Monday, September 3, 2018

Pondering anew.

As I mentioned in my other post, the one about "Simon's Love Life," as we're calling it, that I'd made some progress on "Ponder." The poor thing has been so neglected, but I do still care for it. It's just ... it's a difficult story, it seems. So much world building, plus having to balance several things at once. Developing multiple characters. All that world building (again). It's a lot for a new writer, I've rationalized, so hitting those snags isn't all that surprising.

But the two little breakthroughs. Neither is entirely paradigm shifting, but in their way, each has helped me progress a little on the difficulties that held me up. Also, I can't remember how much I've shared about the story (apparently not much because "Ponder" wasn't even a tag I'd used on a blog post here before), so this may all be totally unclear. But I'll just proceed to share anyway because I'm too lazy to look it up!

First, one of the points of "tension" (assuming I really go that direction—having, you know, tension in the story) is that they're waiting for a resupply to get them through the next month. But it's never going to come. They talk about what they need all the time (or at least several times), but it isn't going to come. So this is the minor "causal black hole," but it's a really important one given it's what dooms them and seals the story's unhappy ending.

Basically, the problem was: Why didn't the resupply come with the ponderswap? What I came up with was that the ponder returning to Earth takes a list of all the supplies they need, then in 2-3 weeks, the resupply comes, and all is marvelous. The breakthrough was realizing the timeline: The ponder returns to Earth after it's been destroyed, so no resupply can be mounted because it's gone. Duh.

This doesn't change much, I suppose; it was just realizing something basic about the world I'd been building that was already built in. But it affects how I approach this problem and plan and execute in the course of the story, so that's a big deal.

The second thing is a bit trickier. In the original plannings, I was going to have someone remark that they pitied Oscar's wife for having to put up with an asshole like him; I can't remember exactly how I planned it in my notes, but he was basically going to smile knowingly and say something evasive. Later, when they're all watching the world getting destroyed, he was going to fall to his knees and sob "My husband...", thus revealing his gayness. I think the idea was—whether I quite realized it or not—to conflate the reader's recognition of his personal tragedy and loss with the discovery that he's actually gay and that the surprise of the latter would combine with the sympathy of the former to synergistically create a stronger response in the reader...? Maybe?

There are a couple of problems with this, and I wasn't entirely comfortable with any of them. Roughly 2.5ish, to be precise.

  1. One is an ethical sort of problem(s) that my boyfriend Anthony introduced me to. That is, I hadn't heard of it/them until he mentioned them, not that he caused them in our relationship. (Important distinction!)
    1. Queerbaiting: I'm not entirely sure this would have qualified as queerbaiting, but as I reflected on it the other day, it felt uncomfortably close to it. And I didn't like that. Usually, it involves a homo relationship that's implied but not depicted. Oscar's relationship with his husband isn't directly in the story and it isn't, really, hinted at either, but it seemed similarly dishonest anyway. Also, using gayness as a gotcha? Hm...
    2. Fridging: Also not entirely sure this counts, but it was uncomfortably close. With fridging, a character (usually a woman) is killed, and her death isn't sad in itself—as the tragic end of a whole, valuable human being's life—but as a means to progress the story/motivations of the main character (usually a man). What felt uncomfortably close was that Oscar's husband was basically gonna get name dropped as he was getting killed just to advance Oscar's personal tragedy. Their relationship would have no other impact on or development within the story.
  2. The other problem is that I'm not entirely sure keeping his husband a secret is in character for Oscar. While, yes, he's a consummate asshole and troll, I'm not sure a) that, in that future time when things are (hopefully) more open, he'd have the motivation to hide it and b) that, troll that he is, Oscar would want to be coy, even to fuck with everyone.
I'm still not sure to what extent his marriage will be developed in the story, if at all, but in reflecting on those problems, I happened to figure out a better, more honest and ethical way of "using" Oscar's husband for the purposes of the story. First of all, no more "Gotcha!"; that should go without saying, I think. Second of all, rather than off handedly or simply conveying his tragedy, his bringing up his husband could bring home the overall tragedy of the story—everyone's tragedy—that everything and everyone they've loved have been gone and dead for a month—in one simple gesture:

"Oscar! Calm the fuck down!"
"I will not calm down—my husband is down there!"
"...was down there," Kimberly corrected quietly. "Was."

I think this is better? At several/a couple points during the story, Kimberly has reminded the other characters that, although the ponder is broadcasting in "real time," it's a month behind the actual events, and she's done so in exactly this way—simply correcting their tenses. But this time, it introduces the major causal black hole: That everything they've been doing and discussing over the course of the story has no meaning because humanity and their home have been been callously erased from the universe.

Anyway, I'm not sure when I'll get back to "Ponder." I still find it kind of intimidating, frankly, and I'm really focused on "Simon," so it may be a while yet. Still, I'm pretty happy with these bits of progress.

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