High-Stakes Secrets

Psst... Can you keep a secret?

Recently I've been consuming media about secrets - what a character will do to keep a secret, what happens when a secret gets out...

Jason and I recently watched There's Someone Inside Your House. It's a horror movie about a killer making his way through high school students with secrets. At one point, one of the characters throws what he calls a "secret" party. The attendees are encouraged to share their secrets, the idea being that if your secret is out, the killer no longer has a hold over you. These being high schoolers, the secrets range from crushes to miscarriages. Though as you might expect, not everyone confesses the Real Secret, the Big Secret, the High-Stakes Secret, and people keep dying.

I also recently finished reading Speak, a book about a high schooler keeping a secret that takes such a toll on her that she pretty much stops speaking all-together. Read more about that here.

It made me start thinking about my stories. What secrets do my characters have? What secrets do they consider to be high-stakes? When I was in high school my Big Secret was who I had a crush on, which seems so stupid now. But it's a matter of perspective. Sometimes it's a matter of culture or your place in society, too. A secret that is a big deal for a character in one story, in one world, may be laughable to worry about in another story and world.

I have neglected my characters' secrets. I don't even know what secrets some of my characters have. I need to go through my stories (and especially Brinyor, now that I've decided to workshop it some) and figure out what people's secrets are.

Altos Have More Fun

There's a point in every young actress's life when she wants to be the ingenue. She wants to be Christine Daae, Sandy, Eliza Doolittle, Cinderella, Maria von Trapp. These are all leading ladies - some are lovely damsels, wilting flowers - and they are all sopranos.

And then there's a point when the actress realizes that Reno Sweeney, Rizzo, Velma Kelly, Mame* - the altos - are actually the more fun roles to play. (Yes, of course this is a broad generalization, and yes, it does depend a lot on the play. Tracy, the "ingenue" of Hairspray is still a more "fun" role than Christine Daae.)

*You don't even really have to be a great singer for Mame. Lucille Ball, after many years of smoking, played Mame and basically spoke in rhythm for most of the songs.

When I was a teenager, I wanted so badly to play an ingenue. I wasn't the highest soprano out there, but I had a good range. The problem was, I didn't have The Look. My mom once cautioned me that a role I wanted was one the directors saw as being "pale and frail." Well, I've got the pale down. The frail... not so much.

I go more into that aspect of my time in the theatre in this post.

About the time I hit my early-mid twenties (shortly before I stopped doing theatre altogether), it occurred to me that the altos had more fun. I started auditioning for roles like Rizzo; even though I was technically a soprano or mezzosoprano, I had a decently broad range, so higher altos (like Rizzo) were perfectly feasible for me, from a vocal standpoint, at least.

Driving along in the car sometimes, belting (as best I can, now that my range is more limited) along with Anything Goes, I do kind of wish I could go back and remind myself not to ONLY audition for the leading lady. Sometimes the alto sidekick has more fun.

Put it in Your Pocket

This morning I prepared to meet a friend for a walk. I was packing Elianna's diaper bag, and tucking small things into the pockets of my leggings. (Yes, I have leggings with pockets - they're awesome.) I think that, in conjunction with Elianna's Wonder Woman t-shirt (made to look like it had a little utility belt), made me wonder why utility belts aren't a common thing.

Wouldn't that be fantastic? Haul around all the small items you need without worrying about it falling out of your pockets, or having to carry a purse? I'd love to have a utility belt. I do have a steampunk pouch that attaches to a belt that I occasionally use in lieu of a purse, but I'm talking multiple pockets and pouches on a belt.

There was a story I was going to write back an embarrassingly long time ago where one of the characters had an absurd amount of pockets and pouches hanging off her belt. (I have long since abandoned that story, which was basically Harry Potter fan-fic, for much better stories.)

Last week I was thinking about pockets in the context of writing, too. I posted a writing prompt on my Facebook page asking fellow writers to consider what unique item their character carries in a pocket or pouch. I do like little character sketches and insights like that - what small, defining quirk or characteristic can you come up with for a character you're writing?

Do you have something special, something unique, that you carry with you in a pocket or purse?

Bad Boys and Phantoms and Elves, Oh My!

Despite being married to a nice guy, I have to admit that I have a soft spot for the bad boys, at least in fiction. I had varying levels of crushes on the Phantom of the Opera (musical version, not novel version) and the Goblin King in college. (But then, I'm sure a lot of people have had a crush on David Bowie at some point or other.)

