It's official. Spring - that is. All signs point to it: the stores have emptied their shelves of stockings and bows and have replaced them with hearts and shamrocks. In western Pennsylvania, the buds on the pussy willows are actually beginning to poke out - confused by the 60 degree weather and the deluge of March-like rain. On December 23rd, it doesn't feel especially 'Christmasy". But that really is a Hallmark conceit - isn't it? Or maybe Norman Rockwell. Snow and such...my mom pointed out how silly it is to presume that everyone envisions Christmas the same way we do just because all of the songs are about cold and snow and conspiring by a fire. The truth is that most of the world probably spends more time perspiring than putting another log on.
Whatever is my point? I suppose it makes me sad to see Christmas go, seemingly even before it arrives. I devote so much time to the business end of things: shopping, wrapping, cleaning, baking, etc., that I don't remember to look around until it's too late. Until I'm confronted by a glitter-glued cupid.
Yesterday I had to have a scan of my leg to make certain that I didn't have a blood clot. The calf was swollen - about half an inch bigger than the other - and the podiatrist I went to see for my aching heel didn't want to take any risks. The test came back negative, but it did take up a considerable chunk of my time. I had so much to do - a big list waiting for me on the kitchen counter - last-minute things I needed to pick-up and do, but when the man said blood clot, I could not remember what one of those things was. All I could think was that I didn't want to be dead for Christmas. And it's funny to me (today) that it took a life-threatening situation for me to appreciate the 60 degree weather. The rain. To remember to love the people around me or I might as well pitch their presents - the ones I stayed up till 2 am to wrap.
My heart, not unlike the Grinch's, feels 10 times bigger today. I wish that for you. Merry Christmas, my friends.
December 23, 2011
December 2, 2011
Krauss Rhymes with House
Silence is a difficult thing to capture in a story. How do you create silence when your only tools are words? But it's important to me to keep trying to make my characters be quiet. To show how much 'the nothing' weighs. I say things like: He was most afraid of the deafening nothing. Or: They stood saying nothing. I use the space bar a lot. It's tricky business.
I recently gave a lesson on public speaking to my first-year writing students. "If you stumble," I said. "If you come to a moment where your mind goes blank and you can't recall your phone number let alone what you were going to say next, think of Norm McDonald." Remember that guy? He used to deliver 'the news' on Saturday Night Live, and he was the least funny man I have ever heard on that show. Still, he managed to get quite a few laughs simply by making silence work for him. He could say whatever stupid thing came into his head. For example: Why did the elephant cross the road? When no one laughed, he didn't flinch. Silence accumulating like the national debt, he waited them out. Finally, he'd say: Because it was the chicken's day off. And since he had allowed the quiet to speak for him, permitted the audience members to feel the weight of their own thoughts and in turn, his - they laughed like crazy.
I have been told that I am not funny. I have also been told that I am funny. I have been asked to Stop making words with my mouth and Why would you write about that? And I have been asked to Say more and Please write more about that. And in truth, I believe the greenhouse effect is in part a result of a layer in the atmosphere where all the wrong words we've ever spoken or written rise and collect, choking out the clean air. Many times 'in real life' I wish I had just kept quiet, so it's no wonder that I want to gift my characters with this quality. This ability to not talk a thing to death. And, unlike Norm McDonald, I don't want to use silence to get a laugh. I want to peel back the padding words provide like barriers between us and show the tender spots. The bruised fruit beneath the skin. I want to look at what hurts. Analyze it like a scab.
On the other hand, sometimes I don't say enough. Sometimes I keep too quiet. I don't stay on top of emails to people I care about. Or out of fear of confrontation (which I am getting better at as I age) I retreat. Wave the white flag and say nothing when a situation clearly calls for the opposite. Even this blog goes stale for weeks at a time, waiting for the 'right' words to fill my fingers. Perhaps I should ponder what Mr. Myiagi might say: "Balance, Daniel Son."
The last thing is this: I often dream about people who are long gone from my life. Those who have died or departed in other ways. I wonder why their faces appear in my unconscious thoughts. I like to think it means they are are thinking of me at the same time. That our words sleep walk and venture into a world we can't travel by foot. A place where we meet and hold hands. Sing songs and say all the things we didn't say when we had the chance. Probably a bunch of baloney - but who doesn't like a little balogna from time to time? White bread and a squirt of ketchup and Voila. Happiness.
Here is a great song by Allison Krauss and the Union Station. It came into my head last night and so I send it on to you.
I recently gave a lesson on public speaking to my first-year writing students. "If you stumble," I said. "If you come to a moment where your mind goes blank and you can't recall your phone number let alone what you were going to say next, think of Norm McDonald." Remember that guy? He used to deliver 'the news' on Saturday Night Live, and he was the least funny man I have ever heard on that show. Still, he managed to get quite a few laughs simply by making silence work for him. He could say whatever stupid thing came into his head. For example: Why did the elephant cross the road? When no one laughed, he didn't flinch. Silence accumulating like the national debt, he waited them out. Finally, he'd say: Because it was the chicken's day off. And since he had allowed the quiet to speak for him, permitted the audience members to feel the weight of their own thoughts and in turn, his - they laughed like crazy.
I have been told that I am not funny. I have also been told that I am funny. I have been asked to Stop making words with my mouth and Why would you write about that? And I have been asked to Say more and Please write more about that. And in truth, I believe the greenhouse effect is in part a result of a layer in the atmosphere where all the wrong words we've ever spoken or written rise and collect, choking out the clean air. Many times 'in real life' I wish I had just kept quiet, so it's no wonder that I want to gift my characters with this quality. This ability to not talk a thing to death. And, unlike Norm McDonald, I don't want to use silence to get a laugh. I want to peel back the padding words provide like barriers between us and show the tender spots. The bruised fruit beneath the skin. I want to look at what hurts. Analyze it like a scab.
On the other hand, sometimes I don't say enough. Sometimes I keep too quiet. I don't stay on top of emails to people I care about. Or out of fear of confrontation (which I am getting better at as I age) I retreat. Wave the white flag and say nothing when a situation clearly calls for the opposite. Even this blog goes stale for weeks at a time, waiting for the 'right' words to fill my fingers. Perhaps I should ponder what Mr. Myiagi might say: "Balance, Daniel Son."
The last thing is this: I often dream about people who are long gone from my life. Those who have died or departed in other ways. I wonder why their faces appear in my unconscious thoughts. I like to think it means they are are thinking of me at the same time. That our words sleep walk and venture into a world we can't travel by foot. A place where we meet and hold hands. Sing songs and say all the things we didn't say when we had the chance. Probably a bunch of baloney - but who doesn't like a little balogna from time to time? White bread and a squirt of ketchup and Voila. Happiness.
Here is a great song by Allison Krauss and the Union Station. It came into my head last night and so I send it on to you.
November 2, 2011
Happy New Year
No, I am not operating from the calendar of an alternate universe. I realize that January 1st is a ways off, but aren't calendars man-made devices? Don't the trees see this as the end of their year? Thus, the beginning of another? And trees, like chickens, have strength in numbers, so who am I to argue? Therefore, I have decided to acknowledge November 1st as New Year's Day.
Since last October, I have felt as though I have been walking around with a sign that reads "Kick Me" taped to my forehead, and although my family and I have been spared serious illness and catastrophic loss, I am a little sore. But now that Halloween has passed, I am ready to approach the new year, armed with the lessons I have learned over the course of the past 12 months. I share them now in the form of a numerated Note to Self:
1. Inspect your bank statements. Don't allow them to pile up in a laundry basket. Open them, for the love of Mike. Or better yet, join the information age and enroll in online banking. Make certain that $4.99 is not being deducted from your savings account each month as a result of carrying a balance less than $300. Do this before your account dwindles to $14.99. Before the bank manager tries to sell you a low-interest rate mortgage when tasked with closing said savings account. When she tells you she is trying to do you a favor, offering you a great deal on a home-equity loan because you seem to be experiencing 'cash-flow' problems, speak to her as you would the dog: "Shame on you. Deep shame."
2. Do not assume it is safe to cross the parking lot of a grocery store, even after looking both ways. Remember that demons drive at the speed of sound. You will not hear them until after they've almost flattened you. Until they've unfurled their forked tongues. Shouted "You're a little too fat to be running out in front of traffic," in your general direction. In the future, park your car next to the cart return, thereby avoiding the crossing of any lanes on foot. Or better yet - stand in the middle of the road and wait for that woman to return. Wait through rain and sleet. Drive to the same store every damn day, and wait.
3. When someone in a position of power offers you 'the opportunity of a lifetime', say, "No. Back to the depths with ye!" Worship no one but the Hero upstairs.
4. Write thank you notes to guest editors who give sage advice to aspiring authors in the forewords of yearly anthologies. Be grateful for gems like these:
Go see the world. Stay there for as long as you can - maybe then, after you've shaken off the stink of your own living room - your preoccupation with food allergies and infidelity - when you've taken on the odour of foreign living rooms and become sickened by foods native to far-off lands - sickness which is inherently more interesting because it is co-opted - you will become a real writer.
Rush to the nearest travel agent. But, alas, remember that you are experiencing cash-flow problems, and a plane ticket to the world probably costs more than $14.99. Try not to despair. Eudora Welty said, "Write what you don't know about what you know." Remember that Alice Monro (hailed as the greatest short story writer since Chekov) writes almost exclusively about her native Canada. And Chekov, for that matter, was a Russian writer who wrote about Russian people. Russian babies and a Russian Lady with a Dog who runs off with a Russian man - not, by the way - her Russian husband.
5. Trust that despite the kicks to the head, the year will provide many wonderful surprises as well. Gracious, gifted writers who share their time and stories with you. Goodness in the form of unexpected emails from editorial assistants at large commerical magazines. People will like you. Really like you - you (and Sally Fields) for exactly who you are.
Since last October, I have felt as though I have been walking around with a sign that reads "Kick Me" taped to my forehead, and although my family and I have been spared serious illness and catastrophic loss, I am a little sore. But now that Halloween has passed, I am ready to approach the new year, armed with the lessons I have learned over the course of the past 12 months. I share them now in the form of a numerated Note to Self:
1. Inspect your bank statements. Don't allow them to pile up in a laundry basket. Open them, for the love of Mike. Or better yet, join the information age and enroll in online banking. Make certain that $4.99 is not being deducted from your savings account each month as a result of carrying a balance less than $300. Do this before your account dwindles to $14.99. Before the bank manager tries to sell you a low-interest rate mortgage when tasked with closing said savings account. When she tells you she is trying to do you a favor, offering you a great deal on a home-equity loan because you seem to be experiencing 'cash-flow' problems, speak to her as you would the dog: "Shame on you. Deep shame."
2. Do not assume it is safe to cross the parking lot of a grocery store, even after looking both ways. Remember that demons drive at the speed of sound. You will not hear them until after they've almost flattened you. Until they've unfurled their forked tongues. Shouted "You're a little too fat to be running out in front of traffic," in your general direction. In the future, park your car next to the cart return, thereby avoiding the crossing of any lanes on foot. Or better yet - stand in the middle of the road and wait for that woman to return. Wait through rain and sleet. Drive to the same store every damn day, and wait.
