The Wizardess of the Willows

Image by floodllama via Flickr

A friend of mine who will go unnamed, *cough* Holly Jahangiri, otherwise known as the Wizardess of the Willows, Thwartress of Wallows, opened a massive, steaming can of slap-upside-the-head on my Facebook page last weekend. She was responding to my response to another person who will go unnamed, *cough* Unfinished Person, who had asked how the writing was going. In so many words, I admitted that I was struggling a bit because it goes against every parenting impulse I have to tune out of hyper-vigilance into the altered state of twilight, (neither wakeful nor asleep), where I do my best writing.

Her Wizardessness suggested that while my children are small I might want to think about creating stories for them instead of concentrating on adult novels. I countered with, "But... but... I don't know how" (in so many words) and she volleyed a, "Kill the inner critic and just do it! You can write. You read to your children. Write what your children would like to read." (In so many words). Then she kicked me square in the behind. 8O

And so I'm thinking about this thought as one thinks about thoughts in a thinking sort of way, and all I can come up with is, "But...  if only I could draw, I'd make the fear go away..." .

And putting my butt against the wall. 8O

So now I'm thinking of stories. How does one tell a story on the fly? Does one sit on the fly and tell a story? I'm less prone to act, more apt to worry.

Writing prompts! I need to find a website with writing prompts for children's stories. Oops, there isn't one. Oops, yes there is. But I can only find prompts for Christmas and Easter. It's neither Christmas, nor Easter, so those prompts are certainly of no use to me.

Ouch! 8O

I suppose I could give one a try. Or create my own prompt. But I don't know how to do that.

8O

Okay! I know how. I'll do it right now. :D

Slow Down, but Keep on Moving

Image by tomas brechler via Flickr

I've been a stay at home Mom for three years now, but when I worked in financial services, multitasking with a sense of urgency was the golden standard. There weren't enough hours in the day to accomplish what needed to be done, and an ever-present school of wishes nibbled at the rim of my consciousness—things I wished to accomplish to increase my efficiency and put my team in a position to spend their time doing what they did best, selling, instead of floundering in minutiae that could have and should have been delegated to me or another associate, if only we had the time.

Today, while working on a weekly schedule and wondering if it's possible to purchase sanity by the ounce, it hit me. I'd never come down to Earth. I'd packed that very same golden standard on my back, from Wall Street all the way into Motherhood.

"Great!" you might be thinking. If ever a job requires multitasking skills and a sense of urgency, it's Motherhood. It's one half of the most demanding job in the world, if one is lucky enough to go into it as a Partnership rather than Sole Proprietorship; there are no higher stakes, no more important a charge, no "clients" more precious and deserving.

However, while one most certainly should expect to experience concurrences of will and nature where the golden standard is warranted, it should be held in a holster on the hip an arm's reach away unless, of course, one is a workaholic. In that case it should be kept in a locked vault in the basement, under a copy of The Tao of Pooh.

There in that hallway it hit me like a ton of bricks—slow down, but keep on moving. Pace yourself. I thought, this isn't the old pre-parent days when you could slam out a day's work, then go and pass out on the couch for the rest of the day and evening if you needed to recover. You're a parent now. Your job is 24/7.

When you are at home and not in an office, and you can make your own rules, concentrate on one thing at a time, most of the time. Sleep, take a breather, do what you have to do to relax and keep your sanity, but keep moving. Picture cross-country running rather than an elbow-knocking sprint. Think about doing one thing per hour for three hours instead of doing three things at once for two hours. You should be tuning out far less often to recover from the brain drain and mock ADD created by multitasking, and this should make up some time.

If you are a stay at home Mom like me, realize you don't need to justify your existence with a constant stream of busywork. Focus on what truly matters to you. What matters to me the most right now is the well-being of my children, my family as a whole, and nurturing my passion and my creative outlet: writing. The way I spend my time should reflect and support that.

Unfortunately, at the moment, it doesn't. Instead of burying myself with my habit of perpetuating and possibly even creating needless busywork just to feel intellectually and existentially solvent, I should use the situation to and for my advantage, and for the well-being of those for whom I temporarily resonate with God-like power and light.

Somehow I can't get it through this thick skull of mine that it's okay to take the day and do nothing with it but spend time with my children. That feels like cheating. Before becoming a wife and mother late in life, I had always worked and was confident in my ability to support myself. Now I am dependent upon my husband not only for his income, but for his support as a husband and father. This terrifies me. And so, I manufacture work for myself via blogging and social networking and tell myself it will lead to something someday, that I too am contributing to the family.

