From: "Shelly Roberts" Date: Sun, 23 Aug 1998 10:46:46 +0000 Subject: Shelly Roberts Interview by Elizabeth Elkins The following is submitted as an unsolicited feature to glbt papers by Elizabeth Elkins at the usual rates. Elizabeth can be reached at Eelkins16@aol.com to confirm or set arrangements. Thanks. **************************************************** Righting the Rules by Elizabeth Elkins Exclusive Interview With Shelly Roberts, author of Roberts' Rules of Lesbian Dating, Roberts' Rules of Lesbian Living Daily Calendar, 1999, Spinsters Ink. Shelly Roberts writes the rules. That rule-writing is quickly making the Atlanta resident a lesbian icon. Her three book series "Roberts' Rules of Dating" (published by Spinsters Ink) is a popular seller at gay and lesbian bookstores across the nation. It's no wonder. The rules are not only witty and funny - they're also true. What began as a consistently clever column has parlayed into a collection of one-line proverbs for the lesbian nation. She is no stranger to humor writing - she has written other funny books such as "The Dyke Detector" and "Hey, Mom, Guess What!". But that's not all she does. Roberts is currently planning what she calls the "largest rainbow community musical event ever staged", The Rainbow Celebration Concert set for October of the Year 2000. Roberts recently spoke with me about the trials and tribulations of being much more than a rule writer. Elkins: Why do you write The Rules? Roberts: Lesbians seem to believe that we have borrowed everything from some place else. That we aren't entitled to a culture of our own, even though we have created one daily since the dawn of orientation. The entire Roberts' Rules Series is about establishing that we do indeed have a culture, and that we have our own rules (although unwritten until I scribbled some of them down). One of those areas where we still haven't acknowledged our uniqueness is in the whole arena of dating. We still see it as a boy-girl carryover from high school. No wonder we all look confused when people ask us in couples "which one is the boy?" We're not sure either. (And the answer is NOT the butch-er of the two in the couple.) We're not sure because we don't really play by those rules, because they don't fit us. But we don't really know yet what other choices we have. So the Rules of Dating was a natural in this series. Elkins: Tell me about your history as a writer. Roberts: When I was two or three, my parents used to take my sister and me for rides in the countryside in Los Angeles on Sunday. Way back when Orange County, California really had orange groves in it. They tell me that I would stand up on the back seat, look out the window, and make up poems about what I saw. Sounds like a truly annoying little kid to have in your Sunday car, but there I was. I love words. I have always loved words. I have lived by my wits and my words forever. I started out as an advertising copywriter, and grew up to be a creative director, and yes, you have seen some of my ads, and, no, I won't tell you which ones. Then somewhere in my mid 40's, with a billion or two word vocabulary, and a wicked sense of humor, I decided to turn my attention to our communities. I had previously written humor works about computers, about business, and about the women's movement. The Rainbow community was a natural evolution, and finally, my willing, laughing friends and audience. Elkins: Tell me about the writing process. Is it all from personal experiences? Roberts: I can only tell you that I love to HAVE written. (Past tense.) The process itself isn't painful. It's the long rev down the runway before takeoff that's the painful part. Once I've a keyboard under my hands, it's easy. But clearing the thousand demanding details in the pathway, including that little teeeeeeeeny, (and getting teenier) voice that says "writing hurts" is the hard part. Is it personal? Yes. Absolutely. In the sense that anything written must come from the personal observation, experience or interpretation. But no, it isn't all personal experience. Many who have read my column for years really think they know me because I put a lot of personal experience into that, but I use what I have of personal experience only to make a larger, more cosmic, and sometimes funnier, community point. I think it would be really boring to only be talking about myself all the time. And, in fact, I do know one woman who, after reading my writing, decided that she could do at least as well, and started a personal experience column of her own. She only talked about herself and what happened to her, and never got the part that it had to have some relevance to the real lives of other people, and she isn't writing it any more. When I do the rules books, I do lean heavily on my personal experience and observations. But I don't think my personal reach is long enough. Sometimes I'll throw out some open-ended questions to the lesbian Internet. Sometimes I'll ask for a panel of lesbians willing to talk about their own experiences. I want to throw as wide a net as possible in the books, and usually that happens. So that if page 37 and 91 don't exactly apply to you in any given book, then probably page 26 and 67 will. Somewhere you should be able to see a piece of your life mirrored in my work. That's not because I think I'm good enough or observant enough to be able to tell you what your life looks like, but rather, that there just aren't enough mirrors with lesbian reflections in them. So