Kyle Garret's Blog, page 12

Best New Writing 2014 Out Today! I'm in it!

Shameless plug time: Best New Writing 2014 is out today and my story, "Young Zombies in Love," is one of the editors' picks!

It's available anywhere and everywhere, but for convenience sake, the link is to Amazon.  You can buy it in hard or digital copies.

I got my contributor's copy a week or so ago and its chock full o' great stories.  YZL is one of my favorites, too.  I think it turned out really well.

If you've got a few extra ducats lying around, please check it out and let me know what you think!

Fruitful: Out of My Head

I live in my head a lot.  It's entertaining in there.  It's usually pretty safe.  It's never boring.  I live in my head so much that sometimes I have a hard time behaving appropriately when I'm outside of it.  I think I've gotten better with that as I've gotten older -- I don't think I'm the spaz I used to be.  But it can still be a problem.

I dislike being forced out of my head.  That's a whole thing.  I do, however, really like choosing to come out.  If I choose to come out of my head for something, then it's really important to me.  I come out of my head for Nicole and very rarely is that not my choice.

I would like to live outside of my head more often.  Living in your head is nice and all, but it can make every little thing harder.  It can make you resent things that are really not a big deal.  It makes it hard to have perspective.

Having a kid is going to pull me out of my head and I'm really looking forward to that.

Like I said, I like coming out of my head, because doing so by choice means I'm doing it for something I feel very strongly about.  I know I'm not going to have any problems doing it for my son.  I'm looking forward to it.  I'm looking forward to having a reason to come out of my head.  It is the least of what I will do for him.

It's easy to lose perspective, particularly if you're the type of person who finds most aspects of life strange.  I think Nicole probably gets a little tired of me pointing out things that I think are weird, because they're invariably absolutely normal things.

I'll be honest, it can be tiring.  It can be tiring to always live in your head and not in the world.  As exhausting as it can be for me to interact with the world around me, I would love to do it more often, if only it were easier.  I would love to have some kind of focus.

I think I do a good job of maintaining my focus on Nicole.  I know I can drift from time to time, but I think
I have to use this snippet from Morrison & Quitely's New X-Menthat when she needs me, and when I need her, I'm there, in that moment.  I like to think that I can will myself out of my head for Nicole.   She's the only part of my life that I can do that for on a regular basis.  Everything else is spotty.

But this kid, this kid is going to be a whole other thing.  He will pull me kicking and screaming out of my head.  I would imagine that for as much as I claim I look forward to being more focused for him, I have no concept of what that will really entail.  I have a feeling that he's going to force the pendulum to swing drastically to the other side.

I'm looking forward to that, though.  I'm looking forward to seeing what that's like.  I'm looking forward to having clarity of purpose, because that's not something I have very often.

No pressure or anything, kid, but dad already has some preconceptions.  If you're anything like your mom, you'll blow those away, and I'll be happier for it.

Rewatching Buffy: Season Four

It was the best of episodes, it was the worst of episodes.  It was Buffy: season four.

What can you say about a season that includes both Hush and Beer Bad?  That includes Restless and Where the Wild Things Are?

I have this theory that the writing staff on Buffy did not have typical childhoods.  My theory holds that they didn't have the same college experiences that most of us did, nor did they have the same twentysomething experiences that most of us had (it's easy to see in Whedon himself, as his background is fairly unique).  This made it very hard for them to tell "college" stories and, later, "twentysomething" stories.  This explains why season four is so hit and miss and why season six is so bad.

All that said, even the worst season can be saved by a qualified overarching storyline.  Season two is constantly referred to as being great, when the reality is that it's only great because of the main plot.  This, of course, is of no help to season four, as the big storyline is horrible on almost every level.

There's a common complaint that Buffy failed when they characters graduated, that the show was unable to expand beyond it's central metaphor of high school as hell.  I disagree.  I love season five.  I think the show's failure comes when it tries to expand too far.  The show is at its best when it's telling small stories.  The characters are the key.  No one is turning into Buffy for the fight scenes -- no one.  They're tuning in to see what's going on with their favorite characters.