Until I can hold up a paycheck to my husband procured via my blogging or writing, I will always feel guilty that I get to stay home with our children while he has to spend the day at outside work. This is not his fault; I do it to myself. I've been told countless times that what I do matters, that there's no more important job in the world than to see to one's family. But in a society that turns down the volume on working women who are lucky enough to choose to be stay at home Moms, I found that I want to be heard.

And so I am in constant motion, trying to make something of myself while I spend my days in the comfort of our home. I'm looking at the wrong way, I know that. Every Mother of older children tries to impress on me the inestimable value of these years, when our children need so much from us, and are willing to hug us in public. I need to stop the madness. By slowing down I just might be able to coax time into matching my pace.

Like me, your child will peer in your eyes for signs of attention, to make sure you are dialed in. You know it's impossible to fool her, yet you persist. If you're thinking about a client, or the bills, or how to prioritize to make more time to spend with her, she will know. And it will make her sad. And eventually, if you do it enough, she just might tune you out, or stop believing you when you say, "Just five minutes. I only need to... and then I'll... I promise."

Slow down. But keep on moving. Schedule your time if you have to, at least until you can be trusted to your own devices. Write a list of everything you need to accomplish, followed by things you desperately want to accomplish to meet your personal, family, creative, or professional goals. Fit it in; make it work. This is not a new concept: if something is sucking your time and not fostering your spirit, your family, or your goals, put it in the "when I have extra time" pile. And do make that pile. It's the only way you'll allow yourself to put it aside. And over time if it turns out that you don't have extra time, let it go.

Check things off. With two small children at home, I have to snatch time for my personal and creative goals when I can. Therefore, it makes sense for me to schedule small blocks of daily time, with no set hours, to accomplish my writing and networking goals. Half hour of commenting on blogs, check. Half hour of social networking, check. Half an hour of writing, check. Perhaps I will create recurring tasks on Outlook and check them off after they are accomplished.

If you don't set time limits for yourself and your children are good nappers, most likely each of those half hours will turn into many hours, and you'll still end up feeling as though you accomplished nothing. By physically checking off items on our daily schedules, we build our self-confidence and self-trust. We take back control over our lives.

I'm  hoping that I will be able to render my childrens' time with me more fulfilling, tackle my personal obligations, and still honor my writing goals to my satisfaction. By slowing down and focusing my full attention on my babies or the task at hand to the highest degree possible, I'm hoping I will feel less divided and frazzled, that much closer to my children and to whom I want to become.

It's hard out here for a pimp

If you're a blogger and you want people to actually read your blog, and you probably do, or maybe you don't, or maybe you do and say you don't or vice-versa, blogging is not enough.

Our blog posts by themselves are but a sneeze on the upturned noggin of Cyberslovokia. If you want to turn the head of Master Internet, Mistress Interweb or Uncle Intergoogle, you also need to develop the skills of a public relations professional slash search engine optimization engineer. (Isn't that how it's listed on Monster daht cawm?) The whole kit and caboodle.

Unfortunately, I don't have a good head for business. In my perfect world, left to my own devices I would fully submerge myself in the universal spring of creativity. I'd cover myself with mayonnaise and glitter, put on a beret, take a big swig of pumpkin butter and think my most private thoughts at you with my mind.

Sound terrifying? That's because it is. This is why things are set up the way they are. To keep us from turning into characters from Easy Rider. And, via the accountability borne of sharing freely what once belonged to us alone, to occasionally save us from ourselves. Plus, it ain't easy gettin' glitter out of your belly button.

Just to keep things decent, and bloggers civilized, we must also promote ourselves. That's why we're in your faces, irritating you like gnats up the nostril, networking and neck-licking like debutantes in a Miss Fancy Nosegay contest.

These days I blog to hone my craft and connect with people who entertain and inspire, laugh with me, and help me make sense of the world. I am discovering amazing people with shared interests who can and do introduce me to resources that will help me to realize my potential as a writer. I don't know how to do this by myself, nor do I want to. So I blog, comment on other blogs, and poke around inside your head. It's you that I want. You are the reason I'm here.

It took me a while to realize that.

That said, oh the horror, I created a Facebook Fan Page today. OUCH! Every time I say it God drops a giant iron anvil on my head. (Hmm... I wonder if I can absorb iron via the wound and put my cast iron skillet to rest... but I digress...) Who the heck am I to be creating a FAN page? Fan pages are for Roddy McDowall, not for regular, everyday folks like yours truly. You have Anne to blame. 'Twas her post about de-cluttering your sidebar that inspired the idea.

