Mari attempts the Writing Thing

Terrible secret: There's a really awkward thing that happens to all writers (and other artists/creatives/makers).

They get good enough that it becomes hard to write anything.

As your skill increases, so do your standards. So everything you write feels mediocre.

The weird part is that this "mediocre" writing is far better than what you were writing before.

You have just moved the goalposts on yourself as you improved.

So you have to learn to give yourself permission to write anything. Even if you think it's bad.

What usually happens at this is point is that you either:

A) end up not writing badly at all and surprising yourself with what you manage to produce

OR

B) create something that has issues but is easily editable later on into something that meets your standards

But wow, is it a gnarly adjustment to ignore that emotional reflex of "this sucks, I suck" and press on anyway.

And no, this doesn't just happen with writing. It happens with every kind of artist and craftsperson.

People tend to quit just as they're getting good, because their standards have raised along with their skills.

I do find myself frequently wondering how many writers reach this awkward phase, believe wrongly that they suck, and never write again -- just at the point when they're starting to get good!

I'd imagine A LOT of them.

a.k.a. you may find your work Bad and Cringy™️ but you wrote something and that’s a Good Thing™️.

PSA to all you fantasy writers because I have just had a truly frustrating twenty minutes talking to someone about this: it’s okay to put mobility aids in your novel and have them just be ordinary.

Like. Super okay.

I don’t give a shit if it’s high fantasy, low fantasy or somewhere between the lovechild of Tolkein meets My Immortal. It’s okay to use mobility devices in your narrative. It’s okay to use the word “wheelchair”. You don’t have to remake the fucking wheel. It’s already been done for you.

And no, it doesn’t detract from the “realism” of your fictional universe in which you get to set the standard for realism. Please don’t try to use that as a reason for not using these things.

There is no reason to lock the disabled people in your narrative into towers because “that’s the way it was”, least of all in your novel about dragons and mermaids and other made up creatures. There is no historical realism here. You are in charge. You get to decide what that means.

Also:

“Depiction of Chinese philosopher Confucius in a wheelchair, dating to ca. 1680. The artist may have been thinking of methods of transport common in his own day.”

“The earliest records of wheeled furniture are an inscription found on a stone slate in China and a child’s bed depicted in a frieze on a Greek vase, both dating between the 6th and 5th century BCE.[2][3][4][5]The first records of wheeled seats being used for transporting disabled people date to three centuries later in China; the Chinese used early wheelbarrows to move people as well as heavy objects. A distinction between the two functions was not made for another several hundred years, around 525 CE, when images of wheeled chairs made specifically to carry people begin to occur in Chinese art.[5]”

“In 1655, Stephan Farffler, a 22 year old paraplegic watchmaker, built the world’s first self-propelling chair on a three-wheel chassis using a system of cranks and cogwheels.[6][3] However, the device had an appearance of a hand bike more than a wheelchair since the design included hand cranks mounted at the front wheel.[2]

The invalid carriage or Bath chair brought the technology into more common use from around 1760.[7]

In 1887, wheelchairs (“rolling chairs”) were introduced to Atlantic City so invalid tourists could rent them to enjoy the Boardwalk. Soon, many healthy tourists also rented the decorated “rolling chairs” and servants to push them as a show of decadence and treatment they could never experience at home.[8]

In 1933 Harry C. Jennings, Sr. and his disabled friend Herbert Everest, both mechanical engineers, invented the first lightweight, steel, folding, portable wheelchair.[9] Everest had previously broken his back in a mining accident. Everest and Jennings saw the business potential of the invention and went on to become the first mass-market manufacturers of wheelchairs. Their “X-brace” design is still in common use, albeit with updated materials and other improvements. The X-brace idea came to Harry from the men’s folding “camp chairs / stools”, rotated 90 degrees, that Harry and Herbert used in the outdoors and at the mines.[citation needed]

“But Joy, how do I describe this contraption in a fantasy setting that wont make it seem out of place?”

“It was a chair on wheels, which Prince FancyPants McElferson propelled forwards using his arms to direct the motion of the chair.”

“It was a chair on wheels, which Prince EvenFancierPants McElferson used to get about, pushed along by one of his companions or one of his many attending servants.”

“But it’s a high realm magical fantas—”

“It was a floating chair, the hum of magical energy keeping it off the ground casting a faint glow against the cobblestones as {CHARACTER} guided it round with expert ease, gliding back and forth.”

“But it’s a stempunk nov—”

“Unlike other wheelchairs he’d seen before, this one appeared to be self propelling, powered by the gasket of steam at the back, and directed by the use of a rudder like toggle in the front.”

Give. Disabled. Characters. In. Fantasy. Novels. Mobility. Aids.

If you can spend 60 pages telling me the history of your world in innate detail down to the formation of how magical rocks were formed, you can god damn write three lines in passing about a wheelchair.

