Mette Ivie Harrison's Blog, page 37

Internalized Misogyny: a Checklist

Patriarchy is everywhere. Misogyny is everywhere. There is no real way to escape it. But it’s still useful to point it out when it pops up.

If you are a woman, internalized misogyny means that you yourself have learned to hate what is feminine in others and what is feminine in yourself. You see this kind of thing when people talk about rape, obviously. Blaming the female victim if she was dressed too provocatively, or didn’t follow “rules” like staying with a group or not going out in the dark that men never have to observe, or imagining that she “should have done more” like said no more or fought more. But internalized misogyny happens all the time, in the most innocuous circumstances. I am going to list some here that I myself have fallen prey to.

You might have internalized misogyny if you:

1. Find yourself talking to the guys more often because they seem to be having more “important” and less “trivial” conversations.

2. Think that women really are the ones at fault when there are miscommunications because they need to “speak up” more, or “insist on being heard.”

3. Don’t watch female athletes because they aren’t as “good” as the men.

4. Are hypercritical of female bodies, on everyone from Hilary Clinton to Britney Spears.

5. Have ever used the term “Feminazi.”

6. Think that the standard lists of classic works of literature that include few female authors are sadly still true assessments of real literary value, because women just “haven’t had the opportunities that men have.”

7. Write male characters because they feel “more powerful” and “more interesting.”

8. Think that the topic of female menstruation, childbirth, or breasts is inappropriate for mixed company.

9. Pride yourself on taking less time in the shower than any other woman you know.

10. Refuse to wear makeup because it makes you feel inauthentic.

11. Cringe when you see “pink” things because you just don’t like that color.

12. Wonder why women need to have special shirts at races and why they can’t just wear the unisex like everyone else.

13. Think hair on a female figure (leg hair, underarm hair, facial hair, toe hair) is ugly.

14. Laugh at jokes about dumb blondes.

15. Read novels by women who write about male characters.

16. Wish women on television didn’t have to look so sexy.

17. Ever use the terms “girly” or “like a girl” as an insult.

18. Wish that you had a better body, like so and so.

19. Felt competitive with another woman because she looks better than you do.

20. Think that it’s a real achievement when you “keep up with the guys.”

21. Thought that a female politician should be spending more time with her kids.

22. Asked when a married woman you know is going to start having children.

23. Wondered if women should be doing certain things because they are too dangerous.

24. Wished your boobs and/or hips were smaller.

25. Imagined a world in which men and women were “equals” where equality looks a lot like color-blindness, and means that women are just more like men.

26. Evaluated a woman based on her family and her children, rather than solely based on her professional skills or contributions to society.

Again, let me say that I can make this list so easily because I have done all of these things myself. At a young age, I chose to be a “tomboy” because that got a lot more approval than being girly did. I grew up with 6 brothers, and they tortured me out of showing emotions, in much the same way that boys torture other boys. As a result of that, I interact socially more as a guy than a girl. That means that I treat women the way that men treat them often, rather than as another woman. For a long time, I believed that was because I was being “equalist,” by evaluating everyone on the same terms. But they were male terms.

You might argue that some girls choose certain things, like being a tomboy, or colors other than pink, or not to wear makeup because that is what they *want* to do, not because it is forced on them by some kind of internalized misogyny. You may be right (though I frankly doubt it), but how would we ever know? How can you ever know what choices you would have made if you lived in a world in which there was no misogyny? There is no such world. And as one rather annoying gentleman asked me at a recent panel, why can’t we just have more equality and treat everyone the same, it’s because we live in patriarchy and there just isn’t such a thing.

There is awareness of misogyny. There is criticism of the patriarchy. That’s it. That’s all the utopia I can offer. Maybe I sound German (I certainly had plenty of training in thinking as a German philosopher in college), but as soon as you make a utopia, you will see how quickly it falls apart and reveals its real underpinnings as based in patriarchy. And so we reveal the truth. And we admit we are part of it.

