Happiness Award

Thanks to Chez Aspie, I woke up to find that I had been given the "Happy 101" Award.  What a great way to start the day!  The rules are:
 

1. List 10 things that make you happy.

2. Try to do at least one thing on the list today.

3. List 10 bloggers who brighten your day.

4. Those of you to whom I give this award are to link back to my blog and perpetuate the happy with your own lists and recipients and whatnot.

And here are my 10 things:
1. Being with my husband and two sons
2. Getting to see my parents and sisters, brothers-in-law, sisters-in-law, nieces and nephews
3. Going someplace new
4. Writing something I'm proud of
5. Being astonished by something -- positively astonished I mean, not horrified
6. Helping someone to see themselves differently, which I suppose means teaching
7. Playing my violin
8. Laughing with friends
9. Going to the theatre
10. Being inspired and spreading the inspiration

And today I get to do numbers 2 and 3! Not bad.
But being a naturally subversive kind of a person, I'm not going to follow the rules to the letter. Rather than hand this over to 10 bloggers, I'm going to throw it open to all you wonderful bloggers who find me here or in your own comments boxes, or hovering incognito around the maps of your stat counters.  But to make up for it, I'm also going to do number 10 on the list and spread around this invitation to an event which, alas, I won't be able to attend, but which seems like it will be truly inspirational to anyone who can go along.  My friend, fellow writer and blogger, Kelly Swain, has passed along this:
     On Wednesday February 3rd the Whipple Museum will hold a special concert to celebrate the works of astronomer and musician William Herschel. It will feature performances of William Herschel's oboe concerto in Eb and two trio sonatas for harpsichord and strings, as well as an introductory talk from Herschel scholar Michael Hoskin and a reading from Kelley Swain's new novel-in-progress about Caroline Herschel.  All are welcome!

Whipple Museun, Wednesday February 3rd 2010, 6-9pm
Tickets are free but must be reserved via HPS reception (01223 330906).

http://www.hps.cam.ac.uk/whipple/events/ 


Enjoy your Sundays, everyone.

Magic or Realism

I’m a cheap drunk.  One glass of wine and my face becomes numb, my mind wanders.  This is especially true in an airplane, which is where I wrote this, hovering over the Atlantic halfway between London and New York.  In between films, I’ve been reading my book, Haruki Murakami’s Kafka on the Shore,  and I’ve become perplexed and fascinated.

It’s not quite kosher to write a review before you’ve finished a book, but this is not actually a review.  Rather, it is a musing about something I’ve wondered about for a long time: why am I so drawn to “magic realism” and why can’t I seem to write it myself?  Isabel Allende, Robertson Davies, Mikhail Bulgakov and now Murakami.  I love the way these authors carry me along without a hesitation into their worlds of inconsistencies and illusions.  But I am forced to ask the question, why can’t I do it, too?

I don’t think it is a problem of technique.  I would never compare myself with such great writers, but I can see the way they accomplish their task.  I can see  the stitches within the tapestries.  I don’t even think it is a matter of a lack of imagination, although it might be partially due to that.  No, I think it is more likely to have to do with some innate need in me to create reality. My fiction is always firmly set in a “real” location, with “real” buildings, “real” streets,  “plausible” meteorological phenomena.  The characters I create always find themselves placed in a specific time against, or sometimes reacting to, “real” historical events.  Laws of physics always hold true.  Cats do not talk. People do not disappear from one place only to inexplicably appear in another.  In other words, although I create new people and new lives, their world stubbornly remains our world.  Believe me, this is not consciously done by choice.  I just can’t seem to do otherwise, even though I may wish to.  And I believe this has something to say about me.

Alas, I’m not drunk enough to be able to figure out what that something is.  Is it fear? Anger? Maybe it’s that other part of me, the part that could have led me into business or law or some field centered firmly in reason.  I don’t know, but I’m willing to listen to suggestions.  And I’m thinking maybe sometime, it might be a good idea to hide myself away, not let anyone know, and try to suspend reality and write up some magic of my own.

