I need to get back to basics my writing life. Yesterday I felt like my writing life had taken what Julia Cameron calls a creative U-turn, in her best seller, The Artist's Way. But, thankfully that mood only lasted a day and a half. My creative U-turn came about because things I'd planned for regarding my memoir are not going to happen as planned. It put me in a blue funk. It made me think, what's the point of all the work I'm doing anyway? But this morning I listened to Cameron words: Once we admit the need for help, the help arrives. I got back to my desk, made some calls, sent some emails, got the answers I needed, and voila, my mood is back to creativity again. I know this sounds vague. I'll get more detailed in the future. Please stay tuned. And keep your creative career from making that creative U-turn. Remember every creative career has it failures. We must accept them, work through them, and not let them get in our artist's way. … [Read more...]
Is life fair?
I'm going through a rough patch. Well, not myself personally just people whom I know and love. I found out yesterday that one of my dearest friends has lung cancer and she never even smoked. And one of the cutest little babies in my life has to have a feeding tube put through his nose to try to stop him from aspirating food into his lungs when he swallows. In a conversation with another friend we decided life isn't fair, and the older we get the more we see of this unfairness. Even so, we must stay positive and think good thoughts for healing miracles to make our loved ones better. And maybe a pretty picture will help too. Jelly Fish at the Monterey CA Aquarium … [Read more...]
Keeping agreements
True confessions: in the mid 1970s I spent two weekends at the Los Angeles Convention Center in a room with hundreds of people taking the est Training. It was the thing to do in those days. And over the next decade, over a million people like me resonated with Werner Erhard's philosophy of transformation, personal responsibility, accountability, and possibility. We left the room at the end of the fourth day, feeling very much like we Got It. And now, in 2012, I still feel that way. I always think of est when I say to someone or myself to go for it. est espoused the notions of going for it more than 100 per cent, living on the high road, and riding the horse in the direction it is going. Such simple concepts, made so clear and meaningful in four short days. The most important aphorism of the training for me was: If you keep your agreements your life will work because if you do, you don't have to squirm, equivocate, think up lame excuses. You've kept your agreement and now … [Read more...]
A gray Friday
It's been drizzling all morning and downpours are expected tonight. So it's a good day to show off our front garden's dazzling spring Clivia blooms. They started blooming early this year since it's been so warm, but unfortunately they last only a short time. Today's rain gives them an extra special sparkle. … [Read more...]
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) – a ruthless and certain killer
Whenever anyone in my synagogue community dies I get an email from the rabbi. I read today's email at about five in the morning that Jill Cherneff Laverty died probably yesterday. I had heard last week that it wouldn't be long, but even so I definitely wasn't ready for the news. Jill had ALS and she lived over six years with it, much longer than most ALS victims, but still, it's hard to take. Persons with ALS have a loss of muscle strength and coordination that eventually gets worse and makes it impossible to do routine tasks such as going up steps, getting out of a chair, swallowing and then, finally, breathing. ALS does not affect the senses (sight, smell, taste, hearing, touch), and only rarely affects bladder or bowel function, or a person's ability to think or reason. That's why I've heard that it must be like being in prison or a coffin. There is no known cure for it. It is a ruthless and certain killer. I understand that Jill's first symptom was difficulty in speaking. … [Read more...]
Another Buddha
I don't want to get into all the stuff going on right now and all the things I need to do, so I'll just post a pretty picture. Every time I look at it, it makes me relax. … [Read more...]
Social network and novel work updates
Social Network Update I've now joined BranchOut and Pinterest as if I needed more social network connections than I already have, e.g., Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Goodreads. I really don't know what BranchOut is all about and Pinterest is even more of a riddle. A recent pin on my Pinterest for the home board According to their websites: BranchOut makes it easy to search for jobs and see inside connections in your network. Our quick tour will help you discover BranchOut's powerful features. Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes. Best of all, you can browse pinboards created by other people. Browsing pinboards is a fun way to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests. I haven't really worked with BranchOut yet because I haven't been actively looking for a job but of course one never … [Read more...]
My thoughts about Didion’s Blue Nights – probably just sour grapes?
Joan Didion I'm sure this is what you'd call sour grapes. I've just finished reading, Joan Didion's latest book, Blue Nights, about the death of her daughter, Quintana Roo. I read The Year of Magical Thinking and was mesmerized by it, but Blue Nights just didn't register. Didion suffered two losses recently her husband and her only daughter and relatively close together. What she has been through has been horrible. And, I am so glad she, as I did, found writing helpful. Hers is indeed grief literature. I know because I wrote about my son's death and our family's aftermath in my memoir, Leaving the Hall Light On also grief literature. But, I found Didion's Blue Nights too caught up with Minton plates, Chanel suits, champagne flutes, her various homes in the privileged areas of Hollywood, Malibu, Holmby Hills, and New York. She also muses about clothes from Bendel's and Holly Harp and that Quintana had sixty dresses hanging in her closet at the time of her Christening. Finally … [Read more...]
