Escapades of the Bored Writer

Star Trek Into Darkness is by all means a great film in a wonderfully vast and diverse universe marred by the outcry against the “Whitewashing,” of certain iconic characters (One iconic character).

Like many science fiction writers, Gene Roddenberry and his team created a character with all of the great advantages that evolution had to offer humans. The result was a man given the impressive sounding name of Khan Noonien Singh. And like a great many science fiction characters, the description fit a man of color. Ricardo Montalbán brought the character to life first in Space Seed and most popularly in The Wrath of Khan.

The casting of Benedict Cumberbatch into the fold of Khan isn’t an issue of the character’s ethnicity. Khan has no ethnicity. Nor is it an issue of his being classified as Sikh, thanks to his very telling last name.

Sikhism is a religion in Northern India, practiced almost exclusively by the people in Punjab. I would know, I grew up in a Sikh family. Actively practiced the religion for many years. My grandfathers were both Singhs. Singh is a title given to you when you take vows to follow the faith. When you become a warrior for god. It preaches goodness and kindness, giving when you can, protecting those that need to be protected.

It is also one of the most inclusive religions. At least on paper. Anyone can become a Sikh, anyone can become a Singh. Or not. Sikhism is all about finding your way to the one true being. And because the aim is to return from where you came, it is held that all people have a different path. Be it Sikhism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, ect. You make your own way to the same central place, with your own guide.

So a man with Cumberbatch’s face can be called Khan Noonien Singh.

It is disappointing on a different grounds.

As a child, seeing a man of color on the screen with the name Khan Noonien Singh was a godsend. He was incredible, intelligent, different. In a time when everyone that looked like me played a bumbling terrorist, Khan was evil incarnate. And that was okay. Because he was a villain you identified with. He was(is) a badass. IN SPACE.

I’m not angry that the character is now portrayed by Cumberbatch. Hell, I’m even a member of the CumberCollective, he’s phenomenal. But he doesn’t look like me. I will root for the character, because I love villains (my heroes are just good villains), but I won’t want to be him. If I was a child watching this character, I wouldn’t be inspired. That is the issue.

This isn’t about ‘whitewashing.’ Contradictory to popular belief, racism goes both ways.

Khan Noonien Singh influenced the type of person I am in some ways. Not quite so powerfully as Ursula LeGuin’s red skinned, Ged from EarthSea. He and characters like him, helped make me the type of writer I am. Not afraid to make a woman of color my main character.

So no, it isn’t wrong, but it’s disappointing and I will get over it.

I don’t know how other writers get ideas for their books/tv shows/movies/comics; I realized some time ago, that I don’t really care. Why? Because their methods are not mine, they only work for them.
No one can teach you how to write. Sure, you can learn the turns of phrase, proper syntax, those devices that made English boring. Devices many writers won’t admit that we weren’t aware we were using. A writer is separated by their ideas. Everything else becomes important after they get that idea.
My ideas come to me like aches. It tears through my psyche, leaving behind a ravaged mind that would give a great deal to live in that world. A world that hadn’t existed hours ago.
These ideas only come once or twice in a decade.
But the pain it brings is almost enough to sink me into a depression. Almost.
The fact that I can write all of it down saves me. If I couldn’t write, I don’t know how I would deal with the instant feeling of not belonging. Not belonging to the world, being in a nightmare: going to sleep and expecting to wake up in the world my mind invented.
But everyday I wake up in this place. Everyday in the same place.
When another writer can make me feel that way about their world, it only showcases their talent. And every time I read something by them, I go to sleep wanting to wake up in their imagined place. But I never do.
It’s why I write, to go to those worlds in the daylight.

Somedays are just silent. Nothing but the hum of your computer harmonizing with the buzz of the refrigerator to keep you company. It’s nice to write on these types of days. You’re not lost in the haze of activity; you get to slow down for a moment and see the breathtaking beauty of the world. You get to be awash in description, and nothingness.Meaningless banter isn’t necessary here, lost in your own mind, wandering from one place to the next, with little to no hope of stopping. Yet it’s a slow craw through the thicket of the mind. A lazy gait through the forgotten worlds of yesteryear. You accomplish so much by doing so little.