Please know that, despite what Dave Doolin might say if he had a really bad headache and a twisted ankle, I really don't think too much of myself. (Dave, I couldn't resist teasing. You know I am fond of you. Not in a creepy or inappropriate way, though. Not in the way I am fond of Jannie Funster. Ooh, come to Feather Heather, Jannie, ooh, that's it... bring the poodle, oh yeeees... )

In any case, I'm hoping it's a smart move that will help me to discover who among my friends is interested in my writing, so I may leave the rest in peace before they hire a hit man, and to develop new contacts in the writing world from which I may learn.

Hopefully, eventually I will be able to help others as well. If I ever get good at this writing business you can rest assured I will be thrilled to help other hungry budding writers like myself. (I was going to say hungry young writers, but, lol, yeah I know.)

How about you? Do you have a Facebook Fan Page? If so, please leave a link in the comments section below so that I may become your Fan. I'm probably already your fan, so let's make it official.

Texas, Heather. Heather, Texas.

Image by velo_city via Flickr

I'm writing to get over the hump. I've never before written in this state, this town, or this room. I don't associate my present surroundings with writing. I don't associate my present surroundings with anything. It's all new and unfamiliar. Grey, cold, and confusing.

I lost it the other day. Freaked out and panicked. I thought we'd made a huge mistake in coming here to Texas. I've moved a lot, but always within the lap of Mother California. One town is as good as the next was my way of thinking. Wherever you go, there you are, and there's always something good about any place new, something to be discovered and learned from. Each move has marked a new era in my life. Some good, some not so good, but most downright enlightening.

The unknown has a way of making our demons scramble for a better foothold, and they temporarily reveal themselves in the process.

Here in Texas things look similar, but feel different. I have no ties that bind. I am floating. I can't feel a memory off to my left, across town, where I sought a book and chased Joe Joe around the corner of an aisle in Barnes & Noble, heady with the scent of wordlust, simmering ideas, and Starbucks coffee.

I associate my former home with writing. It was there that I sat awake reading the Twilight series, and wondering to myself if perhaps I might be capable of writing something like that someday. It was there that I woke up early, too early, and plunked myself down in my chair and stared at my computer and typed away my subconscious concerns.

Not here. Here it is cold and scary and foreign. People are really into chicken here. I mean really into it. And steak. I've seen lots of gray sky, and naked trees, gas stations with unfamiliar names, and chicken joints.

And so I will crawl out of my hole and begin the process of nesting. My top priorities for our new home are comfort and function. Home must feel good, and feel like us, and serve us well. I will place my scent on the trees in our yard, and on the brittle winter grass. If I am feeling brave I might even watch and see the frisky squirrels as my neighbors, and resist the urge to snap their picture because they will be here tomorrow, and so will I.

It is time to peer out through my fingers and eyes at all that surrounds me, to take in the stark beauty of winter in our new home, and appreciate it, and fully open myself to the joy and mystery of a new life and new adventures.

I can't see

Re-post: Originally posted August 12, 2009.

Image by d ha rm e sh via Flickr

Now John at the bar is a friend of mine
He gets me my drinks for free
And he's quick with a joke or to light up your smoke
But there's someplace that he'd rather be
He says, Bill I believe this is killing me
As the smile ran away from his face
Well I'm sure that I could be a movie star
If I could get out of this place
From: The Piano Man by Billy Joel

Billy Joel sees what I can't. I've lived forty years inside my head, a landscape with which I am all too familiar. It is possible to bring the world into focus, but it's the exception and not the rule. When I encounter another I routinely avert my eyes lest he should volley a pleasantry for which I have no reply. I don't look at people. I feel them. I get a beat on their intentions by osmosis. I don't see them.

I am a coward.

Since I can not remember and describe that which I can not see I will duct tape my eyelids to my brows. When I walk past people I will look them square in the eye and elevate the corner of my mouth just so. I will perform the quick chin jerk that is the universal signal of acknowledgment in the land of men. I will practice the eyebrow lift, nod and audible release of breath followed by sheepish grin commonly offered to women with small children.

Is this seeing? I have a feeling it isn't enough. How can I exercise my vision without inspiring shudders of discomfort in the subjects of my consideration? Only creepy people stare.

Perhaps it's better to start small. I shall position my children in various places about the house and observe them and jot down what comes to mind.

It hurts my head to think about this. I'm not sure I can do this. I tried once and my efforts resulted in a page of prose worthy of submission to The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. Is doing something very badly better than doing it passably? Is there a flip side to that joker?

