In Your Feelings

Some moods can make me crave avoidance of any kind of expression and being on automatic is a substitute for presence and feeling what you don’t want to feel. But, I’ve learned to lean into the mood and see what seems most purposeful in the moment — poetry, a short story, the skeleton of a novel, a scrapbook for future horror stories or a soliloquy.
The writing muscle continues to grow some girth and eventually, some definition. Being who you’re meant to be as a writer requires curiosity about the inner workings of one’s mind and the audacity to have opinions about everything and to envision the possibility of becoming an authority on something or someone. In writing through uncomfortable feelings, such as impatience, pain and grief, the writer wins. Boethius wrote in prison while awaiting execution, which reminds me to be a little tougher.
A hint of melancholy is just another shade in the color palette and not a reason to run from what has made life worth living on so many occasions.
Dark moods might inspire a radical departure from the norm. Writing through feelings is another experiment and what is creativity but a series of experiments?

Writing Advice...

Books and classes on writing will fill your head with disparate ideas about how to approach your story. Some authors will tell you to write about what you know and others will tell you to write about what interests you. Because I believe there is freedom within structure, I think it's a good idea to create an outline of each story. An outline is like a trail of popcorn leading out of the woods. You can write short stories of ten pages or more with no expectations of what they might become.


Working Outside Your Comfort Zone

Keep writing playful and lay off the cash-and-prizes pressure. To keep your creativity limber, choose to focus on something outside your comfort zone. And to assuage the terror, write down what you'll have to learn to write about historical figures, true crime, hospital settings or zombies. Writing about things that engage your mind, imagination and make you run to the computer or notebook each day is the samadhi of writing.

Fictionalized or Heightened Creative Nonfiction

It's tricky writing about family, old friends and childhood contexts. I always wonder how much we have permission to reveal about others' lives. Any criticism of an individual's behavior begs an exploration of his or her character and how that person became the evil-doer in a family or among a group of friends. Would you write your personal narrative as a fable? Would you consider stating the facts as they were with no regard about where you'd spend Christmas?

Where SHOULD ideas come from?

There is no such thing as a magical spout of story ideas from which we all fill our cups. We writers are wanderers in search of the next interesting thread and the desire to see where it leads. All art begins with desire. Writing from your navel has some definite advantages and staying there in the nebulous imagination of your past can be something that stunts creative growth.
Sometimes, I find it important to explore why I want to limit myself in my writing choices. Is it laziness to want to write from and about one's personal experience? Is there are a fear of being inadequate as a researcher that keeps some writers from writing a historical novel?
As a person who loves writing advice, I can say the best advice is to follow what motivates you to get to the pen and paper or computer. When you compare yourself to those writing in your favorite genre, you might become immobilized. And picking up on the latest writing trends feels like a cash grab in a clear booth on a game show. Ideas come from everywhere and the stories we weave can become bigger as we trust our abilities to learn new things and ask questions. Being an introvert and writer doesn't mean you never talk to librarians -- they are great resources. The human touch has not yet lost its touch, and when you're stuck, making calls to connect with your tribe or talking to humans at the local drugstore can break the spell of obsessive focus on rearranging the alphabet.

Morning Psychography

I have been writing morning pages every day for years and after a couple of weeks or months of writing accumulates, I do a quick scan and see if there is anything that could be transformed into readable text. I pick through, find words or sentences that flow well and save them for later and the rest goes in the recycling bin. A morning freewrite unencumbered by purpose, lets ideas breathe and some poems and stories have emerged. From freedom to structure is a process I enjoy. It feels good to know each word isn't precious and is just a mental warm-up or purge if I have been particularly challenged by something or someone. A quiet rage on the page is a rare event, but happens sometimes.
The guideline for those morning pages is to write quickly as a way to kick up what might be hidden from my consciousness but bubbling to the surface in one way or another.
And I focus on balance - keep it light on complaints and heavy on the gratitude.

Artist Interviews: Charlie Vázquez, Author, Poet, People-Connector, Bon Vivant

1.     What have you learned by watching Youtube videos this week?

Funny you should ask that. I use YouTube for both entertainment and research (sometimes they are the same thing!) and last night I investigated the “urban fantasy” literary genre, as people close to me have told me that my fiction could be classified as such. One of the writers interviewed explained how “the dark forests” of older literatures have been replaced by even darker urban spaces, such as foreboding alleys and subterranean environments.

This transition and the need for it fascinate me.

And that a major distinction between classic fantasy and the new more brazen urban style is that the urbanized genre permits a lot of space for sex in the plot, whereas in the older style sex was nearly taboo or just omitted. So now my imagination is really unraveling! I began writing my next novel, which is set in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and as I started out as an erotica writer and drifted away from that to explore other things, all the threads are coming back together now.

