I often hesitate to speak too big about a movie I’ve just seen and loved. I try to stick to the “under promise, over deliver” concept. Then, if a person takes me up (more…)
Archive for January, 2010
Crazy Heart
Saturday, January 30th, 2010January Revision
Friday, January 29th, 2010
January has been one helluva writing month. Most months I don’t feel like I have enough time to write. But, this month, something happened. Time opened up. I’ve been writing every day, hours disappear and I put my head up, sore necked and tired eyed and wonder what happened to the hours. Writing, that’s what. I’ve finished the revisons on my novel manuscript.
Over and over this month, I chose writing over many things that often push their way ahead. It wasn’t really even a choice or a have to. Even with a few beautiful days that might’ve lured me outside to see what the garden has to offer up (just out the window I see snowdrops and hellebore blooming, trees budding, daffodils and day lilies pushing up their pretty young greens), I wanted to stay in. I wanted to sit at my computer. I wanted to write. The garden is coming along just fine without me. So, while winter debris is left to compost where it dropped, while dust piles up on the shelves and crumbs gather on the floors, I’ve fallen even more deeply in love with the writing life.
I’m happy with how the revisions have turned out and especially glad to have had this month to really go through the last 100 pages and consider how the story ends. Because I was changing the narration from first person to third, and from present tense to past, I had the chance to consider what work each word, sentence, paragraph and scene are doing for the story. I had to be willing to let go of things I once thought were necessary. With each scene, I considered: what does she want in this moment? What’s in her way? Do we learn something new? Does she grow or change? Revision is one of the best things about writing.
In the meantime, even with this head-down writing month, I’ve had a chance to look up and get out into the world, or on the phone or Facebook or email. I’ve had some pretty wonderful contact with some very cool people, old friends and new connections. And I think, in my metaphorical background, I’ve been asking myself those same revision questions.
It’s paying off, all the way around.
I look forward to whatever February has to offer up.
Comfort
Sunday, January 24th, 2010
When Bill came home from work Thursday afternoon, he was tired, he’d had some rough things to deal with at work. He wanted to go to the place we go to at times like that. Justa Pasta. We’ve been going to Justa Pasta for I don’t know how many years. Seven? Eight? Ten? Whatever, it’s been long enough and often enough that it’s our “go to” place for all kinds of things.
We usually go to Justa Pasta when we’re having a date day – a matinee and early dinner. But we’ve celebrated birthdays there, brought friends for small or big dinners, we’ve taken each of my siblings to Justa Pasta when they were in town for a visit. Bill and I got into a fight there once and I spent most of my meal crying. The staff kindly pretended they didn’t see. We’ve been there with our friends Dane and Mary and laughed so hard we may have scared a few guests away. One night, after a few glasses of wine, I let the owner, Roland, know just how cute I think he is. When our niece Devin died, we came here on our first night back in town from the funeral in Condon. Angelina, one of the lovely people who work at Justa Pasta, knew what had happened and she greeted us with hugs and good care.
It’s a fine thing to have a place to go that’s familiar and comforting, a place that smells good and has consistently delicious food, low lights and people who remember who you are and know what you like, people who make it easy for you to be there even when life isn’t easy. What’s your place for comfort?
Damn Good Pictures
Saturday, January 16th, 2010
My niece Shannon got married last summer. Before the wedding, she told me about the photographer she’d hired, Jamie Bosworth. She gave me Jamie’s website address. I went in and had a look. Her work drew me in and I kept looking through wedding pictures of people I didn’t know. I kind of wanted to be the people in those pictures. I wanted to go to the places where the weddings took place. I wanted to be able to take pictures like that. What’s more, Jamie has a blog where she posts pictures that aren’t weddings. And she writes. She writes really well.
Shannon’s wedding pictures came and despite the fact there were HARDLY ANY PICTURES OF ME, they were pretty damn wonderful. Shannon and Randy got married in Condon. Jamie took pictures of the bride and groom in a stubble field, she took pictures of them next to grain elevators. I love these pictures, in part because they have my niece and new nephew in them and they look happy, but also because of the beauty of the place. Jamie took shots of places around Condon. She saw what people from there love about that place, why we’re proud to be from there.
A week or so ago, I placed an order for some of Shannon’s wedding pictures. Jamie had a question about my order, so she called me. It was a fine conversation. We went from the particulars of her questions about my order, to me telling her about how much I like her work, and her blog. She told me a little about herself, but you can find out more if you here. You won’t be disappointed.
A Favorite Month
Sunday, January 10th, 2010
January is one of my favorite months. Yes, it’s gray and damp and all that excitement from the holidays is over. I love January though, because we’re done with all that holiday hoopla and people are petered out from being on the go, so everyone seems to step back from the fray a bit. I imagine people having a collective satisfied sigh of relaxation and catch up, of tucking into movies and football games and stew. For me, that satisfied sigh is my return to writing.
In December, I long for time to write and don’t find much of it because the things that December is made of: gatherings and gifts and going here and going there, demand my active attention. Every December, I finally surrender and say, “I’m going to make it okay to not write this month.” But the longer I’m away from it, the more I worry that I won’t be able to start again, that somehow I’ll have forgotten how, that I’m fooling myself if I think I’m a writer if I take a whole month away from writing. I get tense and anxious and a little bit cranky.
But by January, time opens up and I finally, finally, sit down at my computer. The words come easy. The relief is huge. I didn’t forget how. I still love to write. I can still write. I feel a loosening in me, the anxiety eases. I’m nicer to be around.
This cycle has happened often enough over the years that I’ve learned to trust it, even while I’m having that edgy anxious feeling, those worries. Every January I remember how it works: all that time not actually sitting at my computer is writing time too. Sometimes the words need to sit, they need to bunch up together and make their own stew, not be tended carefully by my active mind. In January, I love welcoming those words to the page.
What months are your favorites, for writing or for whatever it is you like to do?
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