Expectations

I'm not shy. Not exactly. Okay, a little, or a lot. Engaging in what amounts to personal correspondence is daunting. I wouldn't say I'm shy. Rather I want to call it awkward. Beyond the usual social anxieties. Partly the product of being an only child for nearly ten years. The other half of the equation is expectation.

When I was twelve, I promised to write to my great-grandmother. We enjoyed each other's company, but we often lived several states apart. Being a child, I didn't think too deeply on the words and the impact they truly carried. A month or two went by, and my mother reminded me to write it. So I sat down at my little draftsman's desk, which more often than not was a stand-in for a console on the starship Enterprise. The piece of paper sat there blank. I twirled my pencil. Ideas ran through my mind, but every time I put the pencil tip to the sheet, I stopped. I was twelve. Great Grandma was eighty-one. What could we possibly have in common or of mutual interest? We were family, but we saw each other a few times at most. Unlike the rest of the horde of great-grandchildren, I was mild-mannered. I didn't go looking for trouble or to be mischievous. When she spoke I listened and she wanted to hear from me.

What I ended up writing her turned out to be an elementary school letter of lameness. I wrote about what subjects I liked. Briefly, in short, terse words. They expressed nothing except disseminating information. I tossed in other garbage, filler. Mom thought it sucked. I knew it sucked. We mailed it anyway. Great Grandma died a few months later, but I heard she read the letter.

Awkwardness and expectation, it comes down to these two things. Expectation caused me to freeze on the letter. There is also the chicken or the egg paradox. What came first, awkwardness or expectation. It's often hard to tell where they begin and end. Recently, my mom wanted me to do something. I don't remember what, but it involved communicating something to someone. When the conversation swayed towards the pitch, she made an offhand comment, "You're a writer, write something." Even thinking of her words, I want to pantomime taking a punch. First, and foremost, the hardest thing to ask a creative person to do is be creative. Second, it's impossible to do it on the fly. Third, the expectant results chased me away from whatever she wanted.

Sure, I can write a 96,000 word novel, its sequel fast approaching 120,000 words, and have plotting for several more stories. Try to get me to tailor something for a desired outcome and -- Well, you might as well have not asked at all. The result is the same. So to answer the question of why I don't blog with any sort of schedule, rhythm, or frequency, I'm too awkward to talk about myself and the unknown expectations of the audience scares the shit out of me. That doesn't even cover the fear of my own expectations. While I have mostly broken my self-editing habits, being so open has me reaching for the backspace key, or at least glancing its way.

I surrendered long ago to the fact I reveal myself through my writing. It's a package deal with the career. You can't write anything without showing who you are in some fashion. However, when you're writing fiction, you convince yourself the lines blur easily. Camouflaging your thoughts and emotions within scenes and words is as much art as the craft itself. Some are so good at it, they fool the whole world into thinking you're a tolerant and caring human being when in real life, you are a hateful bigot. (Though in hindsight, the boys were boyish and the girls were girlish motif of that series should have been a giveaway. Also the clear and divisive hatred of giants. Ah, the things we learn.)

When the fictional veils are torn away, and you're standing there on a stage before the world, you're alone. Your characters aren't going to pop up and steal the spotlight from you. Your audience, your fans, want to hear about you instead of your creations. Even though you have already shown them the multifaceted craziness of your heart, mind, and soul, they want to experience it raw and unfiltered. The current day "cancel culture" and everything is political landscape freaks me out even more.

The real me isn't entertaining. He is a smart ass who hides behind his patented and trademarked sarcasm. He's foreboding and entirely too insecure in and about himself. He doesn't like being visible, especially since its impossible for him not to be. He struggles to speak and when he does, he knows more than likely he will be misunderstood. (Looking at you Starbucks Drive-thru! Venti Black and White Mocha Frap. How hard is that to understand after repeating it four times?!) Frazzle, interrupt, or throw him a curve ball him mid-speaking and you'll have a front row seat to a grown man unable to vocalize anything resembling speech. That's the real me. To paraphrase an extraordinarily famous nerd of Ensign proportions: "I will disappoint you."

And while that will be the case, I can only hope you don't hold it against my characters and stories. :)