What an odd sentiment. It’s vague, unhelpful with a dash of shame, and a stark reminder that no one wants to hear your problems. Which is, of course, exactly why I’m going to tell you mine.
I suffer from “F” disease. Female. Fat. Fifty. The “F” disease is fatal. Eventually. My physical problems are made more challenging by extra pounds while each of them in their own unique way makes it difficult to lose the extra pounds. When mobility is an issue, even simple exercise can be a challenge. I’ve spent most of 2018 with a cast on my right leg.
I’ve been advised to take naproxen or ibuprofen and drink plenty of water. Prescription pain meds might as well be Bit Coin. I’d like to know where the hell the doctors are who abuse pain med privileges, because my doctors are always sure I can just “tough” it out with aspirin and ice packs. You know, because what I really have is “F” disease.
I was delighted when my cast was finally removed and I was upgraded to “walking” cast. And it was with that ugly, bulky appliance that I made my way to the hospital for an MRI image of the offending leg. I purposely chose a hospital satellite location that had plenty of good parking and 24-hour service for this procedure.
I arrived on time, sans any metal objects, and ready to get to the root of the problem. As I was called back for the MRI, I was informed of two unsettling facts. The building was under construction (rendering the behind-scenes area a dusty maze of plastic draped corridors), and that the MRI machine had experienced what my escort characterized as a “hiccup” that morning. I was led to a small (teeny-tiny) room with two changing closets and a row of lockers, told to remove ALL my clothing and my walking cast, put on a hospital gown, have seat and wait to be called. All of which I did because I’m nothing if not obedient.
Waiting in that very small room, feeling as vulnerable as one can feel while wearing an ill-fitting hospital gown, I was surprised when another patient was led into the room. A male patient, already in hospital gown, took the seat directly across from me while his escort scampered off without a word. Did I mention it was a small room? We were sitting knee to knee. He did the thing. The man s-p-r-e-a-d thing with knees about as far apart as he could get them to make room for what must have been a gigantic ball sack.
I had zero desire to see his dusty old scrotum so I averted my eyes as far as I could without physically snatching them out of my head. I was so relieved when my name was called I jumped up, completely forgetting that I couldn’t bear weight on my leg, and I lurched from the room. I limped down the hallway, through and around the construction zone, never once being offered any assistance. At the end of the trail I discovered that the MRI that would be used was actually located in the back of a semi-tractor trailer out in the parking lot. I wish I was kidding.
Aha, the “hiccup” explained. We had to use the mobile unit. Did I forget to mention it was freezing cold that day? Grabbing the walls for support I made my way over the gap between building and truck, over the metal gangway and into the cargo area for my MRI. I was shivering with cold, everything smelled of diesel and exhaust fumes, and I just wanted to get it over with.
Thirty-eight torturous minutes later, I shimmied off the table, limped back over the gangway into the building and was confronted by an angry old man. I know he was angry because he was yelling that his appointment was “TEN MINUTES AGO” and how dare they keep him waiting. He was wearing a hospital gown but there was no escort with him, he was just there. And angry. And yelling.
Thank goodness I was sufficiently although somewhat immodestly covered. This man (not the same dusty scrotum guy) DEMANDED attention and he got it. Not only did my escort abandon me, his escort came running down the hall. Still without my walking cast, still not offered any mobility assistance at all, I was directed to return to clothes closet, get dressed, and show myself out.
That’s what it’s like to have the “F” disease.
Talent is Tin, Opportunity is Gold
When people hear that I’m a writer, they all ask the same question. A variation of why/how do you write? I will answer, “I write because I have to,” and “One word at a time.” Those answers are the simplest form of the truth and yet still meaningless to someone who’s never felt the urge to fill a blank page with words.
My writing comes from a desire to create, live in, and enjoy a world outside the realm of the limited opportunities of my existence. Writing is my way of working around the old conundrum that while talent is tin, opportunity is gold. Writing creates opportunity. Opportunity to discover, learn, research and investigate things that were otherwise beyond my reach both physically and economically.
Reading is essential to writing. Reading is mining tin and storing up the raw material to later make art. I started as a reader. And I read everything; cookbooks, dictionaries, instruction manuals. I consumed words as if I had a literary tape worm. Somewhere between my Anne Rice phase and my all things Stephen King phase, I started reading biographies. I borrowed them from the library or bought them for a quarter at rummage sales and read them to learn about other lives, other ways of being.
Biographies led me to history and history led me down the path to historical romance. I can hear people sputtering now, but… but… Romance? Historical romance, to me, represents the triumph of heroines over biased social constructs, economic restrictions, and stifling patriarchy. Writing of these victories, one story at a time, is a balm to my own struggles with independence and authority.
Like so many others, I had to find the magic alchemy that would turn what little tin I had into gold. I was born into the sort of large, poor, small town family that rarely gets noticed for anything other than their run-down house or shabby clothes. Like my siblings, I started working while still in high school. I typed up forms at one job before walking down the road to flip burgers at the other job. I cleaned bathrooms, filed thousands of pieces of paper, and answered phones. Still, I had not saved enough to attend even the local community college.
So out I went into the world to greedily collect experiences while reading about lives much more glamorous than mine. The more I worked the less I had time to write but the love of reading never left me. Going to college got pushed further and further out of reach as marriage and then children took up my time. Until one day, a small notice in one of those shopper’s circulars that usually gets thrown in the trash after the good coupons are clipped out, a notice about the meeting of a local writer’s group caught my attention.
I didn’t know anyone there, I had never before been to the place where they met. I remember sitting in the parking lot staring at the building, watching the other women walk in the doors and wondering if they’d think me odd and untalented. I went in anyway. At the end of the meeting they sat around the table, each reading a page or two of their current work. When my turn came I took the folded sheets from my purse, the scraps from where I pulled them out of the spiral notebook littered the table like confetti as I read. They hated it and told me so.
And yet I went back the next month. Because, while they hadn’t liked it, they had taken it seriously enough to discuss it. That crumb of encouragement was all I needed. Writing was no longer just the secret project hiding in a box under the bed, it was real. Turned out that little group of like-minded women were a chapter of the Romance Writers of America. Joining that group made all the difference in how much opportunity gold I was exposed to.
My reading tastes have changed over the years but historical romance will always hold a place in my heart. Stories of women with little autonomy, straining against rules put in place to keep them firmly within their social class and butting their heads against barriers constructed to keep them low and small, will always call to me. The characters in these books have to be quick and clever to overcome and survive. I read those stories for the triumph and satisfaction of the happy ending.
And that’s exactly why I write them.
I still belong to RWA and still see many of the women from that first table reading. The writing community is like the ocean in that you never want to turn your back on it for too long. RWA, however, will always welcome you home and toast your successes with you.