Spontaneous Musings

Aggravating day.

It occurs to me that if we treated each other as beloved family members we'd deeply morn and would do just about anything to help, love unconditionally and without judgement, instead of a bunch of strangers and well the exact opposite of beloved family members - the world would be a a much better not to mention easier place to live in. But the difficulty is we don't get to choose our family or who resides in this world with us. Unfortunately. OR Fortunately, depending on your point of view.

I'm trying to figure out how to help a poor man on the top floor get all his books which were delivered today. His job is to write reviews and commentary on them - according to the super's wife - or from what I could interpret, she has a VERY thick polish accent. I'm used to it actually. That's kind of New York City? Everyone is difficult to understand, you just go with the flow.

Apparently, he paid extra to have the books delivered to his door step. And asked the super's wife if she could help put them inside. But alas, the front door lock is broken, and the delivery people left them outside the front door of the building and the super brought them to the mail room. I don't understand why they couldn't have gotten someone to help take them to the 6th floor, but I decided it was best not to ask since I was headed on my way out.

What's up with the front door? Well the buzzer doesn't work quite right. So people kept trying to open it before it buzzed them in, and broke the lock. Now - you can't get in or out of the building, without being buzzed in. You can't open it with a key, and you can't push it open. This morning a family had all their luggage lined up to go on vacation but they couldn't get the door open. So the super sent her kid to the basement out the ramp, and exit and around the building to buzz the door, so she could open it and let them out. Then she just kept the door open all day, and watched the delivery people come in and out.

Super's wife: the man is coming on Monday to fix it.
Me: Monday? Can you find a way to ensure it stays open? Because we can't all just stay locked in the building or locked out of the building all weekend long.
Super's wife (ignoring the question - they have a brick door stay keeping it open, there's no other way obviously): The lock smith is Jewish and practices Sabbat so he can't come until Monday.
Me: He's Jewish - so he can come on Sunday. They don't practice on Sunday's.
This didn't occur to her and she smiled, in agreement.

I feel sorry for the man. But I can't physically take those books up. There's about two large four foot stacks of boxes. I'd kill my back. And I'm thinking the super is in the same situation.


Spent the morning wrestling with the internet. It won. I honestly don't know why I bothered. I've had it with Ao3. I may put them in my spam email slot to never be heard from again.

All I wanted to do was share my writing with folks. I wasn't hurting anyone.

I don't understand why fandom continues to discriminate against non-fiction fan works. Wales and I were discussing this last night.

Wales: it may be because a critical work destroys the fan's squee. They want to love it and not have anyone criticize what they love or analyze it.
Me: But I like to analyze and critique stuff I love. Pulling it apart and dissecting it and figuring out why I love it, and what works and what doesn't work is part of the fun.
Wales: But some people don't want that.
Me: They don't have to read it.
Wales: I agree - it is censorship.
Me: Ironic too, since nonfiction critical fanworks actually are completely allowable under copyright law and can be published as commercial works, while fanfiction kind of skates the line and isn't allowable.
Wales: Maybe that's why? They are jealous? Their stuff isn't really legal and yours is?

I don't know. I don't understand Ao3. I remember when it first went up and everyone was excited. I wasn't. It was basically just fanfic.net under a different name - it allowed fanfiction only. I was excluded for the most part as were most works. Then sometime in 2020, around March, they said - oh we want meta too - or non-fiction fanworks. So I wasn't sure what that included - meta is kind of broadly defined, and no one knows exactly what it means. Now that FB has acquired it as a firm name - it's gotten worse.
I'm amazed it was permitted - since it's not an original name. But was told reviews, character analysis, fandom essays, critiques of fanworks, analysis of fanworks and of media.

So I posted 465 works. One of those works was a snarky review of Twilight films. Right after that - I got the complaints on my movie reviews. So, I took down the Twilight posts (although they weren't targeted). What was? Four - Five movie reviews. (eye roll).

