Reay Jespersen

A philosophy isn’t an easy thing to change. We grow up being taught certain things (intentional or otherwise), believing certain things, and have opinions formed by interactions with the people in the world around us and our experiences - things that are right and wrong, things that should or shouldn’t be, and why.

It has long been my philosophy that while I’m a creative idea man - I have notebooks full of them, for everything from stories and characters to settings and isolated independent scenes, inspired at times by anything and everything I experience and hear - the fact that I see precious few of those ideas through to completion, always writing something only to be distracted, crow-like, by the sparkle of a new idea, means that I should protect what relatively little I do finish.

Protect it from what? In short, theft. Which sounds exceptionally egotistic put so bluntly, but truly isn’t so. My concern has never been that of course people will steal my material because it’s clearly so damn good, but rather that I’ve been writing stories of various kinds literally since I could put two sentences together, and so with a lifetime of writing to my credit and with a passion to make even a modest living writing my own material, that it would kill me if someone somewhere took any of my material and presented it as their own and had success with it when I hadn’t.

Then several years ago I came across the website of a friend of a friend (whose name I unfortunately no longer recall, with some embarrassment), who regularly posted new short story material on her site. It blew me away, in part that someone could crank out fresh material that quickly, but more because she was just laying it out there for anyone and everyone to see and for anyone and everyone to take. I contacted her in that regard: here’s my baggage, and aren’t you similarly concerned about people taking your ideas and using it for themselves? Her response was that she has more than enough ideas to go around, and that what she posted was the tip of the iceberg of her completed material arsenal. Intriguing!

Years later, part of my wanting a website of my own was to accomplish the same feat: to not only write stuff, but post it. This was around the same time I started pitching some of the feature-length scripts I’d been working on, so it was part and parcel with not just finishing material, but trying to start getting some attention for it and for myself. And you can’t do that by sitting on a (slowly growing) pile of finished material and not telling anyone who had the ability to do something with it; to make something of it and, over time and with some luck, of you.

That first point of the website failed when I found myself still unable (ok, unwilling) to post my material online. Same old reason. Despite the big steps toward going public with my stuff, I couldn’t quite step over the threshold and actually do it.

A few years later, cutting now to a scant month or two ago, I read an interesting, brief article which cited someone - I believe Cory Doctorow - who stated that writers shouldn’t fear pirates of their work, but should instead fear anonymity. An interesting outlook which truly struck a chord with me.

Then this last week, I followed a link from Bubble Cow on Twitter which hit even closer to home. Seth Godin’s point in his excellent article on how to protect your ideas in a digital age is to not protect them at all, but in fact get them out there as much as possible. You aren’t going to be successful keeping ideas all to yourself, but may find success in making a name for yourself as someone with a lot of ideas.

In that light, and inspired in part by Twitter followee Alan Baxter constantly posting and hyping new material, and by new followee Simon Later’s infectious love of writing and posting about it, my philosophy is at least in the process of changing, with a huge part of that being my taking that step over that threshold I spoke of.

My next post will be the first time I’ve let the public see a story I’ve entered in contests but have shown to precious few; my first #flashfriday entry; the first time I’ve posted something I was hoping to save for future print publication. And hopefully, far from my last.

I was listening to a podcast last week - called I Should Be Writing, which is excellent and should be checked out by anyone aspiring to write fiction - when I heard a commercial for The Amazing Meeting 7. It’s a conference on “critical thinking”, and says that among other things, it will “sharpen your skeptical skills”.

This is the second or third time in perhaps a year that this notion has been presented to me. A former was a podcast that had been recommended by some friends, which I found the urge to stop listening to in short order because it began with a group of guys sitting around and talking about how they’re all skeptics. Even more, they were lauding a member of their group (who wasn’t with them) who was, they all agreed, a great skeptic.

And I don’t get it. I don’t get the appeal of being actively skeptical. Certainly not of being a notably “great” skeptic. And really, how is being skeptical about everything you hear any better than believing everything you hear? How is one extreme better than the other?

Personally, I don’t know that any extremism of any sort is a mentally (nor physically) healthy thing.

