comedychick

This year has been a journey for me. I started writing this entry in May, but things have changed a lot even since then. I have a son who was singled out as having some behaviour issues in school, which I won’t go into detail about, but they led to us making doctor appointments, and getting referrals for autism evaluations. The process led to me receiving a greater understanding of what autism is, and everything that makes up a diagnosis. Oftentimes in the forms I had to fill out for him, I found myself thinking, “This sounds like me,” and “No wonder I didn’t think anything was unusual, because I’m the same way.” I learned that there’s likely a genetic component to autism, as it tends to run in families. So when my son was finally diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder at the end of March, I decided I was curious enough about myself to pursue an evaluation for myself.

It only took me two appointments with a new psychologist who specialises in autism to be told, “Yes, you’re clearly on the spectrum, and it’s fine for you to tell people that and talk about it if that’s something you’d like to do.” It likely helped that I’d compiled a list five and a half pages long of things I do or have experienced in my life that I thought may be linked to autism, over a range of the areas that make up the diagnosis, from social issues, to sensory ones, from my rigidity, to my obsessions. I’d always known about these things in my life, that had affected me; it just hadn’t occurred to me that I was so different from neurotypical that I was a different type of normal. When I received this news that I’m autistic, that’s how I viewed autism – because diagnosis now counts 1 in 68 people as somewhere on the spectrum. I don’t think autism is a bad thing, and having had it and managed to live okay all my life without knowing, I thought that it’s not necessarily a disability, though it could be, depending on where one falls on the spectrum. It’s just having a brain that processes information different from the “typical.” When I talked to my psychologist about this, he agreed that for me, it’s not a disability, and he found me very interesting because of how I’ve taught myself to adapt socially, and forced myself into situations that made me feel uncomfortable, despite my difficulties.

However, living with the knowledge that I am autistic for the last few months has changed my opinion, because now I’m noticing more the areas in which I am moderately disabled, and realised what I was actually fighting was internalised ableism, because I didn’t want to see myself as disabled. On my recent summer road trip, I didn’t drive at sunset/night until the end of the trip, when I had longer drives (El Paso to San Diego, and San Diego to Oakland). I knew I preferred not to drive at night, but I hadn’t understood exactly why until I had to do it on this trip. Here, I finally understood it’s because of my sensitivity to light. When there are particularly a lot of cars on the road, and I’m driving on highways at speeds that are 55+mi/hr, it’s a lot harder to see clearly, because the lights (headlights and tail lights) emit a beam several feet in diameter around the origin. Seeing that on dozens of cars on the road is almost sensory overload to the point I maybe shouldn’t be on the road (thankfully I’ve never been in an accident as a result, because I’m always an overly cautious driver anyway).

I have a number of similar examples that came up as I went through the process of realising I was autistic. I didn’t know sensory issues were part of autism until I kept getting asked if my son was sensitive to sound and touch. It even took me a while to realise he was sensitive to sounds, despite the fact some sounds would send him into a big fit. It was thinking about my son’s sensory issues, and those questions I kept getting asked, that led to me discovering my own sensory issues. See, as an adult, I’d adapted to avoid my sensory issues to the point that I didn’t have to think about them really. “Please don’t whistle because it hurts my ears,” was something I didn’t have to ask often. My aversion to touching raw meat – especially ground meat – was easily avoided when I could just peel the plastic off the meat and dump it into the pan to cook it. But I won’t make meat patties for burgers, because I don’t like how it feels. I’ll use a fork to mix ground meat and gravy when I’m making sausage rolls, and try not to touch any of the mixture when putting it on the pastry for the same reason. I’m constantly washing my hands in the kitchen when I’m cooking, whenever anything touches my hands. But it had never occurred to me until I was thinking about what could make me autistic that my aversion to those things was because of sensory issues. One night, after learning I’m autistic, I was in a bar having a conversation with people, and I was barely involved or focused on the conversation because the lighting and sound of the bar had put me into sensory overload, leading me to understand one of the reasons bars haven’t been the most comfortable places for me to meet and talk to people. It’s like my mind is awake to understanding more about how my body works now, and as a result, I’m struggling a lot more with issues I’d managed to adapt to and ignore in the past. I’m not sure the knowledge I’m autistic is better than when I was in the dark about it, even though technically I know it doesn’t change who I am as a person. I’ve always been this way. I was born autistic. I’ve always struggled with things. But right now, knowledge doesn’t feel like power.

I guess the major change in my life since I’ve learned I’m autistic is that, being public about it (I talked a lot about autism in the lead up to my psychologist appointments on Facebook, and after that, and then it was what I obsessively talked to people about in person a lot), I’ve given myself permission to actually lean in to my autistic behaviours rather than attempt to hide them all the time. I’ve cried more in public because I’m very emotionally sensitive and it can be very draining on me to try and hide that constantly. But it’s helped to be around friends who’ve helped me feel comfortable crying in public around them. On the other hand, it’s very easy for me to blame my autism for the things I can’t do. For example, I have a lot of amazing activist friends who will go out and march for the causes they believe in. They’re causes I agree with, and I’m always excited to see their participation, but at the same time, I wish large crowds didn’t send me into sensory overload so I could participate more, too. It’s not just the overwhelming sound. It’s the way my body processes empathy. I literally take on the emotions being experienced by those around me. This can be useful in times when I can’t read people’s facial expressions, but when I’m in large crowds experiencing strong emotions, it can be quite debilitating and/or overwhelming. My favourite example and experience with this, though, was when I was in Cape Town, South Africa the day Nelson Mandela passed away. When I walked past the town hall and encountered a group of South Africans singing and dancing to mourn his death. They weren’t crying; they sounded like they were celebrating his life. But being there, receiving their emotion into my body, I cried so hard just being amongst them.