Saying No

Recently, a post went around the internet about creative people who said no to a researcher who wanted to ask them about their process. (If you want to read it, go here: https://medium.com/thoughts-on-creativity/bad7c34842a2). Basically the point of the post is that creative people have time to create because they say no to things like research about their process. They're too busy using their process to produce work to talk about it.

I think that the more successful artists become, the more they tend to need to say no to things.

I think that the more successful artists become, the more they tend to need to say no to things.

Say no to people who invite you to lunches in the middle your work day.

Say no to people who ask you to watch their kids during your work time, or for other favors.

Say no to answering the telephone while you are working. Or the doorbell.

Say no to people who want to come into your office space.Say no to projects that other people suggest will give you great exposure, but pay nothing.

Say no to people who want you to do something for them that you don't really want to do.

Say no to other artists who want you to get together constantly to chat. It can be great to have a social life with other creative types, but realize it is social, and should probably be done during off hours at night or on weekends. Or it should be done fairly rarely.

Say no to the temptation to go shopping or to the movies when it isn't busy because everyone else is working.

Say no to the demon in your head who tells you that taking this one day off won't matter.

Say no to the internet. I mean, really. If you are working, you are not on youtube, facebook, or twitter. You just aren't.

Say no to the dishes, the laundry, and the dirty floors. They aren't paying you to clean them during your prime work hours.

Say no to friends who stop by in the middle of your work day.

Say no to kids or a spouse who think you should run all the errands because you're at home.

Say no to the desire to read or experience other art (watch TV or movies, visit a museum) during the time you should be working. Those are great activities to rebuild your creative spirit. They just aren't work.

Say no to the idea of writer's block. It's mostly just a little kid complaining he doesn't want to do his homework. If you are having life block, that is another problem and needs serious treatment. But there's no special thing about being a writer that means that you need to just wait for the words to come because they are better that way. They aren't, trust me. The words you make come are just as likely to be good or bad as any of the other ones.

Say no to people who tell you you aren't good enough and you should give up on your dream.

Say no to a day job that drains all your creativity out of you.

Say no to perfectionism. It will kill you and all your productivity. Good enough is good enough for now.

Say no to keeping up with all the news, all the TV shows, or all the gossip in the neighborhood. Whatever your obsessions used to be before you became an artist, guess what? You don't get to have them anymore. You have only one obsession now. It's your art.

Say no to people who tell you that they have an idea they want to share with you, fifty-fifty split on the profits. They are just a waste of time.

Say no to anger. It will suck up all your time, and it will give you nothing in return.

Say no to fear of rejection. Of course you are going to hate rejection. Of course it will hurt. And then you will get over it and get better or find the right person to appreciate your work. Rejection is a massive time-saver because it helps you know where not to go again.

On ways to make your 24 hours feel like 27, try this: http://www.amazon.com/The-Hour-Day-Productive-ebook/dp/B00F8JTZ9K

Monday Book Rec: Jo Knowles' Living With Jackie Chan

This is the story of Josh, a boy who had meaningless sex with a girl who was did not say no. It is the story of a boy who wonders if he ever deserves anything good to happen in his life again. He knows what he did was wrong, and he knows that he did it anyway because he was thinking more about himself than he was about another person. Or about the consequences of sex that might change his life and his whole family’s forever.

Living With Jackie Chan is a sequel to Jumping Off Swings. But Jackie Chan can easily be read without having read the first book.

I found myself at times wanting to yell at Josh an talk to him about rape culture. I wanted to say that what he did WAS rape, that using a girl’s body for your own pleasure when she is simply limp, is not consent. If a girl isn’t saying yes and encouraging, then you are using her. Sure, it’s not rape in an alley way kind of rape. But it’s certainly part of rape culture, which puts all the onus on a girl, makes her a slut if she doesn’t shout no and fight for her life, and then makes it all her fault.

But this is Josh’s story. And it’s a book of fiction, not a tract about rape. Jo Knowles’ does an incredible job of seeing things from the other point of view. Not once does she ever excuse Josh. He never comes off as a hero, or even as a victim. He knows very well what he did was wrong. He knows that he’s the bad guy here. And he doesn’t know if he can ever be anything else. How long do you spend hating yourself and punishing yourself for doing one thing (however terrible) wrong?

