The day I almost became a criminal
I have always been a very calm, quiet and well-behaved girl. Too well-behaved at times, you might say.
One day I found out that the principal of the school where my mother was working had brought a school bag covered in vomit and shown it to my mom. He was convinced that it had been one of the children with learning disabilities who was responsible for the soiled bag. He made my mom clean it up. The day after, everyone found out that it had been one of the so called ‘normal’ students who had vomited on the bag.
That made me come extremely close to committing a crime. I was seized by an almost irreisstible urge to slash the tires of the principal’s car. But unfortunately, my upbringing and my natural shyness prevented me from doing it. Unfortunately, yeah.
If I’d been able to release that anger back then, I might not have felt so impotent now. It sucks big time being this nice and timid. But I guess it’s just something I have to accept.
Oh, and by the way, if my dear, sorely missed dad had taken the call from the police, I’m pretty sure he would have replied: Slashed some tires? Not my daughter. She was watching tv with me all evening.
Dad was good at that kind of thing. He saved me once, when I’d neglected to go to one of those pointless sports days in high school. I hadn’t even asked him or prepared him for the possibility that my teacher might call. Nice one. Thanks, dad!
A dime a dozen
There are times when I feel like this. That what I’m writing is of poor quality, lacks originality and is plain boring. At other times I can be more hopeful. But… The truth is, I know there are plenty of girls like me, some very young, some a bit older, who write about almost exactly the same themes I do. Many of them write as well as I do or better.
What do I have to offer, really?
Times like these, I just know I’ll never have my books published. Who would like to read them?
But then again, sometimes I consider this: others, less talented writers not only get published, but sell like mad. Then I think, why not me? If they can make it, so can I. Maybe I’m even a little better than they are, these writers who shall remain anonymous. They might be among your favorites. The last thing I want is to insult my readers.
At the end of the day, all I know is that I don’t know anything. Someone a lot smarter than I am, came up with that, but it’s still true.
Women Who Love Gay Men
I just read an article about a Swedish book called (in translation) Women who love gay men, by a Swedish woman by the name of Linda Leopold. It was very interesting reading.
The article mentions all kinds of ‘fag hags’. From the ‘traditional’ fag hag who goes to gay clubs, dressed and made up like a drag queen, to young women who love gay porn and even, women who are married to gay men.
One reason women like gay porn seems to be that women are tired of being submissive objects, like in many other aspects of our culture. I believe in that explanation. Of course there can be others too. In any case, I don’t think women who like gay porn need to make up excuses for their preference. Men like lesbian porn. If that’s ok, the equivalent should be ok too.
Slash, including the Japanese yaoi, is also mentioned in the article.
All this seems to be a trend gaining in popularity. I can’t help but think that it’s a slight improvement on our generally negative society.
I recognize quite a bit of all this. Not dressing up and wearing makeup like a drag queen, but much of the rest of it.
Besides, personally, I’m not exclusively a fag hag. I also love, to the same extent, sweet, kind, submissive straight guys. You could say that quite simply I love most guys, except for the pushy, bossy dominant ones.
Modern sex habits
I keep reading about the modern woman’s sex habits, and that, believe it or not, isn’t why I read the papers. But it’s everywhere.
They like to be forced to have sex by a whole gang of guys. They like it rough, ie the guy treating them roughly. And naturally, the all time favorite – lesbian sex. Not lesbian women. Straight ones. What I can’t understand is how straight women can like that. Isn’t it part of the concept ‘heterosexual’ that you prefer the opposite sex?
Am I the only one who likes the other type of rough? By me, against the guy? Or… now that we’re on that topic – the guys… 😉 Am I alone in being turned on by watching two or three hot guys being together or at least kissing?
I guess I’m hopelessly geeky and “out of things”. Except… if I’m the only entirely straight girl left (not quite true, I know at least one girl who is like me), shouldn’t there be more guys left for me (us)? 🙂
You can always hope. And the rest of you. Good luck! I hope you’ll have a lot of fun in life. As long as no one innocent gets hurt, I hope everyone gets what they want. Just one thing – let me have a couple of those guys you don’t want anyway, ok? 🙂
What do the words slash and yaoi mean?
What does yaoi really mean? I’ve never really thought about it before, but recently I read an article about it, and I realized that it’s a sort of acronym. It means (translated from Japanese to English) ‘no climax, no punchline, no meaning’. That means the same as a PWP story – plot? what plot? – in other words, it’s all just a sketch of two hot guys having sex with each other). Apparently, there’s also a more humorous interpretation, which means – in translation – Stop! My butt hurts!. Whoever made that up clearly hasn’t read too much slash… Pain is never a reason to stop…
I just realized that the word slash might not have been explained clearly. Slash is a / which stands for pairing. For some reason, slash just means a male/male pairing, though you can always use a / to indicate which pairing you’re writing about, even if it’s a het adult story. Femslash has been formed from the original slash. An early example of slash is what fans call K/S that is Kirk/Spock. They’re from Star Trek TOS (The Original Series) in case you’ve never heard of the two gentlemen. You’d never refer to a Kirk/Uhura or a Spock/Chapel story as slash. I have no idea why.
Besides, it’s also being said – though I don’t believe it – that slash usually is a sexually explicit story. There are all kinds of slash, including some which doesn’t even contain a kiss. The point is simply that two men (or boys) love each other. They don’t have to do anything about it, just feel that way. I even think unrequited love falls under the same heading.
Why I write
I write because all the time, my mind is full of stories. I’m always thinking “what if things were like this instead”. A writer has full control over her created world. Since personally, I lack control over my life, no matter how hard I try, how much I struggle, I like to have control somewhere.
Writing is creating, and I can’t create anything else.