This is one of the things I’m sure I experienced all my life, but had really learned to hide. One of the things I’d discussed with my psychologist was how, as a kid, I would get teased for being a “cry baby.” I likely seemed overly sensitive, and as a result of that, when I fractured my foot when I was younger, my parents thought I was fine because I always overreacted. I walked on that foot for a week before they took me to get it x-rayed. Not having any understanding of these sensitivities, and getting teased for them, likely also made my already difficult social issues ten times harder. I recalled for my psychiatrist an experience when I started high school. A friendly girl had seen me sitting on my own and invited me to join her group of friends. Part of me wanted to, but I didn’t go right away because I was so scared and unaware of how to socialise properly. There were a number of stupid and unconventional things I tried because of my lack of social skills in high school. Like, I couldn’t ask people directly for their phone number because I was too uncomfortable talking to people, so I’d use the phone book and look up their last name in it instead. And even after that, it was pretty rare for me to gather the courage to actually call it and talk to the person. One completely embarrassing example is when I anonymously wrote a letter (because I got his address from the phone book, too) to my then crush and told him to meet me somewhere, then when he and his friend showed up, I denied that I knew anything about it.

Though improv has helped me immensely when it comes to dealing with the social issues side of autism, the one note I would receive most from my director was “speak louder.” I’ve often had issues with people being able to hear me properly, and I’ve come to realise that it’s probably because of my sound sensitivity. When I speak at a volume that is “normal” to other people, in my ears, it sounds like I’m shouting. I don’t want to sound like I’m shouting. So this has been a struggle work past, and a hump I’ve yet to get over. On the other hand, I have a lot of autistic traits that are actually beneficial to being an improviser, which I can say because the things I get complimented on most in my performances are all things I do automatically because I’m autistic. Things like sharing my vulnerable side, because I don’t have the same sense of shame/boundaries that neurotypical people do, and as a result I talk about and say things those people are too afraid to say; or the same thing but with physical space – I’m not afraid to go up and touch people and make them uncomfortable to get an honest reaction out of them. I’m also often more emotional on stage, which brings a different life to shows that audiences often enjoy. I don’t just pretend to experience these emotions, either. I actually experience them in the moment. I’ve been trying to think about how I can teach people to improvise in the way I do, when it’s not something I’ve learned, just something I do. I like that people connect with it, and want to be able to help them open up in the same way.

I also recognise how incredibly fortunate I am to have found a psychologist who was able to put me on the spectrum after only two sessions with him. Women with autism are often under-diagnosed and not believed, in part because autism affects males and females in subtle and different ways, and most autism research has been done with males. It’s also a lot easier to diagnose children than adults (which is part of why I went in with examples of how I was as a child/teen). In the past, when I thought I had ADHD (which has some similarities with autism) instead, I was dismissed, not even being asked why I thought I was. I feel like there’s not enough awareness of autism in the field of psychologists for it to be recognised unless you see someone who actually specialises in autism like I did. The biggest relief that came with understanding, I think, was knowing where my history with depression and anxiety came from. It wasn’t my fault that I was born autistic, and could never figure out social norms.

Whilst the autism spectrum is an interesting place to learn I belong, I can really only talk about how my life is affected by it, not how autism affects everyone else on the spectrum. This comic does a much better job of explaining how vast the differences those on the spectrum are than I ever could, and there’s no sense in my detailing it over again. I do feel like I’ve surprised a few people when announcing I’m autistic, because the lack of understanding around what autism is, and also because of how I’ve managed to adapt to the world around me, so I’d figured out how to disguise, hide, or cope with many of my autistic traits so as to pass for “normal.” As a result of this surprise, though, I’d love to see greater understanding of autism, and a wider representation of the spectrum in the media. The limited representation tends to promote the idea of autistics being socially awkward male math geniuses, with not much else. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen any female autistic representation (unless it’s possible they just weren’t labelled as autistic). This may end up being my next writing endeavour, with my focus on expanding diversity. I’ve tended to steer clear of writing disabled characters, thinking I didn’t have the experience to write about them accurately (unlike my ability to write bisexual characters as a bi woman, and writing other ethnicities because I know a lot of people of other ethnicities), but now I know I was wrong about that. I know I can write autistic characters with accuracy, because I know what it’s like for both my son and myself to be autistic.

Related articles across the web

• The Joys and Challenges of Being a Parent With Autism


• Sesame Street just introduced kids to its first autistic character


• 7 activists tell us the best thing about being autistic


• ‘Minecraft’ players on the autism spectrum find a safe space on the Autcraft server


• Perfectly normal

comedychick

On September 26th, 2015, I got up on stage with my improv troupe, YUM, and delivered a 90 second monologue about how I’d bingewatched seven seasons of Supernatural in the previous five weeks (you can watch the clip below, if you’re interested).

I’d started out just wanting to catch up on the series before season 11 started, but that only required me to watch seasons 8-10. Watching them made me want to go back and revisit the series (and, okay, season 10 wasn’t available to buy yet when I finished season 9, so I started on season 1 again at that point). Though I’ve been a long time fan of the show, having started with season 1, episode 1, when it first aired in Australia, moving to Malaysia disrupted my ability to watch the series regularly. I only watched season 4 after I received it as a birthday present when I lived in Malaysia, and seasons 5-7 were watched when I first moved to the US once I had access to Netflix.

If you watched my monologue above, you can see that I was a bit embarrassed about my level of obsession with the show at the time. It’s not so much because I like the show, but because I watched so much of it in such a short period, and that it was affecting my creative motivation. I’m not embarrassed that it inspired the story I wrote for Marked by Scorn: An Anthology Featuring Non-Traditional Relationships, but I was embarrassed that part of my motivation for wanting to get more into acting was because I thought it would be awesome to a) be an actor on Supernatural and/or b) act opposite Jensen Ackles (Dean Winchester). As unrealistic as I know that desire is, my improv director and fellow troupe members encouraged me to go for it, asking, “Why not?” Why couldn’t that happen? Obviously people already saw something in my acting ability through my improv shows, and clearly I had the motivation to keep working on that.

