By KD, on April 22nd, 2013 Look, gang. I like when people find my blog because they’re looking for my books. That’s lovely.
Seeking rants on the awesome of Tom Hiddleston? I’m glad to see those hits too.
Checking out Blake Snyder’s Beat Sheet? More power to you. I love it and I think you will too.
But when day after day hits come from someone searching “how young does a child know he’s gay?” and the like?
That’s both wonderful and depressing.
I hope when people find me that way they stay to read, that they are comforted, that they decide to chill the f*** out and not worry about their 5- or 8- or 11yo’s sexuality too much. But it’s more than a little awful that people are so terribly worried about this.
The simple truth is, the sooner we stop making this a big deal, the sooner it stops being a big deal. So your kid might be gay. He might be left-handed too, and you’ll probably have to make more accommodations there than for the other. We got past the idea that left-handed is wrong. We’ll get past the idea gay is wrong too.
We’ll do it sooner if some folks would just chill out.
By KD, on April 4th, 2012
I was reading this today, and I wanted to stand up and cheer.
I’m talking about how we minimize, despise, excoriate, and abhor ourselves. How we exclude ourselves from consideration. How we martyr ourselves for others. How we call ourselves ugly, awful, incompetent, and stupid.
I don’t know exactly how to describe the sensation I get when I see a beautiful, fiercely intelligent, accomplished and skilled artist and craftswoman twenty years my senior call herself ugly and stupid… but I am realizing that I have that same power now, and it’s up to me to use it wisely. Not to give voice to the anger and self-hatred and self-loathing I feel so fiercely. Not to indulge in the kind of scab-picking hairshirt self-abnegation that we’ve been trained to crave, even though it’s so fucking bad for us and everyone around us. Even though it robs us of our power to be positive in the world, and good for other people. ~Elizabeth Bear
We are taught to do this. I remember my mom doing it. I’ve spent years learning not to do it. Flylady calls it “stinking thinking” and emphasizes kicking it to the curb.
I don’t do this [much] anymore. Friends think I’m so amazingly confident–just because I don’t do this. I never thought of it this way, though. I mostly came to it through defiance–my belief that there are enough people out there ready to put me down. They don’t need my help, and why should they have it? Treating me like crap has never helped me lose weight, get smarter, try harder…as a motivator, it just sucks. And it makes me feel like crap besides.
It was hard. My inner dialogue sounded like “come on, you idiot. You were stupid enough to say you could do this, so you effing well do it. Now. No, you’re not going to bed till you freaking get it done.” Now it’s more “come on, girl. You can do this. You’re smart and awesome, and you can do this.” Guess which works better to get things done?
In February, I turned 42. People told me I was “just a baby.” Others said things like “Happy Birthday! So you’re what, 21?”
Proudly I told them I’m 42. It’s a significant age! As Elizabeth Bear said of herself, I finally feel like a grown-up. I can handle things. After twenty years on my own, I feel like I’ve got this. And it’s a great feeling.
So, friends, you can stop trying to take it away. I appreciate the sentiment, but I am forty-two FANTASTIC years old, and I’m proud of it and me.
And you should be proud of you. You’ve made it this far. You’re clearly a person of taste and discerment (or you wouldn’t be reading my blog, right?) Let up on you. Give yourself the benefit of the doubt, just like you do your closest friends and maybe even strangers.
STFU. You’re amazing. Deal with it.
By KD, on January 16th, 2012
I’ve had people say that to me. Yes, I wanted to smack them. It’s not actually what I’m saying here, I just liked it as a title.
Recently a young lady on my Twitter feed decided to tweet some pictures of herself in various outfits. I clicked a few (I was actively avoiding editing, of course), and my first reaction was “oh honey. Don’t.” But then I stopped.
She was not, by Hollywood standards, beautiful. The lighting was bad, and the angles not perfect. But she was a happy young woman in clothes she loved, that looked just fine on her. They were not sexy or meant to be, just pictures. And my first reaction was “don’t send pictures like this to strangers!”
Well, screw that. I tweeted back that her outfit was lovely, and so was her smile. And by the time I tweeted it, I felt that way.
Last night was the Golden Globes, and while I haven’t seen a single picture, I can (or could have, last night) told you what lots of people wore and how people thought they looked in it, just from glancing at my Twitter stream. It was annoying to me then; now it makes me sad. So many people get their information on how to live life from their TV, and with TV it’s all about appearance. It’s all about one narrow set of “this appeals to the most people, everything else must go.”
Apparently they’ve cast a white man to play the lead in Akira. The movies market to white people, and white people won’t see movies about with Asians, apparently. (Jackie Chan’s sheer awesome aside, of course. He’s the exception.) Anyway. That’s the decision. Anime fans around the world are banging their heads into walls.
I don’t mean to say that racial issues are caused by the movie business; I just want to point out that major media companies don’t seem to be fighting on the side of justice, whatever they like to put out through their PR firms. (George Lucas backs me up in this.)
The really sucky thing is, the movie studios are perpetuating something that’s already there, at least in me. I’m ashamed to admit that when I decided to make Zeke Cayden in Queen’s Man black, I struggled with it. I was raised in a white area (one black kid in my high school graduating class) and I’m not used to seeing black people dating white people. Unless it’s a movie about interracial relationships, it doesn’t happen much onscreen (at least, in the stuff I watch. Which is not exactly intellectual most of the time.) The only thing I’ve seen that I can think of offhand is Firefly, and even there, it’s the woman who is black. I remember the nasty meme of how black men will steal your women! and I wince.