There's this stereotype (or archetype?) of good girls liking bad boys. I never went so far as actually wanting to be involved with someone who was dangerous, but the reason for the fascination with the dangerous man fascinates me. It's a huge staple in literature. I'm sure that most of the women out there would rather have a nice stable Sam Gamgee than a singing sociopath, but the dashing bad guy is what sells.

I wonder how much of it is biological instinct. The little lizard part of your brain tells you to look for the other, the different, the alien - in other words, not someone who might be too closely related to you. I wonder how much of it goes back to when the "good, safe" men where the men in your village and the other other men you might encounter were dangerous invaders come to steal brides who were not too genetically similar to them. (I also think this idea of the neighboring clan abducting women may be where the stories of elves/fae/sidhe stealing people away comes from.) I think this may be where the teenage fascination with the bad boy comes from - Daddy approves of the boys he knows, so the leather-wearing motorcycle-riding boy from "the wrong side of the tracks" satisfies that instinctive need for someone different, someone "other."

The modern woman who knows that abduction is not the right way to find a bride still gets a thrill reading a book or watching a movie where a rebel highlander, a vampire, or a musical murderer swoops in and snatches his love interest away. It takes a while for ingrained instinct to catch up with 21st century sensibilities.

The Non-Super Superheroes

We all have a favorite super hero with a special talent.  Some superheros have super strength or the ability to fly.  Some have a special physical difference, such as claws or being able to transform into a different shape.  Most superheroes out there have useful - or even frightful - special powers.  You never hear about the super"heroes" that have the ability to do a mundane task incredibly well, or who have a power that, while impressive, is entirely useless.  Unless you're watching Mystery Men or the superhero game on Whose Line is it Anyway.

But if there were a collection of superheros out there, with mundane or useless powers, what would they be?  

I personally have a couple "super" powers:
-When going somewhere new for the first time, I will get lost.  I will make a wrong turn somewhere, even if I have very clear directions.  Even if it's not a complicated route.  It's guaranteed.
-I also have a magical cell phone.  It never fails that if I am stuck in traffic and think that I am going to be late, that my picking up the phone to call or text someone to alert them to my predicament alters something in the alignment of the planets.  Traffic will begin moving again.  That broken down car that was blocking a lane will finally be towed out of the way.  The jack-knifed tractor trailer will right itself and the stopped traffic will part like the Red Sea, allowing me to cruise along my merry way.  I will arrive on time, and whoever I called or texted will say, "I thought you said you were running late."

I realize the latter example is actually helpful, though it's so strangely specific as to only happen very rarely.

So let's close our eyes and imagine a special school for mutants and superheroes.  But not the gifted ones.  Not the elite ones.  The ones with the weird, unhelpful powers.  You have been recruited for your mutant power, and now it's time to share!  Is it the miraculous ability to always ruin a new baking recipe?  The power of coming in the front door and tripping over an item you thought you lost now that you've broken down and bought a replacement?  An amazing anti-charisma with dice that ensures you will always make the worst possible roll?  Revel in your amazingly-mundane abilities!

The Costume Makes the Character

In a previous blog post a couple years ago, I talked about the importance of costume in character and world building.  You can read that here: 

Revisiting "Costume and Character" Post, April 2016

As a theatre major and a costume designer, I personally find that figuring out the character's costume really helps solidify who they are, what they are, where they are, and all those great W's of a character. Granted, there are times that going into too much detail can be distracting. As much as I love reading George R. R. Martin, he does have a tendency to go into so much detail that only a cosplayer who is going to be actually building this costume is still interested at the end of the description.

But it is helpful to know something about how a character is dressed and why. Did she pick out this outfit herself? Did she MAKE it herself, and what does that say about the world she lives in and the position she has in it? Does the character have a certain color, or range of colors that he wears exclusively? And again, is it a case of choosing that color, or is it more that he's in a position that he has to wear this for whatever reason? Regardless of the how or why the clothes were made or chosen, how does the character wear them? Does she take pride in her appearance? And is the pride related to her position? Does he just throw on whatever is lying around? Or has he specifically chosen clothes that make it LOOK like he has picked up whatever is lying around?

This is just as important in a contemporary peice as it is in a fantasy, sci-fi, or historical peice. I think it's something that maybe people think about less for modern peices, but showing the difference between a character who wears a nice dress even when she's working in a book store and a character who has just thrown on whatever rumpled khakis and t-shirt are lying around already tells you something about the two charatcers, even if you don't know anything else about them yet.