3. When someone in a position of power offers you 'the opportunity of a lifetime', say, "No. Back to the depths with ye!" Worship no one but the Hero upstairs.
4. Write thank you notes to guest editors who give sage advice to aspiring authors in the forewords of yearly anthologies. Be grateful for gems like these:
Go see the world. Stay there for as long as you can - maybe then, after you've shaken off the stink of your own living room - your preoccupation with food allergies and infidelity - when you've taken on the odour of foreign living rooms and become sickened by foods native to far-off lands - sickness which is inherently more interesting because it is co-opted - you will become a real writer.
Rush to the nearest travel agent. But, alas, remember that you are experiencing cash-flow problems, and a plane ticket to the world probably costs more than $14.99. Try not to despair. Eudora Welty said, "Write what you don't know about what you know." Remember that Alice Monro (hailed as the greatest short story writer since Chekov) writes almost exclusively about her native Canada. And Chekov, for that matter, was a Russian writer who wrote about Russian people. Russian babies and a Russian Lady with a Dog who runs off with a Russian man - not, by the way - her Russian husband.
5. Trust that despite the kicks to the head, the year will provide many wonderful surprises as well. Gracious, gifted writers who share their time and stories with you. Goodness in the form of unexpected emails from editorial assistants at large commerical magazines. People will like you. Really like you - you (and Sally Fields) for exactly who you are.
October 5, 2011
Clarity, Brevity, Simplicity, Humanity
For most of my adolescence, I idolized Barbra Streisand. Long before the talented young actors on Glee began popularizing songs from Funny Girl and Yentl, I was the Greatest Gtar...I was Second-Hand Rose...I was singing to Papa by candlelight and Nobody, No Nobody was gonna Rain on my Parade. In this way, I was sort of a weird kid. I can't explain exactly why I felt such a kinship with Babs, except for maybe I recognized that I, too, have a nose of distinction. But that isn't all. It was her strength that I admired. Her ability to entertain and her sense of the world. Even now, I can't help but weep when I watch her sing. It's involuntary. Like love. And I realize the real reason I related to Barbara is that she gave voice to every feeling I had - even as a small girl. She made it okay to be a clown. To laugh at yourself and at the same time to be a strong woman. To say what you want and expect to get it. And most of all, to speak out against injustice. To not apologize for your convictions.
I used to say I wanted to be the first 'woman' President of the United States, and amazingly, at age 9, I believed in earnest that this was possible. Even when another girl - a friend of mine, who was ever so slightly thinner and therefore more popular announced that she also planned to one day throw her hat into the ring, I wasn't deterred. Such was the power of my fantasy that when Geraldine Ferraro ran for Vice-President, I secretly rooted against her. I saw myself at a podium. Reasoning with Gaddafi, whose bombs I spent many many hours worrying over. World War III, we were told in elementary school, would be the last War. The nuclear war from which only the cockroaches would be left to write about. But on my watch, there would be no war. On my watch, there would be peace. Peace the way Barbra described it in her 1986 ONE VOICE concert.
Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro - who started out as a school teacher in Queens - lost by a landslide to Ronald Reagan, but upon accepting her nomination, addressed a crowd of cheering, tearing supporters with these words: "I stand before you to proclaim tonight: America is the land where dreams can come true for all of us." Indeed, she went on to do great things. As the Ambassador to the United Nations Humans Rights Commission in 1993, she condemned (for the first time) anti-semitism as a human rights violation. After suffering with an extended illness, Geraldine Ferraro died last March. She was only 75, and I wonder what she would have to say about Alabama's new immigration laws. Laws which permit police to "Stop and Ask" individuals within its borders to produce their 'papers'. Legislation which gives the green light to racial profiling and feels eerily like a movie set in Nazi-occupied Europe. Except it's real, and it's happening here - in the Land of the Free.
Today, I get to stand at a podium. I get to talk about human rights and raise awareness about social issues. I get paid to read and write, and maybe I don't have the qualifications - the Ivy League education or the bank account to run for President, but ironically, I am doing exactly what I envisioned. My dream, though in disguise, came true. And I never forget, despite my outrage, that because I live in America, I am allowed to question the leaders of my country. To run my classroom on the following platform: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity. A fortune cookie's description of the basic premises of writing and not too shabby a mantra for life.
Here is a video from Barbra's 1986 concert. I dare you not to cry.
I used to say I wanted to be the first 'woman' President of the United States, and amazingly, at age 9, I believed in earnest that this was possible. Even when another girl - a friend of mine, who was ever so slightly thinner and therefore more popular announced that she also planned to one day throw her hat into the ring, I wasn't deterred. Such was the power of my fantasy that when Geraldine Ferraro ran for Vice-President, I secretly rooted against her. I saw myself at a podium. Reasoning with Gaddafi, whose bombs I spent many many hours worrying over. World War III, we were told in elementary school, would be the last War. The nuclear war from which only the cockroaches would be left to write about. But on my watch, there would be no war. On my watch, there would be peace. Peace the way Barbra described it in her 1986 ONE VOICE concert.
Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro - who started out as a school teacher in Queens - lost by a landslide to Ronald Reagan, but upon accepting her nomination, addressed a crowd of cheering, tearing supporters with these words: "I stand before you to proclaim tonight: America is the land where dreams can come true for all of us." Indeed, she went on to do great things. As the Ambassador to the United Nations Humans Rights Commission in 1993, she condemned (for the first time) anti-semitism as a human rights violation. After suffering with an extended illness, Geraldine Ferraro died last March. She was only 75, and I wonder what she would have to say about Alabama's new immigration laws. Laws which permit police to "Stop and Ask" individuals within its borders to produce their 'papers'. Legislation which gives the green light to racial profiling and feels eerily like a movie set in Nazi-occupied Europe. Except it's real, and it's happening here - in the Land of the Free.
Today, I get to stand at a podium. I get to talk about human rights and raise awareness about social issues. I get paid to read and write, and maybe I don't have the qualifications - the Ivy League education or the bank account to run for President, but ironically, I am doing exactly what I envisioned. My dream, though in disguise, came true. And I never forget, despite my outrage, that because I live in America, I am allowed to question the leaders of my country. To run my classroom on the following platform: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity. A fortune cookie's description of the basic premises of writing and not too shabby a mantra for life.
Here is a video from Barbra's 1986 concert. I dare you not to cry.
September 14, 2011
Fowl Mood
I'm feeling a little bit better today; thanks for asking. My head doesn't feel like an excavated mine this morning, which is nice. Although, a bit of the ugly mood - the residual funk that accompanies phlegm - remains. Which is not so nice or I'm not so nice. And while I'm thinking about it - Please stop inserting commas before the conjunction in a sentence consisting of one independent and one dependent clause! You know who you are: you newspaper columnists, novelists and other so-called 'famous' writers. You seriously undermine my work as an educator when you whip those commas around like so many boomerangs. As if grammar were some kind of horseshoe match - as if being close counts. I'll tell you what I tell my students: Read the damn handbook. How hard is it, really? If the parts of the sentence that come before and after the comma can each stand alone - by all means, plop that comma down in there. Otherwise, keep your unwieldly punctuation to yourself.
And another thing: When visiting a bookstore near you, take note of the numerous jacket covers prominently featuring chickens. As I wandered through my local Barnes & Noble last evening, waiting for my daughter to finish with her dance lesson, I couldn't help but feel a bit of hope at the sight of so many books about these plucky birds. I thought - I have a story about a chicken. Maybe I've finally done it - written a literary short story about something people might pay money to read - I mean just look (I thought to myself) look at all these stinking chickens! Free-range, cartoon, vintage...certainly there's room for one more feather among the flock? But then I remembered that there are more chickens than humans walking the earth, so they can afford to be choosy.
For all I know, chickens are running the publishing houses. Chickens scratching behind the desk at the New Yorker. Chickens gathered around a table, discussing my story. "What does this chicken want? Has this chicken earned that cliche? This chicken has not been fully realized..."
Can't you just see the rejection letter? "Dear Fowl Writer:..."
Oh well. Cover your mouth when you cough. Keep your hands clean, and don't forget to say God Bless You.
And another thing: When visiting a bookstore near you, take note of the numerous jacket covers prominently featuring chickens. As I wandered through my local Barnes & Noble last evening, waiting for my daughter to finish with her dance lesson, I couldn't help but feel a bit of hope at the sight of so many books about these plucky birds. I thought - I have a story about a chicken. Maybe I've finally done it - written a literary short story about something people might pay money to read - I mean just look (I thought to myself) look at all these stinking chickens! Free-range, cartoon, vintage...certainly there's room for one more feather among the flock? But then I remembered that there are more chickens than humans walking the earth, so they can afford to be choosy.
For all I know, chickens are running the publishing houses. Chickens scratching behind the desk at the New Yorker. Chickens gathered around a table, discussing my story. "What does this chicken want? Has this chicken earned that cliche? This chicken has not been fully realized..."
Can't you just see the rejection letter? "Dear Fowl Writer:..."
Oh well. Cover your mouth when you cough. Keep your hands clean, and don't forget to say God Bless You.
August 31, 2011
From Poetry to Prose
Ten years ago, John Mayer performed a set from his debut album Room for Squares in the WYEP studios - an independent radio station in Pittsburgh. I heard a recording from that session this morning. "Will you want me when I'm not myself?" he sings. As it turns out, my answer is Probably Not.
I used to say that he was the poet nearest my heart - a line stolen from the movie Shakespeare in Love. A movie about the imagined life of Shakespeare and the reckless love - 'come ruin or rapture' - that inspires him to write both Romeo and Juliet and Twelfth Night (from which comes my favorite line in all of Shakespeare's writing..."If music be the food of love, play on.") And I really loved John Mayer. Before he made it to commercial radio. Before he became the playboy of the western world - before his words went from 'poetry to prose' -- to borrow a line from "Not Myself".
But then, as a writer of prose, how can I stand in judgement? Further, as a writer of fiction - creator of unreal realities - why can I not separate the man from the artist? Why should I care that he dated Jessica Simpson? That poor girl likes a doughnut as much as me - but at least I'm not on the cover of every magazine with the words 'Wide Load' plastered across my ass-end.
Originally, I was angry that he'd chosen her. I had imagined him with a girl who'd broken his heart in 6th grade. A plain but pretty girl who (as he sings in "Comfortable") could distinguish between Miles and Coltraine. The One. So, seeing him posed next to the platinum Simpson was a blow. But the real problem for me occurred when he started saying ugly things about Jessica and the other high-profile women with whom he'd paraded down the red carpet. How could this callous misogynist be the same man who wrote "Daughters"? Who seemed to keenly understand the complications particular to girls who'd been abandoned by the first man they ever loved? Who wrote about watching his parents age with unparalleled tenderness in "Stop This Train"? About high school reunions and St. Patrick's Day; hope and heartbreak? Who left track #13 blank - just in case. How John? Please, if you're out there, I really want to know. How do we know if we'll want you when you're not yourself if we don't know which self is really you?