And speaking of magic…my mother turns 80 today.  It doesn’t get more real than that.  Happy birthday, Mom!

What's the Point?

The New York Times ran two annoying articles yesterday.  The first, on the front page below the fold, was titled, "On Kindle's List, the Best Sellers  Don't Necessarily Need to Sell." It seems one way publishers are dealing with the panic about ebook pricing is to give away books -- yes, for free -- as a way to introduce (read entice) readers to the works of lesser known authors.  It has occasionally worked. By giving books away, a buzz is created which makes readers more comfortable about spending money on otherwise unknown authors. New sales are generated, new readers amassed.  Not a bad idea if it works. But for most writers, that's a big "if".

The second, even more annoying article (at least to me) was "Celebrities Sell Books in Britain (Talent is Optional)."  All of us who live here and have walked anywhere near a bookstore lately -- or even watched a bus drive past -- knows that the British publishing industry has been having a love affair with celebrity memoirs.  As Sarah Lyall wrote in her article,
         Unlike such (bestseller) lists in the United States, which tend to be mixed bags heavy on political polemic, popular sociology and inspirational memoir, the British lists are dominated by one kind of book alone, the celebrity autobiography.

Okay, some are interesting.  Some have even been written by people who have lived more than 25 years and have experienced more than just the Big Brother house.  And yes, these books, even the awful ones, have sold in the 100,000's.  So whose fault is it? The question, though, isn't really whose fault it is.  After all, publishing is a business and it is in the nature of businesses to make money where they can.  But the question, perhaps, is what are they doing with this money?  As Philip Stone, the charts editor of The Bookseller, is quoted as saying,

     I can't blame them for wanting to sign up celebrities to sell books or blame retailers for stocking them...Publishers always say that the success of a celebrity memoir will bankroll books by debut authors. Whether that  is true, I don't know, but that's what they say.


Ugh.  So I ask, what's the point?
This morning I sent Number 2 Son back to University after his 6-week Christmas break.  To my surprise, waving goodbye was just as difficult this time as it was the first.  So I went up to my room, turned out the lights, got back into bed and had a good old-fashioned weep.  But then I was nagged by this short story character whose been living in my head for the past few weeks, and I got up and began to finally write his story.  Two hours later, I left my room, had some lunch and moved on, feeling better, alive, and purposeful.  My conclusion for the day, then?  Writing...it may not be a living, but it's still a life.

Short Circuit: A Personal Response

    I figured it out.  It’s been over five years since I wrote a short story.  In the meantime, I’ve written countless poems, two novels, two plays and journalism galore, but no stories.  Very strange.  And to be honest, although I have always loved both reading and writing short stories, I haven’t really missed working in this genre much at all – until now.

    Salt Publications has brought out a truly wonderful textbook (of sorts) called “Short Circuit.”  It is edited by award-winning short story specialist, Vanessa Gebbie, and contains articles on various aspects of the craft by such other noted short story writers as Tania Hershman, Alex Keegan, Elizabeth Baines, Sarah Salway, Clare Wigfall and others.  Chapters cover all the topics a short story writer could ever need to consider, from beginnings to middles to ends, from character to theme to place.  I read it from cover to cover and it’s thrown a spanner into my writing objectives.

     I’m a planner.  I like to be working on a project at all times and I like to have a series of projects lined up waiting their turn to be tackled.  But then I read “Short Circuit” and Uncle Isaac annoyingly came back into my life.  Let me explain…. my first novel, “Tangled Roots,” was originally constructed out of a series of short stories which then became chapters.  But there were many of them and when I was putting the final manuscript together, some didn’t make the cut.  One of those that didn’t, unfortunately, was about one of my most favourite of all the characters I’ve ever created, Uncle Isaac.  He just didn’t fit into the book so I put him and his story away into a drawer.  But now he’s come back to life, appearing in my dreams, filling my head with his voice.  I now know that I have to put all my plans on hold and finally write his story.  Although I don’t quite know what it is yet, I know I have to jump into the void, just as the “Short Circuit” contributors have taught me to, and let him have his say.  I’m both excited and scared and I blame it on Salt’s new Guide to the Short Story. So I suppose it means that “Short Circuit” is inspirational, and as far as I’m concerned, there’s no better recommendation than that.

