Glutens for Punishment

My blog is called Pancakes and Prose and the last few weeks or so I’ve been faced with an interesting question – can we separate the Pancakes from the Prose?

A few months ago I was feeling sick and after I’d written off the seasonal melancholy and wasn’t feeling any better, I went to the doctor (damn vampire) and he came to a conclusion – Celiac’s disease. On one hand – great news: it’s treatable, its reversible, and it’s managed by diet. Other hand held a bit bleaker picture – no more cookies, cake, or the yummiest of carbohydrates. I can’t eat gluten and gluten, well gluten’s wheat, gluten’s pretty much in everything I want to eat.

It probably seems preposterous to even question whether my writing will be affected by my wheat boycott. Words and foods don’t really mix. But its bigger than that. Pancakes and my Saturday morning wrote my last book, the best one yet I think. It gave me a sense of schedule and purpose. Just the thought of pancakes made me feel creative. Now, thanks to Celiacs, all they make me feel is forlorn.

Today I’m having a bad day and all I want is a cookie. Two days ago I was feeling sick and all I wanted was a cracker. Tomorrow we always go out to lunch at the pizza buffet. None of these simple things I can partake in anymore. (Even the thought of eating out has me scared because who knows what they’re doing back there in that kitchen and all the places where my meal can meet with cross-contamination doom and silently poison me.)

I want to feel better, so very VERY badly, but the world doesn’t seem to understand that this change is bigger than going on a perpetual Atkins Diet. I’m making a major life change; one I can’t cheat on, one I can’t be lax about in a few months after I’ve gotten into the swing of things, one I can’t give up if its usefulness has left me. I will never taste sourdough bread again. Fondue is out as one of my favorite things. My mother’s famous Surprise Hamburgers, a thing of the past. The joy of eating cookie dough and watching Goonies on rainy days, gone. The convenience of not cooking and grabbing what’s easy, kaput. This is not a diet – this is my life.

And yes, if done right it will make me svelte. It’ll also make me broke (who cares about the stock market, get me in bed with the makers on Xantham Gum, stat), make me neurotic (now waitress, are you SURE they didn’t flip this burger with the same spatula they flipped the toasted buns? And was the grill cleaned after cooking that quesadilla I saw you bring to that other table?), make me sad (but I don’t want to eat another salad without dressing. Why can’t people just get with the program and have one thing without breading on it?). And now I’m worried about it making me mundane too.

It’s been barely 100 hours of gluten-free living and all I want to do is stop. The thought of doing this for decades upon decades more is depressing. I don’t want to be responsible and read labels – I want to be five and it’s summer and I’m taking a nap and having nothing to worry about.

Licorice, Beer, and Soy Sauce – three things I don’t even like but the fact that I can’t have them kind of haunts me. And the idea that NaNoWriMo starts in 10 days and I don’t know if I’m up for it hanuts me more. What if wheat was where all the words came from?

Growing Up

I’m down with my nephew this weekend, walking through town with my mother, and two people asked me how old my son was. It’s hard explaining no, not my kid. It could be – and since it’s the son of my twin brother it literally Could be. Got me thinking.

Our 10 year high school reunion is coming up in a month. My co-worker asked me where I think I stand in the graduating class and the answer wasn’t great. Ten years is all about relationships and appearances – neither of which I’m very good at.

So what would I say? What is my “elevator pitch” on what I’ve been up to for the last decade? Let’s see . . .

‘I graduated from college with a BA in English and never left. Now I monitor our software system and get worked up over people forgetting to tell me about subject codes.’

‘After college I won a Room to Move contest meaning the Internet voted me most pathetic 20-something and paid me to fix the problem.’

‘Well my brother is married with a great job and an adorable son. I . . . went to their wedding . . .’

‘My job? I work a lot of hours and have a long title that will bore you which loosely translates to Office Fixer and Girl Who Attracts Work But Repels Raises.’

The last decade broken down into tweets. Not all that exciting to look at. Or probably to talk about really. Maybe my problem is that I never managed to be very good at the small talk. I’m the one with the jokes and the quips and the listener who makes sarcastic, pithy comments. And maybe I’m not as happy with where I am as I want to be. And I’ll be the girl on the wall again who couldn’t get anyone to notice her to dance and expected to stand there with a smile while people who are remembered more step front and center to reminicse. Me with the bad memory who can’t remember names and sometimes only faces.