if I can offer up just one more, than that's another place where we can see who we are, and what we are up to. It takes a whole lot of mirrors to dismantle an abomination self-image. And until we deconstruct that one for ourselves, our lives can never model themselves as fully and convincingly normal and normative for anyone outside the Elkins. Seems a lot to ask of 150 one liners, but the surprising thing to me, and apparently a lot of critics and nay-sayers, is that it's been working. Elkins: What is your favorite place to go on a date? Roberts: Date? Date? Since I started working on the concert, I became, unintentionally, a theoretical lesbian. So I have to answer this from theory. And good memory. And the answer is: (Ta Da!) Home Depot. Or as my good friend Jim calls it: Homo Depot. You can learn a lot about a woman from walking through a hardware store with her. Elkins: What is the worst thing a lesbian can do on a date? Roberts: Talk about her ex. The end. Unless the other half of the date is still bereft and still in mourning, and gets equal time to talk about her ex. Then you will both be bored only half of the time. Elkins: What is the most important rule? Roberts: It isn't a funny one. The funniest/truest, of course is the one I've started all three books with: It is never a good idea to marry anyone BEFORE the first date. A very lesbian concept because we never actually date anyone we don't already believe we'd like to live with through eternity. Boy-girls use dating to find out if they want to spend more time together. We use dating to find out which one of us is willing to pack the toaster in a cardboard box and leave it in the garage. But the most important rule is that we are each of us just fine. And that just being lesbian isn't sufficient evidence to condemn us for anything. Elkins: What do you do in your free time? Roberts: Free time!? You've got to be kidding, right? I came to Atlanta to create out of vision and belief, the largest rainbow community musical event ever staged, The Rainbow Celebration Concert, in October of the Year 2000, to celebrate the successes of the "Gay 90's." I am putting and have put all my energy and all my resources into it. I've said I will invest everything I have right down to the day before I have to share the tinned tuna with the cats to make this happen. I am doing what small side advertising work is necessary during the three years I've committed to making this happen. I'm living in the wing of someone else's house to keep my expenses down. And attempting a highwire act of unprecedented proportions. In whatever "free" time I might have, I huddle small in a corner babbling "What are you, NUTZ?!" Then I get over that, because it's counter-productive, and I call another person to come help make this fantasy a reality. I really believe that it's time for us to stop and pay tribute to ourselves and each other. It's time to stop gnawing at each other because the biggest, most common enemies are mostly on the decline. It's time to listen to our own music and celebrate ourselves and what we've done. Even if you never did a single political thing in your life. Then it's time to come celebrate what others did so you could live your life in some way that didn't include getting beaten up for daring to be with who you love. Free time! What a concept! I recently learned accidentally, and after it had been corrected, that I probably had only about a year to live under some current medical circumstances I don't want to get into. Fortunately, the universe took care of that, and it isn't an issue any more. But if you really want to bring yourself up short on what you are doing with your life, try having someone tell you THAT tasty bit of information. I probably wouldn't have lived to attend my own concert. So now, none of my time is free. After October, 2000, I'm hoping, however, once again to have some diversional time, and plan to stop being a theoretical lesbian. Elkins: How did the books get published? Roberts: This whole series was a marketing idea that, fortunately hit a nerve, or a funny bone, with its audience. I was at the American Booksellers Convention, promoting my other humor books and noticed that there wasn't an impulse book for lesbians. (You know, the cheap/cute little won't-fall-off-the-toilet-tank/won't-break-the-budget book at the counter) though there were several for gay men. I offered it to my then current publisher, but she she gave new meaning to the words "small press," and couldn't afford to take on another book. So I wrote to another lesbian publisher and did about 75 one-line rules to show what I had in mind. It was an inexpensive book to produce and Spinsters Ink's wonderful Publisher, Joan Drury, said "do it." Now we're on the third, and there's even a ROBERTS' RULE A DAY CALENDAR for 1999. What a hoot. Look, Ma, I'm a Calendar! (And she never thought I'd amount to anything! Ha!) If you also mean "How do other lesbians get published?" all I can say is practice and persistence. I have another book that I've been working on for four years because I thought it was a good idea and I hoped a mainstream press would get it. They didn't, and I almost gave up, but I made one last try, and after four years of being persistent "BABY DYKES" (baby pictures of famous and garden variety lesbians, and one straight lady) will be published by Alyson in 2000, to coincide with the Rainbow Celebration Concert. If you believe that you can, you can. THAT is the ultimate Roberts' Rule.