcase or one cupboard and still so many miles to go before I sleep.
Still it is what it is and C used a very effective technique to remove me from the Ikea premises – if we hurry, he tells me, we can make the Rivers shoe sale before rugby. Oh yeah, baby, that did the trick! I’d seen the sale for Rivers shoes on TV – lots of sexy me style shoes – and I’d been determined to get there this weekend. We worked out that I hadn’t bought new shoes since C and I started dating (I think maybe I bought one pair of boots for this last winter). Noone ever asks you as an indie publisher where your money comes from and noone really wants to know, as long as the deals keep coming and the potential to make a sale to you still exists. But I’ve been cutting corners in my personal budget for years now and one of those places was in buying new clothes and shoes [1] and underpants [2]. And at some point, those chickens are going to come home to roost when all your clothes and shoes wear out, which unfortunately is starting to happen to me. And in the move I’ve had to admit this and throw a bunch of falling apart shoes out which has meant I almost have no nice work shoes left [3]. So a sale seemed like an efficient and cost effective solution to my problem. And OMG it was! To be fair, a lot of the really sexy shoes in the ad were almost all gone from the store we visited (nearest to Ikea) but I got a few pairs for work and one or two nice going out ones for a very lowdown price. And why have I never tried on their shoes before? They are SO comfy! (I think I am getting old when comfort in shoes becomes a factor). It was a frenzy, I did the whole thing in the time it took C to go get a coffee and something to eat before his game. And now I’m not entirely sure whether I should have bought 37s or 36s. But oh well.
And then we had a quick detour into Officeworks where I determined I would buy nothing. And came out with a 50c hot pink Sharpie. And then, only realised last night, I should have looked for plastic slip covers for books. And then onto dropping ogf C for rugby down at the UWA foreshore and I then headed off to Elixir to meet Jonathan. We’re kinda trying to pretend we are trying a bunch of cafes outside our comfort zone, even though I think we both really just like Beautfort St. Now that I am coming up from an hour a way, it makes better time sense for J to come meet me close to where I am because we get more chatting time. That’s how we found the Sassie Cookie and we would have gone back there but we had to do this thing and so him coming out to Nedlands meant more time for the thing.
I had heard good things about Elixir. To be honest, I was disappointed. The food was excellent – I had a pesto bruschetta with avocado and bocconcini – but the coffee was disappointing. And I kinda think that it’s easier to put up with less great food ( or just have a muffin) than less than great coffee when meeting up for coffee. We’re going to have two or three cups after all. The place was very funky. And the crockery was really cool. And we found a really lovely little courtyard to sit in and talk all things publishing minutiae, as is our wont.
And that was my glorious and productive Saturday.
Sunday I executed another perfect day of pottering and reading. I fear I need many more of these to properly de-stress. Which sounds “oh so terrible” but I hate knocking back invitations to hang out with people and catch up and so on. I’m trying to balance socialising with downtime and the interesting thing is really realising how little downtime I’ve been allowing myself for the last several years. When hanging out at home two Sundays in a row seems decadent, you gotta problem. I read a large chunkc of Passage and am very nearly done. I worked a little on my cross-stitch. Watched a couple more episodes of Twin Peaks. I helped (but not well) C put together my craft cupboard – it looks lovely now but it was tricky and I think I am banned from buying a matching one. I started sorting my craft pile(s). I tried to start parting with yarn stash but I think it might just not happen. You can always use random spare yarn for all kinds of things and I’m used to having acrylic stash – like for the last 20 years – and acrylic is good for high frequency washing items. This might be an iterative task.
Which is my circle for this post. I’ve watched so many episodes of Hoarders shows and the thing I’ve learned is that the people who really overcome the illness learn to look at individual items, assess their value and cull. I’m learning to be more ruthless – in terms of most of my craft, I’m looking at not saving my most favourite fabric or yarn but using them because that was why I bought them but also because my taste will change in the next decade. And that in reducing the to finish or to do queue, even by just retiring items in it, is very very freeing – it means that in the future I can buy or create more projects to do without the baggage of items I added 5 years ago that I may not have enthusiasm for anymore. But also, and this is the important lesson, the decluttering and freeing of time is an iterative process. It has to be done constantly and regularly and I need to be ok with that. And that allows me to also say, ok, I’m not ready to part with this now but I might be next time round. And as long as I don’t do that with everything, I move past the paralysis of indecision and I get things done. Starting with the easy things – definitely keeping and definitely getting rid of – also helps.