Well, sure, but in the last year and a quarter, I’ve done a few things to go after my acting dreams (whether Supernatural related, or not — when I wasn’t constantly watching it, it was easier to let that go as my motivation). I took classes, like training with Michael Navarra at SF Acting Academy, and then five months training with Jeffrey Weissman. I did workshops with people who work in LA and came up to San Francisco. I submitted myself to roles, auditioned for some of them, and acted in my first ever student film, which I was fortunate enough to be cast the lead in. I had to turn down a last minute opportunity because I was unavailable for the role. I lost 40 pounds, and I dyed my hair back to my natural brown, all because I thought it would help me get more auditions. I went to networking events.

Along the way, I feel like I’ve made a few revelations.

I’m more of a personality than an “actor” or “improviser” or “writer” or whatever else it is that I do. I’m always going to do my best work when I’m working with a team of friends who understand me and want to work with me. When I was the lead in Go Your Own Way, I got a taste of what it feels like to be part of a film cast&crew family. I think this is a big part of the draw of Supernatural, because you can see what a tight nit and caring family they are. You see it in their interactions, and how dedicated they are to their fans, with their conventions and their campaigns. They care. And that’s the kind of thing I want to be part of. I’d rather work with people I like on projects that inspire me, for no pay, than go through the arduous audition process to try and get a part for something I’m not really interested in just so I can get a paycheck.

In improv, I have this. The community, the feeling like family, is a big part of why I’ve continued to follow that route and progress to the level of performing at festivals. I feel weird saying this, but this has been the year where I’ve had improv newcomers come and tell me they were fans of YUM, and my work, and they have said that a part of that has been because of how open and honest I am as a person and in my work on stage. I feel like I’ve had a very small-scale experience of what many of the Supernatural cast have — fans being able to connect on a more personal level. It certainly changes the appreciation for the person from more than just their work in their chosen craft. It’s an appreciation for their personality. The realisation that this person is human just like you are. I had a conversation with one of these “fans” (again, I still weird saying that, because to me it’s a developing friendship) somewhat recently about their feeling intimidated talking to other improvisers with a lot more experience than them, and the fear of not measuring up. And so I talked to them about my own experiences with feeling like that, and how I built up my confidence over time through working and training with more experienced people, so it led to a friendship.

And then I think about how I was at the San Francisco Supernatural convention this past weekend, and how different things were for me there. It’s been many, many years since I’ve been involved in any kind of fandom community. A Harry Potter one was probably the last, which I left probably back in 2009. Or it wound down. I don’t remember the details. Sure, it was post Supernatural starting, but I joined more for the community aspect than appreciation of fan works.

Attending the Supernatural convention alone and seeing so many people there with a friend, or groups of friends, gave me a greater understanding of what the SPN family community is like. How it’s helped many people find a sense of belonging, and working on various mental health issues. I found myself feeling a little envious that I’ve missed out on some of that because I’m not involved in fandom, and I choose to not make time for it because I have other things in my life that are more important to me. It’s not like I don’t have my own community, my own family. I just tend not to have friends that I talk with at length about the shows and movies I watch, or the books and graphic novels I read. I’ve found that, even though I can get really enthusiastic and excited about the things I’m interested in, I’m rarely able to convince people to take a chance on those interests themselves. I’m about as good at convincing people to watch popular things I like as I am at getting them to consume my creative outputs, which is to say it doesn’t happen very often. When I attended the convention, I thought the only Supernatural fans I knew were: my friend who was originally supposed to go with me, but thought she might have a work thing she’d have to attend; my husband’s girlfriend; and an Internet friend from way back who’s been to a ton of fan conventions over the years. I didn’t think I’d get much reaction posting about any of it on Facebook. That ended up not being the case, and I discovered a bunch of other people who liked the show, who I’d just had no idea were into it because I don’t talk about it that much. And even if some of the Facebook reactions I got weren’t from people who were fans of the show, it suggests that I also have a lot of friends who appreciate my ability to celebrate the things I like on Facebook.

I’m going to talk more about the actual convention when I write up a part 2 of this entry, but there are still some things that relate more closely with the thoughts I had here. Like, before I attended, I figured it’s so expensive, I’d only go to one Supernatural convention ever, because how could I justify spending that kind of money again, when I’ve already seen all the actors I like? I ended up snagging 6 different photo ops because I thought I wouldn’t have another chance to if I wasn’t going to attend another convention. But then actually being there, I felt the value. It made me want to go back. It made me want to connect with other people, even though I was too shy to really talk to anyone. I barely ever said more than thank you to the actors during the photo ops because I wanted to do the polite thing and not hold up the lines, as we were directed in the rules. I mean, I didn’t even introduce myself! I figured they see so many fans at these things, it’s not like they’d remember me anyway. Although I did comment to Rob Benedict, “I’m back again,” when I went for round two of the free Louden Swain autographs, so I could get my CDs signed. I was wearing the same red leather jacket so I thought he might’ve been able to recognise that, and maybe I was a little embarrassed to be doing that. Probably my favourite interaction with another fan was chatting to someone at the Random Acts booth while I made a birthday card. She commented on my “Emma Swan” jacket, and I fortunately knew she was referencing Once Upon a Time, because that’s one of the only other network TV shows I watch at the moment, and I got to comment on the fact I didn’t make that connection when buying the jacket, and I associate red leather jackets more with Buffy from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and it was just nice to be able to talk to someone who understood all of those references.

