Sunshine, lollipops and rainbows - or maybe not.

Here is a little known fact for the day – you don’t have to be okay, all the time.
Surprised? Don’t worry, all will become clear. Put down that fake smile and come with me.

Lifestyle and beauty bloggers, to name but two kinds, often present an image of jovial perfection; a glossy haired, toothsome happiness surrounded by kittens and muffins and must-have eyeshadow palettes.

My presented image is the wonky thing we all see each day. I choose to talk about things that happen to me, or things I question, or just simply have the odd moan. You can still be productive in this way, but for this, I’ve come under fire from some people for being a misery. Or rather, sounding like a misery. I can absolutely assure you I’m quite alright, for the most part, and a lot of my angst is worn like an old overcoat; something I can slip on when the mood takes me.

Here is a short list of things I categorically love:

• My boyfriend, family and friends. These are my favourite people. I think people are ace and my people are especially brilliant.
• Toast. Yeah. Toast is incredible. Toast with jam, toast with almond butter, toast with coffee. All the baked goods, all the time.
• Being healthy. Generally speaking, and touch wood, I am in rude health.
• Puppies. Like WHOA. Hell yes, puppies. If there are cocker spaniel puppies near me, I’ll basically have a cute overload and melt.

I’m not going to tell you about the things I hate, because it would take too long, and frankly it would depress the hell out of all of us. But what I am saying is it’s okay to hate things, to question things, and it’s fine to be sad sometimes. You don’t need to face the world with a plastered on grin or have it all together. You can be covered in mud, trailing bits of twig in your laddered tights, sobbing deliriously into a Thermos flask filled with your own tears (if you like, or soup is good). Being alright isn’t mandatory, but it can be a small beam of sunlight into what can be a dreadful day. What I’m really saying is be you. Always.

What did you want to be?

When I was little, it took me a long time to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up. My friends had their future careers picked out - I think one of them even ended up doing what they wanted to do.
Once I'd figured it out, I wanted to be a writer - more specifically, I wanted to be Lois Lane. Not a journalist, or a reporter, or even an author. It didn't matter that she was fictional; all the best people are.

Now I am older, and have learnt 'growing up' is entirely optional, I'd still like to be Lois Lane. She's a successful reporter, living it up on a seemingly best-selling newspaper in Metropolis (which was modelled on Toronto, but I always assumed it was a real place - somewhere near New Yoik) and the girl knows how to rock a bob cut. She's not without her flaws, of course, one major factor being unable to tell Clark sans spectacles is quite clearly Superman. Maybe she did notice, and never mentioned it. After all, nobody likes to blow someone's cover.

I've recently had a second piece accepted by The White Rabbit which will form part of a podcast coming soon. It was about heroes and villains and the ordinary folk who have to clear up the mess after Superman has caused chaos. I'll post a link when it's online - it will be available on iTunes in the early Autumn.

With heroes and villains in mind, and my own journalistic desires, this is my question to you: what did you want to be when you were little? Why? Are you doing it now? Would little you back then be happy with what big you does now?

Leave a comment or tweet me @ruthsedar using #IWantedToBe and let me know how many of you are astronauts, deep-sea adventurers, authors, doctors, shopkeepers, vets or police officers. I especially want to know about jobs you think are boring, but are fascinating to everyone else.

New submissions

My new work is another submission for Are You Sitting Comfortably? hosted by The White Rabbit. This time the theme is 'heroes and villains' and I'm taking a sideways look at what it means to be heroic in a world of superheroes. Are the heroes the ones with their pants over their tights? Or are they the normal people going to work and keeping the economy afloat? Are the villains always the ones laughing in an underground lair, or are they the people who look just like you and me?

I've also found a writing group near me and I am working on a piece on the theme of 'intrusion', which is proving difficult to avoid stereotypes and clumsy plot so  it needs a lot more thought.
I watch a lot of horror films (read: horror is the only genre I watch) so the theme is familiar to the point of being predictable - "What was that sound?" "Oh no, the serial killer is in the house!" The key is going to be avoiding cliché as much as possible.

Follow me on twitter for more ramblings and inspiration searching: @ruthsedar
Anything work or writing related is always tagged #amwriting but I am also prone to rudeness, swearing, tangents, observations and everything else. What I'm trying to say is I talk a lot.

Further adventures in caffeine

The girl poured a double measure of whisky - or brandy - into her coffee while no-one was looking.
I saw.
She saw me see her. I'm not saying anything.

I'm out quite late this afternoon to research any websites or publications taking open submissions this Spring - I tend to work better to a brief so I enjoy finding open ideas and having a think about what it means to me and how I can pull the story out.

Stories are always there - for me, it's like the Michelangelo thing: the statue is always there, in the piece of stone, and it's just up to the artist to uncover it. To paraphrase badly, that is.