As I said above, I majored in theatre, and when I did so I chose a double concentration in performance and design. There was a decent period of time in college where I was always working on some costume project or another. But I was coming at it from the other side than I am now. In college, I was given a fully-formed character and told, "figure out what they're wearing." I had clues in the text to go by. Sometimes the playwright has very specific instructions. There's a Chekhov play, I don't remember which one now, where the dialogue indicates several times that a character is wearing a very tacky combination of a pink dress and a green sash. But this, of course, had it's reasons. Chekhov was pointing out not only that this character was awkward and didn't have a good fashion sense, but also that the other characters were petty enough to talk it up.

Now I come at it from the other side. I have to make sure that if I have pointed out what the character is wearing, that it's important. I'm the sort of person that reading a story I see it in enough detail that I don't necessarily need to know every nucance of a character's outfit. If you tell me they're at a ball, I see them in the finery of the time period you've already set up - unless you have made a point to note that one of the characters is wearing a suit that is at least a decade out of style.

This is actually something I need to work on for Brinyor. I don't know that I have ever described what Rigan (the main character) is wearing in any particular scene. (What makes this a particularly heinous oversight is that her mother dyes fabric for a living.) I do have one scene where I have described what Janus, another major character, is wearing, but really only because he is wearing it for an important ceremony and he's not happy about it. I really need to go back to the peice and figure out scenes where the reader needs to know what people are wearing and why. Maybe that's what I'll do next.

I have been thinking about this again lately, as I work on The Wolf and the Sheath.  I have, fortunately, done a little bit more to describe what Reyala wears in this piece than I had for Rigan in Brinyor, above.  But I still need to do more work on that.

Reyala travels from one society to another in this story.  The clothing of the two societies is different.  I have a very clear image in my head of what she wore in one place, and what she wears in another.  I still need to work on translating those to the page.  Are her clothes easy to move around in?  Can she dress and undress herself?  How does the difference in weather affect what she wears in one place rather than the other?

More than that, though, I need to work on the other characters' clothing.  It occurs to me that I have barely touched on ANY of the other characters' clothes, except one.  Even though Reyala is the main character, that doesn't mean that I can neglect what the rest of her society are wearing.

Write What Ails You

If you've been following this blog for a while, you've probably noticed that on occasion I will talk about how I've been late with a post or gotten less done than planned due to a bad headache.  In my case, "bad headache" generally means "migraine."  Now, thankfully, these aren't the completely incapacitating, "12-hours of crushing, vomit-inducing pain" migraines I used to get when I was a kid, but they are, according to my ENT, that type of headache.

What does this have to do with writing, aside from the fact that sometimes my left eye socket hurts too much to focus on a screen?  It occurred to me this weekend (a substantial portion of which I've spent laying down due to a "bad headache") that I have several stories where characters are affected by similar issues.  

In Bright Fire, the main character's brother suffers from migraines and chronic sinus and ear infections (though they don't call them that).  In Brinyor, the main character's little sister and mother suffer from sinus headaches like this - which means that she knows what to do when a friend of hers is dangerously ill and their healer doesn't know what else to try.  Her grandmother's remedy for this type of sinus issue ends up being an important clue to something else later in the story.  I have another story I haven't started writing yet, but have a solid story-line in my head, where the main character is a young queen who has identified 4 distinct types of headaches that affect her; the story begins as she develops one of her weather headaches as a "storm of the century" moves in.  Later when the same symptoms return, she realizes another monster storm is imminent in time to get people to safety.  

Oddly enough, the last story above is the only one in which the main character suffers from these kind of headaches (though Bright Fire has issues with being inexplicably cold, which is another issue I have).
 

The Christmas Belles

A Christmas Carol was published in 1843.  Lately, partly because of things going on in the news, and partly just because of the time of year, there's been a decent amount of talk about how we still often seem to ignore the lessons Scrooge learned over 150 years ago.  

But I'm not going to be talking about Scrooge today; I'm going to be talking about the women of A Christmas Carol.

First, let's discuss Belle.  Belle doesn't get a lot of "screen time," but she is arguably an extremely strong and progressive woman.  In A Christmas Carol, Belle spends a very long time engaged to Scrooge; ostensibly because Scrooge claims that he wants to wait until his finances are better so that they can afford a good home after they marry.  But after years of Scrooge putting the marriage off because he still doesn't feel that he is successful enough, Belle realizes that he will never attain his unreachable financial goal, and worse, that he has come to value riches more than he values Belle herself.  With this realization, she does something drastic - she breaks the engagement.  This was virtually unheard of during the Victorian era.