2.     How did you connect with Puerto Rico?

I connected with Puerto Rico later in life, in 2009 actually, and stayed on the western coast. During that trip alone I saw San Juan, Arecibo and La Cueva del Río Camuy, Quebradillas, Aguadilla, Rincón, Mayagüez, Cabo Rojo, Boquerón, San Germán, Sabana Grande, and Ponce. We almost made it to Juana Díaz where my father was born but didn’t quite make it. And most of those places have since become locations for a series of short terror stories I’m developing alongside the new novel.

The Puerto Rican writer Mayra Santos Febres called me in 2011, regarding her Festival de la Palabra, and how she really wanted to bring programming to New York. So I met with her and José Manuel Fajardo, the programmer, and was hired to coordinate dates in New York after the San Juan dates wrapped. I’ve since made numerous friends on the island that have helped me to reconnect to it Puerto Rico in various ways. I connected to Puerto Rico, in short, through writing and my love of literature.

3.     What is your favorite music to write to?

I like writing in silence, as much as New York City will allow me. But when I do play music it cannot have vocals. Symphonic music, electronica, I’ve used before.

4.     Describe your favorite writing and why this appeals to you (novelists).

This is a tough one because I read all over the place. But to give you an example of one style I like, I’ll refer to the great Belgian crime writer Georges Simenon. What I love about his style of writing (20^th century) is how he, with such filed down economy, can paint a scene, the characters in that scene, and the feeling that permeates it, in half a paragraph. He’s just genius.

I’ve read about six or seven of his Inspector Maigret Parisian crime novellas and novels in the past and recently came across one of his more better known “romans durs” (hard novels) called The Strangers in the House. The romans durs were existential and dark forays into the crime itself and the characters surrounding it, but also of the narrator’s psyche.

That’s how I like my fiction. Thrilling. Not just in the tone and voice that can make it tantalizing, but the philosophical threads that keep it feeling fresh for years to come. And that’s why so many 19^th-century novelists will never go out of vogue, because life and the world keep recycling our miseries and anxieties and Dostoevsky, Flaubert, Goethe, and Melville will always have something eternal to teach us about our own humanity.

5.     What are your 3 favorite rituals to ignite your creativity?

Walking, reading, riding the subway. I do all three a lot!

6.     What did you wake up loving today?

Me desperté amando la primavera, darling. And life.

I see Gringos everywhere! Where are the Latinos? Odilia Rivera-Santos

Latinos are workers, tax payers, and consumers of many things, including culture and media.
We are guilty of not making enough noise when it comes to our representation in the media on American television. 
We are guilty of not making enough noise when it comes to the blatant racism in Spanish-language television. On Spanish-language television, Latinos know you have to be of European descent to represent. In the real world, the majority of Latinos are not White with blue eyes and blond hair. 
Where are the Latinas who look like me?
Where are the Latinos who look like my (Hershey's Dark Chocolate-colored) AfroPuerto Rican relatives?
Where are the Latinos of Asian descent?

Where are the Latinos ...period.

The African-American Community has done a brilliant job in the area of gaining visibility in film, television shows, etc. 
As Latinos, we have a lot to learn from our African American peeps.

I started https://www.facebook.com/WeWantLatinoActorsAndWritersOnAmericanTelevision to encourage Latinos and those who ADORE us to focus on our political and economic power in regards to our visibility in the media.

VISIBILITY, VISIBILITY, VISIBILITY!

If you are an actor, writer,production crew member who is unemployed or underemployed, take daily steps to get back on track.
1. Call two people a day and tell them you're available to work on their project and tell them to give your number to someone else who might be in need of your services.
2. Promote your work online for two hours per day.
3. Pray for God to send you the right people and present you with the best opportunities to use your skills.
4. Write down other work you enjoy and would be willing to do to earn money.
5. Your 'B' job is the parent and your vision is your baby.
The parent has to provide whatever the baby needs and some babies are high-maintenance.
If your vision requires studio time, taking classes, buying equipment, you need to earn a higher salary. 

Be willing to take small steps each day toward achieving your goals.
It's not hard; it's challenging. And our minds need a challenge in order to work to the best of their potential

In other words, ¡pa'lante! #OdiliaRiveraSantos, your AfroPuerto Rican CEO 
www.fashionloveandneuroscience.blogspot.com 
www.nycpoorbutcool.blogspot.com
www.peopleforpuertorico.blogspot.com
www.howardsendennuevayork.blogspot.com