Mojo Lost, Mojo Found

Posted on June 30, 2015June 30, 2015 by Jade A. Waters

It has been an insane seven months. I’ve had more stress happening in my life than is reasonable, most it fueled by big drama that I don’t care to get into and that I’d say is only half resolved, but that—I will finally admit—did, in no uncertain terms, zap the shit out of my writing mojo.

Now, for those of you following along, you may have picked up I’m a bit hard on myself. I am part masochist, part perfectionist, part over analyst, part wannabe superhero, and part head-in-the-sand ostrich, so when you mash all this together, sometimes it takes a bad turn. I’m freakishly good at putting on a big smile to cover whatever the hell is going on, ignoring when things are bad, and pushing through insane amounts of pain. On top of that, I am so optimistic (I’m of the “fuck half-full, I have a glass!” ilk), I can convince myself things aren’t as bad as they seem, all while crying about it at the same time.

Gif of muppet freaking out from Gifs for the Masses

Take a chill pill already!

Awesome!

Not.

So here’s the deal…I was working on this book for the last, oh, ten or so months. I was excited about it and the vision I had for it—except I kept ignoring how stressed out I was. Well, okay, that’s not entirely true. I was admitting how stressed out I was, but ignoring how much it was affecting me. Insomnia? Whatever. Excessive oversleeping when given the chance? No biggie. Hours spent watching TV to try and soothe my head, chiding myself the entire time because I should be writing? Whatever. Dragging myself into my desk chair and trying to figure out why the hell I couldn’t focus on the words in front of me, not because I needed a muse, but because day after day I had a bizarrely “fuzzy head” that was, honestly, starting to make me feel physically ill? P-shaw. I mean, the list of symptoms went on and on—but despite all these warning signs, good friends telling me to give myself a break, and me telling me to give myself a break (ha ha), I just kept going. And perhaps as no surprise, the book suffered massively because of this.

There’s good news, though, I promise! First, I had a huge meltdown (no, I swear, this is good). Malin James and I often talk about how some people run like sports cars—we run really hot, crazy fast, and super flashy…and then one part flies off on the track and shit hits the fan and our machine needs major repair. This is complicated and expensive, but damn, does that baby run better once it’s fixed. That said, I am certain I was a BMW in a past life, because, holy shit, did this little car have a break down. In the middle of it, my amazing beta babes kindly (and firmly) took the book out of my hands and suggested a break.

Break? Me?

I circled the track a few more times. Was I really going to break? Would I come back on the track speedier and flashier than ever if I did?

I won’t lie—this part was scary and fucking hard. I have an ingrained fear of doing what I did long ago, something I talked about in my interview with Molly Moore about my adventures between writing as a teen and not coming back to it seriously until about five years ago (and only because I was grounded after a major injury): wandering away from my passion for way too long of a time. I consider myself a Jill of all trades—not amazing at anything but pretty good at a lot of things—and sometimes these side things consume me. (Did I mention earlier I’m also part obsessive? Yeah, that too.) Working Renaissance Faire, becoming a seamstress, becoming an aerial acrobat—these things were passions of mine that I dove into with everything I had, forgetting all the while how deep my true passion, writing, ran in me. When I found that drive again a few years ago, it was so hot, so amazing, so why-the-fuck-have-I-been-away-from-you-for-so-long?, I guess whenever I do cut myself some slack, there’s this tick of worry that I’ll be seduced away in some schmaltzy love affair that might distract me, again, from the real deal.

But that’s not what happened. I’m older, and I understand now how much I love writing…so I went ahead and did it.

I gave myself permission to break.

For a few weeks after the breakdown, I tinkered—and then I just threw up my hands and walked away. Other than a few poems and some blog posts, I barely wrote. Then I took it a step further and took an entire week off to do absolutely no writing or editing or thinking about writing at all. I picked up my niece for a couple days and took her Great America (so fun!), I read some books, I cooked, I slept, I watched a lot of movies, and then I woke up one day and…

BOOM.

There it was, cuddling up beside me—this great big urge to sit in front of the computer and write again.

I took it real easy at first, deciding there was no need to work on a large project, but rather, to write a bunch of small things. I needed to practice starting and stopping again, rather than [over]futzing with something too big to chew on just yet. I needed to simply have a good time writing whatever I felt like, no matter if it was good or bad or for any purpose other than to make me smile again. This was the deal I made with myself for the first two weeks I’ve come back—and, holy fuck, I’m a bit shocked at how much has poured out of me! In the first week I wrote six flash pieces, five shorts, a couple blog posts, and opened up documents or scribbled down notes for upwards of a dozen starter ideas or first lines for new things. I even revisited a character I wrote about prior to switching to erotica, and decided she may one day make it into an erotic series, who knows…but I wrote a flash piece about her to enter a contest.

Then came the best part: my amazing beta babes, Malin and Tamsin, sent me feedback for that book I mangled. The evidence that it was in need of work was clear, but guess what? It turned out there was hope in the thing. And instead of worrying about it, I read their feedback and smiled. Yes, there’s work to be done—but it no longer feels so foreboding and terrifying. It actually feels like it’s going to be pretty fun!

So, here I am in my second week of “play time,” and I’m starting to toy with ideas on what I’d like to do next. Fix the book? Likely. Work on other big things? For sure. But either way, I think it’s finally safe to say it.

I may have lost my mojo for a bit there, but, hot damn—that baby is found!

