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jonquil:
Comment to this post and I will give you 5 subjects/things I associate you with (if you're lucky). Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given.
Living Abroad:
The year after I was graduated from college, I spent six months in London (with side trips to Greece, France, Spain and Morocco, and all over England itself). I was enchanted by all of it. One of the advantages of traveling poor (and I was) is that you can't insulate yourself by staying in hotels that look virtually the same as the hotels you stay in at home; you find yourself taking buses with chickens squawking in the back (Morocco), or spending a week eating feta cheese and oranges for breakfast and lunch so you can splurge and have moussaka for dinner (Greece) or rooming with an embarrassing American who reminded you of why you were going to keep trying to speak the local language (Paris). I had fabulous adventures: leeches! hauntings! bus rides from London to Athens and back! buying parts for cars! waking up on the roof of a hotel in Tetuan, Morocco to see the sun rising over the mountains. I worked a series of odd jobs in London: chambermaid, temp, typist clerk (in the basement office of Thos. Cook Travel at the Houses of Parliament--that was a great job). I learned all sorts of things about my own parochial vision of the world and how different people and places--even places where we share much of a language--can be. And how alike. London is still my second-favorite city to walk in in the world, and Paris close behind it. And--because I have a weirdly retentive ear, I came home with the weirdest accent imaginable--the result of having lived in London, traveled (and been the translator) in France and Spain and Morocco, and hung out with South Africans, New Zealanders and Australians.
I'd love now, when I'm older and a little less impervious to discomfort than I was at 22, to spend a year in England and just live there. If my fairy godmother is listening...
Writing: I didn't mean to be a writer. In my family, my father and my brother were artists, and I hadn't the talent or the skill to compete there (and it was pretty clear that it was a competition, and no thanks). My mother had wanted to be a writer, or at least an author (ie., one who has written), and she kind of spoiled that idea for me by simultaneously pushing the idea hard and saying things like "I would have been a writer, but then I had you kids." I wanted to be an actor. Except: not so much talent. And I kind of ran in the opposite direction of writing, because it was my mother's thing, and there were issues. Writing--in the sense of assembling a series of words and putting them down on paper--had never been particularly difficult to me, but I didn't really think I was any different in that regard than anyone else.
Then I spent six months living with my mother in LA when she was sick, and writing was the only thing I could do that was mine, that got me out of the rather toxic proximity to her unhappiness. I wrote a book. I sent it off to a friend of Mom's who was an editor. Editor bought it. And I spent the next dozen years or so feeling like I had kind of cheated by getting in the door so easily. Life has thwacked me upside the head on that one, and I no longer feel like a cheater. Going to Clarion helped with that--being somewhere with a bunch of people who care about the same things you do is an immense help. And I feel that it's my job to get better, if I can--an uphill road made more difficult by my inherent laziness. I don't take writing classes, I am suspicious of books on writing and the writing life because my first thought is always "yeah, but," so it's a rather lonely process. I'm in a workshop, which helps. I read, which is my best tuition. I cringe, sometimes, re-reading my older stuff and noting where I gave up and figured it was as good as it was going to get. And sometimes (and these are the times one lives for) I'll read a line, or a paragraph, that sings, that is right.
I write slowly. I'm not terribly disciplined. When it's going well, it's the best damned toboggan ride ever; when it's going badly, it's like banging your head against the wall. And everything in between.
Adventures: I don't know that I really have many. It's just that I'm good at making stories out of the few that I have, so I sound braver, wittier, and more adventuresome than I really am. I'd like to be Sarah Tolerance, but alas, I think I'm more Fanny Price.
Fencing: Back in the eighties, some friends who were taking fencing classes needed to get more people together so that their teacher would have enough folk to teach stage combat. I reluctantly said "okay" (I am deeply lazy, and was deeply poor at the time) and then, of course, fell in love. I got to be fairly good: the nice thing about stage combat is it's narrative, and it's not competitive: you're working with a partner to create an illusion. I was eventually certified by SAFD (the Society of American Fight Directors) as an actor combatant, able to do rapier, rapier-and-dagger, broadsword, quarterstaff, and hand-to-hand. This has been hugely useful in writing, because I can actually choreograph a fight while writing it.