Maybe it’s just me. I’ve certainly got a more temperate personality than many do, so extremism of any flavour isn’t big on my list of qualities, nor things I find appealing. And there’s doubtless an argument to be made for my spending a lot of time playing with story and character ideas in my head, so perhaps it’s just not in me to default to questioning if/how that this or that could actually happen so much as revel in the possibilities; enjoy the wide-eyed wonder of “what if”s.

Do we know everything? Of course not. We’re constantly building up our base of knowledge about ourselves and everything around us. So it smacks of hubris when “great skeptics” write off certain concepts as being impossible. Unproven is one thing. That it simply can’t ever be, or ever have been, the case is a whole other matter.

Do we know a lot about a lot? Absolutely. I just think that a healthy mind is one that’s open to possibilities and constant learning, even about things we think we know.

And for anyone who’d eschew the notion - dammit, we know what we know and what is and what isn’t - I’d remind you that at one time the best and brightest minds knew for a fact that Earth was the centre of the universe. Looking back, how foolish we were then…

So the race to be Toronto’s next mayor has begun. It was after David Miller folded and gave in to the Toronto Outside Workers Union’s recent strike demands - they who were on strike, who kept public pools closed, kept the island ferry shut down, and kept garbage from being picked up for several long, stinky weeks - that I’d concluded that his days as mayor were numbered. Not only would I be hard-pressed to name even one thing he’s done to benefit the city, but his standing firm against the union’s demands, having the bulk of the city’s population behind him, only to finally buckle and give the union most everything they wanted anyway, would seem to be his career’s death knell.

However, even more surprising than his giving into union demands after putting the city through weeks of smelly discomfort (and in the process losing untold millions from tourists who had caught wind of the city’s garbage woes and went elsewhere with their summer vacation dollars) was the announcement I heard last week: David Miller is throwing his hat into the ring and looking for re-election.

I’ve no idea who the other contenders are, but failing their being extremists or people with personal agendas the public finds particularly unpalatable, all I can say to you in your seeking another term, Mr. Miller, is good damn luck.

Holy CRAP! There are birds there now! It’s like they’re little winged heralds of irony, showing up mere minutes after I made that birdfeeder post.

Some little white and black-hooded birds came out of nowhere and started using the bird feeder, not only partaking in the (smaller) sunflower seeds from the side, but eating the seeds from the suet squares.

I don’t want to be an alarmist, but birds becoming eaters of meat byproducts may… MAY signify the end of days. Get the word out!

And if you have “beef, sheep, etc.” livestock, for the love of god, protect their loins and kidneys!

… I think toasted, buttered cinnamon raisin bagels and chocolate milk is the breakfast of champions.

That’s what I’m having, after all, and I’m a champion (in my head).

This is the first time I’ve sat in the home office and watched the bird feeder we put out on the back deck. It was a present from a friend of ours. It’s a pretty highbrow affair made of cedar, with a plastic-encased centre chamber for seeds, and two narrow fry basket-type deals on either end for suet and seed squares.

So there are these two little birds - they look like sparrows, but one is pretty red on the head and breast, so I’ve got no clue what they are - that have been hanging out on our deck lately. Thus far, it looks like they’ve only been sharpening their beaks on the berry bush beside the deck (so help me, that’s what it looks like) and eating the crusty snow on the deck railing. I wasn’t sure what they’re eating, but obviously they’re surviving on something. So I thought the bird feeder would be a big hit. In my typical cinematic way of envisioning things, I saw myself putting the bird feeder out and going back inside and turning around to see it alive with birds of all kinds looking to cash in on a free meal. Such wasn’t the case, of course.

So I’m sitting here and looking back there and it doesn’t look like there have been any takers yet, at least none taking any significant amount. And the two little birds just came by, sharpened their beaks on the bush branches, ate some snow, and then - finally - took notice of the bird feeder suspended over their heads. They went to check it out, and the first one up there, rather than noticing the tray of open seeds at its feet, looked like it clonked its head on the clear plastic siding, where all the seeds are stored. Apparently, birds aren’t caught up on the concept of clear plastic.

I was thinking, though, that the sunflower seeds we stocked in the centre silo may be too big for these birds anyway. It would be like a human getting a hamburger three feet wide. But the suet squares on the side cages of the feeder have various tiny little seeds in them. Much better for wee birds, I’d think.

