December 14th, 2018

Throwback: April 14 and 15, 2009

This is new

Boring work anecdote: I have been working on a very long story for quite some time. I tried to some of the structural issues with such a long piece by breaking it into sections. There are 4, and each was originally named for something the characters try to purchase or get within the section: Dress, Car, Salad, and Repair. Just now, beginning to go over some details in the final section, I find that someone who is most likely me has changed the title to Light. Light???? What did I mean by that? Seriously, I can’t make one connection between that title and the content of the section, let alone remember my actual thought process when I chose it. Could this be a very specific computer virus, or a sign that I’m working too much when I’m tired?

NOTE from the future: I have no memory of any of this, including what story I was working on. But wait…

April 15, 2009: Fest

Still struggling with the same story as last night. I’ve finally cut a paragraph that hasn’t been needed in a long time, but that I have a ridiculous fondness for. So, as with all my ridiculousnesses, I’m posting it here, just so it’ll have a home.

It’s hot in Western Ohio. It was hot in Montreal too, but back then it was also dawn, which gave your clothes some clearance from your body. Now everything is slicked tight, even the baggy canvas of his shorts, even the thin cotton of the street-stand t-shirt that says, Fest. It is a generic t-shirt, bought for four-dollars in Outremont when he spilled red wine at a party and ran downstairs to see if he could by a new one. For four dollars, he didn’t care what Fest it referred to, although here, in Western Ohio, with the rubber-decal letters sweating to the hair on his chest, he panics briefly that someone might ask him. Not Iz, of course; Iz was at the party.

NOTE from the future: Now I remember–I only ever wrote one story that went from Montreal to Western Ohio. This was published the following year in my chapbook Road Trips as “I Have Never Loved You Less” in a very different form. Man 2009 was a long time ago.

Throwback all the time

As you may have noticed (or maybe not–I wouldn’t blame you if not), Rose-coloured has encountered some interesting adventures lately. It was down, then it was up, then it was down again–and now obviously up again. Google was saying “this blog may be hacked” for a while, then not, comments were turned off on all posts briefly–plus six years of posts disappeared for a while. 

Almost everything is fixed now, mainly thanks to the know-how and patience of Stuart at Create Me This. Also thanks to the people at BlueHost, who now host this blog and hopefully will be nice to it, but it’s Stuart I’m grateful to.

Which is why I’m really trying not to bother him, at least for a few weeks. So when I realized a few more weeks of posts were missing than I initially reported, I really didn’t want to interrupt his life anymore. I thought about letting them go–it’s only about 6 weeks and certainly not everything I write on this blog is gold–but it’s sort of an important 6 weeks for me for a few reasons. But THEN I realized those posts still exist somewhere, on the old Blogger version of Rose-coloured. So I can just copy them over myself, one post every whenever I get around to it, until they are back living on the blog again, albeit somewhat out of order.

I’m not planning to recreate link posts, as the lost posts are from April/May 2009, and most of those links are now dead, and ditto posts about upcoming events that are now 9 years in the past (let us have a moment of mourning for how on top of things 2009 Rebecca was, though, eh?) But anything that could possibly be relevant to 2018 audiences (and maybe 2019, by the time I get done with this project), I’ll attempt to wrangle over here.

So without further ado, my post from Tuesday April 14, 2009
[ok, actually, some ado, for context–my brother moved to Tokyo in September 2008, and this post is part of a series I introduced in January 2009 about my preparations to go visit him. The main reason I want to save these posts is that they actually cover the trip, which was in May 2009.]

Planning for Tokyo

I have now read the first 50 pages of the Rough Guide: Tokyo (I have the version prior to the current one here, but you get the idea) and I have learned *much*! Thanks so to SKS for lending me the book!

First, the word of the week, which is “onna”=female. Not that I will have cause to say it aloud; I think if anyone is talking to me, my gender should be as apparent as it needs to be. But the guide tells me I’ll need to learn the written Japanese for my gender if I have hope of using the appropriate bathroom. Hence, my first kanji!

Other things I’ve learned:
–I want to ride in a boat designed by a cartoonist
–I will be in Tokyo for the portable shrine festival (Kanda Matsuri) and another festival (Sanja Matsuri) that also features portable shrines, but seems to focus more on an ancient tale of fishermen finding a statue. I’m sure I have this all wrong, but I’m looking forward to it.
–you have to take your shoes off indoors and put on slippers, which I am fine with and in fact always do at home, because I a) don’t like wearing shoes but b) get cold easily. However, even when you are indoors, you have to change out of your normal slippers and into toilet slippers when you go to the bathroom, and that seems *exactly* like the sort of thing I’d forget to do. Worrying. [Note from the future: Most of the above actually wound up happening in some form, but I never did encounter “toilet slippers.” Maybe that’s something in private homes–or the book made it up?]

