Who
is... Donna Barr? Donna
Barr has been drawing since 1954, writing since 1962, published since 1986,
and publishing since 1996.
She has a Bachelors' Degree in German, and
is a veteran of the United States Army (1970-1973).
Readers worldwide
follower her THE DESERT PEACH, STINZ, BOSOM ENEMIES, HADER
AND THE COLONEL, among others.
She is recognized by her peers as
a pioneer in the field of drawn books and their use in new technologies of distribution
and reproduction. She is a contributor to the world's largest webcomics site,
moderntales.com, and its affiliate
sites.
She achieved her lifetime career goal in 2004 when her life's
work -- past, present and future -- has been accepted as part of the San Diego
State University's Library's Special Collection, and will be available to students
and professors for research, and to the public for exhibits.
She can
be emailed at barr at stinz dot com (remove spam barriers). She answers. Keep
the sentences short.
I've recently made the bad mistake which I just keep making of trying to find a group to hang out with. Dumb as shit, but I'm only human, huh?
I know better than to do this. Years ago, right after I'd graduated from college, and was staying with an alcoholic German professor friend of mine, she was weeping into her latest carafe of red wine and moaning that she didn't really have any friends, nobody she could really talk to, nobody who understood her.
God, I was wise back then (unlike now, when I'm just a wise-ass). I solemnly took a sip from my own glass of wine (NOT trying to keep up with her because she was a German and a Prussian to boot, and that would have been not only foolish but hopeless). And I said:
"Well, get used to it. If you're smart, and original, and have your own opinions and your own viewpoint, you're going to be a Lone Wolf all your life."
She kept trying to say, "Yes, but --," and "No but --," but I shook my Wise Mouth Of Babes head and said, "Nope. You don't get to run with a bunch of friends. You'll be alone all your life, and you'll be lucky to get one or two loved ones. All you can hope for is peers you can respect. Get used to it."
It took the rest of that carafe of wine and the beginning of another before she let it drop. Can you blame her? We're a gregarious species, and the idea that you (RY) may be left all alone in the Big Scary Jungle, asphalt or otherwise, with nobody to take your back with the leopards closing in, is enough to make any of us just want to find a hole and hide.
Do I listen to my own advice? I do not.
When I was first published, I ran with fans. They would talk to me. How was I to know any better? Hell, the first Group I was in, in the industry, was the Furries.
Yeah, and now you know why I, if I see one of those people at a convention, I will turn and practically run screaming from the room. They taught me what groups were all about internal politics, single-minded subject matter, petty squabbles, and attempts to direct everybody and anybody involved with the Point of the group interest into each little leader's personal camp. For this I am grateful but I'll be damned if I'll let 'em get near me again.
So what's wrong with me? I keep getting into these groups. And recently, I've been invited onto a bunch of so-called professional forums on the internet.
I thought I knew forums. I'm part of The Desert Peach forum. The Master Of Ceremonies and the membership long ago decided that they could talk about anything they liked, at length and in detail. I mean, aren't drawn books about anything and everything? They don't start that idiotic arguing about what each and every word means. They don't start that "you said, I said, she said," says nothing that goes on in forums. They're usually NOT talking about my books, and that's okay with me. They're international, and they don't all go to the same conventions or fan meetings. They're professional people, with lives and families. They're funny, and raucous, and if I need to know anything about everything, they can either give the entire lecture, or send me to a URL full of photographs. They're one of the best research spots on the net. And it's not for kids, so don't go there we swear.
So when I got invited onto these other forums, my guard was down. I was expecting the DPF, and I got the Furries.
I mean, it's the same everywhere you go. Jewish Writers' Group, Spandex Writers' Group, Comics Writers' Group, Gay Writers' Group. Manga Writers' Group, Web Writers' Group. It's all about everybody who wants to think alike, about the same things, the same histories, the same people they go to dinner with. It's wallto-wall Fence People, with nobody who wants to hear from the outside Wilderness. I'm not kidding you talking to these people, you have to put a mental hobble on your head. You have to watch your vocabulary, your viewpoint, your subject matter, your fricking SPELLING.
It's like being back in High School, in a pep rally! (Which me and bunch of other Lone Wolves were allowed out of when we pointedly boycotted them, even though we were there in the auditorium). I mean, if you're not standing up in the bleachers and getting wet over the latest Team Captain, and sneering at the bad cheerleader, and wearing the right buttons and colors you're the weird kid, and you threaten the hell out of them.
In this industry, I've been in Professional Groups, and Forums, and you name it, and if I'm not lock-stepping every damn minute and playing Baby Chick to some Mother Hen, they have a crisis of ego or something. They're all the same! My gods, do they have a factory someplace? A brain-stamp? So they're all in the same patter? And fan groups don't stop there. Holocaust Studies, Classical music, The Twelve Apostles, Nuremberg rallies where do the fan boys quit? Everyplace you look, there are people who aren't happy unless you're thinking just like them, and gods help you if you use the wrong vocabulary.
Well, it's my own fault. I'd better take seriously what I told my German professor years ago
"You're a lone wolf, and the rest of the pack doesn't like that. They think you're out to steal their elk haunches or something."
So here is my declaration to the Wolf Pack: I don't want even a mouthful of YOUR elk haunches.
I have my own, thank you. And it tastes better to me than yours could because I don't have to share! And it doesn't have your spit on it.