During this time period, many women would not have had a way to support themselves without either their father still caring for them, or a husband.  For Belle to break a multi-year engagement was extremely drastic.  A woman who had been engaged but was no longer would have been viewed with suspicion at best, and become a pariah at worst.  And yet, in this story, we see Belle many years later, happily married to another man.  Belle took a huge risk, something most women probably would not have done in her position.  And yes, it did work out for her, but she was incredibly brave to do what she did.

Then there are the Cratchit women.  First, Mrs. Cratchit.  And, yes, here I'm going on the interpretation of her as presented by A Muppet Christmas Carol, because I haven't read the original since college...  Mrs. Cratchit is a strong woman.  She cares for her family (both emotionally and technically) and can be what is needed for them at any given time.  She is tender when Tim is ill, does her best to show a strong front to Bob when Tim dies in the avoided future (despite the fact that her heart is broken, too), and when Scrooge comes knocking to joke about Bob being "late" for work, she is right there to defend her husband.  (OK, it helps that she's played by Miss Piggy...)

And who remembers Martha Cratchit?  (Don't worry, most people don't - she's not in a lot of the adaptations...)  Martha is the eldest Cratchit child.  I don't recall her age from having read the book, but she's old enough that she's working somewhere that she doesn't come home every day.  And, as we see from Scrooge's reluctance to close the office, and the fact that food shops were open, Martha is somehow able to swing getting off from work to come see her family for Christmas.  I imagine she was a maid or cook, possibly a governess.  These were jobs that would not have Christmas Day off.*  I imagine that she had this sort of job, because her parents are NOT expecting her to be home.  She arrives home and her siblings make a big deal about making her hide so that their parents will be surprised to see her.

*In Britain, Boxing Day - the day after Christmas - was the day that the Help had the day off, and leftovers from Christmas were boxed up so they could take food home with them on their day off.

So while we always like to think of and remember that miraculous change of heart, the reformed misanthrope, whether it's Scrooge or the Grinch, let us also remember the Christmas Belles - the strong women who are just as worthy of attention.

Stranger Things Than Fiction

When I was in high school, Winona Ryder was my favorite actress.  I loved her in Little Women, The Crucible, and other movies.  She played the kind of roles I wanted to play (or in the case of The Crucible, the kind of roles I wished I was brave enough to play).  And then she went and got crazy for a while.

I kind of unintentionally have been watching a lot of her lately, though.  I binged-watched Stranger Things a couple weeks ago, and, because I'm reading a book on the Salem Witch Trials, I re-watched The Crucible this week.  And what I kind of latched onto with both of those pieces is that she plays a character who, admittedly, is kind of crazy.  But each of them is a crazy that makes sense.

In Stranger Things, she plays a mother who loves her child so truly and unhesitatingly that she (twice!) turns her home into a House of Crazy on the off chance it MIGHT help her son.  

In The Crucible, it's a case where either the clingy ex-girlfriend/woman scorned thing has become so strong as to push her over the edge, or that she has gotten so caught up in her own lies that she starts believing them.  

We believe Joyce when she is CONVINCED that Will is talking to her through Christmas lights, because what we have seen makes sense; we follow her logic and agree with her.  When Abbigail shrieks at an invisible yellow shapeshifter in the rafters and then climbs over the pews to get away from it, it makes sense because we have been following her journey and know exactly what she's up to.  Her actions may not be rational in that we, the audience, know that she's faking - but we understand that she is faking because she has too much invested in the lie to let it go.  And that makes sense to us.

It's strange looking at these two performances by a very gifted actress, and then watching her make bizarre faces at an award show that just confuse us.  And that's the difference between fiction and reality.  The fiction has to make sense.  If a character in a novel, play, TV show, etc. acts bizarrely, we have to understand why, and a good author will show us.  Reality doesn't have that constraint; that's why we have the term "stranger than fiction."

Am I Too Picky?

Sometimes I read a book and I get really into it and issues with minor details don't bother me.

And sometimes... not.

I recently finished reading a book about a group of scientists discovering a megalodon shark alive in the Pacific.  Cool premise - giant, prehistoric shark is made aware of small, tasty humans and wreaks havoc.  In practice, though, the story was less than satisfying.  Most of the characters were unlikable - like, seriously, the loathsome wife existed ONLY so that you would kinda cheer when she got eaten by the shark.  The protagonist was bland.  The "mentor" figure who was set up to be a wise environmentalist made stupid decisions and put everyone at risk.  The whole story would have been avoided if people followed basic safety protocol - not rushing a risky submarine dive when there was a storm coming,* not choosing a submarine pilot who has a known history of claustrophobia-induced panic attacks, and not choosing afore-mentioned submarine pilot who hadn't dove in 7 years and who was unfamiliar with the new vessel over an active pilot who had worked extensively with the new model and the lead pilot because she was "too emotional."  

