shalanna

I've simply got to cancel that "your horoscope by e-mail every morning" service. Today it claims:

Pisces (Feb 19 - Mar 20)--The realization of your fantasies can sound too good to be true, but this can bring disappointment, too. Sometimes the most exquisite desires are better left floating in the clouds of illusion, for they don't meet your high expectations once they have precipitated into reality. Be careful what you dream; you might have to live with it.

Come ON. Why don't you just poke me with a pin? You won't be happy even when you're happy!

However, I just woke up from a dream in which my knee wasn't stiff any more and I was really bending it well, and it actually *doesn't* feel quite as stiff (it's usually hideously stiff after I wake up, especially if I've slept more than three hours or so) and is bending pretty well. This did not bring any disappointment.

I no longer have that fantasy about [famous celebrity's name redacted] showing up at my door because he needs me to co-star in his next film and/or appear on his game show, so that can't be what they're warning against.

So let's bring on those dreams come true! As long as they're not the BAD dreams--and it doesn't sound like that; it sounds as if they're shaking their heads dourly and reciting a litany of warnings against being too happy about getting something you have worked towards your entire life, because it may not be all it's cracked up to be. Well, hell, kiddos, let me simply say that I'll be thrilled to have a better class of problems!

Can't get my hardcover books positioned in a special dump at the front of the store? Can't get top billing above Michael Douglas in my next feature film? Can't reserve all of Spago tomorrow night for my big party? Pout! Pout! Oh, dear, the wrong color of cut flowers was delivered to our tour bus! _Quel horreur_! But I can live with that! What I can't live with is the constant failure and abuse that life typically throws on our heads. So let's see you stars and planets upgrade all us Pisces babes to that better class of worries and problems, and see if we don't pull an Esther Williams right here in the lily pond! *wink*
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I just read this, and it seems like a useful distinction: if your heroine is rollin' with/responding to changes in fortune that weren't necessarily caused by her, then her story is event-driven. If she's responding to events caused by her own karma/stubbornness/mistakes (actions she has consciously taken or has unconsciously failed to prevent because of her tragic flaw or her deepest fears/doubts or whatever it is she's going to experience change in during her character arc), then the story is character-driven.
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"Schadenfreude can be a bracing tonic."--Some naughty 'net wag who wants to remain anonymous, and understandably so. (Not me!)