writing

Listen to My Story!

There is a story that is out there, acting like a grown-up, getting read aloud like some sort of literature. And I wrote it. I wrote a story that someone out there, who I don’t even know had to read. Aloud. Professionally. Probably more than once, that poor woman.

I knew this was coming at some point, but when I woke up this morning and saw the notification on my phone screen that it was real, it was here and real, everything stopped. And then I avoided it.

Okay, so I have been writing a book. You’ve likely heard this from me for about 5 years or something. I mean, I’ve been tinkering for like 5 years, I’ve been actively writing this book for about a year now. It started out as me just writing down things that happened around me that I thought were funny. And I was on a PTO, which is like a PTA but not as official or something so a lot of my stories revolved around the fun (and trouble) we got into in the PTO. And then I started talking to people here in Colorado who had similar experiences to some of the more dramatic stuff and I decided that I needed to fictionalize it all and write a whole stupid book about it. Except now my book has gotten bigger than that. Now it’s about friendships and whatever.

However, I was asked if I could condense some of the PTA stuff into a few thousand words that could somewhat come together as a story for this podcast. So I did AND SOMEONE WHO DOESN’T EVEN KNOW ME HAD TO READ IT! How crazy is that? I feel so powerful.

I also feel a little like an impostor which is why I just stared at the notification this morning and then ignored it for a couple of hours. I mean, if I had to read my own writing, that’s one thing, but to hear someone else have to do it made me feel secondhand embarrassment for some reason. I eventually listened to it and I feel good. It sounds normal not in my own voice. All of this is not selling the podcast is it? Okay, ignore this paragraph.

So a woman, who is named Julie Niblett, who I didn’t have to guilt into anything, read my story, amazingly by the way, and it exists out there like a real thing. And you should all listen to it!

https://pendustradio.com/humor-satire/kicked-out-of-the-pta/

Isolation Day #6 (maybe?): The Writing Group Dilemma

I have a novel that I’ve been writing and rewriting and rereading and deleting and starting over and writing and rewriting for like 5 years now. It’s super exciting and I love it and I also think its a steaming pile of crap that should never see the light of day.

But it should. Because I love where it’s going. But I’m bored of it and how awful it all is.

But I figure I should use this self-isolation time to be productive. No excuses.

There’s also the fact that Camp Nano is coming up and I like doing that AND that I just joined a writing group which I’ve always been drawn to writing groups.

The dilemma with this new writing group however, is that I hate my above mentioned grand opus. Then there’s a story that I have partway written, that I DO like, but it came to me fast and furious, in a dreamlike way and I have no idea where it wants to go and so 10,000 words just sit there like Whitney Houston in sunglasses staring at me from across the fountain. The writing group is going to kick me out for being a waste of their time, probably.

While logging into the laptop in my efforts to have a productive writing isolation, a link came across my attention that Scribd is offering a free 30 day membership to read and audiobook as many books and magazines and whatever else you can find there as is your want. No strings attached. I’m taking this opportunity to finally read (well listen to) Save the Cat because apparently I am scrapping all of my efforts to finish something and I’m going to write a screenplay! Because of course I am. After I listen to this book and maybe a few others, because 30 DAYS FREE BOOKS!!!!

But seriously, what should I do about this writing group? Do I submit something I really like with no signs of an ending, or do I submit the mess that is my novel that I really want to finish but I don’t know that a writing group will be able to help me with, or either that, they’ll collectively tell me it’s a pile of crap and needs to be immediately scrapped with a promise I never write again? I know that won’t happen, no one is that mean. Right?

Alright, if anyone has advice, I’m here for it. In the meantime, I have a book to listen to.

I think my life is maybe just a Paulie Shore movie.

Hi. I have been quite absent from this blog and I have no excuse. Well, moving across 3 states over the summer. That’s an excuse. Also, I’m lazy.

As you may or may not know, I’m writing a book. I’m not sure how much I plan on talking about it yet because I don’t want to jinx it, and I’m battling that voice that is very loudly yelling at me that I’m a fraud and nobody likes me. That’s a fun demon with which to co-pilot this trainwreck. So I’m trying to overcome that voice by writing really bad blog posts. I’m sure that won’t make it all worse. Like at all.

