Fighting My (tiresome) Biases

I have them, you have them, let's put them on the table, leave them on the curb, throw them on the fire. But let's talk about them first.

One of my worn-out snobberies is the whole genre fiction thing. I've had to really look at this in the last two weeks because of wanting to dive completely into a writing project that would mean I was writing a (gulp) murder mystery. Oh. My. God. Yes, the end of higher western civilization as I have come to accept it, and I've had to begin moving on in the grief process yet again. (Remember the losing my job one from not long ago?) Researching, sketching out character profiles, plot projections...for one of those books. Still need some time with this one.

Another silly pigeonhole is the craft verses tschocshky polarity. Why do I insist on doing this? The artists who only pick up pure red squirrel hair brushes from the primeval forests of Bohemia and slouch towards another wearisome weekend with other trustafarians in the Hamptons call me a mere craft poser because I use something other than the finest canvas, brushes and oils. Smell the contempt? Then I do the same thing, looking at all these insta-plastic-collage things pretending to be cutesy knock-offs of Nick Bantock or Sabrina Ward Harrison and I wonder why these 50-somethings spending their husbands' money on expensive all plastic materials even bother. It all looks like Tammy Faye in her hey-day to me. I'm so unforgiving. To me, there's no creative spirit here, it's all pre-fabricated materials, it's all plastic, it's all overpriced, and these women are kidding themselves that they're doing anything more than the 21st century version of painting by numbers. They should take up quilting. And I know I'm being horrible, absolutely horrible. The plastic thing really bothers me. My Urban Portland Left Coast Liberal Agenda is showing again, sorry! I guess I should acknowledge I need more time to work on this one, too.

The SUV thing---more of the above Agenda Exposed, I'm afraid, but I've seen Jolie haul around horse barn stuff in hers first hand, it's not a grocery hauling chariot in her driveway.

Here's a good one---my old bias about people not (appearing to be) working hard---I am living first hand. Since I've been laid off, I'm getting some of this from other people, and my reaction to their almost dismissing of my time investment is curiously funny to me. There's an irresistible need to chronologically account for my day or week, which must sound really sad or over-compensatory. "Yes, I'm still important as a person, I am worthy, my time is valuable, too!" I almost didn't go to a party this past weekend because I was getting uncomfortable about responding to people's questions of "What do you do?" or "Are you working yet?" Still making peace with getting the business off the ground and doing the craft-art thing.

So---my own biases are biting my own butt. Terrific. So what is the answer?

Gotta get better at the snappy comeback, and get more comfortable with saying "I'm starting my own business," and not sound pathetic saying it. Me being an art or lit snob is actually keeping me from doing fully what I want to do, because the Acid Voice of Snark stays loud and clear the more I indulge it with other people's creative efforts, and I wind up leveling it on myself, like that's constructive. Some days it is so overpowering, I can't even make myself write or craft anything, and I retreat into the Wonder World of Magazine Potentialities. A cry for help certainly, and time to call my ArtPal, for sure. But I tear out pictures from the mags, and before I know it, I have a small stack of triggers for color or journal work, and...recovery ahead. Time to make coffee and get busy.