Josh is a kid. Sure, he is a boy. Sure, he listened to rape culture tell him that what he was doing was allowed. But he pays the consequences of rape culture, too. He loses access to his son. He loses all self-respect. He loses his friends and his senior year in high school. He loses living with his parents.

Because Jo Knowles is a compassionate writer, he is also given mercy in the form of his uncle Larry, “Jackie Chan.” And in a world where there is not much mercy, I could still as a reader believe that good things could come out of a terrible thing. They didn’t have to. I don’t believe that good always comes of tragedy. But sometimes tragedy does make us reevaluate and make changes in our lives. In some ways, this can feel wrong, too. As if we’re not allowed to have anything good come out of a tragedy. But we can choose, even when we have done something wrong, to be better.

Living With Jackie Chan may seem like a simple story, but it is like a delicate bit of porcelain. Too much of Josh making a new life might feel like saying he wasn’t at fault. Too little of the journey back might have felt like it was easy. This book is a gem and it’s the perfect way to begin talking to teens about what is right and wrong in assumptions about girls and boys and sex without ever having to use words like “rape culture” or making them feel like you are making judgments.

I also loved the story of Stella and Britt. Stella might have become simply Josh’s new love interest, but she wasn’t. While he clearly liked her and she might be interested in him, we as readers got a chance to see why Stella would pick a rich, entitled kid like Britt, and why he was in love with her. It is a complicated story, and while it is something a lot of teens (and adults) experience, it never felt like simply a lesson or an example. It was an individual story, about a girl in a particular situation, and the particular boy she fell in love with. It was messed up, but it wasn’t all bad and it wasn’t all wrong.

Loved, loved this book! And will be thinking about it for a long time.

Monday Book Recs: The Coldest Girl in Cold Town by Holly Black

I found myself dog-earing pages in the first few chapters, and then dog-earing more and more pages in this book. I know your librarian told you not to do that, but this is my book, which I own, and so I give myself permission to deface it.

Here is one of the passages I marked:

There’s something easy about the idea that vampirism is some kind of disease—that they can’t help it that they attack us, that they commit murders and atrocities, that they can only control themselves sometimes. They’re sick; it’s not their fault. And there’s something even easier about the idea of demonic invasion, something forcing our loved ones to do all manner of terrible things. Still not their fault, only now we can destory them. But the third option, the possibility that there’s something monstrous inside us that can be unleashed, is the most disturbing of all. Maybe it’s just us, us with a raging hunger, us with a couple of accidental murder under our belt. Humanity, with the training wheels off the bike, careening down a steep hill. Humanity, freed from the constraints of consequence and gifted with power. Humanity, grown away from all things human.

And this one:

We all wind up drawn to what we’re afraid of, drawn to try to make a way to make ourselves safe from a thing by crawling inside of it, by loving it, by becoming it.

And this:

The monster is bigger than human. It represents abundance—overabundance… It has lots of eyes, extra arms, too many teeth. Everything about it is too many and too much.

That was how she felt, right then. As if there was too much of her, as if her skin was tight with muchness. She felt ripe to bursting.

And she remembered what Gavriel had said when she’d woken handcuffed to a bed. Being infected, being a vampire, it’s always you. Maybe it’s more you than ever before. It’s you as you always were, deep down inside.

Maybe this was who she always was. Always shoving all that muchness down deep inside her where no one had to see.

And once she’d found Pearl, how long before she became the monster her mother was? How long before the infection sank so deep down into her blood that all she could think of was how to get warm again? How long before Pearl was just soft skin and a beating heart? She might be herself still, but she’d be herself hungry, a self she didn’t know yet. Herself with the brake lines cut. A self she didn’t trust to do anything but kill.