I'll do it. I'll write what I see with no thought to the nausea it inspires. Shortly thereafter I will summon my old friend edit . Edit's cup overfloweth with forgiveness and second chances. After all, I can't do it alone.

Goals for 2010: Blogging or Writing?

What am I trying to do here?

I have no clue. That's not entirely true. Some days I have a clue. The next days I can't find it.

What is my blogging goal for 2010? If I don't know where I want to be my chances of reaching my destination are zippo, zilch, nada. Wait, not nada. That means nothing. Not zippo either, that's a type of collectible lighter.

As is my way, I'm not going to consider what is possible, I'm going to consider what I actually want. Assuming the reality that my net achievements will fall somewhere in-between where I am now, and where I want to be, if I were to lower my brass ring to a reachable level, odds are I would achieve less in the coming year than if I were to toss it away from the carousel and onto the beach, into the waves, where it would most likely be carried out to sea by a passing crab and inevitably swallowed by a curious dolphin. This dolphin would not get sick. The ring would simply tickle the inside of its belly and make it laugh up rainbow bubbles to the surface of the water where they would burst upon the air, their gentle scent eventually wafting back to the boardwalk and infusing it with an air of lightness, hope, and possibility for not only myself, but for all creatures in my vicinity, living and undead alike.

I don't know who I am as a blogger. We need to know who we are to know what we want and what we need. As somebody who does not know who she is, I know I want and need to figure out who I am. A good place to start is by figuring out who I am not.

• I am not nor will I ever be a SEO expert.


• I am not nor will I ever be a Social Media expert.


• I am not nor will I ever be a Blog Monetization expert.


• I am not nor will I ever be a Giveaway Queen. (That takes planning, yee Gods!)


• I am not particularly technologically proficient.


• I am not a dung beetle.


• I am not comfortable networking only with other "Mommy bloggers".


• I am not competitive.


• I am not simply a humor blogger, although life and chances of success would certainly be greater if I were. (Or weren't??)


• I am not a provider of answers (as I learned via the construction of this post).


• I don't want to be tied to my computer, living on the edge of an Alexa rating, fearful that should I take a day or two away to attend to my family or my self, my blog will suffer. I don't want to live my life desperately chasing numbers.


• I am not my blog. I am myself, a wife and mother, daughter, sister, cousin, co-conspirator, buddy, and blogger. The state of my blog should have no bearing on my self-esteem and sense of self.

Where does that leave me? Things look pretty bleak. What hope do I have for success? And what does success mean to me? I need to determine this in order to determine which activities will move me further towards my goals, and which will coax me away from them.

• I wish to cultivate a variety of contacts to whom I can not only relate and find comfort with, but who amuse and fascinate me with their powerful intellects, alternate realities and their knowledge and confidence of self. For this I must look both within and outside of traditional Mommy-blogging circles.


• I would like to expand my readership and create a sense of community herein. I want my readers and commenters to eventually recognize and interact amongst themselves, as well as with me. I want them to have fun in my comments section and look forward to their visits, rather than see them as an obligation of sorts.


• I want to toughen up. It seems that people are not always willing to be kind. I need to not only be prepared for the possibility but expect that sometimes people will leave comments and send emails that are ugly, and that I shouldn't let them effect me in a negative manner. Their negativity is about them, not about me.


• I have no hope of being considered an expert at anything, so for my blogging success I am going to have to shoot for that ridiculously unattainable goal: to achieve a readership based upon who I am and my ability to express myself and connect with other human beings. That's right. I'm hoping that people will want to visit my blog and interact with me and my other readers simply based upon the fact that they like, or are entertained by me in some way. Now that I've determined this I need to make a vow to myself and my readers to always be myself. I can't hover and agonize over my keyboard before pounding out each post, worrying who I might offend if when I say the word poop. I need to be able to relate the details of my crazy, silly life without worrying that my readers will consider me vapid, or worse - ungrateful and unappreciative of the gifts that life has provided me with. I can't provide something helpful and useful in ever post. I can simply be.


• My wish, apparently, is to gain blogging success based upon being myself and providing no value whatsoever to my readership other than entertainment, commiseration, schaudenfraude and possibly pathos.


• To what end? I want to make some money. Blogging alone is a source of satisfaction, but the reality of my situation is that I need to make some money. I am not independently wealthy. I want to do what I love (blogging) and make some money from it. There, I said it. Hmm... the sun is still perched just above a frog-shaped cloud. Earth did not turn on its axis. A sea of spit did not make its way to my face, nor is it currently dripping into my bra.
  