Alice Walker once said, "Deliver me from writers who think the way they live doesn't matter..." I agree. And I disagree. Let's say I was to make it to the big time as a writer. Let's say readers were out there imagining my life - idealizing a set of ideals for me. Absorbing my words like gospel - holding me to an unattainable standard - and then one day, I was exposed. Caught in a contradiction between my public and private life - billed as a fraud and a liar and a jerk. But what if I really meant everything I'd ever written? In that moment in time, it was true - I felt every emotion that had plucked the soulstrings of those once faithful followers? Who could say which moment was me being 'myself' and which was me as 'somebody else'?
Maybe it's best not to know too much about the artists whose work inspires us to lift our lighters in a dark sky. I don't know. But I do know that when I heard him singing this morning, I couldn't stop it - that old reckless love.
Listen to "Heart of Life" and decide for yourself:
I used to say that he was the poet nearest my heart - a line stolen from the movie Shakespeare in Love. A movie about the imagined life of Shakespeare and the reckless love - 'come ruin or rapture' - that inspires him to write both Romeo and Juliet and Twelfth Night (from which comes my favorite line in all of Shakespeare's writing..."If music be the food of love, play on.") And I really loved John Mayer. Before he made it to commercial radio. Before he became the playboy of the western world - before his words went from 'poetry to prose' -- to borrow a line from "Not Myself".
But then, as a writer of prose, how can I stand in judgement? Further, as a writer of fiction - creator of unreal realities - why can I not separate the man from the artist? Why should I care that he dated Jessica Simpson? That poor girl likes a doughnut as much as me - but at least I'm not on the cover of every magazine with the words 'Wide Load' plastered across my ass-end.
Originally, I was angry that he'd chosen her. I had imagined him with a girl who'd broken his heart in 6th grade. A plain but pretty girl who (as he sings in "Comfortable") could distinguish between Miles and Coltraine. The One. So, seeing him posed next to the platinum Simpson was a blow. But the real problem for me occurred when he started saying ugly things about Jessica and the other high-profile women with whom he'd paraded down the red carpet. How could this callous misogynist be the same man who wrote "Daughters"? Who seemed to keenly understand the complications particular to girls who'd been abandoned by the first man they ever loved? Who wrote about watching his parents age with unparalleled tenderness in "Stop This Train"? About high school reunions and St. Patrick's Day; hope and heartbreak? Who left track #13 blank - just in case. How John? Please, if you're out there, I really want to know. How do we know if we'll want you when you're not yourself if we don't know which self is really you?
Alice Walker once said, "Deliver me from writers who think the way they live doesn't matter..." I agree. And I disagree. Let's say I was to make it to the big time as a writer. Let's say readers were out there imagining my life - idealizing a set of ideals for me. Absorbing my words like gospel - holding me to an unattainable standard - and then one day, I was exposed. Caught in a contradiction between my public and private life - billed as a fraud and a liar and a jerk. But what if I really meant everything I'd ever written? In that moment in time, it was true - I felt every emotion that had plucked the soulstrings of those once faithful followers? Who could say which moment was me being 'myself' and which was me as 'somebody else'?
Maybe it's best not to know too much about the artists whose work inspires us to lift our lighters in a dark sky. I don't know. But I do know that when I heard him singing this morning, I couldn't stop it - that old reckless love.
Listen to "Heart of Life" and decide for yourself:
August 23, 2011
We're Closer Now Than Ever Before
This song was originally featured in Emmet Otter's Jugband Christmas. Listen to this terrific version of "Our World" as performed by My Morning Jacket. What a treat for us all!
August 19, 2011
At the Top of the World...
...there is a place called Linden Vineyards. If you begin in Charlottesville, Virginia and drive along Rte. 29, it will take you about an hour and a half to arrive at the Top of the World, located, unexpectedly,on Rattle Snake Mountain...(why not Sparrow Mountain or Rainbow Range...etc, but I'll get to the 'why' questions later). En route to the Top of the World, you will pass through a series of small towns situated along the Shenandoah Valley. For example Madison and Sperryville, the apparent home of one of the biggest "slow-food" movements in the country, and mile after breathtaking green mile later, you will arrive at a gravel road. It is my opinion that this road was left unpaved to challenge the people who don't really care about wine. Or cheddar cheese which burns the roof of your mouth with its local sharpness. Or being so close to God you could almost ask him a question. Or three.
For the determined oenophile, however, there is no path too treacherous. No matter how wooded or narrow. How full of ruts like gaping jaws for gulping down little red cars.
This end-of-summer trip actually began in Washington D.C. There we visited the Holocaust Museum and the White House. Julia Child's kitchen and a statue of Andrew Jackson. We also stopped in at a place called "Busboys and Poets" named in honor of Langston Hughes and enjoyed a "Poet Pizza". Afterwards, we walked back to the hotel and passed a church with the following bible verse posted on its marquis: Wisdom is a tree of life to those who embrace her; those who lay hold of her will be blessed. (Proverbs 3:18.) Go ahead and chew on that for a minute while I sew this up.
History is full of contradictions. Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence - decrying that all men are created equal - but over the course of his lifetime, some 600 slaves lived and worked on his Virginia plantation. During WWI, allied troops dropped leaflets from their planes onto the Germans - words written in their native language advising them to give up hope. That the U.S. and other armed forces were too great in numbers and prowess to be defeated and surrender was the only option. This tactic inspired a young German soldier. A frustrated artist named Adolph Hitler who tweaked the concept to sell anti-semitism to his citizens through one of the most effective propaganda campaigns ever created.
What else? About five blocks from the Holocaust Museum stands the statue of Andrew Jackson - the author of the "Indian Removal Act". By the end of his tenure, 46,000 Native Americans had been exiled from their homeland. He was, however, the only U.S. President to pay-off the National Debt. I suppose that's what's up with the statue. And it's funny (not ha-ha) how much of what I heard during my educational field-trip smacked of deja-vu. Not allowing German refugees into the U.S. because they might take 'our' jobs sounded strangely familiar, as a for instance. Why did the U.S. bomb the German factories first? Apparently they were afraid to raid the death camps because it might have pissed Hitler off and provoked him to do something really bad. Why oust Saddam Hussein and not the gang of misfit boys holding eastern Africa hostage? And what of the other nations of the world - where do they stand on genocide while wagging their fingers in our direction?
At the top of the world there is a place called Linden Vineyards. It is a place where you can drink some of the finest red wine being produced in this country in between bites of warm baguette and sharp cheese. You can say to yourself: I am blessed. I am lucky to be here - to have seen these mountains. Despite this, you find yourself wanting more. Wondering if you were granted an audience, invited to ask of God three questions - what would they be? Why me? maybe? But a why question runs the risk of soliciting the dreaded: "Because I said so". How is trickier to answer. How can we make things right for the homeless who sleep beneath the opulent buildings in our Nation's Capitol? How can we use our words as a force for good? How do we climb the tree of life, to embrace wisdom in the here and now, rather than when it's too late?
For the determined oenophile, however, there is no path too treacherous. No matter how wooded or narrow. How full of ruts like gaping jaws for gulping down little red cars.
This end-of-summer trip actually began in Washington D.C. There we visited the Holocaust Museum and the White House. Julia Child's kitchen and a statue of Andrew Jackson. We also stopped in at a place called "Busboys and Poets" named in honor of Langston Hughes and enjoyed a "Poet Pizza". Afterwards, we walked back to the hotel and passed a church with the following bible verse posted on its marquis: Wisdom is a tree of life to those who embrace her; those who lay hold of her will be blessed. (Proverbs 3:18.) Go ahead and chew on that for a minute while I sew this up.
History is full of contradictions. Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence - decrying that all men are created equal - but over the course of his lifetime, some 600 slaves lived and worked on his Virginia plantation. During WWI, allied troops dropped leaflets from their planes onto the Germans - words written in their native language advising them to give up hope. That the U.S. and other armed forces were too great in numbers and prowess to be defeated and surrender was the only option. This tactic inspired a young German soldier. A frustrated artist named Adolph Hitler who tweaked the concept to sell anti-semitism to his citizens through one of the most effective propaganda campaigns ever created.
What else? About five blocks from the Holocaust Museum stands the statue of Andrew Jackson - the author of the "Indian Removal Act". By the end of his tenure, 46,000 Native Americans had been exiled from their homeland. He was, however, the only U.S. President to pay-off the National Debt. I suppose that's what's up with the statue. And it's funny (not ha-ha) how much of what I heard during my educational field-trip smacked of deja-vu. Not allowing German refugees into the U.S. because they might take 'our' jobs sounded strangely familiar, as a for instance. Why did the U.S. bomb the German factories first? Apparently they were afraid to raid the death camps because it might have pissed Hitler off and provoked him to do something really bad. Why oust Saddam Hussein and not the gang of misfit boys holding eastern Africa hostage? And what of the other nations of the world - where do they stand on genocide while wagging their fingers in our direction?
At the top of the world there is a place called Linden Vineyards. It is a place where you can drink some of the finest red wine being produced in this country in between bites of warm baguette and sharp cheese. You can say to yourself: I am blessed. I am lucky to be here - to have seen these mountains. Despite this, you find yourself wanting more. Wondering if you were granted an audience, invited to ask of God three questions - what would they be? Why me? maybe? But a why question runs the risk of soliciting the dreaded: "Because I said so". How is trickier to answer. How can we make things right for the homeless who sleep beneath the opulent buildings in our Nation's Capitol? How can we use our words as a force for good? How do we climb the tree of life, to embrace wisdom in the here and now, rather than when it's too late?
August 8, 2011
Dear You, Love Me
My childhood mailbox wasn't bolted to the house. It wasn't nailed to a wooden post at the end of the driveway, either. Especially in the summer, checking the mail was an event. At ten to 11, the streets of Virginia Hills emptied of kids long enough for us to retreive the mail key from inside our respective homes, taking care not to slam the screen doors before reconvening, filing one-by-one into the parade. A half-mile procession to the recreation hall, where once inside, we were rewarded for our efforts with a blast of ice-cold air. Staring at the wall of silver, we held our collective breath - hedging silent bets. When we turned the key, would there be a child-support check or a stack of utility bills? A letter from a boy or an empty echo?
Summer always makes me nostalgic for letters. Hand-written, stamped, and sometimes even S.W.A.K.ed. What could be better than a letter? Better than reading words meant only for you, as if language had been invented for that singular purpose? A child-support check, of course. But other than that, not much. However, a letter in a story or book can be almost as satisfying, sometimes even more so, when it allows us to anonymously appease our inner voyeur.
Dear Mr. Henshaw by Beverly Clearly ranks among my favorite books from childhood. Unfortunately, in modern literature, the epistolary form is often regarded as passe'. Often but not always, as in the case of a story called "It Looks Like This" by Caitlin Horrocks. Having read several of Caitlin's stories in various literary journals, I was pleased to find her collection of short fiction This Is Not Your City featured prominently on the "Discover New Writers" shelf at Barnes and Noble.
