Tag: Millennials

“We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams.”

Sara Mazariegos

I used to think this was a Willy Wonka quote. I had no idea he was quoting a poem by Arthur O’Shaughnessy.

We are the music makers,
    And we are the dreamers of dreams,
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
    And sitting by desolate streams;—
World-losers and world-forsakers,
    On whom the pale moon gleams:
Yet we are the movers and shakers
    Of the world for ever, it seems.

Isn’t it wild to think that people didn’t know things like that before the Internet? Granted, I could’ve looked it up sooner than the other day, but still. We were just out there, learning things as they came to us and assuming things because we didn’t have pocket encyclopedias*.

This has been on my mind lately because John Green has been posting about the negative aspects of the social Internet for (let’s face it) years now. He’s taking a month off from Vlogbrothers in part because of the toxicity of the modern Internet, and I can’t blame him but also 😭

I am a Millennial. I grew up playing outside with friends, watching VHS tapes, and using a complicated Dewey Decimal System (with cards in organized drawers!) I clearly remember being 14 and liking a band and having to buy their CDs if I wanted to hear them. Okay, the bands were from the 60s so it’s not like I was listening to Millennial music, but still. If I wanted to listen to The Who’s discography, I had to buy that sh—

A moment ago, I just listened to a full Monkees album I’d never heard before because I didn’t own it. Am I nostalgic for a time when information wasn’t at my fingertips? NO! I just think it’s unfortunate and not necessary that we as a connected, better-informed society have gone from “I learned a thing! :D” to “everyone who disagrees with me is stupid and doesn’t deserve to go about their day without me telling them how badly I think of them.”

And now to awkwardly pivot a little. On Sunday, a literary agent tweeted this:


This is bad. This is really bad. I would hope that the majority of literary agents would not ever even think of doing something like this. Not only is it embarrassing for the writer she rejected, but it’s basically saying, ‘you gave me this idea, now I can take it and have someone else write it instead of working with you.’

It’s quite disheartening to see this behavior from a literary agent. They are supposed to be the ones writers can trust and turn to for support and advice. I don’t want to write off all agents because I know for a fact that most of them are wonderful, but it certainly doesn’t help their case in the growing traditional vs. indie publishing debates.

What do you think?


*Or maybe some of us did. Nerds.

Mojo dojo casa house.

Sara Mazariegos

When I was a kid, I had a lot of hand-me-downs from my older sister. She was born in 1980, so it meant I had a lot of cool, older toys. I had Barbies with fun, eighties styles that hung out with my newer, nineties dolls. I had a Soda Shoppe playset that I used to pretend served the concessions for ‘drive-in’ movies in my parents’ den.

Those tiny hot dogs and buns were frustrating to work with. The stools doubled as cups for human consumption of the soda.

My dolls didn’t live in the classic, pink Dream House. They lived in my sister’s version, from the 80s. It was yellow for some reason, but it was still eleganza.

Many a cat also lived in that house. Most probably not by choice.

One ‘new’ thing my Barbies had was a Porsche Boxter with a working convertible roof.

Whenever Barbie or Ariel or Megara (I had a lot of Disney dolls) wanted to go to the drive-in, she’d roll up in that beauty.

The Barbie movie made me wistful.

America Ferrera’s monologue was the only part that made me cry, though it doesn’t have as much to do with Barbie as it has to do with society’s treatment/expectations of women.

I really liked it. I also liked Oppenheimer, but not as much.

Big think.

Sara Mazariegos

I’ve shared my query letter drafts with a few online groups as I struggle to describe my novel within only about three hundred words. It’s made me have a big think about what people’s reaction has been. Not friends or people in my social circle, just random strangers. After all, it would be random strangers who’d consider reading my novel once my devoted loved ones have read it.

It doesn’t feel great to be told that my lived experience of being a Millennial who graduated from college in 2009 and struggled to find a career for years after that isn’t realistic or interesting. I can’t tell if I need to really rework my selling points or the story itself.

So for this week, I’m mostly sad.

I’ve probably got a lot of revisions to do. Big, overhauly type ones. I hesitate to completely start over because I’ve worked on this story for the past three or so years. The query readers want more conflict, so short of introducing a monster in the third act, I have to come up with something more conflicting than being poor and practically frozen in time.

Being a writer is so isolating sometimes, isn’t it?

“My spoon is too big.”

Sara Mazariegos

A lot has been said about Millennials. Too much, probably. We just want to live, but every time we turn around, we’re being blamed for something by Boomers or looked down upon by Gen Z (so the articles would have you believe anyway… what generation is writing those articles, though, hmm?)

As a card-bearing Millennial — it’s called an I.D. card — I can assure you that we’re hard-working, stressed out, and kind of done with the whole generation debate. We graduated college and entered the workforce at a terrible time. Most people I know who got jobs after college were working retail or waiting tables, or both. Being able to afford things was a constant struggle. Living with one’s parents, though not great, was the only way to stay afloat, and moving out of their houses was no walk in the park either. Unless you live in a place with low rent or mortgage rates.

But this post isn’t about complaining. I just wanted to start with some perspective.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the changing landscape on the Internet. Homestar Runner and StrongBad were bickering. Badgers and snakes were badgering and snaking around. When I first started using Facebook, it was only available to people who were currently in college. MySpace was a serious rival, with its customized profiles and annoying autoplay music. I started using Twitter in 2006, back when it was used for people to share their inane, random thoughts. YouTube was random and silly. Things were fun back then.

It’s not surprising that things have changed. Everything has become discussion-based. Argument-based, more like. Even the memes have become a lot more cynical than they used to be. Remember Charlie the Unicorn? That was just dumb; it didn’t have any underlying social commentary.

Please don’t tell me it has underlying social commentary.

I suppose the Internet is just a day-to-day example of the way things change, and how fast change happens. It feels strange to be nostalgic for something so goofy that didn’t really matter, but I suppose every generation has their version of that.


I leave you with this song. It’s about MySpace, played with a ukulele, and it’s on old-school YouTube. You’re welcome.

Killing My Darlings.

Sara Mazariegos

I’ve drafted my novel. I’ve taken a break from it, edited it, revised it, rewritten things, taken things out, dissected it, kept myself up late with worry about it, and let some of my friends have a look at it.

I set a goal for myself. I’m reading a chapter a day, as a final ‘edit now or forever hold your words’ read-through. My birthday is on Wednesday. After Wednesday, I’ll start submitting my manuscript to book agents.

Deep breaths.

I wrote my novel with a particular readership in mind. It’s for the Millennials who graduated college thinking everything would go as well as it did for their parents, only for everything to be ten times more difficult. It’s also a love story, because it’s dangerous to go alone.

I can’t wait for you to read it.