I keep coming across random posts online (in different places and I never remember to save those sources) about how people don’t really smirk or chuckle in real life and so you shouldn’t use those terms in writing (whether in original work or fanfiction.) Today I came across a post on Tumblr (where I am not a member, but like to randomly cruise through now and then for fun posts and random rants about history that all check out when I want to check for authenticity) that said,
those posts criticizing common writing patterns in fanfiction are so ******* harmful and they ruined me
so like yknow what??? People tell you to avoid “smirk” and “chuckle” as descriptors because no one does those things (???) but then when I need to use those words I have a ten minute crisis about how I’m a ****** writer. So heres my unwarranted writing advice: If you want your characters to smirk and chuckle ******* let them and don’t let anyone tell you that no one smirks or chuckles because I do both on a daily basis whenever I tell a ****** pun, bye –rowdyravens
I sat there for a moment and remembered running into all of those posts from before that say not to use smirk or chuckle and was really confused. For the first time, I realized that people genuinely think that no one smirks or chuckles in real life. I had not realized this before and had thought that those previous posts were jokes (or I was really tired when I read them and didn’t really take in what they were saying.)
Because quite a few of my family members genuinely smirk all the time. My dad does it (though he won’t admit to it) and he chuckles a lot. My eldest nephew is a pro at smirking (which is just all kinds of unfair, because I’m one of the few in my family that can’t do that at all) and has the deepest chuckle that I have ever heard in my life. (Which, again, is saying something because both of my brothers have some of the, previously believed to be, lowest voices in my family and they chuckle more often than they laugh. (How my 15-year-old nephew went from soprano to bass in his vocals seemingly over night, I will never know. Seriously, that kid didn’t have a voice that cracked even a little bit! My niece’s voice cracked a little when it change from first soprano to first alto/second soprano! That gangly kid is something else…)
So I hadn’t realized before this moment that many people believe that smirking or chuckling is something that only exists in literature rather than in real life.
I had to even stop and share this with my nephew and he didn’t believe for a moment because he is either being a straight man or sitting there smirking like a little brat.
And the chuckling! Over 90% of my life hearing my dad when he’s doing some kind of laugh has been listening to him chuckle! He doesn’t really laugh, he just quietly chuckles.
This is just really throwing me for a loop!
I- I must go do something else before I expend all of today’s energy being confused and ranting at posts on my computer.
Breathing In 