"It Looks Like This" is a story about an 18 year old girl whose mother suffers from crippling arthritis. A girl too busy caring for her mother to pass 12th grade and writes a letter to a former teacher, explicating the details of her life for extra credit. Supplemented by clip art, a diagram of the Pythagorean Theorem, and thumbnail photographs, this story brilliantly acheives the look of a school report. But much like a Brandi Carlile song, it reaches a painful epiphany - like a guttoral scream - in the spaces the writer leaves blank.
Another solidly written story told in letters is "Luckily, Lucy Sims Has No Stamps" by Shellie Zacharia. A master of the flash format, Shellie reveals the sad story of Lucy Sims' life (to hysterical effect) through notes written to Bed Bath & Beyond, the Manager of Primo Italian Cafe, a seventh grade English teacher, an ex-husband named Bill, the parents of Lucy Sims' elementary-aged students, and her former mother-in-law. I love intelligently written absurdity. It's like candied beets: a treat that's also good for me. This story and many fine others can be found in Shellie's book Now Playing.
Although not written in letters, Stewart O'Nan's latest novel Emily, Alone offers a portal into the mind of the book's namesake. Without giving anything away, I think it's safe to say that nothing really happens. There are no plot-turning moments. No cliff-hangars. No catastrophic highs or lows. But somehow, I don't care. Never mind the fact that the book is set in Pittsburgh, which is great for those of us on the home team - the references to Eat-n-Park and the Ft. Pitt Tunnels rended with as much loving detail as the descriptions of a Van Gogh exhibit and the array of dog droppings emerging during the spring thaw. What makes this book special is being privy to Emily's thoughts. Thoughts we might not think an old woman would have. Almost as if she's willed us her diary and rather than wait until she passes, we sneak a peek at the envelope - pretending to be upstairs in the bathroom while she makes us a nice cup of tea.
In an interview appearing in this week's New York Times Magazine, Nicholson Baker (author of several unconventional novels including The Anthologist, which is really funny) said this about trying to write a traditional novel: "I get to the point where there should be a major thing that goes wrong and I don't want it to happen. It doesn't feel true to me. I don't feel entitled, because very few bad things have happened to me."
When faced with photographs of emaciated children - literally starving to death in Somalia, most of us would be hard pressed to disagree with Mr. Baker. And maybe Stewart O'Nan had the same idea in mind - that nothing truly awful had ever happened to Emily and pretending that it had would feel false on the page. But there is one thing we can all be certain of, one inescapable similarity. One day we'll turn the key to find our final notice has arrived.
But hopefully, someone will find the letters we wrote to our mothers from camp; to our seventh grade boyfriends over a summer break; to our brothers and sisters away at college - long-distance friends, future husbands and wives - and know that we were here.
Summer always makes me nostalgic for letters. Hand-written, stamped, and sometimes even S.W.A.K.ed. What could be better than a letter? Better than reading words meant only for you, as if language had been invented for that singular purpose? A child-support check, of course. But other than that, not much. However, a letter in a story or book can be almost as satisfying, sometimes even more so, when it allows us to anonymously appease our inner voyeur.
Dear Mr. Henshaw by Beverly Clearly ranks among my favorite books from childhood. Unfortunately, in modern literature, the epistolary form is often regarded as passe'. Often but not always, as in the case of a story called "It Looks Like This" by Caitlin Horrocks. Having read several of Caitlin's stories in various literary journals, I was pleased to find her collection of short fiction This Is Not Your City featured prominently on the "Discover New Writers" shelf at Barnes and Noble.
"It Looks Like This" is a story about an 18 year old girl whose mother suffers from crippling arthritis. A girl too busy caring for her mother to pass 12th grade and writes a letter to a former teacher, explicating the details of her life for extra credit. Supplemented by clip art, a diagram of the Pythagorean Theorem, and thumbnail photographs, this story brilliantly acheives the look of a school report. But much like a Brandi Carlile song, it reaches a painful epiphany - like a guttoral scream - in the spaces the writer leaves blank.
Another solidly written story told in letters is "Luckily, Lucy Sims Has No Stamps" by Shellie Zacharia. A master of the flash format, Shellie reveals the sad story of Lucy Sims' life (to hysterical effect) through notes written to Bed Bath & Beyond, the Manager of Primo Italian Cafe, a seventh grade English teacher, an ex-husband named Bill, the parents of Lucy Sims' elementary-aged students, and her former mother-in-law. I love intelligently written absurdity. It's like candied beets: a treat that's also good for me. This story and many fine others can be found in Shellie's book Now Playing.
Although not written in letters, Stewart O'Nan's latest novel Emily, Alone offers a portal into the mind of the book's namesake. Without giving anything away, I think it's safe to say that nothing really happens. There are no plot-turning moments. No cliff-hangars. No catastrophic highs or lows. But somehow, I don't care. Never mind the fact that the book is set in Pittsburgh, which is great for those of us on the home team - the references to Eat-n-Park and the Ft. Pitt Tunnels rended with as much loving detail as the descriptions of a Van Gogh exhibit and the array of dog droppings emerging during the spring thaw. What makes this book special is being privy to Emily's thoughts. Thoughts we might not think an old woman would have. Almost as if she's willed us her diary and rather than wait until she passes, we sneak a peek at the envelope - pretending to be upstairs in the bathroom while she makes us a nice cup of tea.
In an interview appearing in this week's New York Times Magazine, Nicholson Baker (author of several unconventional novels including The Anthologist, which is really funny) said this about trying to write a traditional novel: "I get to the point where there should be a major thing that goes wrong and I don't want it to happen. It doesn't feel true to me. I don't feel entitled, because very few bad things have happened to me."
When faced with photographs of emaciated children - literally starving to death in Somalia, most of us would be hard pressed to disagree with Mr. Baker. And maybe Stewart O'Nan had the same idea in mind - that nothing truly awful had ever happened to Emily and pretending that it had would feel false on the page. But there is one thing we can all be certain of, one inescapable similarity. One day we'll turn the key to find our final notice has arrived.
But hopefully, someone will find the letters we wrote to our mothers from camp; to our seventh grade boyfriends over a summer break; to our brothers and sisters away at college - long-distance friends, future husbands and wives - and know that we were here.
July 28, 2011
What Fiction Can Do
This week The Sun Magazine arrived in the mail. As usual, I turned to the table of contents to see how many fiction entries were included (in this case, 2) and who wrote them. Then, I read the bios. When I saw that the first story was penned by a woman born in 1992, I considered setting the pages on fire. I didn't even stop to do the math. In 1992, I worked the cash register at Wendy's. (Not the drive-thru window because adding change in my head was a skill I simply could not master.)
For two years, I stood at the front counter rolling my eyes at mothers who allowed their toddlers to choose from a menu they couldn't even read while a line snaked out the door behind them. "Full-serve," I'd yell to warn the boy flipping the meat. Managers emerged from their hive, agitated as smoked-out bees. Salt flew like sand and buns shot from the toaster. Meanwhile, the kid with purple contacts who'd recommended me for the job, stayed cool. Cleaning off tables in the dining room, watching as customers helped themselves to the plastic ware. Spoons I knew he'd licked before placing them in the canister the night before.
Technically, I was old enough to give birth in 1992. Old enough to be a teen mom to this precocious young author in The Sun - which today, might have landed me a lucrative role on a reality TV show. But alas, I missed my opportunity, and most writers, if they are being honest, believe that publishing should be based at least partially on seniority. Certainly not on youth or who you know or whether you live in New Jersey beneath the umbrella of a giant bouffant hair-do. So, it was with great humility that I finally decided not to toss the magazine into the flame beneath the tea pot.
"Be Near Me" by Josie Charlotte Jackson, a writer living in Christchurch, New Zealand, is a remarkable story. Told with a straight-forward, stylistic voice, I immediately connected with her characters. With the imagistic descriptions, the witty dialogue. With the recitation of a stanza from Tennyson's "In Memoriam", the poem from which the story gets its title: Be near me when my light is low...when my faith is dry...when I fade away. It is a tale of regret, cemented by death - not unlike Amy Hempel's "In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried", minus the jarring shifts in verb tense.
In 1807, the poet William Wordsworth wrote the famous line: "The world is too much with us." Imagine what he would write today. Of Casey Anthony posing for pictures in the courtroom. Of J-Lo and Marc Anthony's divorce - reporters postulating on what will become of their joint clothing line. Of 24 hour news channels and cell phones with internet access, desensitizing us to the ever-increasing incidence of gun violence, among other atrocities. It is nearly impossible to escape this world or to feel something real when reacting to news we are told is "true."
"Be Near Me", on the other hand, made me care about perfect strangers. Coaxed me to mourn the death of a man who never drew breath except on the page and to grieve with a narrator who didn't get to say good-bye, which is more feeling that I can claim for J-Lo or even Amy Winehouse. Why? Because that's what fiction can do.
Like memory, fiction is more abstract than absolute. Hazy hues of pain or bliss - the point of focus a faceless body until we read it and recognize with clear vision, scenes from our own lives. Wasted love. Words left unspoken. A purple-eyed boy who I didn't stay in touch with. My lab partner and friend. A man who took his own life years after we left high school, just when I thought I'd forgotten the spoons.
Kudos to Josie Charlotte Jackson, a writer who proves that when it comes to illuminating the human condition, age is irrelevant.
For two years, I stood at the front counter rolling my eyes at mothers who allowed their toddlers to choose from a menu they couldn't even read while a line snaked out the door behind them. "Full-serve," I'd yell to warn the boy flipping the meat. Managers emerged from their hive, agitated as smoked-out bees. Salt flew like sand and buns shot from the toaster. Meanwhile, the kid with purple contacts who'd recommended me for the job, stayed cool. Cleaning off tables in the dining room, watching as customers helped themselves to the plastic ware. Spoons I knew he'd licked before placing them in the canister the night before.
Technically, I was old enough to give birth in 1992. Old enough to be a teen mom to this precocious young author in The Sun - which today, might have landed me a lucrative role on a reality TV show. But alas, I missed my opportunity, and most writers, if they are being honest, believe that publishing should be based at least partially on seniority. Certainly not on youth or who you know or whether you live in New Jersey beneath the umbrella of a giant bouffant hair-do. So, it was with great humility that I finally decided not to toss the magazine into the flame beneath the tea pot.
"Be Near Me" by Josie Charlotte Jackson, a writer living in Christchurch, New Zealand, is a remarkable story. Told with a straight-forward, stylistic voice, I immediately connected with her characters. With the imagistic descriptions, the witty dialogue. With the recitation of a stanza from Tennyson's "In Memoriam", the poem from which the story gets its title: Be near me when my light is low...when my faith is dry...when I fade away. It is a tale of regret, cemented by death - not unlike Amy Hempel's "In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried", minus the jarring shifts in verb tense.