I could go on and on, quoting parts that are brilliant thoughts about the human soul and about storytelling and the creation of monsters and heroes and why we need stories and what makes us human or not human and what we do when we read books and how we form communities and cut people out of communities and on and on. But I’ll stop with this much and say, you have to read the book. Because the quotes don’t make nearly as much sense unless you have. And maybe they don’t even make as much sense unless you have read all the vampire novels that Holly Black has read and is speaking to. Literary novels have all these allusions to other literary novels, but what Holly Black is doing here is honoring all the vampire novels, treating them as if they are worth being alluded to, and reworked, and remade into something more. And because she believes it, they are.

Yes, it’s a vampire novel. Yes, it’s about a girl who is out to save her best friend, and her little sister, and then other people she comes in contact with, from becoming vampires. It’s also about a girl who is in love with a hot, old vampire and who ends up becoming a vampire herself (though I suppose there might be different interpretations of the ending). So it may sound like it’s like a hundred other vampire novels you’ve already read. But you’ve never read a vampire novel like this before. This is the meta-vampire novel, the vampire novel that is about why we read vampire novels and why girls have dreams of hot, old vampire guys and why we want to become vampires.

Read it. Read it now.

Writing What Only You Can Write

When I first started in this business, I was mainly concerned with finding a story idea that I a) COULD write well enough to be publishable and that I b) COULD find someone who liked it well enough to help me edit it. I still love many of those books. They were just within my grasp, with me growing along with the ideas so that I could write almost to the level that the story deserved. They were, truly, the very best I could do. I poured as much of myself into them as I could.

But I have changed in terms of what I want to do with my writing. I no longer simply want to be published. I suppose this is the luxury of having been published already. Like someone who has had sex once, the thrill of the thing itself is no longer enough. I want to have good sex. In fact, perhaps I want to have sex of the kind that no one else has EVER had before, or thought of having before, in the history of the world.

Now, as a reader, that is not necessarily what I want from every book I read. I often want a book that is predictable. I want a book that does not, in fact, challenge me on every page. Because I read when I am tired, or depressed, or looking for comfort. I read when I am waiting in line at the grocery store and have only about a quarter of my normal attention. I read when I want to be able to think with half my mind about a problem that I can’t solve.

As a writer, a story that entertains is no longer enough for me. I don’t want to write stories that other people could have written. I don’t want someone reading my book to put it down and think, that was fun. And then never think of it again. But most of all, I don’t want it to feel generic, like it might have been a project outsourced by the IT department at a major publisher, who was looking for a writer who would work for hire.

I want to write MY stories, the books that come out of my world and are so twisted by my imagination, my unique experiences and my bizarre worldview that people put down my books, shaking their heads, and knowing that this was a book that is unique. Not entertainment, but transformation. I want to write books that use words people have to look up in the dictionary, and that people disagree with violently and want to throw across the room at times. I want to write books that get nasty reviews because they are so misunderstood (which seems like it’s not that hard, actually, so maybe I should take that back). I want to write books that are unforgettable and that when people meet me, they nod their heads and say, yeah—I knew you already because I read your book and your voice would not get out of my head.

Do you know what I mean? Maybe I’m crazy, and I’m certainly not saying that there is only place in the world for one kind of book. There are lots of readers and lots of writers. I don’t know that every writer starts where I started or will end up where I ended up, and I know that not every reader is going to want to meet me all the way in the middle with these books. But since I am me and I have both the blessing and curse of being able to choose what books I write, this is what I choose. I choose to write books that no one could ever mistake for being anyone else’s.

Race report Kokopelli 2013

I was so tired driving down to St. George for 5 hours for this race, that I actually fell asleep about 9:30. Since I didn't need to be up until 6:30, that means I got almost 9 hours of sleep the night before a race. This is unheard of for me, though perhaps it is something I ought to try to to do more often.