Never wanted to say,

Now the words have faded away,

Like childhood memories,

All the things I needed to say.

We’ve been drifting apart

For so long

You didn’t see it

Till I was long gone!

Now we’re standing here,

No apologies strong enough,

No repentance heavy enough,

To mend these broken bridges.

We were never brave enough,

To admit we were wrong,

To admit we never belonged,

We never should have held on!

How can you know?

Of this ache inside my soul?

How can you see?

When I never let you near me?

How and why?

Are you drawing me down,

Into my own,

Into my own…

We’ve had one every year for the past nine years. Well I’ve only been aware of them for the past nine years anyway.
The first time I saw one I was certain something was about to happen. I did not know if it was a harbinger of good or bad occurrences, but I did know I was fascinated with it.

I was inspired to write the first few pages of a three part series. It was one of my favorites, it still is. It was the first of many books that made me dig deep into a place I was certain I could hide behind smile after smile. So deep, I wouldn’t even remember what the truth was anymore.

It’s not really as dark as I make it seem, but the stench of pain still lingers.

I noticed the red sunsets one cold midsummer’s day in India, when all of my preconceived notions of family and tradition lie shattered around my feet. Childhood fantasies torn asunder.

Yet, I find them so beautiful, those stunning red sunsets, messengers of long buried memories. You see I was right, you can bury the truth so deep that even you don’t recognize it anymore.

The Play

What are you hiding from,

I wonder.

What are you running from,

I wonder.

Are they the hallowed vows

Of yester-year?

Or the wistful boughs

Of dreams lost in fear?

Could you pause for a moment?

Could you linger for a minute?

I would hold your hand,

If only for a second.

What do you hear

I wonder.

What do you fear

I wonder.

Are they the words

Of the one you’ve forsaken?

Or the wrath

Of the one you left, broken

Could you hold still?

I want to memorize your face.

I want you to take part in this farce.

I want you to play my part.

-Amanjot K. Sandhu

So I haven’t really been on Facebook in about two and a half weeks. I haven’t died, I’m not ignorant of the world, and I’m definitely not insane. Which makes me think all of this “social media helps us stay in touch” stuff is crap. Only a handful of my friends follow me on twitter (handful is generous, 8 MAX), and for all anyone else knows, I could be dead.

It’s nice to see how many times I’VE been the one to start conversations with the people I supposedly love, and how few of them care about me. To the ones who do care, thank you, seriously, you guys deserve better than me.

My point is, that in this mad rush to make ourselves feel important we’ve forgotten that we need to make others feel important too, especially those who take the time out of their days to make us feel better about ourselves. Even if it is a birthday reminder on Facebook that prompts us to do so.

Would you like to know how many happy birthdays I got on my birthday last year through any form of communication (text, phone call, facebook, twitter, email, snail mail, ect)? Nine. Nine out of my 250 so called “friends” on facebook. NINE including the 4 other members of my family. NINE, and five of those nine only happened AFTER I told them it was my birthday. So I’m not expecting much this upcoming birthday. Do you know how many people I said happy birthday to? Everyone I could get a hold of, in my “Old English” style so it stood out from all the other half-hearted “Happy Birthdays.”

So yeah, I’m a bit bitter. But I’ll be fine, because I’m perfectly fine with having fair weather friends, so long as you’re fine with being the same. I’ll end with this; a question for you that an old video game once asked me;

“Do you have friends? Do they consider you a friend?”

-Legend of Zelda; Majora’s Mask

Everything passes as if in a haze; blanketed by the gloom of the persistent gray fog. From the haze, if you look hard enough, you can explore the secrets of another world. Quite frankly, I hate the fog. I’ve been wanting to go to our local ice cream shop for the past week and a half, but no, it has to be too cold for that, without any hope for the sun to shine through. I’d go to the local coffee shops but there are far too many “writers” there. The act of writing should be personal. I like locking myself in my walk in closet and writing by the dim glow of a reading light. I know, weird, but if we weren’t weird we wouldn’t be writers.