I’m creating a work in progress pile which I’m hoping I might work on steadily in the next year with the aim of reducing and maybe even removing, by the end. I want to probably start new projects too and that feeling may increase once I’ve properly set up my craft space again. I’ll post a photo once that’s done. Surprisingly, yesterday I stumbled across several sock projects I’d entirely forgotten I’d started so I might be getting some new socks to wear much sooner than I thought.
[1] and going to the dentist. Recent experience shows that was potentially a poor decision.
[2] if you’ve heard my rant in person. My mother’s response was, well would like new underwear for your birthday?, which is sweet but not the point.
[3] apart from the boots, which featured in a recent Galactic Suburbia episode.
New episode up! Grab it from iTunes, by direct download or stream it on the site.
In which we discuss the SF Gateway and some great additions to the Women in SF conversation, Alex eats all the Bujold in one bite, and Alisa’s puppy does his very best to oppress us.
Alisa: Maureen Johnson on www.whyy.org/podcast; Twin Peaks; Mercy (not genre but interesting feminism);
Alex: sooo much Bujold (3rd, 4th and 5th omnibi, and Memory); lots of books, because of holidays! But particularly Heartless, Gail Carriger; Blackout, Connie Willis; Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, NK Jemisin… also Harry Potter 7 and Transformers 3.
Tansy: The Demon’s Surrender, The Holy Terror & Robophobia (Big Finish), Subterranean’s YA Issue
Pet Subject: Feedback from our Joanna Russ episode
Please send feedback to us at galacticsuburbia@gmail.com, follow us on Twitter at @galacticsuburbs, check out Galactic Suburbia Podcast on Facebook and don’t forget to leave a review on iTunes if you love us!
It’s nearly Thursday already. I have no idea where the week went. And Thursday this week I am in the field all day. And it might be raining. And I’m getting a kick in the pants on the public transport thing by having to take the train home tomorrow as it’s easier for my colleague to pick me up past the train station tomorrow morning since we’re heading further south for the day. (Actually I’m looking forward to getting a good chunk of Passage read on the way home.) But see that means it’s almost Friday, already!
Taking off Monday was SUCH a good idea! It’s given me a bit of respite and, with the puppy’s help, I’ve been able to get up earlier this week, get to work earlier, work like a machine and then work a bit late, and make up some time I owed. I really think the random day off is a great idea and I’m going to see how I can go about doing that a bit more often. My workload at the day job is pretty full on now that I have all this coordination and admin to also do. And there seems to be a lot of work coming in at the moment. And lots of pressing deadlines. It’s making for a tired me by the time I get home.
I have though decided how I’m going to fly to World Fantasy Con. A couple of people suggested a travel agent to help me with this but seriously, it was almost easier to do it myself, especially when “doing it myself” meant my mum doing a bunch of the research. Qantas are clearly offering incentives for travel agents but you know, Qantas, that’s not actually going to make me book to fly with you, it’s more likely going to make me ditch my agent due to feeling bullied into a choice I don’t actually want to make. Qantas was the only option she was interested in pursuing and went with “they are cheapest” and “you have to book by the 21st, hurry hurry.” Yeah. In my day job, as soon as someone applies pressure to make me hurry on a decision, I have learned to slow completely down and read everything very carefully and look for the thing they are hoping I’ll miss. So when the pressure was on to pay for Qantas tickets, I stopped and thought long and hard and realised that I hate flying Qantas so much that actually, I would happily pay $200-300 more so as not to (and I think that’s actually the difference). I’ve flown before on the cheapest option, because it’s the cheapest option, and more often than not I’ve been cursing myself midflight for being so cheap. So, I’m not flying Qantas. And instead I don’t have to fly across the country, I can fly to Hong Kong and break up the flights into more equal flying times so I don’t have to do a really really long 20 hour haul. So, we’ll see how that goes.
