I've had a book coming up from within me for a while now. Like someone pressing persistently at the door, whispering, to come in.
To have the shades pulled, the curtains pushed aside, the windows thrown open.
To tell the truth, there are always stories and TV shows and plays, complete with actors and blocking and lines, generating in my subterranean mind.
Often, as I fall asleep, there is some sort of story emerging. And sometimes, I will turn toward it, and watch and listen for a while.
It's always visual. Like little TV shows, or a vignette that you catch if you're standing in your neighborhood as a kid, and you're peeking around the corner, listening to an interchange.
Several years ago, I began to write down small snippets of short stories. The computer died, of course, but the stories and characters remained with me.
Recently, I began noticing an appetite to write more than the small pieces of life and nature and days passing by, and our lives.
And so ,slowly, almost imperceptibly, one of the stories began rising up to the surface-a story I enjoyed thinking about.
Before I knew it? It began growing on it's own ,inside of me, becoming more complex. Additional characters in the family; ages and past circumstances; a more detailed image, inside and out, of the house . It's location. The town, the stores, and it's inhabitants.
Certainly, there were names and ages and physical characteristics and interchanges. Before you know it, they were events in the past and the present, and tendrils streaming out in several directions into the future, until there developed one central trunk, and then many small branches, all on their own, just wandering along ,growing.
I was taken aback, although I know this does happen in many many different ways depending on the individual.
I know that children often create fantasy worlds, with great specificity. Adults conceive of written work , employing a broad range of approaches.
I began to try to catch up. To write down some of the things that were going on.
I felt as if I had a yard that I had been caring for for a long long time, that was suddenly maturing : reproducing, expanding, blossoming - what have you.
I suddenly remembered the desk of somebody I knew years ago, a large wooden broad desk, with the most creative elaborate score of small intricate frames with beautiful drawings and photographs and objects upon the desk and on the wall behind it.
I actually wrote to the person, after locating them, explaining that I suddenly discovered I was writing a novel, in which their desk was the desk of the protagonist, and did they have any photographs remaining?! What a funny thing!
After all these years, they replied! And said that they did recall that beautiful desk and all of its accoutrements, but had no photograph. Proffered a photograph of their present-day desk, singular in it's purity, but completely different.
So I thanked them; realizing that my memory of the desk would serve me just fine for this character and her study, as she went about her writing.
In the parking lot one day, I saw a young man walking by. He was tall, not spare, but no bulging muscles either. Straight black hair with a sheen. A thoughtful, tentative and yet assertive walk. Backpack, black pants and sneakers, grey T-shirt.
God ! I realized , he looked like one of the characters. And I thought to myself, "Is this how it works?! This is nuts! " But I guess this is how it unfolds sometimes,eh?
Your self , your mind has this finger on the pulse of the story. The story line. Individual characters. And how they unfold into what they've experienced previously and who they are today. And you begin to see places in the outside world that are wonderful models! Wow.
I went over to visit some dear friends, who recently experienced a death in the family. I brought them homeopathic remedies for the grief and shock, and some sedating herbs. They had to leave to go to an appointment, but bid me walk around and see their new home.
I declined, knowing how little energy I usually have, and remained at the kitchen table, slowly pressing the herbal mixture into empty capsules.
It was then that I caught sight of the kitchen door, leading to the side porch. There was this intricate lace curtain, a porcelain doorknob with flowers painted on it, and some sort of brass key hanging from the doorknob." Lovely! "I thought.
Finishing up with my herb work, I glanced around the kitchen. I suddenly realized it was a wonderful old house with an interesting layout.
I stood, overtaken by something, and slowly walked through the downstairs, and then up the elegant staircase to the rooms on the second floor.
Then, I walked around the out doors, peering at the neighbor's yard with the conjoined driveway, the front gate and the town stores directly behind it. Yet another grand old maple in the backyard, with one Adirondack chair, facing the towering mountain behind.
I'm not used to this. Not at all, this kind of process. This compelling focus that pops up whenever anything that pertains to a story line appears, wherever I go.
But there it was. Relating to the layout of the house, of course to be enhanced in some deliciously ridiculous manner.
I found myself realizing that what I was writing went against many very commonsense rules, but I still kept on following the river. I found that I didn't care. That I was doing it because I enjoyed it, and it seemed to be coming along nicely all on its own, thank you very much.