One of the things (many things!) I love about English TV/movies is that they’ll have biracial couples without making a single mention of how it’s an amazing thing.
So, my problem. Before I could write Zeke, I had to be able to picture him. I had to do therapy. Lots and lots of therapy.
Poor me.
*ahem* So, anyway. There’s a problem. Many of us know there’s a problem. It’s not going to go away easily. I guess I’m just blogging to say–
It’s all in our heads (which is where a lot of the worst stuff lies), but we can change our thoughts. Keep thinking.
By KD, on January 12th, 2011
Eve Marcori is a freighter captain and former Marine offering advice because of Authorial Privilege out of a sincere desire to help. Advice not guaranteed legal in your province/planet of residence. Check with local authorities. This blog takes no responsibility for any criminal charges you may incur by acting on Eve’s advice.
In general an ellipsis [...] indicates Eve had to be prodded by her author was thinking. If you’d like to know her better, Eve Marcori plays a prominent role in Knight Errant, currently available through Turtleduck Press.
Eve, when you’re faced with a bunch of enemy fighters trying to frag your ass and there’s an asteroid belt at hand…do you dive in and play tag in the asteroids? Or just run for it? (And you’re in a small, personal fighter for this one.) ~Jeena
Weird thing is, asteroids don’t give a damn who’s the good guy. Rather not have more shit to dodge. Running’s the better option. Get me some gravity, some negative visibility–something to play with that’s not likely to kill me. Pretty effin’ good at hide and stalk.
Give me my Dream, though, where I got the firepower and shields to sock it out…yeah, my Leopard was sweet, but my Dream kicks ass better.
By KD, on January 8th, 2011
This is a new series here on Forging Ever Onward, and I’ll probably be tinkering a bit to figure out the best format. Suggestions are welcome!
Also, since Eve tends to be short with words and there’s no way to ask follow-up questions in real time, I’ll be the one prodding her for more in-depth answers. I do hope you appreciate the risks I run to do this.
So! Onward.
Someone who didn’t leave their name (probably wise) asked:
Eve, help me plot! If you were part of a dying-out species that was *massively* outnumbered by an enemy determined to wipe yours out, because someone of *your* species tried to wipe *them* out, what would you do? What *could* you do?
Eve answers†:
Got a gun?
And explosives. Bombs are good.
…‡
Look, you got their objective right there. They want to wipe you all out. Don’t let ‘em. That don’t mean just do defense–you’ll all die in a frakkin’ hole. But stash the non-combatants. Hide ‘em as deep and safe as you can, and put good people to guarding them. Then you and your mates go make the galaxy safe.
Use your mates. Use ‘em up if you gotta–you let the slime win and everything’s gone anyway, right?
That don’t mean waste what you’ve got. You use them up too soon and you’re fighting alone. That’ll get you dead. Think sneaky. Think knife strikes. In and out, no damage to you and lots to them. Hitting their supply dumps is good–always fun to shoot a slime with his own gun.
And if that damned fool started everything is still around–wrap him up with a pretty bow and hand him over. You don’t need slime like that. Your species is better off without him.
†Advice not guaranteed legal in your province/planet of residence. Check with local authorities. This blog takes no responsibility for any criminal actions instigated in response to Eve’s advice.
‡At this point, I poked. Send get-well cards and gift-baskets c/o the Pendragon’s Dream.
By KD, on January 8th, 2011 You asked for it. (No, really–some of you did.) So we’ll give it a shot.
Eve Marcori Answers Your Questions!
So this is Eve Marcori.
…
Okay, wait. That’s just a doll I made a long time ago. Though she has, at least once, been in possession of a harpoon gun. Let me try… Let me look… Ah-ha!
 This is Eve Marcori. (That’s Ben with her. She’s the one with the gun.)
Actually, that is an awesome drawing by the fabulous Sambre, but I can do–
 Ow. Damn. I think she broke my nose.
Okay, the drawing will do.
Right, then. Where were we? Oh, I think I remember. *ahem*
Eve Marcori answers your questions!
That’s right, just type them in the little box here (or on the front page of the blog) and this woman–Marine, combat veteran, freighter captain and pilot–will help you with All Life’s Problems!†
So who is Eve, and why should you listen to her?‡
Eve is a survivor. She’s lived homeless; she’s been in a gang. She was a pickpocket before she was a Marine. She can fly and fight and shoot, and she’ll never leave a mate behind. She lives by her own code of honor, a code so stringent she earned herself a court-martial rather than go against it. She’ll tell a Fleet Commander to kiss off, but she quakes in her combat boots at the idea of telling Ben how she feels.
You think you’ve got problems? Bounty hunters from here to Mantixa want her head, the aforementioned Fleet Commander wants her ass in a sling, and Ben keeps trying to turn her into a girl. Her ship is old and her crew is not–nothing but newbs and kids, one bleeding heart doc and an alien engineer who keeps fixing things.
Hell, your problems are liberty without the booze to her.
So give it a shot. Ask her a question. What have you got to lose?††
†Advice not guaranteed legal in your province/planet of residence. Check with local authorities. This blog takes no responsibility for any criminal actions instigated in response to Eve’s advice.
‡You probably shouldn’t.
††She’s never been to earth, so she’s not likely to show up and shoot you if you annoy her. This, also, is not guaranteed.
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