Season four attempted to expand the mythology, but did so without using a character as the focal point.  Yes,
an argument can be made that Riley was that focal point, but Riley was a brand new character that no one ever had the chance to get to like.  Expanding the world by incorporating the Initiative and then making the only access character someone brand new to the show was a bad idea on almost every level.

Notice how the expanded mythology worked in season two -- because it all came through Angel, a character we knew.  To a certain extent, the same could be said for Faith in season three and, appropriately, Buffy in season five.

On the big character arc front, there's not much to write home about.  Obviously, the big one is Oz leaving and Willow dating Tara, but even by the end of the season that relationship is still too new to really appreciate.  It's easy to forget how groundbreaking it was when it originally aired, though, which makes it a pretty big deal.

Giles finally gets a girlfriend, or at least a friend with benefits and, hey, look, there's a non-white character on the show! Whedon often gets criticized for having a vanilla cast, but I think that's mostly a Buffy problem, caused in no small part by the setting (as Mr. Trick says in season 3, "...strictly the Caucasian persuasion in the 'Dale."). The smaller cast on Angel makes it less of a problem and it's a non-issue on Firefly.

The biggest development for the show is the evolution of the relationship between Xander and Anya and the eventual addition of Anya as a core cast member.  She's a fantastic character who is automatically unique among the Scooby Gang.  It's something they never manage to achieve with Riley and something that takes more than a season to achieve with Tara.

And speaking of characters finding their role on the show, we come to perhaps the biggest problem: Spike.

Spike initially help the group doesn't bother me.  After all, they appear to have a mutual enemy.  Given that, it doesn't seem strange that they'd keep him alive, let alone take care of him.  They need information.

But as soon as Buffy discovers that Riley is a part of the Initiative, Spike should be dust.  There's no reason for him to be kept alive.  At one point, he becomes suicidal and Willow intervenes.  Now, I appreciate that Willow is a kind, gentle soul, but let's think about all of the things Spike has done since he was introduced in season two, let alone the things he did before he came to Sunnydale.

It's absolutely insane that Spike is left alive.  Once you start forcing a show to change for the sake of a single
character, you're in trouble.  It's less problematic in season five, but becomes intolerable again in season six.

I would love to say that season four worked as a metaphor for the transition we all make the year after we graduate from high school, but it simply wasn't good enough.  There was transition there, for sure, but it came in the form of the writers not really having any idea what the show was about anymore.  They knew the characters well enough to write some funny bits, but they spent most of the season desperately searching for drama, and when they couldn't find it, they manufactured it in a way that was untrue to the show.

Still, by the end of the season they'd found their footing.  They managed to bring the gang back together while strengthening them.  The finale did an excellent job of setting up the fifth season, laying the groundwork that they so desperately needed for season four.

Fruitful: Hurry Up and Wait

At work the other day, I learned that elephants carry their offspring in the womb for 22 months.  They also nurse their young for 2 years.  The average lifespan of an elephant is 60 years, which means an elephant spends 3% of its life breast feeding.

These are the kinds of things we talk about at my job.

You would think there would be some kind of ratio for mammals with regards to how long offspring is carried by the mother.  Elephants carry their children much longer than humans, both in actual time and in percentage of life.  That seems like a raw deal for elephants.

I mention this because there's an awful lot of "hurry up and wait" with regards to being pregnant or, in my case, having a wife whose pregnant.

When this is published, Nicole will be through 45% of her pregnancy, yet she still doesn't really look all that pregnant.  Aside from sleeping a lot and some emotional instability, the big pregnancy changes haven't kicked in yet.  And let's face facts, that's just crazy, because it means the next 55% are going to be a roller coaster ride of insanity.

But this has meant that, up until now, it's all felt unreal.  I think Nicole, especially, has been getting a little antsy to just be full blown pregnant already, the kind of pregnant she doesn't have to tell people about because they can already tell.

For the first few months of Nicole's pregnancy, we got ultrasounds on a regular basis.  This kid had an entire album of pictures taken in the first 12 weeks.  But now we're on the "yes, your pregnant, so you get normal doctor visits because this is the way things happen" visits that result in listening to the heart beat (which is fantastic), but no pictures.  And I want pictures.

But we don't get pictures until 20 weeks.  There are intervals for these things now.  This is how it works.