But now I’m wondering about the medium. I could totally see interest in a pressed square of just seeds, but having suet as the glue holding them together? Isn’t suet some kind of animal fat? Yes. Ok. It is. I just looked it up. So offering birds the seeds they so desperately want in these lean winter days but only combined with “the hard fatty tissue about the loins and kidneys of beef, sheep, etc.” seems a bit of a cruel joke.

Birds, unless I’m totally off on my recollection, aren’t big on animal byproducts. Are flocks of sparrows ever seen swarming cows to get to that succulent kidney fat? Not that I’ve ever heard, which is pretty good news for cows (and really, with the lives they lead, any bit of good news will do…) So what makes people think that such a product would be a great substance to put seeds in for creatures that have no interest in it?

It strikes me as akin to marketing a treat product for cats that’s pieces of meat driven into a 2X4. Like, come on… it’s meat! Cats love meat! What does it matter what’s holding the meat together?

There’s also a distinct chance that I’m overthinking this. After all, the bird feeder industry’s been around an awful lot longer than I have, so presumably they’re onto something with the suet concept. All I know for sure is the empirical evidence that’s before me: wee birds who could use a good snack on these chilly days are going for the proverbial 3-foot hamburger instead of the smorgasbord of tiny seeds packed in (now frozen) animal fat.

More updates on this exciting topic to follow!

So I recently came across a publication called A Thousand Faces, which is geared to stories about real world (or perhaps more accurately, non-traditional-4-colour) superheroes. In the submissions, they mention that they want well-written stories which wouldn’t work if the superhero element were removed from them.

While smacking more than a bit of the TV show Heroes, it also struck me as a kind of cool idea to have anyone from anywhere write their own stories about their own characters, without adhering to an overall story arc.

I’ve come up with several story concepts to send in, of which I’ve nearly concluded one and have just started another.

Hopefully I’ll be able to pass along some good news on the publication front soon.

So Obama was sworn in as the 44th President of the United States yesterday.
Also, he’s black.

There. I said it.

I just wanted to get that out of the way for anyone who wasn’t sure about it, or who felt that it was something that shouldn’t be mentioned, because… um… yeah, it really, really should. How could it possibly not be?

One of my wife’s co-workers mentioned that we shouldn’t bring up the fact that Obama’s black, because that makes it a race thing. My take on it? The man’s the first black President of the most powerful country in the world. It’s not being made a race thing, but you can hardly look past it.

Now, should Obama have won because he’s black? Of course not. No more than anyone’s race should have any effect on what they should or shouldn’t be able to achieve. He was, from what debates I saw (and of course the intangibles of what I felt), the better choice between the two candidates. I wouldn’t have voted for him on the basis of his being black any more than I would not have voted for McCain because he’s white. I’ll always go with the person who strikes me as the one whose platforms most closely match my own views on things, regardless of their colour or gender.

What I hope, but I fear isn’t the case, is that others did the same when it came time to vote a few months back. I’d like to think that Obama was voted in based on his stances on the country’s/global situation; that he was the best man for the job all around, and not that he’s a black man and “wouldn’t it be awesome to see a black man in office?”

In short, the race thing is something that people are very wary to bring up, understandably. But the first black man in history to run the United States? That deserves mentioning. When the first female U.S. President is voted in - and I assure you, it is a “when” not an “if” - that’ll be a big deal, as well.

When we get to the fourth black man to be voted in - or the sixth woman - it starts becoming less an issue. At that point, we should hopefully be more assured that the vote was based on best person for the job, not “oh, it would be so cool to see a [blank] in office!”

In any case, I sincerely hope that he can live up to the crush of weight and hopes that have been pinned on him by people around the world - also arguably undeserved, as well as owing to his colour. The man doesn’t just have a full plate, but a heaping one. I’d hope that anyone stepping into that position would be able to handle their situation, whatever their colour may be.

Ok, so no Cuba pics posted. Yet, anyway. Jackie and I have been a little busy of late, what with… oh… buying a house, and all. So I’ve been a little distracted. That, plus a crunch time the last few weeks at work, and now adding onto that my wanting to put an entry or two in for the Animax script contest. Which happens to deadline a few days after our move date. Nothing like heaping up one’s plate nice and full!

So I will be posting Cuba pics soon, but perhaps house pics sooner.

Stay tuned!