  
  
  • Problem: I can't sell worth a darn. I've tried. I simply don't have that relentless pursuit of victory thing when it comes to separating people from their money.
  
  
  • Problem: Ads won't work on my site because my regular readers don't want to click on Google Ads that lead them to a better iPod carrying case, nor do I particularly want them to.
  
  
  • Problem: My stupid flipping Google Page Rank sits there at PR1 even though I have ten times the readership I did when my blog had a PR3. And you need PR3 or above in order to gander any type of reasonable opportunity with regards to paid blogging.
  
  
  
  

I want to learn to be a good writer. Hopefully upon achievement of that goal I can become a successful writer. Magazine articles? Books? Airport leaflets? STOP signs? Who knows.

Which leads me to this...

• Can one be a successful blogger and a successful writer? I used to assume that the two were natural bed-buddies, but now I'm not so sure. To be a successful writer I will have to do lots of back-end, behind-the-scenes exercises and activities, and submit writings to other places, taking time away from posting here at Happymaking. My posts here help to sharpen my writing skills, but, unfortunately, not the type of writing skills others are willing to pay for. I would like to be a columnist, but since the advent of blogging, I'm not sure the discipline still exists since most blogs are basically self-published columns.


• Let's say I push and squirm and make a deal with the devil and over time my name becomes well-known in the blogdom. What could possibly come of that? Advertising revenue? A book deal? Work-from-home employment opportunities? Paid writing gigs? I simply do not know.

If any of you know what one might hope for upon becoming a well-known "personality" blogger, please do share the wealth of your knowledge. This information will help me form my goals for 2010, and hopefully others as well. I do not seek to be a well-known blogger to appease my ego, but as a means of making a living that allows me to be at home with my children. Since I do not harbor net-translatable knowledge or skills for which others are willing to pay, it is simply my only hope for blogging success.

Should there be no means of procuring a little kaching-ching upon becoming a popular blogger, I'm probably going to have to step off the blogging a bit, and focus my efforts on writing. But at least I will know. Disillusionment can be a wonderful thing!

Thanks for riding alongside me on this journey. Here's to goal-setting and success for us all in the coming year!

What is my purpose?

I'm starting to realize that the more I communicate with other human beings, the less likely I am to write. Also, the more regular regular readers I am lucky enough to procure through arm-twisting and bribery, the more likely I am to want to please them with my posts, rather than blogging for me.

But you haven't been pleasing me, you may be thinking. You've been blogging crap lately.

I know. I know, right? And it's your fault. :wink: When I gander the spectre of you on my shoulder I am prompted to write things that I think might be of interest to you. But since I only have it in me to be me these days, my decades of natural, habitual and possibly pathological people-pleasing long behind me, this errant desire to please functions in my psyche as sand would in the guts of a pocket watch.

Or perhaps it's not your fault. Perhaps it was my decision to monetize my blog that is making me think of cutting my hair and dressing for success rather than embracing and developing my peculiarity. And isn't it justifiably so?

When you work for sponsors, or to attract them, isn't it necessary to attend the mandatory drinking of their kool-aid? You owe the people who pay you. Exactly what you owe them I'm still trying to figure out. In an office setting it is simple. Adhere to the dress code. Read between the lines and step things up. Go above and beyond the usual means in order to please and represent them. When people pay you to perform a function aren't you meant to lose yourself in order to become the function? And if you want people to pay you, shouldn't you proactively become the function in order to attract them?

What am I supposed to be doing? What is my purpose? Perhaps I should look to my own posts for the solution. It would seem my natural inclination is right before my eyes.

I don't answer questions. I ask them. And it has always been this way.

There, I can work with that.

I'm going to continue to be myself here at Happymaking. Hopefully sponsors will be  attracted to me and want to throw money at me for being weird. Barring that, I am also going to start two niche blogs and focus directed material at them. I would like to thank DiTesco of iBlogZone for sharing his expertise with me via private consultation and for answering my questions about niche blogging.

In the meantime, if you have any answers that need questions, you know where to find me.

Link to post at Textual Medium

Hidee ho!

No, I'm not calling you a "ho".

What do you mean if anyone's the "ho" it's me? I'm not the one galavanting around in flashy turquoise Nike short shorts kicking leaves into the faces of passing bikers just to get them to turn and notice my ass!

Oops, I said "ass". Sorry, Mom. Sorry, Christian friends. Sorry, common decency. Ugh.

I can't help myself. I also almost took the Lord's name in vain over at my other blog. I know it's wrong and I know why it's wrong. These things sometimes bubble to the surface and make themselves known. They're pesky, impish, nasty little profanities that lull me into mini-naps, type themselves, then giggle their way back into my fingertips.