A lot of people do seem to return to these conventions, and I certainly got a taste as to why. There’s a part of me that feels a desire to be more of an unashamed fanatic. I don’t judge the way others celebrate their fandoms, but I think I do judge myself. It’s like, I’ll say something to myself to the effect of, “Why are you getting so worked up? They’re just people, just like you.” Or, “They’re never going to get to know you, so just admire them from afar; you don’t need to reach out, and they’re not going to want to be your friend if you’re an obsessive fangirl anyway.” Whether that’s true or not doesn’t matter. I’m a bit of an obsessive fangirl of improv rock group Oil in the Alley, but I worked my way to friendship with them, and worked on music videos with them. Granted, I was friends with one of them before I knew who they were, but they still appreciated me, and how much I celebrate and share their work. So, the point is, I could just be telling myself lies in order to make myself behave in a way that protects me from feeling judged rather than letting myself appreciate something the way I want to appreciate it. I know I’d like to attend another Supernatural convention. Maybe by the time I do, I’ll have worked out how to connect more with the rest of the community of fans. Because if there’s any fandom that really appreciates and caters to their fans, it’s Supernatural. That’s been obvious since as early as season 4, when the plotline of the Prophet writing the Supernatural books was introduced, and Sam and Dean discovered fanfiction written about them. Including the incestuous stuff. It’s the only show I’ve seen celebrate that side of fandom to that extent. Even without being involved in the fandom, the meta episodes like those are my favourites.

(Part 2 of my thoughts and commentary after the convention will be more focused on the events at the convention itself, and include the photos I got with the various cast members; I’ll post that sometime after I get the jpegs, which will be better than the scanned versions I currently have on Facebook).

comedychick

This post is part review, part personal commentary. I turned 32 yesterday, and my gift from my husband’s parents was a ticket to see If/Then at SHN Orpheum in San Francisco. I really enjoyed it, and it brought up a lot of reflection and thoughts for me, so I wanted to share some of them here. Please note that there may be some minor spoilers about the musical.

If/Then wasn’t like any other musical I’ve seen before (other professional musicals I’ve seen include Spamalot! and Avenue Q on Broadway, Wicked in London, and The Book of Mormon at the same theatre in San Francisco). It’s a modern day tale that, if any resemblance is possible, would be most similar to the Gwyneth Paltrow film Sliding Doors, both for their female protagonists, and their “what if?” story structure. They pick one point in the character’s life and how their life could drastically change depending on the choice that was made.

I didn’t know anything about the musical before I went to see it. I wanted to go because the protagonist, Elizabeth, was played by Idina Menzel. I quietly joked to myself on the way up from BART that it should be a musical about computer programmers due to the nature of if then statements when writing a program. An interesting side effect considering I haven’t had to do much computer programming for many years.

Whilst I didn’t know what I was getting into in seeing the musical, and reading the program for it at the start suggested they operated on Broadway at a loss, I really connected with the musical in a number of ways.

First I want to discuss the diversity, because that’s one of the major focuses of my blog. I really appreciated the ways they dealt with sexuality in the musical. One of the characters, Lucas, is bisexual. In one timestream, he sleeps with a woman, clearly in love with her, and in the other, he has a relationship with a man and clearly points out that he could go either way. However, his sexuality is not his defining trait, which is too often what happens with non-straight characters in fiction. It’s just a small part of who he is. The same can be said about the lesbian couple that feature in the musical. I truly felt like they were fully fleshed out characters rather than one-dimensional lesbians. One minor note about the treatment of bisexuality, however, is when ‘Liz’ makes a comment that she “[doesn’t] believe in bisexuals [and] they should just pick a side.” Lucas is her best friend; she should know better than that. Fortunately, I only heard one person in the entire audience cheer that line, so I like to think the rest of the audience know how bogus that is.

The other thing I appreciated about the diversity was the racial make up of the cast. I don’t know if this was a conscious choice within the script, a conscious choice in the casting process, or if they went with non-traditional casting. Either way, though, it was nice to see a racially diverse cast in such strong roles, and for their race to not need to be called out. The African American characters in particular had very important careers, and so I appreciated that they did not have to play into negative stereotypes.

In the musical’s program, I read that the writer wanted his audience to really think about their own “what if?” moments in life, and how things have worked out for them, and that was certainly true for me. I don’t know how differently I’d have watched it had it not been November, when I’ve already been reflecting on a friendship I regret to have lost because November is pretty much the month we truly became friends. In some ways I felt like I could relate to Lucas with the ‘Beth’ timeline. Not simply because of his bisexuality, but in the difficulty he had sharing his vulnerability with her, and her ultimate rejection of him. And, later on, revealing that they had not communicated for years before finally seeing each other again.

It’s hard to be that vulnerable with someone who doesn’t seem as strongly influenced by a friendship that you are. To admit to someone how much they meant to you. How much they still mean to you, despite all efforts to move on.

I haven’t thought much about that person from my past in the last several months because cutting contact with me seemed to be a clear indication that they had no interest in trying to fix our friendship, or forgive me for my regrettable behaviour when I suffered too much from depression and anxiety. I don’t blame those illnesses. I still made the bad choices I did, even when I was influenced by them.

There’s a part of me that wants to try and reach out again. Could my former friend have had enough time to heal over more than a year? On the other hand, I don’t want to risk interrupting what is probably a perfectly good life for them now, without me in it. I have this belief that they’re not the kind of person who would reach out to me if they missed me, but I’m also afraid to take that vulnerable step toward rebuilding a friendship with someone when all signs suggest they don’t want me to. Just because I’ve managed to bridge the gap with one of my other important friendships in the past, where we were able to rebuild trust and regain what we had, doesn’t mean I’d be able to make the same thing happen again.