XX,
Jade

Talk Dirty (Captions) To Me

Posted on May 12, 2015May 12, 2015 by Jade A. Waters

After last week’s seriously nitty-gritty editing post—which, in all truth, resulted in me realizing it was time to take a break from the book and pass it on to betas…now…before I start going nuts—I’ve decided to lighten things up a bit over here.

Occasionally, I like to share a picture. I’m a pretty visual person—both in bed and out—but photos usually don’t do much for me. There’s a very large group of writers who use images as inspiration, and while I don’t seem to have the capacity to do that, I enjoy a good image purely for its own value. Take the image I previously posted of the beautiful built man searching the sand for who knows what or the fabulous ass of the gentleman about to get it on with the Lady of the Perfectly Arched Feet—I could look at these over and over, and while they won’t inspire any words beyond “DAMN” and “HOT,” they still look deliciously good to me.

So today, I’m turning the tables around. Let’s play a little game, shall we? I will post a picture, and I want YOU to tell me what comes to mind. Call it research. Or fun. Or just that I enjoy seeing how different people respond to images. I’m not even about to blast you with a super NSFW image, either; this one is really pretty tame. With images, I think it’s often about the hint of something to come, the promise of what could be. I still haven’t figured out exactly what in this one speaks to me (might be the lean?), but it’s what I’ve got my eye on today.

Does it grab you?

I do hope you’ll play with me—I’m totally inviting you to talk dirty to me! Caption away, or share your thoughts. What do you see here? What does this image inspire in you?

I dare you to share. 😉

XX,
Jade

It’s Time For…Editing Mayhem!

Posted on May 6, 2015June 29, 2015 by Jade A. Waters

After careful consideration, I’m 100% sure I am an over-editing fiend.

This isn’t to say that the editing I do is bad editing, or even that it’s unnecessary. It’s just potentially a little over the top.

“All things in moderation,” one of my parents used to say.

Yeah. Kind of missed that boat, guys.

In all fairness, we all have our methods. We’ve got to do what works for us. I felt as though I’d fine-tuned my novel editing process the last time around, but I’m coming to realize that whatever the process is that I think I have nailed down, it will be sabotaged when, say, I’m in times of great stress. (Perhaps uncoincidentally, this is when my weird urge to check the oven is off at least three times before I leave the house kicks in, too. So fun.)

The last book hit some road bumps before I called the edit done, but somehow it didn’t feel quite as disruptive as what happened this time. My awesome system was all screwed up due to too many “life issues,” and of course there was that whole bout with adding a subplot, removing the subplot, changing the subplot and re-adding it again. What all this basically amounted to was me convincing myself I’d fucked everything up, then laughing hysterically because I started re-editing things I’d already edited. Three times.

I like my plot lines how I like my love life: hot, heavy, and complicated. #amwriting

So about that plot line issue…

At least there was laughing, right? That’s good.

So, anyway. Clearly I’m going tangential today. There will be no fiction, no confessions, no poetry, no pictures of hot men. I have decided to share the editing process that is by no means “in moderation,” but that I used with both my currently shelved comedic memoir and that first erotica novel I finished writing last January. It’s a method I think I like (because I honestly love editing), and that I’ve attempted to use again—I just stress attempted because, well, see the last full paragraph. And yes, it might well be a little nuts. Or, maybe it’s normal. Or maybe it’s indicative of a woman who spent three years of her teens wanting to be a neurosurgeon so there remains a residual urge to meticulously fix things…who knows. Either way, perhaps you will find something of use (or at least a good laugh) from my editing insanity!

Here goes!

Jade’s 10 Steps to Editing Mayhem

Step 1: Mull It Over. Do not touch your first draft for at least three weeks after you type “The End.” Then, and only then, print it out. Read it cover to cover (best in a short, consistent time frame) with all pens and pencils locked somewhere you cannot find them. Once you finish, mull for 2-4 days. Make mental notes of any plot issues that strike you as seriously fucked up, but do not write anything down. Not yet. This is thinking time.

Step 2: Grab the Pen of Destruction. After you’ve sufficiently mulled it over, find your favorite pen (I’m a big fan of blue or green—red makes me crazy). Then, in batches of three or so chapters, edit like a maniac. At the end of the third chapter, enter the changes on the computer. When you finish, go back and read these chapters on the screen, making changes as you see them. Then repeat your chapter bunches to the end of the book.

Step 3: Throw It All Off. Bear in mind, you will need to stop to add scenes where appropriate. This will of course throw off the “[three] chapter bundle” plan, so after typing a new scene, edit it on screen, print and edit it on paper, enter the changes, then continue on with the rest of the chapter bundle.

Picture of woman lying on floor looking reading

Is this step 4? Step 10? A cat nap? I don’t know. You pick.

Step 4: Assess Your Mental Health (Take 1). Recognize this has taken a bizarrely long time already, and that, according to writer friends, this is where many people stop and send the damn thing off to beta readers. Laugh a good laugh and keep going, special snowflake. It’s time to let that freak flag fly.

