Cravings

Spencer Dryden

Cravings

As an erotic writer, a natural topic for this post might be my sexual cravings. I've stated here and  other places that my interest in erotica is an expression of my seemingly life-long enslavement by female allure. However, outside of my fantasy life in fiction, I can't act on those cravings and hope to remain outside a prison with real bars, or worse, dead at the hands of a jealous lover.

I'm currently on a blog tour promoting my latest book. (look to your right) If you really want to know more about my sexual cravings, you can find my posts all over the blogosphere. I think I've done twelve in the last two weeks. My friend and crit partner Meg Amor (yes, that's her real name) and I have done a series of discussions on all manner of things. Our latest is on fantasy guys and girls. I have a thing for tall women that we explore on her blog. It's lots of fun. Go there if you like and tell us about YOUR FANTASY LOVER. (You'll have to scroll down to the Nov 4th post)

I could also write about my twin jones of coffee and doughnuts. I  am an insufferable coffee snob. My wife and I pack our own beans, grinder and coffee maker whenever we travel. I have driven miles out of my way to get a cup of  good coffee. I have circles on my trip map to Florida showing the Starbucks locations. (They don't all appear on the smart phone). Once you get south of Indianapolis good coffee joints get harder to find. In my handyman work at home I have a map in my head of the location of a coffee shop in relation to assigned jobs, which take me to all corners of the greater Minneapolis/St. Paul area.

Don't hate on me. It's cheaper and less obnoxious than being a wine snob—that would be my baby brother, who is about one class short of being a sommelier . Don't go out with him unless he's buying. He's a food and beverage manager at a five star restaurant. He really knows his stuff because he has to. He chides me for my love of cheap oaky Chardonnay's. I've made him into a coffee snob.

Doughnuts. I'm trying my best to part with them. At times it seems hopeless, especially considering how they enhance a cup of good coffee. But the scale is telling me it's time to try again. Parting is such sweet sorrow.

My fellow writers here have been so forthcoming about the trials and demons in their lives that I thought I should try to explore my most destructive craving—fame and fortune.

Now it's not a bad thing to be rich or famous. It's the motivation that causes one's undoing.  I don't know what men grow up wanting today. When I was growing up, a man was measured by two things—how much money he made and what kind of position he held. Then comes the twist—those two things had a big impact on the kind of women he could meet. (Back to my life long allure thing.) Vonnegut explains the two primary male motivations succinctly in the opening of "Breakfast of Champions"-gold and wide open beaver.

It started around age ten for me. Come with me for a moment to my neighborhood barbershop-a place where men gathered to talk, and, if a ten year old boy was lucky, someone left the Playboy Magazine open to the centerfold when he was called to the barber's chair. I remember so clearly the first time I got the money/male/power connection. A guy had just left, pulling out in a well appointed new sedan. The barber who attended him said in a low register. 'He (name withheld) told me he paid over four thousand dollars in personal income taxes last year.' This was 1960. Four thousand dollars is a lot of money now. It was nearly a fortune then, at least in a working class community like mine. Most of the men in the shop didn't make four thousand dollars a year. The look of awe and admiration on the faces of the other men imprinted on to some permanent scoreboard in my mind. I wanted to be that guy. It wasn't really the money. I was too young to have an appreciation for money beyond what I needed to feed my doughnut jones. It was the admiration and even envy I found as enticing as the pictures in the Playboy Magazine I kept peeking at. The Freudian twist. If other men admired me, maybe I could admire myself.

As I said, there is nothing inherently wrong with wealth, if it is a natural result of dedication and excellence. However, since that time, I have craved wealth as a tool achieving a positive self-image. It's perverted motives not perverted ends. Isn't that a recurring topic in Shakespeare?

Wealth and fame seem to travel together like coffee and doughnuts. I came to crave fame as much as wealth. Again, all I had to do was look at the way men responded to the athletes of the day to make me practice harder at what ever sport I was mastering. And the girls, oh the girls liked the athletes. The athletes got the prettiest girls.

I had a brief brush with fame in high school. If crack is as addictive, it's no wonder there is so little hope of recovery. I was an accomplished athlete from early on—pick a sport, I excelled at it. I finally settled on basketball—probably a bad choice as I hadn't picked the right parents. I was small, even for my age but I got good enough that the older guys would let me play in playground games. As a high school freshman, I was nearly drilled  to death in basketball fundamentals by one of the great coaches/mentors of my life. I had the tools, just not the size. My sophomore year I made varsity, a fete only a handful of sophomores had done in the school's history. No fame, no girls, it was hard, humbling and at times, humiliating. I was so burned  out by the end of the season I had planned on quitting sports.

In between my sophomore and junior year my parents moved the family from Milwaukee to the Madison area. We settled in a near-by farming community that was ten minutes and thirty years from Madison. It was a place where high school sports was the main entertainment in the community. I had decided I wasn't going to try out for any sports. I had grown a lot physically over the last year but emotionally I was shot. Then reality came to visit. I didn't have anything in common with farm kids who'd grown up together. I was lonely. I decided to try out for basketball and made the team easily.