So as November passes into December, I hope I will be able to move on again, as I did before, and just reflect on those “what ifs?” when I’m confronted by them in the media I consume. Theatre. Movies. Music. It didn’t help that this former friend explicitly mentioned Sliding Doors in one conversation we had about the coincidences and choices within our friendship. But I will move on again.

Anyway, that’s enough reflecting about that. There were also ways I connected with Elizabeth. So many moments that felt so real, and the ultimate question of “Can women really have it all?” It seemed that in one timeline, she was able to have a successful career, but failed in love, but the opposite was true in the second timeline. Was she happier in one or the other? No, she had ups and downs in both. They were simply different. Different positives, different negatives, such that you couldn’t make an objective comparison as to which life was better. Does that mean we should just be happy with what life throws us? Not necessarily. There are still choices. Whilst there was only one moment that split the timelines, there were several other moments open to “what if?” questioning. Other possibilities. I do think that we are ultimately responsible for the choices we make, and too often we put the outcomes in the hands of fate, or blame other people for what we’ve chosen to do, or not chosen to do, as the case may be. I know I’ve done that. There are many choices from my past that could have led me down a completely different path than I’m on now, but it’s also been interesting to wonder how much fate has had a hand in it. Opportunities falling through, only to present themselves again later, in a better way.

I make more active choices in my life now than I ever have before. It’s how I’ve managed to continue with improv as long as I have, and gained the courage to move into acting. But I’m not immune to having my choices affect other people. I might have to make choices for myself that inevitably hurts someone I care about. Perhaps that’s what my former friend had to do with me, when they chose to cut contact. But I hope if I have to do that again in the future, it’s done out of love rather than fear. The problem with being a writer is that I will often consider things from so many different angles that it can then be confusing to understand my motivation behind anything.

All in all, I thought If/Then was a very emotionally engaging musical. There were several moments I found tears streaming down my face. It’s still playing in San Francisco for a few more days, so if you have the chance to go, I recommend it. If you’re not in San Francisco, if it does come to your city, hopefully you can see it too.

Related articles across the web

• LaChanze from “If/Then”


• FROZEN’s ‘Let It Go’ by Idina Menzel is Certified 8X’s Platinum


• God and Elphaba announce S.F. musical theater runs

comedychick

When terrorist attacks occur in Western countries, Westerners can be quick to respond with vitriol and hatred directed at Muslims, whether or not the attack has yet been confirmed carried out by people who identify as Muslim. I don’t know what it was like before September 11, 2001, because I was only 17 then, and not yet aware of the worldwide political landscape. The World Trade Center attack was a wake-up call for many, as it was me. I watched it live purely because it interrupted whatever comedy programme I was watching at the time it started. What I can say is that I’ve noticed attitudes towards “others,” especially Muslims, seems to have gotten steadily worse since then, especially with the rise of social media.

I generally don’t step up to talk about these issues. Part of it is about wanting to keep the peace, though I know where I stand on the issues, I don’t wish to fight with people who disagree with me on them. I also often don’t feel I know enough to make comment, and that there are many more people with a more personal understanding of the situations who are better suited to speak up. I believe it is better to listen to the stories of the people who have first-hand experience with things, rather than having those stories filtered through someone who does not. I cannot begin to fathom the true sense of loss and pain suffered by those who have experienced the violence of terrorism. I have never lost someone that way.

Having said that, I’m tired of reading hatred spewed online, filling up small sections of my Facebook news feed. I am lucky that I don’t have very many Facebook friends who believe all Muslims are evil, but the fact is I have still seen it. I’ve never felt like I could argue with someone who believes such things, so I never spoke up. But I’m sick and tired of that attitude, and I want to say something now.

I lived in a predominantly-Muslim country for over five and a half years. In my experience, the attacks they get in Western culture is unwarranted. Those who I know personally who identify as Muslim enjoy the same things we do. They just want to go about their lives the same way we do. They’re not violent people, on the whole. I’m sick of seeing people blame the violence and terrorism on an entire religion. This video sums up much better than I can about why I think it’d ridiculous to lump every Muslim into one category. There are a lot of Muslim countries in the world. They are not all suffering from the threat of ISIS. Even in the Middle East, The Queen of Jordan has said there is nothing Islamic about ISIS. And getting people in Western countries to fear Muslims is exactly what ISIS wants.

I wish there was a simple way to get people to choose love and compassion over fear and hate. Though I don’t consider myself religious, I was raised Catholic, and I still believe in the compassionate teachings of Jesus and the Bible. Love thy neighbour. My understanding of most major religions is that we should be compassionate to all, not just those who look like we do, and believe the same things. This is true of Islam as much as it is Christianity. I’ve learned this through knowing people who are Muslim. I do my best to avoid poor mass media representations of them, because personal experience with actually meeting them and listening to them should trump that.

Now, I understand the difficulty with that, I do. I’m guilty of not taking the time to ask people questions about their experiences because I’m afraid of saying something offensive. But that doesn’t stop me from reading about their experiences online, where they have made the effort to be heard. That doesn’t stop me from being friends with them and understanding their character, finding what we have in common, outside of religion. Because religious beliefs will always only be one aspect of who a person is anyway.

Not everyone will be open enough to talk about their experiences, but we can always listen to the ones who are. About a year and a half ago, perhaps a little longer, when I still lived in Malaysia, my eldest son’s best school friend came from an Iraqi refugee family. I took my son to visit him one afternoon, and stayed. I got to talk to his parents, but mostly I just listened. I listened to their stories of how Iraq was once a more open country, where Muslims and Christians lived side-by-side in peace. I listened to the pain they felt when they started to see their country change, and the moment where Muslim was pitted against Muslim, slaughtering each other in the street, solidifying for them that it was time to flee their home. I learned about how their family is now spread across several countries around the world, and I felt the pain of being separated by that distance. But they were the lucky ones. They got out. They survived.