I also was rejected by Slayage. The scholarly fanzine and fandom sect. [This is run by the Association of Whedon Scholars, although they did change their name - because, ahem, Whedon apparently is an asshole. Oops.] I worked hard, followed their rules, and they rejected my essays as not up to their standards. Wales and I discussed academia and other professions. Weirdly Crazy Org is no worse than those, if anything it's nicer. Academia is insanely competitive and petty. So too is the publishing world. And the rejection is high.

Being a non-fiction fan writer is not easy. You get rejected and ripped apart a lot. I'd say you get used to it - but you never do. And people don't often publish or save things on merit, or talent, or how good it is from any objective standpoint - but based solely on how it validates them and makes them feel good about themselves, and in some cases perpetuates the lies they've been telling themselves each and every day.

Mother told me last night that she thinks everyone has a negative side their personality. I responded, yes, they do, I call it the demon.

**

I'll be happy when the funeral is over. I'm tired of talking to my mother about it. She keeps telling me how my brother will speak at it - and she doesn't really want me to. I feel like my mother has sidelined me in regards to my Dad's funeral preparations, or anything else. Although the truth of the matter is - I don't want to speak at the funeral. At all. I don't even really feel the need to write anything at the moment. At first I did, now I don't. She just wants me to sit back and listen to her like some objective observer. I'm finding it aggravating. And I'm trying not to be angry at her and resentful.

My Uncle P is doing the homily (it's a homily not a sermon), she's having him do it - since he's presiding over the ceremony and it's his older brother, and she feels he'd be put out if she had someone else. He told her that he'd talk about how my father was now at peace in the hereafter, and not the past, but the future. Not who my father was, but where he was now.

Sigh.

A sizable portion of my family is atheist. The agnostics and atheists kind of outnumber the religious faithful. I'm in between the two. So I'm okay with it. But I don't quite believe in the same hereafter that my Uncle does. I'm Unitarian Universalist - we believe everyone rejoins the source.
This whole heaven and hell bit is for the birds.

Mother feels the stories about my Dad should be saved for the reception. And my brother will speak about who my Dad was.

It's not that I want to speak or say anything, I don't. But I also don't like being sidelined. And normally I'd confront my mother on it - but I honestly don't know what I should be doing anyhow. I wish my Dad was here - so I could discuss it with him. God, I was perfectly fine until right this minute - now...sigh. Life hurts more than death I think. Neil Gaiman's Sandman is interesting on that point - depicting Death as actually the most kind hearted of the Endless Ones, providing peace and rest. It's living that is hard, and hurts each day. And yet, for just a glance of sky, a cool shower, a cool glass of water or the swallow of breath into lungs, it's worth it.

***

Mother's security data breach courtesy of my brother's stupidity (He gave her the number) - has affected me. I used their computer. So all my sites and passwords were compromised. My phone alerted me to the "data" leak and I had to spend most of this morning changing passwords across the internet.

I hate hackers and spammers. Doesn't do me any good though. Be nice if I could kill someone instantly with my hate - but alas no. They dance about for another day. Explains last night's nightmare - where I felt I had to change or move or remove all these boxes of clothes, and clean out all these rooms in my family's home for some move or other and do it right now. I felt overwhelmed. My brother and Wales were in it. It was very stressful. I woke up relieved and annoyed.

Oh well, took two longish walks - to grocery and food stores. Got the grocery shopping out of the way for the time being at least. Took a cool shower. Watched mother's and mine soap opera. I watch it mainly for her.

***

Off to make dinner. Wales may come down tomorrow for brunch and to hang.
We also are considering making plans to visit Governor's Island sometime in the near future. We just have to make reservations on the ferry in advance, and plan for it. She looked it up and realized, it's really cool, and wants to try it out.

We're both bored and aggravated with our lives at the moment. Too much loss. Friends. Family. We both feel as if we've somehow passed a turn in the road that would have lead to well something better than this. But this is what we've got - and we have to find a way to make it work.

[This goes without saying, but will state it anyhow...thanks for reading or listening, please no advice, I'm aggravated enough as it is, commiseration is always welcome.]