The Boy Underneath the Fur

Inspiration can hit us at any moment and time, sometimes even after reading a stupid post on the internet that doesn't align with our beliefs ...

Today, I'm discussing a process I went through recently whereby I did exactly that; how I channelled my frustration down onto the page, and how miraculously, it ended up being something worth publishing. 

You can get your copy of The Boy Underneath the Fur here. 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

So whilst I haven't been doing anything with the podcast for the last two months, I have been busy doing other stuff in relation to my writing. So earlier in the year I kind of saw a comment someone made online about Burguins. If you don't know, Boguens were a group of women in the 12th to 13th century. I don't know how accurate that is, but let's just go with that. They're old, if that's the point I'm trying to make. And they were a group of women who were religious, but they lived in their own type of fractions or communities, or essentially outside of male control, because obviously back then, like now, society was very male control and driven, and the women didn't have a lot of say and control. So basically, from what I understand is that these women basically came together, created their own little villages and communities, and it wasn't like a cult or anything, like the women could kind of like come in and leave if they wanted to golf and marry or do whatever. So it was really kind of an open community led by women for women. Anyhow, I was online, as you are in this day and age, and I saw opposed about someone who basically suggested that women should go back to creating these sort of communities for each other. And most people probably think, yeah, that's a great idea because it seems like a easy or seems like an easy solution to dealing with all the male-driven stuff. And but me being me took it in a completely different context. And I got annoyed at it for a different reason. And my annoyance came from the fact that, well, if we were to do this again and women were to create these communities to just support them again and isolate themselves from the men, and like I gotta there is merit for it and whatnot. I'm not saying that it's not an option, but I'm just personally wondering whether it was the best option, considering we've done this before, you know, eons ago and it didn't really do anything for us. So my frustration was um if we could instead just raise men to be, I don't want to say decent, because that then implies that men today aren't decent, but if we could just raise men to be more aligned with themselves and to stop this toxic masculine business that is just so driven into them. And if we were to actually support them in that and help them connect, just not just to themselves, but to each other without all this toxic shit in the background. Like if you look at it with men, the only way they can socialize with each other is through some sort of toxic thing, like it's drinking, or like alcohol is not good for you, or it's sports and gambling, which again isn't good for you, or it's you know, maybe fishing. I guess fishing is like the least toxic of the three options I've given. But no matter which way you go about it, the way men socialize in general is that it's done through some sort of toxic means. And because it's done through some sort of toxic means, it's not really authentic, is it? I don't think men actually know how to be authentic around each other. I think it's this complete ego show of showing up and seeing who's the toughest and who's got the biggest ego and who can get the girl and who can get their dick quit. It just seems to kind of be this constant need to show off to each other and showing off your peacock fellows essentially, as opposed to just being quiet and still and vulnerable and creating a space where you can actually listen to each other and talk about the shit that's actually really fucking hard in your life, and in return getting some validation that, yeah, sh life is fucking tough and it sucks, and you don't have the man up about it, you just have to work through this intense tide that's just coming for you at the moment. So I got so fucking annoyed about this post and about the idea that women should just like basically fuck off and create their own communities and just let men figure it out. And I decided that I just wanted to write something about this. I really just wanted to write something that just showed an alternative universe, essentially, a different way that we could go about it as opposed to trying to repeat something that we've already done and didn't really work for us. And so I started writing this narrative poem about a group of women and a group of men. And it was it was sort of funny. It was I always find it interesting how these things kind of happen with creative flow and when an idea pops into you, and when you're just so rammed up with feelings and just how can lay on the page. So it was it's funny because I I when I when I drafted it, I drafted about probably three quarters of it, which is usually the case. I can never finish anything. Endings, I always need to come back and redo because it just requires that extra bit of brain power that I generally don't have after writing something like three-quarters or something. Anyhow, but when I when I wrote the beginning of it, I started off with a group of women heading to a forest and doing something, and it then shifted to a group of men being in like a wool shed or something like that, and they're kind of all spending time together doing stuff. And basically, the way I kind