Besides, languages are my life. I love learning languages, but so far I can only write in two languages. If I had my wish, I’d like to be able to write in all my languages, but I realize that really only the two I already master are ‘useful’.
One reason I write (and create stories inside my head) is that I can’t stand myself the way I am or my life the way it is. When I write I re-shape my reality so I can go on living.
I write because it’s one of the few things that makes me feel happy and proud over myself. It’s one of the few things I’m good at. That means I feel successful according to my own definition. And that’s the only way to feel successful.
I love putting together the plot and develop the characters. Even though I love languages, it’s the plot, the characters and their dialogue that interests me the most.
Writing enables you to add your own opinions, that no one ever ask you for, to your story, and be able to say what you feel, and perhaps even influence others. If you look at the works of literature that have survived through history, they’ve had an enormous influence on posterity, even if their own time ignored them and their authors. I’m able to leave a lasting legacy.
I write because it’s almost the only thing that can make me forget the world around me. Writing makes me vanish into a different and better world.
Learning things develops the brain, but so does creating things. And if you learn things that you can use in your writing, it’s doubly useful.
What one person writes could never have been written by anyone else. It’s always entirely unique and specific to the author. Creating something unique is a fantastic feeling.
Views on homo- and heterosexuality in fandoms
The fact that I’ve still paired up Jack and Karen from Will & Grace, in a series of humorous stories, has it’s funny and complicated explanation in the fics. I’m not saying Jack isn’t gay. Obviously he is. That’s why he’s not involved with Karen in the traditional sense. It’s all a long and complicated story.
Will, on the other hand, I perceive as a gay man who has some straight tendencies. He’s clearly still partial to Grace and just like many straight guys, he’s fascinated with any hints of lesbian connections between women. You get the impression Will wouldn’t mind living in a culture where it’s totally acceptable to be married to a woman, and still have gay relations on the side. I imagine there are many men like that in real life too.
Actually, it’s quite odd that though it’s a very common and completely accepted practice, in fan fiction, to make a straight character gay, the opposite – making a gay character straight – is completely off limits and taboo. When I pair up Will and Grace – not because I’m in any way can be considered a ‘shipper’ (someone who is for a particular ‘ship’ i e relationship, in practice a pairing) – I immediately get enraged comments. ‘That could never happen!”.
Before I wrote those stories I asked my gay/bi/sex addicted friend for advice. I also checked what Minotaur had to say. Minotaur, if you didn’t know that already, is what is extremely rare – a gay man who writes fan fiction. He has a big site with advice for the slash writer. According to Minotaur, it’s common for gay men to have sex with women, when they’re drunk. Why they do that, is beyond me, but if that’s how it is, why shouldn’t Will have sex with Grace? He’ll still be attracted to men, but he might also find out that sex with a particular woman might be pretty good too.
There was a comment added to the reply – about gay men having sex with women. You have to watch out so you don’t write something homophobic. If that’s the reason you want to ‘convert’ a gay character. What no one seems to consider is that there might actually be heterophobic tendencies floating around in the fan fiction world.
I’m not homophobic and the fact that I don’t read femslash/femmeslash – stories about sex and/or love between women doesn’t mean that I’m opposed to it on principle. It’s simply not my thing. It doesn’t interest me. Deathfics don’t and not songfics either. I don’t read fics with the ‘wrong’ pairing from my point of view or fanfics based on fandoms I’m not into. I’m the ‘customer’. Don’t I have the right to choose what to read?
I’m not a beta reader (someone who edits and comments other people’s stories), but if I had been, I would naturally have read and commented on a femslash story too. Of course, I don’t know how much my opinion would be worth, since I don’t read femslash, but in any case I could check on spelling, grammar, plot, character descriptions etc.
In real life, I wish everyone all the best, if they can find a partner to be happy with. I hope they’ll be very happy. Naturally this only goes for pairings made up of two consenting adults of normal intelligence or two adult people with learning disabilities. No one should be allowed to abuse children, animals, retarded people, the mentally ill, senile or dead people. If someone falls for a pair of shoes, fine. That won’t hurt anyone.
I don’t know if this is true or not, but I have heard that several men have expressed a wish to marry their motorcycles or the big new tv. Yes, that’s what I heard. I don’t know if it’s right to marry a gadget, but if the gadgets turn them on, well, at least no one gets hurt.
How a slash story is born
Many times there are male characters in various fandoms, which I find enormously sexy and fascinating, but I’d never want them myself, if they existed, and if I had a chance with them. They would, however, suit some other male character. That’s one of my reasons for writing slash. For instance, I can ask myself a few questions.
Is he hot? Is he nice? Is he interesting in other ways?
Fine. If he is, would he make a good boyfriend for the female character I can identify with the most?
Even if there isn’t someone like that in the fandom, you might be able to find one in another fandom, which goes well with the guy’s fandom. It’s called a crossover. Otherwise, you might be able to make up an original character. Well, it’s possible, but the readers tend to ignore the original character or avoid a story with one. I can understand that. Despite that, I sometimes use one in my stories. I might feel the need for an original character for some reason.
Even if that isn’t possible, there might be another male character in the same fandom, who might be a good match for the first guy. I won’t go into the fanfics which don’t require any pairing at all. Pairing means – well, the two people who become a couple, in the fic. Some types of fanfics aren’t suitable for het adult or slash.
Still, say that it is one that’s suitable for some type of pairing, the guy might still not be compatible with me (or in this case, my alter ego). He might still be a good match or one of the other male characters.
It’s hard to say exactly why. One reason might be that I can’t imagine being submissive in any relationship. That means I wouldn’t like to write about a relationship in which the female is submissive. Even if the man isn’t exactly dominant, he might still be too tough and outgoing. I still wouldn’t match him with a female character.
Of course the man might be typically gay, in which case the pairing with come naturally. He just has to have a male partner.