Anyway, I wrote a post at Textual Medium (click click click) that explains the location of my brain and my writing and social networking schedule going forward. I thought I'd point it out to my readers here not because I think you live and die according to my posting schedule and Facebook status updates, but out of respect for your attentions. I don't want you to think I'm not writing or that I've tired of your company.

Quite the opposite is true! In fact, I find your company so stimulating that I'm inspired to try new things.

I hope you're having a good weekend, and that you and yours are well. I hope you'll spend a little time this afternoon stoking your passions, whether they be cooking, painting, singing, people-watching, writing, finding new ways to entertain and educate your children, running, biking, reading, networking, mocking or knocking boots in a Donald Trump wig. Peace out.

I can't see

Image by ohmann alianne via Flickr

Now John at the bar is a friend of mine
He gets me my drinks for free
And he's quick with a joke or to light up your smoke
But there's someplace that he'd rather be
He says, Bill, I believe this is killing me.
As the smile ran away from his face
Well I'm sure that I could be a movie star
If I could get out of this place
From: The Piano Man by Billy Joel

Billy Joel sees what I can't. I've lived forty years inside my head, a landscape with which I am all too familiar. It is possible to bring the world into focus, but it's the exception and not the rule. When I encounter another I routinely avert my eyes lest he should volley a pleasantry for which I have no reply. I don't look at people. I feel them. I get a beat on their intentions by osmosis. I don't see them.

I am a coward.

Since I can not remember and describe that which I can not see I will duct tape my eyelids to my brows. When I walk past people I will look them square in the eye and elevate the corner of my mouth just so. I will perform the quick chin jerk that is the universal signal of acknowledgement in the land of men. I will practice the eyebrow lift, nod and audible release of breath followed by sheepish grin commonly offered to women with small children.

Is this seeing? I have a feeling it isn't enough. How can I exercise my vision without inspiring shudders of discomfort in the subjects of my consideration? Only creepy people stare.

Perhaps it's better to start small. I shall position my children in various places about the house and observe them and jot down what comes to mind.

It hurts my head to think about this. I'm not sure I can do this. I tried once and my efforts resulted in a page of prose worthy of submission to The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. Is doing something very badly better than doing it passably? Is there a flip side to that joker?

I'll do it. I'll write what I see with no thought to the nausea it inspires. Shortly thereafter I will summon my old friend edit. Edit's cup overfloweth with forgiveness and second chances. After all, I can't do it alone.

Muse?

Image by Smithsonian Institution via Flickr

I'm not feeling it. Hmmm... is my music loud enough? I know I was listening to this same song last weekend and it was filling me with all kinds of deep thoughts.

LIVE, I love you but I'm not feeling what I was feeling last Sunday. Come on, man. I needed that. Don't hold out on me now.

While Stripes. Oh yeah. If anyone can get it going it's you. Dirty and raw.

Not doing it.

Oh shit. SHIT.

Don't even tell me it's not the music. Frick! Fricken fracken m frick fr. Sigh.

If the music doesn't do it then explain to me why I was feeling the way I was feeling last Sunday. It even spilled into Monday. I dreamed about it. I fell asleep with the songs in my head and woke up with them on my breath.

I'm listening to the same songs OVER and OVER and OVER but I'm just not there.

If it isn't the music then WHAT is it that's making me feel this way?

A story in progress

Image by unprose via Flickr

I'm all about experimental writing exercises these days. I'm going to start a story with one sentence. Not a good sentence or a bad sentence. Just a sentence. I'm hoping you will make the story live. Make it fun or dull. Serious or silly. Whatever. No pressure or expectations with regards to quality of writing.

Post the next line or section of the story in a comment. No rules, except that it should make reasonable logical sense. I'll edit the post to add your contributions, with occasional input from myself. If this catches on, I'll bump the post periodically so the whole world can marvel at your creativity. If it doesn't, I'll just blame it on you. :)

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Chapter 1

That damnable zipper was doing its best to humiliate me. I finally decided to go skinny dipping - in the ocean, middle of the night, all dark, save the moon - and, now, I couldn't get out of my dress. So I did what any self-respecting, thirtysomething woman-in-crisis would do... I gave up and sprinted through the icy waves in my dress, laughing as I went. The instant my ankles hit the water I realized two things; it was far too cold for me and there was no way in Hell I could stop now or I'd never live it down. Unfortunately, my granny panties were not up to the task and had fallen around my ankles. Before I knew it, my undies had captured 2 sea urchins, a starfish, and a good length of sea weed. Then My grannie panties were full of codfish too. Since our family had not eaten in 2 days due to the famine, we feasted that night as we had never before. And next morning we saw our garden that we'd given up for dead due to the drought -- was bursting with corn, tomatoes, beans, peas, melons, potatotes, squash and hundreds of sunflowers.