I was invisible at the local barbershop, listening in to the talk of the town and still trying to get a peek at the Playboy. If I'd been killed in a hit and run accident, there would have been no one who could identify me. That all changed a couple of weeks later when I played in my first basketball game. They'd never seen the likes of me before. The local radio announcer once described me as the biggest 5'9" guy he'd ever seen. I had a thirty six in vertical. I could almost dunk a basketball. I had learned to do tip-ins both left and tight handed, I dribbled just as fast left handed as right. My coach used film of my jump-shot as training material.  I'd learned an aggressive, physical style of play. I was an on-court leader with a attitude. My older sister told me I looked so menacing she wanted to root for the other team.

In one day I went from being nobody to the talk of the town. Suddenly, everyone at school knew who I was, and yes, I got to talk to, and even date cheerleaders. The next time I went into the barbershop, the conversation stopped and every eye in the place was on me. The barber greeted me by name. I got so busy talking to the patrons I couldn't look at the Playboy. I loved being in the spotlight. For just a little while I was "that guy."

After high school, the fame disappeared, but not the craving for it. Fame made my life easy and for a while it raised my self-image, but it was fleeting, like the cheerleaders. I'm sorry to say I spent most of my adult life chasing after fame and fortune. It lead to poor career choices, poor relationships, a terrible first marriage. It took me years to realize that basketball had made me famous because I had worked at it and developed the body and skills to compete at a high level. I never developed the tools to carry me into the adult world. I failed at everything. But it was because of the wrong motives.

Still, I got close to fame and fortune on several occasions with insurance product design, a television show, and inventions. Just one more break in any of these endeavors and you wouldn't know Spencer Dryden. As my writing mentor, John Leicht says, "Marketplace success is a convergence of highly improbable events." Too true. The motivational speakers I worshipped never gave enough credence to perfect timing and extraordinary good luck to go along with the long hard work and a positive mental attitude. 

I spent my white collar years feeling invisible, vulnerable, and perpetually anxious, waiting for the other shoe to drop. It did, mostly on my head.

Time has brought some wisdom. One day, in total despair,  I found myself asking why I had to do all these things to get people to like me just so I could like myself. Why couldn't I skip all that achievement stuff and simply like myself? It was the start of the journey that brought me here.

Along the way I discovered that I had a natural talent for the mechanical trades. The basis of my life changed from external to internal validation. I'm very good at what I do. I am homo habilis rex. I have more work than I want. A while back an old high school friend made this logo for me.

 

 I'm not over it by any means. The challenge of my writer's life is trying to keep it from triggering a relapse into my fame and fortune seeking mode. When I got my first book contract, I saw myself being interviewed by Charlie Rose. Thankfully, I can look at the Playboy now without recrimination.  Would you mind passing the doughnuts?

Legacy

By Lisabet Sarai

I'm not a great writer, and never will be. Please, don't object – this isn't false modesty, just realism.

I'm a competent writer, with excellent nuts and bolts skills. Give me a theme and I can spin a plausible yarn that will amuse or arouse my readers. My plots are for the most part believable and consistent, without the truck-sized holes one sometimes sees. My sentences generally read well. My characters might not jump off the page, but they're not cardboard either.

Still, I know I'll never win awards, never be called a genius, never write something that will change my readers' lives. I just don't have anything that important to say – possibly because I've lived nearly six decades without experiencing any great trauma or tragedy. My tales aren't mindless smut, but they don't have the emotional or moral depth of great literature. They're basically throw-away entertainment. When I die, I will not leave an enduring body of work behind me. Oh, I've got a pretty long back list, don't get me wrong, and I hope it will continue to grow, but I doubt that anyone will have heard of Lisabet Sarai ten or twenty years in the future.

That's one reason why I work so hard on behalf of other authors, especially those new to the publishing game. Maybe, just maybe, one of the authors for whom I do crits or whom I edit will turn out to be a truly Great Author. And then I'll feel as though I've done a bit to help make that happen.

I'm better at mentoring and critiquing than I am at writing, and believe me, I realize these are valuable skills. I try to apply them for the benefit of my colleagues. I know a few authors whom I really admire, who truly have the GA Potential, but still have difficulties with grammar, or pacing, or coherency. I'm pleased when I can assist them in smoothing the rough edges of their jewels.

Sometimes I fantasize about winning the Pulitzer Prize. Hey, I'd be thrilled with an EPPIE! My identity isn't tied up in those dreams, though. I've always written, but I never envisioned myself as a Writer with a capital 'W'. So honestly, it doesn't bother me – too much – to acknowledge my limitations.

If one of the authors I've worked with, though, won a prize, I'd be over the moon. I imagine their work, becoming classics, receiving the accolades they so justly deserve. If that ever happened, well, that would be my true legacy – not the slick and superficial novels and stories I list on my website.

And honestly, I'm okay with that. I don't need fame to be happy – luckily, since I'm certain I'll never be famous, at least not for my writing! The knowledge that I've contributed to the creation of something with lasting value is enough.