So. I have a meeting first thing in the morning. That I can’t be late for. So I’ve been trying to get to bed earlyish, sleep lots and then get up early. The puppy clearly read the memo as he did not allow me to go back to sleep *at all* once C left for work. At 7am. Yeah. And then by 9am, that puppy was snoozing away on his first *of many* naps for the day. Bastard.
So I was up before 8 having my coffee and reading. And then I spent the next few hours reading and watching a couple of episodes of Twin Peaks. I *meant* to do more today. I honestly thought I could both relax and just knock off a few tasks, catch up a bit on TPP. I did quite a bit yesterday that it felt weird to have no oomph today.
Just before 3pm, I had my anxiety attack – I was going to bake! I was going to cook soup for dinner! I was going to finish the unpacking! And all I’d managed was one load of washing. So I got up and actually got a bit of unpacking done – two boxes [1] unpacked which dramatically reduced the remaining mess. I have only three large boxes left. And interesting, I finally decided, a week or so ago, to throw out large amounts of my PhD stuff and then today I found my aborted postgrad project (I started one and then it got taken off me for political reasons and I got a new one) – all kinds of paperwork and research reading. Why the hell did I keep that? And move it in and out of about 7 different places since 1999? Inquiring minds want to know.[2]
It is freeing to be separating myself from all this *stuff* – it’s just stuff that I have schlepped with me from place to place, as though having it itself makes up part of my identity. So much of it is guiltridden – things unfinished that I don’t want to finish. It’s nice to be drawing a line under a lot of this stuff, casting it off as *not part of me* and allowing myself to move on and give myself (physical and mental) space to be who I want to be.
So that was my day really. I did bake banana bread in the end. And get some dishes washed. I did keep going over to the pile of stuff still to be sorted and unpacked and vaguely pick through it. It occurs to me that I need to learn to be able to say “enough” – to work on something and be able to put it down as enough done for today. I don’t do that with anything, ever. I feel like if I am awake and not doing something, I could be working on something or tidying something or catching up on something or sewing something. I never think “well hey, I did this today” or “I got a chunk of this done” now I can go off and read. Or go to bed early. Or whatever. I don’t ever do that. Maybe if I did, I would be able to relax more and maybe I’d be able to stop and actually log what I do achieve instead of focussing on what I have left to achieve. Maybe my Week To Do List needs to be cut down into reasonable day lists.
Back to work tomorrow.
[1] My mixing up all the boxes when I packed has been interesting. My stuff has lost its “mineness” – that recognisable thing where you move from house to house and everything goes back essentially where it was cept the desk is different or the kitchen drawers are in a different space. But when you suddenly mix things up so half a drawer is in one box and half in another, your attachment kinda wanes because you have to look at each individual object rather than the whole on mass. I’ve mananged to part with a lot more crap this way. Also, mixing the boxes meant that almost every box had half of it as easy to unpack. Means I’ve unpacked a lot more.
[2] Yesterday I threw away a lot of stuff from my memory box (you know where you keep letters and photos and love notes and cards) from the ex. His love notes made me feel sick. I don’t need the photos or thank you cards to us from things. But I do wonder, now I have thrown those away, when I am old, will I be sad that I don’t have them? Like, did I erase it from my personal history? On the other hand, I’m not ever going to be important enough that people will need/want to trawl through the paperwork of my life. Surely. My grandkids will just have to hear the stories from me, I guess. Heh.
Oddly that is a question I find myself asking a lot lately, about a lot of different things. I guess, when you’re doing a major declutter in your life, it can’t help but spill over into all aspects of your life, because when you’re asking yourself why you need to keep or why you value X, or what’s its point, you train yourself into thinking that way. And so now, I am decluttering in a lot of places. Today for example, I unsubscribed from a bunch of mailing lists cause, well yeah I can continue hitting delete straight away or I could not have to look at them at all and give them any part of my time.
