Treasures, yams and the stories of youth

If you appreciate the random, you're gonna like this one.

THE INSPIRATION: Bad days

“If I keep my body moving, and my mind occupied at all times, I will avoid falling into a bottomless pit of despair.”

— Chris Traeger, Parks and Recreation

Aren’t we all just running away from the bottomless pit of despair?

No? Just me, then?

Look, I know I usually use this space to tell you that you can climb that mountain and spike that football or whatever metaphor I’m into at the moment, but I realize as I move through life that not every day is a “spike that football” kind of day.

Some days are “I’m going to sit home in my pajamas and watch Schitt’s Creek and not answer my phone” kind of days.

And that’s okay. It’s okay if you’re just scrambling to keep out of a bottomless pit of despair. Let’s not be toxically positive. Some days, things suck hard, and that’s okay. That’s life. That’s how it goes.

You’re gonna be okay. If today is one of those shitty days, you have permission to call in sick, eat a pint of Ben & Jerry’s (Phish Food for the win!) and just watch reruns of Parks and Rec and chill your shit out for a little while.

It’s okay. You can take a day off if that’s what you need.

THE FAT ORANGE CAT: Trashy treasure

You know that feeling when you own something that’s trash to everyone else but is of inestimable value to you? Maybe it’s the earrings you wore on your first real date or maybe it’s Zipper, the beat up stuffed leopard that your kid left behind when she went to college or maybe it’s your dad’s old watch that has been stuffed in a cardboard box since he died.

Give one of those trashy treasures to your main character.

And then take it away from them.

The “Get Your Stuff” link will bring you to an item I selected specifically to accompany this post, but you do not have to buy that thing in order to support me. Just keep popping through Amazon and buy the stuff you were going to buy anyway.

THE TROPE: Flashbacks

Like most of the “bad” writing device tropes, flashbacks only have a bad rep because so many writers go to them for writer reasons rather than story reasons.

Writer reasons to go to flashback include but are not limited to: the writer wants to explain something from the past (exposition); the writer wrote a great piece of discovery writing that takes place before the now of the story, and they want to include it; the writer isn’t sure what to write, so they go into the past while they figure it out, and then forget or don’t know that it’s discovery writing.

That said, a great way to use flashback is to tell two parallel stories that reflect on each other. We bop back and forth between two complete narratives (two narratives that each have their own protagonist and antagonist and a central narrative conflict that is resolved by the end of the story) and those two complete narratives each illuminate the other creating a deeper overall narrative.

Like I said, not always bad. Just be careful how you use it.

THE QUESTION: Random questions

All right. You guys are busy. I get it. But when you don’t ask me questions, I’m going to head over to the Journal Prompt Generator at Redital and see what comes up.

God knows, I should journal more.

“What book setting would you like to visit if you could?”

—JPG

Dear JPG,

I have a problem with this question, because the answer came to me absolutely immediately with no hesitation whatsoever and I am not proud of my answer. I want to think again, and provide a cooler answer that isn’t so very on-brand middle-aged-white-lady but…

I yam what I yam. Speaking of which, what even are yams? Are they just another name for sweet potato? Do we need another name for sweet potato? Sweet potato is really enough, and it’s so descriptive whereas yams yes I’m stalling jeez ALL RIGHT ALREADY.

Longbourne.

Sigh.

LOOK. I KNOW. Every middle-aged white lady wants to be in Pride and Prejudice and I KNOW. It was NOT a great time for women, not every Elizabeth got a Darcy and England has always been a global imperialist nightmare but especially during those times and it’s so fucking classist, I mean, these quote-unquote “poor people” have goddamn SERVANTS and it’s all fucked if you think about it for even a minute.

I know.

I know.

My answer stands. I swore I wouldn’t lie to you so yes, I want to spend the day wearing empire waist dresses and read books and do embroidery and learn how to play the pianoforte and take turns around my 5-acre garden and then come in at night and drink tea by the fire while I giggle with my sisters and be surrounded by men who speak in English accents.

I am not proud of it. But… that is my answer.

Everything,

L

P.S. Here is the answer to the yam vs. sweet potato thing.

THE PRACTICAL: An escape from cynicism

I’ve recently gotten into the Netflix TV show Sex Education, which I’ve been hearing about for a while. And besides appreciating that Gillian Anderson is just as hot now as ever she was, it’s gotten me thinking about why stories about teenagers are so popular.

Teen shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Glee and Freaks and Geeks. Movies like To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before and Lady Bird and Booksmart. And books… Twilight, Harry Potter, The Fault in Our Stars, The Catcher in the Rye, The Hunger Games.

You could say that we’re culturally obsessed with youth, and I’m not going to argue that we don’t have a real issue with devaluing older people and their stories, but I think that’s kind of a pat answer that doesn’t think beyond a blanket, snobby hand wave.

I think we love these stories because we love discovery. Even as those of us who are older watch these kids explore things that we have long since gotten past, there is something about both the newness of it, and the lack of hard-earned and realistic cynicism that feels good to visit.

I mean, even the most cynical of youth-centered stories like, say, Freaks and Geeks, is not about how wonderful and lovely and exciting the world is, but rather how depressing and fucked up the world is. But it’s still about that discovery; the moments when we move from childhood into the world as it is, when we finally drop our cloak of innocence and enter the world as adults that is kind of exciting.

It was a time when we had our feet firmly planted in two worlds; the real world with all its grunge and danger that we were just beginning to understand, and the world of possibility and hope that existed solely because our choices hadn’t yet limited us.

It’s not an obsession with youth, I don’t think. I think these stories help reconnect us to our own sense of hope and possibility. I think they remind us that just because we’ve made choices doesn’t mean that we don’t still have more choices open to us.

If you think you’re too old for something now, for anything, it’s just not true. There are two states of being; alive, and not. If you are the former, there are still things for you to do, to discover, to experience for the first time, even if it’s something you’ve done before because you haven’t done it as the you that you are now.

You’re either here, or you’re not. Some people are both here and not, because they have forgotten that they are still here. I think our enjoyment of stories of youth are not a yearning; they are a reminder, telling us that potential is never lost, and hope is always right here where you left it. Your now is always yours to use as you will.

So how are you gonna use it?

Everything,

L