Seven Lessons from a Visiting Writer

Last night (Wednesday night--as the light palpably returns, it's easy to burn the candle at both ends), Boise based fiction writer Alan Heathcock gave a reading and informal talk at the college. It was the easy informality of a small town's dedicated community of writers who all know each other; also the special intimacy of a small audience. The roads, rain upon snow upon ice, prohibited many from venturing out. 

From Alan's website. He doesn't really look like this at all. He has much more beard, but also a bigger, more expressive mouth. Different hat and glasses too. He looks much younger than this photo.

From finding out about the event to showing up to the event itself to the bar afterward to going home, working late, and digesting, I felt enriched. Aside from Alan's engaging candor, immediate sincerity, unabashed passion, which produced an easy familiarity of conversation despite the fact that I believe none of us, Alan included, are particularly gregarious people...aside from feeling like we'd been gifted a new friend, I felt I'd gained some important lessons.

Lesson (1): Pay attention to news sources in the local community. I heard about Alan's visit from my friend Lynn in Anchorage, and that's not the first time she's tipped me off to a Homer event. Because I'm the round-up coordinator for the literary blog 49 Writers, I tend to presume, nay, expect that people will feed me any literary happenings in town to put in the round-up. Turns out many people in town consider 49 Writers a source for statewide rather than local literary information. "Well, it's advertised on the radio, it's in the newspaper, there are flyers up at the Library," they say. I don't listen to the radio or read the newspaper; some days I don't make it out of the cabin and its immediate surroundings. I'm woefully disconnected to local newsfeeds, and I should have my feelers out for events to post, rather than assuming I'm at the center of the web and will be fed announcements, neatly cocooned like flies. Speaking of the web, the local newspapers are well represented online, so there's really no excuse. A new habit for me: pay more attention to what my friends are doing. So, be where you are, and pay attention.

But, lesson (2), be willing to expand from your "local" zone. Alan was raised in urban South Chicago, but he says that during his MFA, he received consistent feedback that his stories set there seemed inauthentic, largely because of reader bias insisting that he was not from that demographic. "Write what you know," they would always say. Alan performed his marvelous full-body face-scrunched-open shrug--well, it is what I know... But, he listened, and began setting stories in rural Indiana, where his mom was raised, and things began to fall into place in terms of audience response.

But (3) insist on your own sense of what is right--he gave some examples of instances in which he would not compromise, particularly in the context of a movie adaptation of a story, and also underscored the importance of knowing who you are, including your family of origin (he read some stunning excerpts from the journal of his great-great-great-great-great grandfather); of getting to know the pulse of your own creativity, the way things come out of your mouth.

Therefore, (4) be proud of what you send out into the world! He said it was easy, during his MFA,  to feel like he was in a race, with huge pressure to rack up publications. So, he sent something off, and the thing got accepted, but when it came to galleys he was horrified. He had no pride in the story whatsoever, didn't want anyone to see it ever, is still ashamed of it, says "don't read this." Thereafter, he published just five more stories over the next dozen years. And now his collection Volt is out (and has won a Whiting award, which is no small thing, but which he barely mentioned). If he's going to publish a story, he wants to be so excited about it that he'll be standing up (again, with one of his wonderful physical postures) and proclaiming, "You gotta read this story!"

To get to that point, (5) when he's starting work on a story he tries to get all the words down asap, all the bare bones structure and start-to-finish through-line, and then he goes back and does the hard work on it so that every single sentence feels "correct." He doesn't analyze in great detail this sense of correctness; he keeps going back to instinct, which is also belief in and respect for oneself, which is about developing the most finely tuned ear, and a gut response to your own voice. 

At the bar, we talked with more hilarity and less restraint about his writing habits and our own, and one additional message that struck me (6) was the value of getting into the piece of writing (no matter the genre) with your whole self. Full body, more than chewing a pen or scratching a hole in your head. As I've suggested a few times, one of the most impressive things about Alan is his full-bodied self, especially when he talks; even more especially when he reads. He moves with the narrative as if miming a map of the story. When he reads, it sounds like he's singing the Blues--his voice so melodic, the cadences of his phrases so much the theme and variation of a Blues riff--bo daa daa daa-bo daa daa -- bo daa daa daa-bo daa daa -- -- -- bo daa daa daa daa dabodabodaboda bo daa daa. 
Yes, he said in explicit words that we're all "eggheads" (guilty giggles) but that we need to get into it in a more felt way. But the fact that he not only said it but did it was the amazing thing.

