If you love stories about ghosts, dragons and aliens, come in.
Full disclosure. All the other shows in this series have one of two things in common. Either they were a childhood favorite of mine or a recent love. I’ve only seen bits and pieces of Enterprise. And there’s a chance that, even if you’re a big Trek fan, you haven’t seen much of it either.
Enterprise has a hell of a bad reputation. Trek fans kind of hate it. And so, for a long time, I didn’t bother to give it the time of day.
I should have. Enterprise has all the same qualities as the other Star Trek shows. It’s got great storytelling, fun characters who grow and change as people. It’s funny, it’s smart. It has that same fast and loose hand with science that we’ve all come to love.
So why is it so disliked? And more importantly, how can you as a writer avoid these same traps?
It only makes sense to begin at the beginning. In this case, we’re talking about the theme song.
Oh, this theme song! It’s like someone ate the theme song for Full House and threw it back up.
Not only is the song a bad eighty’s pop ballad, but it also has nothing to do with the show. It doesn’t fit the style at all.
This alone was enough to throw people off. Okay, well what does that have to do with writing a book? Let’s compare a theme song to a cover. A cover is something that everyone tells you not to judge your books by, but you do.
Don’t feel bad, I do it too. And at least two books I’ve loved recently have caught my eye because of their cover.
Your cover matters. If you’re an indie writer, make good use of that. If you work with a publisher, then use whatever pull you have to make sure you love the cover.
Now, let’s talk about the ending. And by that, I mean the last episode. And I’m not going to lie, you this is a problem that a lot of shows seem to have. No one seems to know how to end a show without pissing everyone off.
I’m not talking about endings that weren’t supposed to be endings, like Chuck or Santa Clarita Diet. I’m talking about endings that knew damn well they were going to be ending. Like Game of Thrones or Roseanne. Shows that decided the best way to end was to kick their fans square in the junk.
That’s the kind of ending Enterprise has. And a bad ending is always bad for business.
I don’t mean a sad ending. A good sad ending can rip someone’s heart to pieces and they’ll thank you for it. Good examples of this are Flowers for Algernon or Lord of The Rings. No, I mean a lazy ending, that makes the reader or watcher feel dumb for putting so much time in. Or an ending that doesn’t make any sense. Anything that falls into categories like this.
It was all a dream.
The main character’s been in a coma.
The whole story took place in a little boy’s mind while he looked at a freaking snow globe.
It was all a playback on the holodeck.
These are things that make fans hate you. They make fans want to hurt. Since that’s legally frowned upon, they will do the next best thing. Trash you and your work all over the internet. And word of mouth matters.
Word of mouth, after all, is why I didn’t watch Enterprise for so long. I’d just heard too much bad about it to think it could be good. And that’s a really hard thing to get over.
That’s it for this time guys. Next week we’ll be talking about a new favorite of mine, Lower Decks.
Thanks for reading! You can support Paper Beats World on Patreon or Ko-fi.
Hey, you remember how I said that just because a Democrat is in the White House doesn’t mean we can all relax now?
I was right, and I still didn’t listen to myself. We’ve got a lot of work to do still. So, speaking of work, why don’t we start with making sure everyone gets a livable paycheck for their work.
That’s right, we’re talking about minimum wage. It hasn’t increased since 2009. And that’s a problem.
But Nicole, you might say. I don’t make minimum wage. What does this matter to me?
Today in this bonus post, let’s talk about why you should for sure care about minimum wage, even if you’re making a comfortable living.
We all want to call frontline workers heroes. Now, we need to help them.
We’vespent the last year showering frontline workers with our praise. And they deserve it. Listen, I’ve worked fast food. I’ve worked retail. These are hard jobs, and they suck. And there’s no way our society could function without them. Could you have survived the last year without Amazon and Walmart delivery? How about takeout? I damn well couldn’t have. I swear the only person I had a face-to-face conversation with was the lady who works at Sheetz.
People who work these jobs deserve to make a living wage. They always have. We always have. Everyone, no matter what job they’re doing, deserves to make enough money to take care of themselves and their families.
Kids trying to go to college can’t make enough to go.
But, what about kids? This is always the argument of people who are against raising the minimum wage use. Surely teenagers working their first job don’t need to make enough money to support a family. They’re just making fun money, right?
Oh hell no. Teenagers who are working might be trying to earn money for college. And college is getting more expensive all the time. Maybe they’re raising a kid, or helping to support a younger sibling. Maybe even a parent who’s having trouble making ends meet.
And frankly, even if none of that is the case, I still think they should make a living wage. Teens are learning lessons they’re going to rely on for the rest of their lives. And one of those lessons should be ‘an honest days work for an honest days pay’.
When I was a teenager, I worked as a dishwasher. I made okay money. And it taught me that if I work hard, I get a reward for it. This powerful lesson encouraged my work ethic for the rest of my life. Please don’t ever forget that a teenage job is about so much more than just the work.