Coffee holds my thoughts together and lets them string apart like mad bunting. This week I'm going to be working on my secondary WIP (work in progress) as my primary is sitting ignored on my external hard drive and there it shall remain until one day I gain the knowledge to be able to finish it.

My WIP is maybe a third through - it's a short story which is a dark comedy about what happens when you get what you really want. There's a goth, a doctor with sketchy morals and an elderly lady stuck in the middle. I'm not posting any snippets yet!

Courage is a rabbit

Years ago, I used to submit work without batting an eyelid. I'd contribute copy to music review sites, kept about four different blogs, sent spec letters to anyone and everyone. The courage of being 17 years old is a special kind you rarely feel again once you are past 27 and picking up speed.

I am beginning to submit work again. This is a Big Deal. Short fiction, mostly, to a few open publishers and I'm trying to write something, no matter how short, each day. Practice is as practice does. And courage comes.

Inspiration

My inspiration comes from funny places. The same places as everyone else, I suppose - I'm not suggesting my own inspiration is more important or interesting than anyone else's.

To look outside and see a rare hint of Spring in spite of it being early February made me want to sit and write. "Spending warm summer days in doors..." Morrissey knows all about this, too. I don't know anyone in Luxembourg, though.

Projects this week are focussed around submissions I am planning on making, one of them being a short 'Alice' inspired story for http://www.thewhiterabbit.org.uk/

The Alice stories are some of my favourite things. I have a hardback copy of Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass which I received for a birthday present when I was seven. You know those people who read the entire Lord Of The Rings every year? I'm like that, but with Alice.

I want to work mostly on the reality themes, rather than the unreality and the surreal themes. I'd like to see Alice as an adult working through her messed up, subterranean childhood as led by woodland creatures.

Back to basics

A Christmas in retail is a terrifying creature. But realising it is 37 days into the New Year and having not written a damn thing since October - that's far more frightening.

Back to square one; a notebook and pen in every bag, on every journey. No excuses.

As I mentioned above, I haven't been writing. Not even writing about not writing, nor writing about anything at all. Life got in the way.

However, an unexpected thing has happened. I have become inspired again. You can expect further rambling updates of the progress of various projects. My main project is sitting pretty at 10,000 words and there's maybe another 20,000 to go before I can think about diving back in and killing my darlings.

Publication fears. Proof-reading terror. Prose and grammar fails, I hope you'll stick with me through it.

No. 1 - Writing About Writing

This sounds more complicated than the reality - I write, so writing about writing should be relatively straightforward.

Here's the trick - it isn't difficult. Writing is, in fact, frustratingly simple; you are using your fingers to type or hand to hold your pen(cil) and let these body bits be a conduit for the other body bit - your brain - and connect the two.

Pretentious nonsense aside - although it can be wonderfully indulgent to talk rubbish, writing can be a comfort or an enemy. More of that later.
It can be a reassuring sign that your brain is still alive and hasn't slipped into TV or internet-induced hibernation.
More than anything else, writing is something I do. There are lots of things I don't do, but it is one thing I can and do.

Today I am writing about what I do, when I do.

1. I usually do in any number of coffee shops - not to perpetuate the stereotype, of course; I don't sit alone in a corner in a beret, weeping into a steaming cup and getting the biscuits damp from my misunderstood, artistic tears - they just have free WiFi. And coffee, which is good. I do sometimes wear a beret in winter. Shut up.
Luckily coffee shops are generally quiet if you hit them at the right time, but the drone of the grinders and swooshy steamer can be kind of reassuring.

2. I also write in my flat. I chose an armchair specially for writing; this is my only nod to being extremely pretentious. Plus, it was second-hand and it is also the comfiest damn chair. Red leather, metal studs, little castor wheels - he is called Edward and he is the best chair.
My laptop has to be on my lap. I've tried smaller devices but ideally something with a 15" screen is a must and it needs to be a decent weight - at least 2kg - so it can't and hopefully won't slither off my lap. Laptops on desks don't work for me; I'd rather live with the shoulder and neck pain and frighteningly overheated thighs.

3. Occasionally I write on the train, although the little back-of-seat fold down tables drive me crazy as they simply aren't big enough and the lack of free WiFi is just rude. There's also the added peril of hot drinks with the flippy plastic lids. I'd rather get it all over me, or my neighbour, than get it on my laptop. (NB. Past spillages include an entire bottle of water over a keyboard and half a bottle of nail varnish remover which made the black plastic surround of the keyboard bleach white, then it sort-of melted. Don't let me near liquids.)
I have to take a lot of train journeys, and invariably I just stare out of the window instead of doing anything mildly productive.

4. I write in silence or with white noise (see above for coffee shop noises - Coffee Shop Noises, coming to a stereo near you). I used to only be able to write with music on -  I don't know when this changed but it just distracts me now. Unless it's something one of my characters would listen to, I don't bother because it's just too much of a distraction. There will be more about distractions later.

5. I don't keep a diary. Only interesting people should keep diaries.