So, like, what’s the point? Of this journal. That’s a question I’ve been wrestling with. I think I’ve mentioned here before how I am struggling to figure out what this place is going to be. And I also talked about some of the constraints. And with the immediacy of Twitter, it turns out, a heck of a lot of what you want to say really can be distilled down to 140 characters. I’m just over 39 000 tweets over at Twitter.
So this last weekend I’ve been really thinking about this blog and about blogging and what it all means/meant to me. If I put aside the fact that blogging on the internet is, yo, blogging on the internet and people who like you and people who very much don’t like you can read it and might use things against you (and have) and that now I am the face of a small business, and that changes how you interface with the internet …
I originally started blogging wow, more than ten years ago at Diaryland. At that time I was writing – fiction and non fiction – and I wanted a mechanism to ensure that I would write *something* every day. And I also wanted a space to be self reflexive, in the hope of creating material in the old “write what you know” vein. And then I moved to LiveJournal, I can’t remember why but I think it was because I’d started to move into the Aussie small press scene and some people I knew were there. And somewhere along the way I began to feel that actually the genre I am good at is blogging. About me. It was the area that I got the most positive feedback from and what came most easily to me to write. The nonfiction side of things expanded and I got published and paid for pieces I was writing, and that was nice, and actually I didn’t much rate my fiction. But I began to feel like my blog needed a cohesive narrative. I found that reading other people’s naval gazing got tedious when they repeated cycles of behaviour, obliviously. There’s only so many rounds of watching someone walk up to a hot stove, put their hand on it and then cry about the pain, you know? So I guess I began to work harder on what I was writing, but also on me. It was a feedback loop where I wanted to learn from what I was experiencing and I wanted to document it. And I wanted to grow.
So there was that whole time when I was blogging the wanting to have a boyfriend, the having the boyfriend, the drama of the having the boyfriend gone wrong and the recovery of that back to me. What’s that, like, 8 years or something? Wow. And ouch. And it was, you know, good times. There was the ups, and the downs, and the tears and the victories. And I’m making light of it but I made a lot of really good, long lasting friends on LJ. A lot of people I met through fandoms and we kept each other even though our shows ended. There are people I only know through my blog, but who I think really know me, and have been really big support during my (hopefully) lowest points.
And that kinda brings me to here. I remember once asking on my LJ what happens when you finally get what you want/finish all the tasks on your to do list. And the answer was something like, you sit on your back stoop, sip a cup of tea and watch the sunset.
But that’s like really hard to blog.
I’m really happy in life. Right now. And have been for a good while now. Yes, I’ve had a couple of bouts of depression and burnout and stuff but those were related to specific events rather than “wow my whole life sucks, I have nothing I really want”. I found a really great guy, like beyond great, and we have this unbelievable relationship – he likes all the stuff I like (which is annoying when it’s weird things like black jelly beans that I normally don’t have to share with people – ‘cept I like sharing with him) and we just get on well. We hardly fight. We don’t need to fight – if you really love someone, don’t you just want them to be happy? And if this thing here that you have (object/time/effort/shirt off your back) will make them happy, wouldn’t you just give it to them? He understands me in a way noone else ever really has and he knows how to deal with me when I’m not in my best moments in life (aka depression/anxiety/OCD loop). How do you write about that stuff every day on a blog? “It’s another perfect morning here in lalaland…”
Which means I guess that your perspective either gets finer detailed or larger. And leaves me in a quandary. I *want* to write, I want to write on a blog every day – it’s my habit and it makes me feel like I am still a writer. And the answer feels almost like I need to push myself into talking more about what it’s like to be me in terms of the 35 year old woman trying to get a start up business to succeed and balancing all those other things like a full on day job, the family thing and so on. I worry that talking *more* about my business pushes me away from one of the core things I loved about Livejournal which is interacting with all my friends there. I also worry about talking specifics about publishing – that whole giving away your secrets thing, versus giving back and so on. I’m still finding a balance here but I feel like I need to give myself permission one way or the other – either to talk about the big things or talk about the little things.
So, the plan – get my life back on track! Eat properly, rest properly, get back into a reasonable sleeping pattern, cut back on the coffee, and do a little bit of TPP etc catch up.