Step 5: Begin Your Word List Madness. When I read, I’m hypersensitive to echoes—repeated words and phrases—so when I’m on Step 2 I keep a notepad handy, jotting down every word or phrase I swear I’ve repeated too many times. This list can get disturbingly long, and it will turn out that some of the words are not actually echoes but phantom echoes. That’s okay, though; write them down anyway, because you’ll take great pleasure in finding out you’re wrong when you do a “find and replace” for each and every word on this notepad. When you find a true culprit, though, set some random upper limit in your head for the number of times you think it should appear. Proceed to slash and hack to fit that number. This process, while tedious, will allow you whole phrase changes that will make the book read better—you probably didn’t need to say cock that much, even though the word rolls around so well on the tongue. (Heh.) Also check excessive adverbs and your Naughty Words List (the list of words that you tend to overdo).

Step 6 (Optional): Create Post-It Confetti. When feeling particularly Word List sensitive (this happened for me last time), write down the really bothersome word on a Post-It, and make note of what pages it happens. Then make another Post-It with synonyms and their page numbers. Sometimes, you can find an eerie pattern that makes you feel your use of certain words is logically connected to the Universe—but don’t spend too long pondering this. Your next goal is to disperse your abundance of synonyms so that the first half of the book doesn’t have all the cock and the second half get the shaft. (Ha ha. Who said editing isn’t fun?!)

Step 7: Assess Your Mental Health (Take 2). Realize you have synonym lists on Post-Its all over your desk and that this alone may be far more concerning than your browser history. Laugh another good laugh. Is it a math brain that makes one so obsessed with patterns? The OCD? Will you ever know the true answer? Does this have something to do with the meaning of life? Why do you care? This is not the time for an existential musing. Whatever the cause for this madness, regain your focus and set some rewards: a night out when you’re finished and a damn good book to read. I promised myself Alison Tyler’s Wrapped Around Your Finger when this current edit was finished, and while it’s been sitting on my nightstand for almost six months, I am going to get to it soon, goddammit!

Step 8: Sigh and Run Your Spellcheck. Breathe a sigh of relief. The hard work is over. Now, give the whole document a spellcheck. Take this opportunity to spot and change more boring words. You’ll find them. I promise.

Step 9 (Best for post-beta read, but whatever): Go Aural. Read the entire story aloud. No, really. This is the best piece of editing advice I ever got, and I still do it, every time, no matter what the length of the story is. It catches almost every error, swear.

Step 10: Get Your Ass and That Book Out. Send the doc to your beta readers before you find ways to make another pass through. Then, take yourself out to celebrate.

BOOM. You’re done. Easy as pie. Yes?

So, a few notes: First drafts get better as you write more (thank god), so this list, while arduous, goes faster and gets simpler with each new story. The next edit (post-beta or otherwise) won’t require several of these steps, either—so far I’ve stuck with a single read-through, then 2, 3, 8 (sans sighs), 9, and 10 on that round, with 2 and 3 switched. Also, 10 is even more celebratory because it’s more done, which is always a good thing. And once this bad doggie is out the door, you can now move on to all the other projects you’ve avoided save for a random piece of flash or ten.

Until, of course, you get your edits back from your betas/editor/agent again.

🙂

XX,
Jade

You Got Turned Out

Posted on April 15, 2015April 15, 2015 by Jade A. Waters

Well over a year ago, a close friend used a term that struck me as profound—so much so it’s been simmering in the back of my head ever since. The truth is that it was said in reference to a relationship I’d experienced, but eventually, I realized how wide the scope of it was, and how very much I needed to write about it.

See, at the time of our conversation, I was wrapping up one of the most painful breakups of my life. I’ve had many relationships in two decades—some of them waking me in one way or another, others serious enough we nearly ended up engaged, and still others breaking me in ways that required many years of lightness to heal—but this was different. It was heavier somehow, more real, more intense. If I were to describe my past relationships as watercolor paintings, this one was made of oil—dense with color, small details, and texture, and labored over not just with brushes, but with rags and carving tools that molded the canvas of us. It started as a casual fling that should have meant practically nothing, but in the mere nine months we lasted—including four breakups, three standoffs, and two attempted months of silence—the impact still coursed through my blood and transformed me.

So on the night we chatted, this friend of mine listened while I cried to him for probably the third or fourth time, dragging myself in circles over this new kind of hurt, and this strange feeling of having had my heart and soul wrenched open in ways I couldn’t understand. And in the midst of it, he said, very sweetly, “Honey, don’t you see? You got turned out.”

This friend has long been special to me for a variety of reasons, but his frankness—paired with his somewhat uncanny understanding of women—has always captivated me. Having never heard the term, I sniffled a few times and asked what the hell he was talking about. I’ll take the liberty of paraphrasing his response, but the basic concept is this: getting “turned out” means someone has fully broken through to you—turned you upside down, cracked you open, and unraveled you completely. Sure, you may have had sex and love before—hell, you could have had endless sex and love, and believed you’d felt the magic—but this experience is not common, and when it happens, you know. It’s more powerful than any love or good fuck or orgasm you’ve had before; it’s like you’ve found that person who can sink right into your soul, delve into your pores, and bring you out into the world as an entirely altered, more phenomenal version of you.

When he said this, it clicked. I’d known love, lust, empathy, closeness, hurt, passion, and all of the feelings that connect us with one another—but this thing, even as short as it was, had me lost in an emotional and sexual haze all the way through and well after it ended. Truth be told, it’s one of the most complicated things I’ve ever experienced, so uplifting and murky and amazing and excruciatingly painful, charging me even beyond the time it took to heal. This is why I strongly believe the last part of what my friend said in that phone call, too—that this type of experience will inevitably end in one of two ways: ideally, you and the person seize the magic and end up together for life, exploring this brilliance discovered together; or, you and the person call it quits, she who got turned out is hurt for a long, long time, and then—once all the pain dissipates and she can see straight again—she’s essentially reborn with so much more sense, emotional power, and feeling than she’d ever dreamed of before.