I mean, you are well advised to write about areas on the earth that you are very similar with. With ethnicity you have lived or are very familiar with. And so many other elements.
And yet, I found that I just didn't care. And that just didn't seem to be happening. Here we were, all of these characters and myself, engaged. I was enjoying it.
Of course, then, some character involved with this brought up the idea that there needed to be conflict. Problematic aspects. Challenges. Because life consists of those very things. All of those factors are as involved with the story as breathing. As oxygen. As the earth.
I nodded my head in assent, and watched, fascinated, as different storylines along this tree with branches blossomed here and there.
As if you're moving down a river, and it veers off to the left for a while, and then right, and then along it goes until at another point ,it picks up the story line of those prior places.
Almost as if there is some sort of vine that intertwines all of them together, weaving and connecting.
So, I'm surprised. I have this lifestyle of rest rest resting, I am blessed to live quietly with four-footed creatures in the wild wild woods . A benevolent husband and on-their-own , stable children . And a handful of terribly caring devoted and stimulating friends.
I've had a complex , eventful life full of grave challenges and rich loveliness.
Like many of us, I have learned over the years to keep an eye out for where the river is heading, and adapt myself. Move along with it as gracefully as I am able.
So now, here I am, with all of these individuals, who have ideas on pasts and challenges and yearnings and interactions and conversations.
Sometimes it's hard to close the door. But I know it's like that for many, no matter the reason they are creating. Discipline, sustainable habits, and relationship development with what one is involved in is something that grows; like a muscle. A habit. An agreement. A learning curve.
But now, in this climate, as we all slowly turn toward August - unfolding into it's middle, and then yet another end, here I am with so much company and such ruckus I hardly know what to do with it.
I imagine this is the way of it. So many different ways of having a life.
The bear that stopped on the path and slept soundly, only to wake hours before the pup and I walked by ,the other day. The ferns and undergrowth crushed into a large , comfortable-looking circle.
The large, towering old Maple by the back of our house, that has raised countless chipmunks and White Faced Wasps; has sheltered too many family gatherings to count. Innumerable quiet times of grief or consolation or delight or passion. That must be cut down this fall.
The wise old Toad that knows me so well- greeting me tentatively each spring; and then with confident familiarity all summer long.
All these lives, in and outside of us, on all these perfectly good days.
To have the shades pulled, the curtains pushed aside, the windows thrown open.
To tell the truth, there are always stories and TV shows and plays, complete with actors and blocking and lines, generating in my subterranean mind.
Often, as I fall asleep, there is some sort of story emerging. And sometimes, I will turn toward it, and watch and listen for a while.
It's always visual. Like little TV shows, or a vignette that you catch if you're standing in your neighborhood as a kid, and you're peeking around the corner, listening to an interchange.
Several years ago, I began to write down small snippets of short stories. The computer died, of course, but the stories and characters remained with me.
Recently, I began noticing an appetite to write more than the small pieces of life and nature and days passing by, and our lives.
And so ,slowly, almost imperceptibly, one of the stories began rising up to the surface-a story I enjoyed thinking about.
Before I knew it? It began growing on it's own ,inside of me, becoming more complex. Additional characters in the family; ages and past circumstances; a more detailed image, inside and out, of the house . It's location. The town, the stores, and it's inhabitants.
Certainly, there were names and ages and physical characteristics and interchanges. Before you know it, they were events in the past and the present, and tendrils streaming out in several directions into the future, until there developed one central trunk, and then many small branches, all on their own, just wandering along ,growing.
I was taken aback, although I know this does happen in many many different ways depending on the individual.
I know that children often create fantasy worlds, with great specificity. Adults conceive of written work , employing a broad range of approaches.
I began to try to catch up. To write down some of the things that were going on.
I felt as if I had a yard that I had been caring for for a long long time, that was suddenly maturing : reproducing, expanding, blossoming - what have you.
I suddenly remembered the desk of somebody I knew years ago, a large wooden broad desk, with the most creative elaborate score of small intricate frames with beautiful drawings and photographs and objects upon the desk and on the wall behind it.
I actually wrote to the person, after locating them, explaining that I suddenly discovered I was writing a novel, in which their desk was the desk of the protagonist, and did they have any photographs remaining?! What a funny thing!
After all these years, they replied! And said that they did recall that beautiful desk and all of its accoutrements, but had no photograph. Proffered a photograph of their present-day desk, singular in it's purity, but completely different.
