Photo by Russ Seidel on Flickr
This quote from Shelley Jackson's meta short story "The Swan Brothers" speaks to me on many levels.
"Because you’ve also lived—you’ve been living and reading for years, sometimes both at once—you are not surprised that people often repeat their most unpleasant experiences.
It’s probably for the same reason we tell the same stories over and over, with minor variations...It is cozy to have one’s expectations met, though there is also, always, the possibility—is this is a happy thought or a sad one?—that things will turn out differently, this time."
First, it explains why we gravitate toward genres when it comes to the books and movies we consume. Nearly every romantic comedy/horror/action movie has essentially the same plot, right?
This gives us a template—something solid to latch onto—so that we know what to expect, while offering just enough variation to keep things interesting.
I used to think this was because life was chaotic and unpredictable, so these stories offered a counterbalance. But while yes, life is messy and does not consist of three predictable acts, for many of, life still conforms to certain patterns.
These patterns can be related to family or relationship dynamics...people that choose the same types of partners over and over again, even when it never works out. It could relate to health issues or recurring situations in jobs.
This is not to say these patterns are always negative. You can often tell by high school which people are going to have successful careers or family relationships by how they show up in other areas of their life.
Either way, when we become stuck in these patterns, life becomes stale and boring.
Enter metafiction. Metafiction shakes up generic conventions by offering up other possibilities for how storylines play out.
In "The Swan Brothers," one storyline involves a performance artist/seamstress who fades into obscurity, sewing away in a dusty abandoned shop plastered with flyers for flashier acts like burlesque dancers.
In a parallel reality, the shop is repainted and she is the star of a glamorous media event. In another (or perhaps these realities merge), she begins a love affair with a woman who lost her hands while jumping trains (or maybe her father cut them off).
The seamstress's six swan brothers—temporarily humans—come to her reception, but in Cinderella-like fashion, they must leave before they turn back into swans. Or perhaps she ate her brothers—along with her children.
The point is this. Metafiction is fiction that is self-aware. This awareness lends it fluidity. Because fiction, by definition, is "made up," it does not have to follow the set path dictated through narrative convention; it can change course any time.
We could do well to adopt the same approach for our lives. If we decide we're just making it up as we go along, this gives us the freedom to alter the storyline.
If you don't like the way your life is going—or are simply bored with life—then change the scene.