So, a couple of months ago, I moved away from the love of my life, Los Angeles back to my hometown of Denver. It’s a bit of a lot of baggage to unpack. I went from feeling like Link (Brendan Fraser) in Encino Man where I’m the weird but super loved new guy to being Crawl (Paulie Shore) in Son-in-Law when he falls in pig poops at the farm and everyone hates him and he’s barely wearing pants. It has been a good move and my family seems to love it and it will be a great thing for our future. However, no matter how many movies, holiday-themed or not I’ve seen on this subject of moving home, I wasn’t prepared.  Sweet Home Alabama taught me nothing.

While there are a LOT of things (people) I’m glad to be away from, there is SOOOOO much more that hurts my heart to have left. Like a bunch of my favorite people. And I’m struggling to get my creativity back. I feel like I’ve fallen back into a vacuum.

Los Angeles has this reputation of being a vacuous wasteland of plastic beauty, soul-less egos, debauchery, and drugs, and gang members harassing old ladies. And while that does all exist, it is a city so rich in personality and friendships, and lost people and found people. And everyone you meet has something they want to share. And they want to support you in your nonsense and you want to support theirs. And they all hug hello. And whether sincere or not, everybody wants to be your friend and share a bottle or 7 of wine with you over gossip and dreams.

I don’t know if I’m going to find that here. People in Colorado are very polite yet reserved and no one wants none of my antics.

And I am, once again, an outsider looking in.

My oldest son came home from school the other day and says, “Kids just don’t think I’m that funny here,” and then he shrugged and went upstairs to play Fortnite.

God, kid I KNOW, RIGHT?

I sound very dramatic. I realize this. I’m going to go have a glass of wine by myself and try to get back to writing the book.

And in case you were wondering, sobbing it out on the internet didn’t shut the mean voice up at all.

And I do love living in Colorado. I’m just going to drop in weird on everybody like Mork from Ork and make them love me.

Maybe this is the same mentality I need to conjure when I’m writing.

Nanu Nanu.

The Facebook Hiatus

pexels-photo-267350.jpeg

The husband and I have been binge watching Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee and the Tina Fey episode was on. I’m in awe of Tina Fey. I don’t know how she has accomplished what she has while also somehow living with two small kids. I can’t even type this sentence with both hands because my 6 year old is currently hanging off my right arm, crying about his turn on the Xbox, and wiping his snot on my shirt. The main take-away from that episode, though, Tina Fey doesn’t use social media. I do. A lot. I’m going to assume that this is the only reason I am not as accomplished, and smart, and funny, and driven as Tina Fey. It’s the internet’s fault.

I don’t know if you’ve clued into the fact that I’m obsessed with the internet. I have been for years and years and years. It’s been a problem since high school and I graduated in 1994, so like, 7 years ago or something like that. My high school years were THE years that the internet started to take hold. It was real underground at the time and they charged you by the hour so we took the internet SERIOUSLY.

But my fascination with the internet has always been more specifically, on the social media wing of the mansion.  I think it started a million years ago with Prodigy, the online service provider that read all your emails, not to be confused with the guy with two mohawks, but I might also trust him to read my emails.

You know what? Anyone really can sign up for the job to be my email reader and email replier. Maybe then I can realistically pretend that I contribute to society.

Prodigy was amazing! There was nothing like it! I was OBSESSED with the Prodigy bulletin boards, most specifically, the Kids in the Hall bulletin boards. My moniker was Mr. Sizzler, or something.
Side note: I met two really amazing people on Prodigy and formed a comedy troupe with them, even though we lived thousands of miles away from each other. We wrote sketches via private Prodigy messages and emails, flew to each other and filmed sketches in snowstorms, and eventually we sent our best three sketches to MTV and Comedy Central which ended in us thisclose to being hired on as writers for a new comedy show for kids on Nickelodeon. We were Serious Artists so we said no. Ha! sigh, there went my beach house.

In the early 90’s, it was all about Prodigy. And then it wasn’t because everyone started jumping ship and going to AOL. So naturally, I too went to AOL because I need my internet attention!

All my online buddies were there!!!!! And we chatted and we danced. (we didn’t dance) And it was magical and wonderful.

I stayed up ALL. NIGHT. LONG. chattin’ up people. But this time it became weezer chat rooms.

