IWSG: My Favorite Aspect of Being a Writer

On the first Wednesday of every month, the Insecure Writer’s Support Group encourages writers to talk about their insecurities.

 

 

Each month, they also have an optional question to answer. This month it's What is your favorite aspect of being a writer?

 

I just love writing.

I have ADHD, OCD, and a bunch of other disorders that are also words you try to make when the Scrabble board is mostly full. So I have chaos in my head, and writing gets a little bit of that out and allows me to function as the amusing nerd I am.

Beyond that, it's just unbelievably fun. I mean, the editing and querying and stuff isn't, but discovering wacky characters and helping them tell their stories? That's the best thing ever.

(Except maybe dogs dressed as dinosaurs.)

But since Circuits & Slippers was published, I've found a new thing I like about writing. Other writers.

I don't like people. I'm happiest when I don't have friends and I have been known to hide from my neighbors. So I was reluctant to do any sort of social media, but Twitter seemed acceptable to me because it's just: write a short funny thing, other people can like it if they want, you do the same for them. It's barely social.

But then I was chosen for the anthology, and was automatically part of a group. We weren't forced to interact or anything and I know a few of them knew each other before, but I guess there's probably some psychological thing that makes people in a group want to interact.

We would post about the book, talk about each other's stories. If they tweeted something about their cat, I'd sometimes reply with something about mine. Some of us have talked about our love for obscure movies and Doctor Who. I drew this doodle for our editor because we both like sea creatures and dumb puns:

And then I realized I might be making friends. And that's weird for me.

My default setting in life is "amuse other people so they won't ask me to go away." It isn't a choice I make or anything, but in just about every social situation, my only goal becomes the other person laugh before they realize I'm an anxious mess who doesn't want to talk to them.

Now I'm slightly less anxious and I kind of enjoy talking with some people, and I don't know how to do it.

I've never been great at having friends, especially in real life. How much interaction is too much? Too little? Do people really like my dumb jokes or are they just too nice to tell me I'm annoying? What do they want for their birthday! (Luckily the Internet eliminates many of those pesky real life problems since we don't actually know each other and I'm not asking them to hang out with me when they have other things to do - and when in doubt, send them a picture of a dog dressed as a dinosaur.)

But I'm excited, because the fact that I'm not quitting Twitter the instant people want to interact with me must be a good sign. Of what, I don't know. But it's a good thing.

So I'll end this post with another dumb little doodle pun. It's a nerdy and obsccure one, requiring you to know about the microscopic creature called a tardigrade, and that the TARDIS is the blue police box from Doctor Who.

 

 

 

Yes, folks, it's a TARDISgrade.