The Good:
1. I took over 4 minutes off my best time for this race, and 6 minutes off the most recent time for this race. That is pretty clear evidence that I am actually improving, I think, and not just catching flukes or shaving time off transition (which is real time, but still . . .)
2. I paced myself superbly. My run time in particular was exactly paced, so that half the time was up to the turnaround and half back. Granted, the turnaround marked the point at which it was more downhill than uphill, but still, I was proud of that pacing.
3. I sprinted hard the last 200 yards, catching up a woman who was doing the sprint race and wasn't in my age group at all. We neither of us needed to compete against each other, but it was actually just plain fun to do it, so I kept it up all the way to the line. I won't say I let her win, but she won and I didn't.
4. I got to catch up with an old friend who lives in Europe on a long phone conversation on the way to the race. I also got to listen to a complete audiobook. This may not sound like a fun birthday celebration to normal people, but I really enjoyed the quiet and being alone. Which isn't to say I don't enjoy company. I had originally planned this as a family trip. That didn't work out, but I really enjoyed it this way, too.
5. Good food. I ate at Durango's, which is like Cafe Rio but better. They have sauteed veggies for vegetarians (and carnivores) to add to all the meals and their food is still super cheap. Is it wrong to admit that I had a salad before a race instead of pasta? I did eat some of the tortilla.
6, I got 3rd place overall. My nemesis still beat me, but I narrowly edged out a woman who beat me in my last race by a large margin. Not that I'm counting or anything. She thought she was ahead of me and that she'd taken third. I feel a little bad about that, but I passed her at one point and she should have noticed my leg, which sported my age, declaring proudly that I started 4 minutes back from her. So when she zoomed ahead of me as we went into T2 together, I was still 4 minutes ahead.
7. I am getting really good at gas station bathroom "showers" where I dunk my head into a sink, rinse, and generally get cleaned up. A 5 hour drive all stinky did not appeal to me.
8. Great race T-shirt. And also, I got a new swim bag as my prize for taking 3rd place. Woot!
9. Post race meal including a veggie wrap for me. I never feel like eating after a race, but that doesn't mean I need to. I got in what I could, chatting up one of the volunteers who was eating, and then took the rest in the car to eat on the way home.

The Bad:
1. I went off course on the swim. I have done this every single time I have done this race. And every year, I say to myself, "don't think about anything else in this race but getting the swim right." I pictured it in my mind, reminded myself to stay to the left (for some reason I always go to the right, in this course, and not in any other). I was so far of course one of the kayaks came over to try to fetch me. There were some other people out there with me, which was why I hadn't corrected earlier. Wish I hadn't done that. And I suppose that is something to work for again on the next year.
2. The bike course was horrible! This chip sealed road has made me grit my teeth in frustration before, but it is just so unpleasant to bike on. The next time your city government elects to chip seal a road because it is cheaper, please vote against it. It is so cruel to bikes!
3. I guess this year I can't complain that they start the old ladies (over 40) in a different group than the younger ones, since it might have turned to my advantage, but I wish they would start us based on our expected finish time instead. Or something. It just seems unfair that you have to guess who you're competing against overall.

And that's it. More good than bad by a long shot. And now I am home and I hope I will sleep well again tonight. But first, food!

15 Gross Things Triathletes Do:

Ask the average triathlete how many times they visit portapotties before, during, and after the race. Gross.

Swimming in open water. Does anyone do this anymore, except for triathletes? It's gross. Think about all of the animals peeing in that water. And the dead fish that are in it. And possible other dead things. And the dirt, sand, slime, and seaweed you are likely to ingest while swimming. Even if you try hard not to swallow anything. Gross.

Peeing in a wetsuit. This is done by everyone, everywhere. It must be why people go so fast the first 100 meters. They're trying to avoid thinking about what is in the water.

Peeing on the bike. Many triathletes think this is a weapon and will actually save it up to release on a competitor who gets too close or may be drafting without officials watching.

Peeing by the side of the road. They can't put portapotties everywhere. Some triathletes think that the world is a giant portapotties. The cows do it. Why not the rest of us?

Clearing the throat/nostrils on the bike or run. I used to carry a small towel with me attached to my bike so I could wipe my nose, which tends to run while I'm biking. Then I learned what all bikers everywhere know. You just hold one finger to close one nostril, and then blow hard and hope it lands on the road. Or possibly, hope it lands on a competitor who is annoying behind you. Gross.