More soon, I’m sure. 

I craved / I ate hearts
RR

Here are the original comments because why not:

7 comments:

Frederique said…

When do you leave? Will you be blogging from Tokyo?April 14, 2009 at 10:04 AM 

Kerry said…

I never learned to read anything during my 14 months in Japan, so I wouldn’t stress out too much if I were you. Also, everyone will expect you to do things, you being foreign, so don’t worry too much when/if it happens. You should also learn the word “sugoi!” which means cool/awesome/amazing and is used as an exuberant exclamation. Pronounced, “sa-goy!!!!!” (with at least five exclamation marks).April 14, 2009 at 10:14 AM 

Kerry said…

“Also every will expect you to do things WRONG”April 14, 2009 at 10:14 AM 

Kerry said…

Um, everyONE (I am tired. Obvious? Enough of this).April 14, 2009 at 10:15 AM 

Rebecca Rosenblum said…

I leave in a month–eek! I mean, yay! I mean…oh, my goodness, I have a lot to get done between now and then.

I don’t imagine I’ll have *much* blogging time in Japan, but I should be able to manage a few posts!April 14, 2009 at 2:15 PM 

Careygirl said…

Japan! Purrrr, such a wonderful place. How long are you going for, gaijin?April 14, 2009 at 3:01 PM 

Rebecca Rosenblum said…

Two whole weeks–long enough to get good and lost, and found again! Very excited!!

November 26th, 2018

Tell me what to watch

As a whippersnap, I watched a lot of TV–it was something I did with my brother and sometimes the rest of the family. When I moved out, I rarely watched TV with my roommates and even less once I lived alone. When the TV finally kicked it in 2004, I was limited to watching at the gym and friends’ places, occasional movie dates on someone’s couch..

Then I got into a “serious relationship” and found my desire to spend time with Mark occasionally outstripped the things I had to say to him. Sure we could sit and read together, that’s always nice, but sometimes you want to be experiencing the same thing at the same moment, together–and it was back to TV. In the nearly 10 years (wow!!) we’ve been together, here is a list of what we’ve enjoyed on the tube…anyone got any recos? We almost never watch TV separately (gag, I know) and both our tastes combined present a pretty narrow list of options. If you have any suggestions of things we might watch next, I’d be all ears (and eyes)…

Rebecca and Mark’s TV viewing history (ranked from faves to shame)

Parks and Recreation (complete series)

The West Wing (seasons 1-4, although now I wish we’d stuck with it even though it was tapering a bit in quality, as we went on to watch much worse later)

30 Rock (complete series)

Mad Men (complete series–I’d say this one was way more Mark’s choice than mine, but I was certainly invested enough to keep coming back every episode)

Community (complete series except for the season that was somehow only available on Yahoo, because how?)

The Simpsons (seasons 3 through 17)

Black Books (complete series)

Glow (complete series so far)

Stranger Things (complete series so far)

Mad about You (in progress)

Arrested Development (complete series, although the last 2 seasons were pretty much incoherent and we should have stopped)

The Tick (2018 version, half of the first season–it’s pretty good, but a bit violent and hard to follow…)

Bored to Death (1rst season–liked it fine, but not enough to figure out how to get season 2)

This Is Us (season 1 and…maybe season 2? I just can’t figure out if this show is great or manipulative pap? sometimes I catch Mark sleeping)

Sports Night (a little bit of season 1–I remembered this fondly from the 90s, but it’s actually quite bad)

That 70s Show (complete series–I can’t explain this, so embarrassing–the first two seasons were good, everything else…I don’t know!)

Shows attempted and not pursued: The Crown, The IT Crowd, House of Cards, Disenchanted, Downton Abbey, Love

November 21st, 2018

More ways to feel bad about being a writer

Sorry about this, guys. I’m not even in a particularly dark place right now (I went to a chocolate-making class last night, actually). That last post was a long time coming, and just happened to get posted recently, and then all these other on-theme things came up in quick succession. So here ya go…

1) The movie Can You Ever Forgive Me? is a true story about an author named Lee Israel in the 1990s. Her books fell out of favour and she couldn’t get a book contract and had trouble holding onto a day job, so through a series of accidents she turned to forging letters of famous dead writers and selling them to collectors. The ins and outs of the scam are interesting, but Lee’s living situation and desperation are incredibly sad. I saw it with Mark, so as two writers we kind of moped out of the theatre. I’d still recommend the movie. It’s well-written, though I bet the book it is based on, by Israel herself, is better–there’s some plot holes in the film. As well, I really like Melissa McCarthy, who plays Israel. It’s nice to see her in a dramatic role for once, albeit one where she makes a lot of dark jokes. It also has the guy who plays Kevin on *Brooklyn 99* in it in a tiny role. Kevin is my favourite!