One final, wonderful lesson, (7), and this is about parenting, but is also hugely inspirational to anyone, parent or not. Alan shared that he has a sixteen-year-old son who is an extremely talented musician--jazz piano and singing, already somewhat in demand, likely to be competed for by the top music conservatories rather than the other way round. Family members are asking what his "fallback" career plan is, because music should just be a hobby, of course. Alan told (miming with his body, of course) of his absolute insistence that there is no fallback plan. If his son wants to be a musician, that's what he is aiming at, full body, full mind, full spirit, and that is what he is going to believe in, and that is what he is going to do. What are you talking about, "fallback plan?" He is, and is going to be, a musician.
I restrain myself from further comment, and offer, simply, a standing ovation.

Candles, Chanukah, Turning the Gaze Toward

It was the first day of Chanukah when I decided to go wrestle with a poem instead of getting my blog post up. Actually, by then it was the second day, courtesy of our being so far to the left of whence time is measured. (Day teeters into day.) It's still the second day under my fingers here and now, but in Israel they're well into the third. (Day unto day uttereth...what kind of speech?)

What I loved most about Chanukah as a kid was the candle-lighting -- how the candle for each of the eight days was on the stand, even if it would remain unlit till the last day, how the candles for the earliest days burned farther down, with blacker wicks, than the pristine latecomers...best of all, though, was the shamash: the ninth candle without which none of the candles would be alight; the candle that wasn't even counted, that didn't have its day, but that you could hold alight in your hand, and pass on light to others. Shamash is server, but to me, shamash was the one who got to work all the magic. I wanted to be that one! (Day unto day, light unto light.)

from: http://socialtimes.com/

Back in England, I was familiar with Chanukah, Christmas, Diwali, Eid-ul-Fitr (that one was puzzling to me, because my Arabic-speaking Israeli grandmother calls every holiday "Eid," including those at the opposite end of the year). From my reading of novels set in Roman times, such as Rosemary Sutcliffe's Eagle of the Ninth, I knew then about the pagan Yule festival too. I loved the synergy between all these religions, that each held a festival of lights around the same time each year, although it did not yet occur to me to wonder why places like India, with far less dark, needed a festival of lights, or whether the southern hemisphere needed to have these in June. (The candle passes from faith to faith to faith.)

And yes, all these faiths, and secular non-faiths too, use candles not only as naked, direct light in darkness, but also as a drawing-in of energy and attention; the visual equivalent of a ringing bell.

I now don't know why it made me so happy, as a little kid, to feel assured that all religions were ultimately the same act of praise to the same God. I don't know why, rather than studying the matter deeply and seeking how to bring people back together, I chose instead to turn my face away when I began to learn of all the divisions among believers, among humans. So many cherished beliefs are shattered in the teens.

The tailspin from which I'm now emerging is the most malignant phase in an attitude of steadfast turning away, toward passage into a different plane of existence entirely. As I emerge, dodging shame; as I accept the various crutches of lifestyle, medication, friendships, foods, upon which I have to lean, I begin to gaze into candlelight, trataka meditation. Gazing into the light, feeling the air around me fill with sound beyond my ears' own ringing, I think of my family in Israel, where it is tomorrow; of who I was yesterday, of how candles and festivals and hand-holding across race and creed and space show those subtle connections, those ulterior harmonies, that might just win out over being separate, heads turned away.

Gratitude, Story, More on the White Flag

I'm not grateful to be alive. But:
- there are numerous people for whose existence I am boundlessly grateful
- and I am grateful for all the experiences I have embodied and absorbed through my senses
- and for the stories these represent.

I'm not grateful for the unprecedented peacefulness of our era, which is apparently the case despite endless war. I believe in it, but have no way to understand it. But:
- I am grateful for the safety of my family in the Middle East
- and for the love, grace, peace, generosity so palpable in my circles of friends
- and all the stories this brings.

I'm not grateful that my scale's battery died the very day I went to give an honest weight. I'm further not grateful for the anxiety provoked by the fact that the scale and I had been quite consistent, after wild initial fluctuation; and that now, with a new battery, it's showing wild fluctuations again. But:
- I am grateful to be shown that wild fluctuations may, astonishingly, not be all me
- and I am grateful for the reminder that technology isn't always home base
- most of all, I am grateful for the story it offers.

I'm not grateful that I have to have vital signs tracked, and to have rebelled against this, and to have been out of integrity. But:
- I'm grateful that I couldn't stay out of integrity
- and I'm grateful for having the experience of returning to integrity, that waving my white flag felt like such a relief, as it set the scene for beginning to project what might come next, rather than keeping things stuck
- and I'm grateful for the story to be told here.

