Intellectualizing My Emotions For the Holidays
What would it be like to feel things outside of romance novels?
Romancelandia Holiday Fairies is open for 2023 - RHF is a mutual aid effort for the "Romancelandia" romance novel reader community to support anyone in the community who could use help with purchasing gifts for themselves or loved ones this holiday season.
You can directly provide support for another member of the romance community by buying from wishlists. And, if you need some help, you can submit your own wishlist.
"I was having an emotion and I hate that. I'd rather have nice, safe emotions about shows on the entertainment media.
Having them about real life things human said and did just led to stupid decisions."
-Exit Strategy by Martha Wells (Murderbot series)
This post is about feelings and romance novels, and hope, and anger, and powerlessness, and the year 2020.
And 2021.
And 2022.
And 2023.
It’s also about how entertainment, including reading romance novels, is a safe space to learn emotions, name them, feel them for abstractions, yet also keep distance from those emotions. When those emotions jump from the page, the screen, or the futuristic media serial, it can be hard, painful and messy.
Although this post is about feelings, I feel compelled to share my intellectual journey towards realizing that.
Thinking About Feelings
Sometimes discussions with guests on Shelf Love podcast dislodge things for me that I didn't even know I was feeling or thinking. Someone will say something, and the response that pops out of my mouth is not something that I have consciously thought about but after it comes out, I’m like, oh shit: I didn't realize I felt like that, but now that I've said it, I totally feel like that…but it’s not the kind of thing that’s accessible until an unguarded moment.
So at the end of May 2020, I was recording an episode with Katrina Jackson. In case you need a reminder about what was happening in the world, we were about two months into the pandemic and it was days after George Floyd was murdered on camera and protests were beginning to make the news and happen across the U.S..
So Katrina and I are sort of skirting around talking about what's going on and I mentioned I had just watched Contagion, which is a star-studded 2011 disaster movie version of a pandemic story.
So I'm telling Kat about this and then she asks this question:
Katrina Jackson: That's hard. How did you get through that?
Andrea Martucci: I think the way I get through most things in life… by dissociating my emotions from what's happening?
Katrina Jackson: This is sadly relatable. Oh my God, yeah.
Andrea Martucci: I have emotions, but-
Katrina Jackson: You just don't process them.
Andrea Martucci: I'm like, let me examine this logically and then it will make sense to me.
Afterward, I thought about that response a lot.
I guess I do dissociate my emotions from a lot of things and then I wear that fact like a badge of honor, or I dismiss feelings like I'm above the need to feel emotions, as if I can logic them away.
It's probably a defense mechanism.1
Hearing myself say that the only way I can deal with the world is to not have feelings about it did make me feel bad, a very bad feeling I immediately wanted to stop feeling.
So I returned to the comfort of intellectualizing, and next wondered:
Is this why I'm so interested in reading romance novels?
Romance Novels Are About Feelings
A lot of readers identify hope as what they're seeking when they read romance novels. You can escape into this world that's either completely different from your own, or maybe very similar to your own. But unlike real life, you're guaranteed that things will end up better than they started. That's hope in a nutshell.
I'm sure that's part of the appeal for me too, but I started to wonder, how much of what I enjoy experiencing in romance novels is that intimacy with characters' thoroughly explored emotions?
I get to peer inside their hearts and minds, see characters recognize their own emotions, express them to other people and navigate important journeys of self discovery. Some of these emotions are related to love, sex, and romance. Some of these are familial emotions of love. Some of these are feelings about injustice or work or career or having children or dealing with tragedy.
The format of the novel and the romance novel in particular is incredibly dedicated to the idea of sharing the interior emotional life of the character with the reader.
I can diagnose multiple reasons why this is particularly alluring to me, and maybe some of this sounds like you, too.
Lack of good emotional role models. I grew up in a family that was very much like, Oh, are you experiencing an emotion? You need to buck up and get over it because life's tough kiddo. In other words, growing up I didn’t learn emotional literacy and how to be in tune with my emotions.
Internalized misogyny. In the patriarchal society that we live in, we're told that excess emotion and sentimentality are associated with things that are undesirable. Intellectually capable people don't dwell in emotion, according to that line of thinking. So emotions and sentimentality are feminized and in a hierarchy they're placed below the importance of logic and being emotionally contained, which is associated with power.
This, not coincidentally, is one of the mainstream critiques of the romance genre from those who usually have never read one. And the critique is basically that because romance novels deal with emotions that they're for women only, and that they must be silly and not for serious powerful people, not even serious powerful women.
Again, this is the mainstream critique of what Jayashree Kamble calls "the media romance,"2 which is not really what romance is, it's people's perception of romance.
