The Odd Man

Have you ever been in a room surrounded by people you love, people who love you, and felt totally and completely out of place? Totally and completely isolated? Like you're the third or fifth or whichever odd-numbered-wheel? It can be one of the saddest feelings...

If you've ever felt this way, I'm betting someone has told you that you weren't seeing the whole picture...that you were being melodramatic, or ignoring things and focusing instead on your emotions. Maybe that's true. Maybe that's what I do. But that doesn't mean that, when you're in that situation, it sucks any less.

Feeling left out is one thing that I struggle with a lot. I don't want all the attention all the time. I don't want all eyes on me. But, when I have something I want to say, it's nice to be heard, to be listened to. Or, when you're saying something, it's nice for people to, even if they aren't all that interested, to let you finish before they change the subject, or say something like, "As interesting as this is..." before they move on to whatever it is they want to talk about. It hurts to be at the bottom of the totem pole.

But...maybe isolation is best. I've noticed that when I put myself in situations with other people, and let my hopes get up that something great is going to happen, I find myself let down more often than not. But, what if I just kept myself apart more? What if instead of expecting things to happen, I just trained myself to enjoy being alone, so that when I was with people, I wouldn't expect anything at all. If I was ignored, it wouldn't be any different than being by myself. Nothing would have changed.

I'm tired of whining to my friends whenever I feel sad. I'm tired of writing these blogs whenever something hurts my feelings or makes me mad. I'm tired of feeling bad about things...

The good thing about being the odd man out is, when you do separate yourself from the group, it doesn't change their dynamic, so at least you're not upsetting or altering what they're doing. With the exception of one less body in the room, their activities will go on just as they had before. The bad thing about it is...you're still the odd man out. You're still alone. And if you're anything like me, that's no fun. (But, like I said, maybe it's time to start training myself to like that...like eating celery, at first it tastes awful, but after you eat it a hundred times, it starts to grown on you.)

Sometimes I Think I'm a Crazy Person

I sit and stare at the clouds and wonder what they mean.

I sit and stare at people, and wonder what they see

that I don't see. What they see about me,

can they see through me?

I try to be reasonable about things. At least, I try to try. But my emotions carry me away like sand in the ocean. I don't float along on top and eventually come to a stop a few feet down shore still intact. 

I scatter. 

I sink into the silt at the bottom and get all blended up and lost. Sometimes I wonder if I've ever come back together after one of my meltdowns, my panic attacks, my freak-out-like-a-crazy-person-episodes. Maybe I just keep spreading. Keep drifting further and further away from what I was before...maybe what I'm drifting away from was worse, maybe it was better, but I don't think I can get back there.

Have you ever added salt to a pot of water to help it boil faster? At first, you see the grains sink to the bottom. They're separated, but they're each there. But after a while, they melt. The water boils, but the salt is gone, changed...Maybe this is a great thing, and maybe it's terrible, but I think I'm the salt. I think I'm the sand. I think I'm the thing that keeps breaking apart, separating, and dissolving into something else...

A Tribute to Anne McCaffrey

On April 1, 1926 Anne McCaffrey was born into the world, and on November 21, 2011 she left it.


She was an American-born, Irish, science fiction author whose books won both the Hugo and Nebula awards, along with many others. Her book The White Dragon (my personal favorite) was one of the first science fiction novels to ever make its way to the New York Times Best Seller List. The Science Fiction Writers of maerica named her the 22nd Grand Master in 2005, and she was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2006.

Her series about Pern is twenty-six books long. In total, Anne published 97 books about horses, aliens, telepaths, people, and dragons.

When I was probably eleven- or twelve-years-old, I was at my grandfather's house in Tennessee. I was an avid reader, but had neglected to bring anything to read with me for the visit. My uncle Vaughn (who was roughly my age) agreed to let me borrow his book Dragonseye to read while I was at his house. I remember looking at the cover and thinking that it looked silly, but that I would give it a shot. I sat down, I think maybe I curled up in their dusty blue recliner that used to have a finger tip sized hole on it's left arm, and began to read. Within just a few pages I realized that I was in love.

I went home and told mom I was going to need all of her Anne McCaffrey's dragon books about Pern, and my mother, being the beautiful heart that she is, got them for me over the years. I devoured them, and then moved on to many of her other series. I loved the telepaths of the books following the Rowan, and the alien men and women in the Freedom series, but the dragons and dragonriders of Pern were the ones who claimed my heart first.

Anne made me want to write. She made me want to create a world that was so unique, so engrossing, that the reader couldn't help but forget about the real world and instead get lost in the world she created. I wanted to do that. She is the first inspiration I remember having, and that inspiration carried on until now, when I am one day shy of completing my Master of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing. Even today, when I think about the books that really shaped my love of, and appreciation for, writing, Anne McCaffrey is always at the top of the list.

This blog is a small thank you to the woman who created Pern, thread that fell from the sky and ate everything it touched, and the dragons who ate stone and breathed fire onto it to protect the planet. The Pern series, and all the other beautiful books she wrote, will forever hold a place of honor in my heart, and on my shelf.