In 1807, the poet William Wordsworth wrote the famous line: "The world is too much with us." Imagine what he would write today. Of Casey Anthony posing for pictures in the courtroom. Of J-Lo and Marc Anthony's divorce - reporters postulating on what will become of their joint clothing line. Of 24 hour news channels and cell phones with internet access, desensitizing us to the ever-increasing incidence of gun violence, among other atrocities. It is nearly impossible to escape this world or to feel something real when reacting to news we are told is "true."
"Be Near Me", on the other hand, made me care about perfect strangers. Coaxed me to mourn the death of a man who never drew breath except on the page and to grieve with a narrator who didn't get to say good-bye, which is more feeling that I can claim for J-Lo or even Amy Winehouse. Why? Because that's what fiction can do.
Like memory, fiction is more abstract than absolute. Hazy hues of pain or bliss - the point of focus a faceless body until we read it and recognize with clear vision, scenes from our own lives. Wasted love. Words left unspoken. A purple-eyed boy who I didn't stay in touch with. My lab partner and friend. A man who took his own life years after we left high school, just when I thought I'd forgotten the spoons.
Kudos to Josie Charlotte Jackson, a writer who proves that when it comes to illuminating the human condition, age is irrelevant.
July 4, 2011
Let's Go Bucs
It's no secret to those who know me well that Willie Stargell is my favorite Pittsburgh Pirate. He's been gone 10 years now, but he lives on in several of my stories. As Shakespeare writes:
But thy eternal Summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Of course, he lives on in sports history, as well. When I was very small, Pittsburgh was a powerhouse of a sports town. We were a family, then. Franco Harris, Willie Stargell, my mom, dad, sister, brother and me. I love the picture of "Pops" - old #8 - snapped in mid-air after the Pirates won game 7 of the 1979 World Series, and while it hasn't been quite that long since they've had a winning season - it's been darn close. The last time was 1991 - Andy Van Slyke and Yes, Barry Bonds at the helm. I went to a game that summer - I was 16 - and someone asked me on my way out of the bathroom if I was Madonna. It was a good day.
Now, after years and years of apathy - of baseball in Pittsburgh being 'All about the food', the Pirates seem to be alive again. One and a half games out of first place, no less. With a number of players on the injured list, they've called up several young guys from the minor league. One in particular, Alex Presley, who, when standing in profile, looks just like Tom Cruise in Risky Business. Today he hit a grounder into center field and made it to third. This kid ran like the devil himself was chasing him. It was fantastic! They ended up defeating Houston 5-3. It's exciting to me because baseball is a sport I can get behind - I understand the rules, unlike golf or hockey. I don't really like all the spitting that goes on, but I do like bubble gum. And Andrew McCutcheon. I sense he's a lover of literature.
I don't know what has shifted for the Pirates this year. Maybe it's the new Manager, Clint Hurdle. He chews that gum like a champion, and his gut reminds me of my grandfather. Maybe he lines them all up against the shed and hurls the ball at them while their hands are tied behind their backs. "Don't be afraid of the ball, you little girls!" Whatever he's doing, he should only keep doing it. Watching these guys inspires me. As if with a bit of hard work and hustle - those of us sweating it out on the farm team might just make it to the big leagues.
Happy Fourth of July!
But thy eternal Summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Of course, he lives on in sports history, as well. When I was very small, Pittsburgh was a powerhouse of a sports town. We were a family, then. Franco Harris, Willie Stargell, my mom, dad, sister, brother and me. I love the picture of "Pops" - old #8 - snapped in mid-air after the Pirates won game 7 of the 1979 World Series, and while it hasn't been quite that long since they've had a winning season - it's been darn close. The last time was 1991 - Andy Van Slyke and Yes, Barry Bonds at the helm. I went to a game that summer - I was 16 - and someone asked me on my way out of the bathroom if I was Madonna. It was a good day.
Now, after years and years of apathy - of baseball in Pittsburgh being 'All about the food', the Pirates seem to be alive again. One and a half games out of first place, no less. With a number of players on the injured list, they've called up several young guys from the minor league. One in particular, Alex Presley, who, when standing in profile, looks just like Tom Cruise in Risky Business. Today he hit a grounder into center field and made it to third. This kid ran like the devil himself was chasing him. It was fantastic! They ended up defeating Houston 5-3. It's exciting to me because baseball is a sport I can get behind - I understand the rules, unlike golf or hockey. I don't really like all the spitting that goes on, but I do like bubble gum. And Andrew McCutcheon. I sense he's a lover of literature.
I don't know what has shifted for the Pirates this year. Maybe it's the new Manager, Clint Hurdle. He chews that gum like a champion, and his gut reminds me of my grandfather. Maybe he lines them all up against the shed and hurls the ball at them while their hands are tied behind their backs. "Don't be afraid of the ball, you little girls!" Whatever he's doing, he should only keep doing it. Watching these guys inspires me. As if with a bit of hard work and hustle - those of us sweating it out on the farm team might just make it to the big leagues.
Happy Fourth of July!
June 27, 2011
Wrong Number?
Darn but I hate it when someone calls my cell phone and doesn't leave a message. Mostly because when I see a missed call from a number I don't recognize, I get immediately excited. As if I've just missed the call of calls. The New Yorker, for example. Deborah Treisman, Fiction Editor, phoning to say she's decided to bump Alice Munro to make room for my story in the next issue. And to insist I hop the first plane to Manhattan so she can buy me a beer and I can explain exactly how it is that I do what I do.
Or maybe another editor - a judge from one of the 25 or so book contests to which I've submitted this year. "Is this Bridgette Shade?" yes..."Congratulations! You've won...you've won!" Or even an old friend who wants to say something nice. "Hello." or "What a thought-provoking, yet entertaining blog!" or "Thinking of you."
But there was no message. Two calls from the same wrong number. Someone trying to dial someone else on his lunch break - peanut butter fingers confusing the 8 for a 6. Someone who dialed me twice - maybe just to hear my lovely outgoing message - or to laugh listening to it once again, this time in the company of coworkers.
The truth is, no one calls anyone anymore. It's all texting and emailing and maybe, if anyone ever figures out how to crack the code, commenting. And I guess that's okay - but these things can't compare to hearing your name as it's spoken by someone with good news to give. With kind words to share. With years of stories stored up to tell.
As a Fiction Editor myself, I often write a personal note to writers who submit to WEAVE. Even if I don't think their work fits our needs, I want them to know I appreciate the effort. And I love nothing more than being able to send the email that says "CONGRATULATIONS! We love your story!" It's like Christmas and Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July to me. And it would be wonderful to phone them, but no one does that anymore.
Which brings me to my next point: Issue 6 of WEAVE is now available for purchase. This issue is truly a work of art. Not only is it loaded with outstanding new fiction by the likes of Jane McCafferty and Mary O'Donnell, but it is aesthetically unlike anything you'll find on the shelves - or Gasp - within the electronic files of your EReader. Please consider visiting the WEAVE website...a link to which appears along the right margin of this blog... and order a copy or two.
While you're at it, pick up the phone and call someone. And for pity's sake, don't hang up without leaving a message.
Or maybe another editor - a judge from one of the 25 or so book contests to which I've submitted this year. "Is this Bridgette Shade?" yes..."Congratulations! You've won...you've won!" Or even an old friend who wants to say something nice. "Hello." or "What a thought-provoking, yet entertaining blog!" or "Thinking of you."
But there was no message. Two calls from the same wrong number. Someone trying to dial someone else on his lunch break - peanut butter fingers confusing the 8 for a 6. Someone who dialed me twice - maybe just to hear my lovely outgoing message - or to laugh listening to it once again, this time in the company of coworkers.
The truth is, no one calls anyone anymore. It's all texting and emailing and maybe, if anyone ever figures out how to crack the code, commenting. And I guess that's okay - but these things can't compare to hearing your name as it's spoken by someone with good news to give. With kind words to share. With years of stories stored up to tell.
As a Fiction Editor myself, I often write a personal note to writers who submit to WEAVE. Even if I don't think their work fits our needs, I want them to know I appreciate the effort. And I love nothing more than being able to send the email that says "CONGRATULATIONS! We love your story!" It's like Christmas and Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July to me. And it would be wonderful to phone them, but no one does that anymore.
Which brings me to my next point: Issue 6 of WEAVE is now available for purchase. This issue is truly a work of art. Not only is it loaded with outstanding new fiction by the likes of Jane McCafferty and Mary O'Donnell, but it is aesthetically unlike anything you'll find on the shelves - or Gasp - within the electronic files of your EReader. Please consider visiting the WEAVE website...a link to which appears along the right margin of this blog... and order a copy or two.
While you're at it, pick up the phone and call someone. And for pity's sake, don't hang up without leaving a message.
June 19, 2011
What is Left?
My father called at midnight on the day I graduated from high school. He hadn't attended the commencement and the last time I'd spent time with him was for my 12th birthday. "Have a good life," was what he said. I was 18 and I have no memory of how I responded.
I don't have much to write about Father's Day that won't sound pitiful. At 36, I still wish, almost everyday, that things had turned out differently - that my father had turned out differently. That he would have stuck around to tell me he loves me. To tell me I'm pretty. But still, I have his nose. When I look in the mirror, I still see his eyes. I can't escape the part of me that is him. And the parts that I can't see, the factions of my heart that are the same as his: the dark as well as the light - the man who sang and loved us outloud. But it is a bitter pill, this day. Always, every year.
Watch this video from the closing moments of the movie Smoke Signals. It features a version of Dick Lourie's poem "Forgiving our Fathers" which speaks for all of us, I think - those who love our fathers in spite of themselves and those who live with their ghosts.
I don't have much to write about Father's Day that won't sound pitiful. At 36, I still wish, almost everyday, that things had turned out differently - that my father had turned out differently. That he would have stuck around to tell me he loves me. To tell me I'm pretty. But still, I have his nose. When I look in the mirror, I still see his eyes. I can't escape the part of me that is him. And the parts that I can't see, the factions of my heart that are the same as his: the dark as well as the light - the man who sang and loved us outloud. But it is a bitter pill, this day. Always, every year.
Watch this video from the closing moments of the movie Smoke Signals. It features a version of Dick Lourie's poem "Forgiving our Fathers" which speaks for all of us, I think - those who love our fathers in spite of themselves and those who live with their ghosts.
June 9, 2011
Reading is Sexy
Years ago I saw a bumper sticker that read "Fat people are harder to kidnap." I can't imagine ever pasting such a thing onto my car, but the idea of it comes to me, consolingly, when I've (once again) lost the battle of the bulge to an ever-cunning jelly donut.
Today I saw a blue pickup with the following words stuck to its slightly rusted bumper: "Reading is Sexy". Faster than a finger snap, I turned my attention to the driver of this smart vehicle. It was a man, and I couldn't look for too long because traffic was beginning to move, but clearly, this wasn't one of those ironic bumper stickers. No siree, Bob.
Of course, it's possible he bought the truck with the sticker pre-stuck. Maybe he can't read a lick. Maybe he burns copies of War and Peace to keep warm in the winter and the sticker is just a facade - a way to get written into the blogs of bookish women driving to the supermarket in rental cars. But who gives a hoot? You have to admire a person who projects a positive message out into the world.
