erda | (no subject)

I wasn't going to write about this because it's so ~~dumb~~ majorly stupid, but writing is the only way I seem to be able to let go of things and I've gotten away from the habit of my paper and pencil journal so

Margaret Atwood said "Being white is getting more and more exhausting. There are so many bad waves attached to it."

I decided to emerge from seclusion and go out to breakfast with my cousin a couple of days ago. Pretty much I'd rather not do this, but it doesn't seem psychologically healthy to be as reclusive as I am. Or something like that.

So we eat breakfast together and tell each other lies that make our lives seem completely uninteresting (or maybe her life just is uninteresting, I don't know.

She had to stop at her son's house to pick up something after we ate and as we got out of the car I roused myself from my near comatose state to try to act normal and said, "Nice neighborhood."

She rolls her eyes and says, "Except a black family just moved in down the street. "

One of the most wonderful things about transracial adoption for me has been the truly astounding reduction in the number of blatantly racist comments I have to hear like this. Everyone in my neighborhood, everyone in my family, at the school, at 4H, everywhere I go, knows that I have African American children and I'm hardly ever subjected to this kind of thing anymore. On recounting this to my husband he was surprised to discover that my cousin harbors such racist sentiments. I am not at all surprised by that, I'm just mad that she shared it with me, that she wouldn't let me alone in my little safe deluded life.

Years ago I would have launched into a self righteous lecture about the evils of racism and just a short time ago I would have tried to gently nudge her towards a better awareness, but I found myself overcome by a feeling of futility. There was a long, awkward silence during which she no doubt remembered that I'm no longer completely white, and then she changed the subject. And I allowed her to do that because I'm going to be unhappy about this really no matter what I do or say.

I've become the kind of racist that packs off a couple of bucks to the Southern Poverty Law Center and then checks what's on TV and what we're having for supper. I'm worn down and exhausted from struggling with people and I just don't want to be bothered.

I'm going back into seclusion for a while now, but I don't feel good about myself.

Why do people talk to me anyway? I don't actually speak English and I'm pretty sure I'm not from around here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I hope you don't mind that I friended you. I just finished reading your story "Responsible" which I thought was unusual, layered, well-written and well-characterized. And I think I read something else good by you before. Anyway, I was interested enough to go to your profile and liked what I read there so I went to your journal and saw you'd written quite a bit (I usually friend fanfic writers whose work I like). Then I saw this post so I thought I'd read it and see - and I like what I see. So, I friended you. Hope that's okay.

If you check out my LJ profile and my LJ journal (I've only been here since November 2007 so there's not a lot substantial to read through, many happy birthday wishes, etc., which you can skim) you'll find out lots about me and my current situation. It's hardly very interesting but you might find it so.

Have a good day and a good night!
Love, max

Thanks for the comment on Responsible. It's almost impossible to judge your own writing, too close to it, and I've worried that the story is incomprehensible to anyone but myself.

I do find you interesting. I seem to have a lot of 20 something friends, and that's fine, but sometimes I feel like it's a little creepy of me so I'm glad to friend someone closer to my age. My main friend criteria right now is shared obsession with SGA, also trying to avoid to many people who don't cut tag their journals because I like to read everyone I've friended and w/o the cut stuff gets pushed off my friends page.

You've only been here since Nov? You must have been on the internet longer than that, though, I guess.

I used to do a lot of mailing lists, but I've only been involved in fandom since I got on lj June 2007 and just getting started writing.

I was happy to see you "friended" me back - especially since you don't seem to have an extensive LJ friends section. Thank you for your interest.

I definitely share your obsession with SGA - I find the characters, particularly Sheppard and McKay, fascinating to read about. I don't know whether I'll write much fanfic but I devour the good stuff written and despair over the poorly conceived stories. Of course, everybody can't write well; everybody hasn't got depth, breadth and layers! But I appreciate the occasional superior story when I come across it!

Yes, I've been in various fandoms over the years, starting out with "Beauty and the Beast" (the series with Vincent and Catherine and Diana), for which I wrote zines and wrote for other people's zines. Then I wrote many stories in the "Highlander" (the series) fandom. Finally, I wrote "dueSouth" stories (Fraser/RayK).

From my old zine days I gradually built up a list of folks I'd send my stories to, and it spread a bit as other people heard of me and commented and I added them. Also, my website (prepared for me by a friend) got some interest over the years. But there's nothing like LJ for spreading your work far and wide! I "friended" folks whose stories I liked to read and one thing led to another and now you can see I have a large "friend" and "mutual friend" section on my LJ profile but I've only had real (i.e., emails back and forth) contact with a very few of those people.

I enjoy reading the journals of people of all ages and backgrounds but I understand your feeling that it's nice to communicate with somebody closer to your age. I'm amazed by the quality of the writing coming from people who haven't hit thirty yet! But their life-problems tend to be very similar to one another (school, money, diets, parent-problems, boy or girlfriends, identity crises). Not that we don't all have some of these problems but the emphasis and perspective is very different at retirement age....

I've been reading stories in The Sentinel and X-Files (mostly like Skinner/Krycek) over the years, along with SG1 (Jack/Daniel) and of course, recent years, Stargate Atlantis. Lately, LiveJournal has pretty much eaten my life but fortunately, I'm retired, so I have time to read as much as I like, whatever I like!

That's enough of that. Looking forward to reading more of your journal and stories today. It's cold outside!
Love, max