H to the izz-O, V to the izz-A...
I'm watching great musical moments from MTV's award programs. I forgot how much I loved Jay-z's song IZZO.
H to the izz-O, V to the izz-A...
I'm going to have to buy Jay-z's cd Blueprint.
Then Staind came on and sang that one song that I had to listen to for hours on end, "Fade". And now Eminem is on. I know, I know, he's a bad and evil boy, but I like him He's got a way with words and I love his anger. He's controversial and he makes you think, and I think behind all the BS lies a very intelligent and incredibly angry young man.
H to the izz-O, V to the izz-A...
Thursday, August 22, 2002
Good advise from from the Writer's Digest August 2002 issue. Tracy Chevalier, who wrote "Girl with a Pearl Earring", said the following when asked "Do you have any advice for writers starting out?"
"Write about what you're interested in, not about what you already know. Don't write about yourself--you're not as interesting as you think! There's a whole world out there to explore."
My thoughts exactly. I get alot of flak from well meaning friends, who want me to write about my life. My first reaction is, how boring. I'm not interested in writing a memoir or a biography. I'm a fiction writer, and fiction means the following (dictionary.com):
An imaginative creation or a pretense that does not represent actuality but has been invented.
The act of inventing such a creation or pretense.
A lie.
A literary work whose content is produced by the imagination and is not necessarily based on fact.
Word History: To most people “the latest fiction” means the latest novels or stories rather than the most recently invented pretense or latest lie. All three senses of the word fiction point back to its source, Latin ficti, “the action of shaping, a feigning, that which is feigned.” Ficti in turn was derived from fingere, “to make by shaping, feign, make up or invent a story or excuse.” Our first instance of fiction, recorded in a work composed around 1412, was used in the sense “invention of the mind, that which is imaginatively invented.” It is not a far step from this meaning to the sense “imaginative literature,” first recorded in 1599.
n 1: a literary work based on the imagination and not necessarily on fact 2: a deliberately false or improbable account [syn: fabrication, fable]
"Write about what you're interested in, not about what you already know. Don't write about yourself--you're not as interesting as you think! There's a whole world out there to explore."
My thoughts exactly. I get alot of flak from well meaning friends, who want me to write about my life. My first reaction is, how boring. I'm not interested in writing a memoir or a biography. I'm a fiction writer, and fiction means the following (dictionary.com):
An imaginative creation or a pretense that does not represent actuality but has been invented.
The act of inventing such a creation or pretense.
A lie.
A literary work whose content is produced by the imagination and is not necessarily based on fact.
Word History: To most people “the latest fiction” means the latest novels or stories rather than the most recently invented pretense or latest lie. All three senses of the word fiction point back to its source, Latin ficti, “the action of shaping, a feigning, that which is feigned.” Ficti in turn was derived from fingere, “to make by shaping, feign, make up or invent a story or excuse.” Our first instance of fiction, recorded in a work composed around 1412, was used in the sense “invention of the mind, that which is imaginatively invented.” It is not a far step from this meaning to the sense “imaginative literature,” first recorded in 1599.
n 1: a literary work based on the imagination and not necessarily on fact 2: a deliberately false or improbable account [syn: fabrication, fable]
It is still difficult for me to write about what happened on 9/11. Right now, I feel like crying and it' hard to type, and I'm at work waiting for my query to finish.
It's almost been a year, but I'm not sure I've processed what happened that day and that week. I wonder if I ever will? I wonder if the tears and sadness will dry up some day, only because there will be no more tears left or sadness to feel. Strange how I have such strong feelings about what happened on that day. I don't personally know anyone who died, but I feel such extreme sadness mixed bitterly with the furious white heat of anger. My body and fingers shake, tremble with my feelings. Stranger still since I'm not the most emotional of people. I'm not quite sure how to explain my feelings about what happend on 9/11 to myself or anyone else for that matter.
It's almost been a year, but I'm not sure I've processed what happened that day and that week. I wonder if I ever will? I wonder if the tears and sadness will dry up some day, only because there will be no more tears left or sadness to feel. Strange how I have such strong feelings about what happened on that day. I don't personally know anyone who died, but I feel such extreme sadness mixed bitterly with the furious white heat of anger. My body and fingers shake, tremble with my feelings. Stranger still since I'm not the most emotional of people. I'm not quite sure how to explain my feelings about what happend on 9/11 to myself or anyone else for that matter.
I'm trying to decide if I should take September 11, 2002 as a day off, as my way to honour what happened on that day. So many memories flood my mind from that week.
On 9/11/2001, I didn't turn the TV on that morning. Strange for me, since I normally turn it on every morning to check the traffic and weather. Even when I was in my car driving to work, I didn't turn the radio on till I was on the road for five minutes. Why I don't know, and the reasons for my out of the ordinary behaviour that morning still elude me to this day. Maybe I was somehow intuitively picking up the horrible feelings that were already in the air, because by the time I got up the World Trade Centers were already on fire, the Pentagon was in ruins, and the plane in Pennsylvania had already crashed. I don't know.
My first bad memories of 9/11 are therefore, driving in my car and turning on the radio and NPR and listening to the announcers freaking out about what was happening. Part of me thought at first, that I was listening to a clip from a movie or a documentary. Within five minutes, I knew it was real. There is something really strange about listening to a national tragedy like 9/11, while doing something completely mundane like driving to work on the freeway at 70 mph.