Not like those beef jerky commercials. Have you seen them? The ones where a couple of goofballs pretend to invite a socially awkward Sasquatch into their fire circle, complete with sticks of beef, of course, and Big Foot just wants to be their friend, so he takes the bait only to have the seat pulled out from under his hairy butt at the last second. Nothing like marketing your product as a footstool for bullies. Endorsing the concept that it's okay to devalue people (and beasts) based on their appearance as long as you're having fun.
Wouldn't it be more humane to use the imitation meat as a peace offering? An olive branch extended to those who frighten us by their difference? In this way, I'm inclined to side with the haughty message I saw on a Lexus: "If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention."
The problem is that being outraged isn't enough. It isn't enough to assign blame to motorists who aren't wagging their fists in protest or politicians who aren't keeping their promises (or their flies zipped) or holding high-minded conferences about hunger and war. Anger alone will never fill the bellies of hungry kids - won't heal the soldiers, wounded in places you can't see. Not to mention the damage anger does to the lining of the stomach. If you ask me, it's better to eat a doughnut - to get it all over your face and fingers and sprinkle a little of that sugar - everywhere you go.
Today I saw a blue pickup with the following words stuck to its slightly rusted bumper: "Reading is Sexy". Faster than a finger snap, I turned my attention to the driver of this smart vehicle. It was a man, and I couldn't look for too long because traffic was beginning to move, but clearly, this wasn't one of those ironic bumper stickers. No siree, Bob.
Of course, it's possible he bought the truck with the sticker pre-stuck. Maybe he can't read a lick. Maybe he burns copies of War and Peace to keep warm in the winter and the sticker is just a facade - a way to get written into the blogs of bookish women driving to the supermarket in rental cars. But who gives a hoot? You have to admire a person who projects a positive message out into the world.
Not like those beef jerky commercials. Have you seen them? The ones where a couple of goofballs pretend to invite a socially awkward Sasquatch into their fire circle, complete with sticks of beef, of course, and Big Foot just wants to be their friend, so he takes the bait only to have the seat pulled out from under his hairy butt at the last second. Nothing like marketing your product as a footstool for bullies. Endorsing the concept that it's okay to devalue people (and beasts) based on their appearance as long as you're having fun.
Wouldn't it be more humane to use the imitation meat as a peace offering? An olive branch extended to those who frighten us by their difference? In this way, I'm inclined to side with the haughty message I saw on a Lexus: "If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention."
The problem is that being outraged isn't enough. It isn't enough to assign blame to motorists who aren't wagging their fists in protest or politicians who aren't keeping their promises (or their flies zipped) or holding high-minded conferences about hunger and war. Anger alone will never fill the bellies of hungry kids - won't heal the soldiers, wounded in places you can't see. Not to mention the damage anger does to the lining of the stomach. If you ask me, it's better to eat a doughnut - to get it all over your face and fingers and sprinkle a little of that sugar - everywhere you go.
June 6, 2011
Guten Tag
Perhaps it is an odd mistake. Some glitch in the tracking system, but when I checked the statistics for my blog this morning, I noticed that 21 people in the UK supposedly visited this site. Also, there have been viewers from Germany, Denmark, Australia, and Russia - with the lion's share residing in Germany. Perhaps, unwittingly, I have become the David Hasselhoff of bloggers, and though I've never been to Germany, I did study the language for four years in high school, which prepared me to say, "Vielen Dank."
I can also sing a song called "Ein neuer tag" as interpreted by the trio Peter, Sue, und, Mark and can quote various idioms including the ever-useful "Der apfel fallt nicht weit vom stamm." (for the sticklers out there, I am aware that there should be an umlaut over the a in fallt, but I have no idea how to type that in this space.)
But I digress. The point is that I began to worry after my last posting that I'd only mentioned Carlo Gebler as being Edna O'Brien's son. (His name should have an accent mark over the first e in Gebler, just to be consistent). I was so excited about the inscription his mother wrote for me, I neglected to point out that he is an extremely accomplished writer in his own right - in addition to being the original English gentleman. He taught me a great deal about story telling and gave me this important advice: "Always do exactly what you are asked and nothing more." These are invaluable words for someone with a propensity toward unneccessary elaboration...
And while I'm at it, I'd like to say that teachers have been some of my favorite people from the start: Miss Jubera, Mr. Silbor, Mrs. George; Miss Patti, Dr. Merrily Swoboda, Dr. Constance Ruzich, Mary O'Donnell. How different I would be if not for their presence in my life and always at the precise moment I needed it.
I can also sing a song called "Ein neuer tag" as interpreted by the trio Peter, Sue, und, Mark and can quote various idioms including the ever-useful "Der apfel fallt nicht weit vom stamm." (for the sticklers out there, I am aware that there should be an umlaut over the a in fallt, but I have no idea how to type that in this space.)
But I digress. The point is that I began to worry after my last posting that I'd only mentioned Carlo Gebler as being Edna O'Brien's son. (His name should have an accent mark over the first e in Gebler, just to be consistent). I was so excited about the inscription his mother wrote for me, I neglected to point out that he is an extremely accomplished writer in his own right - in addition to being the original English gentleman. He taught me a great deal about story telling and gave me this important advice: "Always do exactly what you are asked and nothing more." These are invaluable words for someone with a propensity toward unneccessary elaboration...
And while I'm at it, I'd like to say that teachers have been some of my favorite people from the start: Miss Jubera, Mr. Silbor, Mrs. George; Miss Patti, Dr. Merrily Swoboda, Dr. Constance Ruzich, Mary O'Donnell. How different I would be if not for their presence in my life and always at the precise moment I needed it.
June 3, 2011
Two Bridgets
Last week Half Price Books and Records held its annual Memorial Day 20% off sale, so I made the rounds to (almost) all of their stores in the Pittsburgh area. It's a weakness - buying books, and if I had any business savvy, I'd open a store myself - just so I could spend my days talking about writers and convincing people to read the ones I love.
Anyway, one of my finds was a biography of Flannery O'Connor by Brad Gooch. The cover boasts a cool oil painting of Ms. O'Connor flanked by a pair of peacock feathers like blue eyes with overgrown green lashes. I found it in the fiction section, however, which is a pet peeve of mine. Much as I love Half-Price Books, they are a bit lazy when it comes to shelving. If it were my store, I'd have a vast section of local authors prominently displayed, and nonfiction would never be housed next to fiction. None the less, it was a great find, hardback and in mint condition. AND - it's inscribed. Here's what it says, in lovely script, I might add:
"For Sarah...Love Mom & Dad 2009 HAPPY BIRTHDAY!"
Now, if by chance, Sarah, you happen to be reading this, I'm sorry for exposing your secret. But shame on you. Your parents dedicated this book to you, and it doesn't even look like you read it. Maybe you don't care for Flannery O'Connor. Maybe, like me, you aren't a big fan of birds - but come on! A dedicated book is priceless. What did you get for it? Five bucks? Ten on the outside? We have precious little to hold onto when our loved ones die, and handwriting has become a rarity. Hopefully, your parents are alive and well. And Heaven forbid anything happened to you which resulted in someone else having to sell this book on your behalf. But regardless of the reasoning behind the sale, it breaks my heart a little.
I have a book called Two Bridgets by Cynthia Hathaway. It was written in 1944 and purchased the following Christmas for a girl named Kathleen by two women named Joanne and Sara. Thirty-two years later, my great-grandmother bought it for me. Her inscription is just below theirs:
"To Bridgette Bernice on her Second Birthday
March 17, 1977
From her Great-Grandmother, Mary Bernice Campbell."
Grandma Campbell died in 1993, but I have her words right here next to me.
What will become of these treasures if E-Readers replace real books? I have many books signed by authors as well. Just yesterday my dear friend Lorraine sent me a personalized copy of Edna O'Briens' new collection Saints and Sinners. Ms. O'Brien's son, Carlo Gebler, was one of my mentors while studying for my MFA in Ireland. So it was an amazing treat to read what she wrote following an evening at Symphony Space in NYC:
"For Bridgette, from Carlo's mother, some stories...Edna OB"
I have been known to go a little overboard with the hero worship, so I won't gush too much about the less than six degrees of separation between me and this incredibly accomplished woman. (I've had tea with her son for pity's sake!) And, truly, it is Lorraine that I am in awe of - for her thoughtfulness. For standing in what must have been a hellish line to secure this special book for me - a book which I will never sell. Even if the Nook police come knocking at the door with nunchucks.
Anyway, one of my finds was a biography of Flannery O'Connor by Brad Gooch. The cover boasts a cool oil painting of Ms. O'Connor flanked by a pair of peacock feathers like blue eyes with overgrown green lashes. I found it in the fiction section, however, which is a pet peeve of mine. Much as I love Half-Price Books, they are a bit lazy when it comes to shelving. If it were my store, I'd have a vast section of local authors prominently displayed, and nonfiction would never be housed next to fiction. None the less, it was a great find, hardback and in mint condition. AND - it's inscribed. Here's what it says, in lovely script, I might add:
"For Sarah...Love Mom & Dad 2009 HAPPY BIRTHDAY!"
Now, if by chance, Sarah, you happen to be reading this, I'm sorry for exposing your secret. But shame on you. Your parents dedicated this book to you, and it doesn't even look like you read it. Maybe you don't care for Flannery O'Connor. Maybe, like me, you aren't a big fan of birds - but come on! A dedicated book is priceless. What did you get for it? Five bucks? Ten on the outside? We have precious little to hold onto when our loved ones die, and handwriting has become a rarity. Hopefully, your parents are alive and well. And Heaven forbid anything happened to you which resulted in someone else having to sell this book on your behalf. But regardless of the reasoning behind the sale, it breaks my heart a little.
I have a book called Two Bridgets by Cynthia Hathaway. It was written in 1944 and purchased the following Christmas for a girl named Kathleen by two women named Joanne and Sara. Thirty-two years later, my great-grandmother bought it for me. Her inscription is just below theirs:
"To Bridgette Bernice on her Second Birthday
March 17, 1977
From her Great-Grandmother, Mary Bernice Campbell."
Grandma Campbell died in 1993, but I have her words right here next to me.
What will become of these treasures if E-Readers replace real books? I have many books signed by authors as well. Just yesterday my dear friend Lorraine sent me a personalized copy of Edna O'Briens' new collection Saints and Sinners. Ms. O'Brien's son, Carlo Gebler, was one of my mentors while studying for my MFA in Ireland. So it was an amazing treat to read what she wrote following an evening at Symphony Space in NYC:
"For Bridgette, from Carlo's mother, some stories...Edna OB"
I have been known to go a little overboard with the hero worship, so I won't gush too much about the less than six degrees of separation between me and this incredibly accomplished woman. (I've had tea with her son for pity's sake!) And, truly, it is Lorraine that I am in awe of - for her thoughtfulness. For standing in what must have been a hellish line to secure this special book for me - a book which I will never sell. Even if the Nook police come knocking at the door with nunchucks.
