I am revising and needed an aerial view of two chapters.
I was making progress with that birds-eye view until . . .
Scattered pages and chewed pens are one thing,
but clawing at my words brings “critique” to a whole new level.
“Animals are such agreeable friends―they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms.” ~ George Eliot
Whatever you say, George.
I am revising. Again.
(John Irving once said, “Half my life is an act of revision,” and Tracy Abell says, “Amen to that.”) My critique group The Writing Roosters gave me feedback on my middle-grade novel, and I began revising accordingly because they’re pretty wise and much of what they said resonated with me.
So far so good.
Then I got a read from my writer nephew who also had a handful of very wise insights. And yesterday I spent hours reworking one earlier scene over and over again until I’d finally gotten it right. I congratulated myself and moved on, only to realize that the subtle changes I’d made in that one scene have to be reflected in later scenes.
Ah, the curse of a tightly woven story.
Whenever I tug on one thread, there are repercussions throughout, and one of these days I hope to remember that. In the meanwhile, I’ll get back to these seemingly never-ending layers of revision and keep passing the open windows.
I just listened to HUNKY DORY while lifting weights.
That might seem an odd choice for pumping iron,
but I’ve lifted to that album many times.
As I posted back in 2007,
HUNKY DORY is one of my desert island picks.
I’ve loved it ever since high school when I’d close myself
off in my room and play both sides.
Today might be the first time I cried while listening.
Kooks got to me first.
And if you ever have to go to school
Remember how they messed up this old fool
Don’t pick fights with the bullies or the cads
‘Cause I’m not much cop at punching
Other people’s Dads
And if the homework brings you down
Then we’ll throw it on the fire
And take the car downtown
Will you stay in our Lovers’ Story
If you stay you won’t be sorry
‘Cause we believe in you
Soon you’ll grow so take a chance
With a couple of Kooks
Hung up on romancing
And then Quicksand really brought the tears.
I’m not a prophet or a stone age man
Just a mortal with potential of a superman
I’m living on
I’m tethered to the logic of Homo Sapien
Can’t take my eyes from the great salvation
Of bullshit faith
If I don’t explain what you ought to know
You can tell me all about it
Or, the next Bardot
I’m sinking in the quicksand of my thought
And I ain’t got the power anymore.
Don’t believe in yourself
Don’t deceive with belief
Knowledge comes with death’s release
However, as Wildebeest said this morning:
“I never met him, but I don’t think he’d want us to be all mopey.”
Wildebeest listened to lots of Let’s Dance today.
Put on your red shoes and dance the blues
And finally, here’s my favorite tribute I came across today:
RIP Mr. Bowie.
We’re in the last few hours of 2015, one of the most difficult years of my life.
But not only am I still standing, I’m still running.
Despite the frigid temperatures (about 30 degrees in the sun),
Zippy and I went for a run around the neighborhood.
Cold yet life-affirming.
And now a friend is coming over to hoop with me.
That will be a warmer yet also life-affirming activity.
This morning some of my favorite kinds of birds showed up
A lovely way to say close out 2015.
Wishing everyone a Happy New Year and a glorious, life-affirming 2016!
Woke up to about ten inches of snow on the deck railing.
The driveway had drifts about eighteen inches deep.
My shovel broke and you can probably figure out why.
Not including photos because everyone already knows what snow looks like.
Also, grumpy.
Wait. How about some happy-inducing cormorants from last May?
There.
All better.
A: This blog post.
B: This photo.
C: This photo.
D: This 30-second movie clip from ADAPTATION:
“Maybe banana nut. That’s a good muffin.”
Western Scrub Jays are very smart birds. Today they found our newly-filled peanut feeder and quickly spread the word. Many jays have flown in to grab a peanut and then taken off again to hide the peanuts (my neighbors across the street might discover a nutty motherlode in their yard next spring). I ate lunch while watching all the activity outside the living room window.
Marcel watched, too.
For the most part he’s remained calm, tail still. That all changes when one specific jay arrives and then Marcel makes clucking sounds and lashes his tail while climbing the window. I’m guessing there’s some trash-talk going on between the two of them.
Zippy and I went for a run this morning and it wasn’t until our cool-down walk that I noticed this:
A spit trail down my thigh. Apparently the wind caught my saliva rocket and returned it to me.
When I got home and started my stretches, I realized I’m basically an all-around rag-tag runner gal wearing holey socks and a ripped 20+-year-old polypro long underwear shirt:
I do, however, have a fairly new Garmin watch in fashionista chartreuse:
Look for me on the nearest runway. I’ll be the one rockin’ the groovy watch and sweat-stained togs. I promise not to spit.