When I got to work, a couple of people from work were standing outside my building. My company had closed our office because we were close to the airport, and they were afraid that if anything happened at the airport we would be in danger. There was also a news report saying that all the roads around the airport would be closed, and we didn't know if our office would be affected.
On the way home driving, I remember just feeling very sad and crying. At stoplights, I looked around at other drivers and wondered if they were freaking out as well. In my mind, everyone looked dazed but that might have just been wishful thinking on my part. On the way home, a news report came on saying that the Golden Gate Bridge might be a target, and I thought great. I live five minutes from the Golden Gate bridge, and if they block the roads I might not be able to get home. Then another thought came. What if the bridge gets blown up? How will the bridge gets blown up? If they drop a bomb, what if they miss and my neighborhood gets blown up? What if the terrorists have hijacked another plane, and another struggle ensues and they crash the plane in my neighbourhood instead? I'm only five minutes away, after all. If I have to die, I want to die at home where I'm comfortable. I feel bad, thinking how selfish I was at the same moment a national tragedy was taking place. People were already dead in NYC, DC and Pennsylvania, and all I thought about was wanting to get home as soon as possible so I could die comfortably in my own home.
As I parked the car in my neighbourhood, I saw that the schools were letting the children out. I had heard on the radio that Mayor Willie Brown had closed the public schools. I thought of parents who had to leave work to pick their children up, who had to explain to little ones what was going on and why they had to leave school. My eyes fill with tears at this memory. I was glad to not be a parent, who had to explain 9/11 to a child.
Walking around my neighbourhood was eerie. There was an unnatural silence in the air. I pictured televisions on in every house, and people watching the news in horror. I didn't see anyone on the street, as I walked back to my apartment, which was strange. At that hour of the morning, there would have been quite a few people out on streets. Perhaps my neighbours were too freaked out to leave their homes and apartments. I wondered if they were having the same fears I was. God, we were only five minutes away from the Golden Gate Bridge and they said on the news that the bridge was a target. Were people in their houses praying to whoever they worship, I wondered? Praying for the people who had already died back east, praying that the terrorists had not hijacked another plane, praying for their own safety, and most of all praying for their own peace of mind to face whatever was going to happen that day.
More later.
On 9/11/2001, I didn't turn the TV on that morning. Strange for me, since I normally turn it on every morning to check the traffic and weather. Even when I was in my car driving to work, I didn't turn the radio on till I was on the road for five minutes. Why I don't know, and the reasons for my out of the ordinary behaviour that morning still elude me to this day. Maybe I was somehow intuitively picking up the horrible feelings that were already in the air, because by the time I got up the World Trade Centers were already on fire, the Pentagon was in ruins, and the plane in Pennsylvania had already crashed. I don't know.
My first bad memories of 9/11 are therefore, driving in my car and turning on the radio and NPR and listening to the announcers freaking out about what was happening. Part of me thought at first, that I was listening to a clip from a movie or a documentary. Within five minutes, I knew it was real. There is something really strange about listening to a national tragedy like 9/11, while doing something completely mundane like driving to work on the freeway at 70 mph.
When I got to work, a couple of people from work were standing outside my building. My company had closed our office because we were close to the airport, and they were afraid that if anything happened at the airport we would be in danger. There was also a news report saying that all the roads around the airport would be closed, and we didn't know if our office would be affected.
On the way home driving, I remember just feeling very sad and crying. At stoplights, I looked around at other drivers and wondered if they were freaking out as well. In my mind, everyone looked dazed but that might have just been wishful thinking on my part. On the way home, a news report came on saying that the Golden Gate Bridge might be a target, and I thought great. I live five minutes from the Golden Gate bridge, and if they block the roads I might not be able to get home. Then another thought came. What if the bridge gets blown up? How will the bridge gets blown up? If they drop a bomb, what if they miss and my neighborhood gets blown up? What if the terrorists have hijacked another plane, and another struggle ensues and they crash the plane in my neighbourhood instead? I'm only five minutes away, after all. If I have to die, I want to die at home where I'm comfortable. I feel bad, thinking how selfish I was at the same moment a national tragedy was taking place. People were already dead in NYC, DC and Pennsylvania, and all I thought about was wanting to get home as soon as possible so I could die comfortably in my own home.
As I parked the car in my neighbourhood, I saw that the schools were letting the children out. I had heard on the radio that Mayor Willie Brown had closed the public schools. I thought of parents who had to leave work to pick their children up, who had to explain to little ones what was going on and why they had to leave school. My eyes fill with tears at this memory. I was glad to not be a parent, who had to explain 9/11 to a child.
Walking around my neighbourhood was eerie. There was an unnatural silence in the air. I pictured televisions on in every house, and people watching the news in horror. I didn't see anyone on the street, as I walked back to my apartment, which was strange. At that hour of the morning, there would have been quite a few people out on streets. Perhaps my neighbours were too freaked out to leave their homes and apartments. I wondered if they were having the same fears I was. God, we were only five minutes away from the Golden Gate Bridge and they said on the news that the bridge was a target. Were people in their houses praying to whoever they worship, I wondered? Praying for the people who had already died back east, praying that the terrorists had not hijacked another plane, praying for their own safety, and most of all praying for their own peace of mind to face whatever was going to happen that day.
More later.
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