Yeah, that sure sounds like a lot of fun. There’s an open bar – maybe I’ll just plan on drinking my weight in Tequilla Sunrises . . .

Happiness – Who Knew?

It was a week ago that I spouted on my melancholy existence. This is what people like me do when they’ve had a bad day and heard about the horrendous state of raises at their company. I know, I know, lucky to even have a job, let alone get a raise, but still, annoyed me. I yelled at it, I cried at it, I wrote at it – anger now gone.

Now, I’m for some reason in an insanely good mood. Not that much has happened recently. I didn’t break the new computer system at the office. I haven’t tripped and gravely injured myself lately. I have yet to set off a set of occurrences that disrupts the space-time continuum and causes me not to be born. Are these really things to celebrate?

But it’s true, my attitude has undergone somewhat of a shift. You can ask my Team Banner at work (of which I’m regularly cheerful at – I color code them to within an inch of their life and make them have Pocket Pow-Wow’s with me. I’m like the ideal supervisor, right?!) – I’ve downshifted to decidedly laissez-faire. “Whatever, no big deal, it’ll all work out.” I think I may have started to scare them frankly.

But it makes you realize – most things in life are all about perspective. If you can get your attitude to change, really change, not just an ‘ooh, look at me I’m so progressive and evolved’ change that sticks just long enough for the cute guy to leave your office, then great things will happen.

It isn’t about outward changes, no matter how much we like to think it is. Even though losing those pounds is torturous and difficult, it’s still easier to shed fat than fatalism. But a smile has the power to eradicate every flaw we see; a cheery expression and confident air won’t have anyone looking at your cellulite, or caring about it.

Why is this such a scary thought? Why are we so obsessed with striving to be things that underweight professional advertisers tell us to be? As any woman knows who’s ever opened a catalog, those clothes that look so perfect on the page never look even half as good when they’re hanging in your closet. Hammer pants, bell bottoms, oversized day-glow t-shirts, skinny low-rise jeans – styles that seem to be screaming for a long-range 10 year perspective of “What Were They Thinking?” Yet fads all the same, able to convince most everyone that this is what America looks like, come buy into the mass delusion.

Somewhere along the way we were trained to think of ourselves in a certain way. We’re allowed to be culturally different, racially different, nationally different, but our own self-image always comes back to the same thing. We label ourselves as weird or outcasts, simply meaning we’re contrary to what’s popular. If we were being true to ourselves, style would be much more inclusive. Can’t I like a yellow blouse today and black emo eyeliner tomorrow? No.

The key isn’t not caring what other people think; the key is caring despite what other people think. Thinking, thinking never got us anywhere. I think I like long walks on the beach. You know what? Beaches are hot, and full of people, and sand migrates and gets caught in places even Houdini would have a hard time entering. So why does everyone profess to like the outdoors and long walks on the beach?

I’m over thinking, and over over-thinking, me. I am who I am – someone who doesn’t like the beach even though she lives in California. Yes, I could stand to lose a few, frankly more than just a few, pounds. But let’s stop pretending that you want me to do it for my health (frankly, I have great blood pressure, absolutely no issues with cholesterol, and even though diabetes runs in my family at the moment it’s running a hell of a long way behind me). I’m deceptively strong – wanna see me bench press that ideally slim woman over there? – and surprisingly graceful – if you happen to catch me in a fall it will be the most beautiful catastrophe you’ve ever seen. No, you want me to do it because the fact that I don’t care as much as you offends. What, a happy woman with a huge waistline? But, if she’s happy and loved and successful like that, then what does that mean about the world I live in that says dropping five pounds will make me fulfilled? How can she have confidence along with her cake, and eat it too? . . . Uh-oh, did I just disrupt that space-time continuum?

Melancholy Misery

Today I am like the hamster that runs and runs and runs on its wheel, never getting anywhere. Today I am the dog that chases it’s tail, never managing to catch it but never managing to ignore it either. Today I am the donkey that only moves when the carrot is dangled, but never reaches it of its own volition, always just a step behind.

