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Spoiler Alert: Read with caution

In an effort to try and get me out of the deep, blue funk that I’ve been in, I tried to wear something yesterday that I have never worn to work as a writer. I wore an elegant, black, designer skirt, thigh highs, a simple black sweater, that was suddenly made feminine and pretty by being paired with the skirt, rather than jeans. Instead of my usual boots that work more for club wear, I wore a knee high pair that were more girl. The outfit looked like someone else. It felt different. I even moved differently in it. Something about the clinging of the skirt and the feel of the hose against my thighs just let me know it wasn’t the day before when I was still on a downward mood because the current book I’m writing, Bullet, had taken a dark turn. I spent the day being very aware of the fabric of the skirt, the sweater felt softer next to my skin. I hadn’t worn these boots in months. Everything yesterday made me have to be aware from my skin out that it was a different day, and thus a different mood was made possible. I didn’t realize how much it helped my mood until I got dressed this morning.

I wore the only “business” skirt I owned yesterday. It was nice enough to be a date skirt. Jon, my husband, liked it a lot. But my other skirts are club or fetish skirts. I actually was going to try and wear one today, but once I started trying to put garters on for stockings it just seemed too complicated for two days in a row. So screw it, I put on my usual straight, fitted jeans, that tuck into New Rock boots, and a t-shirt that would get you sent home from almost any school in this country. The moment I was dressed, I felt down again. I have a very good friend who is a policeman, and is no longer active duty Marine. (I would say former Marine, but there’s no such thing. Once a Marine, always a Marine.) He told me that putting on his uniform as a cop put him in the mindset he needed to do his job. That’s part of what a uniform does, it helps you know that you’re working, and a certain attitude that needs to go with the job. What I’m wearing today is my uniform. I hadn’t realized that, but as I put on each piece of it, I felt that attitude coming over me. That kick-ass, smart-alec, everything is out to get me, and danger is around every corner mindset. It’s Anita’s mindset, and once upon a time, and some days still, I need help getting into her head space and the current book, but what’s happened with Bullet, and other books as well, is that I’ve gone too far into the head space.

When I step away from the desk I need to have the book percolating in the back of my head, but I do not need to carry Anita’s sorrow with me. I mourn when my imaginary friends are hurt, or worse, but I do not need to carry grief equivalent to the loss of a real, flesh and blood, friend in my head and in my heart twenty-four hours a day. Doing that means I never really rest, I never really step out of the darkness. I need to rest, I need to leave some of the darkness at the computer and not carry it all like some evil back pack that I never get to take off, or put down.

I dressed today and it felt like I was putting on armor. To guard me against the grief, the day, the people, and I was instantly in that mindset that everyone is a potential danger, that yellow alert that sometimes you need on certain jobs like police or soldiers. I am neither of these things in real life, I only pretend on paper. I do my research and try to make it as real as possible, but in the end I just play an executioner and U.S. Marshal on paper.

Several people on-line suggested I do fetish wear, because I did say that I had more skirts of that flavor than business. But fetish wear, at least the way I do it, is not soft and feminine. It’s leather and pretty aggressive. It’s again, Anita’s mindset. One person said wear it so Anita can get a hug from Jean-Claude, but fetish leather isn’t about hugs, its about sex, and a very specific mindset for sex. A mindset that is a little rougher, more aggressive. What I needed yesterday, and still apparently need today, is something softer. Anita is having a hard book, and thus so am I. I put a lot of myself on the page and I’m willing to bleed with my characters, but when I stepped away from the computer yesterday the outfit helped me almost instantly be out of the darkness. I needed that reminder that I just play this part in books, so I don’t have to carry it with me everywhere.

I was able to be sad with Anita yesterday, but when I got up and went elsewhere the gloom stayed at the desk, with the book. In the past I’ve dressed to help get me into scenes. I’ve worn lingerie, or fetish wear, when I’ve had trouble with certain scenes. I’ve put on the holster and worn the gun while I work. I’ve spent a lifetime learning how to get closer to my characters, but for the first time I realized that maybe the same techniques could be used to give me a little more distance from the most painful parts. I’ll cry at the computer, but when I step away, I need not to weep through my day, or be on yellow alert all day, all night, because I left Anita in a scary place in the book.

Today in my “uniform” I came to my office reluctant, dreading the next scene, so invested emotionally that I’m having trouble moving forward, or wanting to. For the first time since the first book the promise I made to Anita that no one she cared for would get seriously hurt, or worse, has been broken. It was time, somehow. But now I’m scared. I’m afraid that it won’t be the last loss this book, and it makes me not want to write it. The person we lost was not a loss that would destroy us, but the person currently in jeopardy on the page is, and now I no longer know that he will be safe. I don’t know how bad this is going to get, and neither Anita, nor I, want to see that. We’re afraid. Even writing this blog is procrastinating, because I don’t want to turn to the other computer and see where this scene goes. One death makes the world less sure, makes me less certain that there won’t be more. I finally realize that part of my problem for awhile now has been that my emotional boundaries with my real and my imaginary have blurred too much. I need to remember who I am emotionally a little bit more. If dressing a little softer, will do that, then skirts & dresses aren’t the worst thing in the world.