*Said storm** never actually occurred.
**I was hoping this would be like Jurassic Park and Sphere, where the action is set off by a storm that locks the characters into an area for the duration, as opposed to just being a flimsy excuse to ignore procedure.

The only character who was interesting (or, rather, could have been) was way under-utilized.  A young scientist and submarine pilot, she was overshadowed by her older brother (also a submarine pilot) and her school-girl crush on the protagonist from when her father trained him years earlier.  We were told she was too emotional to pilot a submarine into the Mariana Trench, but never actually saw her be more than just slightly aggravated (and this aggravation was always justified).  Her one problem was that to begin with she was antagonistic and kept calling the main character misogynistic without provocation, but after about the first 30 pages that went away.

(Though I guess maybe these aren't minor details.)

Despite the fact that every few pages, something (the complaints above, logic bombs, etc.) would take me out of the story, I kept reading - mainly because I wanted to see what happened with the shark. 

Maybe I'm being too picky.  Maybe I should have given the book a chance to redeem itself, even though just 10 pages in I had already had so many issues with the characters that I kind of felt like I was looking for problems.

As I mentioned above, there have been other books where I notice issues - historical inaccuracies, characterization problems - that don't necessarily prevent me from enjoying the book.  For example, a few months ago, I read a historical fiction piece about the Romanov sisters.  The girls all came down with the measles right around the time their father abdicated, and someone mentioned antibiotics at one point.  While I remember thinking, "I don't think antibiotics were around during WWI," the rest of the story was compelling enough that I let the slip go and kept reading.

Likewise, there's a series I'm currently reading that, while it is not historical, is heavily based on medieval England.  It always throws me for a loop when they mention drinking coffee, but I remind myself that this is fantasy, not history.

So I guess maybe the question is not "am I being too picky?" but rather, "at what point do the problems become so overwhelming that you can't fully immerse yourself in the story anymore?"  As a writer, I'd be curious to know what your reading turn-offs are: poor characterization?  Historical or technical inaccuracies?  Logistical problems?  

Please comment - I often ask about things you enjoy as readers, but it's important to know what can ruin a story, too.

What's in (the Spelling of) a Name?

Let's talk about a character in my next big project*.

The main character in the novel I have decided to work on next in named Reala.  For the purposes of this post, that's really all you need to know about her.

As some of you who have followed this blog for a while know, one of the things I consider strongly both when reading and writing is spelling vs. pronunciation of a character name.  In fact, it's kind of been in my head a lot recently because I'm reading Lady Macbeth by Susan Fraser King and, as you might expect of a book set in 11th century Scotland, there are a lot of old Celtic names that are most definitely not pronounced the way they are spelled.

I personally find it kind of annoying to pick up a book, begin reading, and have an idea in my head of how to pronounce the names, only to find out several chapters in that what I had in my head has been wrong for dozens or even hundreds of pages.  (And in this particular book, the character list, glossary, and pronunciation guide is in the back of the book, and it has spoilers: "Dudgdhe - pronounced Dude - son of Gusgeheh - pronounced Guy.  Killed by Brugheheh - pronounced Bro.")

So, because I think that at least the main characters need to have names that are very clear right off the bat, I'd like to know from you, my readers, when you see the name "Reala," what is your immediate thought as to how it is pronounced?
A. Ray-all-a
B. Reel-a
C. Something else

Please comment! (Yes, you may be the one to determine the spelling of a character's name in a future novel!)

*No, I'm not working on Wolf and Sheath just yet.  At least, I'm not doing any major work on it until after the wedding, but I am thinking about it a lot, and may start working on small things like name research as I have a little free time here and there.

Dress for the Role You Want

Most of you have seen the meme online: "My boss told me to dress for the job I want, not the job I have, so now I'm in a disciplinary meeting dressed as Wonder Woman/Darth Vader/The Goblin King/[insert other cool but oddly dressed character here]."

There is a very strong visual connection between clothing and character, and I don't just mean in a "the guy in the white hat is the good guy" or "the girl in the red coat dies" way.  Human beings are very visual, and what each of us wears tells something to the people that see us.  I'm not saying that's good or bad, it's just the way we're hardwired.