A phoenix rising from the ash, if you will.

That’s a big concept to pin on a relationship, I know, but I’d venture to guess a few of you know exactly what I’m talking about. Maybe while you’re reading this, your hearts are thumping in your chests, your heads lifting and falling as you whistle to yourselves because you remember what this felt like. It’s that feeling of putting your heart, your love, your soul, your very essence in someone else’s grasp like you could never have fathomed before—and still being unbelievably okay with it.

Sometimes, it works out. Sometimes, it doesn’t. But no matter what, you will never be who you were before.

So, that’s what’s been churning in my head for a while now, seeping into my work, my stories. I don’t mean to do it, and then suddenly I do. The first time I saw it was in the last book I wrote—I’d drafted it early last year and then came back a month later to edit, following my character through her adventure in love and sex while I made my scribbles on the page…and then WHAM. I actually saw it in her character arc, and said it out loud:

“Oh, look at you. You got turned out, baby girl.”

I thought it was just a one-time thing. Then the feelings kept resurfacing in other stories I wrote, essays I penned, and poems I posted, without me ever intending it. It was like in finding myself, my characters had to, as well. Even in the book I’m editing now, I saw it happening all over again—the protagonist shedding her old skin, embracing this new life and awareness she finds with the one who broke through to who she honestly was. It wasn’t that she wasn’t whole or happy before—only that, in a way, she had to set fire to who she was to leap into this vivid new self. In doing so, she’s become richer, more powerful, and eager for every sensation and experience yet to be had.

She’s been turned out.

Sometimes, I wonder if the intersection of my own experience happening shortly after I sent my first erotica story into the world was a coincidence, or if it was the Universe trying to give me a message. That in embracing my writing, I’d opened up a personal door. Or that in releasing the erotica I’d kept quiet for years, I was finally able to bare my heart and soul, even if it was going to hurt like hell. Or that, since I was going to explore so many things in real life, I would need to feed it all into my stories over time.

Honestly, I don’t know the answer to the how or why—and like the phoenix, I don’t think the past matters anymore.

When you get turned out, the only thing you need to do is soar on.

XX,
Jade

Damn You, Grey’s Anatomy

Posted on March 30, 2015March 30, 2015 by Jade A. Waters

Okay guys, look—I need to veer way off course right now. Yes, I’m an erotica writer. Yes, I talk about sex often frequently all the freaking time. But after spending the last week sicker than ever and doing virtually nothing but camping in front of the TV, I did a lot of thinking about why the shows I watched were fascinating me. Um…all right, that’s a blatant lie. Other than discovering the Vikings opening theme song has turned into a sort of lullaby that actually soothes me to sleep, I didn’t honestly think about that at all.

That is, until Grey’s Anatomy came bursting out with a big enough disruption to my vegetative couch state I had to do some serious mulling. Unbelievably, that serious mulling has persisted all weekend long, into a few hysterical sentences I shared over lunch with Malin James, and now, oh my god, I can’t stop myself from saying something to all of you about it. I know Grey’s Anatomy and television shows are totally not my usual M.O., but since Charlie Powell of Sex blog (of sorts) just talked rather thoughtfully about not separating blogs into categories all the time, I’m breaking the rules and running with it today (thank you, Charlie!).

So let me start with some background: I watch a short list of shows, but goddammit, if I’m in, I’m in. Grey’s Anatomy is one such show, both because I spent my teens thinking I wanted to be a doctor (this included a brief internship in a trauma room, no less), and because I like quirky characters with real problems who also randomly hook up in on-call rooms while waiting to tackle the next bloody mess. I mean, hello. Curing people and sex and bizarre catastrophes? Works for me.

And despite the naysayers, I’ve stuck by this show since day one, no matter what. Even when Callie and George stupidly got married. Even after Meredith did crazy shit like jumping off a dock or sticking her hand into a bomb-laden body cavity. Even through Alex’s nutso wife. Even when Izzie had an entire affair with a fucking ghost (what the fuck, Shonda Rhimes? WTF). Hell, even when I was getting threatened with no sex in the good thing I had going with a favorite friend with benefits who watched with me during Seasons 5 and 6, because I kept rambling on and on about the DP I had planned with McSteamy and McDreamy. (You think I’m kidding? No. And apparently, the satisfactory response to “What are you thinking right now? You’re awfully quiet” is not “Whether stunning Dr. Sloan or gorgeous Dr. Shepherd is going be in front tonight.”)

But okay, I’m a loyal gal. And sticking it out has resulted in seeing some awesome recent plotlines and characters. Derek’s whippersnapper little sister, Amelia, formerly of Private Practice (another doctor show I watched religiously) was a great add, and so was sassy Dr. Herman (Geena Davis!) as a partner in surgery crime for Arizona Robbins. Oh and there was the grandson of the famous doctor who joined the Board but ended up shirtless one time, rendering me unable to ever remember his name again thanks to that bod and those ridiculously hot eyes—he’s been fun. And you know, sure, I don’t watch Grey’s live anymore—I’m sorry, nothing gets watched live except my beautiful college vamps on Vampire Diaries every Thursday night at 8 pm sharp, thank you very much—but I still have a routine with it: if I’m not going out on Friday night, then I snuggle with my cats on the couch to watch Grey’s before bed. It doesn’t quite beat karaoke or dinner out or happy hour, but it’s a good runner-up if nothing else is going on.