Smashed food. Lots of races will have a “special needs” bag for a mid point during a long race. Or people will stash their special foods in pockets on their person. In either case, think about how smashed this will get after several hours. Mushed peanut butter sandwiches anyone? Gross.

Gu and gatorade. Seriously, I do not understand why people who are not racing would ever drink any flavor of Gatorade. And gu? It is the consistency of snot. Which you are supposed to swallow.

Puking on the run. Watch any triathlon event and you will see people puking by the side of the road? There's a reason for this. If you push yourself too hard on that particular day, with those particular conditions, and try to take in the same number of calories you do in training, your body rebels. Most triathletes puke, and then keep going. They feel better afterwards. Gross.

Lots of people slick their bodies up with body glide or a similar product before a race. There is a reason for this. If you don't, guys are likely to end up with nipple bleeds. You can see who forgot at the finish line, where guys dripping blood down the front of their shirts are visible. Also happens to women. And you can bleed almost anywhere that chafes. Between your legs, on your butt, under your arms. Gross.

Some people are really smart about pinching cups in particular ways so that they can grab fluid while running through aid stations. Some people aren't so smart. And they spill sticky sports drink all over themselves, every aid station.

Sponges. These are great for when a race is hot and they have been sitting in ice water. You grab a couple, stick them down the front of your shirt and down your shorts, front and back. Cooling your body at its core is key to success. Reload at every aid station with new, cold sponges and get rid of the old ones. But you will sometimes see people who think the sponges are for drinking from. Gross! Don't put them in your mouth. Not ever!

Ever watch a triathlete take off their shoes after a race is over? Yeah, don't. Having several blackened toenails, or ones that have already come off—very common. Also, massive blisters which may have broken open and spurted everywhere.

After a triathlon event, just walk the course. You will see sports gel packets strewn all over the place. Plus busted tubes, cups, used sponges, towels, banana peels, orange peels, watermelon rinds. And those are the things you understand. You see a lot of stuff you don't understand and really, really don't want to know about. Gross!

Kiss on the finish line, or become engaged there. Seriously, can't you find a better place for PDA that doesn't include crusted sweat lines on your face? Talk about a nasty photo opportunity!

Grief is NOT a Group Project

There are ways in which having the right people around you can probably help a little with grief. I remember in the first few days (this is eight years ago, mind you), there were constant packages sent, emails to let me know that I was remembered and loved, notes, cards, food.

The funeral itself was a wonderful, cathartic thing. I had friends and family around me, and people did some amazing things, great gifts of service. Touched up photos of our baby, dried floral wreaths from the funeral, special memorial things. The luncheon after the funeral was filled with this strange sense of heaviness combined with laughter. I was astonished that I could be happy while I was so sad.

And then, after about two weeks, all of that ended. I remember I felt this change as a rather abrupt jolt. This was, as I look back on it, about the patience most people have with another person's grief. But guess what? Grief lasts a lot longer than two weeks.

After that first two weeks of the “honeymoon” period of grief, it became acutely painful to have any social contact with other people. I remember that for several years, I cut off one after another of the social groups I was part of, because I would go and then realize that I couldn't do that to myself. Let me explain a few of the problems I had.

When I went to the pool, where I had those casual acquaintances that you know from the gym or some place like that, I kept having to explain what had happened. These weren't people who had information about my life from any other source. And so I had to tell them one by one. Reciting the details of a terrible tragedy to the idly curious is wearing. It left me shaking after each one, and dreading ever going back to the swimming pool. Eventually, I actually switched my swimming pool membership to a different pool so that I didn't have to face people I knew at the old one anymore. It was just too awful. And at the new pool, I didn't make new friends. I didn't want to talk about it.

“How are you doing?” was the question that I would get from people who did know what had happened to me. Other writer friends, for instance, or neighborhood friends at a block party or at church. This is not the kind of question that it is useful to ask in a casual setting. The expectation is that I should say “I'm fine.” Which I did.