No expendable income means creatives are starving
Kind of obvious, this is a personal issue with me. But most of you reading this are probably in the same boat.
All over creative corners of the internet, I’m hearing the same thing. Patreon subscriptions are plummeting. Sales are down.
Art is a luxury. People living paycheck to paycheck don’t get to indulge in luxury things. I’m not talking about a Fossel smartwatch. (I want one). I’m talking about a two-dollar e-book. And people on minimum wage aren’t living paycheck to paycheck. They’re living hand to mouth. Do you think they’ve got the money for any art?
Don’t you think art is something everyone should be able to afford? Don’t you think everyone should have books to read? If you’re a creative, don’t you want your fans to be able to buy your work?
CEOs are making more in comparison to their lower-level employees than ever.
But what about fairness? Isn’t it fair that people who work their way up the ladder make more money?
Oh, for sure. At my day job, my supervisor for sure deserves to make more money than me. She’s earned that promotion. The CEO of the company deserves to make bank. People who succeed deserve to get rewards for that.
But there are limits. Here’s a link to an article from the Economic Policy Institute about how CEO compensation has ballooned while day-to-day workers have not seen similar growth in their income. And it’s not just minimum wage workers here, folks. It’s everyone who’s not sitting in board meetings. So, probably you.
People can’t care for their kids. And that impacts all of us.
Finally, let’s talk about parents. When I was working minimum wage jobs, the majority of my co-workers were parents. So was I.
Parents have everything stacked against them. And poor parents can feel like everything is trying to make sure they fail.
Let me paint a picture for you. You have a child. You and your spouse both work full time. You cannot afford not to and still make your bills. Maybe you have someone around who can watch your kid when you and your spouse are working, but maybe you don’t. So, what if you can’t afford a babysitter? You can’t afford to quit, and neither can your spouse.
What do you do?
If you’re not a parent, I don’t care. Every child is our child, our future. Our legacy. That’s part of the social contract we have with each other. It is in all of our best interests to make sure every kid has a good childhood that prepares them for healthy adulthood. And that means making sure their parents can be home for them after school, while still being able to put food on the table. Parents should be able to make enough money to buy birthday gifts, take their kids to the zoo, go to the pool. They should also be able to have dinner with their kids, take the day off if the kid is sick, and not work two jobs to just afford necessities. Kids deserve parents. And anyone who says people shouldn’t have kids if they can’t afford them is advocating for financial eugenics.
I’m fully aware that lots of people reading this are actually in this situation. Hell, I know that a lot of people reading this are actually in the minimum wage range. And please, if you’re in that situation, listen to me.
While everyone needs to fight for minimum wage, don’t feel like your powerless.
Listen, being broke makes you feel powerless. I know it made me feel like that. It’s easy to when everything in the world is designed to make your life harder for the crime of not having a job our society deems respectable.
But we are not powerless. We have the right to vote. And we have the right to contact our representatives.
Here’s a link to a site that will help you find your local reps. Call them, write them. I know you don’t have a lot of time. But it’s about time that our politicians work for us.
We pay their salary. And you can sure as hell bet they’re making a living wage.
Welcome to week four of our Why It Works, Star Trek series. This week, as promised, we’re talking about Deep Space 9.
This was another that I watched with my grandmother as a child, and then revisited as an adult.
Running from January 1993 to June of 1999, it’s the third Star Trek show to come out and the first to take place on a stationary location instead of on a ship. It’s unique in a lot of ways. I’d say the biggest difference between this and other series is that we see a lot of civilians. I appreciated getting a better understanding of what life’s like in this world if you’re not part of Starfleet. Commander Sisko is part of Starfleet, but most of the station is full of civilians. It’s a different dynamic.
Which is our first tip. While this one doesn’t apply unless you’ve been writing a while, it checks out. Don’t be afraid to do new things.
Not to plug my stuff here, but that’s what I did with Falling From Grace. A good world, Fantasy or Science Fiction, should have different societies, different walks of life. If you’ve created a good world, explore it.
In the first post of this series, I talked about an episode called Trouble with Tribbles. It’s a much-loved episode of the original series, with a hilarious mess up. During a scene where tribbles fall from a vent onto Captain Kirk, a stagehand’s hand can be seen tossing the little critters out. Well, Deep Space 9 had a chance to fix it, and they did. I mean, if you’re going to have a time travel episode, might as well fix some old mess-ups.
They intentionally wrote in a scene with Sisko and Dax in that same vent. And being covered in tribbles, they decide to toss them out of the vent. And Dax worries that her hand was seen. Well done, guys.
Who is here that doesn’t belong? Leave your response in the comments.
Another thing that Deep Space 9 did well was to remind us that it is set in the same world as the other series. Particularly the world of Next Generation. Worf, of Next Generation, is a character for much of the series. Deep Space 9 was great at utilizing past success, but not as a crutch.