Which leads me back to the week of the cold, and me finally streaming Grey’s while I tried not to hack up a lung. I’m going to issue a major spoiler alert right now just to be safe, but holy crap people—I ended up so completely disturbed by Shonda Rhimes’s insane trip down the rocky potential of Meredith and Derek’s currently long-distance marriage last week that I lost my shit.

For those of you who don’t know, MerDer have been through the wringer. They started as a casual bar hookup after Derek’s failed marriage to the uncannily beautiful Addison Montgomery, and while little Miss Grey takes us along through her doctoral education with a bunch of kooky other doctors-to-be, she ends up having this deliciously sweet relationship with the dreamy-as-fuck brain surgeon, Derek Shepherd. All sorts of craziness happens (Bus accidents! Dead friends! Izzie Stevens! Plane crashes! Electrical storms! Shooters in the ER! Being stood-up at the altar! Fake legs! Neglectful moms! Alcoholic dads! Mysterious siblings! The death of my future lover, McSteamy!), but eventually, they solidify their vows and get married—on a post-it. It was a charmer of a scene and takes way too long to explain, but what’s important is that this post-it loving woman has, to this day, never found a more delightful use of her own post-its, which might be why their sticky note marriage still tickles me to pieces. And of course after that, they went on to have some kids and rah-rah, everything is happy.

But then Rhimes comes along with her maniacal ploy to test them, real hard, again and again. As if Meredith’s miscarriage and Addison’s face and everyone moving in and out of their house wasn’t already enough for these two, now she goes and sends Derek off to D.C. and leaves Meredith to learn she’s actually damn successful without being under his shadow. That’s tempting fate now, isn’t it? And then two episodes back Rhimes launches some madness with a mystery woman answering Derek’s phone that starts calling his integrity into question.

NO, SHONDA, NO. YOU CANNOT DO THIS WITH MY BEAUTIFUL DEREK SHEPHERD, INVENTOR OF THE POST-IT MARRIAGE AND ONE HALF OF ONE OF MY LIFETIME SEX FANTASIES.

But she does! She starts making this intensely weird. Meredith is freaking out. The residents around her are freaking out. I am freaking the fuck out. And people, I was sick. This was not good for my health. I’m getting feverish and trying to wrap my brain around the fact that I might for the first time in my life write something I would never dream of drafting—a letter telling a writer I don’t like what she’s doing with my beloved characters—but I’m so fucking enraged by how she’s puppeting Derek around, I want to throw my TV to the ground. I kid you not.

So this whole run of stress continues for most of the show until, thank god, she brings us all back around to reality. Derek is not the bad guy. Meredith is not going to leave him.

I can continue believing in post-its.

And despite this, despite settling down and kicking back on my couch and breathing a true sigh of relief over a goddamn TV show, it hits me what just happened.

Shonda Rhimes did what we writers all want to do: she made her plan, then wrote her brilliant heart out exactly as she wanted to, and even if I didn’t like what she was doing, she got me fired up enough to care and kick and scream and threaten to break my $1,000 TV.

And that, people—that’s great writing. Damn fine writing, in fact. Ambitious, follow your wild-little-mind kind of writing that we should all aspire to each and every time we sit down to write, even if it makes our audience fucking crazy.

No wonder I keep coming back to this show.

XX,
Jade

PS More sex-writing next time. I promise.

He’s Got Her

Posted on March 18, 2015December 30, 2016 by Jade A. Waters

I rarely write while drinking. For one, I’m usually out with friends, and sitting down to pen something wouldn’t work in the moment. Then, there’s the fact that my creative process simply doesn’t flow under those circumstances. I might have some good ideas, but they won’t come to fruition in any sort of cohesive way until I’m completely clear-headed.

That’s why today’s poem is a bit of an anomaly for me. A month ago, my friend and I met and played our usual rounds of dice games over drinks at a local bar. And as the evening progressed, we shared a powerful conversation on those people who rip you right out of your comfort zone—loves who make you see things differently, move you in ways you didn’t imagine, and break straight through to your soul. Sadly, he had to leave soon after, but I was still buzzed and nowhere near ready to drive. So I sat in my car for a while, texting friends, reading blog posts, and replaying the conversation.

It was then this poem started writing itself, inspired by the heady nature of the discussion and some memories of my own. I wasn’t able to finish it that night, but I’ve finally pulled it up off my phone notes and touched up a few spots. For the most part, I left the original poem intact.

So today, I’d like to share “He’s Got Her” with you:

Sakkmesterke ©123RF.com

HE’S GOT HER

Jade A. Waters

He’s got her
Spread out
Naked
Her limbs stretched across this bed
Wrist to headboard
Foot to base
But this has nothing to do with
That.
It’s the way he looks at her
The way he sees inside her soul,
The way his fingers dig
So deep inside her cunt,
Finding her secrets
Her truths
And all her dreams,
With the flick of his wrist and a glint in his eyes.
She thinks for a moment
It’s not right that he can do this,
Not right that he can take her
From cynical to believer in seconds
But he does,
Every time he holds her
Kisses her
Loves her.
This is what she realizes
As he circles her clit with his tongue
And drives those fingers inside;
He’s got her,
Caught her,
Ensnared her heart and soul in his net
For a lifetime to come
Because it’s supposed to be,
Was meant to be.
It is.
So when he thrusts into her,
Grunting, bearing, deep and loving,
She knows—
This love he takes from her
This love she freely shares,
It was never hers to give in the first place
Because she’s always
Belonged to him.