It's difficult in a number of ways.  Nicole regularly looks at her stomach, waiting for it to expand.  It has, but just not to the point where you might know she's pregnant just by looking at her.  I think she's looking forward to that day.  I thinks he's looking forward to basking in that glow.

And we're both eager to meet this little guy.  We talk about him a lot.  We wonder what he'll be like.  We wish we could jump forward in time so we could see him.  There's so much to look forward to, yet it seems so far away.

It's constant, too.  We're regularly doing things to prepare for an event that's still five months off.  It becomes a giant tease.

They say the waiting only makes it better, right?  Isn't that a thing that people say?  So we'll try to be patient.  You take your time, little guy.  You take all the time you need.  Just realize that by the time you show up, your parents will have spent nine months thinking about you, thinking about every little detail.  So be prepared for an overload of love that's been building up that whole time.

You should probably expect that your whole life.

It's week 18!

Uneducated

In June of 2000, I graduated from Ohio University with a Master's degree in Creative Writing.  It would take me years before I realized just how large the holes in my education really were.

Don't get me wrong, I had a great time in grad school.  It was a nice combination of college life and the real world.  My workload increased, I had two jobs, but I was still partying and play in a band.  It actually kind of makes me tired just thinking about it.

The real perk of grad school is the fact that there has been and never will be another time in my life where my main responsibility was writing.  I was forced to produce work on a regular basis, which is fantastic for a young writer.  I learned a lot about writing.

I didn't learn a single thing about being a writer, though.

While my degree was in Creative Writing, my area was Fiction, although that was ultimately something that seemed to just fall on me.  Less by chance was the fact that I was exclusively writing short stories; the idea of writing anything close to a novel was never introduced, at least not in any of my classes.

There's something to this.  Short stories are, at a base level, the product of academia.  I went into a great deal of detail about it here.  But the bottom line is that the only people who really read short stories are people who also write short stories, and many of those people are connected to English programs in some way.

Only being taught short stories isn't that big of a deal, though, or at least it wouldn't have been if I'd had absolutely any idea what to do with those stories once I finished them.  I didn't know how to submit stories or write query letters.  I had no idea which literary journals were good and which would publish two issues and then disappear forever.  I knew nothing about the business side of writing, the side that, ultimately, would determine whether or not you could make money at it (because, let's face facts, there are a lot of crappy books out there that make a ton of money).

Fortunately, I had friends, friends who were smarter than me.  My friend and poet Amanda sent me a kind of Poets and Writers magazine.
Poets & Writers"hey, quit fucking around and get your shit together" e-mail a year or so after grad school.  Her first piece of advice was to subscribe to

P&W was great, if for no other reason than it opened my eyes to the publishing world.  While I still subscribe to it, I don't spend as much time pouring over it as I did those many years ago, because now I know that this world exists.  All of those literary journals, the agents, the publishers -- I lacked all of that basic information.  I had no idea what resources were out there for writers.

Now I'm on mailing lists.  Now I get (if not read) literary journals.  I subscribe to so many web sites about writing it's out of control.  If writing is a full time job, the business of writing is stops just short of meeting the criteria for benefits.  Just writing about all of this is making me anxious.

I've had small bits of success here and there.  On one hand, I truly doubt my writing was good enough 10 years ago to have gotten published anywhere.  But on the other hand, I wonder how much further along I might be had I known what to do with all those crappy short stories I was producing.  Nothing motivates like success and I can't help but wonder how much more fire I'd have under me if one of those aforementioned crappy short stories actually showed up in some small literary journal somewhere.

My cousin is a writer.  I gave her the same advice that Amanda gave me.  I think she has a leg up on where I was at her age.  And as much as I enjoyed the creativity in my graduate classes, it would have been nice to have had just a little bit of business to go along with it.

Fruitful

"Fruitful" is a biblical term or, at least, it's a term that I mostly associate with the Bible.