I support the idea of letting refugees in. The argument of it being a risk and allowing the terrorists in is ridiculous, because if the terrorists want in, they’ll get in regardless. They will find a way. I would like to think that standing with these people, allowing them into our schools, will create a better understanding of what they have been through. More compassion. When they stand among us, we won’t have to give in to the fear created by the media, because we will personally know these “other” people and know that the media is lying to us. The media should not control us like that, and we have the power to stop it.

Because they are just like us. Their children are just like our children. I am proud of the fact that my kids go to a school with mixed ethnicities and religions. A couple of weeks ago, I chaperoned four kids for my 3rd grader’s field trip. My son was one of them. One of them was a Muslim girl, and the other two were Hispanic kids. They all behaved the same way. Childhood innocence. But who they grow up to be will depend a lot on how they are treated by those who don’t look like them. I wish they could grow up in a world where they had the same privileges my son does. I wish they could grow up in a world that will treat them with the respect they deserve. But I’m afraid with the attitudes I see around the world, that dream is too far to grasp.

The media needs to do a better job of shaping our positive attitudes towards “other.” I do what I can with the anthologies I publish, but I’m only a small independent publisher, and what I release doesn’t have the wide audience it deserves to have. But I still do my best to make those voices heard. In my last anthology, that included a story about a grieving Muslim mother, experiencing loss the same way anyone else would. In the anthology I’m working on now, there’s a story about the difficulty of being gay and Muslim. Both of these pieces were included because I really feel it’s important for people to see the similarities of their experiences, rather than the differences.

We are all human.

It’s time to stop being scared of people just because you don’t personally know anyone who fits into a particular race or religion. The majority of them are not like their negative portrayals in the media.

comedychick

Last week, my friend Able Christian and I recorded a bunch of webcam webisodes of the two old Scottish men characters we’ve been messing around with for months. The basis for these characters started when we were at a birthday party for Leela’s Artistic Director Jill Eickmann. It was a fun night of dancing and drinking, but as the night progressed, I found myself feeling way older than my 31 years, and had to sit down due to a pain in my knee. Able came over to see what that was about.

I can’t remember who started the voices between the two of us, but my feeling old certainly justified some old voices and back and forth between us. There were a lot of drinks with ice and straws, which led to us complaining about the lack of people drinking “real drinks,” and the characters just grew from there. Pretty much any time we’ve gotten together at a bar, and sometimes other places, we just fall into these characters conversing about issues that are important to them. Most often, drinking, and “young people these days.”

We’ve been talking for months about recording the characters. At some point, we’d like to produce some high production quality videos with them. But for now, we were lucky to have time to record direct to YouTube on my camera a few videos that really capture the spirit of the conversations we’ve been having as the newly named Alec Ainsley and Hamish MacAdam over the last few months.

All of the videos are available below, starting with the first one, which should continue through the relevant playlist on YouTube.

Able and I perform together as part of the only LGBT improv troupe in the Bay Area, LiGhtBrighT, as well as separately in Leela’s performing improv ensembles, Marjorie’s Mask (Able) and YUM! (me).

Both of these Leela troupes will be performing on the same bill this Saturday at 8pm at the 9th St Independent Film Center in San Francisco, headlined by duo Pamela and Dave. For more information visit the Facebook event page. Tickets are available in advance on Eventbrite.

comedychick

YUM! cast members, from L to R: Dillon Thomas, Heather Field, Hemant Sharma,
Adrian Bosada, Jean Nachiwala, Casey Trujillo, Nilay Shah, Dominica Malcolm
Photo by Michael Astrauskas

Since my last update about my first 8 months in the San Francisco Bay Area, I’ve been getting even more involved in the improv scene. In that post, I wrote about wanting to audition for Leela’s PIE program, and that their PIE group YUM! had been one of the first groups I saw in San Francisco, before I even knew about Leela.

Though I hadn’t had the requisite Improv III class under my belt, I auditioned with Leela at the end of March, and was subsequently cast in YUM!, much to my surprise and delight! I was able to take the Improv III class in the lead up to our first show, whilst also rehearsing weekly with the latest cast (pictured above), as well as going to weekly duo classes with a separate partner, Syeda Huq. Whilst I am still going to these duo classes and YUM! rehearsals, I wanted to write a bit about my experiences with YUM!, as it’s really had a profound effect on my life. Then, at the end of this post, you’ll have the chance to watch us in action, as our first show was uploaded to YouTube.

YUM! Photo by Michael Astrauskas

The thing that has struck me most about working with YUM has been the level of support I’ve received from my fellow troupe members. I was particularly touched by how Adrian and Dillon — the only remaining members from the troupe as I first saw them last year — supported me when I participated in the Lady jam at the end of the Femprovisor Festival in May, before I’d had a show with them. Heck, we’d only had two rehearsals together by that point. It’s really meant a lot to me to have felt welcomed by those I see as being far more experienced than myself. Especially since I could probably have described myself as being a fangirl for YUM! once I’d seen them perform for the first time. I’m pretty sure they were on the line-up for the first Leela show I went to, and why I’d dragged myself out to see it.

We’ve been connecting really well together, and I feel like our current format with truthful monologues has really allowed us to bond and trust each other quicker than we might have otherwise. Of course, the atmosphere of Leela in general also lends itself to that truthful fun.

Immediately following our first show, or rather the morning after, we were able to gather together for a group retreat, which took place at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, followed by spending the night at Dillon’s place, where half of us stayed up until 6am. Words cannot really express how incredible of an experience it all was, but it certainly helped us feel closer to each other. We’ve found in-jokes and catch phrases, that in part came out of our first show, and has just continued to grow.