Whether we like to admit it or not, we would react differently to being aproached on the street by a young man in a sharp suit as compared to a young man in grubby casual clothes.  A young woman in provocative clothing would deliver a different message than the same young woman in conservative business dress, or even in "mom jeans."

As a former costume designer, I was very aware of this.  You have seconds to make a visual impression on your audience.  Now you can decide to misdirect - put the character who is eventually going to stab everyone in the back in average clothing in unassuming pastels - but the moment your character is out in view of the audience, they are making assumptions and judgements (for better or worse) based on what they see.

The great thing about writing is you don't have that snap visual decision made by your audience. You can take your time to describe the character when it best suits the story.  You can build in layers.  Maybe they need to know immediately that her hair is red, but it can wait 'til later to point out that she mainly dresses in purple.  Or maybe the color or cut of his clothes are important and need to be described as soon as possible, while his physical stature and description are less important and can wait. 

Back to the joke about dressing as a character from above, how many of you feel that your clothing is dictated by the "character" you have to present yourself as at work?  Are you able to dress as "yourself?"  For example, if we're going on the "dress for what you want to be" idea, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the job I dress for is generally "witch."  I don't mean a "and your little dog, too!" witch (though I tend more that way in the winter - striped tights and dagged velvet skirts don't mix well with 90 degrees and high humidity).  I mean a Pratchett witch.

Those of you familiar with Terry Pratchett's Discworld books will be familiar with what I mean.  The primiary purpose of Terry Pratchett's witches is to know things.  To know everything.  To know when to use the things they know to help people, and when to just be quiet and keep out of it.  If I had to sum up the primary purpose of all the jobs I've had in the past 10 years, "knowing things" would actually be a pretty good description.

In addition, I was extremely heavily influenced by a little series by Monica Furlong when I was a kid.  Most of you haven't heard of it, and I'm pretty sure it's out of print now.  It's refered to as the Doran series; "doran" being a word that literally means something like portal or doorway, but is used in the series to be mean a wise person who lives in harmony with the world.  It takes place in the late ancient/early medieval British isles.

So I dress like a witch, but a witch as filtered through Downton Abbey with a little bit of hippy thrown in for good measure: broomstick skirts and lacy tops in the summer, lots of heavy dark fabric in 20's, 30's, and Oz cuts in the winter. 

I came across my personal sense of style in college; I was coming out of a period of rebellion against contemporary fashion and had worn mainly ankle length jumpers and pale colors for the majority of high school.  But I have a distinct memory of going to a meet and greet the weekend before freshman year, striding out in a long black full skirt (so full that I could do a high kick unencumbered) with a fitted burgundy top (two colors that were new to my wardrobe then but that I wear all the time now).  I was also wearing snugly laced black ankles boots and I remember thinking that this outfit was "me."  And not just me, but also witchy and powerful.

So back to you, my readers - what is your character?  What do you wear that is just "you?"  And where can you wear it - or are you lucky enough that you can dress as yourself all the time?
 

The Gorgeous Losers of Wrestling

(The below contains mild spoilers for the first episode of GLOW, but those spoilers really shouldn't do anything but convince you to watch the show : )

I've read somewhere, probably multiple places, that the most compelling characters are the ones who have lost everything, the ones who have hit rock bottom.

Jason and I have been watching GLOW on Netflix.  It's a show about... well, it's a show about losers, when you get down to it.  In the 1980's, a washed-up director is attempting to get a women's wrestling TV show off the ground, and all he has is the dregs, the losers, the people who have hit rock bottom and have literally nothing else.  And it is glorious.

Each episode, we learn a little bit more about these "losers," about what rock bottom is for each of them.  I'm not sure what I expected going into the show - maybe more silliness.  And there is humor, don't get me wrong, but there is also drama and struggle, and characters that you identify with.  These characters, these losers, they're the ones that you watch claw their way back up from nothing, and you root for them.

It's also doubly impactful for me watching it, as a former actress.  Ruth, one of the major characters, is an unsuccessful actress.  She goes to auditions and never gets called back.  She's taking acting classes, but has no money for food or utilities.  I've been there.  She accepts a casting call for the wrestling show mainly because she has nothing else and she has been assured that it's not porn.  And she's the worst!  She complains.  She can't take direction.  She doesn't want to play the bad guy.  For someone who has been in enough acting classes that one would assume she'd have at least some physical (dance, stage combat, etc.) training, she has no physical prowess.  And I sit there thinking, "god, she is the WORST actress!"  And then it dawns on me that yes, she IS the worst actress - that's the point.  Her story arch is going to be that she grows as an actress once she starts taking this seriously.