God blessed them; and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth."-Genesis 1:28
Nicole's dad told us to be fruitful in the speech he gave at our wedding.  It's the only thing I really remember from that speech, to be honest.
I don't know what capital G god is thinking, but I would guess these days he's probably hoping human beings would cut it out with the whole "fruitful" thing.  There are far too many of us and we are sucking this planet dry.  A little less "fruitful" could go a long way.
I also kind of resent the fact that being fruitful is an order from on high.  I don't think anyone who doesn't want kids should have them, not just because it should be their choice, but because they'll probably be shitty parents.  There are so many unwanted children in this world already, and we seem pretty happy to do nothing about that.
I guess that kind of begs the question as to why Nicole and I are, in fact, being fruitful.
I suppose the simple answer is because we want to.  While I don't think being fruitful should be an order, I do think we should have a choice.  Nicole and I choose to be fruitful.
And we can, which is probably the bigger issue.  We know we can provide for this child.  We know that we can make sure that he is fed and clothed and care for.  That's all very important.
We also know that we can provide him with a loving home.  No, not just a loving home, but a growing home.  We both know that we can give our child everything he needs and more.  We also believe that he can surpass us as a human being.
I'm speaking out of turn a bit there because I haven't actually had a specific conversation with Nicole about this, but I think she'd agree with me.  Evolution is evolution and we believe we can help with that.  Our parents did the best they could with what they had and we'll do the same.  But think about the advances in knowledge from when you were a kid.  Now extrapolate that to where knowledge will be when your child is your age.  We're going to raise a child who is ready for that.
There is a belief among certain extremist factions of more or less every religion in the world that we must reproduce as much as possible in order to maintain the army of our chosen religion.  We have to make sure that we have troops for the coming holy war.  It's idiocy, of course, except that there's some truth to it (as is the case for all the worst things).
Our world is only going to get better if we get better, and at a certain point you and I aren't going to get any better.  But our children can be.  Our children will be.
I don't mean that to sound like I want our kid to be a scientist or astronaut or whatever.  No, I think we can make this world a better place by bringing more kind, loving people into it.  Not to get all New Age about it, but the more love we have, the less hate, and that's how we get better.
So we're being fruitful and I'm writing about it.  I'm calling it "The Fruitful Series."
I suppose I'm being fruitful with my words, too. 

Rewatching Buffy: Season Three

As I mentioned in my review of season two, the bar was raised for this show heading into season three.  The question, then, is did the show manage to meet its new, lofty standard?

Well, yes, yes it did.

I wouldn't go so far as to say every single episode of this season is great, but none of them are horrible.  Sure, "Amends" is as melodramatic and heavy handed as anything we'd seen on Buffy up to that point, and every character during "Beauty and the Beasts" is willfully ignorant, but none of the episodes come close to the standard of badness that we saw in the first two seasons.  I would imagine this had to do with the solidifying of the writing team on the show -- every writer has at least 2 episodes over the course of this season.

Season three benefited from the addition of 3 notable characters (yes, 3): Faith, the Mayor, and Wesley Wyndam-Pryce.  Yeah, you probably think that third one is overstating, but I'll get to that in a minute.

Let's start with the Mayor, who is easily the best Big Bad the show ever sees.  He's the only Big Bad who
gets set up the season before.  He's also payoff for the high school years, which could be perhaps more accurately described as the Sunnydale Years (later seasons may take place in Sunnydale, but they're not tied to the town the way the first 3 seasons are).  The Mayor represents an organic expansion of the show, one which is much smoother than further attempts in season 4.

And, let's face it, the Mayor is just flat out hilarious.  He's a wonderful change of pace from the melodrama of the Master and Drusilla (yes, I'm naming her the season two Big Bad, something that we'll get to again way down the line in season seven).  He's also the only legitimately funny Big Bad we'll see over the course of the show, not to mention the only Big Bad with  well thought out, long term plan.

The introduction of Faith adds so many layers to the show.  Aside from being a complicated character, Faith impacts every other person.  They dynamic between her and Angel pays off over and over again when she shows up on his show.  She's also the most overt example of the "other" that becomes a running theme throughout Buffy.  Each character ends up with multiple versions of his or her self over the course of the show, from Xander literally being split it two, to Willow losing control, to Ethan Rayne and Wesley being reflections of a Giles that might have been.  It's a nice way to explore what makes the original character tick.

And, hey, Faith also kicks up the energy level of the show.  While Buffy wallows in any number of new depressions, Faith is constantly up.  She fulfills a hole on the show by embracing her supernatural role and luxuriating in it.  She's the manic half to Buffy's depressant.

