Be Brutally Polyamorous.
“I’m polyamorous, but my partner’s new to this. They say they’re okay with what I’ve told them about poly, but… I can tell they’re nervous. So I’m going to damp it down for a while just to be kind to them – I’ll go easy on the side-dating.”
Don’t do that.
Your kindness will rip ’em to shreds.
Because if you give someone an artificial trial period, one where you give them the faux-monogamous experience to make them comfortable, then all you’re doing is lulling them into a sense of “Oh, this is what it’s like.”
And when you start up the dating after a while, they’re going to be *even more* panicky. Because *not only* will they have the usual assortment of jealousies and insecurities that come when you transition into a multi-partner relationship, but also they’ll be thinking, “But… you didn’t date anyone for a year! Now you’re looking for someone else!
“What did I do wrong?”
And here’s one of the central truths about relationships: What usually scares people the most is deviations from the established norm. For example, I have a sweetie who’s a swinger: she goes to clubs and gets her itches scratched by all sorts of guys. She tells me about her scheduling problems organizing gangbangs. I think it’s adorable.
But that’s because I met her as a swinger. That’s who she was, and who she continues to be.
If my wife, who’s fairly conservative in who she hooks up with, suddenly started hitting the clubs every night, I would fucking panic.
I’d panic because my wife’s behavior would have changed, and I’d feel like maybe I didn’t know her as well as I’d thought I did, and wonder what I was doing wrong that she suddenly was into freaky anonymous sex. And whereas I know my sweetie loves me thoroughly because “gangbangs” were just part of our background noise when w met, my wife attending ’em regularly would be different.
Not saying I couldn’t get used to it. I could adjust.
But that switch in behavior is what scares people.
Giving them a “trial period” and then dropping the big change of “Oh yeah, I date other people now” is going to hurt someone unfamiliar to polyamory more. Often, a lot more. You are doing them zero kindnesses.
Because what’ll happen by then is that you’ll be so much more attached by the time you find out the other person said they’d be okay with poly, but really, turns out they can’t handle it. It’s not like this happened in the first weeks of dating, when you were soppy with NRE but also shallowly attached – no, it’s been months, you’re both emotionally entangled. To discover after a year that whoops, this whole poly thing is actually a dealbreaker for your other partner hurts way more.
If you’re going to be poly, own it.
Mind you, I’m not saying to go out and date someone you hate to rip off the band-aid! If they’re the currently only person in your life, cool, drift with that. But for God’s sake, if you were dating other people before, keep dating. Don’t give your trying-to-adjust partner the illusion that this is trial period is what they’re signing up for.
They deserve to know what sort of effects dating other people will have on them. Some of them will be every bit as cool with it as they promised. Others will need some adjustment, and hopefully you can fine-tune your caring to give them what they need without selling out your satisfaction. And still others will freak out so much that really, your choices boil down to “be monogamous with them” or “break up.”
All of these things are better to know early on.
So yeah. It seems selfish, but… be brutal. Show them what they’re in for. Polyamory’s not for everyone, and going out of your way to give people the impression that “polyamory” means “occasionally you flirt but really, nothing happens” can demolish ’em once the first dating happens. And if you drop that hammer after they’ve come to rely on your love and support, you’ll be one of those poly folks going, “How could they not know I was poly? I told them! Why are they shocked now?”
They’re shocked because you told them that what you were doing was what they could expect, and it wasn’t.
So keep dating. Give them as much love as you can. Hug them and let them know that your love for them is a unique thing that’s not touched by other people.
But keep dating.
Fare Thee Well, Mythbusters
So I’ve been reluctant to write about Mythbusters since the build team – a.k.a. Tori, Kari, and Grant – were fired. I just didn’t feel like giving Mythbusters any excess cash at that point, and “cash” involved giving PR to the show. So even though I remained a large fan, I kept it on the down-low.
Now it’s over, and I figure mise well have my say on the build team-free seasons:
They were kinda dull.
Now, Mythbusters is like pizza in that even bad pizza is still kinda good. And a show that routinely flattens cars with explosions filmed lovingly in hi-def is never going to be “boring.” But compared to its own canon?
The absence of Tori, Kari, and Grant really changed the energy of the show for me. For one thing, it made the show more monotonous – there were more “Jamie and Adam devote themselves to one huge task” episodes, and I always disliked those because if you found that myth boring, well, the entire hour was boring. Whereas in past episodes, they were more likely to switch over to another myth, even if that myth was like ten minutes total.
(And they kind of had to go with more mono-myths, because as Adam acknowledged, you had to do the same show with fewer hands. There were some builds I suspect took up all the screen time just because working with only Adam, Jamie, and nameless assistants meant it took a week instead of three days.)
