Sezin Devi Koehler's Blog, page 17

In Defense of True Detective Vol. 2: A Love Letter to Crime Noir and Broken People

"I'm gonna come straight out and say it: I loved the second season of True Detective. Go ahead and toss your rotten fruit at my head. I've been hankering for jam." My 11th article for Huffington Post, published in August 2015.

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Why I Stopped Giving Unsolicited Advice

"I hadn't realized what a heavy and totally unnecessary burden advice-giving had been for much of my adult life." My 10th article for Huffington Post, published in August 2015.

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Honoring Rockhaven Sanitarium, America’s First Feminist Asylum

"In the stillness of Rockhaven, its stasis of abandonment, we can take a moment to admire the staying power of these feminist pioneers and the vast socio-cultural debt we owe them for their visionary humanitarian work." My 9th article for Huffington Post, published in August 2015.

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My First Fanfiction: The Sad and Redemptive Life of Zuzu LeStrange

The biography of my Harry Potter cosplay character, Zuzu LeStrange.

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Trigger Warning

"Now -- and also in the wake of the newest horrifying mass shooting in Charleston -- is a little empathy and compassion for traumatized people really too much to ask?" My 8th article for Huffington Post, published in July 2015.

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How I Finally Developed Some National Pride

I've been on this planet for 36 years and never realized what I was missing in not having a sense of attachment with my ancestry. My 7th article for Huffington Post, published in June 2015.

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His Watch Has Ended, And So Has Mine: An Open Letter to Game of Thrones

I cannot support a show that capitalizes on the gratuitous displays of female nudity, rape, torture, murder, and pedophilia disguised as entertainment. My 6th article for Huffington Post, published in June 2015.

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8 Things To Remember When Interacting With Heavily Tattooed People

Self-portrait under UV light.

Despite the fact that more and more people are heavily tattooed today, there still seems to be general confusion about how non-tattooed people can approach tattooed people in a way that will not result in an eyeroll, a sigh, irritation, or even a fight.

Being heavily tattooed ourselves, my husband and I can’t leave the house without steeling ourselves for the inevitable onslaught of questions and inappropriate behavior we’ll receive out in public on account of our pieces.

And in spite of living in the soaring humidity and oven heat of Southeast Florida, I often find myself covering up — especially when I go out alone — so as to avoid the attention my own large tattoos inevitably draw.

As a public service for those not in the know, here are a few tips on how to talk to and behave around heavily tattooed people.

1) Heavily tattooed individuals are human beings, not objects. Do not touch our tattoos. Ever. Unless you’ve been invited to do so.

I’ve had strangers run their hands along my back who then have the gall to act affronted when I don’t want to talk to them at all, let alone about my tattoos.

This is a good rule for people in general: Don’t touch a stranger’s body, no matter how tempting it may seem. Seriously. Just don’t do it.

Do feel free to say “nice tattoos” or “beautiful art,” with a friendly smile.

2) People with large tattoos have a deep significance with the designs they’ve imprinted into their skin. A tattoo could represent someone they loved who died, or the passing of a difficult life phase, or an area that has caused a great deal of pain.

Tattoos are highly personal.

Do not ask a tattooed stranger what their tattoos mean.

Would you ask a stranger about their sex life waiting in line at the post office?

Would you ask a scarred or burned person about what happened to their skin when you’re passing them in the supermarket or in a park?

I don’t think so.

Yes, the difference is we tattooed people have elected to re-design our bodies, but that doesn’t make it any less personal or intimate. And just because you can see someone’s tattoos is not an invitation into that person’s life. Just like in any other human interaction, the person will tell you their story if and when it’s the right time.

That also means that most of you will never know about all the tattooed people of whom you’re curious. You will never know why they have that bird, or fish, or monster in that particular place, or why they have a huge tattooed eye on their neck. You have to let that go.