I’m trying hard to practice mindfulness, and am getting better at staying tuned in to the moment rather than doing the past-future mind-twirl (not to be confused with doing the Time Warp). However, today has been more of a shit storm than sunshine kinda day, so I’m going back to the basics to help me be mindful.
Wildebeest and friends drove across the country in Wildebeest’s old Subaru (aka Susie Sweet Rack) to attend a music festival. They were in Missouri on their way back to Colorado when Wildebeest’s friend drove off the newly paved, unmarked road into the dirt and then immediately overcorrected. The car spun one and a half times as a semi’s headlights approached, and then went up into the median strip where it slammed to a stop against a post. The semi, horn blaring, whooshed past them.
No one was hurt. All were shaken up, especially when they realized that the back window had shattered on impact and none of them even heard it.
It took a while, but Zippy and I actually fell back asleep after that phone call. I’m actually pretty proud of that. Progress!
You know that expression “So many books, so little time”?
Right now my main issue is “So many ideas, so little time.”
The bulb in my head keeps flashing with new ideas for
non-fiction, fiction, picture book ideas, young adult novels,
magazine articles . . .
I’m also participating in Tara Lazar’s Picture Book Idea Month
in which I hope to generate at least 30 picture book ideas,
and am having great fun letting my imagination run wild.
I’ve come up with some truly horrendous ideas but have also
jotted down several promising concepts. Someday soon I hope
to pick one of those ideas and see where it takes me.
In the meanwhile, I’m still working on my middle-grade revisions.
Still?
Yeah, still. (You got a problem with that?)
So this is me putting that light bulb on notice. Flash all you want,
but I can only commit to jotting down ideas before getting back
to my manuscript. That middle-grade novel is my priority right now.
Capiche?
I believe I’ve mentioned my aversion to wind. If not, suffice to say I do not like the blowy.
The blowy sets me on edge. I don’t enjoy listening to wind when I’m tucked into bed, I don’t like wind pushing me around when I’m running outside, and I don’t appreciate wind sucking (blowing) the life out of everything.
Today is a very windy day.
Enter Pema Chodron from When Things Fall Apart:
The way to dissolve our resistance to life is to meet it face to face. When we feel resentment because the room is too hot, we could meet the heat and feel its fieriness and its heaviness. When we feel resentment because the room is too cold, we could meet the cold and feel its iciness and its bite. When we want to complain about the rain, we could feel its wetness instead. When we worry because the wind is shaking our windows, we could meet the wind and hear its sound. Cutting our expectations for a cure is a gift we can give ourselves. There is no cure for hot and cold. They will go on forever.
Okay, Pema. I have met the wind and I hear its sound.
Yesterday I sent off the manuscript for the first book of mine that will be published. It’s a short work-for-hire book about composting and how to build a compost tumbler. (One of my critique partners (yo, LP!) is a nonfiction goddess who guided me every step of the way as I applied to the editorial company. Thank you, friend!)
One of the hardest parts of that writing process was switching from my fiction brain to my nonfiction brain. Plus there was the research that triggered my ADD tendencies, writing to a lower reading level, explaining complex concepts in a simplified format, footnoting and formatting, glossary terms and pronunciation keys . . . Suffice to say there was a steep learning curve and a few tears of frustration.
But I put my head down to push through the doubts and nasty voices, and I prevailed. Plus, I (mostly) kept to my promise to myself and worked on my middle-grade novel revisions every day. I learned to bounce from fiction to nonfiction and back again. And it felt like a real accomplishment to hit SEND when I emailed my manuscript yesterday.
This morning Zippy and I went out for our run on the trails. As we took off, I mentioned how I wished we could take a different route out there in the open space. I love the trails and they’re kinder to my body than pavement as I pound out the miles, but lately I’ve noticed my mind wanders when I run. And my mind shouldn’t wander when there are rocks and knapweed and eroded trail segments to navigate. But it wanders because I’m comfortable with my route; I’ve run it so often I can close my eyes and visualize exactly where the rabbit brush stalk sticks out onto the trail and how far up the trail past the turn-off it is that I need to side-step a cluster of partially submerged rocks.
So today Zippy took the lead and he mixed it up. He took us on side trails and detours, but the biggest change was we ran parts of the route in reverse. Which meant I was running downhill where I’m usually straining to run uphill, and struggling up the steep inclines where I’m used to flying down the trail.
Talk about a learning curve. I thought my brain was going to explode! (Not to mention the other very real concern that I was about to barf up a lung).