I'm grateful for hearts, their hugeness, their power of connecting, like the earth with its mats of roots and mycelia.

I am grateful for the brain, with its firing and subliming, more powerful than a WiFi hub.

source: http://fearofwriting.com/brain-food-for-writers.htm

And oh yes, I am grateful for guts, seat of our instincts, absorption, seed-bed of neurotransmitters that regulate our feelings, tidal in ulterior motion like the ocean, like the hidden side of the moon.

http://www.fpnotebook.com/gi/Anatomy/SmlBwlAntmy.htm

And I'm thankful for all the ways these organs connect; all the stories for which they are lenses.

Thank you.

Third Person Post--Bee Story HAWMC

She wakes from a dream of falling, organ failure. The correspondences between numbers and foods are warping and winding, and the "or else" doctor visit is drawing closer. "Should I stay or should I go" insistent, through her head. Poems, growing things, intimate glances, are bringing tears to her eyes far more often than wontedly. Loved ones are leaving town and she's running out of manic, even boosted by contraband caffeine. She can't crash yet!


Whoa! Wake up! It's a beautiful, sunny day! The sun is shining, the ground, tired from its long snowload, greener every day.


Today's prompt: write about a memory from the third person perspective. Don't use "I" unless you include dialogue.


Ela got back to the farm community late Sunday afternoon, after visiting with friends, helping out on their farm. The "lead woman" on the farm, with whom she had an uneasy relationship, came to meet her, somewhat friendly, and told her there had been a lot of bees around that day.


Next morning after the rain, she was out on her walk around the farm with wheelbarrow and fruit-picking equipment, harvesting fruit, seeing which trees' crops were maturing, checking up on that ripening jackfruit. When she came back to the homestead area, barrow loaded with avocados and two racks of bananas, the woman ran to meet her. Many bees were buzzing around, heading toward the office and packing shed which doubled as her bedroom.


The two women stood, looking up into the air, gradually joined by several other community members. There was a throaty hum, like voices in an auditorium before a grand entrance. The whole sky darkened briefly--an airborne life form composed of thousands of four-winged beings, one mind, one intention. The colony landed on the wall of the office, her bedroom, and milled around, quieting, gentle.

She ran over to the next-door farm, where a self-styled "bee rustler" and carpenter was staying, and invited him to join the party. A small crowd had gathered at a respectful distance from the colony on the wall. There were "wows," oohs and aahs. One skeptical voice worrying about stings and allergic reactions. One puzzled voice, obstreperous from the break in routine, "Why are they here?" A confident response, "I guess Ela called them in." Ela and the bee rustler showed the crowd how calm and docile the colony was, how you could put your hand into their midst and have their velvet legs crawl over you. Some community members hung back, others were delighted to join in. The property owner noticed scout bees checking out some cracked timbers, working their way into the building; expressed concern. Bee rustler got up on the ladder with a Sawzall--a surprisingly common beekeeping tool--and opened up the timbers so that there was no hidden spot for them to build into.


Ela brought a hive box and set it beside the colony, filled with frames redolent of old honey. After clearing a spot for the hive to rest, out by the farm pond, she spent most of the day hanging out with the colony, singing to them, playing her flute to them.

this was in AZ, but a similar image

When the sun began to set, still in shorts and flip flops, she took a soft brush and dustpan, and gently brushed the bees down toward the prepared box. She aimed for the center of the clump, where the queen would be, and when that part of the colony had dropped into the box, the rest followed, like a silk scarf. As darkness fell, she gently covered the box and, with the help of a strong man with some bee experience, carried the hive out to their new location. Next morning, she woke to the sound of some bees straggling outside on her wall. But out by the pond, the hive was full of bees, entering and exiting, getting to know their new territory.


Over the months that followed, Ela visited with her bees often, but didn't make huge efforts to increase their colony, although theirs was a small group and she had heard that despite the area being full of fruit farms, there wasn't enough nectar and pollen at any given time to sustain a large colony. She felt some guilt. Just as people suffered from deficiencies in this hugely abundant climate and didn't address them because of their dogma about eating only from the land, so she was hesitant to interfere with the bees' needs. It was "natural" to them to forage from the surrounding trees and vines, not to be fed white sugar. She never took any of their honey. Still, the guilt persisted. But were they really "her" bees? She hadn't even been home when they first scouted the place out. Yes, they came to her bedroom in swarm, but again, she was out harvesting fruit when they first started to arrive. And of course, it wasn't "her" bedroom at all--just a bed in the corner of an office where she shook down at nights, a person with very few needs or demands. Was "letting nature take its course" a form of cruelty, both to the bees and to her own body?