revisiting generalizations

so remember how thanks to the club I attended the world's most horrifyingly, inappropriately sexualized and puke-y prom? well, turns out, good things came out of it.

namely Holly.

a few weeks ago, Holly - who organized the gross, eyeball searing, post prom party - and whose ease and happy personality during the affair inspired me to blog about it - this same Holly became my intern.

even with the last post, i tried not to bemoan the youth of today. in general, i don't like generalizations. generally speaking, generalizations are the cause of racism, sexism, bigotry, and premature notions about what kind of writing you do if you write YA novels. no, my novels are not about vampires. seriously people, get past that.

ahem.

so even as i wrote a blog post about wtF! is up with the youth of today, i knew that one horrible post-prom party did not an entire representation of teens everywhere make. (please let that be true and, yes, i chose to word that last sentence thus-ly).

sure enough, a week after Holly's party, we hosted another prom at the club. and it was a prom. girls in gowns. kids holding hands. kids bopping to the music in the hallways. kids taking pictures. and dancing of the kind that isn't forcibly trying to meld  pelvis to butt. and okay, maybe there was a tiny bit of puking, but nothing on the level of the first party. and although the whole experience was uber-boring compared to what Holly brought us - oh yawn look, kids acting like kids - it was also soul soothing.

being a YA writer, i couldn't help watching the kids at the grody post prom and think, NO WAY are these kids going to read me. as previously mentioned, my characters barely swear - though sez my agent that's so my novels are lower YA aged appropriate as well  - let alone make strippers look tame.

and then Holly came on board at the club and i'm quite happy making this generalization - our youth of today is frickin' impressive. bright, motivated, fun, optimistic. just as we've always been and, aberrations in sexual advancement aside, just as we'll always be.*

* i'm discluding from this statement the bored girl at prom party #2 who said: "this must be even worse for you, serving all these rich white kids. but look around, the kids in this room will be ruling the world one day... or at least New York City."

you chicky? you i'm not a huge fan of.  

for everyone else i'm sending out some e-high fives. i know this is not news to anyone who works, lives, plays around, owns or belongs to a teen, but you guys are doing great. keep up the good work. and parents check your kid's wallet for fake id's because if Holly is any indication....  i'm just saying.

when I told Holly what I did outside of my day(night) job, she gasped and said, I'm a YA! and then we talked books, and how much we both loved Fault in Our Stars. and Holly said what every YA  author dreams of hearing and a line I wish I could record and send to publishers:

"I'd buy every book you ever wrote."

so to turn it back to a how-everything-in-the-world-relates-to-Corrie conclusion - hey it's my blog -

please may i be published soon?

'cause these kids are growing up fast. and if Holly is any indication, what i'm spinning for them is still totally relevant.

a magical evening

on thursday i had a pretty big I Love NY moment. i met a friend in the city for some shenanigans. with a little time to kill before shenanigans could properly start, we were wandering around Union Square when we noticed that a lot of the streets were blocked off. police were everywhere.

it was quiet. it was forbidden feeling. it was doomsdayesque. it was the freakin' President!

"President's in town, ladies." a policeman told us when i harangued my friend (okay, it was Ellen) into asking what was going on.

it must have been a fundraiser. lots of people were lined up outside ABC Carpet and Home. the second floor windows on the building were blocked out with butcher paper. all the men waiting to get inside were in suits. all the woman were in ridiculous, six-inch, tottering, um there's no better descriptor for it, stripper heels. no joke. i'll have to remember that when i meet the president.

smart, classy dress? check. fancy coat? check check. gold spiked platform heels? check check check.

the amount of people and planning it took to pull of this one NYC event was mind boggling. at least eight streets were blocked off surrounding the building. i wouldn't have been surprised if there were a hundred extra cops on hand. secret service was roaming and handing out on fire escapes. anytime a rouge bike messenger tried to zip through, he was stopped by a wall of people, being like, "whoa whoa whoa." and the thing is, all this was needed, because it would have been so so easy to do something bad. planning for variables alone must have taken weeks.

still, knowing that Obama was right across the street, in that building right there! lent a huge air of excitement and importance to the evening. how do DC'ers stand it?

everyone was on their best behavior. the police were super polite and gracious, even telling two women protesting some kind of pipeline that perhaps they'd be more comfortable hanging out with the other protesters right down the block.

i'm always amazed by the who's who of people that call NYC home. Bjork lives in Brooklyn Heights? and the ones you sit next to in restaurants. hello Jay Z. but the President? that's a whole other level. and for an evening, even NY'ers couldn't pretend disinterest.

i know, my photos aren't great. this is
people watching from all the windows.