I’m feeling melancholy and can’t shake it, the parts of my life not quite fitting together into the picture I want it to be. The bad parts, the annoying parts, the clumsy parts – those are the parts that are supposed to be ‘worth it’, something to be powered through like a chicken crossing the road to get to the glory on the other side. But I don’t have any of that stuff, the stuff that makes it all worth it. I don’t have a husband or a child, no family that gives me something to be happy and thankful for everyday no matter how miserable everything else might seem. It doesn’t seem like much but this lack of perspective is jarring.

What I have – I have a job and I have an unrealistic expectation of a dream, that’s it. Telling people it’s “just a job” doesn’t work as well when you don’t view it as a means to an end, when it isn’t something that just serves some other valiant purpose. And I can’t be one of those people who doesn’t give it 110%, who doesn’t try my best or hardest at all times. How I wish that I could stroll in at a competently fine 82% and coast on by. Because that extra effort costs more than its worth, caring too much always does.

Because none of this gets me anywhere. You’re almost exceptional, so very close, but not yet. You’re doing an awesome job, work the hardest around, but its technically your job anyway so thanks for playing. Sure, you don’t have a boyfriend or a relationship but hey, two years ago you went on a really nice vacation to Nashville, that must cheer you up.

And then I get home from the job I give more attention than it probably deserves and I ignore my dream as much as possible. I’m better, loads better than I used to be, but I still don’t commit myself to it as much as I should. I can’t manage to commit myself to anything. I can’t even commit myself to writing in this blog.

I told my friend last night that I would go sky diving with her if there ever came a time when you could walk into a bookstore and see my name in there. I’m afraid of heights. What was the point of that?

The End of an . . . ur, Era?

So yesterday morning I was where you’ll always find me on Saturday mornings (IHOP, duh, no more stupid questions please) and I was writing and eating pancakes, you know, normal stuff. The waitresses there are great – they all pretty much know me, even the ones who don’t wait on me. My favorite, Marissa, she doesn’t even ask me anymore – food just appears at my table.

Yesterday I had someone new and as I get out my notebook and my headphones and start to get in the groove, she asks me if I’m doing homework. Now, in her defense, I looked like a schlub and I own that – I had to go to work afterwards and if I have to work on the weekends, I get to wear whatever the heck I want, that’s the deal I make with myself to get through the front door. But I’ve sailed quite a bit past early twenties, can’t really even claim mid-twenties anymore, and am pretty much entrenched in late twenties at this point in my life. Homework, really?

So I say no, I’m writing a book. She smiles benignly and walks away. And that’s when it hits me – I’ve only been asked this question three or four times on my morning writing jaunts and no one ever asks a follow-up question. I mean, if you met someone on the street who said they’ve writing a book, wouldn’t you at least ask what it was about? I’m not saying I have a very succinct, elevator pitch ready for it but, come on.

So then I started obsessing, like I do, that this is a bad thing. Do I not look writer-y enough? Do I not look capable enough? Is there some psychosis associated with sitting alone at IHOP 50 times a year that makes me inherently un-literate? I try to convince myself that there isn’t anything nefarious going on here – they’re waitresses, they can’t stand here talking to me all day while people are demanding french toast and orange juice. But it still bothers me.

As my breakfast is drawing to a close I realize that I’ve written in almost my whole entire notebook. This is epic and grandiose in ways that most people won’t understand. Like some people collect stamps or kitschy figurines or candles, I collect notebooks. I can’t walk past them and not want to buy one, it’s a sickness really. But until about a year ago, I didn’t write in them. I bought them to fill with stories, the ones in my head and the ones that one day would be, but they stayed tirelessly empty. Until one day I opened it up to the first page and just decided, without much fanfare it was true, that I was going to start using it. I didn’t think I’d last past the third page – that’s always when my conviction started to wane before.

But it didn’t. If anyone opened it up, they’d be thoroughly confused. It’s not in any kind of narrative order, I wrote what I felt like writing whether it be the beginning, the end, or a scene I never even used. It’s not all sentences, some pages just have lists of words or chapters. It’s not all legible, the length of time I’d been at the table or the number of ideas in my head spurning me to bad penmanship in no time flat. It’s not even all the same story.

