Writer's Island - My Imaginary Life

The older I get, the less I imagine what life could be like. Writing those words, I feel a little uneasy. Because although my real life is just fine, perhaps I shouldn't be content to settle for "fine" ~perhaps I should be reaching toward some far more fulfilling and creative life, setting my sights on the stars, like I did when I was a teenager. Just recently, events have occurred that should have drawn me up short, should have sent warning bells resounding in my ears about the finite nature of my time on this world. Events that, by rights, should spur me into a frenzy of action to accomplish all the things I want/need/hope to do. You know all the sayings - life is short, here today, gone tomorrow, make hay while the sun shines. I should be busy pulling out all the stops to make my imaginary life a reality, now, while I still have the time.

Then again, why should I be presumptuous enough to even imagine a better life than the one I have? After all, I have a loving and healthy family, a safe home, plenty of food and water, cars and clothes, and luxuries far beyond what most of the worlds population could ever imagine. What right have I to yearn for more than this?

Ahh, but its human nature to want more than we have, isn't it? Human of us to expect the world, to see the ever greener grass, to dream ever more fabulous dreams.

So, enough prevaricating. Here goes:

In my imaginary life, I always see myself living in an old, historic home out in the country, a home near enough to water that I can walk my dogs through the woods each day and listen to the sound of a babbling brook talking in my ear. I'm surrounded by books and music in this house, and I have plenty of time to indulge my love of words and notes each day. I will write - novels perhaps, or memoirs, even biographies. I will play - a chamber group, of friends and musicians, well known and very popular in the community and surrounding towns. In this imaginary life, my family is all nearby, so I can see them whenever I want - in fact, they come in and out of the house at will, my grandchildren bringing me handfuls of flowers plucked right from my own garden. I see myself wandering the woods in well worn jeans and soft sweaters, coming in from walks to hot coffee in the winter and mint-sprigged iced tea in the summer. I picture Jim and I sitting on our porch at night, watching the fireflies twinkle over the meadow, sipping wine as the sun goes down.

It's not a fancy imaginary life, is it? And, in fact, after all these rambling thoughts, I have come round to describing a life that's not really all that diverse from the life I have right now. Does this signify a lack of imagination on my part? Does this mean I don't dare to dream?

Probably not. It may be that I've simply already forged a good life into existence. Rather than spending time imagining something different, I would do well to enjoy and enhance all the good things about the life I already have.

~to read about others imaginary lives, visit Writer's Island

Encyclopedia of Me Monday: E is for Energy

I have been sick this past week, really down and dirty sick, and while I'm beginning to recover some of my equilibrium, I have not yet begun to rebound from a very profound loss of EneRgY. The thought of getting out of my chair takes a supreme amount of effort~really, you would think I was being asked to run a marathon just to get from here to the kitchen to pour a glass of water. I have never considered myself a highly energetic person, for I would choose lying on the sofa with books and bon bons over planting a garden or going dancing. But the past week has brought me to the realization that I had a good bit more energy than I gave myself credit for.

After all, most days I'm up at 6:30 to get in my morning pages and some yoga before work. After working all day, I often go to an evening rehearsal. Or I walk the dogs, do some shopping or cleaning, then finish out the day by writing and blog reading. This week, I was lucky to crawl out of bed by 8, after which I would perform my necessary morning ablutions and then crawl right back in.

No energy.

How I've take my energy for granted! just like most other aspects of my good health. I've expected it to carry me through work, concerts, chores, social events, all without even a tiny acknowledgement of gratitude.

That ends now. As soon as energy returns to me (and I'm surely hoping it will!) I promise to be a better, kinder steward. I'll take note when it flags, and give it some rest before it collapses in defeat. I'll nurture it with plenty of fruits and vegetables, my daily vitamin, and of course, lots and lots of water.

No more thumbing past the entry for the letter E in the encyclopedia of me.

Madeleine L'Engle-1918-2007

To say that Madeleine L'Engle was my favorite author as a child (and young woman) is probably putting it mildly. My name is scrawled on the library card of all her books countless times...I would renew them several times in a row, and perhaps, the next year, you would find my name there again. The Wrinkle in Time trilogy was a great favorite of course, and Meet the Austins. But my favorite of her books for young adults was, oddly enough, Camilla, the story of a teenager whose life is changed when her father has an affair with another woman, an oddly prescient choice for me, as this would happen in my own life some 15 years after I first read the novel. Ms. L'Engle died last Thursday, at the age of 88. I've been skimming through her Crosswicks Journal, a trilogy of memoirs written in the early 1970's (which is when I purchased and read them). It's been interesting to note what I underlined in these books~this passage stood out tonight: "I am, for better or worse, writer, wife, mother, and all these bits of me are inseparably blended to make up the human being who is-or who is not-responsible. The story comes, and it is pure story. That's all I set out to write. But I don't believe that we can write any kind of story without including, whether we intend to or not, our response to the world around us." "The writing of a book may be a solitary business; it is done alone. The writer sits down with paper and pen, or typewriter, and, withdrawn from the world, tries to set down the story that is crying to be written. We write alone, but we do not write in isolation. No matter how fantastic a story line may be, it still comes out of our response to what is happening to us and to the world in which we live." I thank her for sharing her stories with me.

