Working The Word

It was only a few weeks ago that I wrote in this space about The Word I had chosen as my focus for the year 2015.

Vibrant. 

Today I find myself chuckling ruefully about that word, because there couldn’t be a word less like my experiences so far this year.  I’ve continued to be sick, one of my dogs has been intermittently sick, Jim was sick for a while. We had a huge snowstorm a week ago, and the view outside my window is studded with 10 foot mountains of dirt-topped snow. I’ve gone for days without washing my hair or putting on makeup, wearing some version of yoga pants, t-shirts and baggy wrap around sweaters. 

A line from one of my favorite Mary Oliver poems comes to mind to describe my experiences so far this year. ”I am so distant from the hope of myself...” she writes. I am SO distant from the hope of confidence, excitement, and radiant vibrancy I settled on for my touchstones back in early January.

BUT, I refuse to concede defeat. I am determined to find a way into those words, even if I’m doing it with my pockets stuffed full of tissues. 

Finding a way to Work The Word is my challenge now, to dispel the darkness of winter days and light up my life with Vibrant color. Because I’m a list-maker, this morning I made one. What are some manageable things I can do to bring newness into my world? 

Here are a few of the things that popped into mind...

1. Visit an art museum, and admire the visual beauty of great paintings. Bring home some postcards of my favorites and frame them for inspiration. 
2. Wear RED..it’s February, it’s Heart Month, and red is a beacon amidst the relentless gray of our outside world.
3. Go to a concert and listen to someone else play music for a change. The community college right down the street hosts a free Wednesday afternoon concert series with some great local artists.
4. Sing! even if it’s just singing along with the car radio which I never do anymore because I listen to audio books.  The other day I watched a video of my Grandson singing to himself while he played, and his face was the picture of pleasure as he hummed his own little nonsense song. 

Small things, really, but I think even baby steps toward a more vibrant outlook could make a huge difference right now. At the very least, they will bring me a little bit closer to that hope of myself I had just a few short weeks ago. I’ll keep you posted on the journey.

How about you? If you chose a touchstone word for your year, how are you Working The Word so far? I’d love to hear your story.

The Sunday Salon: Time Travel

I read a lot of historical fiction, and the best of it transports me to another place and acquaints me with people whose ideas and experiences and lifestyles are very different from mine.

This week’s reading is doing all of that.

I started the week with Sarah Waters new novel of psychological suspense, The Paying Guests. Set in post WWI London, this hefty tome starts out slowly but builds to a fever pitch of understated tension that doesn’t lift until the very last pages. Waters does a masterful job of creating atmosphere - the dark grittiness of London streets amidst the roiling undercurrent of dissolving class levels perfectly sets the scene for this novel built around crimes of passion. sometimes found it uncomfortable reading, but I was compelled by it all the same... which is the mark of  a good writer, isn’t it?

After finishing it, I headed straight to the library to look out more of Waters books. I brought home The Night Watch, but was equally thrilled to find a copy of Vanessa and Her Sister, a novel by Priya Parmar about Vanessa Stephen Bell and her sister Virginia Woolf. I thought this would make a good diversion from more of Waters’ brand of suspense, and eagerly dove in.

What a delight this is proving to be! Parmar chose to write in Vanessa's voice in the form of diary entries, interspersed with letters and postcards back and forth between all the members of the Bloomsbury group. Having read all of Virginia’s diaries, as well as most of her collected letters, I love voice Parmar has created for Vanessa - warm, loving, but clever and honest. Vanessa is the de facto mother figure for her two brothers and her sister, and Virginia’s episodes of crippling mental illness are always on her mind.  “It hangs over my head like Damocles’ sword,” writes Vanessa on the eve of her wedding to Clive Bell, "that Virginia will go mad.”

Because I’ve found Parmar’s novel so infectious, I’ve was drawn to my own bookshelves and to my old copy of Virginia Woolf, A Biography, published by her nephew Quentin Bell in 1972. Because this book is divided into years, it’s easy to follow along with the biography during the years of the novel. So I get the “authorized” version along with the novelized version.

True literary geek fun, I guess. But on a dark, damp Sunday morning in February, with a fire glowing, coffee brewing, and two snoring dogs at my feet, there’s probably nothing I’d enjoy much more.

Write On Wednesday: Creative Confabulation

When my son was in elementary school, he developed a fascinating creative friendship with another little boy in his class. The two of them spent hours together creating a multi-layered cartoon series based on the Star Trek TV show, but replacing all the characters with cartoon animals. (Kirk was a kangaroo and Spock was a spaniel.) Their version was called Car Trek, and it included written stories, books and books of cartoon panels, as well as audio and video recordings.