This leaves us with Wesley.  How, you might be wondering, can I possibly consider Wesley a notable addition to the cast?  He doesn't do much but get in the way and act officious (and somewhat lecherous).

But Wesley is added to the show to replace Giles, who has been fired, and this is a brilliant move.  Basically, they have made Giles a member of the Scooby Gang.  He's not longer the establishment -- he's a rebel, just like the rest of them.  Firing Giles and bringing in what he was supposed to be like does a nice job of showing us just how different Giles is from the rest of the Watchers and, when push comes to shove, which side he'll choose.  Giles may be old enough to be their father, but firing him closes the gap between him and
the others.

I'd also be remiss if I didn't point out how nice it was to have a season of Buffy where her mom knows she's the Slayer.  The secret identity business got tiresome in season two, and Joyce gets to show off some depth as she becomes involved in her daughter's life.

While there's room for debate about the quality of the show as a whole once it left the high school setting, there can't be any doubt that sending Angel (and Cordelia) off on their own was an excellent decision.  Angel was never going to grow as a character if he stayed on Buffy, and Cordelia's involvement with the group had become questionable at best.

All and all, in was a nice send off for the high school years, and the revamped core cast (minus Angel and Cordelia, plus Oz) made for plenty of potential for the next season.

Stand out episodes: Band Candy, Lovers Walk, The Zeppo, Dopplegangland, Earshot, and Graduation Day, both parts.

The Best Reactions to My Impending Fatherhood

A little over a week ago, Nicole and I went public with the fact that she's pregnant.  We'd been telling people here and there for a while, but we finally made it official by the way things are made official these days -- posting the news on Facebook.

 If you want some action on your FB page, tell people you're having a kid.  I've never gotten so many comments.

We received a lot of congratulations, all of which were much appreciated.  There were also a few that went above and beyond; I thought they were interesting enough to share.

Wow are you scared? 
That's a legitimate question.  I think I probably covered this in my first blog post about having a kid, but no, I'm not really scared.  Now, part of that is the fact that it takes me months to process things on an emotional level.  The other part is that my anxiety is currently focused on the pregnancy itself.  The final part is that I feel pretty confident that I'm going to be a good dad.

It's awesome, dude. Scariest thing ever, but totally awesome.
The comments from parents kind of hit on a theme.

Congratulations! Parenthood is one wild ride.
Parenting is such a thing... consuming, rewarding, and draining--all wrapped in one non-stop enchilada. 
I feel like being a parent is one of those things that is impossible to explain to someone without kids, which I can appreciate.  No matter how much detail you go into, you'll never be able to get it across accurately.  I suppose it's kind of like doing drugs that way.

Oh this is going to be real fun to watch.
And of course we'll laugh at you. That's how we keep our own crazy day-to-day seem somewhat
manageable. And, well, this'll be you doing this. 
Believe it or not, I really enjoyed comments like this.  Sure, the implication is that I'm kind of a weird-o, but, you know what?  I'm kind of a weird-o.  I like the fact that people think I have a unique perspective on things.  I wouldn't be writing this if I didn't think that was a good thing.

Mazel tov, Kyle! Are you going to quit drinking out of solidarity with your pregnant wife?
Well, I think I've probably answered this question by now.  I have not, in fact, stopped drinking.  So far Nicole has been okay with this fact.  If I had to guess, I would think she'd be less okay with it if it didn't play such a big part in my writing process.  Really, I don't drink all that much if you take away the few nights a week I write.  In that regard, I'm not doing anything that she'd want to be doing.

Holy crap! Congrats! You will be SUCH a rad dad!!
I've got reactions similar to this from a few people.  I think it mostly stems from the fact that I'm more or less a big child myself.  It's clear that I will have no problems teaching this kid how to read comic books, watch cartoons, or play video games.

I like to think it goes beyond that, though, to the fact that I truly enjoy doing such things.  I like to think that a big part of what I'm going to be able to share with my child is an enthusiasm for the things I care about.  I think that's probably part of the reason that people think Nicole and I will make great parents; you'd be hard pressed to find a more loving environment for a child.

Daaaaaaaamn.
Yeah, that's about right.


It's Week 16!
    

My OBGYN Shirt

Not my actual shirtI wear the same shirt to every doctor's appointment regarding our pregnancy.