I don’t even know what we chatted about but there was none of this looking stuff up on google crap. Google didn’t exist. You kind of had to know the web address, the whole http:// thing to get any info on the World Wide Web. So you’d talk to people that called themselves “paperface” who claimed to “bake cookies for the boys” (codeword weezer) and that’s how you got your info.  Because you were talking to people who KNEW weezer. Nobody lies on the internet.

I just realized that I was probably being catfished…

And then I moved from Denver to Los Angeles without a computer and the internet was ripped from my life. And for years I didn’t even care about it. And I wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote. I wrote poems and stories and plays! It was the most productive I’ve ever been in my life. It was probably about 6 years before I got back online and the internet had me in its hold again.

Because MySpace.

I thought MySpace was the coolest thing EVER. I had my own webpage. Holy crap! I didn’t have to search for people, they could search for me. I became like the queen of the internet in my mind.

 

And then people stopped coming by my page because facebook officially arrived. I already had a facebook but I never used it because the only other person I knew on there was my sister-in-law who was in college at the time and I wasn’t in college anymore, I was like a 30 year old woman or something so no one wanted anything to do with me on the facebook and I didn’t want anything to do with them. And then a couple of years later, everybody flocked to facebook, so I adapted because, don’t leave me, guys.

Now I tweet. I tumblr. I pinterest. I instagram. And then there’s facebook. I hate facebook.

The internet for me has gone from always being fun times and meeting cool people that I think longingly about with a smile on my face to wanting to punch a handful of people I know in real life in the head. Making mental burn lists used to take up a great deal of my time and emotional space. Politics was finally the thing that helped me slowly back away from most of my facebook feed. My life vastly improved. I’m not inexplicably angry at someone I met at work 15 years ago because of her rants about chemtrails. I’m free from that baggage. I’m not totally gone, though. Something will pop into my head that I think is kind of funny and up it goes to facebook ’cause that’s the only place people pay attention to me anymore, and there I am. Back in the fray.  Every like and funny comment drags me back in like a sparkly vampire.

 

So here’s the thing. I’m not trying to make any promises because we both know me. But I think I’m going to attempt to stay off facebook for like, a couple of weeks or so. Because I need to write. I have like 7 novels rattling around my head.  All my dumb status updates will come here to my blog. Maybe I’ll actually get a lot more done if I’m not all caught up in the other nonsense. It’s completely terrifying at the same time because people will forget me! Won’t they? Whatever, a lot of the great people I know and want to keep up with either aren’t going anywhere, or aren’t even on facebook anymore anyway. They’re on Instagram. I’m bad at Instagram, too. I’m not a great photographer and I can’t tell my dumb jokes in the medium they require. I’m not an instagram influencer. And the feed is all over the place! but I’ll try to keep up.

Alright, I’ll focus it all here, on my blog. Think of this as myspace. Come visit my page! Look at my glitter gifs! Leave me a comment! I promise I won’t make you listen to music as my blog pulls up.

 

For now.

 

 

The Ghost and Mrs. Ferg (that’s me)

pexels-photo-304875.jpeg

Yesterday I was having a day. One of those days were I question everything, my writing, my sense of humor, my lack of talent, etc. as you do, but instead of spiraling down THAT hole,  I set the timer and made myself write it all out for 30 minutes. My goal was to just stop thinking and letting the thoughts grow, but releasing them into nature so they can go bug someone else, like a weed. One of those dandelion seeds. Woosh into the wind, mean thoughts.

It’s raining, it has been and the light is weird and I think it’s making me feel. The sky is too light but not sunny or blue skies. It’s just that dull white/light gray and I hate it. It feels like dusk.

And then a woman started coming through. She just started showing herself, turning on a light, her rings clanking against the emerald colored glass of the lamp. Not a real lamp, by the way, this isn’t an Official Haunting. I would be screaming a lot louder if it were, this is just a mental haunting. I can’t see her yet. I’m only getting glimpses of her like mist. Like a dream teasing you hours later with tricky flashes of memory. Like a peep show. That’s what I imagine dementia feels like.

I wrote down everything she was showing me.