Did you hear that?

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Mairzy doats
and dozy doats
and liddle lamzy divey.
A kiddly divey too,
wouldn't you?

That song makes me smile. It also reminds me that my ears can't always be trusted. It's important to engage as many senses as possible as often as possible — to overlap them. This helps me to perceive the hidden notes and experience things more fully.

I went many years without. Without music. Without candles and incense. Feeling the sand and water on my skin. Eating quality food. Drinking fine wine. I wonder what I missed during that time? What was supposed to be heard that didn't get heard?

I believe the universe re-plays certain themes until we finally "get it". I must believe that. Otherwise I'd have to think of those missed opportunities as lost forever.

I'm starting to understand why The Buk drank

Image by Marshall Astor - Food Pornographer via Flickr

Writing isn't for the faint of heart.

It's hard.

It's not just the time you put aside. It's the way it hijacks your brain. Writing is like fire. The compulsion is all-consuming and potentially dangerous. It eats your air. It strips away your flesh and then expects you to carry on as though nothing happened. It doesn't always call you in the morning. Sometimes it doesn't call for weeks. Then, just when you've moved on it appears on your doorstep at three in the morning sans apologies and looking hot. There's no question that all is forgiven and it begins again.

I've been participating in some self-driven writing exercises that involve visiting some emotionally stirring places. Music helps with that. It can remind you how things used to feel when you were young and stupid and filled with passion. It can also stir up completely new emotions. Better ones. Scarier ones.

I had no idea this would happen.

Why didn't you warn me?

"Drinking is an emotional thing. It joggles you out of the standardism of everyday life, out of everything being the same. It yanks you out of your body and your mind and throws you against the wall. I have the feeling that drinking is a form of suicide where you're allowed to return to life and begin all over the next day. It's like killing yourself, and then you're reborn. I guess I've lived about ten or fifteen thousand lives now."

—Charles "The Buk" Bukowski, Interview, London Magazine, December 1974-January 1975

Within lies the rub

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It's hard out here for a Mom learning to write. I need to be present for my kids. 100% in the moment. But when I write, even if I'm not actively putting pen to paper, my mind is someplace else — formulating an idea, straining for a sentence. Sometimes when I snap to I am filled with anxiety. Disoriented. Even when my kids are with me. How long was I gone? Two minutes? Three days?

I'm insane about being responsive to my babies. One of my worst nightmares involves a smiling Joe or Lily turning to meet my eye, giddy with discovery or accomplishment, and being met with the side of my head. If this happens enough times will they stop wanting to share and burrow deep inside themselves? To be honest, this is one of the main reasons I need to be with them. Why I quit my job and decided against daycare. I'm not saying it's rational. It just is.

Yet I am compelled to write. How do I get past this? I've always thought of writing as a solitary endeavor involving a cabin in the woods, a rusty old typewriter and a tin mug filled with java-laced Wild Turkey. To be honest, that's the way I'd want to do it. When I think of writing I don't picture a middle-aged woman, wet hair in a clip, stirring black eyed peas with one hand and ruffling her young son's hair with the other.

I could stay up all night and write, but I suffer from an inconvenient sleep situation. I require eight solid hours per night. If I don't get it I become emotional and fuzzy-brained. My temples throb. What feels like an overweight hamster with a limp takes up residence in my frontal lobe. And paces. Everything seems too bright. Happiness irritates me. My sense of perception falters and nothing seems right.

I've thought about training my brain. One good sentence per day. I was going to share that one sentence with the world to keep me honest. But then I realized that I can't come up with one good sentence a month. It really sucks to be compelled to do something for which you have no natural talent. I think about those of you to whom writing comes easily, it's as easy as breathing and yet you have no desire to pursue it. And I think unhelpful thoughts about you.

Maybe if I keep writing the answer will come to me. I would go to the answer, but I don't know where to find it.

Hunger Pangs

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It happened again. I saw my words on another blogger's blog. For half an instant, before I could catch myself, my face twisted into a bitter scowl and an actual "Ugh!" escaped my lips. This is the first time I've actually heard one, having previously thought words like "Ugh!" only existed on paper.