You see that sometimes, with spin-offs or follow-up series. The original show was great, everyone loved it. And so the new show leans too much on the popularity of that show, having old cast members pop in and rehashing old running jokes. That’s not what’s happening on DS9. A good test of this is that it can stand alone. You could pull Worf out of the show and it would still be good.
Is it cool to have those old nods? Yeah, of course. But if that’s all your new story has, then you don’t have a new story. You have a continuation of an old story. One that, if you finished, was probably done.
So that’s it for Deep Space 9. There’s a lot to learn from it, of course. If you’ve never seen it, give it a shot. And join us again next week for Enterprise.
Thanks for reading! You can support Paper Beats World on Patreon or Ko-fi.
It’s time for another episode in our Why Star Trek Works series. This week we’re looking at Voyager.
Technically Deep Space 9 came out before Voyager. But we’ll be talking about that next week. Both shows aired at roughly the same time, so it didn’t matter which one you watched first.
Voyager was, of course, far different than the original series or Next Generation. For starters, it’s not set on the Enterprise.
Duh, I know. But think about what that means. Enterprise is the flagship of the Federation. The people who work on the Enterprise are the best of the best. Everybody from Captain Picard to the dude cleaning the toilets is the best there is at what they do.
That’s not to say that the Voyager crew is bad. But they’re not the flagship. They’re not the best of the best. They’re not getting the best of the best, either. There’s no posh bar run by an eternal psychic here. There’s a crew doing the best they can to survive a hell of a situation.
If you don’t know the premise of the show, let me break it down for you. Captain Janeway and her crew are tasked with tracking down a group of rebels called the Maquis. While trying to catch up with them, both ships are transported somewhere in space they’ve never seen. Over seventy years’ worth of travel stand between them and their families. While Captain Janeway is still dedicated to the mission of seeking out new life, her main mission is clear. To get her people home.
Now, let’s talk about why the show does and doesn’t work. Because while it’s great overall, sometimes we learn lessons from other people’s screw-ups.
Make your own rules, and stick to them.
There’s a rather infamous episode of Voyager that messes up the math for warp speed for every other show in this cinematic universe. That was pretty extreme, but it’s by far not the only example of this show just not sticking to its own damned rules.
Take the Captain, for instance. Sometimes she’s a badass no-nonsense queen. Sometimes she wants to be everyone’s mom. And no one bats an eye at this. Look, I get that people change and grow. But if you’re going through a switch like that, someone’s going to notice.
Let your characters grow.
Alright, all that being said. There is a great amount of character growth in Voyager. And I love that. The premise of the show, that they’re lightyears away from home and might never get back, is going to force growth. No one’s the same person they are by the end of this. Which, if I’m being honest, is something that was lacking in the other Star Trek shows. Picard is Picard, from the start of Next Generation to the end. The same can be said for almost everyone. And that’s just not realistic. I’m not the same person I was seven years ago. Why should any of these characters be?
Have a clear goal that not everyone shares
Here, though, is the biggest reason Voyager works. Right from the start, there’s a clear goal, get home. But, and this is the important part, not everyone necessarily shares this goal.
There are a couple of characters who might be way better off on the other side of the universe. People who were in prison or maybe heading to prison. People who might be just as happy to make their way home, or their way in a new universe.
This sets up the immediate conflict for the whole series. There’s no writer’s block here because you always have something for your characters to be working towards and against. It also sets a finish line.
Over the last few years, never-ending shows have gone out of fashion. There’s an end to most stories, after all. A moment to pause. While life may go on for the characters, one tale doesn’t go on with them. Think of your own life. Has it all been one battle? Or has it been a thousand different battles? Giving a story an ending doesn’t just prevent you from jumping the shark. It’s also infinitely more satisfying.
So that’s it for Voyager. I’ll see you next week when we’ll talk about Deep Space 9.
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Welcome to week two of our why Star Trek works series. This week, we’re talking about Next Generation.
Full disclosure, I have a soft spot for this series. It’s the one I watched with my grandmother when I was a little nerdling. So I might be biased when I say that this is the best Star Trek ever. But I also think I’m critical enough to judge the show honestly. After all, we’re harder on the things we love than anything else.
Taking place 78 years after the original series, the show included a fancier more advanced Enterprise with an entirely new cast. The mission remained the same. To explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no one has gone before!
The show aired from September 28th, 1987 to May 23rd, 1994. Since then, there hasn’t been a time when reruns haven’t been available on tv somewhere.
I’d like to say the popularity of the show was just because the characters were great. They were great, after all. But it goes so much deeper than that.
To start, the show was intelligent. Not so much in the science, most of that was bullshit. It was the creative writing that had to be smart. The show was working within a world that had already been established by the original series. They could make some changes, blame them on advancements. But some things they were just stuck with.