May 23, 2011
No Whammies
Last night I lay in bed, pondering over the week ahead when inexplicably, the Muppets entered my mind. I thought about hearing "The Rainbow Connection" for the first time, which was also the first time I saw a movie at a theater. It was just my mom and me, and I remember being overcome with emotion when those muppets sang "Someday we'll find it - the rainbow connection - the lovers, the dreamers, and me." And Yes, I thought me meant me. And it was then, sitting at the Showcase Cinemas West in a green chair which had not yet become soiled or sticky when it hit me: I, too, was a dreamer. I was four and had already found my flock. I wept with happiness at the connection between myself and Miss Piggy, that karate chopping, self-made woman muppet. Between myself and Kermit, the idealistic, ever patient frog with a story to tell. Fozzie and Gonzo and the Swedish Chef - even the two curmudgeon old men, mocking the naive optimism from their high seats in the balcony. I had something in common with all of them, and it fills me with such joy to think about it, even now.
I love those Muppets and the songs they sang. Everything Jim Henson created was a gift: Fraggle Rock and Emmet Otter's Jugband Christmas are such treasures. And it was a gift to remember them last night. Good thoughts are more valuable than gold, and so for this week (in keeping with things from times gone by) I wish you Big Bucks in the form of good thoughts and absolutely No Whammies.
I love those Muppets and the songs they sang. Everything Jim Henson created was a gift: Fraggle Rock and Emmet Otter's Jugband Christmas are such treasures. And it was a gift to remember them last night. Good thoughts are more valuable than gold, and so for this week (in keeping with things from times gone by) I wish you Big Bucks in the form of good thoughts and absolutely No Whammies.
May 18, 2011
Better to be a Hammer than a Nail?
Sometimes all you can do is laugh. For example, last week I saw an old hearse on the road with two mattresses strapped to its roof - lending new meaning to the phrase FINAL RESTING PLACE. And now, despite the driving rain, there is a man with a chain saw in the back yard, dangling from the same limb he's attempting to remove. Gosh, it's funny stuff. Mud and giant wood chippers and a forest of branches decorating the driveway, and oh, yes, the 15 ft. hole dug by the sewer company just beneath the place where the man is sawing - which is, at least, practical - and ironic given the recent sighting of the hearse.
And to think last week I thought the worst thing that could happen was to receive six rejections in the same day - five of which chimed in before noon. Of course when you submit as often as I do, it's bound to happen. Mass rejection, that is, and eventually I pulled myself together. Baked a batch of lemon raspberry muffins and finished the story I was working on. Sent it out into the world - as if to say SEE HERE YE FORCES OF DARKNESS - I WILL NOT BE BROKEN.
And then the Great Hammer responded: CARE TO MAKE A WAGER?
Yes, over the past six months I have felt very much like a nail. As if, unbeknownst to me, some jerk has been directing every hammer wielding asshole across two continents to my doorstep. And to those folks, I'd like to say: NAILS HAVE FEELINGS, TOO. But my guess is there are many more nails than hammers out there. The people whose homes have been washed away by floods, for example. The parents whose children have been stolen and the children whose parents have been betrayed by sick bodies. Not to mention all the little whacks on the head. Stuff like accidentally bouncing a check or being honked at for hesistating two seconds after the light turns green or placing your trust in someone who does not have your best interests at heart. Perhaps the BeeGees say it best: "We're living in a world of fools, breaking us down - when they all should let us be. We belong to you and me."
Sometimes though, we nails are the self-same fool.
Which leads me to the final question: Is it better to be the hammer than the nail? Would I feel better if I started beating people about the head and shoulders? If I became as sharp-tongued as the aforementined chainsaw? Or worse, if I lost my nail-like faith in people and assumed every person I encountered was a hammer intent on carrying out my demise?
No matter how many times it happens, I am always surprised when the hit comes and yup. It hurts. But I'd still rather be the nail. Blind - but most certainly not mute.
And to think last week I thought the worst thing that could happen was to receive six rejections in the same day - five of which chimed in before noon. Of course when you submit as often as I do, it's bound to happen. Mass rejection, that is, and eventually I pulled myself together. Baked a batch of lemon raspberry muffins and finished the story I was working on. Sent it out into the world - as if to say SEE HERE YE FORCES OF DARKNESS - I WILL NOT BE BROKEN.
And then the Great Hammer responded: CARE TO MAKE A WAGER?
Yes, over the past six months I have felt very much like a nail. As if, unbeknownst to me, some jerk has been directing every hammer wielding asshole across two continents to my doorstep. And to those folks, I'd like to say: NAILS HAVE FEELINGS, TOO. But my guess is there are many more nails than hammers out there. The people whose homes have been washed away by floods, for example. The parents whose children have been stolen and the children whose parents have been betrayed by sick bodies. Not to mention all the little whacks on the head. Stuff like accidentally bouncing a check or being honked at for hesistating two seconds after the light turns green or placing your trust in someone who does not have your best interests at heart. Perhaps the BeeGees say it best: "We're living in a world of fools, breaking us down - when they all should let us be. We belong to you and me."
Sometimes though, we nails are the self-same fool.
Which leads me to the final question: Is it better to be the hammer than the nail? Would I feel better if I started beating people about the head and shoulders? If I became as sharp-tongued as the aforementined chainsaw? Or worse, if I lost my nail-like faith in people and assumed every person I encountered was a hammer intent on carrying out my demise?
No matter how many times it happens, I am always surprised when the hit comes and yup. It hurts. But I'd still rather be the nail. Blind - but most certainly not mute.
May 8, 2011
Mama You've Been On My Mind
In honor of Mother's Day, here are some great short stories about mothers or motherly relationships:
"Homeland" (More of a grandmother story) by Barbara Kingsolver from Homeland
"Silver Water" by Amy Bloom from Come to Me
"The Child" by Ali Smith from The First Person
"An Irrevocable Diameter" (this one isn't exactly about a mother, but when she makes an appearance, it's more than memorable) & "A Subject of Childhood" by Grace Paley from The Little Disturbances of Man
"Let it Snow" (A how not to be a good mother story) by David Sedaris from Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim
And if you'd like to read something by this mother, check out the new edition of Compass Rose in which my story "Pretty Face" appears...to buy a copy go to Lulu.com and type in Compass Rose Vol. XI.
I hope you spent the day drinking nice cups of tea with your mom, or with memories of your mom and that in either case you had the good sense to keep your elbows off the table and your feet out in front of you - where they belong.
"Homeland" (More of a grandmother story) by Barbara Kingsolver from Homeland
"Silver Water" by Amy Bloom from Come to Me
"The Child" by Ali Smith from The First Person
"An Irrevocable Diameter" (this one isn't exactly about a mother, but when she makes an appearance, it's more than memorable) & "A Subject of Childhood" by Grace Paley from The Little Disturbances of Man
"Let it Snow" (A how not to be a good mother story) by David Sedaris from Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim
And if you'd like to read something by this mother, check out the new edition of Compass Rose in which my story "Pretty Face" appears...to buy a copy go to Lulu.com and type in Compass Rose Vol. XI.
I hope you spent the day drinking nice cups of tea with your mom, or with memories of your mom and that in either case you had the good sense to keep your elbows off the table and your feet out in front of you - where they belong.
May 7, 2011
Can't Comment?
Is there anyone out there who knows why some people are unable to post comments to this blog? If so, I would be over the moon if you'd click the contact tab and send me your nuggets of wisdom. Perhaps we could make a contest of it...whoever gets me the answer fastest, gets a cookie. And not one of those invisible kind that track your every cyber move. A real, honest to goodness cookie. Yum.
No time to lose...click away my pretties.
No time to lose...click away my pretties.
May 5, 2011
Cats and Mice
Allow me to begin by saying I like Ray LaMontagne. Or I like his music, generally speaking. I've never met him. There are a few tracks from his new album God Willin' and the Creek Don't Rise that sound a good bit like Joni Mitchell impersonations, which is a little weird, but I also really like Joni Mitchell, so this is okay, too. And my problem today is not with Ray LaMontagne or his song "The Repo Man" which I heard on the radio this morning but, rather, with some of the language he's chosen. Language which, I dare say, we all are guilty of wielding. Words so deeply ingrained in our collective vocabulary that they slip from our tongues without consideration for what they might actually mean.
"The Repo Man" is about a jilted man whose ex-'woman' just got dumped by her latest beau and has come crawling back to the one she realizes she shouldn't have left in the first place - or so the narrator would have us believe. We never get to hear the woman's side of the story. And this is not an especially original theme: Philandering women and men. And, of course, people don't listen to music because they expect to hear something new, they listen because they want to sift through the wreckage and salvage the part that fits, the piece of lyric that feels as if it's been written with them in mind. I get it because I do it, too.
But consider this lyric: "Now where is your woman while you work and you slave? As they say: While the cat's away..."
He doesn't need to finish that phrase because everyone knows what comes next. Ask yourself, though - what sicko came up with this saying in the first place? In what universe do cats and mice live as man and wife or as common law creatures, such as the case may be? No matter how charming that cat seems to be, no matter how much he/she insists that differences bring out the best in all beasts, remember: mice are the prey. And if you've ever seen a cat with a mouse in its control, you know that the cat doesn't go for the jugular. Instead, he bats the mouse around. Taunts it. Paws it back and forth and even gives it a false sense of hope by turning it loose. Setting it free just so he can have the pleasure of chasing it down again. A slow dance of torture before death.
So, dear readers, the moral of today's blog is this: 1. Think about the weird but commonplace thing you're about to say before you say it. And 2. If you find yourself married to or living with or dating a cat, while you yourself are a mouse, skip the play. Pack your mouse bag and run as fast and as far as your little legs will carry you.
"The Repo Man" is about a jilted man whose ex-'woman' just got dumped by her latest beau and has come crawling back to the one she realizes she shouldn't have left in the first place - or so the narrator would have us believe. We never get to hear the woman's side of the story. And this is not an especially original theme: Philandering women and men. And, of course, people don't listen to music because they expect to hear something new, they listen because they want to sift through the wreckage and salvage the part that fits, the piece of lyric that feels as if it's been written with them in mind. I get it because I do it, too.
But consider this lyric: "Now where is your woman while you work and you slave? As they say: While the cat's away..."
He doesn't need to finish that phrase because everyone knows what comes next. Ask yourself, though - what sicko came up with this saying in the first place? In what universe do cats and mice live as man and wife or as common law creatures, such as the case may be? No matter how charming that cat seems to be, no matter how much he/she insists that differences bring out the best in all beasts, remember: mice are the prey. And if you've ever seen a cat with a mouse in its control, you know that the cat doesn't go for the jugular. Instead, he bats the mouse around. Taunts it. Paws it back and forth and even gives it a false sense of hope by turning it loose. Setting it free just so he can have the pleasure of chasing it down again. A slow dance of torture before death.
So, dear readers, the moral of today's blog is this: 1. Think about the weird but commonplace thing you're about to say before you say it. And 2. If you find yourself married to or living with or dating a cat, while you yourself are a mouse, skip the play. Pack your mouse bag and run as fast and as far as your little legs will carry you.
