World and Wilderness

Yesterday I walked and talked with a very insightful woman whose career is in marketing. She is a naturally intuitive person, picking up immediately on the nuances of things I said, and willing to challenge me on my assumptions. I want to get better acquainted with her. What she reflected back to me was that I love writing and I love teaching, but I hate marketing. She wondered aloud why I would want to run my own business, this being the case, but she understood that I like to have control over my endeavors.

This last sounds unsettling. I'm not eager to be perceived as a control freak. But I do understand that I'm happier and more effective if I have creative freedom both in my writing and in my teaching. When I have this, I am able to share more authentically my thoughts, feelings, visions and dreams. And these things, both in writing and in teaching, are at the heart of what I do.

Of course, it helps to be reassured that these things are helpful to my readers and my students -- that we have somehow made a human-to-human connection. When I receive emails from a classroom full child readers, as I did the other day, or words from a parent that my class is sparking her teen's creative imagination, I use these good words as fuel to continue my work.

My friend, J, calls the dual realms of creation and people-connection "wilderness and world." Sometimes I think that for me, the two realms overlap -- as they do now, while I blog very private thoughts, knowing that there may be a reader or two. Maybe it is my inclination to live as an open book that brings me to jarring moments where wilderness and world collide and I want to scurry for cover. (This is why I avoid PTA meetings.)

Do others have some extra layer of protection that I tend not to bring with me? I have the writer's "thick skin" recommended by all editors. But I do not seem to have it in the world of "marketing." If I get a vibe that I'm annoying someone with my notices of classes or church services or books available for sale, I use that as fuel to postpone mailings until it is nearly too late, to hesitate before sharing, even sometimes to procrastinate on sending information to interested parties.

So if marketing is about perceiving what people need and then seeing if I have something to meet that need, I seem, in my more vulnerable moments, to be favoring those who don't need what I have.

And this is silly.

What I need is a sense of "holy apatheia," similar to, but not exactly the same as the Buddhist's detachment from the self. I am clinging too tightly to myself, to my ego, so that I am not allowing the Spirit to work in me. I am equating my gifts with my survival.

Today I will focus on the work -- the writing and the teaching -- as its own self, an entity that can exist under its own power with or without me clinging to it like a worried mother.

And I will bless each emotion that comes and let it come and move through me, but I will not follow that emotion until it leads me away from my center.

In order to do the work, I need an emotional attachment to it. But I also need a strength to separate from the work and trust that neither it nor I will disappear.

On the Disequlibrium of Success

I didn't pick the title of this blog to be ironic. Truly I didn't. But since it's my secret "unloading" blog, it's often not very mirthful.

Within the last hour I have finished a rewrite of my novel. This is a good thing, I think. Why am I filled with panic? I finished it earlier than expected after having left home and gone to a friend's house where I have been writing my patootie off. And my patootie is rather sore, thank you very much.

I did major overhaul on the early chapters and not so much on the later ones. As this is probably the 7th rewrite, I shouldn't be nervous, but I know it's not done. And I know I have absolutely no perspective on it and that an agent is waiting to see it. And that I've just spent the last 4 1/2 years of my life on this one book and the next one better not take that long.

As soon as I was done, I checked my email and herein is where the trouble lies: Taran is in a parent partnership program where we need to submit progress reports every month. And I do this, but twice I have done it late. So I did this month's report early -- only they never got it and now they're "disappointed" with me and unsure whether I can handle the writing class I'm going to teach there. And of course, I can, and will. But really, I just want to be independently wealthy and not have to teach writing in order to pay for groceries. I'd rather teach it as a grand favor to humanity.

I'm not very happy with being flawed tonight. The manuscript is flawed, but I don't know where (see: no perspective). My report-submitting is evidently flawed (thought I really DID do it early this month.) My inbox is so full and I've been away from home since Sunday. I miss my family. I miss Lancelot.

And it is very, very silly for me to be posting all this on a blog.

I must make something deep and philosophical of it.