It would have been easier to just make it an extension of the original series. But they went past that and did it well. Picard is a different kind of captain than Kirk. Dr. Crusher is a world away from Bones. While the positions remained the same, the people who inhabited them were wildly different.
Another thing that stayed the same, aside from the mission, was the lesson of inclusion and equality. It’s one of the first times we see an enemy race become allies in the Klingons. While sometimes the relationship is strained, they aren’t volatile. Over and over we’ll see this trend. Even into Picard, where we see the Borg become friends. But we’ll talk about that later.
One thing I appreciated about Next Generation is the willingness to pivot. When something wasn’t working, they tried to fix it. One great example is Wesley Crusher. His character was an irritating pain in the ass. Mouthy, smarmy. He thinks he’s smarter than everyone around him. Spoiler, he’s not.
Wesley got taken down a peg when he goes off to school and messes up, hard. He becomes a better person after that and a better character. This decision was made after a huge wave of fan hate directed at the kid.
Brag in the comments if you know what he’s drinking.
(Will Wheaton, by the way, is the actor who played Wesley. He’s an adorable cat dad who makes me smile on Twitter all the time.)
Finally, let’s talk about the comedy of the show. It wasn’t overall a laugh riot. It has some of the darker episodes of anything I’ve ever seen.
There are four lights. If you don’t get that, look it up. Then watch the episode and cry.
Somehow they manage to blend this with some really funny things. Like Data’s cat, Spot. Spot the cat hates everyone. No one can take care of this little monster. She put Riker in the medical ward. Even Worf is scared of this fluffy orange cat. Oh, and in case you don’t know, she doesn’t have a single spot on her.
The whole crew would shred you if you hurt this cat.
Hilarious.
There are so many lessons a writer can learn from Next Generation. I’m just going to give you a bullet list below.
-Don’t be afraid to be funny, even in a serious series.
-Let your characters be wrong sometimes.
-Think out your storylines in advance.
-At the same time, don’t be afraid to pivot.
I hope you’re having as much fun with this series as I am. Next week we’ll be talking about Star Trek, Voyager.
I grew up watching Star Trek, Next Generation with my grandma. It’s pretty mainstream now, but back then Star Trek was a niche show. A nerd show.
But being a nerd is cool now, so screw that. And now Star Trek’s got so much love it can’t handle it. I could be a bitter hipster about that. I mean, I liked Star Trek before it was cool. Or, I could just appreciate that everyone loves Star Trek.
Third option. I could revisit Star Trek as a writer and see why it works. I like option three.
Of course, I couldn’t possibly talk about all things Star Trek in one post. So over the next few weeks, we’re going to look at all of the different Star Trek shows, starting with the original series and ending with Picard.
Today, we’re starting with the original series. Why does it work?
Let’s start with the fact that it probably shouldn’t work. I mean, it was kind of a mess. The budget was garbage, the special effects were terrible, the costumes looked tragic.
But it does work. The series ran from September of 1966 to June of 1969. This means that the whole series started and finished seventeen years before I was born. And yet I can tell you Kirk’s last words.
Oh my.
No, not the way Sulu says it.
We’re going to break this down, but I can sum up in three words why Star Trek worked so well. Why it has survived well into the 21st century and will hopefully be around for a lot longer.
It was fearless.
Okay, it could get away with being fearless. No one expected the show to succeed. So it was working with little to no budget and a bunch of actors no one had ever heard of before. So, it could get away with anything.
There’s a great quote by Lorne Michaels that I live my life by. The show doesn’t go on because it’s ready. It goes on because it’s 11:30.
Well, someone must have told Roddenberry that quote. Because let me tell you, Star Trek went on because it was 11:30. This lead to some hilarious moments. Like the tribble incident.
On the off chance you don’t know this story, man are you in for a treat.
In the iconic episode, Trouble with Tribbles, there’s a scene where Kirk opens a hatch and is just showered with the fuzzy little things. If you look closely, or hell not that closely, you can see the shadow of a stagehand shoveling the tribbles through the hatch.
Okay, so what is there to learn from this? Who wants to go into the world with their shirt untucked, so to speak? Why would you want to put work out there when it’s not ready?
Well, is it not ready? Or do you just feel not ready?
Let me tell you something, from my heart to yours. You are never, ever going to feel ready. Your book, tv show, podcast, movie script, is never going to feel ready. It’s never going to match up with the flawless project in your head because how could anything ever be that perfect?
So, because we have to assume that nothing will ever be ready, we have to go on because it’s time. Because it’s 11:30, or we’ve revised the damn thing so much we’re sick of looking at it, or we’ve had it sitting on our desk for years. Does that mean sometimes we’re going to see hands throwing tribbles out of the hatch? Yeah, of course. But the alternative is never sending anything out. Pick one.
