Olivia Returns My Serve

I tossed this one out to olivia… and she sent it back.

You have won a special magical vacation: 

For one year, you will live the life of any character in fiction that you choose.

Who do you pick?

If it’s any consolation, I didn’t find this question any easier than you did. :-)

Like you, I ran through all my favorite characters in my search for an answer, which meant that I ended up making my decision based largely on the troubles I don’t want to have. 

Sookie Stackhouse can hear other people’s thoughts - I already have a low opinion of people, I don’t think that is something I need to be voluntarily reinforcing. Jaz Parks, despite the fact that I admire her enough to take her name (in bastardized form) is not mentally stable and that’s not a burden I would willingly shoulder, not even to land Vayl. Mercy Thompson has been drugged and raped - no thank you. Nell Nichols periodically ends up with trees growing inside her. So, not her, either.

It might be fun to be a guy for a year, but I don’t want to be anybody testosterone-poisoned or gun-toting, or even terribly noir. Hercule Poirot would be fascinating, but even for me, he’s a little bit too much not of the body… I’d miss sex.

I might go with living Anne Elliot’s life, if it could be a year after she becomes Mrs. Wentworth… but that brings me back to my age-old dilemma about doing without the convenience of modern plumbing. (*crinkles nose*) For a whole year? No, thanks. (This is also the primary drawback to being Claire Fraser. That and constantly being on the lam, even if I would have Jamie as a consolation prize.) So, saying no to those, as well

Diana Bishop? Tempting… But even tho’ I love her as a character, her actual life simply doesn’t call to me as something I’d want to experience. Which is interesting, because she’s gorgeous, intelligent, a scholar, and gets to time travel with a sexy vampire. You’d think I’d be on that in a New York minute! But for some reason, no…

Same with Madelaine Maxwell. This series is a fun, madcap romp but for whatever reason, her life is one I much prefer to enjoy vicariously.

No, I think if I ever got to do this, I’d choose to be Jane Yellowrock. I’ve described here some of the many reasons I like Jane. She's a funny mix of contradictions, which is hardly too much of a stretch for me to imagine. A year in her rockin' boots, of course, is an odd choice for a woman who’s not particularly physical or brave. Yet that’s part of the reason I'm choosing her. Jane lives life in a way that I think I could learn from. (You know, “vampire killing” as the equivalent of one of those survival adventure schools.) 

I’m sure it wouldn’t be easy to live as Jane but then again, who among us finds it easy to be who we are anyhow? A year spent living as her might teach me the courage to face down my fears. Certainly, it would be a year of high adventure, dressing like a bad-ass, and doing things I’d would never otherwise get to do. (Particularly since I live in the real world, not a magical one with vampires, witches, and shapeshifters going about their business cheek by jowl with the rest of us.)

PLUS, I’d be living in New Orleans, within shouting distance of Cafe du Monde, surrounded by easy-on-the-eye males (even if I don’t sleep with any but one of them) and boy, howdy, would I be in shape by the end of that year! 

Yep. I think I'd like a year of "smart, sexy, and ruthless"...
I’m goin’ with Jane.