Somebody sent me the following scripture:

But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.
- 1 Corinthians 4:7-10

Well, I can say that the surpassing power certainly doesn't belong to me. My afflictions I seem to bring on myself -- with a little help from modern technology. And I would qualify as perplexed. I don't feel particularly persecuted at the moment. This scripture seems to be about really good people who don't screw up as much as I do.

I KNOW that I'll have more perspective on this once I've had some sleep and can go through the emails one at a time.

One thing about being a writer is that you have to feel things -- you know, emotions and such. Fear, dread, joy, sorrow -- stuff like that. If you can't feel it you can't write it. So you open up the emotion doors and POW.

I would do well to watch some Monty Python.

the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.

And (I think) I finished my rewrite.

Salesmanship and Stillness

I've been posting on my author blog. Lots of pictures of the kids at the writing workshops. Taran very good-naturedly took some head shots of me as all my existing pictures were awful or really out of date. I stopped having pix taken when I got fat, but now I'm getting skinny again.

The author blog sounds kind of sales-y. When I'm trying to earn money I get like that. It's irritating, cloying. I want to tell people that's not really me. But then, I don't know if long, brooding posts are what parents are looking for when they are trying to find writing workshops for their kids.

I cried through the inauguration, from Aretha Franklin to the closing benediction. What a day! I feel some hope for this country for the first time -- ever? Was this how people felt about Kennedy?

I spent some time with the icons in the new chapel Lancelot put in. (Maybe I will post a pic. What the heck?)

I'm loving the chapel more and more. In a sacred space the heart is more willing to open. Mine has been heavy this evening, despite the inauguration. Breaking over Maverick again. I have felt Christ telling me to get back into my heart, but it's full of pain. He says, "Don't worry; I'll be there." To be a mother is to have a broken heart. But maybe that's how we find our own way back home.

Will I write about this one day? Sometimes I think yes. Other times I think it would be career suicide.

And I need to just get really, really quiet in order to write authentically. No salesmanship. No mailing lists. Stillness.

Tess

Simmering

...at least, I hope so. I feel as if I am truly "between projects" instead of actively working on one. I've spent a good deal of time this summer researching Impressionist artists in prep for a novel-in-verse I'd planned to write. Now, I'm not sure if I'm getting cold feet or simply losing my enthusiasm.

A good chunk of the novel involves my own adolescence, stuff about Dad, homelessness, mental illness. I'm not sure how I feel about writing that.

I did do a chapbook on it two years ago and I wonder if I'm done talking about it.

I truly do not want to embarrass Dad. I'm not sure how he feels about the chapbook, which he has, and which he knows I read publicly. I even got to read the final poem directly to him at a reading which featured his best friend. Not sure how he felt about that, but he said, "I came off better than in that other poem you wrote."

When I talked to the editor in NY in February, she was very interested in the fact that my dad had been homeless, though he was an educated professional. She said, "You have to write that book! I know I kept saying, 'commercial, commercial,' but you have to write that book."

The thing is, I'm not sure she's even prepared to take me on as an author. It has been many months... I'm in a bit of a holding pattern.

So now my head is full of Impressionism and I've written nearly nothing on this project.

I am reading Crank by Ellen Hopkins, and it's opening me up again to this idea. She writes poetry that stands up as poetry (not doing this is one of my pet peeves about novels-in-verse), and which speaks sensitively to a topic dangerous not only to the reader, but to her as an author. I wonder what kind of communication she had with her daughter before she published it.

How can I make it not about "Me and My Ego?" My ego is killing me off as a creator. It has its sticky fingers in everything I do. If I can't write things that move a reader through despair and towards transcendence I may as well quit writing altogether.

I've just finished, and have been discussing Gifts of the Desert by Kyriacos C. Markides. It's this book that is causing me to revisit the idea of ego as a distraction.

Markides writes about spirituality in a way that takes me somewhere. I imagine he struggles with his own ego, too.

So maybe the answer is to simply do the work -- if I can figure out what it is -- and know that the ego struggle is a given and overcoming it again and again is the path that I must walk.

While Falling Asleep

I wrote odd poetry last night as I was falling asleep. I had been reading Mary Oliver, whose work I love, but I realized I don't love it as much as the work of Margaret D. Smith. Maybe I should have a look at these strange ramblings:

Poem While Falling Asleep

I stack six books in my lap
or two
or three
never one
lest I not be able
to devour them all.