Then, when we moved out here, I took up regular competitive fencing. It's hugely different, and I was lousy at it. Not narrative--it's all reaction and form. I could parry effectively (nothing like seeing a pointy thing come at you to make you want to move fast) but would literally forget to riposte. I kept at it for over a year, and then developed a ganglion cyst which made holding a rapier painful, so I stopped fencing. Even after the cyst was excised, I didn't go back: my tolerance for being stupid and clumsy was just not high enough, I guess. Still, I love swords, I love watching a well choreographed fight, and I love picking apart a badly choreographed one (hint: unless there's an organic reason to do a 360-degree turn, like, say, you've been knocked off balance or you're wielding a broadsword so heavy that you need the momentum to slice through your opponent's armor, a 360-degree turn is done for pretty and is therefore stupid). Favorite choreographers: William Hobbs and Bob Anderson. Hobbs, in particular, is brilliant.
Motherhood: Like writing, I never really thought about motherhood. I mean, I kinda thought I might be, but I never had a passionate biological-time-bomb feeling about it. And yet, here I am. And being a mother, the hardest, most heartbreaking, most ridiculous, most exhausting and infuriating and delightful job ever, has had profound effects on me, and on my writing. There are no users' manuals. You're making it up as you go along. And you have to reinvent the wheel for each child, because each child is different. I have friends (you know who you are) who think I'm insanely over-involved with my kids; having had parents who were, um, not over-involved with me, I'm willing to err a little on that side. And (hard to believe, I know) we know people who think we are incredibly laissez-faire with our kids (we let them ride public transportation! we let them watch TV and read whatever they want! shocking!). It's all a damned work in progress, and it never ends. The object of parenthood, really, is planned obsolescence: teaching your kids enough so that they don't need you. My kids, on the other hand, show no sign of giving up on me regardless of how much they learn. I like to think this is mostly a good thing.
My father used to quote something Frank Lloyd Wright said: "What a boon to the creative imagination is the baked onion." I would say, "What a boon to the creative imagination is a child." My kids show up in my writing. I've learned patience with people who drive me crazy. I've learned the power of a simple apology, and when to keep my mouth shut and walk away. And I've learned to take pleasure in the weird and delicious ways in which my kids mirror me: Sarcasm Girl saying "heaven forfend," Avocado answering the phone with my exact "hello," (which in turn is my mother's exact hello). It's an adventure.
jonquil: Comment to this post and I will give you 5 subjects/things I associate you with (if you're lucky). Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given.
Living Abroad:
The year after I was graduated from college, I spent six months in London (with side trips to Greece, France, Spain and Morocco, and all over England itself). I was enchanted by all of it. One of the advantages of traveling poor (and I was) is that you can't insulate yourself by staying in hotels that look virtually the same as the hotels you stay in at home; you find yourself taking buses with chickens squawking in the back (Morocco), or spending a week eating feta cheese and oranges for breakfast and lunch so you can splurge and have moussaka for dinner (Greece) or rooming with an embarrassing American who reminded you of why you were going to keep trying to speak the local language (Paris). I had fabulous adventures: leeches! hauntings! bus rides from London to Athens and back! buying parts for cars! waking up on the roof of a hotel in Tetuan, Morocco to see the sun rising over the mountains. I worked a series of odd jobs in London: chambermaid, temp, typist clerk (in the basement office of Thos. Cook Travel at the Houses of Parliament--that was a great job). I learned all sorts of things about my own parochial vision of the world and how different people and places--even places where we share much of a language--can be. And how alike. London is still my second-favorite city to walk in in the world, and Paris close behind it. And--because I have a weirdly retentive ear, I came home with the weirdest accent imaginable--the result of having lived in London, traveled (and been the translator) in France and Spain and Morocco, and hung out with South Africans, New Zealanders and Australians.
I'd love now, when I'm older and a little less impervious to discomfort than I was at 22, to spend a year in England and just live there. If my fairy godmother is listening...
Writing: I didn't mean to be a writer. In my family, my father and my brother were artists, and I hadn't the talent or the skill to compete there (and it was pretty clear that it was a competition, and no thanks). My mother had wanted to be a writer, or at least an author (ie., one who has written), and she kind of spoiled that idea for me by simultaneously pushing the idea hard and saying things like "I would have been a writer, but then I had you kids." I wanted to be an actor. Except: not so much talent. And I kind of ran in the opposite direction of writing, because it was my mother's thing, and there were issues. Writing--in the sense of assembling a series of words and putting them down on paper--had never been particularly difficult to me, but I didn't really think I was any different in that regard than anyone else.