“Jack had an unusual pair of sticks, unlike anything Jill had seen before; they were much like canes, but rather than ending in a knot or handle they continued up into a pair of bracelets, held together round his wrists by a cunning slide mechanism. They kept him, she noted, quite sure of foot even on the steep ground.” (wrist braces; cerebral palsy)

“Fandir wore a ring around her ear. It looked something like a fancy collar, its edges tipped outward as though forming a funnel, and when she was spoken to she turned it in the direction of the speaker.” (hearing aid, based off antique “hearing trumpets”)

“Victor’s left arm was a marvel of the modern age–held together with a thousand miniscule steel plates and ten thousand tiny gears, wearing a small brazier, much like a jacket cuff, to fire the steam that moved its mechanical fingers.” (prosthetic arm, steampunk)

“Sasha carried one of the most unusual canes Mara had ever seen: it was longer than might be considered useful to someone her size, and hollow, its walls so thin it surely couldn’t hold her weight. Mara watched as Sasha swept the cane ahead of her. At first she thought Sasha was merely clearing a path, but then the cane struck a large rock, and Sasha neatly sidestepped it having never been told it was there. Ah, that solved the mystery, Mara thought: the hollow stick vibrated in Sasha’s hands when it struck, and its sound told her what danger she might face.” (white cane, blindness)

“Sibatyn clapped his hands over his eyes. ‘Here,’ said Yanit, ‘put your scarf over your eyes and take my arm. I can lead you until the lightning is over.’“ (avoiding flashing lights, photosensitive epilepsy)

“‘She grows quite ill on bread, even Rosie’s best,’ Sam lamented. ‘Can’t keep a bit of weight on her. It isn’t proper, for a hobbit.’ Gandalf nodded. ‘Have you considered, perhaps, feeding her on Elf-bread? She may take well to grains not often found in the Shire.’“ (special diet, Celiac disease, food allergies)

There are two prominent characters that require mobility aid, specifically a sealchair.(since it’s powered by a magical seal)

There’s one who has an incredibly lavish chair since he is rich and powerful

and a much less complex one for a street performer kid who can’t afford anything fancy. (The main character and her friend spend like, an entire issue trying to figure out how to make a better accessibility device for him since the hooves have a hard time going up and down stairs / steeper slopes). (i wont spoil what they come up with but its pretty dang neat)

“Also, depending on what the answer is, you might need to figure out whether there are any limitations on how long after the injury the healing can take place–if you’ve got healers riding circuit through the hinterlands, suppose someone cuts off a limb a week after the healer leaves: will they still be able to heal it when they come around again the next year?”

“Speaking of, I assume people die in this setting, yeah?  So the only possible outcomes of an injury or illness are either ‘you are instantly and completely healed by magic, with no lingering effects whatsoever’ or ‘you are dead,’ right?  That’s bound to have some kind of effects on society–damned if I know what they are, but you’d better have some idea; this is your setting after all.”

“And, circling back around to how the system works, if magical healing services are available to everyone, the healers  can’t be charging directly for it–so who is paying them, or if they aren’t being paid, what do they live on? I guess it could be sliding-scale, but in that case, how is it decided which healers work in the places where rich people live, and which ones heal the poor?  While we’re on the subject of working conditions for magical healers,  is it something anyone can learn to do, or is it an inborn ability?  If it’s inborn, are individuals with the ability obligated to work for the Magic Healing Service?  If they are, explain how that’s not slavery. (Or if we’re acknowledging that it’s slavery, what effect does this have on the plot?)  If not, how are people recruited to the magical healing service, and what other career options might they have?”

“For instance, Is there magic cosmetic surgery?  If you can afford it, can you have a magic healer grow you some extra limbs?  Can you have them grow your child to the height/weight/appearance you choose? Now that I think about it, does this healing ability work on livestock?  If it does, do people in this setting slaughter livestock for meat, or do they just cut off the bits they want to eat and have a magic-user grow them back?”

“Oh, you…didn’t think about any of that?  And you have no plans to start?  So, your setting has healing magic that can regrow limbs and cure diseases with no after-effects, but the only difference it makes is that there are no disabled people.  Anywhere.   It does not affect society in any way, or have any implications for the story you’re telling. Okay.  That’s…an approach, I guess.”  

Not that health is a valid right to existence… but these people should also consider that not all disabled folks are “unhealthy” or WANT to be made “non disabled”. How would your “total healing” even work on people who have nothing “unhealthy” about them other than they can’t look, speak, or act like YOU.

Wizards have the same trust in magic that software designers have in software, which is to say, almost none at all.

“Are you fucking kidding me I worked in a reagrent shop for a few years I don’t trust any of that stuff. Who the hell knows what other components are in the ashes.”

“Yeah I was in the circle that made Alston’s Divine Circle of Teleportation. There’s some pretty nasty corner cases you can get into but the headmaster published it without us. I just take ships. It’s way safer.”

“I call bullshit on that Necromancer channeling spirits of loved ones. What did he say he was using? ‘Medium Conduit Ruinic Circles’? That’s just a bunch of buzzwords slapped together, and they don’t even interact with each other.”

*passes a scroll* *a few moments of silence*

“I think you missed a bookend rune right here-”

“GODS DAMN IT! IT’S ALWAYS SHIT LIKE THAT! THANK YOU!” *angrily scribbles on parchment*