I see an older house. In the foyer looking in from the door, huge staircase on the right, does it wind up? Sometimes yes, but curved only slightly. Table with phone and lamp sit against the wall underneath. Library a bit down to the left. I’ve written about this library before… There was a man in a red velvet chair last time. No, it was a burgundy chair. Smoking. Does he belong to the woman??? Does she live here? Who was that guy?? Will I be able to remember? I wrote about him when I lived in Denver. I think. Why does it matter if I remember him? Why does he want to be remembered?

This woman is coming through like a spirit. Like I’m the medium and she’s trying to tell her story and I can’t hear her properly like I’m Whoopi in Ghost when she has to yell at all the other ghosts to be quiet so she can hear Sam. Except instead of ghosts being too loud, it’s the internet. 

I’m going to try to listen to her again today. She’s probably going to be spilling all her secrets when I’m in the back of the Uber on my way to this fancy gala I have to go to in Hollywood tonight. Because of course she will. Everyone else will be drinking and laughing and dancing to “Havana” and I’ll be sitting in the corner of the party typing this woman’s entire life into my phone on 23% battery, with my clumsy, drunken fingers.

God, I don’t have anything to wear.

 

New Year, New Me (but likely the same me but hopefully I’m a little less lazy about it)

img_3315

I spent New Year’s Eve laughing and drinking with neighbors and my husband and kids. The kids weren’t drinking, obviously, but I did my part anyway and drank what they couldn’t. We had fun and drank too much and sang Beatles’ songs at the top of our lungs really late into the night. It was the perfect catapult into what I think is going to be a fun year. And then I was awoken from a peaceful dream about swimming in the clearest, bluest, warmest, sharkless ocean by a champagne headache and a cat with a death wish.

I have made grand plans to have a “Me” year, though. Around this time 2 years ago, I vowed to have a Mariah Carey year full of me being my diva self and not caring who knew. Well I had that year and it was exactly like I’d imagined but without the money or the shoes or the personal assistants or the Yes Men. No one cleaned for me. No one made sure my mimosas were filled.

What’s a girl have to do to be seen as a diva and not “Amy, put on pants”?

I’m still on the ultimate quest of living my “Mariah Carey Year” which may or may not have already panned out depending on how liberal we are with the rules. For example, sitting around drinking wine without pants on and talking about myself while everyone else around me does everything I didn’t get around to doing, we’ve probably had similar years, hers is probably a lot more gold plated and sparkly and she has someone to do her hair and stuff. I just look like an episode of Roseanne. (Speaking of Roseanne, did I really see that that show is coming back??? Please tell me it wasn’t a champagne fueled hallucination and it’s really really really happening.)

I am going to have my year this year. I’m doing it.  I say this every year and as a matter of fact, my 2018 so far has been me sitting on the couch juggling mimosas, napping, eating pizza and Doritos, and scrolling the internet all day so, exactly where I left 2017 off. Although, I have showered, gone outside, and am blogging, which, if you’ll notice on the forthcoming list, I’m not doing too shabby.

My RESOLUTIONS are as follows.

  • Try to go outside everyday
  • Exercise for 30 minutes everyday
  • Read for 30 minutes everyday
  • Shower. Everyday.
  • um, Eat an apple or something that grew out of the ground?
  • Blog. Everyday.

Once again, this list looks like a cry for help. But I do intend to blog everyday which is fitting as I leave town for several days soon and the idea of bringing my laptop will probably be met with eyerolls and “Come on, like you’re really going to write everyday. You’re not even going to open that thing once. Leave it here,” which sounds like I’m vacationing with my parent but no, just the husband. But I will be sitting in front of a cozy fire, probably super inspired by my new Oregon surroundings, it’ll be like Funny Farm only hopefully I won’t throw the whole thing into the fire when super husband, Ward Cleaver over here writes a best selling kids’ book about squirrels.

Ooh! Very important side-note: I just remembered that I had a baked potato for dinner so add that to the list of accomplishments because it grew from the ground. It counts. See? I’m doing even better than you thought I was.

There I go, fulfilling resolution list things right and left. Tonight’s supermoon is making me a super human. Or a werewolf. We’ll see what happens when I go outside. If you see me running around Encino naked and howling, you’ll know where we’re at but you have to let me go for at least a half an hour so I’ll be able to add another checkmark to my resolution list.