And speaking of contributions, let me add a quick plug for the Coming Together charitable erotica imprint. Writing and editing for Coming Together is another way I “pay it forward”. All through February, I'm having a Coming Together event called “Share the Love” over at my blog. Every day I'm hosting a different CT author. They're talking about why they support Coming Together, sharing provocative excerpts from their stories, and in many cases giving away free books or other prizes. Please drop by and join in the fun.

Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone

“All abo-o-ard!”

The conductor is announcing the departure of a venerable train that crosses the continent from Obscurity on one coast (home to the aspiring traveller) to Fame (the destination) on the other. There are luxurious cars for dining and sleeping, even gambling and card-playing. Drawn shades at windows might indicate Torrid Affairs being conducted en route.

There is nothing like a train as a traditional symbol of escape and adventure. When I was young, a train threw its poignant hoot against a layer of volcanic rock at the base of a mountain every evening as the shadows lengthened, and every evening, the echoes reverberated through the valley where I felt trapped in a house on the opposite side. “Woo-oo! Leaving here!” called the train while I dreamed of escape.

And now the train to Fame is leaving without me. I can’t possibly catch up. The wheels are already turning faster and faster as the big vehicle picks up speed. Had I arrived at the station five minutes earlier, I could have boarded. I could have been on my way. But I didn’t, and I’m not.

I missed the deadline.

In a marvellous anthology of steampunk erotic romance that I just finished reading (Steamlust, edited by Kristina Wright of this blog), the heroine of one story uses her auspiciometer (sp?) to determine the perfect moment for doing whatever she wants to do: meet the right gentleman, start or finish the calculations for an experiment, go shopping for a hat or a parasol or a pet snake. Her handy device shows her the perfect moment. This doesn’t necessarily mean she will always be in the right place at the right time. Even with the device, she might miss a deadline.

Pregnancy is the one project with a deadline which can never be missed. Due dates can be missed, of course; first pregnancies, in particular, are often several weeks early or several weeks late (if not induced). But the day of birth is the day of birth. Much as an expectant mother might prefer not to experience third-degree labour soon, today, or at this moment, contractions wait for no one.

Human-made deadlines are more like train departures. Once the train has gone, it’s no longer there.

Please! Wait for me!

I hate to be considered irresponsible and unreliable, so after I’ve made a reckless promise or six, I chase after deadlines like a stranded traveller chasing after the only train due to pass through the mountains all week, or the only ship that has come within sight of the desert island for months.

Where does time go? I should have written at least two more reviews this month (see the above reference to Steamlust, which sits atop Red Velvet and Absinthe, Best Lesbian Erotica 2012, Princes of Air, Persistence: All Ways Butch and Femme, and a volume of vintage gay-male erotica from the 1970s).

Then well-meaning fellow-writers and polite colleagues ask me what I’m writing now, meaning “Are you writing a short story, a collection of them or a novel, and why not?” Of course, I should have time for that. If I’m a real writer, inspiration should strike me regularly, like a gong (as in a notorious saying about how often women should be beaten).

Students who ask for extensions of deadlines for handing in essays want them to be graded and handed back between one class day and the next. What else could be more important to me?

Sinister characters like uncanny train conductors invade my dreams with signs reading “FRIDAY” or “NOVEMBER 30” or “TOMORROW AT THE LATEST.”

Then there are events like Pride Week in June (mentioned by Kathleen of this blog) which I managed to unload onto a new committee. Ha! Freedom! But it’s not complete. I wonder how well the new committee of twentysomethings will cope, and how responsible I’ll feel (as an elder of the tribe) if they drop the ball, or several.

But here is a strangely reassuring thought: every time I miss a deadline, a new one is coming up behind it. And with luck, I’ll miss the deadline (due date) for the end of my own life. Am I supposed to be on that train at age 96? Sorry, I’ll still have a few things to finish up first.
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A Day in the Life *

By Lisabet Sarai

I read the news today, oh boy,

About a lucky gal who made the grade,

Although the news made me quite green,

Well I still had to laugh;

I read her biograph.

She was both lonely and unknown,

Older than I am by a year or two.

Six major pubcos turned her down.

A decade on, she scored;

Nobody expected her to win the Nat'nal Book Award... **

I saw a film today, oh boy,

Based on a novel I have always loved,

A crowd of people forked out cash

I couldn't bear to look

How they raped the book.

I'd love to turn you on.

Woke up, fell out of bed,

Brushed the cat fur from my head,

Grabbed a cup of joe and went to read my mail.

Found my keyboard blocked by a black tail...

Read my last day's work and winced,

Tried to keep myself convinced

I could write at all. I penned a line or two.

Checked when it was due and went into a dream...

I read the news today, oh boy,

The vampire lady made another mil.

The New York Times still didn't call

Two K seems awfully small

Now I know how hard it is to publish anything at all.

I'd love to turn you on ...

(to my books, that is....)

* With apologies to John Lennon and Paul McCartney

** For more on Jaimy Gordon and Lord of Misrule, winner of the most recent National Book Award, visit http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/02/books/02book.html