But non-fiction is a LOT harder than I thought it was!

Here my hubby goes cranking out a book a month, and not only are they coherent, you can actually finish reading them without your mind wandering or your eyes going crossed.

I’m six pages into my book on getting the bully off your back and I find myself rambling all over the place!

Doesn’t make any sense.

I can write blog posts and stay focused and coherent, why am I having such a hard time with this?

Basically the book I’m working on will outline how I did it.

How I went from wimpy victim to the *ahem* strongly independent creature that I am!

I’m very proud of the fact that nobody dares bully me now! And even prouder of the fact that I don’t bully anyone either.

(Or at least I try not to and 99.9% of folks would agree.)

The fact that there is peace in my family–even with three son in laws from three different cultures and their accompanying extended families–show’s the extent of the social skills I’ve acquired–I think.

But transcribing accurately the process I went through in order to get to this point sure isn’t easy.

And in the process I’m delving quite deeply into the social hierarchies that exist in any micrcosm, including schools.

One conclusion I’m coming to is that in any group, there is always one person who is at the bottom of the social hierarchy and feels it keenly.

That is the victim.

And part of being the victim involves accepting the prevailing opinion that somehow you’re worth less than everyone else.

It was Eleanor Roosevelt who said the wise words, “Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

And it’s so fascinating that children themselves are the ones who create the ‘cool’ cliques, the ones everyone else strives to emulate.

So basically many victims are feeding into creating their own nemeses.

And most people don’t leave behind this silliness when they graduate high school. They carry these struggles into their adult lives. Why else would so many people dig themselves into such holes of debt just trying to keep up with the ‘joneses’.

Sometimes I wonder if I’m getting too ‘mature’ to write effectively for young people.

A lot of the petty rivalries that pepper bestsellers just seem so stupid to me.

And don’t get me started on those silly housewives of … reality series.

I can’t believe anyone would want to spend time watching such idiotic women!

I guess this is all symptomatic of the sponge phase I’m going through.

So many thoughts, all in a flurry in my poor little head.

Sorting them out feels like I’m in one of those booths with all the money flying around, trying to catch hold of the bills.

One of my favourite shows these days is called Museum Secrets. (As if I don’t have enough stuff floating around in my head, I watch this show because it’s filled with even more interesting tidbits!)

Tonight they were talking about two museums in Berlin.

Never thought I’d care to see the museums in Berlin! But they’re the ones with the bust of Nefertiti!

A lot of people probably don’t know who she was.

I do.

Read it long ago on one of my ancient Egypt binges.

She was the wife of Akhenaten, a pharoah who tried to convert Egypt to the worship of one deity. Not sure if he was monotheistic. He called it Aten and basically it was symbolized by the sun.

A lot of people don’t know that Nefertiti was the mother or stepmother of a very famous pharoah that they do know about: Tutankhamon.

But I bet people didn’t know that Tutankhamon was once called Tuankhaten. They changed the last part of his name from ‘aten’ the worship of the one deity, to ‘amon’, Amon being a very major Egyptian deity.

Why do I know all this stuff?

I read a novel set in ancient Egypt about the lifetime of Tutankhamon.

People probably don’t know that back then, in order to keep the bloodlines pure, pharoahs married their sisters.

No wonder Tut died at such a  young age! And he ended up marrying his half sister Ankhsenpaaten who was later called Ankhsenamon. (Again the deity changing thing.)

But there was a lot of religious zealotry going on at that time. The priests wanting the country to return to the polytheism they were used to and after Akhenaten’s death, that’s precisely what the priests did.

Why am I talking about all this stuff?

Just to say that all these thoughts and ideas and information float around constantly in my head, and eventually settle down into my a kind of lower strata to form part of my subconscious.

The thoughts then lie dormant for years, even decades, until voila I watch some documentary special on T.V. that reminds me of them.

That causes a sort of aeration, a stirring of the compost if you will, and when I’m writing a piece, one of those thoughts will slip right into place there and lend a richness tinged with a slight scent of earthy decay, hinting at the depths from which it came.

You know, that sort of thing.

It’s supposed to make me sound quite intelligent. Not sure if it works, but what the heck, got to try, right?

Bodes well for writing.

Well at least for fiction.

Non-fiction on the other hand, seems to be a completely different animal.

Requires a LOT more clarity.

The thoughts are there. I just have to settle them down into some form of logic.

p.s. After re-reading all this stuff I just wrote, not sure if my blog post is really all that clear. But oh well, it’s late, and I’m tired. Gotta sign out. These ramblings will just have to do for today.

Over and out.