I became the queen of pretending that I was fine, because that was what I felt that other people expected me to say. If they really wanted to know the truth, they'd have come over to my house and sit down with me, and let me tell them the truth. But almost no one did that. I think they were afraid of me telling them the truth. I am passionate and I am articulate. And it appeared to me that other people did not like that.

There began a long period of me hating all the people with whom I shared these casual conversations, which became another reason not to seek out such contact. They demanded that I put on this role of what I called “Robot Mette” who was fine. And then they complimented me on this role. All the time. I can't tell you how many people came up to me to tell me how impressed or inspired they were by how well I was doing. And it was a lie. It turns out that when you tell people a lie that they want to hear, you lose all respect for them.

And after I stopped pretending all the time and let myself show in very small ways how I really felt, people around me were distressed to discover how angry I really was. I was so, so angry! I had not been an angry, nasty person before this and I didn't particularly like that I was an angry, nasty person now. But if I was going to be honest, which seemed part of what I needed to do to heal myself, I had to let that nastiness out. That was not something that other people seemed to appreciate, either. Why was I angry at them? They hadn't done anything! Of course they hadn't. But they weren't suffering, and I was angry at everyone who wasn't as angry as I was.

I did try at one point to attend a grief group. And I never got into it. I just didn't connect with the ridiculous pains that I saw there. Maybe that is telling about me and my impatience with myself grieving. Also, I didn't want to feel other people's pain. I had plenty of my own, thank you very much. So that was a short-lived experience. The only thing that I did on this front that helped at all was to crochet blankets for other lost babies to give to a group who worked at the hospital. But it was short-lived, again because it ended up making me think about my grief all the time and that was SO painful.

In the end, I have to say that my experience with grief was not a group experience at all. Not when it was at its worst, anyway. I was incapable of normal human social interaction. It's only now that I am able to be distant enough on occasion, and willing enough to go back to the grief, that I can talk about it in a useful way for others. And now, I find it occasionally soothing to have comments on posts, whereas seven or six years ago, I would have written something and then spent a week as a gibbering idiot, feeling like I had exposed too much of myself and any comment at all would just hurt too much.

So, that is me and group grief. Not so much. It could be that this is just my lack of normal social interaction coming to the fore again, but in case it isn't and there are others out there who are also confused by the insistence that grief be “shared,” you can join my club of angry, nasty grievers. It's not much of a club, but so it goes.

On Second Place:

This weekend at Camp Yuba Triathlon, I took second place. Overall. Out of sixteen women. It was a small race, but I am pretty happy with the results. I got to take home one of the coveted silver platters I have been watching other overall winners get all year. I tend to take home medals in age group wins, but overall wins are more rare. The woman who beat me was, as is often but not always the case, about 15 years younger than me, still in her 20s. She beat me by about 150 seconds. No one was holding out timers to see who won, but it was close as Olympic triathlons go, which last 2 ½ hours generally for me.

This was in some ways the perfect race. I didn't make dumb mistakes. I didn't go off course in the swim. The swim wasn't too long. I got through transition perfectly, faster than any year previously. I am really pleased with how fast I am able to get out of my wetsuit these days, in under 10 seconds, I think. My bike time was good, but not too fast. I have become slightly suspicious of people who go fast on the bike and then are surprised when their runs are slow. It isn't about your running, usually. It's about pacing yourself too fast in the beginning of the race. I always think about this in the swim in particular, when people are zooming past me, hitting me in the face with feet that are kicking wildly. Seriously? This is a long race. And I pass tons of these energetic early swimmers in the second loop at my rather steady pace.

I was under 40 seconds in the second transition to bike, another thing to celebrate for me. I was in second place still, losing a few seconds more to the top woman (though I beat her in both transitions). And then I hit the run. This is where you really see if you are as good as you thought you were. It was a hilly bike and a hilly run, especially for the middle of Utah, which is supposed to be a desert and super flat. I paced myself evenly throughout the run, and sure, I wish I'd been able to go faster. But every time I saw the first place woman pass me, did I think, oh, I'm going to try to chase her? No, I never did. Because this was my race. It wasn't about other people being better than me. It was about me proving who I was to me. That was it. That is all any race ever is for me. Now maybe that's because I'm not a professional triathlete, but I wonder how many of those have the same attitude. It's not about who wants it the most, as one of my coaches in high school once told me. It's about who has trained the best and who woke up that morning with the best physical conditioning.