And - spoiler alert - she does.  She gets kicked out of the show for not being able to take or follow directions.  She completely loses it in her acting class when the teacher falls asleep in the middle of her Tennessee Williams monologue.  Then she pulls herself together.  She starts watching wrestling on TV - she researches the characters and the moves.  She shows up at practice for the show, striding in the door in costume and makeup like she owns the ring, and proceeds to deliver a verbal throw-down of the Maggie the Cat as portrayed by Hulk Hogan.  And then she gets her ass kicked by her (ex)best friend.  And it is one of the best pilot episodes I have ever seen.

Even if it were just Ruth, it would be a good show.  But it's not just Ruth.  We're slowly seeing characters being torn down, their vulnerabilities revealed.  And now, about 6 episodes in, we're starting to see them make their comebacks.  We're seeing them transform into something new and better.  We're seeing them start to glow.

Confession Time: I'm Not Super Girly

It may come as something of a shock from someone who wears skirts a majority of the time, but I'm really not all that girly.  I can't really do my hair.  My makeup routine takes about a minute and a half in the morning.  Said "makeup" is mostly baby powder (yes, 'cause I'm that pale).  I haven't had my nails done professionally since my senior prom.  The last time I did my own nails is coming up on 2 years ago, and that was for my grandmother's funeral.

So now here I am, 35 years old with no hair or makeup skills (aside from stage hair and makeup, and even that was a long time ago), and I'm getting married in a couple months.  I'm now having to make appointments for these things, and when people ask me what I want to do, I don't even know the right words to use.

Most people have never asked, but there are reasons why I don't do much with my makeup or my hair.  One of them is because of the time and money you save by not doing much with either.  (The afore-mentioned baby powder?  99 cents for a 3 month supply of makeup.)  But I think actually a big part of it is because I was in theatre at such a young age.

Aside from the Christmas pageants and small scale elementary school plays that everyone does, I began my work on the stage at the age of 8.  I was in the Atlanta Ballet's Nutcracker.  As you might imagine from a major dance company, things were very professional.  Even the youngest children (8 was the minimum age) and their parents had many of the same responsibilities as the adult professional dancers.  Our call was an hour before curtain.  We wore heavy pancake makeup.  Our hair had to be solid as a rock.  On top of that, we were expected to remove our makeup before leaving the theatre and we were not allowed to leave in only our leotards and tights.  We had to either change completely, or wear street clothes over them.  Heaven help you if someone caught you trying to leave the building wearing your dance shoes.  (I still cringe when I see kids out in stores or restaurants wearing just their leotard and ballet or tap shoes.)

We were expected to be professional.  Not only did that mean that we were expected to be there on time or either call our understudy and the children's director if we were sick, but that also meant our behavior in and out of the theatre.  There was a very strong delineation between performance/character and your normal self.  It was drilled into us our characters did not leave the building.  Every trace of your makeup and hair (unless you had one of the hairdos that took 2 hours to undo) should be gone before you leave - because a professional does not leave the theatre in costume.

(Granted, many years later, I joined a community theatre where it was common practice to greet the audience as they left in costume and makeup.  But you could argue that that was an extension of the performance and the character.)

Fast forward a few years.  

When I went to high school, my mom decided that I was old enough to wear makeup.  We bought foundation, eye makeup, and lipstick.  It wasn't long before I decided I didn't like it.  It felt heavy, and somehow both greasy and dry on my skin.  The eye makeup usually itched.  Plus I think by that point, having been in the Nutcracker 4 years, and in drama club all through middle school, something about wearing "that much" makeup (I say it in quotes, because in the grand scheme of things, it wasn't a lot) just out and about on a day to day basis didn't feel right.

I don't remember when I stopped wearing foundation and eye makeup on a daily basis.  I don't remember when I started wearing just powder (translucent cosmetic powder, at first), a little blush, and lipstick as my daily makeup.  I do remember, vaguely, either in college, or just shortly thereafter, when I was dirt poor, and realized that $5 for a compact  of translucent powder that lasted a few weeks was nowhere near as good a deal as a travel bottle of baby powder.  I did go in for eye makeup for parties, but you could almost argue that that was a character/persona thing.