     So if you are either a reader or writer, or both, of short stories, do buy this book.  And if you buy it from Salt here now, you'll get 20% off. What are you waiting for?

Blog Borrowing

So we've gone from the chair lift to the dentist's chair.  Number 2 Son's wisdom teeth extraction is all over  but for the ice packs and the tv watching.  And tomorrow, I go for a scan of my very dodgy shoulder which has been troubling me since August.

I'm really just popping by to say "hi," embarrass myself with this photo

and guide you over to Tania Hershman's blog which today has a very handy and exhaustive-looking listing of UK and Ireland literary magazines.  Thanks, Tania.....

The Tyranny of the Should

We've been taking our family ski trips most every year for the past sixteen winters.  I do love being in the mountains. I love the air, the scenery, the food, the wine.  Probably what I like the least, though, is the skiing.  I came to it quite late.  The first time I ever tried it I was a few months shy of my 40th birthday, with two little kids and lots of reasons to be risk averse.  My husband took to it immediately, as did the kids, but for me it was mixed...sometimes I would love it and be totally exhilerated, other times I'd be scared to death.  But for a long time I really struggled over those mornings when I'd wake up and think, no, not today.  I'm taking the day off.  For many seasons, on such mornings I'd feel embarrassed and guilty.  I'd say to myself, "Come on, Sue, you really should go out and ski.  You should." Then, usually I would go out and, usually, it would be fine.  I often even ended up happy that I forced myself to do it.  But not always.

I do believe it can be important to force yourself to do something you don't want to do. If it is fear or insecurity that is stopping you, it can be an important learning opportunity to challenge yourself.  But as I get older I have learned to try to determine why I might be forcing myself to do something that I'm uncomfortable with, and if the reason is because I think I "should" do it, then I've started to allow myself to look that "should" in the eye and say "f* off ."  This morning I thought I "should" go skiing despite being tired and achey, and I didn't.  I didn't even feel guilty about it.  Instead, I'm giving my body a break and am sitting here thinking about all the shoulds in my life that I have turned my back on.  And I'm realising that many of those decisions not to do something I "should" have done, have gone on to become some of the most positive and important decisions of my life.

* Not doing the job I should do, and daring to be a writer instead.

* Not organizing my first novel, "Tangled Roots", as it should have been but going with an unusual structure.  And the same can be said of daring to insist that "Dreams of May" is not a poetry collection but, rather, a play. In other words, daring to write what I want, how I want, regardless.

* Parenting decisions like not sending my kid to the school some said he "should" go to but daring to  try something different.  Daring to help my son take on a more unusual educational choice rather than the one some might say he "should" have taken.

* And for me, the most important of all, daring not to marry someone from my own faith  but instead, marrying who I "shouldn't" and finding  a way to make it work.

Writing all these, I found that the flip side of "should" has often been "dare." Turning my back on what I should have done has often meant daring to do something else.  I have certainly been called stubborn in my life, but I would now like to think that sometimes that stubbornness has really been courage. 

So, am I really saying that staying in and not skiing today has been the courageous thing to do?  Well, even I won't go so far as that.  But it has allowed me to take this morning to think about all the times I haven't done what I "should" have done, and to think that as I face decisions that I know are coming due, I can continue to gather up my courage as I have in the past and dare not to do what I should.

Ski week

Just a quickie to say hi and that you won't be hearing much from me this week because I'm here:

I usually only ski in the mornings and then after a wonderful lunch come back to the chalet and veg out. I do have plans to do other writerly things while the rest of the family is having their afternoon ski, but just in case I get lazy, which wouldn't surprise me, I'll sign off until next week.  A bientot...