I hope you enjoyed it.

XX,
Jade

On Elephants and Landmines, and the People Who Help You Through

Posted on March 9, 2015December 30, 2016 by Jade A. Waters

I’ve been in a really funny headspace lately. It’s one that did more damage than good, but I think one we all go through from time to time, to one degree or another (or maybe I’m only saying that so I don’t feel crazy). But in truth, life happens—it’s just that sometimes, it’s full of giant elephants blocking your way between the landmines that can blow your path to smithereens.

Move it, Bertha.

So let’s see. Where do I start?

I’ve been working on this book. It’s an exciting one for me, a standalone story that I started as what I’d intended to be a quick detour before I sat down to draft the sequel of the book my agent is currently shopping around. This baby’s got a lot of elements going for it that have my engines revved…first, there’s a bunch of exhibitionism (as I’ve said before, I am a bit of an exhibitionist). Then, there are a few relationships happening for my darling lead female—not in a poly way, but in a super complicated way I’m enjoying navigating. And then, there’s said lead character—a woman who definitely doesn’t fit the current mold of female protagonists (read: naïve virgins), and who is instead a highly educated divorcée ready to break free of her troubled old life. Score!

But here’s the thing: this poor book has been taking a beating from day one.

It took seven weeks to draft my last book, but this one has had a perilous path, interrupted in more ways than I can count. There was the one-month break. Then the two-month break. Then that other break. Then the rewriting that had to happen since I kept trying to write while I wasn’t sleeping much, or while I was sick. Or…well, you get the picture. It’s just that, for some reason, I can’t seem to get my time and focus into the game on this one.

Okay, truth be told, I laughed as I typed “for some reason”—because my life has been a hot mess for a few months now. For the last five I’ve been contending with an oil-leaking car (finally fixed…I think) and the HOA waiving threats of fines about for the spot I “took too long to clean” (too long was a week, guys, a week) and now the manner in which I’ve cleaned it (because “soap is bad for the environment”). I’ve still been running Jade’s Cat Hospice, which strangely sucks up a lot of time when you consider chasing cats down and medicating them multiple times a day, with one of them using the litter box as her hiding spot when she’s on to me (oh my god STOP that, kitty, stop!), and twice weekly email correspondence with the vet tech. Then there was the cold from hell that completely knocked me out, ironically, for the few days I took off from work to get some editing in on the damn book. I can’t seem to solve my plantar fasciitis problem, and spend a surprisingly large amount of time working on that (stretching, icing, ordering new shoes, returning crappy shoes, wondering if I’ll ever run again, stretching, icing…). My sleep is fortunately not as bad as it was during my 6-week chronic insomnia run last year, but my trick of moving to the couch if I can’t fall asleep and waking up there with a messed up back in the morning is getting kind of old. Then there’s family drama happening that’s kind of boggling my mind, and on top of that, some shit went down at my day job that was serious enough I might need to consider legal help, but I’m not sure if—with my tendency towards insane stress levels—this is the route to go yet.

But all this is neither here nor there. There are children starving in Africa, right? This is what I learned growing up: my problems are not real problems because there are children starving in Africa. It’s a mantra I repeated to myself for decades, one that left me unable to acknowledge until way later that witnessing my parents’ terribly messy divorce when I was a child actually did have an impact. It was a mantra that prevented me from realizing that raising my sister for two years while I was 11 and my parent worked graveyard did force me to play the grown-up when what I needed was to be a little girl and cry. It was the same mantra that had me putting on my game face after a series of emotional and physical traumas in my teens and twenties, because it was easier to just smile, laugh it all away, and keep it quiet than handle it for what would be about a decade. And later, it would be this very same mantra that, when I was performing aerial circus stunts as I mentioned in my interview with Molly Moore, would lead me to break myself in the middle of a performance because I didn’t believe pain could stop me—or should stop me. Ps-shaw. Hell no. I didn’t do pain. I was a superhero and had no time for pain, relaxation, feeling hurt, any of that.

There were children starving in Africa, for fuck’s sake.

Well, the good news is now that I’m 35 and oh-so-wise (did you hear me chuckle just now?), I am less inclined to resort to the children starving in Africa mantra when I’m hurting. I totally feel pain, and I cry; heck, I even have meltdowns that could, I suppose, be hormonal, but holy shit. They happen. It’s rather bizarre, having been the levelheaded one in the family for so many years [decades], that now I actually cry and have to lay boundaries and stuff.

But that relaxation thing? That part where, when I see a big brick wall—or, say, a field full of elephants and landmines blocking every clear route—I know that I need to slow down and accept that this might be trickier than expected and that’s okay, because sometimes tricky things take time?

Yeah, that part I’m still working on.

So I think you might be wondering where the fuck I’m going with all this. Let’s cut back to the cold/chasing cats/work thing/family drama/limping on my foot on the way out to scrub more oil off the goddamn pavement moment: I finally had a whole day free to write and I simply couldn’t. I froze. I cried. I got myself caught in this loop over the fact that I was wasting my productive time to mull over all this bullshit that shouldn’t be stalling me. It was Meltdown City, and I kept wondering if I was PMSing, or worse, bipolar—because hell, that runs in the family—and before you know it, I’m on the internet taking a quiz to determine if maybe I am (who fucking does that?).