2) On the flight back from Poland I saw the movie Love Simon pretty much at random, and while I probably wouldn’t have watched it in any other context, I quite liked it. It’s about a gay teenager struggling to come out while hanging out with his really attractive friends and going to fun parties. But that’s not what I’m talking about. I could sort of tell by the language of the good but glittery-Hollywood film that it must be based on a book and sure enough, it was–I got Simon versus the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli out of the library and read it over the weekend. I was pleased that the book had more going on and was a bit more subtle, and interested that the book developed different characters in different ways–if anyone wants to do a compare/contract of the two with me, HMU!! But the thing that makes me sad is after all this, I went to Albertalli’s website to see what else she’d written and read her deeply disturbing FAQ. Though perhaps I’ve dreamed of having legions of loving fans, I never thought really really famous writers have to write FAQs like “Would you consider being my therapist?” “I’m feeling depressed and having thoughts of suicide.” “Can you send me your book for free? etc., etc. She sounds like a really nice person and like she’s coping really well, but wow.

3) The The Diminishing Returns report from the Writers Union on writers’ incomes. I’m linking directly to the report so you can see the stats for yourself, though there have been articles in most of the major papers on this thing. In general I think that the conclusions the report draws are true–writers’ incomes are definitely going down, it’s at least partly due to poor copyright protections though I think there are many other trends in play that are harder to quantify or act against, but it all sucks for us writers. I’m sad about all of it. I also want to say that the Writers Union is an organization I most of the time respect and am myself a member of. However…this isn’t a great report when you get right into the math. I wrote up a whole analysis of it but in the end I’m not going to post it because a) what do I and my one statistics course know? b) the truth is, even with variant math I don’t think the conclusions would differ, and c) I don’t want to undermine the central concerns of writers with distractions that don’t really matter. But still, bad argumentation of any stripe makes me shudder. Again if you want to get into it with me privately, always delighted to chat!

Hmm, sorry for all the sadness! In an attempt to cheer things up, I can report that the youth are doing well, at least the youth that I’ve encountered: I visited a writing class at UTSC last week and the students were really fab–I was really impressed with their engagement and insightful questions. I’m also still working with my own lone student, whose work is really fascinating.

Oh, here’s another nice thing–I was telling a friend about reading through a publication and encountering my own work and just reading that too. She was surprised, as she thought maybe I would find reading my published fiction squirmy or embarrassing, in that way you feel when you see yourself in video sometimes. “Nope,” I said, startled at my own answer. “I like my own work. I don’t publish anything I don’t like.” Of course, I do find errors or things I’d like to change sometimes, particularly in older pieces, and sometimes I get tired of excerpts I’ve read many times in a row, but in general I subscribe to Sarah Selecky’s famous “Write what you want to read” and I do. I often tell just-starting writers that there are no guarantees that anyone will ever like your work, so you’d better like it a lot yourself or the whole exercise will be pointless. If you write something you love, then it has value no matter what.

And thank goodness, considering all that other stuff.

November 16th, 2018

Indignities

This is a post about indignities I have suffered in my life as a professional writer. I have been keeping this post going for a while, adding to it occasionally, then going back and deleting or mitigating stuff, forever adding to the header apology to the tune of I KNOW I’m privileged, ok? I know I’m lucky to have my work even considered worth reading by anyone at all, to have my voice heard in any space, and that there are so many who don’t get that opportunity. To complain, as a writer, about being treated rudely, about being occasionally silenced or ignored, when I am so often treated with generosity and listened to thoughtfully, is that just whiny jerkdom?

Yes. But if I acknowledge that I am sometimes whiny, can the world also acknowledge that people shouldn’t be rude to me, or waste my time, or aggressively push me to work for no money? I’m going to say all of the above is true, and until the world pays up on its side of the bargain, I’m very very very occasionally going to whine.

1) Once I wrote a piece for a journal that then emailed to ask me for my SIN so they could send payment. I know very well that there is no reason anyone needs a SIN to pay me but to keep the piece I called to give it. When I called the number it turned out to be some dude’s cell # and he was surprised to hear from me. I told him my SIN, which I assume he wrote on his hand. A few months later I got an email accusing me of having not provided my SIN–the email didn’t even entertain the notion that the publication could have lost it. This time I just emailed it because I didn’t want to talk to that guy again. All told it was a year before I got paid. The amount? $25.