Then I spent six months living with my mother in LA when she was sick, and writing was the only thing I could do that was mine, that got me out of the rather toxic proximity to her unhappiness. I wrote a book. I sent it off to a friend of Mom's who was an editor. Editor bought it. And I spent the next dozen years or so feeling like I had kind of cheated by getting in the door so easily. Life has thwacked me upside the head on that one, and I no longer feel like a cheater. Going to Clarion helped with that--being somewhere with a bunch of people who care about the same things you do is an immense help. And I feel that it's my job to get better, if I can--an uphill road made more difficult by my inherent laziness. I don't take writing classes, I am suspicious of books on writing and the writing life because my first thought is always "yeah, but," so it's a rather lonely process. I'm in a workshop, which helps. I read, which is my best tuition. I cringe, sometimes, re-reading my older stuff and noting where I gave up and figured it was as good as it was going to get. And sometimes (and these are the times one lives for) I'll read a line, or a paragraph, that sings, that is right.
I write slowly. I'm not terribly disciplined. When it's going well, it's the best damned toboggan ride ever; when it's going badly, it's like banging your head against the wall. And everything in between.
Adventures: I don't know that I really have many. It's just that I'm good at making stories out of the few that I have, so I sound braver, wittier, and more adventuresome than I really am. I'd like to be Sarah Tolerance, but alas, I think I'm more Fanny Price.
Fencing: Back in the eighties, some friends who were taking fencing classes needed to get more people together so that their teacher would have enough folk to teach stage combat. I reluctantly said "okay" (I am deeply lazy, and was deeply poor at the time) and then, of course, fell in love. I got to be fairly good: the nice thing about stage combat is it's narrative, and it's not competitive: you're working with a partner to create an illusion. I was eventually certified by SAFD (the Society of American Fight Directors) as an actor combatant, able to do rapier, rapier-and-dagger, broadsword, quarterstaff, and hand-to-hand. This has been hugely useful in writing, because I can actually choreograph a fight while writing it.
Then, when we moved out here, I took up regular competitive fencing. It's hugely different, and I was lousy at it. Not narrative--it's all reaction and form. I could parry effectively (nothing like seeing a pointy thing come at you to make you want to move fast) but would literally forget to riposte. I kept at it for over a year, and then developed a ganglion cyst which made holding a rapier painful, so I stopped fencing. Even after the cyst was excised, I didn't go back: my tolerance for being stupid and clumsy was just not high enough, I guess. Still, I love swords, I love watching a well choreographed fight, and I love picking apart a badly choreographed one (hint: unless there's an organic reason to do a 360-degree turn, like, say, you've been knocked off balance or you're wielding a broadsword so heavy that you need the momentum to slice through your opponent's armor, a 360-degree turn is done for pretty and is therefore stupid). Favorite choreographers: William Hobbs and Bob Anderson. Hobbs, in particular, is brilliant.
Motherhood: Like writing, I never really thought about motherhood. I mean, I kinda thought I might be, but I never had a passionate biological-time-bomb feeling about it. And yet, here I am. And being a mother, the hardest, most heartbreaking, most ridiculous, most exhausting and infuriating and delightful job ever, has had profound effects on me, and on my writing. There are no users' manuals. You're making it up as you go along. And you have to reinvent the wheel for each child, because each child is different. I have friends (you know who you are) who think I'm insanely over-involved with my kids; having had parents who were, um, not over-involved with me, I'm willing to err a little on that side. And (hard to believe, I know) we know people who think we are incredibly laissez-faire with our kids (we let them ride public transportation! we let them watch TV and read whatever they want! shocking!). It's all a damned work in progress, and it never ends. The object of parenthood, really, is planned obsolescence: teaching your kids enough so that they don't need you. My kids, on the other hand, show no sign of giving up on me regardless of how much they learn. I like to think this is mostly a good thing.
My father used to quote something Frank Lloyd Wright said: "What a boon to the creative imagination is the baked onion." I would say, "What a boon to the creative imagination is a child." My kids show up in my writing. I've learned patience with people who drive me crazy. I've learned the power of a simple apology, and when to keep my mouth shut and walk away. And I've learned to take pleasure in the weird and delicious ways in which my kids mirror me: Sarcasm Girl saying "heaven forfend," Avocado answering the phone with my exact "hello," (which in turn is my mother's exact hello). It's an adventure.