But more importantly, Jamie’s not really a presence on camera. I mean, he is, but he’s a stolid guy who cracks the one-liners they give him, and not enough to carry the show. He knew that. This is why even though he basically fired Adam for being too sloppy in the workshop, when he got offered a show, he did his usual engineering math and said, “I’m not good on camera. Who do I know who is? Even though I personally don’t get along with him?”
So basically, sans build team, the “Adam and Jamie” show consists of like 80% Adam -and Adam is only endearing in measured doses. (Particularly in the early shows, before they edited out the friction at Adam and Jamie’s request, you can see why they get on each others’ nerves.)
I get Adam is super-thrilled by things, but the absence of the build team really demonstrated how much of what I thought of Mythbusters was, in fact, a balance. Yeah, Tori was frequently goofy and Kari was frequently cynical, but all five of them created a beauty in the way they interacted that really gave the show depth. All-Adam got grating, at times.
Bouncing back and forth between all of them really made the show magnificent. You didn’t like a myth? Here’s the other one. Adam getting on your nerves? Well, here’s Tori to get on your nerves in a different way!
And without it, well, there were still great moments – I wish the show had had the drone-cameras for explosions right away, and the super-fast cameras capturing shockwaves made for some awesome visuals. The cement-smothers-a-bomb surprise still makes me giggle.
But overall, the last season was comfort watching. Decent. Not great. And given that Mythbusters was slowly descending in the ratings anyway just as they were going with bigger and bigger builds, well, I can see why Discovery Channel did the math.
Still. It’s not dead. It’s like Harry Potter; everyone involved loves it so much, it’s not a question of if it resurfaces, but when. I’m sure in ten years there’ll be a big hubbub about the new Mythbusters and maybe Adam will have died (god knows Jamie can’t, that grizzled cyborg) and maybe we’ll get Kari back or maybe hell, Scotty will decide she wants the spotlight. All of those are good options.
But I teared up at the finale, which was about as good as a finale like that could get. Even with all the complaints I’ve given, I still did not want this to end.
Mythbusters has been a big part of my life with Gini. We became fans together, we loved it together, and now it’s gone. And I’m really glad they brought Kari, Tori, and Grant back for the reunion episode, because really, I think we all know how much they were missed – even the accountants who had to make the call seemed a little sad about it.
The show is too good to go away forever. It’ll be back. But I loved ya, guys.
Always will.
Hey. Thanks For Breaking Up With Me.
It’s been a few months – or is it years? I can’t remember now. All I can remember is that you left, and I just wanted to say:
Thanks for that.
You broke it off cleanly: no texts left hanging in space, no lengthening space between dates. No, you called up one day and said “It’s over,” and so it was.
That was good.
It didn’t make me happy at the time, mind you – if it was something I’d been seeking, I would have broken up with you. But even though you broke my heart, you demonstrated something worth showing:
You protected your happiness.
I had become someone you didn’t trust any more to look after your best interests, and out I went.
Because I loved you, that’s something I can – and should – respect. You weren’t the sort of woman to tolerate me in your life for years at a time, bemoaning all the problems I caused in the faint hope that somehow I’d improve. You gave me time to improve, I didn’t, and it was gone.
And to be honest, I wasn’t entirely happy either, was I? We were both sad and frustrated at that point, circling like punch-drunk boxers in the ninth round, hoping like hell that somehow we’d make it connect –
– when honestly, we never would.
You were strong enough to call it off with me when the goodness trickled low enough that this relationship wasn’t worth harvesting any more. That ending still stings at times, because you didn’t allow me to ride it all the way to the bitter end, wringing out every last droplet of happiness we could have had through long arguments and ugly silences. I’m still fond of you because there was fondness left when you clipped the vine.
Some days I clip the vine. I know how hard it is to look into someone’s eager eyes and tell them it’s over. And I know how much strength it takes to do the quick mercy of breaking up rather than running it into the ground.
Thanks for that.
I still think of you fondly, sometimes, now that the anger’s passed. Some days I wonder if we could be friends, and if that day happens when a reconnection sprouts organically, well, I’ll take it.
But for now, I have faith you’re happy. You were strong enough to guard your happiness when you felt someone else was pulling you off-course.
I support that act of protection. Even when it was me.
Steven's Dad Is Really Kind Of Rad, I Know It Might Be Bad But All I Am Is Steven's Dad
Steven Universe has a devoted fandom, and people choose their favorite character: the unflaggingly bright Steven, cool-yet-tough Garnet, the keenly broken Pearl, boisterous Amethyst.
And once again, I have fallen for my type:
Steven’s Dad.
He’s one of only two main characters in the Steven Universe who’s got no magical powers – and unlike Connie, the gem powers freak him out. He’s not cool – well, not any more. He’s scared a lot, uncertain, doing his best.
And just like Finn in Star Wars and Sokka in Avatar: the Last Airbender, I am rooting for Steven’s Dad so hard that I tear up sometimes.