YUM! at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom

After barely two hours sleep (for me — the others who stayed up until 6am with me seemed to get a little more sleep than I did), we snuggled up with each other on Dillon’s bed and an air mattress to have a last minute discussion on what our photo shoot would entail, as we were scheduled for a session at 1:30pm. A couple of us didn’t really have time to go home due to the distance we lived from Dillon’s place and San Francisco, so that factored into things. I ended up having to rush to a clothing store with Adrian once we arrived in San Francisco, and we were lucky I found an outfit that fit with our plan for “scholarly look” on the clearance rack in only a couple of minutes, and that it fit perfectly once I tried it on. Meanwhile, Jean drove Casey, Hemant and Nilay back to San Francisco, and they’d been tasked with getting dictionaries for the shoot, but when they couldn’t find enough, ended up getting Dr Seuss books, which we all decided via whatsapp actually worked even better for us. It blows me away just how easily everything has come together for us. I don’t think I’ve ever felt more connected with a group of people than I do with YUM!.

All up, I just feel so incredibly lucky to be working with such a talented, open, and honest group of people. Our director, too — Christopher DeJong — has been great. He’s really encouraged us to open up with our truths, and dig deep with our emotional vulnerability. The exercises he’s given us during rehearsal have been great to help us focus on the things that we as a group have decided we want to work on, and I think that’s a really important attribute to have as a director.

So, now, feel free to watch our first show!

Our next shows with this current cast are on June 13th, along with Sketchy Alley and Couples Counseling, and June 27th alongside That One Troupe and Sketchy Alley. Both shows are at the Ninth St Independent Film Center in San Francisco, starting at 8pm.

Tickets are available online for $15 or $20 at the door. See Eventbrite for the tickets: June 13 and June 27.

comedychick

If you’re not already aware, the main project I’ve been working on for the last few months is Amok: An Anthology of Asia-Pacific Speculative Fiction. Submissions closed November 30th last year, and I finished reading through them all by the beginning of this year.

I’m now at the stage of having the proof copy in my hands within the next week, and so I think it’s time I talk a bit about it here.

First of all, the stunning cover was illustrated by Jun Hun Yap. I had a great time working with him and highly recommend him if you’re looking for an artist yourself. Check it out:

Now let me tell you a bit about my motivations behind developing this anthology. If you’ve been following my blog, you’ll know that I write a bit about diversity in the media, or lackthereof. I thought, rather than complaining about the lack of diversity, why don’t I actually create something that represents what I want to see more of? And so came Amok.

Speculative fiction is the genre I’m most drawn to these days, both as a reader and a writer, and so it just made the most sense for me to focus the anthology there. I generally define the genre as real world settings with elements of science-fiction, fantasy, or horror. A nice mix of the real and unreal.

When it came to the selection process, I knew that the Asia-Pacific region would help me with the racial diversity I was looking for. I was also looking for diversity in the areas of sexuality, religion, gender, age, and ability. I was really lucky that I got submissions that represented all of these, though some areas were limited, and I particularly wanted more LGBT stories than I’d received. I ended up writing a story to fill the gap I felt had been missing from submissions, picking a location that no submissions had been set in (South Korea), and adding a non-traditional relationship to the mix.

I was able to include most of the settings that I received submissions for. Aside from my South Korea story, you will also find stories set in Australia (3), China (2), Hawaii (2), Hong Kong (1), India (1), Indonesia (1), Japan (2), Malaysia (4), New Zealand (1), Pacific Ocean (2), Philippines (2), Singapore (1), Thailand & Vietnam (1).

You may note that Malaysia and Australia have the most stories, and that would be because they had the most submissions, with a grand total of 13 for Malaysia and 12 for Australia. Limiting those stories was one of the hardest tasks because the quality was so great, and so sometimes it came down to the type of diversity in the stories themselves. In the Australian stories, there’s one with disabled children, one that includes an Aboriginal woman, and the final one has a single mother protagonist. The Malaysian stories are almost as racially diverse as the country and focus on different aspects of the culture I’ve grown familiar with in the last five years. I really wanted to showcase that diversity, and judging by the reviews so far, people have been impressed with the Malaysian stories.

The Reviews

“No messing around here. You MUST read this book as soon as it comes out. Anyone who likes anything even slightly science fiction will ADORE these stories.” — Read the full review by K.C. Finn

“I have to say that Amok is the most satisfying anthology I have read in years, and it will stay with me for a long time.” — Read the full review by Rumaizah Bakar

“[I]f like me you’re the kind of adult who still requires a story or two at bedtime, these will do nicely. If you’re a reader of Asian-American fiction or Hyphen magazine, you might be looking for just this kind of book.” — Read the full review at Books and Cleverness

The Blurb

In an anthology that spans from India in the west to Hawai‛i in the east, and as far south as Australia and New Zealand, 24 authors bring you an exciting range of tales set in the past, present, and future.

Discover characters like the Moon Rabbit from Chinese mythology, a kitsune from Japanese mythology, and the aswang from Filipino mythology.

Find out what arises when a struggling Malaysian student seeks help for her studies in Chinatown, and what happens when the garbage in the Pacific Ocean is seen as a valuable treasure.

Futures imagined stretch from amazing advances in technology to depressing dystopias.

Read these stories and so many more in Amok: An Anthology of Asia-Pacific Speculative Fiction.

