End of the Year Blues

by Charlaine Harris at the Femmes Fatales

This year I’ve been feeling increasingly autumnal . . . maybe bordering on wintery. It’s been a year of loss, of friends vanishing forever.

After remembering these friends and their influence on my life, I realize how remarkable it was to know them and how profound their effect on me has been. I was lucky to know them at all, really.

Here’s realization I came to: people are amazing. When you come to know individuals, when you see their hearts, there is something interesting or arresting about every single one. But it’s the ‘getting to know them’ part that’s tricky. It can be hard to see past an unlikeable or even repellant exterior, nearly impossible to see past moral and political viewpoints so alien to my own.

Amid all this Pollyanna emoting, I should point out that I find some people amazingly awful. Sometimes I can even perceive they feel the same way about me. This, too, can be instructive and enlightening, or even flattering, like the woman who wanted my previous home exorcised before the buyers moved in. It was quite a thrill to get credit for being so evil.

Creating people is my livelihood. After thirty-five years of being a published writer (I had to check that on my website, it seemed so unlikely), you would think I would have realized all this much earlier. I’m going on the assumption that loss has triggered a richer realization of what life means to me.

It’s a lot to think about. I’m sure everyone has had watershed moments like this, where your understanding of the world attains a new clarity. It’s pretty cool.

Charlaine Harris

Comments

[Mark]

Thanks for the thoughtful post. It's important to remember things like this to appreciate the people who are currently in our lives.

[Charlaine Harris]

That's certainly the mood I was in, Mark. This is serious stuff.

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Yes. Sometimes when I look at the night sky...

[Joanna Campbell Slan]

I've come to believe that there's a backstory to everything and everyone. And yes, people can be amazingly awful. Oddly enough, those same people can turn around and do something amazingly kind, too.

[Elaine Viets]

It's 80 degrees here in Fort Lauderdale, but I'm feeling wintry, too, Charlaine. I've lost too many good friends, and others are very sick. And yes, I'm grateful for their friendship, but their loss leaves a big hole my life. Like any writer, I can create people. But the ones who are here are far more interesting -- and surprising -- than anyone I can invent.

[Karen in Ohio]

It seems that most of us have at least one time in our lives when the mounting losses seem overwhelming. But many would not choose to believe they could learn anything from such accumulation of loss. Brava, for the introspection that led to your expanded understanding of life, Charlaine.

[Lee Lofland]

Hi Charlaine. Great article. As a former police detective, it was part off my job to sit across the table from some of the worst criminals you could imagine, to hopefully garner confessions. To do so successfully it was imperative that I see past those unlikeable or even repellant exteriors. The same was true when working undercover assignments. It was often necessary to look deep inside a person to learn what makes them tick and to learn and adapt mannerisms that could me help fit in.

During the course of "learning people" it became easier to see their needs and troubles, and sometimes those moments helped me find an alternative to jail, such as helping find and secure a job, a home, or even something as simple as a meal. Sometimes, and you never know when, those things helped to steer someone in a better direction.

By the way, I just sent a message to you via your Facebook page.

[Charlaine Harris]

Thanks to all of you for thinking about my rambling ideas. Lee, I don't know how you did it, and I applaud you.
Karen, I believe if you don't learn from your misfortunes and mistakes, you are a poor excuse for a human being.
Elaine, I agree with you. Some of the people I've met, and some my children have met, make the people I invent simply pale in comparison.
Joanna, it's true the sulkiest people can do something really amazing. I remember writer who treated me with condescension and contempt. Later on, several people told me how generous he had been with his time and support for them. Go figure!