Because none of these guys, mundane and outpowered as they are, will ever back down when it comes to protecting the people they love.
Look, I get if you wanna power-trip and pretend to be the Jedi Knight or the immortal Gem guardian or the waterbender. But me? I don’t have those powers. I’m barely mortal; my mental illnesses chip away at my sanity, and some days I break under the pressure. I’d like to believe that I was some crazy superhero, but in truth I’m so fallible, stumbling confused through life that the dream seems unreal to me.
But Steven’s Dad?
He’s got nothing. The man lives in a van outside of the car wash. He’s frequently foolish and needy. He has zero powers. Yet every time someone he loves needs him to be a hero, every time, the man steps up. Every time he’s asked to choose between cruelty and caring, the man chooses compassion.
He’s stronger than any of the gems give him credit for, except his wife, who gave herself up for her son. And he’s incomplete without her, yet he perseveres.
He doesn’t want much. But what he wants, he is relentless in fighting for.
And that’s me. I don’t have superpowers. I wasn’t a gifted writer when I started out. I just didn’t know how to stop. And some days I look at all the Gems surpassing me, these brilliant glowing talents, these beautiful creators who seem gifted with a sanity I never had.
I’m still in there, though.
I’m flailing. I’m uncertain. Sometimes I make a fool of myself.
But I will not stop.
And I see Steven’s Dad, and Sokka, and Finn, and they have no reason to be here. The universe was not made for them. They didn’t get the cool powers. They didn’t get to have people’s jaws drop when they revealed their secret magic.
But Steven’s Dad, and Sokka, and Finn, and me: we’ll make our own magic. We prove our worth by continuing to exist. We prove our worth by not becoming bitter. We prove our worth by rejecting envy, by standing tall with love, by supporting the people we can support with whatever strength we have.
I am Steven’s Dad. And I will sing my song for Steven.
So My First Book Was Published A Year Ago Today. Here's What's Happened.
A year ago today, I fulfilled my lifelong dream: I got a fucking novel published. Which few people get to do! I mean, I hang around with authors, which makes “Selling a book to a major publisher” seem as easy as brushing your teeth, but it took me twenty years to get good enough.
And considering today is Flex’s First Book Birthday – publication date March 3rd, 2015 – I’m going to talk about the things I didn’t expect would happen when I published a book.
I didn’t expect people would fall in love with my book.
Which is weird to say, but… I’m a blogger first, and always have been. When people have loved my writing, it’s always been in the context of “Here’s something adorable Ferrett did,” and the affection came at me.
With Flex and The Flux (and the impending conclusion to the series Fix), the affection went towards Paul, and Valentine, and Aliyah. New readers were only tangentially aware of me, the author – they just wanted to see Valentine spin some more violent ‘mancy and watch Paul be his nebbishy, hyper-responsible self.
It’s a very strange feeling to be responsible for characters people love. And “responsible” is the key term: as I am finishing up the third book in the series, there’s a certain stress of ensuring that I do what’s right by these characters, because people love ’em deeply now. I mean, they’re my characters and I’m not writing the series to make you all happy – for better or for worse, the ‘Mancer series has to thumb my button first. But I want to get it right so even if people aren’t happy with how Paul, Aliyah, and Valentine ultimately end up, they go, “Yeah, that’s fitting.”
I didn’t expect it would do this well.
A year out and Flex is still selling fairly steadily, especially since Amazon and B&N keep competing to mark it down. (I mean, as of today it’s still randomly on sale for $2.99 on Kindle.) It got listed on a fair number of best-of-2015 lists (including B&N’s Top 25) and was nominated for the Compton Crook Best Debut Novel.
Most books come out, splash, and fade – and Flex seems to still be churning along, in part thanks to people who won’t stop recommending the fucking thing. So thank you for that. I really expected nobody would care at this point, and yet this morning I tune in to see Black Gate Magazine recommending the series. Still? I think, and smile.
And for all this hubbub, it’s still small potatoes.
Once I get precise figures from my publisher, I’m going to do a post where I tell you exactly how many copies Flex has sold. I suspect many of you outside of publishing will be surprised to how small that number is. It’s not nothing, but it takes comparatively few sales to be a mid-level success.
And “a mid-level success” is what I am. Flex was never a blockbuster movie; it was a B-lister movie that did well on a low budget. I’m proud of that, but it’s not like publishers are pounding on my door for my next book. Once I finish Fix I’ll be out of contract, and I hope I can finish my next novel (the sequel to Sauerkraut Station) in time that I’ll sell something quickly, but I might be in for a dry spell.
That’s the way this industry works. I wish I wrote quicker. It’d help.
The book tour was amazing, but…
I called my spring book tour “my book vacation” because I was spending money to go see fans.
It was the best vacation I’ve ever had.
