Lake Nowhere Delta (an American Mammoth Jackstock jennet). She lives at Lake Nowhere Mule and Donkey Farm in Tennessee.

I can only blame this poem on random word prompts (I think, because I don’t know what else would have triggered it). Oh, and maybe I can also blame my lifelong fascination for words with multiple, confusable meanings. Those are fun. Dialogue is fun, and no matter how old I get, I guess talking animals are too. I don’t really trust myself to feature them well in my major writing projects. Closest I came was “The Brave Little Porcupine” (unpublished children’s story). For poems, I give myself permission to goof off.

The following is a goofball rolled out of my brain circa age twenty:

“Good day to you, ass.”

“To my ass?!” cried the donkey,

“What mad man are you

To address my behind?”

“I meant you,” said the passer.

“I thought ‘ass’ was your name.”

“It’s Haw,” said the donkey,

“Family surname for years.”

“Hee Haw,” said the passer,

“I’m desperately sorry.”

“You know my first name,”

Hee brayed and went crazy:

“Spying and lying,

I’m shocked at you, sir!

Don’t you fear that I’ll stamp you flat?”

“You bet your ass,” said the passer.

My automatic coping method for most stressful situations in my life has always been distraction. Get my head out of whatever has upset me and focus entirely on something else. This usually means I’m not rooted in reality anymore: I’ve escaped into a story. Growing up, I read fiction or – heaven forbid – gave in to the TV Blare (I’ve been a book-loving snob about a lot of movies, but quality story-telling can be hunted down on the screen).

Now that I’m a fantasy writer, there’s no hope of changing. I’ve heard some people do manic cleaning when they’re stressed. Wouldn’t that be awesome for aftermath? You have a rough day and you have a clean house to show for it? I call that someone who knows how to cope with reality.

Fantasy’s worst reputation is probably the Big Let Down once you come back to earth. You become dissatisfied with the possible, while the impossible torments you with its appeal. Although there’s some truth in that, I honestly don’t know what I’d do for excitement without other worlds in my head. Probably try to go on real-life adventures and accumulate a far more impressive record of injuries (the worst injury I’ve ever had is a sprained pinkie finger; I’m not even kidding).

In any case, I recognized the paradox circa age fifteen, and here is the poem:

Fantasy

Delightful, pleasant

Intriguing, enhancing, appealing

Imagination, creativity—lies, delusion

Disappointing, confusing, distracting

Hopeless, honest

Reality

I would like to preface this portal by pointing out that I myself am an optimist.  Pessimists argue we would spare ourselves disappointment if we kept our hopes low.  I’ve never been able to do that, and I don’t believe it would do me any good.  I think I would have given up long ago in my writing career if I couldn’t get excited about my next “maybes”.  Maybe my next idea will turn out to be a great novel; or maybe this next person I query will want to read my book, maybe they will be THE ONE!  (Finding the right people to love my books is a lot like match-making; way harder than finding my husband).  Anticipation in itself keeps me going.  Given my perspective, you may choose to believe my sixteen-year-old self was mocking pessimists in this filk of South Pacific’s “Cock-Eyed Optimist”.  In all honesty, I was rather fond of Eeyore the donkey and Puddleglum the Marshwiggle.  I thought it only fair that they have their own version of the song:

When the sky has a dark and stormy feel,

I forget every rainbow that shines through.

So they call me a cross-eyed pessimist,

Mature and incurably blue.

I have heard people laugh and cheer and squeal

That we’re carefree and might as well be kings,

But I’m only a cross-eyed pessimist

And I just can’t imagine such things.

I hear the human race dwells in a perfect place,

A spinning ball of paradise,

But every belching mill is selling me a bill

And telling me it ain’t so nice.

I could say life is one big happy meal

And appear more agreeable and light,

But I’m heavy as lead

With the thing called dread

And I can’t get it out of my sight.

This portal judges my past self for her first-job-hunt days.  I was not a fun person to be around at the point that I decided I needed to make my own money – not from my parents – and was not yet able to make it.  I questioned Subway employees during their lunch rush.  I committed faux-pas like telling my library interview that I was waiting on an answer from McDonald’s and had heard I could get more hours there, but if I didn’t get that job I’d love to work at the library.  I got neither job, of course.  Even Arby’s turned me down the first time: the best I could come up with for why I wanted to work there was that I “liked their windows”.

Like a typical teenager, I looked to my parents for someone to blame.  Since my mother was the breadwinner, I guess she was the logical target in this case.  I wanted two expensive trips in one year – my choir (Bel Canto) was going to New York to sing in Carnegie Hall and my high school band was going to Disneyland.  For the first time I could remember, my mother didn’t think she’d be able to afford it all, and I was not receptive to this “new” concern about debt.  Because I was trying so hard to get a job, she did end up paying for both trips in the end.  Having now experienced financial stress over far less debt and zero dependents, I can wag a disapproving finger at my teenage attitude.  My regret was expressed a few years after the incident, through my online poetry course – an assignment called “confessional”.

My mother made money I needed for trips,

That year there were two: one choir, one band,

Because of our debt, she could not give me both.

What’s a high school kid like me to do?

I searched a job market that screamed for “experience,”

Leaving resumes everywhere describing I’d none.

My mom drove me home from failed interviews.

We parked on Quinn street and she tried to console.

My bitter young heart would not hear a word,

I said what I’d now pay it all to erase:

“I shouldn’t be stuck with the money we have,

I’m not the one who messed it up.”

No words harsh enough describe my act then,

One thoughtless thought I spoke aloud.

Ignorant, thankless, I delivered the hurt

To the mother who loved me so well all my life.