I think I did ok. I deliberately didn’t sleep in and C was already up and doing dishes and making coffee and bringing me breakfast in bed (how lucky I am was not lost on me for a second). And then I spent the day pottering – I read a goodly chunk of Passage. I wanted to spend a day like Alex, just reading a book. And it was as nice as it sounds! I got up intermittently and pottered around, unpacking and putting laundry away and so on but I really just immersed in my book.
I did do my 3pm freak out – I tend to feel like 3pm is this turnabout moment in the day. At work I get up and make a coffee to try and get through the last 2 or so hours of the day. On a Sunday, I feel like if I haven’t done everything I want to get done, it’s like the day (and the weekend) is getting away from me. But today! I have tomorrow still to do so 3pm came, I slightly stressed and then could let it go. Monday off was a GREAT idea!
I did get a few bits and pieces for TPP sorted out. Not a lot, there is a lot more to catch up on, but even being able to get started on it was stress relieving.
Hoping tomorrow will be more of the same. And that I can report myself almost fully unpacked, if not decluttered fully.
This is the mission I have presented myself with. After the posts of last week I realised that I needed to actively do something to turn my current state around. I put in early in the week for Monday as annual leave and it was approved on Friday. I am hoping that a long weekend, with a focus of relaxation and sleep might help me get some of my groove back.
Of course, this did not prevent me from drawing up a schedule and task list for this relaxation and sleep filled weekend. To which C declared, “As the sun will rise every morning and set every evening, so too Alisa will overcommit herself.” Whatever. How do you know if you achieved anything if you can’t tick it off a list?
Still, I have my list and I’m working through it. I started last night with a long hot bath, my first in this house, a glass of champagne and a good book. Today we met Barbara and Kathryn for a lovely brunch on the waterside at Toast. Then we visited my parents, popped past the Post Office (and collected two books that came in the mail! Octavia Butler and Holly Black) and then headed off to the Good Food and Wine Show. We got tickets last minute from a friend of C’s who could no longer make it and had seats to see Gary and George (from Masterchef). We spent a good couple of hours tasting wine and looking at all sorts of things – C was great, I was not enjoying the crowds – highlights included some lovely Moscato wines, a ginger liqueur, a hot cocoa with chilli, white belgian chocolate mousse, an excellent jam show bag (with 2 jars of jam, 6 mini jars of jam and a balsamic vinegar). And of course the Gary and George show which was hilarious. We were the last show of the day and got an added bonus Ready Steady Cook off with some shopping centre winners from Karrinyup and Carousel cooking with Matt Moran and Manu. And it all went haywire and George and Gary came back and it was maybe not the best cooking but a pretty entertaining show all the same.
I tend to stress out when I’ve been out all day on the weekend – and away from my computer where there is work to do – but C has been reminding me the last couple of weekends that this was *exactly* what I dreamed of doing when I was working on Swancon. That the spending hours with friends over coffee or wandering around an expo with my boyfriend is the way I want to spend my time in this recovery year.
So, it was a good day.
And tomorrow is a pottering around the house day. Much I want to do, and not do. And a couple of posts I hope to get round to writing too.
I’m still living in Struggletown and hating it. I’ve still got the waking up creep going on – getting up later and later. It’s really bad. This week I’ve had trouble sleeping through the night – last night was woken up several times (one by C and the other by a dog about to throw up in the middle of the bed). It’s that kind of a week. And I dreamed I accidentally ate chicken. No idea what that could be about other than prompting me to wonder just when I last ate protein (other than the milk and the protein powder in my cereal in the morning).
It ended up being a short day on top of that – after wandering in whilst there was a semi important meeting going on in the middle of the building. I had the dentist. Again. Though this was the last filling. Hurrah. Until the check up in September. I dunno. The filling didn’t seem *so* bad or at least not the worst of all the ones I’ve had but he used *the* biggest injection needle, asked me if I’d eaten cause it was going to stay numb for much longer than usual and then as he was administering it, he was talking me through it with breathing instructions. I started to panic that this was going to be some horrible procedure. It kind of was in so far as I have a reasonably easy gag reflex and he had several cotton ball thingies under my tongue and lots of instruments in my mouth for ages. I practiced meditation and repeatedly pointed out to myself that at least it didn’t hurt. Well, not where he was working, anyway. My mouth is still with the pain from the gritting the teeth thing so all my teeth hurt if you knock them or whatever, which sometimes happens at the dentist. But in all, this feeling didn’t seem that bad and the worst of it was all my lips, half my tongue all the way down my throat and the side of my face including my ear were numb for about 4 hours. Still. No pain.