Snow Days

My last post, here, was about resolving not to resolve (among other things).  But as I was preparing to write this post, I looked back to see what I was thinking about around this time last year.  This is what I found, a list of New Years Resolutions for 2009:

1. To speak what I mean and write what I feel

2. To battle the forces of evil (intolerance, prejudice), one by one, as they rear their ugly faces in my life

3. To continue to strive for faith

4. To walk the fine line between demanding too much and demanding not enough of myself and those I love

5. To write because I love and need to, despite the vagaries of the marketplace.

Hmm.  Interesting.  So how did I do? Pretty well in a sort of impossible-to-prove kind of way.  Yep, I did all 5 of those things, or at least I remember trying to.  But what I'm finding even more interesting is that these would still be my list of resolutions this year, if I hadn't resolved not to resolve. The only difference is that to number 3 I would add ..and courage... (thanks for reminding me of that, JJ).

I'm now wondering, though, if perhaps these ideas have moved out of the sphere of resolution, then, and into the sphere of principle.  Life principle. Those things we always strive for, inevitably fall short of, but ultimately believe in.  An interesting thought on this day when the entire  world seems to be asleep under a blanket of snow. Maybe I should pretend that every day is a snow day.

And now to bring the metaphorical back down to earth, I'll mention that the next time you hear from me I'll be hurtling down the Alps on skis ( well, maybe not literally, but...oh, you know what I mean).  Wish us luck.

To get us in the mood, here's something fantastic I found on YouTube.  Thanks BFIFilms:

To Resolve or Not To Resolve

I've been thinking quite a lot about what to write in this, my first post of the decade.  I tend not to use the arrival of a new year for resolutions.   Rather, it offers me a chance to think about what is working in my life and what  isnt.  Like all of us, my life is a series of juggling acts and every year seems to bring a new set of circumstances within which all this juggling needs to take place.  Often, these circumstances are dictated by the changing needs of children.  Sometimes health struggles come into play.  This year finds me with more time for myself than ever, and surprisingly, that also raises new questions namely, how to fill that time, how productive do I want to be, how much of that time do I want to devote to work, and, as I get older, how much "downtime" do I really need?

One of the variables in all this now more and more seems to be the internet.  As we all know, we could spend 25 hours a day on the net between our blogs, facebook, twitter, LinkedIn, Red Room etc etc. For those of us with books to sell, much of this is a necessity. But lots of it is fun as well, and I know that one of the great pleasures of the last year has for me been the friendships and sense of community I have developed via this metal box that's sitting on my lap even now.  Two of my friends, Tania and Elizabeth, have talked on their recent blogposts quite convincingly about limiting their internet time. They have each decided that the internet needs to be off limits for a major part of each day so they can do what they need to do most, write.  I have tried to do the same thing. I do a quick check of my emails and blogs over breakfast, plug in a twitter/facebook status, and then try to get on with my life. Sometimes this works, and I plan to continue to try. But there are many times when this doesn't work and my resolve falls away.  Tania and Elizabeth's blogs have led me to think about why that happens.  What I've discovered is I'm not that much of grown-up, after all.

When I go onto Twitter and see conversations taking place between people I know, when I see a list of status comments on facebook that I've missed, when I see 27 comments that others have posted even before I've gotten a chance to read a friend's blog, I feel catapulted back into my insecure adolescent self.  The party is going on and I missed it.  Or even worse, I wasn't invited.  That  frightened part of me still lingers that tells me if I don't remind people that I exist, then I'll be forgotten.  Some might argue that this is why I write in the first place.  But I know that the time I spend on the internet decreases my sense of isolation, while admittedly nurturing the immutable teenager in me.  So what's the answer?

Baby steps, one step in front of the other, keep on keeping on, deep breaths, trust and faith.  Maybe that's a new year's resolution, after all.

thanks to xbox.com for the photo