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I don’t know about you, but one of my greatest fears is exposure. I’m not talking about someone showing I’ve created some heinous or diabolical crime, because my crimes tend to be of the jaywalking and speeding variety. Nor am I talking of physical exposure, of people seeing my naked form in all its flaws. Now, believe me, I’m in no hurry to display my love handles or to explain how “I’m a grower, not a shower.” But enough people people have seen my goods (and bads), whether it be lovers (yay) or doctors (boo), that I’m used enough to it. As with most people I have things I want to change about myself physically, some of which I’m fully capable of doing so, but I have nothing of which I’m ashamed.
No, when I think about exposure, the thing I’m afraid of is people seeing inside my mind. I think of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode “Earshot” and how it almost drove Buffy insane to constantly hear others’ thoughts, and I understand that--I have enough issues with my own thoughts that thinking of others adding onto them is just too much. When I think about death, which I probably do much too much, especially recently--and when I say death, I mean specifically my death--it’s not the thought of being on cold steel with my chest sliced open, my organs being weighed, somebody snickering about how I won’t be a “grower” anymore, that bothers me. No, it’s the thought of people browsing through my private things, my private thoughts, that really freaks me out.
Because I think sometimes this boy ain’t right in the head.
Which, no, I’m not hiding any dark secrets, no bodies buried in the backyard, no strange obsessions with playing ring toss with donuts.
But my mind works in strange ways, I know that. And sometimes I write about what goes on in my head (such as I originally wanted to say jelly donuts, because I liked the sound of that better, but I don’t know of any jelly donuts with holes in the middle).
I was thinking about this recently when I started writing what will hopefully become my first completed novel. I have had several ideas recently about what I want to write. And I will be likely exploring some of those ideas eventually. Two of the ideas involve Christmas. One of them was going to be a fairly short, sweet story about how Santa manages to bring presents all over the world in one night (although Santa was going to be a character mostly offstage). I thought that I would self-publish the book and send it to friends and family for Christmas. Maybe, if it came out as well as I hoped, parents might read it to their children in the days leading up to Christmas day.
I might still write that someday. Because, you know, I love Christmas. I have a room in my house right now that is still set up for Christmas. I have presents wrapped under the tree. I listen to Christmas music throughout the year. In the month before Christmas I watch all the great Christmas movies and specials. I also watch the sickenly, cloyingly sweet movies that show on Hallmark and Lifetime. I believe Christmas is a time of kindness and love and sharing. I believe that if people acted like it was Christmas every day, the world would be a better place.
So why is it that the first thing I choose to write, the first thing I choose to write ABOUT Christmas, is dark? Why do I, the lover of all things Christmas, start my Christmas tale in a police interrogation room? Why is the story filled with murder? Why is there mutilation? Why are most of the main characters sad or lonely or angry (or all three) people, many of whom proclaim to dislike Christmas? A novel with a character called the Westland Butcher (which will probably not be a different name by the time I’m done, as I’m not in love with the name) doesn’t really scream “and Merry Christmas to all.” But it does scream.
You can call it, per Dexter, my Dark Passenger. Or, per Stephen King, my Dark Half. I wouldn’t even call it looking at things as a glass half empty. Instead, I go through life optimistically, but also...well, that glass could be half full or empty of poison, right? Poison that could course through my body, making my skin melt off my bones or burning me alive from the inside. It’s not. Probably, it’s not. But it could be.
I know how my mind works, but will other people. After all, I’m not going to be around to explain the absolutely plausible reasons there are Google searches for “bunny sex” and “porn star candy” on my computer (actually, I have no idea why “porn star candy” is there, although I probably had a good reason at the time. I have many older things I’ve written, including some godawful stories and many poor, violent poems. What would people think if they found them?
I don’t know. All I know is I love Christmas. And that I didn’t laugh at the movie Gremlins when Phoebe Cates’ character explained how her father, dressed as Santa, had died trying to climb down the chimney. That made complete sense to me. Of course that happened.
No, when I think about exposure, the thing I’m afraid of is people seeing inside my mind. I think of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode “Earshot” and how it almost drove Buffy insane to constantly hear others’ thoughts, and I understand that--I have enough issues with my own thoughts that thinking of others adding onto them is just too much. When I think about death, which I probably do much too much, especially recently--and when I say death, I mean specifically my death--it’s not the thought of being on cold steel with my chest sliced open, my organs being weighed, somebody snickering about how I won’t be a “grower” anymore, that bothers me. No, it’s the thought of people browsing through my private things, my private thoughts, that really freaks me out.
Because I think sometimes this boy ain’t right in the head.
Which, no, I’m not hiding any dark secrets, no bodies buried in the backyard, no strange obsessions with playing ring toss with donuts.
But my mind works in strange ways, I know that. And sometimes I write about what goes on in my head (such as I originally wanted to say jelly donuts, because I liked the sound of that better, but I don’t know of any jelly donuts with holes in the middle).
I was thinking about this recently when I started writing what will hopefully become my first completed novel. I have had several ideas recently about what I want to write. And I will be likely exploring some of those ideas eventually. Two of the ideas involve Christmas. One of them was going to be a fairly short, sweet story about how Santa manages to bring presents all over the world in one night (although Santa was going to be a character mostly offstage). I thought that I would self-publish the book and send it to friends and family for Christmas. Maybe, if it came out as well as I hoped, parents might read it to their children in the days leading up to Christmas day.
I might still write that someday. Because, you know, I love Christmas. I have a room in my house right now that is still set up for Christmas. I have presents wrapped under the tree. I listen to Christmas music throughout the year. In the month before Christmas I watch all the great Christmas movies and specials. I also watch the sickenly, cloyingly sweet movies that show on Hallmark and Lifetime. I believe Christmas is a time of kindness and love and sharing. I believe that if people acted like it was Christmas every day, the world would be a better place.
So why is it that the first thing I choose to write, the first thing I choose to write ABOUT Christmas, is dark? Why do I, the lover of all things Christmas, start my Christmas tale in a police interrogation room? Why is the story filled with murder? Why is there mutilation? Why are most of the main characters sad or lonely or angry (or all three) people, many of whom proclaim to dislike Christmas? A novel with a character called the Westland Butcher (which will probably not be a different name by the time I’m done, as I’m not in love with the name) doesn’t really scream “and Merry Christmas to all.” But it does scream.
You can call it, per Dexter, my Dark Passenger. Or, per Stephen King, my Dark Half. I wouldn’t even call it looking at things as a glass half empty. Instead, I go through life optimistically, but also...well, that glass could be half full or empty of poison, right? Poison that could course through my body, making my skin melt off my bones or burning me alive from the inside. It’s not. Probably, it’s not. But it could be.
I know how my mind works, but will other people. After all, I’m not going to be around to explain the absolutely plausible reasons there are Google searches for “bunny sex” and “porn star candy” on my computer (actually, I have no idea why “porn star candy” is there, although I probably had a good reason at the time. I have many older things I’ve written, including some godawful stories and many poor, violent poems. What would people think if they found them?
I don’t know. All I know is I love Christmas. And that I didn’t laugh at the movie Gremlins when Phoebe Cates’ character explained how her father, dressed as Santa, had died trying to climb down the chimney. That made complete sense to me. Of course that happened.