But its a victory – and a big one – for me. I’m pretty awesome at beginnings, at the set-up, because I don’t plan before I write. I like to let the characters tell me where they want to go. It’s always exciting and exhilarating to figure out what I’m trying to say, where I’m trying to go. But eventually I have to pick a place. I have to make a decision and I have to have an ending and a meaning and a point. Points, not so good with. Because if you asked me what I write, I’d tell you characters. And characters are always just stumbling around trying to find meaning, connection and that tends to mean love, something I know literally less about than astrophysics.

But last week, I was sitting at my computer trying to write a scene in a karaoke bar and suddenly my female lead, she was smashed and she started drunkenly bemoaning the fairytale Cinderella. It was random and awesome and completely unexpected all at the same time. And it was just . . . fun. Genuinely and utterly fun.

I like to say, and say a lot, that it doesn’t matter if I ever get published or not. I’ll be writing, whether it’s with a pen, whether its even with words, my whole life, regardless if you ever see my name on a book jacket. Its hard sometimes to realize that not everyone has it, these ideas bouncing around their heads that demand to be realized or consequences ensue. But even though I say it, I’m not sure if I’ve ever meant it before. I’m a writer – we’re emotional, we’re needy, we want to share.

I got a pen last month for being at my job for 5 years. When you think about it, that’s almost 20% of my life. My co-workers have taken to saying they can’t wait to see me get that check and that clock for 40 years. And it kind of annoyed me because this wasn’t where I wanted to be in 40 years – I wanted to be . . . and the only answer that ever came to mind was writing. Not published – writing.

No one may ever read my books, no one except the friends I press them on for advice and suggestions. But I’ll go back and read them, and enjoy them, and smile at the things that I know that you don’t – about why I named her kids Chad, Jordan, and Jam; about why there’s comic book superheroes named Prism Fighters; about why they went out for fondue instead of margaritas.

I’m not going to stop trying – though first I really have to start trying – to get published. But its a lot about timing, about being current and ahead of the curve, about making people fall in love with your idea and you. And I told you how much I know about love. But maybe it doesn’t matter quite as much as I’ve needed it to. If being happy is really the only worthwhile goal, I can be happy writing drunken tirades and waiting around for my clock. And getting to the end of many more notebooks.

Why We Need Sleep

God, I’m tired. This is both a declaration and a prayer. I need sleep. On another unrelated – or completely related depending on how you look at it – note, my month of No Procrastination is going . . . well . . . it’s going.

And in a weird twist of fate, I haven’t really been able to sleep since I started it. I’m starting to think that my subconscious just has a really twisted sense of humor. Because there really isn’t any other reason why I can’t sleep. You know, besides the weather changing and possibly developing allergies and laying around like a listless blob most of the time. But you know, besides all of that stuff I should be able to sleep, no problem.

In the past I’ve had trouble sleeping because I’ve been unsatisfied with my life – the minute I make a decision about something, sleep returns. Either there was some missing decision that needed to be “Valerie’s Brain Approved” (uh-oh, my cerebellum does not like the color shirt I’m wearing today), I’m fooling myself into thinking that I’m happy, or I really need to cut down on the caffeine. Either way, I need to figure this out because there are quite a few things where being well-rested comes in handy . . .

Things You Shouldn’t Do While Sleepy

Walk (walls tend to jump out at you)
Eat (food tends to fall . . . places that are inconvenient)
Drive (people always say they can get to work in their sleep – they lie)
Send coherent emails (okay, so I knew about my tendency to misspell on Facebook but I never realized that it kicks in at other times too)
Understanding what your boss says to you (usually eyes open is required for this especially when they are referring to some super important paper that would have Really Really Important stamped across it if my life was a cartoon)
Playing Words With Friends (though, to be honest, my words usually get more points when I spell them wrong – this needs to be my new strategy with Matt)
Making To-Do Lists (otherwise every single line says Sleep or is written so incoherently it might as well say sleep)
Watching SNL (because where’s the fun of watching Betty White if you’re falling asleep?! )

Things I’ll Never Live Down

Today my friend Sarah texted me to see if I’d watched the new LOST yet. Since I got my DVR I watch nothing live and my inability to accept that LOST is ending means I generally binge and purge on the episodes, waiting until I have a few to satisfy me for most of the day (which means short answer: no).