2) Several times I’ve been on festival panels or included in other events with authors I was really excited to meet. I had read their books and genuinely admired them. Some of these folks have been extremely gracious and lovely and generous but some of them have shut me down COLD. The impression I have gotten was that they were saving all their energy for their fans in the audience, but I thought it was funny that it never occurred to them that they could have fans among their fellow authors too. I also thought it might be nice to be gracious to be even people who aren’t your fans.

3) There was a period where I was earning freelance money above the threshold for charging GST (this was before HST) so I had a business number and a separate tax account and had to charge GST on all my freelance work–this is the law. One journal told me they “didn’t have budget” for taxes and simply didn’t pay it. Many other journals seemed baffled that GST even existed for creative work–I guess not a lot of creative writers earn above the threshold (most of my freelance income came from other areas)–but only one flat-out refused to pay it. Imagine trying that in a store! I had to pay it out of my own pocket, of course.

4) I once showed up for an in-person interview when I was travelling on a tight schedule for readings. When I got into the journalist’s office, he announced, “I didn’t read your book, but I wanted to give you a chance at the coverage anyway.” Basically, he was giving me the opportunity to talk awkwardly about my work with no questions while a stranger stared me. Lucky duck.

5) More than once, someone has agreed on my behalf that I’ll do readings or to do guest writing or similar things without telling me until a few days before. These things never involved payment, of course, and I couldn’t get out of them without embarrassing all involved. I did them. I was very tired.

6) A friend of an acquaintance once asked me to blurb his book because he already had some male blurbers and needed a woman to balance them out. He told me he hadn’t read my work but his friend told him it was good. I passed.

7) Someone once took the time to write me an email about how bad my book was based solely on the text on the Amazon buy page. The email was longer than said text. A good friend had to talk me out of writing back to tell him how stupid this was.

8) A literary festival I was invited to read at once couldn’t (or wouldn’t, I now wonder) order my books for their on-site bookstore. They told me I could bring books to the festival and the bookstore would sell them on consignment, but when I got there it was clear that the bookstore staff was not set up to keep consignment money separate–if they sold any of my books, they were going to keep the money or it was going to be a giant mess. To make a reasonable stack in the display took 5-6 books–so more than $100, a lot of money to me then (ok, and now) so I chose to just keep the books in my backpack and if anyone wanted one they could buy them directly from me. One woman did ask me, after my event, where she could by my book. I started to take one out of my bag for her and she *backed away*. This one is a sort of 2-for-1 indignity.

9) I once contributed work to anthology for free because I was told the anthology was being sold for charity. Later I got an email announcing the launch party that said explicitly that those contributors on that email couldn’t come, because the venue was small and other more fabulous contributors like x, y, and z were coming, and we could see what a bind they were in! I did not dispute that x, y, and z were much more fabulous than I, but was aware that there are a) bigger venues and b) nicer ways to word that email.

10) So many times, someone has come to one of my readings (often very late–I can see you!) and then, in the Q&A, asked a question about their own self as if the event had not taken place.

11) When I was teaching creative writing in high schools, my students refused to learn my name and always addressed me as “Miss.” I told them they were welcome to call me Ms. Rosenblum or Rebecca, I told them I didn’t identify by my marital status, I told them it’s disrespectful to call someone a name they don’t identify by–no dice. Even the good students that seemed to like me–Miss. It made me feel like a scullery maid.

12) Every time someone who has ever promised to pay me by x date and then when I enquired at x + 2 weeks why I hadn’t been paid, acted like I was being kind of grabby or like it was weird that just because they said that date, that I would have counted on it as a fact??

13) The several times I’ve mentioned to a male writer I just met that I liked his work. They engaged immediately, asked follow-up questions, and seemed very friendly. As soon as I had run out of praise and thought to move on to another topic of literary conversation, the fellows saw someone over my shoulder they had to talk to asap. I’ve learned–don’t lead with flattery, even if it’s true. See if the writer can act like a person first. Also sorry: it’s not all dudes, but it’s always dudes.

14) The time I got left at the train station going to a festival, the time I got locked out of an event space, and especially the time the event space double-booked AND THE ORGANIZERS MADE US GO AHEAD ANYWAY.

15) Solicited submissions rejected by form letter or silence. Obvs, I’m not expecting an automatic yes, but if we’re colleagues enough that you can hit me up personally for work, you can also reject it personally.

16) Doing a commissioned piece AND all the editorial work before being told a person I didn’t even know was involved in the process had rejected it. When I tried to end the relationship on a cordial note despite some decidedly uncordial feelings, I of course received silence. Grr.

17) The time I was shortlisted for a prize and told a) I could not come to the prize announcement because there wasn’t enough room and b) only the winner would be notified–they didn’t even want to email me a second time to tell me who won if it wasn’t me. I found out who won by googling it, eventually.