Do feel free to say “nice tattoos” or “beautiful art” with a smile. Being pleasant might make the person comfortable enough to share even without being asked.

3) Do not use the words “tats”, “tatz”, “ink”, “inked” or “body art” to try and sound like you’re in the know about tattoos.

(Oh Ink Master, Miami Ink, LA Ink, how you’ve made lives so much harder by encouraging this irritating terminology.)

To heavily tattooed people, using these trendy buzzwords words signals a lack of education about tattoo culture and you’re likely to get the eyeroll, sigh, or irritated look mentioned above.

Do feel free to say “nice tattoos” or “beautiful art”.

4) For the love of all that is good and right, do not ask a heavily tattooed person if getting tattooed hurt.

Come on now, use your common sense.

A needle goes in and out of several dermis layers, inserting varying amounts of ink, for hours on end. Of course it hurts. Some places hurt more than others — anywhere near internal organs or bone, for example — but every single tattoo hurts.

And oftentimes people get tattoos to mark difficult periods of their lives or the deaths of loved ones. Those memories are painful, too, and talking about the tattoos is an extension of the potential sadness that lead to the tattoos in the first place.

If you’re trying to use the pain factor as an in to get more information about our tattoos you will inevitably fail.

Instead, try saying “nice tattoos” or “beautiful art” and take a moment to quietly appreciate that this person went through a great deal of pain on a number of levels to transform their body into what you see now.

5) Do not ask a tattooed person to turn around or give you their arm or show you a body part, or try move their clothing so you can better see their tattoo without their permission.

I am often troubled by the entitlement non-tattooed people feel over my body. This is a particular form of objectification that is irksome to tattooed people and can lead to ugly confrontations when the tattooed person says no.

Remember, even though you might be able to see our tattoos it does not mean our tattoos exist for you. And we are not here to assuage your curiosity about us.

Try a lighthearted “nice tattoo” or “beautiful art” instead. The person just might better show their tattoo to you without being asked, simply because you were polite.

6) As the Doorknocker says in The Labyrinth, “It’s very rude to stare.”

Just because someone is heavily tattooed does not make them an exception to this general rule of society.

Staring is rude. Don’t do it.

Try saying, “Nice tattoo.” “Beautiful art” also works.

7) All tattoos are not created equal. Please do not compare the tiny butterfly on your ankle or your non-specific Asian character to our sleeves, half-sleeves, and full-body pieces.

Your one small tattoo and our massive tattoos are not the same. The hours, the extended pain, the weeks of healing, the money, and the dedication to our big pieces is nothing like the few minutes it took for you to pick a design from a wall of flash art on a whim.

Instead say “nice tattoo” or “beautiful art” and next time consider getting a custom piece instead of a generic one.

8) Possibly the most important thing to remember about heavily tattooed people is that we do not owe non-tattooed people anything.

As a stranger — or even sometimes as an acquaintance — you are not entitled to our explanations, time, a better view, or the right to touch us.

A tattooed person’s body is their own, that’s one of the reasons we have tattooed it in the individual way we have.

We are not here to be fetishized.

So, Non-Tattooed Person, when in doubt all you need remember are these two phrases: “That’s a nice tattoo.” Or, “You have beautiful artwork.”

Keep your hands and questions to yourself.

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Lather, Rinse, Repeat: On Being A Method Writer

Cover art ©David Arts courtesy of Shutterstock.

A few weeks ago I finally finished my second novel, Crime Rave.

Hooray!

The final final version is now in the hands of my last team of readers and it’ll come out later this year.

Huzzah!

Here’s the quick Crime Rave plot crunch:

Women, survivors, warriors­—the hard-core ensemble from “American Monsters” survive the worst act of domestic terrorism ever to occur on American soil when 35,000 ravers are murdered in cold blood. Regathered, and regrown from their remaining body parts, they must work with the LAPD detectives Atticus Red Feather and Synthia Günn to put together the pieces of this monstrous act and face a new horror. The science experiments of an elite underground lab team, led by Colonel Ripper Ransom—of Mai Lai massacre fame— want out, and the smog goddess Kaleanathi wants more souls to devour. What will happen if the survivors fail? The world is full of monsters, but the worst are yet to come.

