Writers or authors, authors or writers

Whatever you call yourself, if you don't follow jaylake's journal, you might want to pop over to follow this discussion in which he ruminates about the sorts of people writers are, and what the difference is between writers and authors. Thoughtful discussion going on and worth a perusal. Reminds me of a couple of topics that I wanted to bring up here at some point, sparked by something I heard someone say on NPR the other day. Will come back to it as I have time. In the meanwhile, go read and think....

PS: On a completely unrelated subject, I am wearing beautifully color-coordinated Fat Tuesday beads today in solidarity with the folks in New Orleans: blue and purple and gold. I couldn't find my green beads before I left the house (what's Mardi Gras without purple and gold and green, I ask you?), only to realize halfway to work that I knew exactly where they are. If nothing else, this should tell you something about my skills as a housekeeper. ::wry grin:: Anyway, my intentions are good and celebratory, and I love wearing them. They make me happy on a day when my throat feels like it's been scraped over with razor blades. And I've got chorus tonight. ::sigh::

What does it mean...

Last week, I'm listening to a story on KUOW (the local NPR affiliate) about fraternities at the University of Washington, and about how a frat with a reputation for hard partying decided in the last year or so to turn around its reputation: only one party per quarter, studying harder, doing community service, that sort of thing. They lost a number of members as a result of this decision, but those who stayed all agreed it was the right thing to do if they wanted to be serious and get the most out of school. One of the students who was interviewed said that it was teaching him what it means to be a man.

And that phrase took me off into several different directions. At least one of those directions was the following thread of thought, the steps delineated in bold:

What does it mean to be a man? When I think about the answer to that question for myself, I come up with things like being a person of good and decent conscience, responsible, respectful, emotionally resilient, that sort of thing. The first two items on this list, somehow, seem especially important in this equation. I suspect the student meant even more than that.

What does it mean to be a woman? Interestingly, I found this question freighted with an entirely different meaning. This question seemed to be less about character and more about sex and sexuality, i.e., a woman is sexy, stylish, sophisticated, self-aware, compassionate, empathetic, emotionally resilient (the one place where my definitions seemed to come together, which may reflect more about me and my experience than general social norms and expectations).

Why do those questions seem to come with such completely different baggage? Sex, gender, and social conditioning, surely. But there must be more to it than that.

My hope had been to go a bit deeper with this analysis, but I'm pressed for time and am trying to at least get the ideas and questions out there for more thorough discussion. Thoughts, anyone?