18) Once an editor got in touch to ask me if I would be interviewed for a journal. When I agreed, he said an interviewer would be in touch. What I got was a note saying in order to make this a “collaborative” process, I should come with some questions and then answer them.

19) All the times the stage for readers has been to high to step onto wearing a skirt.

20) The time there was a chocolate fountain at a formal event for writers. Nope. That was mean.

November 9th, 2018

I went to Poland!

Mark and I finally went on this trip! It was an enormous stressball to plan, per the previous post, but completely worth it! You can see photos on my social media and I’m attempting to write some deeper long-form reflections, but should I keep on in the advice vein? Yes, probably, said the no one who is currently in this room with me.

1) Flights: It costs to fly to Krakow or Warsaw what it costs to fly most places in Europe, but it’s a bit trickier and there are fewer flight and times at that lowest price point. There is such a thing as direct flights to Warsaw but not very many when it’s not summertime, and they seem to sell out. There are no direct flights to Krakow but it’s relatively easy to change planes in Germany (Frankfurt or Munich, we chose Frankfurt) although Frankfurt airport is sort of stressful (not LAX stressful, though–it makes sense basically). You can fly to Gdansk, but you have to change planes in Warsaw in addition to anywhere else you change planes, plus you have the cost of that extra little flight, rendering the exercise pointless, at least for us.

2) Hotels: Poland is basically an inexpensive country for a Canadian (a cab-driver disabused us of the notion that it’s an inexpensive country, period–they don’t make the salaries we make). We always stay in budget hotels but we were able to go one rung up and it was all very inexpensive and nice. Not super-luxurious, but everything was clean and pretty and the staff was all charming. We never paid more than about $110 a night, and as low as $45, depending on the place and weeknight versus weekend. Also, October is not exactly a hot tourist season, though several of the places we stayed were fully booked. Also we stayed in European chains like Ibis and Golden Tulip, and one local guest-house–I think the big American chains would be more costly. I didn’t look into AirBNB at all for Poland (I only do AirBNB if I can’t find/afford a hotel) so I don’t know about that.

3) People and weather: I’ve lumped these two together because both struck me as pretty much the same as in Toronto. The trees were starting to turn when we arrived in mid-October, and the weather was highly variable, ranging from sunny and 20 to raining and 5. We got more of the latter sort of weather, which locals said was unseasonable. Most of the trees and farmland looked similar to home, although people out in bad weather seemed to have a better attitude about it and fewer layers.

Although all Poles speak Polish first, most people also speak English there. To generalize wildly (there were a million exceptions) the younger you are, the more likely it is you speak English–interestingly, people over 50, even those with quite good English, seemed to have an entirely different sort of accent. Also, it seemed somewhat class-based–people in lower-paying jobs often had no English at all, even if they were public facing, like store clerks or cab-drivers. Socially, people out in public generally kept to themselves and didn’t make eye contact, but if you asked someone for directions or information, they were usually very kind and helpful. On the other hand, people would put their bags on seats on the tram and then watch you stagger about trying to keep your balance until you finally asked them if you could sit down, when they’d very slowly and grudgingly take the bag off–just like in Toronto. Most people seemed to draw the line at being outright rude, though–with some notable exceptions per below.

4) Trains: Trains were efficient, comfortable, and affordable–a good way to get around Poland easily and see a lot as we did so. Trains stations were awful–confusing, chaotic, and train station staff appeared to actively hate us. Also many of them did not speak English, which I mean–it’s fair, it’s Poland, but the whole rest of the country is full of English-speakers, so why are the train-stations only hiring the monolingual?? Anyway. No, not anyway: in Warsaw, connecting trains are not on the arrivals OR departures boards. Only trains that originate or terminate in Warsaw get to be on the board. It took me about 45 minutes of staring at the board to work this out. So if you are looking to get on a train that originated elsewhere–a LARGE percentage of the trains since Warsaw is in the middle of the country–you have to ask the lone, angry, non-English-speaking woman at the information window what platform. The huge line of people at her window, and the shooing motion she made at me when I attempted to ask a follow-up question, attests to the problems with this system. Also, all of the train stations were ugly. But the trains themselves were glorious and it was worth all the hassle to stare dreaming out the window at the rolling fields and tiny villages for two hours while kindly attendants brought me free bottles of fizzy water.