It was serious business for these two 8 and 9 year olds - more important to them than almost anything else (including school work, of course). They talked on the phone every night, plotting and planning the next episode. They had long discussions about the proper shade of Prismacolor pencil, and their biggest disagreement once occurred over whether to use Gray Number 2 or 3 for the Enterprise. (If my son reads this, he’ll probably correct me on the color numbers because I’m sure he remembers them 25 years later.)

The point is, they learned early on the benefits of creative collaboration, and in the process produced literally hundreds of drawing, stories, and recordings. 

Over the years of my writing online, I’ve made a lot of marvelous and inspiring friends - other writers, poets, photographers, and artists. We’ve communicated back and forth on our blogs, on social media, in e-mail exchanges, and once or twice on the telephone. 

Mostly though, these creative friendships are conducted from afar.  For a while now, I’ve been craving a creative friend in “real time,” the kind you can meet for coffee every so often to share ideas and cheer each other on. Although I have a lot of friends who are creative, we don’t connect on quite the same plane. We’ve met and forged our friendship over different areas - church or music groups or volunteer activities -  and it seems that’s where they’re destined to stay. 

Recently though, I made contact with a professional creative who is practically in my backyard. Christa is an astounding musician, who performs professionally throughout our area. She lives in the same town I do, and is a full time artist/entrepreneur, who makes her living through music. She has been so supportive of Life In General, and we decided to meet and see how we might help bolster each other in our respective creative pursuits. 

We met last week for our first creative confabulation, and it was fabulous. It was energizing and inspiring to meet someone like Christa, who is doing the hard work necessary to make a living pursuing her passion. It reminded me again how relatively easy I have it in comparison, but inspired me to work all the harder for that very reason.

lthough we’re not in exactly the same creative fields, I think our collaboration will be mutually beneficial anyway. Here’s why:

1. Mutual accountability: During our meeting, we brainstormed some things we each could do to promote our latest ventures - a CD for her, and Life In General for me. Then we each came up with a list of things to do before our next meeting. Having that accountability factor, knowing we’ll meet again and have to “report in” is a great motivator, especially for a couple of perfectionists like we are. 

2. Creative Energy: There’s something about verbalizing ideas that incites a different sort of creative thinking. As we talked, ideas seemed to appear in the classic light bulb manner. “What about creating a book club package for Life In General?” Christa suggested when I mentioned I’d been invited to a couple of local book clubs who were reading the book. “You could offer a complete package including copies of the book to local libraries, and I bet they’d love to feature a local author!” Ambitious and creative ideas come from brainstorming out loud.

3. Mutual Support: It’s wonderful to have the moral support that comes from someone who understands the creative process. But as we talked we realized there were concrete ways we could support each other as well. Writing reviews for each other’s books and CD’s, linking to each other in our social media accounts, being a source of connection in the real world as well as in our individual creative sphere.

“Every man works better when he has companions working in the same line, and yielding to the stimulus of suggestion, comparison, emulation.” Henry James praised the power of group activity long ago, and certainly some of the most creative work has been born out of artists circles like the Impressionist painters, the Bloomsbury group of writers. Although I’ve always considered myself as someone who works better alone, I’m seeing a great benefit to spending real time with someone who provides the stimulation of “suggestion, comparison, and emulation” - Creative Confabulation.

The Sunday Salon: Sunday Soothing

With snow falling steadily outside, I can tell the weather forecast is going to prove true. We are in for a good, solid winter storm today, and I’m so thankful neither of us have anywhere to go. 

I am happy to see the last of January, even though we’re beginning this new month with rough weather. January was a stinker of a month. I’ve been sick on and off for most of it, one of my dogs has been sick on and off for most of it, my mom is not doing well. The weather is cold and icy, it’s difficult to get my outside walks in and they often lift my spirits as well as get my blood pumping. 

Then there was the  Parenthood finale. <sob>

Lest you think it is always sweetness and light at chez Becca, do not be fooled. This past month has dipped into the dark side on more than one occasion. So I am in need of soothing. 

I take comfort on days like these in books, in music, in warm snuggles with my animals.  My friend Christa’s beautiful harp CD playing softly in the background. A hot drink, the warmth of the fireplace. A favorite blanket wrapped around my shoulders. The sharp, citrus scent of a Clementine as I separate it into sections, the sweet juicy flavor when I pop it into my mouth. 

Small things that soothe the spirit. I need them in spades today.

January was a good reading month. I finished eight books toward my goal of reading 100 books this year. I don’t normally set reading goals, but after keeping track of my reading for almost 20 years, I notice I always hover between 80-90 books per year. Why not make it 100? I thought this year. 