It's a grey shirt with no writing on it.  It has black trim around the neck, sleeves, and bottom.  I have, for years, operated under the impression that such shirts look good on me or, perhaps more accurately, such shirts make me look good.  That much is understandable, as there's something very twentysomething about this style of shirt, and I regularly dress like I'm a twentysomething.

But I'm not.  I'm going to be 38 soon.

It's hot in the Northern California in the summer time and the dress code in my office is informal.  It is, more or less, wear whatever you want, because we are an internet company without the usual perks you'd find at an internet company, save for being able to wear whatever you want.  Also, the guy who owns the joint likes to wear sandals to work.

In the summer, I wear t-shirts.  I wear t-shirts with things on them.  I have two Batman t-shirts.  I have a Converse All-Stars shirt which I wear mainly because it fits me better than any other shirt I own.  I have a long torso, so my curse is ill fitting shirts that prevent me from lifting my arms above my head for fear of showing off my ever growing pony keg of a stomach.  I have a "Save Ferris" t-shirt that I wear for the exact same reason.  Both were gifts from my brother and his wife who have, it seems, the magic touch when it comes to buying me t-shirts.

I have a Minus the Bear t-shirt.  They're a band.  I have two, identical dark grey t-shirts which are both too baggy for me and yet not long enough to cover the aforementioned torso.  I have a green t-shirt that says "OHIO" in white.  I have a black t-shirt pronouncing me a member of the "Nerd Herd."

None of these shirts are particularly adult.  None of them scream "I'm mature enough to be having a child."  So I turned to the grey shirt with the black trim, the shirt that makes me look cute, the shirt that perhaps pushes me to the mid-twenties, but still comes nowhere close to the late thirties.

It will not doubt be threadbare and holy by the time our child is born.

We're having a kid.

I am writing this 9 days before it will be published.  It will go out the day after Labor Day, as I know that, by that point, we will have told everyone that my wife, Nicole, is pregnant.

When this goes out, she will be 15 weeks and one day along.  As of right now, the only changes in our life have been a regular stream of doctor's appointments and Nicole's lack of energy.  The people who do know are very excited for us, which is nice.  I'm still a ball of nerves, as I can't believe that this is truly going to work out until I'm holding that kid in my arms or, more realistically, until he's ready for pre-school.

Oh, yeah, I said "he."  It's a boy.

Consciously, not much has changed for me.  I'm excited to have a kid, although a bit concerned that it's a son.  I know about fathers and sons and that's fine, but there's a part of me that would have liked to have tried something different.

Subconsciously, I'm regressing.  I'm focused on writing and reading and playing video games and I'm annoyed by anything that stops me from doing those things.  As Nicole has suggested, I'm probably doing these things because I know that, in six months, I won't have the time.

I get like this every autumn, too, as we approach my birthday, but apparently I'm getting an early start.  It's like I have an expiration date on being irresponsible.  My savings account of free time is close to running dry.

The video games will be the first to go, I have no doubt.  My reading habits will become more selective -- no more reading shitty comics out of morbid curiosity.  The writing I will squeeze in when I can; I'll probably have to get the hang of writing sober.

Nicole has been amazing through all of this.  The road to pregnancy for us has been a long, twisted one, and perhaps some day I'll go into greater detail (theoretically in a book).  But it hasn't been easy for her.  She's managed to come through the first trimester with no morning sickness, but the hormones have played crazy with her emotions.

Honestly, I'm looking forward to the focus that having a kid will give me.  My sophomore English teacher Mr.s Reith (who sent me a very nice e-mail after my book was published that I never responded to) once told my parents that I was very talented, but unfocused.  And while I feel myself become more focused as I get older, I'm still off the mark.  I expect a certain amount of clarity to come with having a child.

Right now, though, I'm too anxious to indulge in too much thought.  Everyone keeps saying how well it's going.  The doctors are all positive.  Nicole feels great.  Everyone is just so positive about this that it makes me nervous.  I'm not sure at what point I'll be able to relax.  I know, never, because when you have kids you can never relax, but I'm just talking about accepting the fact that we are, in fact, having a kid.

I can't wait to meet my son.  I know Nicole, can't either.  These next 25 weeks are going to take forever.