Wiscon: Saturday Early: Working, Reading, Magical Realism

[cathschaffstump]

Waiting for breakfast with Yolanda. One more of our party, Julie, fell to the flu, and it scuttled her evening of dressing up and going to the dessert salon, but my friend Laura had Immodium in her room, so after a walk over to the Inn on the Park, I hope we procurred a solution for her. Didn’t do much in the way of parties last night, because I thought we might be down on the flu farm. But Sunday will wait its turn.

Warning: Panel rant about magical realism and the academy ahead. If you’re interested, click more. If not, stick with the nice stuff above the cut.

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Saturday morning, a batch of us went to the farmer’s market, an Arabic spread out by the Capitol. I was keen to recreate my wholesome experience from last year and sought out the whole wheat muffin and a giant coffee. Dan, Lisa, Yo and I ate by, on, and around modern art while Julie scoped the bazaar. We talked about Yo’s job, Dan talked technical, I ate what tasted like Kansas. Then it was back to the convention for our first panel.

Yo and I visited Balancing Creativity and the Day Job. We heard much of the usual, but we didn’t learn a whole lot that was new. We learned not tips on how to balance, but rather heard a lot about how hard it was balance. It felt like a support group for busy people who wanted to write. A lot of the old chestnuts were presented: Set some time to write. How do you get back to writing and working out if you sacrifice it? Do you tell your work about your writing? How does your family feel about your writing?

It was interesting to hear degrees of openness and what other’s experience was. On this panel, Caroline Stevermer, half of the Sorcery and Cecelia team, said at the end something that was meaty, something that I’ve been chewing on all convention. I paraphrase.

“When I was working, I spent every spare cent on eating out and travel, trying to numb the pain of the day job.” The overall implication seemed to be that we might be poorer without work, but we might have happier lives if we were doing what we wanted, and it might be easier than we think, if we could release ourselves from the illusion of security, which Stevermer suggests could be popped at any time. *blink* How’s that for an existential exercise? She’s right, but most of us are in the security/hoarding/horribleness of being penniless state. (Boy, that was some sentence. I must be exhausted!) Some of the other panelists thought they could never do that. I myself think I can’t right now. It is, however, a perspective to mull. Am I held prisoner by my work, rather than my work allowing me freedom and financial independence? Hmmm…

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Originally published at Writer Tamago. You can comment here or there.