Here’s the other way Star Trek was fearless. And it’s arguably a bigger deal. Star Trek wasn’t afraid of doing things that were taboo at the time. Like having a Russian man and an Asian man as officers. Like having a black woman as an officer.
Like having the first interracial kiss in American history on television.
In an episode called Plato’s Stepchildren, Kirk and Uhura share a passionate kiss. Funny story about this kiss, aside from it being the first one of its kind in America. The producers were worried about it, so they wanted to film the scene a few ways. Shatner agreed but then proceeded to intentionally fuck up every single take that didn’t include the kiss until they’d run out of time and had to use the scene as it was written.
That’s right. Shatner decided to be a dick to force social change. Good use of bad behavior.
Not all the episodes worked, that’s for sure. The ones that missed, missed hard. But the episodes that work, work amazingly well. They work so well that they’re still working to this day.
See you next week when we’ll be talking about Next Generation.
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Spoiler Warning: It is all but impossible to talk about Wandavision without some serious spoilers. So if you haven’t seen it yet and you plan to, click away and come back later. You have been warned.
Speaking of a spoiler warning, funny story. The darling husband and I had been planning to watch Wandavision but we hadn’t quite gotten to it yet. Then, we were watching Youtube and stumbled on an Honest Trailor for Wandavision. Normally we watch those right away. But there was a giant spoiler warning at the beginning. This prompted us to watch it, finally.
And man, the twists in this!
So, now that you’ve been fully warned, let’s talk about why Wandavision works.
First off, I don’t know that Wandavision would have worked for people who aren’t old-school tv fans like me. A lot of the fun from the first few episodes comes from the constant references to older shows. I Love Lucy, Dick Van Dyke, The Brady Bunch, Bewitched. This was pure nostalgia and it worked so, so well.
Worked into that, though, are some eerie moments. Right from the start, we see that not everything is how it should be in this picturesque little world. The first episode could have been an episode of Bewitched, except for the man who almost dies at their kitchen table.
It’s so dark a moment, then everyone goes back to what they were doing like nothing ever happened. This is done perfectly. It almost makes the audience feel like they might not have seen what they thought they saw.
Another thing that worked well in this show was the depth it gave to two Avengers who weren’t as well know. I mean, I know Wanda. I know all about House of M, and the epic No More Mutants moment. But from the movies, not so much. Wandavision gives us a chance to see both of them in a new light. In a crisis, in joy. We see more of Wanda’s background. It fleshes them out, makes them real people. And this is something that these characters needed.
Finally, I appreciated that this story didn’t have a fully happy ending. But, if you read House of M, you kind of knew that. Wanda has to make a torturous decision. She has to give up everything she’s ever wanted to do what’s right.
It’s hard, it’s heartbreaking, and it needed to happen.
Let’s be real here for a second. It’s just us writers here. Some stories have happy endings, and they should. Like every single Adam Sandler movie. Stupid happy. Some stories don’t have a happy ending. Just like life doesn’t always have a happy ending. Old Dan and Little Ann died in Where The Red Fern Grows. The Baudelaire children never find their parents or their friends. And Wanda doesn’t get to have her perfect Pleasantville family. Because if that’s how those stories ended, then they wouldn’t matter as much.
Now, all that being said, there is one reason why Wandavision doesn’t work.
If you haven’t seen The Avengers movies, this story isn’t going to make any damned sense to you at all.
Part of that is the feature, not the bug. The Marvel Universe is supposed to be all one big story. Every character’s tale fitting into the next one’s, like puzzle pieces. You have to see it all to see the big picture. But that’s daunting for someone new, who hasn’t been watching from the start.
This is a flaw of the whole Marvel setup, in my opinion. If you’re going to get into the story, you’ve got a ton of watching to do. That’s great if you want to do it. But if you just want to dip your toe in, then this amount of material might just scare you off.
I have this problem. It’s a little embarrassing, but I want to get better. And I thought maybe it might be a problem some of you have too.
I have a weird problem taking advice from people younger than me. It makes me feel uncomfortable, as though I’m failing somehow.
Yes, I’m aware this is incredibly narrow-minded of me. Especially because I’ve been on the receiving end of the abuse that kind of mindset can cause.
Back when I first started this blog, I was the manager of a shoe store. And I had an assistant manager who was a bit older than me. She was in her forties and I was in my twenties. She got hired a few days before me, as a part-timer when I was hired as an assistant. When I became manager, she was my obvious choice for assistant.
Well, she wasn’t really. I shouldn’t have done that. Because she never missed a chance to make me feel like I was screwing everything up.
Spoiler, I wasn’t. I had the job because I had years of retail experience and management experience by then. I was qualified for the job, she wasn’t. But that wasn’t enough to knock that chip off her shoulder.
Alright, I didn’t tell you all that just to complain. I did it mainly to point out that I should know better. And if I don’t learn from the experiences in my youth then I’m a garbage person.