5) Other modes of transit: We took a shuttle service from the airport and then again back–Krakow Shuttle, should you care–and another one through Viator to visit Auschwitz-Birkenau. Krakow shuttle was excellent, very punctual and efficient, and only about $30 each way. The Viator thing was a hassle to get organized but came bundled with a tour and somehow lunch, and ended up being a good experience. I’m not going to recommend the specific people who did the tour because I think Viator uses a bunch of vendors and it would be hard to get the same ones–they whole thing seemed to be a bit of weird–but they were good. FYI the roads out to Auschwitz are very windy and hilly, if you are prone to carsick. We took a cab to and from a visit to my publisher in Warsaw–again, efficient and inexpensive. Also, lots of streetcars in both Krakow and Warsaw, where they are both cheaper and better than in Toronto. And a commuter train out of Gdansk to Sopot, which was like a dollar for a 20-minute ride–this is the Gdansk equivalent of Go Transit and SO MUCH BETTER. Ahem. We took a lot of transit.

6) Food: I thought the food in Poland was excellent, but your mileage may vary depending on what you dig and what you grew up eating. I was worried about the fact that I don’t eat beef/pork/lamb in such a sausage-y country, but there were plenty of pierogies, which I love, and there was always pizza available somewhere–Italian food, especially pizza, is everywhere in Poland. It would be very easy to travel there as a vegetarian, but probably pretty difficult to do vegan or gluten free, I think. I loved both the “Polish” piergoies (mushroom and cabbage) and the “Russian” pierogies (cheese). There was also a meat kind I didn’t have that Mark said were good. In addition there was lots of cabbage and potatoes, both of which I like, something called “farmer’s cheese” or “mountain cheese” (I think they are the same??), smoked fish and lots of other kinds of fish in Gdansk (near the sea), chicken livers (so hard to get here–I was delighted to see them on a menu!) and also lots of sandwiches and pastries–very carb-heavy diet there! Plenty of restaurants just served North American-style food, of course, and I’m sure it was good, but that wasn’t what we were there for. We also liked the Polish chocolate and those famous jelly doughnuts!

Ok, that’s kind of a lot for now. I might try to do a city-by-city thing too, at some point… I love writing about all the great stuff we saw and did!

November 6th, 2018

The life and brief death of Rose-coloured

Around the middle of October, this site went down for a few days. I only noticed when I went to add a post and couldn’t–no one complained to me that they couldn’t view it, and I’m fairly certain no one besides me actually noticed. For a while I felt if I could just get the writing archived here back, I would feel ok if Rose-coloured itself could not survive, but that was a lie. I actually love having a blog, even a blog almost no one reads. It’s the potentiality–someone *might* read it–that makes me try to be clear, coherent, funny, succinct. I just can’t discipline myself the same way when there’s not even the possibility of an audience. And you’ll note, I’m not even that clear or funny in this space!

And of course I love the archive especially! Ten years of random musings–that’s a history I enjoy having around and, again, having it findable by random strangers. I don’t know why. That’s my jam.

Thanks to Stuart at CreateMeThis.com for saving Rose-coloured, and thanks for reading, whoever you are, if indeed you exist.

October 2nd, 2018

Can you please one of the people all of the time?

***Here is a weird thing–I wrote this post back in August for my wedding anniversary, and it never posted. I just found it now in my drafts folder. I think I meant to post it, thought I did, and just assumed it never received any comments, as many of my posts don’t. It’s possible I decided at the last minute not to post it for some reason–maybe I decided it was too personal? I don’t know–I sort of forget a lot of August now. Here’s the post.***

Western ideas of romantic partnership are so weird. You are expected to like someone’s face, body, parents, cooking, taste in music, driving ability, pets, friends, clothes, parenting style, breath, way of communicating, moral code, and hair. Your romantic partner is expected to become the first person you think of when you are upset or need to move a piece of furniture or want to have sex or have financial concerns or are considering an international move or need career advice or want to up your housekeeping standards or want to invite friends over or want to adopt a new pet or child. You expect your partner to consider dropping friends you despise or values you abhor, to challenge beloved family if they are mean to you and to think about professional development in concert with what it would mean to your relationship to take that promotion, retrain for that new field, become part-time or full-time or zero-time or really anything at all. Our partners are the people we want to look hottest for but also perhaps the only people we are comfortable seeing us at our worst, the one whose opinion matters most but also the person who when I say “I want to be alone” mainly doesn’t count.

I’ve been married six years tomorrow and I still find it really bizarre. Great but just…1000 years ago when people were trading sheep for wives I bet they didn’t see all this coming (no wait, the sheep were a bonus with the wife??? I guess that system didn’t make much sense either).

Before I’d ever dated anyone I would walk down the street alone and imagine doing it holding someone else’s hand and how great that would feel, and you know what? I was right. It is great to have a person at the party who I know will always be willing to absorb me into his conversation when everyone I was talking to mysteriously needs to get a drink or go to the bathroom at the same moment. It is great to be at the movies and suddenly overwhelmed with hilarity and look beside me and he is laughing so hard too. It is great to have someone to look at the giant bug bite on my back and say, “Wow, that IS really bad.” It is great to be the smartest one half the time and to be in awe of how smart he is half the time–I am so glad I get to do both.