A good poetry practice – write in the style of other greats
Early on in my poetry workshops, we practiced writing poems in the style of other poets we liked. I especially liked Frank O'Hara's homage to Billie Holiday and tried my hand at writing in this style a couple of times. This poem came to mind when Whitney Houston died two weeks ago. Here is Frank O'Hara's poem for Billie Holiday The Day Lady Died It is 12:20 in New York a Friday three days after Bastille day, yes it is 1959 and I go get a shoeshine because I will get off the 4:19 in Easthampton at 7:15 and then go straight to dinner and I don't know the people who will feed me I walk up the muggy street beginning to sun and have a hamburger and a malted and buy an ugly NEW WORLD WRITING to see what the poets in Ghana are doing these days I go on to the bank and Miss Stillwagon (first name Linda I once heard) doesn't even look up my balance for once in her life and in the GOLDEN GRIFFIN I get a little Verlaine for Patsy with drawings by Bonnard although I … [Read more...]
Book clubs – a way to sell books
Two Tuesdays nights in a row I had the pleasure of being the guest of honor at book club discussions of my memoir, Leaving the Hall Light On: A Mother's Memoir of Living With Her Son's Bipolar Disorder and Surviving His Suicide (Lucky Press, 2011). Last week we had just a short question and answer discussion about the how I prepared the book and the benefits the writing of it had in my healing process. Only one person asked the questions. Last night in a room full of fifteen or so women, the questions kept flying from each one of them, starting with did I think I left anything out of the book to how do I feel twelve years later as I speak about the loss of my son. Does it still affect me emotionally? We also discussed what stigma is and does it still exist, psychopharmacology versus talk therapy, jails versus hospitals in caring for the mentally ill, and whether or not I think my son's former girlfriend has read my book (I don't think so, but of course I'll never really … [Read more...]
A great family visit
Our great niece, Khloe, was here from Denver with her mom and dad this past weekend. She really liked putting her feet into the Pacific Ocean and playing at our local park. And now it's time to get back to my writing work. … [Read more...]
"It’s always a fiction"
My writing teacher and mentor Jack Grapes sent out the email reproduced (in part) here over the weekend. I am in complete agreement with him that our sentences are always fiction. We cannot recreate the past except through writing our own version of the facts. In my memoir, Leaving the Hall Light On, I wrote down the truth as I remembered it. Some of the sentences I wrote about my truth were not as my husband remembered, but since it is my book and not his version, he is okay with it. I'm not distorting his version. I am stating my own. Anyway, please read Jack's comments below. By the way, I took his method writing classes. I recommend them to you all. NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND, NOTES FROM OUTER SPACE: RE: David Ulin's review in Sunday L.A. Times, "Critic's Notebook: What is Fact, What is Fiction." http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-ca-david-ulin-20120219,0,1862704.storySad to say, once again the subject of fact and fiction, fact and non-fiction, or fact and … [Read more...]
Writing critiques are not all alike
Sherwood Smith I attended a Greater Los Angeles Writers Society critique session yesterday afternoon that was different from any I have ever been to before. It was led by author and writing workshop leader, Sherwood Smith. First a little about Sherwood. She walked in at exactly 2:30, the time we were supposed to start. She was wearing a long flowing blue skirt that only showed her Birkenstock sandals and a ruffled jacket type top that matched. Her reddish brown hair pulled back from her plain unmade up face fell down her back past her butt and seemed to fold into her skirt. She had a black leather tote bag and carried a parasol it was definitely not an umbrella. She sat down, got out her bottle of Fuji water, and arranged herself while Tony, our GLAWS leader, in his usual way started the meeting late, made lengthy announcements, and didn't introduce her until almost 3:00. As she was waiting she took a fan out of her bag, unfolded it, and began to fan herself furiously. I was … [Read more...]
What makes a book sell?
I attended the Digital Author's Conference this past Saturday, sponsored by West Coast Writer's Conferences with special recognition and discounts to Greater Los Angeles Writer's Society members. Coincidentally, both are headed by Tony N. Todaro. Tony and his staff do a great job in getting interesting and informative speakers to their events. I found some of the information presented on Saturday so beneficial to my writing life I thought I'd share a little bit here. One was a mention of a blogger I recently started following (at the suggestion of Marketing the Muse's Marla Miller) Seth Godin. I have been marveling at how much meaningful information Seth can impart with just a few lines of short sentences, short paragraphs, and a lot of white space on the page. And Elaine Wilkes, Ph.D. who spoke about ways to place our books everywhere and how to write emails and books that get results said this is the kind of writing that is selling best right now: Short even one-line … [Read more...]
Apple problems and woes
Technology can be wonderful, but unfortunately it can be frustrating as well. I'm not complaining; I'm fortunate to have a lot of it in my life. I just wish it were simpler to understand and maintain. I was so excited to get a new iPhone because my old phone was giving me all sorts of troubles. Yet now I wonder if I should have stuck with my old one since the new phone is behaving much worse at least so far. My major problem has to do with my calendar. After I moved to ICloud, I couldn't see all my events on my phone. In fact, I couldn't see them on my computer screen either. It was crazy making. After talking to five Apple technical experts yesterday and spending about three hours doing so, my calendar is working properly, but now my email isn't. I suspect it's a related problem that happened after the final merge last night. Luckily the last expert I spoke to sent me an email with his private extension. Hopefully I'll get to speak with him soon, and he'll be the … [Read more...]