I crossed the finish line about 150 seconds back from first place. And I was thrilled with myself. I really was. Sure, I've taken first a couple of times and that's nice, too, but you know what? It's not that different. Because if you take first and you think you didn't do well according to your own standards, you are always disappointed. And if you take second to last and you are improving, you are thrilled to death. And I think that's what counts.

So I got to Comic Con that afternoon a little late to my panel because of the race and I explained what I'd done that morning and showed off my cool medals. And one of the other panelists ended up mentioning that he came in second place in audio books to JK Rowling. And he was mad about it. He looked at me and he said, Mette, you came in second place in your race today. I bet you would have been happier if you came in first.

This produced a frustrated feeling in me because I was so happy with my second place. And first place isn't everything, no matter what he thinks. If I came in second to JK Rowling, I guess I would be pretty happy, just as I was happy to come in second to someone who was 15 years younger and who knew the course better than I did. She deserved it more than I did. And also, second place is damned cool. And also, we are all in our own race. To always feel like you missed first place is a recipe for being unhappy all your life. I am really trying to fight against that. I don't know if it was because this panelist was male and in our culture, being male is all about hierarchy, or if it is just who he is. But I am really trying hard not to be that person.

One interesting other fact was that after the panel, this panelist came up to me and mentioned that his wife is doing her first triathlon soon, and wondered if I would be at the race. Maybe I will be. And I won't be unhappy with second place there, either. I bet his wife will happily stand second place on the podium, and I bet he cheers loudly for her. I hope so, anyway.

Fairy Tales, Fan Fiction and Copyright

I was on a panel this weekend at Comic Con about fairy tales and one of the questions we were asked was why fairy tales are so persistent. I think the typical answer is that they are full of enduring characters and that the themes are resonant with Americans today. I pointed to the Cinderella fairy tale in particular as one that Americans like, because we imagine that it is all about the poor person who works hard, suffers, and gets rewarded in the end (not sure it is, but maybe the Disney version). There is also the reality that fairy tales are all plot and short, which makes them easy to tell orally and then to add to for any society today.

But the real reason I think that fairy tales persist is that they have no copyright. I am someone who makes a living from intellectual property rights, so don’t mistake the message here. I want creators to benefit from their property for a certain length of time. But it is also true that some creators become so Draconian about holding onto rights that I think they are harming their own property in a particular way. Yes, they may no longer be able to charge for the original stories. But if you don’t allow people to retell your stories, they will find something else to retell.

Imagine a world in which Superman was an IP that was out of copyright. How many retellings of that story would there be making money for people who weren’t the original creators? I think there are a lot of stories that would lend themselves to retellings if fans were allowed to do it. And one of the things that attending Comic Con taught me was that fans are often brilliant critics and re-interpreters of original work. Just look at the costumes. Sure, there are plenty of absolutely faithful costumes. But a lot more of the ones I saw were deliberately subversive, gender bending characters, updating time periods or simply reusing bits and pieces that were desired and dropping the rest. I was so impressed!

Fans are the lifeblood of any creative work. To look down on their retellings and to only value the ones that are allowed to be monetized like fairy tale retellings seems pretty silly to me. And ultimately, counterproductive. There is nothing that really makes the stories we think of as “fairy tales” today cohesive. There are the Grimm’s tales. But then there are also Perault’s versions, completely different. And Hans Christensen Andersen’s Christian tales. And Oscar Wilde’s rather subversive stories. We think of them all as fairy tales, because they are stories that are short and because they are out of copyright, which means we can reuse them ourselves without penalty.

And what about fairy tales from other cultures? When will we discover those? I suppose when we stop being so silly, thinking that only one culture has fairy tales that are of interest to our current time period. Bunk!