Well, I eventually made it home and recovered enough to have today’s deep thought:
It’s good to step outside my comfort zone because doing so allows me to learn new skills and expand my muscles (whether brain or brawn). Becoming more flexible ain’t always pretty, but it’s necessary.
A couple weeks ago Zippy and I had a bunch of people over. As is true of many things in our house, the front door doesn’t work as well as it should. In this case, it doesn’t close all the way unless you force the issue. Guests aren’t expected to know this and we weren’t paying attention.
Our two cat brothers, Loki and Marcel, are indoor cats. They’ve seemed quite content with that status. Until a couple weeks ago when that front door was left open and Loki escaped to the front yard (that is bordered by a pretty busy street, yikes!)
Following that grand adventure, Loki has taken to fits of crying at the door.
His looks of yearning, frustration, and disgust won’t sway me. The squeaking cries won’t break me. I love him too much to let him go. I only wish he understood.
I haven’t been around these parts in quite some time.
Part of me feels badly about that, but another part knows it was necessary.
I needed that time to hunker down and conserve strength.
And the good news is that I am feeling stronger and more resilient these days.
Yay, me!
Stuff has fallen apart.
But I’ve come to understand on a whole new level that stuff falls apart for everyone.
Every day.
Life as we know it is an ongoing series of sunshine and shit-storms,
and I’m learning not to fight that truth.
As Pema Chodron writes in WHEN THINGS FALL APART:
Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It’s just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.
I’m grateful for that tiny Buddhist nun and the wisdom she shares, and I’m grateful for friends who reached out during my hunkering-down. I apologize for the silence and will be in touch.
Tracy in search of Owls
Photo by Zippy on Stone House Trail 5.25.15
Sometimes when I’m in front of the mirror, slicking down my short-short hair in an attempt to tame The Bed Head, I’m reminded of Alfalfa from the Little Rascals. And I laugh. Then I break into warbly song to woo Darla . . .
(1) I used to be kinda indifferent about Led Zeppelin, but for the past couple months have been mainlining it at a LOUD volume.
(2) I’m still having to run back and forth on the one flat street in my neighborhood due to glute issues and yesterday did three miles with the help of Sly & the Family Stone.
(3) I’ve started working part time as a substitute library page which means I shelve books at various local libraries, and have developed a love-hate relationship with the Dewey Decimal System.
(4) I’m revising a manuscript and enjoying the process which I call a WIN.
(5) If this rain doesn’t let up soon, I’m gonna scream loud enough to be heard over the Led Zeppelin.
Good news: Spring is here!
Bad news: That 11-degree-below-zero freeze we had last November killed a bunch of spireas, sumacs, and possibly the cherry tree.
Good news: Spring is here!
Bad news: The bind weed is back with a vengeance.
Good news: Spring is here!
Bad news: It’s been so rainy the past week it feels more like Alaska than Colorado.
GOOD NEWS: SPRING IS HERE!
I’m reworking one of my middle-grade manuscripts and decided to change a character’s name. The girl is named after her grandmother so I wanted to use Little + Name, but when I did an online search to make sure it wasn’t already a common name in children’s literature I discovered it was, indeed, common. In the porn world. (Fortunately, the girl’s name is Spanish so I can use the -ita diminutive and drop the Little.)
Then I went to make my morning smoothie and the vibrating Ninja blender caused a wine glass to tip in the dish rack and smash against the counter top.
Wonder if Judy Blume faces these types of challenges?
Okay, I didn’t make the cover.***
Or even the Random Notes page.***
And I didn’t pull a Matt Taibbi and publish a muckraking Wall Street piece.***
However, I made it to the Correspondence page. That’s right, I have a letter to the editor in Issue 1233 of Rolling Stone. Woot!
Think I can use it in my clips file?
***Looking waay back to 1972 and those Shel Silverstein lyrics sung by Dr. Hook
*** Loudon Wainwright III references the Random Notes page in “The Grammy Song”
*** Go read this article that starts with “The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it’s everywhere. The world’s most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.”
I’m still (mostly) adhering to my read-what’s-already-on-my-shelves policy and here’s where the latest five books have taken me:
(1) Japan via KITCHEN by Banana Yoshimoto.
(2) England via JEEVES AND THE FEUDAL SPIRIT by P.G. Wodehouse
(3) New York City via THE BURGLAR WHO TRADED TED WILLIAMS by Lawrence Block
(4) Haiti via THE COMEDIANS by Graham Greene
(5) And I’m currently in Georgia with a young Japanese seaman (Hiro Tanaka) via EAST IS EAST by T. Coraghessan Boyle
All over the place without spending a dime. Ah, books.
Tracy Abell 