Sunday Scribblings-Writing

"Writing, the creative effort, the use of the imagination, should come first, - at least for some part of every day of your life. It is a wonderful blessing if you will use it. You will become happier, more enlightened, alive, impassioned, light-hearted, and generous to everybody else. Even your health will improve. Colds will disappear and all the other ailments of discouragement and boredom." Brenda Ueland, If You Want to Write At last, a cure for the common cold, and all other pesky ailments of modern life. Pick up a pen and some paper, park yourself in front of computer screen or even dust the cobwebs off the old Olivetti (that's a typewriter, for those of you too young to remember). Write every day, and, like eating an apple, you'll be warding the doctor from your door. Sounds ridiculous, but perhaps there really is something to Ms. Ueland's thesis. Writing may not literally protect you from germs or disease, but I believe writing does strengthen the spirit as well as the mind. Since I've taken up the habit of writing in earnest, pledging myself to putting words on the page every day, I realize my mind works differently, exercising muscles in my brain that had lain fallow for years. My vision of the world around me is more intense, my eyes and ears more observant to the details of appearance and conversation, my heart more open and empathetic to others. I have become a keen observer of life in general and my own in particular, more aware of the things that spark anger or move me to tears. I am more alive when I write. I cherish life more when I write about it. When I was very young, I harbored dreams about becoming a "real writer." What was that? Someone whose name was on the cover of books, or underneath the headline in the New York Times. Someone whose words were read and acclaimed by "the world." When that dream failed to materialize, I let writing disappear from my life, sure that if I couldn't be one of those "real writers," there was no value in pursuing it at all. But I have come to believe as Brenda Ueland (and many other writers) believe - that "no writing is a waste of time, no creative work where the feelings, the imagination, the intelligence must work. With every sentence you write, you have learned something. It has done you good. It has stretched your understanding." So I continue to put words on paper - in the dozens of notebooks I have scattered around my house, and on the computer screen in front of me now, sometimes on the backs of grocery receipts or paper napkins at the coffee shop. I allow words to unravel from my brain like thread from a dropped spool - quickly, sometimes crazily - onto the page, holding the essence of some thought, some image, some impression, some snippet of conversation that seems to carry meaning for a moment. I look at the world like a poem, and try to capture my seconds on earth in each stanza. I write.

to read more about writing, go here

The Subtle Rewards of Sickness

There is something oddly comforting about being sick, of wandering around in a medication induced fog, shuffling from room to room in baby soft yoga pants and yellow slipper socks, some book or other held open by it's spine and wrapped around my middle like a protective shield. I have allowed myself to succumb to the entreaties of my husband and my friends~go to bed, rest, drink lots of hot tea, watch mindless television. In fact, dare I admit that it's a tiny dream come true? The evil bacteria that have lodged so peremptorily in my throat and sinuses have perhaps given me a small gift. And I have quite willingly abdicated my responsibilities for the past two days. I have not worked, or shopped, or gone to the bank or the pharmacy. I have not walked the dogs, nor cooked or cleaned. I have allowed others to do those things for me, without protest, without even the slightest nudge of guilt poking me in the shoulder and urging me to my feet. I could perhaps get used to this. Alas, I feel this coming to an end as the marvelous wonder that is medicine begins at last to work its magic in my bloodstream, gobbling up the vile germy invaders, flushing them out like the vermin they are. My head is beginning to clear slightly, and the room doesn't spin each time I move. I can take a deep breath without the air stopping dead somewhere midway between my lungs and my esophagus, or suffering paroxysms of the seal-like bark that has been masquerading as my cough. By tomorrow, I may be nearly as good as new. Already, I can feel my husband retreating to his usual safe place in the corner of daily life, the silent observer who patiently waits for all the necessities to be handled, smoothly and competently, and as they always are, by me. Sigh. It crosses my mind that perhaps one should not wait for illness to strike to allow themselves an occasional retreat from the dailiness of living. Perhaps a "me day" every so often is not out of order, a day to wander around the house in floppy yoga pants and yellow slipper socks, a day to eat only toast with honey or chocolate cake if those are the things the palate desires, a day to have an open book on every comfy chair in the house, ready to be picked up as you amble through the room, a day of not answering telephones, not paying bills, not reading the mail. A day to just be. Hmm. I think I'm on to something.