And of course I know that that's all bullshit, but underneath my intellectual understanding that that's bullshit, do I act as if I believe it a little bit? That if I'm too emotional I'm just a silly person who shouldn't be taken seriously or shouldn't be believed to be competent?
As much as I intellectually understand that feelings are good, healthy, et cetera, I think it's hard for me to actually practice that day-to-day. And so I tend to revert to this state where I'm hiding the fact that I have emotions, not just from other people, but from myself.
Because I also subscribe to:
Post-modern cynicism and sarcasm: because after all we know that the fairy tale isn't real and to believe in it means that you've been hoodwinked. You're naive and unsophisticated and, perhaps worst of all, uncool.
And so here I am present day, Andrea, realizing just how emotionally constipated I am and trying to reconcile that with my love for a genre that is about 99% emotion.
On the podcast, can I praise specific romance novels for the emotional modeling that I read in them? Absolutely.
In my dayjob as a professional communicator, I can sit down and logically think about how to influence somebody’s emotions with a story or information, to get them to take action in some way.
But understanding and communicating my own emotions? Ehhhhhh…. I have a tendency to shut down pretty quickly because I think I get overwhelmed pretty quickly.
So yes, there's a vicarious thrill I get when I read about characters having healthy, positive communication, and seeing models for people expressing and articulating and identifying various emotions and expressing the ways that they feel about things. That exposes me to different ways of feeling about things.
The point isn’t always to feel the same way the characters do, but I do get to open my mind to the possibility that certain emotions could exist. I'm not seeing how I need to feel: I'm seeing how I can feel.
Romance Novels are Human Stories
Shelf Love podcast is in many ways an exercise in me needing to talk through the emotions that I'm reading on the page with another human being.
(While my choice of forum has a higher production value than most people choose, this seems like a practice that will resonate with many romance readers.)
As much as I love romance novels as a mode of entertainment, I think that really, I also see it as a lens into understanding.
Because they're so fantastic at expressing emotions, romance novels become a way to understand how I could feel about everything else in my life, from neoliberalism to identity, the meaning of life, and what is love but a cultural script that we're indoctrinated into? And how do we form relationships with other people in communities? And why are these relationships so sacred to us?
I think romance novels can explore literally anything because they're literally just human stories, even when all the characters are aliens from another planet.
I think this is why I've started to question the commonly-heard mantra within the romance community that, of course we as readers can separate fantasy from reality.
Yeah, obviously I don't think werewolves exist and I don't actually want to be captured by a pirate.
But underneath even the zaniest premise of a romance novel, readers are looking for that human story and emotional journey. And even when those emotions are amped up for drama or have less nuance than the intersecting and complicated ones that we feel as “real” people, I think that there are many parts of romance novels that we do see as models or representations of reality.
I Just Have a Lot of (Bad) Feelings
In 2020, I was having a lot of feelings.
I originally wrote the first version of this essay for the podcast back in 2020, but it’s remained sadly evergreen ever since.
I can very easily place my finger on the anger that I felt that year, which was a culmination of many years of growing anger, not just because of what was happening in the world around me, but also my growing awareness generally about the larger forces at play in my life, which I will chalk up to reaching a certain age and life stage.
I felt angry and really helpless to do anything about the things that I was angry about.
Anger is a bit of a crude emotion. It’s also an emotion that blocks us from feeling like we have power and agency in whatever situation we find ourselves in.
So when I'm angry, I feel stuck.
It feels like my only option is to be in a lather all the time or disengage and fall into apathy, because what can I do besides be angry?
Part of what is so paralyzing about this false dichotomy is that when I don't push past my feelings of anger to understand more about the root cause of my anger (which is hard because I have to sit with things that are infuriating) then I can't identify what I do have power over.
Big problems are not a one-person job. And so I think it's often hard for all of us who are limited by our narrow perspectives of big problems to be able to break down those big problems until they get small enough for us to do something about it.
Anger is often a response to powerlessness, but I’ve learned that you can create your power. Nobody can give you real power.
Most of the problems that I'd like to see solved require tearing down the existing power structure, not moving into it and becoming the new landlord.
One way of addressing the anger and powerlessness we feel is to redefine what power can look like.
Creating Power
Back in 2020, I organized a mutual aid effort that was named Romancelandia Holiday Fairies — and, spoiler alert, now it’s back for the 4th year in 2023.
Around Thanksgiving of that year, I started talking about doing something in the Broken Circle Discord channel run by Bree (half of Kit Rocha), and Bree shared a model that they done in the past for their reader community.3
The idea was: wouldn’t it be nice to find a way for people in the romance community to help other people in the romance community?