When I told her I was on a media blackout until I could watch it tomorrow night she responded with: Good idea. I won’t say too much or I might reveal something about Dobby dying . . . And that’s when I realized, there are just some things that you’re never going to live down.

Like most people, we loved the Harry Potter books. I was one of those people who stood in line to buy the book at midnight (I wasn’t stupid – I didn’t go to a bookstore; I stifled my disdain for it and went to a 24-hr Wal-Mart). I was one of those people who started reading it the minute I got it. And yes, I was one of those people who stayed up all night until I finished it. When the last book came out I had a few friends over and we stayed up reading together. They all succumbed to sleep but not I. Which is why when Sarah woke up the next morning and asked me how it was going, my deliriousness got to me and I let the Dobby death slip. My mind sometimes does stupid things – only very rarely can I stop it. Which brings me to . . .

Val’s Awesome List of Things She’ll Never Live Down (in no particular order) –

Telling Sarah that Dobby died
Not knowing how the jelly got into the middle of the donut
Pulling muscles while making my bed, combing my hair, and once (almost) by collating
Being horrendously bad at spelling on Facebook
Accidently sending MMS instead of SMS messages to my sister’s lame cell phone so she didn’t actually know Grandma died
People thinking I’m the evil twin
Liking that I don’t even have to order at IHOP anymore
Writing a book where a fisherman named Gordon is inspired by the fish sticks in the freezer
Having a dirty car that my co-workers swear gave them bird flu and SARS
Hating Ernest Hemingway with the fire of a thousand suns
Giving high-fives during my brother’s wedding ceremony
Winning a contest because I was the most pathetic 20-something that shared a room (and bunk bed!) with my teenage sister
Being stuck in the elevator at work and Totally having it be my fault
The highschool argument heard round the world (yeah, don’t mess with me when I’m talking about mitosis)
Doing the dishes – which is so rare it caused a cosmic rift that injured my roommate
Never revealing the lyrics to the instant smash hit “Singing In The Bathtub”
Falling down the stairs, all of the multiple times
Winning a karaoke contest in college with “I Will Survive” and the macarenna
Getting every song I’ve ever heard stuck in my head, including tonal cell phone rings
Giving up cheese for Lent the 2nd time (miserableness squared)
Making Long Island Ice Teas that I was only man enough to drink

But the bright side of having things that you’ll never live down? Whenever you’re at a loss for something to happen to Jack or Jill and the tumbling down the hill is getting old, you’ve got multiple ideas at your disposal. Did you hear the one about Jill and the jelly donut? Well . . .

May’s Experiment

Today is May Day. It’s supposed to mark the end of the winter part of the year so spring and sunshine is hopefully right around the corner. For me, I have made a bold pledge for May – No Procrastination.

Now, I love procrastination. If I could, I’d marry it. It’s a throwback to my college days when I couldn’t control much but my laziness, ha, that I had covered. But six years later it’s not so fun. I spend way too much time doing the proverbial “nothing” and no longer feeling entertained by it. So in May I’m going to put an end to the wasting of time – get my desk at work spotless enough to tell its a desk, get back into the gym routine so those endorphins will make me all happy and shiny, and finish the novel I’m working on right now since I’ll have all this free time.

The pancakes today were not all that helpful with my word count. Not that its their fault – they were as golden and buttery as ever. And the atmosphere was great, general clinking, generic white noise. There was even a little flirting going on – of course it was with the 4-year-old boy next to me who liked my shiny iPhone but hey, I’ll take what I can get. No, today I introduced a friend to IHOP’s power. It was a win-win: she got into the writing grove and I got to show the waitresses that I’m not an anti-social quack. Who could ask for anything more?

Pancakes and Prose

My name is Val. I’m a writer. I like pancakes. Think that’s all you need to know about me . . .

Okay, lied. There’s a few more things you may want to know about me. I’m a little bit country, and a little bit rock-n-roll. I have an evil twin who lives under the delusion that I’m the evil twin (as if). Right now I’m in love with my iPhone and procrastinating – those thing do go hand in hand. Oh, and I plan on being the next American Idol – oops, uh, I meant next great American author.