May 3, 2011
Joy is a taste
Last night I watched Julie and Julia for inspiration. I've seen this movie many times, but with the birth of my own blog, I studied it with new eyes. Anyone who aspires to write can't help but be both elated and nauseauted by the scene where Amy Adams' character receives 65 phone messages from publishers/literary agents/editors begging her to work with them.
My first thought was that our phone doesn't have an answering machine. So if this blog were to suddenly go viral - say for example, if during my travels I had the good fortune to stumble upon a wise cracking infant and the foresight to video tape her shouting "Step off" to anyone who approached her chubby cheeks in the frozen foods - and if I were to post that video on this blog and the phone were to ring 65 times while I was out combing the stores for other babies, I would never know.
Seriously though, I take my hat off to the real Julie. Has anyone ever tried to read Mastering the Art of French Cooking? It's like a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure novel. If you want to make a raspberry Bavarian cream, you have to flip backwards to find out how to make orange Bavarian cream, and in order to make orange Bavarian cream, you have to flip back to read about how to impregnate the large sugar lumps with orange oil. It's insanity. So kudos to Julie for cracking the code.
But it's Meryl Streep's portrayal of Julia Child, her joie de vivre for life, that really makes this film sing. She luxuriates in every bite of food. Savors every sip of wine and drag from a cigarette. And it reminds me of a poem by Mary Oliver called "The Plum Trees". Here is my favorite part:
Joy is a taste before it's anything else,
and the body can lounge for hours devouring
the important moments. Listen,
the only way
to tempt happiness into your mind is by taking it
into the body first, like small
wild plums.
And no matter how many times I watch this film, I weep when Julia Child finally opens the package containing her book. Her gratitude and sense of accomplishment overwhelm me as does the song by Margaret Whiting swelling in the background: "Time after time, you'll hear me say that I'm, so lucky to be loving you."
And so, with visions of warm brie still dancing in my head, I will end with the beginning of a story (as promised). A tale of a restauranteur with a twist. Feel free to pick up where I leave off and share what your imagination feeds you.
I realized early on that no one would know if I dipped a finger in the pot of mashed potatoes. I only had to mold them back together. Neither would they know that some part of me had become part of them. And it wasn't long before there was a line of people snaking out the door for dinner service. Each one craving some missing ingredient in their lives: an eyelash or a bit of scab - a longing which instinctively led them back to me...
My first thought was that our phone doesn't have an answering machine. So if this blog were to suddenly go viral - say for example, if during my travels I had the good fortune to stumble upon a wise cracking infant and the foresight to video tape her shouting "Step off" to anyone who approached her chubby cheeks in the frozen foods - and if I were to post that video on this blog and the phone were to ring 65 times while I was out combing the stores for other babies, I would never know.
Seriously though, I take my hat off to the real Julie. Has anyone ever tried to read Mastering the Art of French Cooking? It's like a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure novel. If you want to make a raspberry Bavarian cream, you have to flip backwards to find out how to make orange Bavarian cream, and in order to make orange Bavarian cream, you have to flip back to read about how to impregnate the large sugar lumps with orange oil. It's insanity. So kudos to Julie for cracking the code.
But it's Meryl Streep's portrayal of Julia Child, her joie de vivre for life, that really makes this film sing. She luxuriates in every bite of food. Savors every sip of wine and drag from a cigarette. And it reminds me of a poem by Mary Oliver called "The Plum Trees". Here is my favorite part:
Joy is a taste before it's anything else,
and the body can lounge for hours devouring
the important moments. Listen,
the only way
to tempt happiness into your mind is by taking it
into the body first, like small
wild plums.
And no matter how many times I watch this film, I weep when Julia Child finally opens the package containing her book. Her gratitude and sense of accomplishment overwhelm me as does the song by Margaret Whiting swelling in the background: "Time after time, you'll hear me say that I'm, so lucky to be loving you."
And so, with visions of warm brie still dancing in my head, I will end with the beginning of a story (as promised). A tale of a restauranteur with a twist. Feel free to pick up where I leave off and share what your imagination feeds you.
I realized early on that no one would know if I dipped a finger in the pot of mashed potatoes. I only had to mold them back together. Neither would they know that some part of me had become part of them. And it wasn't long before there was a line of people snaking out the door for dinner service. Each one craving some missing ingredient in their lives: an eyelash or a bit of scab - a longing which instinctively led them back to me...
May 1, 2011
Remember when Vanna had to turn the letters?
On our way to the movies the other night, my daughter's friend said, "What does this do?" Strapped in behind me, I heard her take a breath and hold it as she cranked the handle. Exhaled in disbelief as the window separating her from the elements sunk into its slot. "And what about this?" Pushing the button from black to red, she discovered the origins of the lock. As if on an archeologial dig, the two of them began to search for evidence of other ancient forms of life. Might there be a $2 bill tucked into the crack of the seat? A hand written note folded into the shape of a football? And what about those blocks like giant Rubik's Cubes Vanna had to twist to solve a puzzle? I picture a landfill full of consonants. And those uppity vowels - so dear they came at a price - forced to rub shoulders with duds like X and Z for the next thousand or so years. Or instead of a landfill, maybe they were shipped to an inferior game show. One whose state-of-the-art studio got bulldozed by a runaway grocery truck. Though boxy and too tangible to be an app, their insurance company explained these letters were the best anyone could expect on such short notice.
I've been a hold-out for many years now. I admit it. I haven't joined Facebook or followed a single soul on Twitter. And until now, I've been thinking that Vanna must be so despondent. A person needs to feel productive - useful - and without needing to turn the letters, all she can do is smile and wave. Smile and wave and grimace when Pat Sajak crosses the stage to stand next to her. But driving this optionless tin can of a car, complete with string should anyone at home need to reach me through the creamed corn, I'm forced to reevaluate my position. Maybe Vanna has preempted Carpal Tunnel and in letting go of the letters, freed her mind to concentrate on more important things. Afterall, manual windows and locks were the norm when I was a kid but so was Asbestos.
And maybe if we join together, we can create something real out of this void. This week I will post the beginning of a story. A few lines to get things started. I invite you to keep it going. Share what you have written and I'll do the same.
I've been a hold-out for many years now. I admit it. I haven't joined Facebook or followed a single soul on Twitter. And until now, I've been thinking that Vanna must be so despondent. A person needs to feel productive - useful - and without needing to turn the letters, all she can do is smile and wave. Smile and wave and grimace when Pat Sajak crosses the stage to stand next to her. But driving this optionless tin can of a car, complete with string should anyone at home need to reach me through the creamed corn, I'm forced to reevaluate my position. Maybe Vanna has preempted Carpal Tunnel and in letting go of the letters, freed her mind to concentrate on more important things. Afterall, manual windows and locks were the norm when I was a kid but so was Asbestos.
And maybe if we join together, we can create something real out of this void. This week I will post the beginning of a story. A few lines to get things started. I invite you to keep it going. Share what you have written and I'll do the same.
April 28, 2011
Quit your b*%$@ing or I'll give you something to blog about!
Here's a secret: I wasn't just going to the bank. I was planning on stopping off for an egg sandwich and a coffee first. So when the woman crossed the double yellow and slammed into me, I felt - among other things - guilty. As if my intentions for being on the road at 9am were impure. I could have eaten a package of oatmeal or fried up an egg at home, but I really did need to deposit a check, so I thought, Why not feed two birds with one worm? (Thanks to my daughter's keen observation of the cruelty of this casual idiom, we no longer say Kill Two Birds With One Stone). I can't imagine hurling a stone at one bird let alone two, although I'm not fussy about crows. I catch them watching me, squawking back and forth in their crow-speak. Maybe they had something to do with the accident. Perhaps they've been plotting it all along - anticipating what would have to be the road kill find of a lifetime. A feast for the whole flock - the stuff of crow legend.
But there's always something. A rejection email from a lit mag. Two rejection emails. No emails. An email that begins with: I am writing with sad and disappointing news: you did not get the job. And the self-pity collects like dog hair, clustering and lighting on every surface until you begin to believe that fur is a conspiracy against you. All of this despite the fact that you can't touch an email or smell its breath.
On the morning I was hit, I am not sure that I brushed my teeth. In fact I'm certain that before leaving the house, I'd slugged back half a pot of coffee and put the car into drive without so much as a stick of gum to soften the blow. The bank teller would have been protected by a plastic barrier. And I could have spoken into the drive-thru speaker to order my egg sandwich, taking care to smile with my mouth closed when handing over the cash at the window. But the woman who stopped to hold my hand after the crash came face to face with my dragon breath and never flinched. She did not wince with disgust the way the nurse tasked with extracting the staples left-over from my C-section cringed at my oozing abdomen. She hadn't even witnessed the accident. Had no legal responsiblity to pull-over and give a statement. But she did pull-over. Dressed in white, she appeared in the smashed-out window of my beloved little red car and took my hand. She offered me her phone, as mine was lost somewhere in the debris of broken glass and mangled chrome. She zipped my purse. Stayed until the police came and my car was towed away. Waited with no regard for her own egg sandwich agenda.
And so, for this, my inaugural blog, I want to say thank you. Thank you to the woman who held my hand. To all the women and men who stop. Who take the time to touch a stranger, renewing a forgotten faith. And though I miss my car - the only car I've ever loved, I say thank you to those who would crash into us as well. Thank you for ramming some perspective into my sideview mirror and for reminding me how precious the dog-hair disappointments in life can be.
But there's always something. A rejection email from a lit mag. Two rejection emails. No emails. An email that begins with: I am writing with sad and disappointing news: you did not get the job. And the self-pity collects like dog hair, clustering and lighting on every surface until you begin to believe that fur is a conspiracy against you. All of this despite the fact that you can't touch an email or smell its breath.
On the morning I was hit, I am not sure that I brushed my teeth. In fact I'm certain that before leaving the house, I'd slugged back half a pot of coffee and put the car into drive without so much as a stick of gum to soften the blow. The bank teller would have been protected by a plastic barrier. And I could have spoken into the drive-thru speaker to order my egg sandwich, taking care to smile with my mouth closed when handing over the cash at the window. But the woman who stopped to hold my hand after the crash came face to face with my dragon breath and never flinched. She did not wince with disgust the way the nurse tasked with extracting the staples left-over from my C-section cringed at my oozing abdomen. She hadn't even witnessed the accident. Had no legal responsiblity to pull-over and give a statement. But she did pull-over. Dressed in white, she appeared in the smashed-out window of my beloved little red car and took my hand. She offered me her phone, as mine was lost somewhere in the debris of broken glass and mangled chrome. She zipped my purse. Stayed until the police came and my car was towed away. Waited with no regard for her own egg sandwich agenda.
And so, for this, my inaugural blog, I want to say thank you. Thank you to the woman who held my hand. To all the women and men who stop. Who take the time to touch a stranger, renewing a forgotten faith. And though I miss my car - the only car I've ever loved, I say thank you to those who would crash into us as well. Thank you for ramming some perspective into my sideview mirror and for reminding me how precious the dog-hair disappointments in life can be.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)