of got my frustration out on the page and through the story was that I created this kind of like this basic bouncing narrative between the group of women heading to the forest who actually joined up in the forest and the men in the bullshed. And the bouncing narrative basically was written and in a way to sh kind of show what our world could look like if men were vulnerable to each other and actually had a good connection with not just themselves but each other, and then how that manifests with the relationship they have with women and how they interact with the world. Anyway, it was a bit of a funny one because I drafted it and then I didn't touch it for like two months, kind of similar to this podcast. Two months seems to be a thing for me, doesn't it? So, anyhow, I I drafted it and then I was just like forgot about it because I just got caught up in so many other bloody creative projects I have. I've got too many of them. But anyhow, so I did, I'm I was kind of sick. I think it was one night I was just sick of my current projects that were taking up on my time, and I decided, well, fuck them. I'm gonna go back to this thing and see if I can finish it off. And I did. Um, I always love it when you can open a piece of writing, you can immediately just connect to it. And I managed to do that and I got an ending, and the ending was just it was like chef's kiss. It was just perfect, it was so much better than what I could have anticipated because I actually had no freaking idea how I was gonna end this, and I think that's what kept me away from it for so long. But anyhow, the ending came out and it just tied it up so beautifully. And of course, I had to go back to the beginning and edit it and kind of like, you know, make sure it all kind of made sense and kind of flowed together. So there's always those edits involved. But anyhow, I ended up just publishing this um narrative poem out uh without much thought, and because I just wanted to basically get it out and do well. I was just so sick of this kind of online thought pattern that you know the solution to that the solution to our disconnection from one another, especially between the sexes, is to create more of a disconnect between them. It just kind of blew my mind that's you know, that's where we've kind of ended up. And like I said, I do get it. I do get why people are leaning towards it because, you know, it it's it's shit out there, you know, there's some really shitty behavior going on. And women are the ones who are mostly getting hurt because of it. And and I don't begrudge anyone who, you know, has been hurt and thus would like to just cut off all interaction from men and whatnot. Like I get it. I think it's a phase I think every woman will eventually go through in their life, especially if they're leaving a toxic relationship. I mean, there is definitely a group of women in our in our society that just absolutely hate men after um a really shitty marriage and divorce. And like I get it. I think that's somehow part of the process of you know healing and getting through it. I think the problem is that a lot of people get stuck in that phase, and that's certainly a choice, isn't it? But what I really wanted to do with this short piece of writing was that I just wanted to illustrate a different way we could go about it. And I doubt it'll make much impact or be all that profound, but as a creator yourself, the point I'm trying to make in all of this is that you can take the things that frustrate you about your life and the world, and you can put it down in the page and create something quite beautiful with it. And I think this is naturally what writers are supposed to be. You know, we're always trying to define what the fuck a writer is or an artist is, or you know, whether they should be political or non-political. I don't even know why there isn't an argument about being political or not political, but fuck it. The point I'm trying to make is that, you know, if something happens that frustrates you, people online are being batshit crazy like they have a tendency to do because it's online sphere, you know, use that. Use that to kind of push yourself to get something down on the page and let what you write down surprise you. I mean, I think I got lucky with this little um narrative poem and the fact that it actually turned out to be something that I could actually publish because I didn't actually intend on that being the case at all. But I think that's that's the beauty about being a creative is that you can take a spark, you can take a feeling, and you can let it ignite on the page and it can turn into something that you didn't expect. So there's lots of different forms of therapy out in the world. And I do highly recommend the therapy which involves writing down all your woes, even if it's done through a creative palette or lens, and become something that you wouldn't actually write at all because truth be told, I've never written a narrative poem before. I suck at poetry on so many levels. Um, I'm not a big poetry person. I read a lot of poems and go like, okay, that's nice, and then move on. So, you know, I I think there's I think there's something to be sad about letting a moment, letting inspiration hit you and working it through and seeing it and seeing where it can take you. That's probably the point of all this. Just let inspiration hit you and see where it can grow into. And if it ends up being something you can publish, great. If it ends up being unpublishable, then so be it. At least there was a moment between you and your craft where you got to connect and you got to experience expressing yourself on the page.