Juicy, right?

But there’s no rest for the wicked, or writers who have several novels kicking about in their brains as I do. Three of them, in fact.

I woke up one morning rearing to begin writing Book Number Three: a zombie tale set in Prague replete with statues that come to life and continued goddess intervention in the lives of my crack team of badass superheroines and their trauma-related superpowers.

Hyped and excited and totally ready to go. Except the only problem was the words weren’t ready to go. The story has a vague outline, but I haven’t even begun research other than watching the first six seasons of Doctor Who.

And then—thankfully before all the horrible voices that tell me I suck, I’m a hack, I’m not an artist, I’m an infectious piece of human waste chimed in—I remembered: I’m a method writer.

I start with a vague idea of how I want my story to turn out stylistically and I spend months (or even years) immersing myself in similar genres until I have figured out exactly how all the voices in my head will appear on paper. I have a general outline worked out with the arc of the story, but it’s not one I’m married to, it’s merely my first guide to help me begin organizing and structuring the action.

Once I’ve absorbed all the information I need, only then can I begin to channel my story into word form. I’m a human conduit.

So, now, I need to devour books.

These are some of the tomes I own that make up just a fraction of the books I will read to get into character for Book Three. There are dozens more waiting in my Better World Books and Amazon baskets, even more bookmarked in my Lighthouse Point Library account.

By the time I’m done researching I’ll have read hundreds of books, watched hundreds of movies and television shows, and had several dozen bizarre dreams that will work their way into the fabric of my crazy quilt story. My house will have a minimum of three notebooks filled with musings on the characters, ideas, themes, and stories for reference when I finally begin writing.

It’s a rather epic process. And I forgot that it takes a lot of time, patience, including many moments spent not thinking about any of it at all, giving my intuition time to simmer with the narrative until the first shitty draft is ready to be put to paper. Several drafts later, several years later, then there it will be, a tidy and awesome proof copy like the one sitting on my desk for Crime Rave.

And in the meantime, those other two (maybe three) novels will get mentally worked on as well.

Inspiration is a wonderful thing, the way it crosses over from one work to another, shaping stories that are so far in the future they are a wisp of an idea, but alive and breathing nonetheless.

There’s a long and exciting yellow brick road ahead of me.

I’ve got my sparkling red shoes on and off I go.

What’s your novel-writing process?

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So Long, Farewell, Auf Wiedersehen, Good Night 2014

 

I haven’t blogged here since April, and for a very good reason:

2014 saw me become a Huffington Post blogger.

Boom!

My first HuffPost piece—8 Reasons Why I’m Not Having Children—went moderately viral and ended up getting translated into Spanish, French, Korean, German, and Italian to boot. Not bad for a first article, huh?

Today, my fifth and ultimate piece of this year—a review of Amanda Palmer’s amazing book The Art of Asking—went live.

YAY!

You can find my entire HuffPost catalog here. Please feel free to share and widely.

I also wrote a piece on the sexual politics of full frontal in HBO shows for Sociological Images that got cross posted at Pacific Standard and actually got picked up by TV Guide Magazine.

And at the moment, I’m taking a few weeks away from my beloved job as a private investigator to finally finish my second novel Crime Rave: American Monsters Book II.

This has been a good writing year indeed.

As for 2015, you can find me mostly over at HuffPost and/or sign up for my newsletter.

Although, do be sure and check back in here as I plan to get back into publishing short fiction once I begin work on The Secret Life of Stone: American Monsters III, which is a zombie tale set in Prague.

I have a feeling that 2015 is going to be my best writing year yet so stay tuned!

Wishing you and your family a wonderful 2015,

Zuzu

xoxo

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