Still. Sometimes I tell someone I am having a hard time lately and they are baffled because “Mark is so great.” Which is honestly a thing I might have said when I was young and had never been in a great relationship and thought great relationships might be the universal antidote to all sadness. But then again I am baffled, too, by people who say “my partner is my best friend” or “my partner is my whole world, my everything.” My partner is my favourite human and I am so lucky to have him in my life, but I get to have friends too, right? And the rest of the world?

My wedding day is legit one of the happiest days of my life. Mean people sometimes liken that to having peaked in high school, but it’s not about the wedding being better than the marriage–it isn’t–but about concentration of happiness. I liked having a whole day to celebrate our love along with the love of our friends and family for us. I liked celebrating our new little family with our old big family.

Hmm, what I’m trying to say is there is a lot of pressure on romantic partnership to be so much to us, and it is already a lot, and the same time a lot of pressure to be chill about it. When we go out tomorrow to celebrate out anniversary, I’m sure there’s going to be half a dozen people who inform me gravely that they never bother to celebrate their anniversary or even know when it is. From a certain contingent, there’s this idea it’s shallow to think about one’s relationship too much or get too excited about how great it is, even if it is in fact really great. Are these the “my partner is my whole world” people too? I don’t know.

I am lucky. I am in love, and loved. I am tired. I have had a headache for most of the summer, but I just got back from a vacation where I swam in the ocean. Mark is the best thing that ever happened to me, but he isn’t perfect and he hasn’t solved all my problems, or even very many of them except for the problem of not being in love and the problem of not being able to carry heavy things. I think that’s enough. We aren’t friends. We’ve been married for six years.

September 25th, 2018

Vine Awards Shortlist

I had thought So Much Love, now out for 18 months, had passed through all its award eligibility, but I got a pleasant surprise last week–it was shortlisted for the Vine Awards for Canadian Jewish Literature for fiction. You can read the full list of shortlisters–and excerpts from their work!–at the link above, but the other two on the fiction list are Bonnie Burstow’s The Other Mrs. Smith and Class Mom by Laurie Gelman. Great range, eh? And the judges are Beverley Chalmers, Joseph Kertes, and Lee Maracle!!! So I’m just delighted by the company, obviously, and very honoured. I’ll try to read both my colleagues’ books before the awards are announced on October 11.

This is also my first time being noticed for an award by the Jewish community so this is extra-special to me. What an incredible run SML has had. I am very lucky.

September 21st, 2018

Wedding gift etiquette

This post is a bit off-brand, but I read a really egregious wedding-gift-etiquette post this morning–it very strongly implied you should attempt to “cover” the cost of whatever wedding catering you eat with the cost of the gift you give, with the kind of caveat “Of course you don’t have to but c’mon everyone knows you should.” Um, no. Also, I was chatting with a newly engaged woman on the weekend and threw out some random wedding etiquette facts from when I was researching weddings in 2012 when I got married, and I got some looks–I know a LOT. When I research, I really research, and since I don’t intend to get married again, all that info is just sitting in my head, going to waste. So here it all is–wedding gift etiquette! Everything I know!

1. You never have to give a wedding gift. It’s not a rule of etiquette by any respected authority I’ve ever seen. In fact, of all the occasions commonly celebrated in North America where there are often gifts given–birthdays, engagements, retirements, etc., etc., etc.,–the only ones I’m aware of where a gift is an obligation of attending are showers, wedding and baby. Shower is a short form of shower with gifts, and gifts are the point of those events–if you don’t want to/can’t give a gift, send regrets and that gets you out of the obligation. For everything else, gifts are optional. Pretty often, we WANT to give gifts because we want to celebrate the people involved and gift-giving is one way that a lot of people do that, but everything from the whether to the when to the how much is up to us.

2. While not a regulation, gifts are certainly a norm. Most people do give and expect gifts as most weddings. Etiquette experts have been talking for years about how weddings are celebrations of love with one’s nearest and dearest and not a transaction, but if the culture in your family say you owe your cousin at least a dust-buster to cover your chicken cordon-bleu, then that’s the culture in your family and your cousin won’t be less mad if you tell her no dust buster and also she’s wrong. Also many cultural groups consider money the only acceptable gift and some consider it a terrible gift; some hate registries and some hate people who don’t have registries. I don’t know what to tell you except know who you are dealing with.