Then there's hair.  Even at the height of my theatrical ability, when I was more capable of doing things with my hair, I didn't.  My hair is very fine and it takes a lot to keep it in place.  Even a little hair spray brings me flash backs of the absurd amounts of Dippity-Do (a 1980's hair gel that was something like clear Elmer's glue in radioactive green) that lived in my hair for most of the month of December for  4 years of my childhood.  They say there are light, fragrance-free hair sprays out there.  But in my (admittedly limited) experience, just like with sunscreen, even the stuff that is supposed to be "light and fragrance free" is still heavy and smells like what it is, in my opinion.  Plus, there again, if I have stuff in my hair, I feel like it should be because I'm on stage with a period-accurate 1820's chignon.

So what's a non-girly, bride-to-be to do?  I actually felt a lot better about it yesterday after meeting with a hair-stylist to try out some stuff on my hair.  In her simple ponytail, she confessed that she doesn't do much with her own hair anymore, either - it's time she could be spending on other things.  Plus she agreed with me that at your wedding, you want to look like yourself - the prettiest, best version of yourself, but still recognizably you, and not a Character.

What does this have to do about writing?  Well, not a lot, really.  But it does kind of give you a glimpse into my mind as to where Character begins and ends.

Animals Are Characters, Too

This week, I have to brag on my good boy.

My dog, Baldur, has some issues.  He has a sensitive stomach and sensitive skin, and he has seasonal allergies.  He's actually very much my son.  But, unlike me, sometimes he does things that aggravate these issues.

Jason's parents live on a lake in Central Georgia.  When we go down to see them, we always take Baldur.  My boy is a wanderer, an explorer.  He loves to go roaming around in the weeds, and rolling in the grass.  His mommy avoids weeds, and never walks barefoot in grass, and for that matter tries to avoid walking in high grass without closed shoes, socks, and long pants on, because grass makes her skin itch.

A few weeks ago, 2 weeks in a row, we went down to the lake and let Baldur hang around outside with us.  Despite having a bath when we got home, both times, he kept scratching himself - a lot - after those 2 weekends.  This came to a head last weekend when he just couldn't stop scratching for more than about 30 seconds.  We rolled him over onto his back so we could look for bug bites, and we found several places where he had scratched enough to break the skin.

To make a long story short, the vet prescribed some ointment, and antibiotics and prednisone for him.  But this required him being rolled over onto his back twice a day to get ointment on several places on his tummy.  He doesn't like being on his back - it makes him sneeze, and usually he's not good about following directions.  Plus, I can't tell him to roll over, because for Baldur, "roll over" is a feat of athletic prowess that would get him a gold medal in the Olympics, if he could stick the landing.

But over the past week, he has very patiently come to me when I call him in the morning and evening and slowly (though not always elegantly) flopped over onto his side, and let me take his little chicken-thigh legs in my hands and roll him over like a lamb on a spit.  He always gets a treat for this (and by "treat," I mean a pill cleverly hidden in a ball of wet dog food).

I'm always fascinated by animal personalities.  The things they like and don't like, how they think, their little quirks and excentricities.  Baldur hates water, but he enjoys the process of being dried off.  He will sit in the tub with a sad, resigned look on his face, but when he gets out, oh, he loves his carpet surfing!  After he's been towel-dried, he goes running around the house, sliding around on the carpet and rubbing himself drier.

Murphy, the little Maltese we had when I was in high school and college, was a problem solver.  She didn't like jumping down off the couch (as small as she was, that would be like you or I jumping down almost a full story).  She would push one of the decorative pillows off the couch and jump down onto that.  But sometimes it wouldn't land right - it would hit at a diagonal against the coffee table.  She would let out an exasperated "huff" and go down to the other end of the couch and start over with another pillow.  She was also a stickler for schedules.  In her later years, she developed high blood pressure, and got a pill for this, every night at 10:00.  She always knew it was time for her pill and would come remind us.  Then, if more than 15 minutes passed before we got up and started getting ready for bed, she would come to the foyer, where she could both stand at the bottom of the stairs and look into the TV room at us, and huff or bark impatiently until either we got up, or until we told her to go on up.

My mom's cat is fully grown at 7 pounds.  But in Willow's mind, she is a 700 pound tiger.  She flips the heck out at other cats in the back yard.  She mercilessly stalks any bug or lizard that gets onto the back porch with a determination that rivals an army sniper.  She is so active and fearless (walking the hand rail on the balcony of my parents' 2 story family room, for example) that my mom considered naming her after Edmund Hillary, the first successful climber of Everest.

Some of the most interesting people I know are animals.  Because to me, they are people.  They are clever and sweet and weird and opinionated.  And sometimes I turn to them for character inspiration.

Please tell me about the animal characters that live at your house.