I like the darkness. The reason we fear the darkness is because we don’t know what could be hiding away in it; but I flock toward it. In the darkness I find my most inspiring characters. I’m not telling you to go write in the dark, though it might be fun to watch… The most personal of my characters was born in the dark. Their world formed out of the fog of my imagination.

So I guess I owe the fog, but it doesn’t mean I have to like it. If anyone read this madness to the end the lesson is; I still want my ice cream.

So I have resolved to post more on Tumblr. Unfortunately I have nothing to post, nothing that I want on public domain anyway. Though I would be liberating to rant about my woes and the injustices inflicted upon me; I’m afraid to bore you so soon in our relationship.

But I’m certain you’ll see the depth of the emotional trauma when you read my book (If I ever get it through the revision process…totally not bitter). Or you can ask me whatever you would like to know. I’ll answer to the best of my ability.

I’m crazy about them. So crazy that I actually make lists of books I’ve read, need to read, need to reread, and am currently reading. Sometimes people laugh it off when I say I want to live in a book store, and sometimes, the best times, they agree with me. I’ve always wanted a castle, immature, childish, and almost unattainable, I know, but I want one. Not for the fantasy or the faerie tale, but for the library. Have you ever once seen a castle without a beautiful library? Me neither.

So there it is, my completely childish and uncharacteristic dream, to own a freaking CASTLE. This is my quirk, the thing people see and make up their conclusions about. No body ACTUALLY wants a castle, they just say they do.

I’m supposed to be the mature one. The one who has it all together, and can make anything work. I’m supposed to be smart, witty even, so forgive me my lapse. It’s my own fault really, I’ve perpetuated this entire persona of mine to the point where I don’t know where I end and she begins. There was always something expected of me, something I was supposed to be. I’m afraid I can’t live up to the hype.

It doesn’t scare me as much as it used to. I always thought I had to be a certain way or no one would care. I found out quickly just how TRUE that was, but I’m okay with being me. Nobody else matters, because they don’t really care. They’re just there to make sure you care about something.

Books never judge you, and you can’t ever judge them. If you hate on a book without ever having read it you’re called ignorant and childish, without a leg to stand on. However we can judge people without ever having met them, we can tear them a new one everyday, and others will hang on to your every word, even praise you.

I love books, so much that I decided to write one. A good one that you would have to read before you can judge. Books are respected, because it’s the writer baring their soul and giving the world a gift. Books are amazing.

It seems like every time I work on my book some new plot hole seems to pop up. They’re not major ones, just stuff that can easily be explained, but they’re there none the less.

Of course a lot of them will probably all make sense in the next book, and everything will work in the last book, but people are fickle. They can’t be patient, but when they get their reward too quickly they aren’t pleased with it or they complain that it was too soon. That I didn’t give them enough suspense. People have NO idea what they really want, or need, yet they’re vocal about it none the less. I think the pressure is what gets to me.

I just wish we weren’t so impatient, that we didn’t pressure others into moving too quickly and not doing they best they can. Sorry to repeat the old adage, but Rome really wasn’t built in a day. In fact it wasn’t even built within the parameters of time allocated to suburb builders. Rome took decades to complete.

But nobody cares about that, all people see is the finished product. Sometimes I wonder if they think I can sit down and crank out a book in a single sitting. I HAND-WRITE everything before typing it into the computer, and once it’s there I edit, like a maniac. I write and rewrite plot hole explanations, invent dialogue that sounds real, like something someone would say.

No, not just anyone can write a book, not a good book anyway, I’m not sure I can write a good book; but I sure can try. I’m writing the book I want to read, the book I think people want to read. It doesn’t have to make sense, but it does have to be fun, and at the end of the day it needs to make you think. Because it is the only medium that remains that can force you to think. If I can write a book that makes people say, “Yeah, she knows how to write, she has a good grasp of advanced writing skills, and her message made me think things I didn’t think of before.” Even if they absolutely hate the message because maybe it goes against what they see in the world; I am a success, because they read it, and they felt something for someone else. That is all that matters.

So I’m going to take my sweet time and write the best book I possibly can, because I owe it to myself.