So I thanked them; realizing that my memory of the desk would serve me just fine for this character and her study, as she went about her writing.
In the parking lot one day, I saw a young man walking by. He was tall, not spare, but no bulging muscles either. Straight black hair with a sheen. A thoughtful, tentative and yet assertive walk. Backpack, black pants and sneakers, grey T-shirt.
God ! I realized , he looked like one of the characters. And I thought to myself, "Is this how it works?! This is nuts! " But I guess this is how it unfolds sometimes,eh?
Your self , your mind has this finger on the pulse of the story. The story line. Individual characters. And how they unfold into what they've experienced previously and who they are today. And you begin to see places in the outside world that are wonderful models! Wow.
I went over to visit some dear friends, who recently experienced a death in the family. I brought them homeopathic remedies for the grief and shock, and some sedating herbs. They had to leave to go to an appointment, but bid me walk around and see their new home.
I declined, knowing how little energy I usually have, and remained at the kitchen table, slowly pressing the herbal mixture into empty capsules.
It was then that I caught sight of the kitchen door, leading to the side porch. There was this intricate lace curtain, a porcelain doorknob with flowers painted on it, and some sort of brass key hanging from the doorknob." Lovely! "I thought.
Finishing up with my herb work, I glanced around the kitchen. I suddenly realized it was a wonderful old house with an interesting layout.
I stood, overtaken by something, and slowly walked through the downstairs, and then up the elegant staircase to the rooms on the second floor.
Then, I walked around the out doors, peering at the neighbor's yard with the conjoined driveway, the front gate and the town stores directly behind it. Yet another grand old maple in the backyard, with one Adirondack chair, facing the towering mountain behind.
I'm not used to this. Not at all, this kind of process. This compelling focus that pops up whenever anything that pertains to a story line appears, wherever I go.
But there it was. Relating to the layout of the house, of course to be enhanced in some deliciously ridiculous manner.
I found myself realizing that what I was writing went against many very commonsense rules, but I still kept on following the river. I found that I didn't care. That I was doing it because I enjoyed it, and it seemed to be coming along nicely all on its own, thank you very much.
I mean, you are well advised to write about areas on the earth that you are very similar with. With ethnicity you have lived or are very familiar with. And so many other elements.
And yet, I found that I just didn't care. And that just didn't seem to be happening. Here we were, all of these characters and myself, engaged. I was enjoying it.
Of course, then, some character involved with this brought up the idea that there needed to be conflict. Problematic aspects. Challenges. Because life consists of those very things. All of those factors are as involved with the story as breathing. As oxygen. As the earth.
I nodded my head in assent, and watched, fascinated, as different storylines along this tree with branches blossomed here and there.
As if you're moving down a river, and it veers off to the left for a while, and then right, and then along it goes until at another point ,it picks up the story line of those prior places.
Almost as if there is some sort of vine that intertwines all of them together, weaving and connecting.
So, I'm surprised. I have this lifestyle of rest rest resting, I am blessed to live quietly with four-footed creatures in the wild wild woods . A benevolent husband and on-their-own , stable children . And a handful of terribly caring devoted and stimulating friends.
I've had a complex , eventful life full of grave challenges and rich loveliness.
Like many of us, I have learned over the years to keep an eye out for where the river is heading, and adapt myself. Move along with it as gracefully as I am able.
So now, here I am, with all of these individuals, who have ideas on pasts and challenges and yearnings and interactions and conversations.
Sometimes it's hard to close the door. But I know it's like that for many, no matter the reason they are creating. Discipline, sustainable habits, and relationship development with what one is involved in is something that grows; like a muscle. A habit. An agreement. A learning curve.
But now, in this climate, as we all slowly turn toward August - unfolding into it's middle, and then yet another end, here I am with so much company and such ruckus I hardly know what to do with it.
I imagine this is the way of it. So many different ways of having a life.
The bear that stopped on the path and slept soundly, only to wake hours before the pup and I walked by ,the other day. The ferns and undergrowth crushed into a large , comfortable-looking circle.
The large, towering old Maple by the back of our house, that has raised countless chipmunks and White Faced Wasps; has sheltered too many family gatherings to count. Innumerable quiet times of grief or consolation or delight or passion. That must be cut down this fall.
The wise old Toad that knows me so well- greeting me tentatively each spring; and then with confident familiarity all summer long.
All these lives, in and outside of us, on all these perfectly good days.
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