I don’t want to be a garbage person. So, here are four reasons why I’m trying to listen to younger people.
So many young artists are just killing it
I follow several people younger than me on Youtube. Caitlin’s Corner, Amanda Rachel Lee and Temi. They are all inspiring, upbeat, helpful women who are creating great content. They also happen to all be younger than me.
This doesn’t stop their videos from being a bright spot in my week. And they’re far from the only ones. Artists, writers, singers, online business people are all out there doing great work in their twenties. And I don’t want to miss out on that work.
They have different life experience
Let’s go back to my example from the shoe store. I was qualified to be the manager over my older assistant because I had led a different life and made different decisions. Those decisions meant that, despite my age, I was more qualified for the job.
What kind of asshole would I have to be to not realize that other people have that same experience? While I was working retail and writing books, Amanda Rachel Lee was learning to design bullet journals. Of course, she can teach me a thing or thirty-seven about them. Temi was devoting herself to improving her art. She can draw like no one I’ve ever seen.
We have got to value the experiences of others and the lessons they’ve learned from them. That’s why it’s so great that we’re all different. I can learn from them, and others can learn from me and all the effort I’ve poured into being a writer.
They have the experience of their elders to build on
Let me tell you another story. When I was growing up my grandma was good with computers. I mean, for the time. She taught me to use her old pc. She taught me to go online, access things in DOS, all that. So, when I started using computers myself, I had that foundation to build on. I didn’t need to learn it all again, so I could go steps farther.
Every generation has the experiences and lessons of the ones who have gone before them. There are lessons they don’t have to learn. I didn’t have to sort out how to use DOS, I was told how. So, I could put that time into going further.
The same can be said for younger people. They don’t have to reinvent the wheel, they’ve got it. They have time to discover and tackle new problems. Then, reach back and help us with those.
I wanted to be listened to when I was younger
Scratch that. I want to be listened to right now. I’m only thirty-four, turning thirty-five in June. I think I have things to teach people older than me. And I know for sure that I did when I was younger. So, of course, other people can teach me. And if I want to be a better person, as I always do, I need to be willing to learn.
So what do you think? What lessons have you learned from people younger than you? Let us know in the comments.
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Money is something most writers have a sticky relationship with. We’re artists, we don’t do this for the money. But we need money to, you know, live. We have day jobs until we make enough money writing to sustain us full-time. If we ever make enough money writing.
Then, there’s spending money on writing itself. Now, you don’t need to spend much money at all to write. But to get projects finished, published or in front of people’s faces might be a very different situation.
The problem is that money spent on writing is like money spent on anything else. Some things are a good investment, and some are little better than setting your precious dollar bills on fire.
Today I’m going to go over some of the best and worst ways I’ve spent money on my writing. This is a personal list based on my own experiences. What worked for me might not for you, and vice versa. If you’ve had different experiences, please let us know in the comments.
The worst ways I’ve spent money on writing
Let’s start with the obvious item. Unless you enjoy pretty stationary, you don’t need to buy it to write. I’d caution you against buying a pretty notebook for your rough drafts. Your rough draft is going to be just that, rough. It’s not going to help you write freely of garbage if you’re doing it in a plush leather-bound notebook. I might be biased, though, since I’ve literally burned rough drafts before.
Another thing I don’t spend money on anymore is contest fees. This might be up for debate, but I just don’t do it. At least, not yet. It’s a And if you’re going to pay to be in a contest, make sure you do your research. Some, like the ones hosted by Writer’s Digest, are perfectly legit. Some are run by heaps of steaming trash masquerading as people who are only there to steal your hard-earned money. Even if they are legit, though, paying for a contest is kind of like buying a lottery ticket.
Here’s something that I thought would be a bigger help than it was. It’s something that sadly ate up a ton of money throughout my career. It’s advertising. I have tried to advertise my books on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Amazon. None of these have ever produced enough sales to make them worth my time and money. Can’t say I didn’t try.
Finally, I have a complex one. I put a ton of physical copies of my books, thinking I’d be able to hand-sell them. Then, I didn’t. I had a bunch of events lined up. Then I had to cancel them. Then covid happened and now I don’t know when I’ll ever be able to schedule any more events. So that’s a lot of money sitting in my house staring at me. Don’t order copies of your book unless you know what the hell you’re going to do with them.
The best ways I’ve spent money on writing
I’d like to start here with something that I pay for every single month, my Dabble subscription. This isn’t sponsored, I just love them. Dabble is my word processing software. It’s the one I’m working on right now. It’s not so important that you subscribe to this exact software. It’s just important that you have one that you enjoy and that fits your needs. Good writing software has been worth every penny to me.
Another thing I spend money on that I consider worth it is my WordPress site. It allows me to do a lot more fine-tuning, get ad info, and all sorts of fun things. It also gives me options to personalize the look of my site. I plan to do a full website remodel later this year. I’ll consider this upgrade invaluable then.