Featuring stories by:

Brett Adams, Jo Wu, Kris Williamson, Recle Etino Vibal, Tabitha Sin, Ailia Hopkins, KZ Morano, TR Napper, Terence Toh, Kawika Guillermo, Barry Rosenberg, Eeleen Lee, Jax Goss, Jo Thomas, Daniel A. Kelin II, Fadzlishah Johanabas, Shenoa Carroll-Bradd, Dominica Malcolm, Aashika Nair, Celeste A. Peters, Agnes Ong, Rebecca Freeman, NJ Magas, and Tom Barlow

The Campaign

As with Solarwyrm Press’ previous books, we are crowdfunding again. Amok is actually one of two anthologies we’re releasing at the same time. The other one is Allusions of Innocence, edited by Jax Goss, who previously edited our first anthology, Fae Fatales. Though the official release date for these books is April 30th, you’ll be able to get them early by ordering them through the campaign.

Click here for the campaign on Indiegogo.

We are also coincidentally running the campaign at the same time Indiegogo is promoting campaigns that empower women for International Women’s Day next month. What this means is that, since we’re included in that, Indiegogo will give us $1 for every $25 raised on March 3rd. That doesn’t mean you should wait until then to buy a book or two. We’ve already gotten off to a great start with orders, but the amount we actually need in order to pay everyone who was involved in the books is a lot higher than the goal we set. We just set the goal low because we wanted to be able to get the books to people regardless of how much money we made from the campaign. That means every dollar we receive makes a difference!

Right now the rewards are limited mostly to the new anthologies and our back catalogue (including my novel, Adrift). However, if you love the book cover(s), I will most likely be adding a t-shirt reward in the next week, if you’d like to pick up a t-shirt with one of the book covers printed on it!

It would be awesome if you can help us spread the word about the campaign and the books. And if you can contribute by buying something, even better!

comedychick

Getting to this point has been a long and sometimes emotionally difficult road. I wasn’t sure how I was going to feel once I finally held my novel in my hands. Creating the ebook files was almost too easy for me, with my background in Internet Computing. It didn’t quite feel real then. And whilst battling with depression, I thought there was a strong possibility that I wasn’t going to feel anything.

Thankfully I was proven wrong by that. In one of my more obvious narcissistic tendencies, on the day the book arrived, I kept looking at it, admiring my work, from the cover design, to the formatting inside. Then I’d look at how thick it is and think, “Wow, did I really write that much?”

I’ve been working hard on sorting out the Indiegogo perks, looking at sales avenues, and various marketing opportunities, over the last few days. I got to be a guest on a new podcast, which will go live on September 20. That was a lot of fun to do. Go check out Stark Raven Mad Radio to see what it’s all about!

Now to let you know what else is happening with the book.

I set up a pre-order for the ebook, and PayPal “buy now” options to order it direct through me. If anyone orders it via the PayPal links before the release date, I’ll try and get them sent off early. While I’m travelling until Sept 1st, I may not be able to get those orders organised until I return, but I can do my best to try. You can check out those options here, or you can wait until the official release date (September 19) to buy it direct from Amazon and other locations.

I’m also running a giveaway on Goodreads right now! 3 paperbacks are up for grabs, so feel free to check that out! That’ll end on the release date.

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Goodreads Book Giveaway

Adrift

by Dominica Malcolm

Giveaway ends September 19, 2013.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

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</p>

Enter to win

comedychick

Meet Jax Goss: South African born, New Zealand based writer. She’s the instigator behind Solarwyrm Press, which recently released its first book, Fae Fatales: A Fantasy Noir Anthology. Prior to starting up Solarwyrm, Jax won a highly commended award for her short story “Icarus” from Commonwealth Writers, and published a collection of shorts in The Edge of the Map.

Since I finally got around to reading The Edge of the Map whilst in India, and Jax has been keeping busy with Solarwyrm projects, I thought now would be a great time to feature her here. You can find my review of her book on Goodreads, but for now, I asked Jax a few questions.

In your mind, what sums up your style of writing?

I write a lot of speculative fiction. I think, probably because it’s what I prefer, my writing is very character-based. My stories often start with a character, and then I build from there. My first question is almost always “Who is this person?”. Of course, the ‘person’ might be a mole, or a building, or anything. But the character is the important thing.

Tell us a little about the diversity in Fae Fatales.

The diversity is possibly the thing I am proudest of about Fae Fatales. I didn’t set out to make a diverse anthology, not explicitly, anyway. But there are multiple characters who break the cis-hetero-white-male mould. There are multiple LGBT characters in the anthology, and several characters of colour. I’m not sure if it is something about the genre that draws that out, or whether it speaks to the kinds of writers that are drawn to something like Solarwyrm (which is a tad left-field), but it made me very, very happy to not even consciously try and achieve that kind of diversity.

As well as the diversity within the stories, our writers and artists came from all across the globe, from Qatar, to New Zealand, to Italy, to the States. That’s also exciting for me, especially since it is relatively recently that that was even possible.

As an anthology editor, what sorts of things do you like to see in the writing you receive?

The most important thing is difference. That’s a really difficult thing to pinpoint, I think, but what I am looking for is something twisty, something unpredictable. I have an MA in narrative theory, so it is rare for a story to surprise me – if you can pull that off it goes a long, long way.

Another thing vital for me is character. I love character-driven stories, and so I am drawn to interesting and well-developed characters. This is not always easy to do in a short story, so when an author succeeds, it is always very notable.

Jax is currently looking for submissions to her next anthology, which is seeking stories about precocious children in adult fiction. You can find the details on the Solarwyrm web site.

Pick up The Edge of the Map:

eBook on Smashwords (you set the price)

Print copy from Amazon

Pick up Fae Fatales: A Fantasy Noir Anthology

Black & white edition on Amazon

Full colour edition on Amazon

Kindle ebook on Amazon

ebook on Smashwords

To learn more about and follow Jax Goss, look her up on her web site, Facebook, and Twitter. You can also follow Solarwyrm Press on their web site and Facebook.