Anybody who needs some material help can submit an Amazon wishlist, and a list of wishlists can be found in a central location. Then “holiday fairies” can go browse the lists and buy things that then get sent directly to the people who asked for the stuff.
It’s a way for people to give directly to one another, with as few barriers and as little administrative overhead as possible.
Although I handle the administration, it’s always been a true community effort. People have always been so generous with sharing, buying, volunteering their time in various ways, and using their platforms to broadcast the message and bring more people into the fold.
That first year in 2020, I had no idea what I was getting into. It kind of started on an ADHD hyper-focus whim, which means that once I started I was 100% committed.
It really did seem to chase away that feeling of powerlessness, though. I was high on “doing something.”
Take that, anger! I'm adding wishlists (61 the first year!)! I'm making Canva graphics! People are sharing it and telling me that they're buying stuff! It’s working! Goals met!
But this is an essay about feelings, and I’ve been avoiding them for too long.
Feeling Some Feelings
The turning point that first year was when I started hearing from the people who were getting packages in the mail.
One email was particularly memorable.
It started by describing a bit about their family situation and how much this means to them and their family to be receiving gifts from their wishlist.
I asked for permission to share this paragraph:
“I will be eternally grateful to you for what this opportunity grants me. It allows me the chance to gift to my children and use that money for groceries and necessities for the bathroom. I'm able to craft and give them some sense of normalcy.
Santa will happen in our house because of you and others like you, who adopt families like mine that are isolated, weary, scared, and needed someone to shine a light for us.
You gave me back hope and showed me that humans are still kind."
I literally can not read this without crying.
I’m not kidding. When I originally read the above for the podcast recording 3 years ago, I had to take sob breaks, and I am literally sitting here now revising this essay with tears rolling down my face.
And, you know, maybe this sounds emotionally constipated (it does, and I am), but I am continually surprised by how many emotions this message brings up for me.
Surprise that seemingly small acts can have such a big impact on the recipient.
Sadness that people face unexpected health challenges and economic insecurity.
Happiness and pride that I was able to facilitate this for them.
And shame that I don't do more and that I can't always do more.
These are not abstractions. And it's just all too much.
Intellectually, I understand why it's hard to look too closely at the struggles and suffering of other people who live among us in the world. And one defense mechanism against that secondhand pain is to try to find a rational explanation that helps explain why this can't happen to you.
Neoliberal rhetoric and culture teaches us to believe that we all get what we deserve based on how hard we work or how good or deserving we are.
And that's bullshit.
Misfortune can happen to any one of us. And every person deserves help, no matter how “good” or “deserving” we judge them to be.
If you look too hard at bad things, you have to realize that you're not safe from those things either.
So we shy away.
I shy away.
Another word for that emotional dissociation is apathy.
Is it possible that romance novels, as stories that explore emotion and emotional growth, have to end up at hope?
Hope that when you feel powerless, that if you can recognize and honor your feelings, you may see that there is something you can do, you just haven't figured it out yet? Because when you believe there can be a different way instead of accepting "it is what it is," you're empowering yourself to take action and actually change things for the better.
Maybe you're changing things for yourself, which is enough. Maybe you're changing things for one other person, which is also enough. But maybe it also could be bigger than that
To learn more and get all the details about Romancelandia Holiday Fairies, you can find all the information on the Shelf Love website:
There are 30 wishlists up for 2023 so far, and we’re just a few days in!
I would very much appreciate if you could help spread the word about this mutual aid effort to your circle of the romance community.
You can find graphics and pre-written social media posts on the link above. Here’s an example:
Romancelandia Holiday Fairies is a simple gift drive for the romance community.
1. Friends in need submit a wishlist link
2. Fairies swoop in to buy what they can & help out. Every gift makes a difference!
all the info & wishlists: bit.ly/holidayfairies
This history of this post
Maybe you first heard a version of this on Shelf Love podcast, or maybe this is your first time. I’m never sure how much my Substack audience overlaps with podcast listeners, or how far most new listeners go back into the back catalogue.
Apparently some people aren’t into podcasts (gasp!), so I figured it was worthwhile to make a written version. In case you’re curious, here are other iterations over time:
The first audio essay:
The reboot version where I talk about Murderbot:
(It’s definitely a defense mechanism.)
Jayashree Kamble writes about the idea of "the media romance" in Making Meaning in Popular Romance Fiction. She also writes about it in her chapter in the Routledge Research Companion to Popular Romance Fiction "Romance in the Media."
With Bree’s blessing, I ripped off the concept AND the name, which is how we ended up with “Holiday Fairies.”