I visited my parents before heading home and off to Puppy Playgroup Graduation. I’m kinda sad not to check in with the other pups and pup peeps after this week. It was kinda fun. Today was still hilarious, FINALLY Sasha was excited to be there and very playful with the other puppies and the people. He was the centre of attention and loved it! Soooo cute. But also sad he only really enjoyed the last week of it. The other weeks he’s been very timid and stayed with us, often facing us and pretending the rest wasn’t going on. Still. He can now socialise nicely, answer to his name, sit, come when called (even in the midst of playing with other pups), lay down, leave it, and um, a new trick of roll over that he performed on the night since the handshake did not go so well. It was a very lovely class and the woman who runs it was great, we’re going to take the adolescent classes when pup is the right age. She gave so many freebies and things, I think nearly every week we got a gift. I can hardly imagine how much it costs her. We got a certificate for graduating and a little medal for his dog collar – apparently the local ranger will keep dogs longer if caught and found to be wearing one (it says: Puppy Playground Graduate) because it means someone invested in the dog. How sad about what that says about the rest of the dogs they impound.
Course now, I have heard several times from the other room: Is that how a Puppy Playschool Graduate behaves?
Too funny.
In the midst of it all, in the middle of my day I was wandering back to my building and I thought “ooh yay, I get to see C tonight!” as I often used to do when we were only seeing each other one to two times a week. And then I thought, “hey I get to see him everyday, I LIVE with him” and I still had that excited newness about it all. Nice. I don’t really want to lose that feeling. But I am really enjoying living with him. It’s just comfy.
The second season of the Twelve Planets is now available for preorder. The three books will be out before the end of November and are:
Bad Power by Deborah Biancotti
Showtime by Narrelle M Harris
Through the Splintered Walls by Kaaron Warren
The season most definitely has a dark bent. Biancotti explores use & abuse of power. You’ll find yourself wondering just what your own bad power is. Harris brings her quick sense of humour & talent for the quirky to her collection. You’ll laugh but you’ll also be deeply discomforted. Warren will take you on a journey through the back roads of Australian towns and leave you feeling uneasy and more than a little creeped out.
Preorders for the season can ber mde over at the Twelfth Planet Press store where you can also upgrade your subscription from a single or two book purchase to a subscription to the full series.
The bad news is there is a small delay on the release of the third volume of the Twelve Planets, Thief of Lives by Lucy Sussex. But the good news is it went to press today. And the even better news is that we will release the next three volumes of the series all before the end of November.
So here’s some sneak peeks! The cover of Thief of Lives:
And some scoopiness on the contents, the titles of the four short stories:
Alchemy
The Fountain of Justice
The Subject of O
Thief of Lives
In the introduction, Karen Joy Fowler says,
The four stories showcased here could not be more different, one from another, but collectively they constitute an excellent introduction to the talents of the incomparable Lucy Sussex. I can’t imagine the person who would read these and not want to read more.
Pay attention to this woman! Turn these pages! Here be monsters and mysteries and marvels.
And the back cover says of the book:
Why
are certain
subjects so
difficult to talk
about? What
is justice?
Why do
writers
think that
other people’s
lives are fair game?
And what do we really
know about the first chemist?
A story about history, women,
science (and also the demonic); a crime
story, based upon a true crime; a realist satire
of the supposedly sex-savvy; and a story exploring lies,
and the space between the real and the unreal. Welcome to
the worlds of Lucy Sussex, and to her many varied modes.
•
Pay attention to this woman! Turn these pages! Here
be monsters and mysteries and marvels.
– Karen Joy Fowler
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