By having my hands
on three or four
objects at once
I hope to gain
years lost in
a swift backward march.

The other day I followed stories
to their source --
the other day I followed me
and became a story.

Outside are growing things --
beetles in the dirt,
woodpecker,
soft-spotted fawn.

How I would like
to keep them company.

As hours turn to years
I must decide:

Will I let it all be snake-stolen?

How many herons will I need
to carry the books I want to write?

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Here's another one...

Dream Poem

Today as I was
falling asleep I felt
I needed a uniform
for dreams.

How else to go into
them without the dignity
of piping, pressed pockets
and a really good hat?

If you are prepared to go into a dream -- that
is to say, dressed properly --
the people will know
to offer the proper respect
reserved for dreamers
who arrive at their dreams
in some official capacity.

If you forget some of this --
especially the hat --
you may be subject to
the whims of dream people
who, while not altogether solid,
can pack a mean left hook
when you aren't expecting it.

If you remember at least the hat,
those in the dream will know
to solute,
to serenade you,
or at least to bring flowers.

These are the rules for going into a dream:
1) find a small rock that you can kick
in order to find your way out
2) talk to strangers
3) never interpret a dream while you are
in the dream -- that's cheating.

Try to find a quiet place
in the dream,
like a side lawn of a house
or an abandoned airplane hangar.

Especially, look for someplace
that is spelled correctly.
Failing that, look for a
dream-like spelling
and the muses will forgive you.

Know that dream travel
is dangerous
the way certain snakes
are dangerous --
always carry a flute and basket
and you will have
nothing to fear.

Gut feeling

Writing class has gone very well for the most part. I hope I'm giving them enough balance between time to work, time to move, time to socialize. I feel that the socializing is pretty important for teen writers -- heck, it's important for adult writers.

I keep saying this is an isolating profession, but I don't know if that's true. It hasn't really been isolating for me. I've made some of my best friendships in the writing community -- and I do feel I've found my tribe after feeling just a little "odd" and "outside" most of my younger life.

I'm worried about Maverick. In a way that sick, anxious feeling in my gut only goes away when I distract myself. Writing classes were good for that. Someday maybe I'll be able to write about this, but I'm still not interested in making myself a target. I love my boy. I'm heartbroken about some of the choices he's making. I wish the world was different. But if it was different, there would be other things to worry about.

I'm ready to learn to pray again.

Tess

Loaded

It feels strange to be posting here again, having finished with my "anonymous phase." But the idea of writing whatever I feel like without a real audience is appealing.

I did the AFSP suicide prevention walk last month in Seattle. It was amazing. 17 miles. Took us 8 hours. My son, Maverick, walked with me and that was the best thing of all. To be around so many who had lost loved one and who could say the word "suicide" without laughing or flinching was mind-blowing. I thought at first that I'd feel out of place because Dad survived. That I'd have no right to tell my story. And I kind of didn't want to tell it all that much. It felt good to listen. My feelings about Dad are still loaded.

I called him from the walk and thanked him for having taken the gun out of his mouth. He had been sleeping and he had no idea what I was talking about. He said, "I don't have a gun in my mouth. I have sleep. In my mouth."

I worry that he's winding down -- that he's failing. He has memory lapses. He is 80, after all. I need to clean his apartment, or hire someone to clean it. I'm not as good a daughter as I wish I were.

So having finished my last novel, I'm playing with the idea for the new one. It keep getting further and further afield from parental suicide. At the moment it contains time travel. And I still don't know if I can write it. Didn't I already write about this?

I've had 23 extra years with Dad. I haven't used them particularly well, but I've had them to come to terms with things. He's incredibly homophobic. He pretends not to know Maverick is gay. I wish this were not so, but there it is. And yes, that was a deliberately ambiguous sentence.

I can almost deal better with dad in writing than in person. But does that mean I've simply created a character called "Dad" and that's who I'm interacting with?

This is a great deal more angsty than I intended. I think I'd better get my lesson plan on humourous essays done.

Tess