the joke's on me…

Five years of writing, four and a half publishing, averaging about twelve hours a day, seven days a week, for close to the three hundred and sixty five days each of those years is long—pouring your heart and soul into what has become a nicely profitable passion.
No pun intended and I'm still waiting for that joke to get tired…


Let me start off by saying I adore my family. All of them. I love them to pieces. I’m truly blessed. 

However…

I appear to find myself the constant butt of jokes at family gatherings. Now, I grew up as the youngest of six, and I think I'm pretty well-weathered against the ribbing and teasing that inevitably is part of growing up in a large household. But the unending ridicule of something I am good at (if I say so myself), am damn proud of, and have invested a lot of time and effort in, is starting to wear a little thin. 


Hey, I can handle a good ribbing or two—hell, we all do it, have all been subjected to it—but when the same spot keeps getting poked, it eventually becomes painful.
Taking something that is important to another person—so much part of their identity—and relentlessly laugh at it, turns not only their passion, but their person into a mockery. 


Perhaps it’s because sex jokes always find an appreciative audience. And even though there are others with passions—be it work or hobby—they don’t quite tickle everyone’s funny bone the way mine seems to.


Sure, I openly describe some sex scenes in my books. When I outline the inner thoughts and emotions of my characters in detail to create a believable connection, it seems silly to me to not also include those aspects of a relationship that give insight to the most intimate interactions. 


That doesn't make my writing porn. It doesn’t even qualify as erotica. My stories are plot-driven, character-driven, but certainly not sex-driven. 
And to be honest, to have my work, my investment, my passion, reduced to porn jokes—doesn’t do it justice.

It doesn’t do ME justice.