3. Wedding gift-giving is not affected by attendance. Unlike the showers mentioned above, which are really in-person-only affairs, whether you attend a wedding or not should not affect whether you give a gift. In fact, some people will give a nicer gift if they don’t go because they have more space in their budget due to not having to pay for travel, hotel, party clothes. That’s certainly not an expectation though. Basically, if you don’t go, you just send the gift you would have given anyway. If you weren’t going to give a gift, I would strongly encourage a card–in all cases, but especially if you’re not going. A lot of people (myself included) feel their weddings are a really important day in their lives and if your only response is “not coming” and then silence, that is easy to think that you are trying to end the friendship.

4. Wedding registries are suggestions not requirements. Registries of any type are supposed to be helpful ways to feel confident you have bought the couple a gift they will like and use. Thoughtful couples will select items in a wide range of price points, and thoughtful guests who wish to spend on the high end will not simply buy up a bunch of the low-priced items because that is a dick move. Other ways to feel confident you given the couple a gift they will like and use include giving money, giving gift cards to a store or restaurant or other place you know they like, or knowing them so well you can figure out a non-registry, non-cash/card gift that you feel confident they will enjoy. There is no hierarchy among these choices.

5. There is no minimum amount to spend on wedding gifts. You just give what you can afford and want to give, period. This was actually a lot easier when I was broke, as there was a hard upper limit, the end. I once gave a pair of newlyweds a $15 board game and felt proud of myself because it was on sale and I wrapped it nicely, so it seemed slightly more expensive. For weddings during periods of financial turmoil where I’ve had to travel to be there, folks have gotten a pretty card with nothing inside but my heartfelt good wishes–by strict budgetary standards, I probably shouldn’t have even been there, so a gift was out of the question. Once I was making a decent living it got more confusing because what I could “afford” was relative. Basically I try to find a nice present on the registry that I feel good about giving. Also getting married myself was useful, as people gave us gifts and I learned what those people consider a nice gift!

6. Don’t bring gifts to the ceremony or reception. Even fairly etiquette-savvy people don’t seem to know this one and thus there will usually be a card box and gift table at most receptions (not at the ceremony–no one is ready for gifts at the ceremony and you’ll wind up having to hold the boxed dust-buster in your lap) but it’s really not ideal. If the reception is in a banquet hall where the public or even just guests at other events have access, someone will need to watch the gift table and card box to make sure nothing is stolen and as the night wears on and drinks flow, that’s harder to do. Everyone has heard a story about a wedding-gift robbery–those are both awkward and depressing. Also, at the end of the night the gifts need to be taken somewhere–challenging if they are big, extra-challenging if gifts are fragile and whoever is doing the loading is drunk. Stemware gets broken, gifts get separated from their cards and no one ever knows who gave the dust buster, and if the couple is leaving immediately on their honeymoon or even just is driving a smaller car, now it’s a storage concern for someone. Send the gifts to their home before or after the wedding.

7. Be ok with not receiving a thank you note. The etiquette rules are pretty clear on this–wedding thank you notes should be sent within a few months and they should be a personal note about the thing you actually gave, not a pre-printed “Thanks for giving a thing!” But etiquette isn’t a contest and so many people don’t send wedding thank you notes that it’s wise to check yourself ahead of time for how much resentment you might harbour if you don’t get one and if it’s “tonnes” just don’t give a gift. And relying on thank you notes to confirm that the gift even made it to the recipient is not a great plan–per #6, have it sent to their home with a tracking number or use the registry to track.

8. If it’s driving you crazy, stop. One of the worst things about etiquette is that it can sometimes feels like we serve it and have to do whatever etiquette says, instead of the truth, that etiquette was created to help us maintain good relationships. If etiquette drives people to not like each other, they’re doing it wrong. If you are hunting for a wedding gift and angrily thinking/talking about how much you don’t want to buy anything for these people who you barely know/you don’t like/don’t deserve it/have lots of stuff, maybe that’s a sign you shouldn’t go to the wedding at all and step back from the friendship. Or if it’s just a stress reaction, and actually you do like them, could you just skip the gift and enjoy the wedding with lots of love? Or could you chat with them and mention that you’re stressed/broke right now, but since you’ll be friends forever, there will be a chance down the road for you to get them a nice gift? If you can neither comfortably skip the gift nor comfortably talk to them about it, I’d be back to looking at the relationship itself.

9. My favourite thing I got for my wedding is people coming to my wedding, though they could have been doing anything else that Saturday. My second favourite is towels. Seriously, even if they don’t seem like “fancy bath linens” people, we all have to shower eventually and few of us are that into shopping for towels. Even if they have some nice ones already, time comes for us all and eventually they will get around to using yours. I registered for cheap ones because I felt guilty and also like it didn’t matter, but then Mark’s aunt got us Vera Wang towels somehow (!!!) and when I am buried I want my shroud to be Vera Wang towels. That is all.