So I’m working on it. It’s funny how setting that intention has made me more mindful about my reading time. I’ve been more likely to carry a book from room to room, to make sure I have my book in the kitchen to read a few pages while I’m waiting for the oven to preheat or a pan to boil. I’ve been less “guilty” about sitting down in the middle of the day to read for half an hour. I have a purpose! A reading goal! So it’s all for the greater good. 

I’ve also been actively using Goodreads this year, although I’ve been a member for a long time I’ve not used it as a book tracking system. I am also a Goodreads Author, so Life In General has a page there too. 

The last book I read in January was Jo Jo Moyes Me Before You. Several friends told me what a wonderful story it was, and they were not wrong. But it was a tear-jerker - and I probably didn’t need to add any more emotion to an already somewhat emotional week for me. However, I loved it, and highly recommend it. 

I’m starting February reading with a completely different genre - a literary suspense novel by Sarah Waters, The Paying Guests. It won’t be soothing reading, necessarily, but I suspect it will keep me nicely entertained on this snowy winter day. 

Bed on the Couch

When I was sick and lay a-bed, I had two pillows at my head, 

And all my toys beside me lay, To keep me happy all the day. 

I posted this photo on Instagram the other day. It was captioned, “Cozy bed on the couch, day three." The hashtag -#sickgirl-further defined my condition. 

Today could be called cozy bed on the couch, day five. This most persistent of maladies has kept me literally on the couch since Saturday. More disturbing is that this current episode is the third bout of this mess I’ve endured since mid December.  The symptoms are old news - cough, body aches, sore throat, headache, congestion, earache, upset stomach. Apparently I’m not the only one whose been going through this revolving door of malaise. According to an informal poll among my Facebook friends, this is rampant.

I realized today how complacent about my good health I’ve become. I was a sickly kid, always on the verge of coming down with something or other, even if that something was mostly in my mother’s overactive and fearful imagination. At the slightest sniffle, she had the thermometer in my mouth and was on the phone to the doctor, scheduling an appointment. (To be fair, I was asthmatic, and had made enough middle of the night trips to the ER for breathing treatments to make any mother wary. And mine was especially so.) Then she’d make me a “cozy bed on the couch,” with my two pillows at my head, my favorite blanket, and a pile of books to keep me company. Just like the child in Stevenson’s famous poem, The Land of Counterpane.

I outgrew the asthma, but most of my adult life I’ve been prone to sinus infections and even a normal head cold invariably ends up as bronchitis or sometimes pneumonia. When I was actively working in schools and exposed to so many different germs, I was sick quite often during the winter. I became pretty adept at powering through it.  I recall once accompanying 15 students at a State vocal competition, then playing the second night of a three night run of 42nd Street all while running a temperature of 102 degrees. 

The show must go on, and all that.

But I’ve since learned the hard way that rest is a key component in treatment and recovery. So every time I got sick this past month, I have been diligent about stopping in my tracks, staying inside, drinking a lot of fluids - all the things my mother taught me to do when I was firmly entrenched in those long ago bed on the couch days.

Nevertheless, I keep getting sick, and this past week was a doozy. I can’t recall when I’ve felt so completely wiped out. I dragged myself downstairs in the morning only long enough to get some toast and hot water  - another mark of the seriousness of this episode? Neither coffee nor wine had any appeal whatsoever - and then I’d be back to my bed on the couch.

As with every gray cloud there are silver linings. Enforced stillness is sometimes good for creatives. In between my fever dreams I’ve actually had some good ideas for things to write about. I’ve read a lot, putting me closer to my goal of reading 100 books this year. My mom has gone full throttle into Mother mode, making dinners, dog sitting, offering mom-like advice in several phone calls during the day. She loves to be needed (and what mother doesn’t?) My dogs have enjoyed spending these sunny winter days romping around in her backyard instead of cooped up in the condo with me.

My poor husband though- not only has he been forced to listen to my coughing, snuffling, moaning and whining, he’s had to look at me in my saggy flannel pajamas, trailing my blanket around like Linus. 

And now is not the time to remind me that my word for 2015 was VIBRANT.

Normally I might think that these recurring episodes of sickness are about my body trying to tell me something. But I’ve been taking pretty good care of my body for some time. I eat well, I exercise moderately every day. I don’t overdo my activities anymore, and the things I choose to spend time on are just that - things I’ve chosen which makes a world of difference in how you perceive time spent doing them. My life is pretty stress free these days, which is saying a lot for a woman my age.

So I’m left pondering what the message is here - because I always believe there’s something to learn from every experience, that every small thread of the universe connects us to a larger story within our own lives or in the world around us.

I guess I’ll crawl under that blanket on my cozy bed on the couch and see if something comes to mind. 

If you have any ideas, let me know. Just don’t get too close - I might still be contagious.