One thing I’ve put a decent amount of money into is having my self-published works edited. My goodness, this is expensive. But it’s a must if you’re not going with a publisher. Even if you have to save up a while before you get this done, don’t publish without it. You just don’t know how much better your work will be afterwords.
Despite my feelings about fancy notebooks, I do invest money in tools I use and I love. Like the felt tip pens that I write with. Actually, it’s just those. I can use any old notebook to write rough drafts (so long as it’s college ruled). But these pens are a must, even if they’re a dollar a pen. Having something that I can hold comfortably and that works so well for me is worth it.
Finally, I cannot emphasize enough that I’ve never bought a book about writing that I regretted. On Writing, Dase Macabre, Save the Cat. Everything that Natalie Goldberg has ever written. Every one of them taught me something different and I value all of them. I honestly never think a book is a bad investment.
Except maybe Twilight.
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No post this week, guys. Please enjoy this short story instead.
I know a lot of witches these days are real out in the open about it. They go online and share spells like recipes, post pictures of their alters. There’s about a hundred Facebook groups for witches. That’s great and all, really. I’m super happy for everyone who can be so open with their craft.
That isn’t me. I mean, I would love for it to be me, don’t get me wrong. I wouldn’t have any problem getting right out there with the rest of them, openly buying sage at the farmer’s market and filling my home with witchy goodness.
I have a calling, that’s the problem. You see, I was abandoned by my mother when I was four. There was a man, but it’s a cop out to say that was why. There was a bottle, and that was always the reason.
But I don’t waste a lot of time worrying about her. I was adopted by my uncle, a great witch and a great man. Only problem was, he was in Japan at the time. While he hustled to get himself back to the states and start the adoption process, I was in foster care.
And this foster lady, man, she was the best. She was the absolute best person I have ever, and I mean ever known. Her name was Birdie, and she just scooped me up and took me right into her home. Because of her, I was able to stay safe, happy and cared for until Uncle Howard was able to come get me.
Birdie passed on a few years ago. I could never thank her enough for what she did for me, though I sure tried while she was alive. When she started getting sick, she started getting me involved in the foster care program. And, I mean, what was I going to do, say no?
But I’ll tell you right now, no one lets you be a foster mom if you’re a witch. Even Uncle Howard didn’t tell them he was a witch until they were all done checking up on him.
“I know it’s not fair,” he explained to me. “But lots of things aren’t fair. The mundanes just aren’t in a position to understand. Our eyes are open farther than theirs, so we must be wiser. Especially if you’ve got to adopt a child. My lord, is that a struggle. Those people will criticize you for wearing the wrong color socks.”
So you can understand. My practice was in the closet, my alter and tools literally in the tiny closet of my bedroom. But so help me, I was going to be a force for good in children’s lives.
And so it’s gone for years, until a few weeks ago. When I got a call late in the afternoon about a little boy.
“His mother was in a terrible car accident, and didn’t make it. He was at his sitter’s for a few days, but of course they can’t keep him forever,” explained Esther, one of the better caseworkers. Some of them were far too aggressive, dropping children off who had no business being away from loving parents. Esther was never that sort. She just didn’t seem to have an ounce of emotion in her except for disdain. I swear, I’ve never seen the woman smile, not once.
“Bring him right over,” I said, casting a look at my kitchen counter. I had been intending to put together a honey jar spell, but that wasn’t happening now. I made a dash to get things put away and picked up, lighting a candle in the living room for strength as I went.
Soon enough Esther was there, with a little boy with dark hair, a crop of freckles, and a look of distance in his eyes.
“This is Douglas,” Esther said, handing me a suitcase of the boy’s things. “Douglas, this is Wendy. She’s going to be looking after you for a little while.”
The boy, Douglas, looked me up and down. I gave him the smile I’ve done my best to master over the years. It’s not too happy, since of course most kids aren’t here under good circumstances. But it was, I hope, comforting.
“Come on in, Douglas. We’ll get you all settled,” I said, holding my hand out to him. He took it.
Some kids are a handful right from the start, loud and screaming. They’re scared, and they react like animals backed into a corner.
Some, like Douglas, are silent as a tomb. Those are the ones who worry me. Sadness and grief are a poison. We’ve got to draw them out, suck them away from flesh and soul before they start to rot.
I know.
Esther nodded. “I’ll give you a call tomorrow,” she said, and reached out to shake my hand with her own gloved one. What a weird woman.
With Esther gone, I closed the door, and started the business of tending to Douglas. He was standing very still in the middle of my living room, looking around. “Want to see your room?” I asked. He nodded, but still said nothing.
Even if he was silent, he was agreeable. We put away his things, a few changes of clothes and some toys. Tucked in the front of his suitcase was a stack of origami paper. This was a surprise. Even more of a surprise was when he snatched the stack away before I could touch it and set it reverently by his bed.