Having a hundred people show up at a signing was thrilling and weird and happy-making, and some of those people had even read the book and still wanted me to sign it. And it was a lot of money out-of-pocket to go see everyone on both coasts, but it also made the book highly visible at indie bookstores, so I don’t know whether it was worth it financially or not.
As a vacation, though? Reading to you, saying hello, going out for drinks? My only regret is that there just wasn’t enough time to talk to all of you one-on-one. I tried. I tried so hard. But if you have an online following, and if you can do a book tour, then I think you should, because it was so amazing.
(Plus, I will forever thank Delilah Dawson and Wes Chu for telling me that it was okay to go completely nuts on your first book, thus allowing me to get a special cake and themed fingernails and a big party because shit, you don’t know if this book is going to sell or not, why not round up all your buddies and celebrate before the news comes in?)
…The runup before your first novel is fucking stressful, yo.
When you’re writing or selling your novel, you can always fix things. But there was a period of about six weeks when I’d signed off on the final edits and all I could do was wait to see if people liked it.
That damn near killed me. And it seems to be the hidden little secret in books – that dead period between “book goes in” and “reviews come out” is devastating, because it’s like being tied to the tracks while the train bears down upon you. Maybe it’s a good train; it was for me. Maybe it’s a bad train. Maybe it’s a train that doesn’t even arrive, you sell no copies, the train forgot about you, and you have to untie yourself and wander away heartbroken.
Those six weeks, I popped Ativan like they were Tic-Tacs. I survived. And I also thank Dan Wells for telling me explicitly that things get better – after enough books, the panic dims where you don’t even check your Amazon Sales Ranks any more – but those were panicky days of “MY BOOK DROPPED TEN THOUSAND RANKS WHAT DOES THAT MEEEAN”
The promotion is never enough.
Some days I feel like all I’m doing is going BUY MAH BOOK BUY MAH BOOK.
Then I get emails asking, “I loved Flex! Did you ever write a sequel?” And the answer was YES I BLED BLOOD TO WRITE IT IT WAS OUT LAST OCTOBER WHY DID YOU NOT GET IT. The answer is YES I AM BLEEDING BLOOD TO FINISH OFF BOOK THREE IN THE SERIES IT’S DUE IN SEPTEMBER HOW COULD YOU NOT KNOW I NEVER STOP WRITING ABOUT THE THIRD BOOK.
And yet they don’t.
Social media feels weird in that you assume you’re always in the spotlight. But people only read your blog once every couple of weeks. That status update scrolls off Twitter. Facebook’s algorithm goes, “Nah, people don’t need to know about your book.”
So you write and you write and you write and people don’t hear.
And I mean, obviously, all I write isn’t book promotion – that’d be boring – but even with the copious amounts, I still get good fucking friends who are like, “Oh, when did you sell the third book in the series?”
I wound up in a talk with Mishell Baker, who has her fantastic book Borderline out this week – and she was like, “Well, I have 950 friends on Twitter, if I post once, they’ll all know, and they all know all about me.”
As someone who posted for months about my impending book tour, at least ten different announcements blaring out every destination stop, I can tell you that literally the day I left every town I had a good friend of mine email me saying, “Oh, I didn’t know you were coming!”
If you wonder why some authors go off the deep end and make their blog entirely about self-promotion, well, now you know why. I feel like I mention MAH BOOK too often. The sad truth is, I’m probably not doing it enough.
There’s a certain peace I feel.
Periodically, I hold “Ask Me Anythings” on my blog. And for years, people asked, “What’s the #1 thing you’d do if you had a wish?”
I always answered, “Publish a book.” To the point where other people started answering that question in the comments for me, because they knew the answer would be “Publish a book.”
Seriously. I tried for twenty-plus years to get a book sold to a major publisher. Seven books I wrote, and all of them failed. Gini will tell you how I cried sometimes, how I broke down, how many times I curled up in a ball and realized I’d never pull this off.
Finally, I gave up all hope and wrote this self-indulgent book about donuts and videogames, and it sold. And you know what?
I’m happy now.
About three years ago, I had a major heart attack requiring a triple-bypass. And when that happens, every twinge you get in your chest makes you wonder whether today’s your last day. And a weird thing’s happened:
Before Flex got published I thought oh no not yet
After Flex, now I think, it’s okay. It’s okay.
And I don’t want to die. But I’ve done what I set out to do. If by some sucktacular means it’s over now, well, I found the love of my life and I got my book published and it’s good now.
I’m not saying it’s that way for everyone. And I’m not saying I’m still not seething with ambition. But I got my bare minimum. This is what I said I was gonna do, and I did it, and everything else after this is pure bonus round, and I am content with that.
Thanks for buyin’ Flex, and The Flux, and the still-being-written Fix, for everyone who did it.
I’ll tell you more what it’s like about this next year.