I suddenly felt like I did once upon a time, even without the Africa mantra, but damn—was I being hard on myself!

Then three magical things happened.

First, I put a call in to the wonderful and lovely Malin James. Many of you know I adore this woman—she’s like my long lost twin separated at birth—so she felt like the right person to call. She needed a few minutes to call me back, and that was okay. While I waited, I texted my other friend—a non-writer with whom I share other similarities (including some astrological traits, if you’re into that). As she texted me back, I randomly found this article by James Clear about not striving so fucking hard for goals and instead reaching for the process and savoring that. Because that’s attainable. That you can’t fuck up, or bemoan not reaching. Because it’s all about the journey, remember?

So about the time I’d gotten the gist of Mr. Clear’s very clear point, my phone went off with a text and a phone call all at once. My two dearies had come to the rescue. The texter hit me with some sweet words telling me I was going to do just fine with the book, and then some encouragement to go on a long walk and drink more (she’s an exercise fiend and a wine connoisseur) and remember we’re Geminis (and thus naturally a tad bipolar). Meanwhile, the fabulous Malin chimed in with her extraordinarily calming and logical approach to tackling huge missions while circumventing bitchy elephants and dangerous landmines in a way that made sense to me (the twin thing again).

Bring it, Journey. Konrad Bak ©123RF.com

And I’ve got to say—between these three events, I was suddenly okay with putting my story down for the day. I took a deep breath. I closed the browser telling me I was potentially bipolar. I calmly enjoyed the rest of my afternoon. I even went karaoking with another great friend (my version of the walk and drinking…instead I danced and drank) until something like 2 in the morning.

Because you know what? There are children starving in Africa. And elephants are awfully big to walk around. Also, landmines can be treacherous.

So sometimes you’ve just got to slow down and go with it.

Things are still stupidly chaotic in my life, but I’m not panicking on the book anymore. It will happen. And writing this post reminded me of a passage I scribbled from a phenomenal book I read last summer, Hillary Jordan’s When She Woke:

“I don’t have far to go.”

“That may be…or it may be that you have a greater distance than you think. But either way, you’ll get there eventually.”

You know what?

I will.

XX,
Jade

Nostalgia

Posted on February 25, 2015December 30, 2016 by Jade A. Waters

I ran into an old boyfriend last week, one that stands out from the others in his own right. The encounter itself was mellow and calm—much like our very short relationship—but it got me thinking about our time together and nostalgia, in general: that special place we hold in our hearts for the memories really worth keeping.

I’d known of C. a couple years before we dated, but I didn’t actually meet him until a strange time in my life. I’d finally ended a five-year bruise of a relationship, and though I’d ventured away from my hometown after high school with big dreams that carried me all the way through college, something about what I’d just been through made me feel like I had to go back. In a sense, I needed to be close to my roots so I could graduate again. I wanted to break out into the world all over, but this time as me, just me, with no noose, agony, or pain weighing me down.

So there I was one night, a couple months home and at a bar with a friend, and this handsome bartender I recognized came to take our order. “Whoa! Hey, C.! I didn’t know you worked here!” I’d said, and we’d been excited to formally meet one another. He was all smiles and charm and nice, exactly like I’d assumed he was after our occasional run-ins over the years, and not one week later we were on our first date at an absurdly fancy restaurant. He said a bevy of sweet things that made me blush so pink he claimed it was his favorite thing about me, and after hours of laughter, wine, and incredible conversation, I confessed that with all I’d been through—a story he, like many others, had heard mentioned around our hometown—I couldn’t handle anything other than light, fun and calm.

And for a while, C. was all those things. He was tall and twinkly eyed, a big carefree bear of a man who loved to make love and cuddle and laugh so loud heads turned. And when we were together, it was impossible not to laugh with him, not to spend hours rolling around in bed and having Sex and the City marathons, or singing at the top of our lungs to silly songs while we drove just to drive, fast and free, enjoying the moment and not really caring where it led.

Fun and free was what our entire relationship was for me—and though we ultimately ended because C. started wanting more and I still wasn’t ready or healed, I think deep down we both knew there was more difference than that between us. In many ways, I was still the small town girl aching to run somewhere bigger, somewhere I could stretch out my little wings, while he was more about sticking to roots, home, and comfort. It was the exact pairing I’d needed then, and yet, not something that could have worked for either of us beyond the length of time it did.

After C., I had more convoluted, tangled relationships. Some were long, some short, but many were not the kind worth remembering. This is why when I ran into C. last week, I had the strongest rush of all we shared in our brief time—not in any sort of pining way, but with that lovely flash of details that had been so good between us. I remembered bowling competitions with strikes and spares earning kisses, swing dancing in our underwear, enthusiastic discussions on the merits of men’s watches and women’s shoes, gentle kisses under a veranda before he told me I had “the most spectacular blush,” attempting to out-sing each other to Cake’s “Love You Madly” over leftovers and wine, and him surprising me with flowers on Valentine’s Day even though we were over, because, as he told me, I deserved them.