“Do you do origami?” I asked. “Like paper folding?”
He nodded. Apparently that was all the interaction we were going to have for awhile.
It was a quiet afternoon that melted into evening. Douglas was sort of like a very polite, very obedient ghost. He sat in his room until I asked him to help me with dinner. Then he ate well enough, and sat on the couch to watch tv with me. We watched a movie, and he didn’t say a word.
After a shower I got Douglas into bed. “I want you to know that you’re going to be safe here for as long as you need to be,” I said. “And you can talk to me about anything. Trust me, you can’t tell me anything weirder than I’ve heard before.”
Douglas nodded, his dinner plate eyes never leaving my face.
“I was in foster care when I was little,” I said.
Still, nothing.
“Okay, well let me know if you need anything. My bedroom is just on the other side of the living room. Sleep well.”
He nodded, and pulled the covers up to his chin.
I left the door open just a crack, and left the living room light on. I was feeling off kilter. I know it was only the first night. I also knew that healing whatever was broken in him wasn’t really my job. My job was to keep him safe, well fed and cared for until the state figured out where he was going.
Still, he was so sad. He hadn’t been abandoned by a distant mother. His mother, who had presumably loved him very much, had died.
Feeling uncomfortable to the point of itchiness, I decided there was nothing for it but to do a quick cleansing. I grabbed my palo santo, and started cleansing. With a twist of my finger I sent the smoke through the whole apartment, except Douglas’s room. I didn’t normally use magic to move smoke, but I didn’t want him to hear me walking all around the place. It might make him nervous.
A few minutes after I started, though, Douglas popped his head out of the door. He looked around, as though excited.
I tucked the burning wood behind my back. “Just lighting some incense. Sorry, does it bother you?”
His face deflated. Slowly he shook his head, and went back into his room.
I have a habit on the first day I have a new kid of waking up and getting them to help me put together breakfast. It’s not just food, even waffles with strawberries and chocolate chips, that gets a kid to warm up to me. It’s the act of cooking together.
When I approached the bedroom door, I didn’t hear anything. I gave a little knock, having learned better a long time ago than to just throw open a door.
But after waiting a few minutes, I didn’t hear anything. Worried, I opened the door.
Douglas was sitting in the middle of the room, and I saw why he’d had all of the origami paper. It was scattered around him, some folded into pieces and some waiting to be touched. He must have been up all night, playing with it. And as I opened the door, the air was full of paper birds. Cranes, blue jays, any sort of bird that could be folded into paper, fluttering around Douglas’s head.
How had I not sensed it?
At the sight of me, Douglas dropped the birds. They all fell onto the ground with soft, pattering sounds. He looked at me, terrified.
“It’s okay,” I said, kneeling down. “It’s okay. You’re a witch, aren’t you?”
Still, Douglas said nothing. His eyes looked like they might pop right out of his head, looking at me.
“Don’t be afraid, I am too.” The words popped out of my mouth before I even knew I was going to say them. But as the words were out now, I couldn’t take them back. So I decided to prove myself instead. I lifted the closest bird to me in the air, and fluttered it around him. I even got it close enough to peck his nose.
To my surprise and relief, he laughed.
Then, he spoke. “I thought my mom was here last night. I thought I could smell her.”
“The palo santo,” I said. “I was cleansing the house.”
He nodded. “She’s not gonna come get me, is she? I really miss her.”
“No, Douglas, I’m sorry. She’s gone. But you can talk to her.”
Carefully I gathered the young witch in my arms. We went out, and collected things that reminded him of his mother.
A sample of the perfume she wore.
A leaf from the park they’d played at together.
A stone from the driveway of the dental office she’d worked at.
All of these things we put on my alter together, and we lit a candle. “Now,” I said, “she can hear you. Go ahead and talk to her.”
I stepped away, letting him have some privacy.
There was a knock on the door before he was finished. I went to see who it was, and felt my chest tighten.
It was Esther. And the closet that held my alter was wide open, with Douglas perched in front of it.
There was nothing else for it, I couldn’t very well pretend I wasn’t hope. So I opened the door.
Esther stepped in, looking around. “Good afternoon. I brought some of Douglas’s clothes. Where is he?”
“He’s, um,” I stammered, but she’d already brushed past me. And right into my room.
There sat Douglas, giggling. He had a paper crane floating in front of him. “I’m getting really good at them,” he said.
“I, I can explain what’s going on,” I said, rushing behind her.
“Explain what?” Esther asked. She turned to me, and smiled. For the first time, I noticed a gold chain around her neck. It led to a tiny, moon pendant.
“If you have anything to explain, it’s what took you so long. Young lady, how many witches did I need to send into your house before you started teaching them the right way?”
And just like that, Douglas and I were out of the broom closet.
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