I don’t like coffee so I don’t write in coffeehouses. I write in IHOPs, hence the pancakes. I’ve been doing it for so long now the waitresses don’t even need me to order and the smell of syrup sends me looking for a pen. Unfortunately I’m in a rut where once a week breakfast is the only time creativity will bloom. Hopefully I’m going to be changing that soon.

Losing Hope . . .

I’m starting to wonder – in that way that’s bad, in that way that just brings about the worst possible scenarios in the worst possible times but has the uncanny habit of growing like mold until it’s infected all the foundation and there’s little else you can do but move and condemn the damn thing – on whether I am ever going to make this happen.

I’ve bought the books and the first page is always congratulatory – “Good job! If you’re reading this then you finished your hopelessly long work of fiction. Aces! You’ve done more than the tons of people who always say they want to write a novel; you’ve actually written it. The ability to put ass to chair and pen to paper earns you a gold star. Yeah you!”

I hate those paragraphs. For some reason they always lull me into a false sense of security. Yes, I did something – go me. But the hardest part of trying to get my book in a bookstore is not the writing of the book. Who knew it was the easy part?!

I thought before I did this that I knew myself, that I was realistic in the fact that not everyone was going to like it, that I would get rejected, that this would be hard. But I’ve said that so many times – to myself, to my friends, to even this blog – that the idea lost meaning completely. I said it, I thought I thought it, but turns out I’m not sure I ever really believed it.

Because there’s this email that I’ve been afraid to open for more than a month now. And even though I knew from the beginning this person wouldn’t like my stuff, even though I don’t feel the advice she’s given me is practical, even though I know a synopsis of facts is not my forte, I can’t bring myself to see what the email says. I just can’t take the criticism.

In my mind I guess I just believed that the criticism would come with a little bit of praise. I like my story, I like it a whole lot, I can’t help but think that everyone else should find something redeeming too. I feel almost like that “The Best Show You’re Not Watching.” Not that I think I’m the best or anything but in my heart of hearts I truly believe that if I can get you to read the first three chapters of my book, you won’t want to put it down.

There I go again, thinking people are going to give me a chance to convince them more than my 300 word query letter or 600 word synopsis. I’m not good at those things – concise and condensed and collapsible. I’m wordy. No more, no less, just is – wordy.

So this email, I had my roommate read the one before it (because I needed to know what it said and I was having a truly awful day) and it said that I should change the premise of my book because it’s hard for first time writer’s to sell. And it hits me again – how can this person be making value judgements on my book when she hasn’t even read it?! Talking about judging a book my its cover – this is judging a book by its spine.

And there are two voices inside my head – one saying screw it, you can make it happen and the other saying she’s right, no one is ever going to read it, its staying locked up in your bedroom forever. I want to believe in myself but its so hard when no one else does. That’s not to say that no one does but most of the time I walk around bemused when people tell me that they’re sure I’ll make it. I always want to ask them the stupidest question: Why?

Why do they think I’ll make it? They’ve never read anything I’ve written. Am I giving off some crazy writing vibe that means they have to agree with me as they back away slowly? Is being a successful writer written in my DNA and as easy to discern as someone who is good at math or public speaking? Or is it – as I fear – just a nice little thing people say and they don’t believe it at all, just want to be encouraging. Them I want to scream at, they’re getting my hopes up for no reason at all.

It’s cliched and trite and probably a bit melodramatic and egotistical to say but I will anyway – I feel like I am supposed to be doing greater things than going to the office everyday and pushing paper around my desk and answering phones and crunching numbers. But who am I to say that? Who am I to think I deserve better than everyone else there?

And it kills me to think that what I have written, I have written for just me. And it kills me to think that if I do find someone to love it and help me they’ll want to change it until its unrecognizable from the way it started out. And it kills me to think that I will spend my life replaying these same arguments, these same ideas, with myself – waffling back and forth between two options that I’ll never choose.

I escape into characters and stories that do things I can’t do for myself. How successful is that if they do nothing but sit in my bedroom as well?