In that very same half an instant (granted, it was a long half an instant), I thought to myself how these Heather word/idea sightings always meet certain conditions:

1. The blogger is well-established with a much bitter (whoops) bigger "following" than me.
2. The blogger is a contact of mine, but never offers me any direct feedback.

Yes I realize it's not only possible but quite likely that I'm a self-absorbed harpy with a good imagination and an inflated sense of word-worth. It's possible that these are all just coincidences. After all, I don't own ideas. And we all live in the same world so it's possible that we could have had the very same idea at the exact same moment and that we may have even used the exact same words to describe a particular feeling. It's possible.

It's also possible that the idea I offered you so freely out of a sincere want for you to succeed—that you decided to employ three days later and said as much on your blog—that I never expected you to thank me for but was miffed upon noticing that you not only did not thank me but thanked a third unrelated person in what I can only assume is another social-climbing strategy of yours—could have been forgotten and honestly re-dreamed up by you three days later. It's possible.

To have one's brain material and one's creative ideas borrowed without credit feels like a violation. That much is true. But these situations also offer us an opportunity for personal growth. What do we really want? Consideration? Kudos? Respect? Self-respect? Is public drama the best way to achieve that? It might be for some, but for me it just doesn't feel right. Calling out another blogger for things like these, unless it's so blatant that a calling-out is no longer a viable option but required in order to make sure some other blogger isn't similarly violated, is something I will never do. And no, that's not an open invitation to steal my stuff.

I've decided to take the advice of centuries of people who clearly have never had their mental babies taken to the park by another and twirled and displayed and presented as though they were their own. I've decided to feel flattered. If respected bloggers are borrowing or stealing from me it must mean that I'm doing something right.

It also makes me realize that I'm most likely not the only blogger whose idea shelf has been raided. It's quite possible that the ones doing the raiding don't have creative coffers of their own and borrow and steal to survive. As one who knows how painful it can be when the creativity refuses to flow, this just makes me feel sad. When all is said and done, I know that I was blessed with an endless spring, that the ideas will return and continue to flow through me until my heart stops beating. For that I will be eternally grateful.

Hopefully someday I will actually do something with my words and ideas so my family and I can reap the benefits before I'm old(er) and gray(er). I keep picturing us in a little cabin by the sea surrounded by books and an old typewriter and vintage board games. I need to write more often so I can improve. I realized a mere two weeks ago that I actually like writing. That it's not just a compulsion. Writing is accessible to all of us and not just the sport of Queens, PBS intellectuals and pompous elitists. I need to take writing seriously. And myself seriously for that matter. I can't control others, but I can stop shooting myself in the foot as soon as I get a tiny bit of steam rolling. I can stop being my own worst enemy.

If I were a better writer things like this would not happen to me. People wouldn't dare tread heavily on my personal writing space. Would they?

It's time for another self-reminder. It's the journey and not the destination. Never be fat and happy. Always be hungry. Someday, with a little bit of dreaming and a lot of hard work, my family will be doing the reminding for me in our cabin by the sea.

Hunger
by Emily Dickinson

I had been hungry all the years ;
My noon had come, to dine ;
I, trembling, drew the table near,
And touched the curious wine.

'T was this on tables I had seen,
When turning, hungry, lone,
I looked in windows, for the wealth
I could not hope to own.

I did not know the ample bread,
'T was so unlike the crumb
The birds and I had often shard
In Nature's dining-room.

The plenty hurt me, 't was so new, —
Myself felt ill and odd,
As berry of a mountain bush
Transplanted to the road.

Nor was I hungry ; so I found
That hunger was a way
Of persons outside windows,
The entering takes away.

Do you Write or are you Written?

I know I don't post as often as I should. I don't do anything as often as I should. I do things I shouldn't do more often than I should. It's not my fault. You see, I don't write. The reasonably good posts that is. I am written. I sit here sometimes for five minutes staring blankly at the monitor. Eventually my mind goes numb and my fingers spring into action and words appear on the screen. When I look back on some of these posts I chuckle to myself and think... If I had sat down with the intent to write that the words would not have come. I could not have done it. The words have nothing and everything to do with me. They are entities in and of themselves.

Sometimes I wonder if a little person exists inside my head driving me like that little alien in Men in Black drove Vincent D'onofrio. Now see I stopped to find a picture of said little alien and I lost my train of thought. Then again I didn't so much lose it as it turned into an ant of thought.

[ETA my husband just encouraged me by saying 1) "Your blog was good baby, but it wasn't Vincent D'onofrio being driven by the little alien, it was the old man. He got driven into the morgue and they pulled his ear and his face opened up.", and 2) "Don't let the facts get in the way of your creativity!".]