On Blogging for Readers

A/N: So this post got lost in email to self oblivion, but since I just remembered it existed, I hereby post it for your enjoyment. I wrote this on November 18, actually.

---

So Catherine Caffeinated talking about blogging because you had something to say, and it got me to prop my metaphorical chin on my metaphorical hands, plunk elbows on the edge of the desk, and think about why I write. Do I write because I have something to say?

I have often thought about what would make a good blog for a fiction writer and finally thrown up my hands in disgust and realized I hadn't the foggiest idea. My nonfiction and fiction interests are separate and apart. Writing is for writers, not readers. But this made me think about: what is it I have to say when I write fiction? A lot, actually.

I said it once before: I write fascinated. I have found that I am interested in the same things that differentiate literature I love from that which I fangirl. I am interested in cost and sacrifice, power and strength, and mastery of oneself. I prefer the twists of complexity, characters who make hard decisions and pay high prices but accomplish their goal. I love order and making logic of chaos and impossibility. Fiction puts my world into perspective: it enables me to see the underlying patterns and constraints grant the freedom to make those hard choices. Selflessness, love, resolve, endurance, the ability to stand persecuted and not defend oneself—these things are power and a power I wish I had.

But how to put that into blog posts? M.C.A. Hogarth does it with meta and does it beautifully, but I have never been able to write meta. It pulls my characters out of their worlds and makes them constructs. They do not exist in my world to talk to me; they are not voices in my head, but people in their worlds. They are flesh and blood and mind and bone and heart and spirit and blood. I have tried meta and cannot do it.

I have written fanfic but that always becomes simply fic. I dislike writing descriptions of their history unless it is answering a question. Most readers do not read endless fic upon fic on a blog if it is not a serial. I'm fascinated by words, but even I am bored by other conlangers posts about the lexical features of their languages. I love the social structures of my worlds, but best when shown in fic.

En brief, I have a lot to say about love and power and strength and romance and angst and tragic choices, terrible sacrifices, and efficient success with terrible consequences, etc., but I say it in fic. I still don't know how to blog it.

But it has me thinking.

Download article as PDF

Originally published at Liana Mir. You can comment here or there.

The Perfect Cup of Tea

This entry is part 1 of 1 in the series December Ramblings

So, thecatisacritic asked me to ramble to you all today about the perfect cup of tea.

The perfect cup of tea varies, of course. It depends on my mood. When I was growing up, my grandmother always had a tin full of various Celestial Seasonings flavors and we would boil water and try out a new flavor each time, sometimes go through more than one a night, and even less often, more than one per cup. My favorites growing up were my perennial yerba maté—we were doing Wisdom of the Ancients back then—and Roastaroma, which is essentially chicory tea. I still love chicory and now I use it in my own blends.

Yet and still, I buy those old flavors I loved so much over the years: the holiday teas, Bengal Spice, zinger teas, the new rooibos flavors. Sometimes, I just like the comfort.

Growing up, I often drank cold yerba maté from the fridge (we brewed up pots of it at a time), but after I left my insurance job due to tendonitis, my grandfather would bring me cups of steaming hot maté from time to time, and I was hooked. I'm often cold, so cold tea has completely lost its appeal for me. I'll buy bottled Guayaki if I'm out and about, but I always drink that at room temperature or heat it up. In short, the perfect cup of tea is piping hot and sipped for pleasure, warmth, and whatever additional benefits it may provide.

As mentioned, I make my own blends now. I drink supertea daily for health and it's my standing go-to: equal parts pau d'arco, stevia, thyme, and yerba maté. When I want to get warm and want to save my supertea, I tend towards peppermint chamomile, gingermint, chicory spice tea in various ratios, and rooibos with flavor of the day additions. And every once in a while, I still do pull out tea from the fridge and pour it in a cup to drink it cold—just not often. It's a granddaughter/grandfather thing, this hot tea stuff.

Download article as PDF

Originally published at Liana Mir. You can comment here or there.