As short-lived as my time with C. was, seeing him years later—still bartending, smiling, and belly laughing, proudly showing me pictures of his beautiful wife and daughter while asking after me and rooting me on in that big-hearted way he used to—made me profoundly happy. Our relationship was a couple-month snapshot on a wide panorama of formative events, and the likelihood I’d see him again was fairly small—but when I left the bar giggling, blushing as pink as he made me do over a decade ago, I had the sweetest warmth of memory and the biggest smile on my face.

So I think that’s the true beauty of nostalgia—it doesn’t matter how small the memory is; when it’s that worth keeping, it will always be pure gold.

XX,
Jade

Malin and I Talk Fifty Shades of Grey – in Stereo!

Posted on February 16, 2015February 16, 2015 by Jade A. Waters

As you may well know, Malin James and I are the best of pals. We have a knack for chatter, laughter, and ridiculously good times. So for Valentine’s Day this year, we opted to take ourselves out to see the hugely hyped and widely discussed Fifty Shades of Grey. I mean, we do write erotica and all, so it made sense—and by golly, we were going to go into it open-minded and with the intent of making the best of it.

Here we are before the show:

Pre-Fifty Shades in Our Super Shades

Since we’d both planned to write blog posts on the movie, we had some things to bounce around afterward. But when we found ourselves chatting over our usual Thai lunch with so very many things to say, we got to thinking…what if we just had this chat over a microphone and shared our thoughts in audio with all of you?

So, that’s exactly what we did. We ended up having a smashing good time (so much so that we should probably apologize in advance for how loud the cackling got), and we hope you enjoy our take on this highly debated erotica blockbuster.

Also, I should mention: outtakes. 🙂

And with that…

Malin and Jade Talk Fifty Shades of Grey:

Thank you so much for joining us!

XX,
Jade

Pillow Talk Secrets: All About the Dirty Scenes!

Posted on February 11, 2015February 5, 2015 by Jade A. Waters

It’s time for another Pillow Talk Secrets, everyone!

Today I’m quite excited as Malin James, Tamsin Flowers and I—your host for the day, Jade A. Waters—have a spicy new topic for you. We’ve been wanting to get back to the dirty, seeing as we are Erotica Writers Talking Dirty, so today I’m delighted to be leading our discussion on the best erotic scenes and acts to write. That’s right—you’ll be hearing all our favorite pairings, naughty deeds, and explicit (literary) moments, and we hope you’ll enjoy the ride. (Eh-hm. Pun intended.)

So without further ado, welcome back to…

Pillow Talk Secrets

Jade: Hello, ladies! How are you both today?

Malin: I’m doing really well, thanks! How are you, Jade? Tamsin?

Tamsin: Very well, thank you.

J: I’m so glad to hear you’re both well. I’m very excited for our session today, and I suspect there’s some real dirtiness ahead. 😉 Shall we get to it?

M: Absolutely!

T: Fire away, Jade.

J: All right then. Today, we’re talking about favorite pairings and acts to write in erotica. Hot! Let’s kick off with pairings: one-on-one, threesomes, different gender combos, etc…any particular preferences?

M: Well, I’ve always loved writing m/m/f threesomes—my WIP is about how one develops longer term, (among other things). That said, I just wrote my first m/m last fall and kind of loved that too.

T: Yeah, I enjoy the old m/m/f—my novel Her Boss & His Client was about one—and that was so much fun to write. Double penetration and the rest! 😉

J: Right! You know, I haven’t written a ton of threesomes myself, but I did love penning the few I tried. So far I’ve only run with m/m/f. Have either of you given f/f/m a whirl, and if so, what do you feel are the differences in actually writing them (besides the obvious, of course)?

M: I wrote an f/f/m very early on—the story is awful, though the pairing was fun. I think the biggest difference, (for me), is that with m/m/f I feel free to just go to town, whereas with f/f/m, I’m very conscious of the fact that the f/f portion can accidentally come off as a bit performative, (as in “bi for his benefit”). While there’s nothing wrong with that in print or in life, there are other aspects of that dynamic I want to explore more.

J: That’s a really good point, Malin. That performative piece is so ingrained as a societal fantasy, it’s something to be mindful of.

M: It’s true…that said, I’ve read a lot of stories that dig into powerful, sexy stuff with f/f/m’s. There are a lot of different power dynamics to play with—same with m/m/f.

T: One thing about writing anything with three people involved is the need to be a little more specific about whose body part is whose—you can’t just say “his cock” if it could be Tom’s cock or Dick’s cock. And you need to be really clear for the reader on the logistics—it can certainly get confusing when there are six hands, six arms and legs, and multiple genitalia!

J: And that’s the same for more than three, too—I wrote a fourway orgy (in space, no less). It was three men and a woman. Mind your pronouns was the name of the game!

M: Absolutely—pronouns and body parts get really interesting when there are more than two people to manage. Same with action—it’s easy to accidentally focus on two of the characters and leave the third (or fourth) in some sort of sexy holding pattern. It’s like juggling balls (ha). You’ve got to keep all of them in the air.

T: Smart analogy!

J: Yes. Body part circus! 🙂 It’s something we have to pay attention to no matter what, but it’s certainly heightened in the three-four-five-(whoa wouldn’t that be fun?)-ways. So, while all the pairings are lovely, it’s clear we tend to gravitate to one-on-one for the majority of our writing. Let’s focus on specific acts in couple erotica then, no matter what the gender pairing. Shall we start at the beginning? They meet, they make eyes, and then…there’s the kiss! What are your thoughts on writing the kiss?