So maybe it's just me but I came to the realization this weekend that I am just not ready for my book to be read by certain people.

It has now, by the way, been read by one other person.  It was a very gratifying experience for me all in all.  I gave it to my friend, who leads a very busy life and she wasn't able to get to it for a couple of weeks.  No problem there, I was only mildly aching to have someone read it.  But after she started she could not stop and finished it in only two days.  That in and of itself is more than enough praise for me.  But she has also said that she likes it, had many things in it that she liked.  I was quit happy with this conclusion as well, as you should be able to imagine.

Had I mentioned before that in some ways the main character could seem to be semi-autobiographical?  How about that another character has as a base template a friend of mine?  Well apparently when you read through this story and you know me it because incredibly evident that the main character is me and that the other character is my friend.  Now I still don't hold that this is truth because they are not.  While there are a number of parallels there just as many ways where their actions and there attitude divert from and differ from the real life me and my friend. 
   Although perhaps what has really occurred is that while I know that the main character is not me, that the way he ends up acting and being in the story is the way that people see me.  In some ways this is probably flattering, quite flattering.  I am not sure, maybe that is something that will have to decide as more people who know me and or the other character read the book.

This, however brings me back to my first point.  I am not ready for certain people to read my book.  As I said only one other person has read my manuscript, although it has been given to a second person as well.  But another friend has heard some things about the book from the person who read it.  As a result of the discussions that he had with the person who had read it, he brought back to me some mild ribbing and mockery based upon the fact that these people were based upon real life people.  I was able to take the ribbing and the mockery in good spirit and to return as good as I got but the entire time I was doing it, I found that I feeing awful about it.  I was feeling sick inside and I just didn't like it.

   It's not, either that the ribbing was negative, I think I would be able to accept any amount of constructive criticism from someone I had given the book to read but not this.  This wasn't constructive, this was just part and parcel with way I interact with the universe, you know, a place where mocking and ribbing is the way things should be in all situations, always.  But you know, something about this book, and more so with this book than anything else I ever write, I think, this is very special and meaningful to me.  It's something I am not ready to have made fun of.  A lot of this is because I am still so unsure about how good or worthwhile it is.  And I might be this way for a long time.  I really have no way of knowing.  It's my baby though, and it's tender. 

   So I have wondered when I was pulling away from the idea of certain people reading it before.  I wasn't sure why I was thinking what I was but this has served to clear that up for me.  The  thing is that this same person who mocked yesterday will very likely be incredibly, likely to unbelievable levels of super-support, supportive when he reads the book but there will also be some making fun.  And to be fair, because I am programmed to react in a banter-like way, he might never know that what he his doing is bothering me.  But the thing is that I don't want to have to cope with that.  I guess I am going to have to learn.  It's not like I and not have him read it at all. 

   Read it, enjoy it, criticize it, but don't make fun.  Hmmm. I wonder, even though I like to think that when I sense that someone has invested a lot in something that I am relatively sensitive about mockery and try to just be supportive but you know, I have to believe, knowing me and how much mockery is a part of my being that I have gone to far more than a few times.  To those of you that might have been effected by these attacks, I apologize.  I now understand better that even if you know that I don't mean anything negative by what I have said, that it can still hurt.  I'll try harder in the future.  Maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea if you didn't expect too much though.

That all said, next week, I start edit step number two. After that step, a bunch more people get to read. Irg.

update on the work crush. in a meeting with her today i noticed that she has a wedding band and she mentioned her kids.  crush not failed yet but not nearly as prevalent in my mind anymore.

i made up this recipe for lemon-blackberry cheesecake cupcakes last night. my my i do love them.

away now.