Read. It's good for the soul!

I am and have been reading voraciously.  I can not seem to get my fill of so many different, revealing, personal, touching and unique ways that writers write. I have allowed myself to become the flesh and breathing of characters in the books I have read, so much so that I cry and laugh out loud when the characters in the books do so.  I allow myself to block out the chair in which I am sitting, the treadmill on which I'm walking, the view out my window so that I may sit in a chair in the book, walk down paths I would have never walked down, and see out my window the view of the town, village, city, street, room that I have suddenly been welcomed into. I am happily, magically, completely overwhelmed with desire, pain, happiness, and oneness to each setting/character(s) into which I melt  The voices around me, dialects new to my ear--seem so strangely familiar.  New smells and aromas, colors and sounds fill my world, my thoughts, my passion, my need to be able to put down on paper words that will evoke those feelings and complete surrender of readers to my writing.  If you've not read these books, you surely must....
.The Help by Kathryn Stockett, Little Bee: A Novelby Chris Cleave, and the one I am currently reading that has brought me to snorting guffaws of laughter and heart-wrenching sobs of sorrow One Vacant Chair: A Novel (Graywolf Press) by Joe Coomer.  Joe Coomer is magical. His characters will reach out their hands and beckon you into their lives. This is his latest. He has many others.  No doubt I will read them all.

I am hearing from many sources that to be a great writer you must read, read, and read some more.  I've come to think 'So many books, so little time'.  Read, it's good for the soul!

"Ba Haba"

You simply cannot live in Maine and never make your way someday to Bar Harbor on Mt. Desert Island.  It's a must see, but probably more memorable in the dead of summer when the tourist are packed like sardines on sidewalks, in hotels, bed and breakfasts, cottages and beautiful huge mansions.  Although the folks taking up summer residence in the fairyland homes with the breathtaking views of the Atlantic Ocean are probably not considered (nor do they consider themselves) tourists.  They are summer residents from far away places.  Their summers are probably more spent behind the privacy fences in their luxurious "summer homes".  But I could be wrong. They may well love the hustle and bustle of the crowds that overtake this paradise island from the 2nd week in April until Labor Day.


We chose to go a couple of weekends ago. Easter weekend. One of the last weekends before the quiet goes away. Hotels and business were putting on the final touches and signs heralded the approaching season and the opening of those establishments.
 
The ride up US 1 is interesting.  All along the way there are the rows and rows of white coffins some in a line, some squeezed in this way and that. At least that is what the boats with white shrink wrapped tarps in every port along the way looked like to me. Coffins or rows of soldiers waiting patiently for their unveiling when they could once again breath life into themselves and the men and woman that captain them.

As we drove up the sun was beating in through the passenger's side window toasting my right ear and face.  The warmth penetrated the window.  I closed my eyes and let myself feel the wet sand as the water laid itself in lapping motion against the shore.  I could smell the salt wafting off the water through the air. The warmth and my imagination transformed me from the car to a warm tropic beach.

Our trip took us through Brunswick past the St. John's Parish Hall and the strangely named St. John The Baptist Catholic Church.  We scooted past the Wylie Gallery-Contemporary Craft and the stop light at the "Town Mall".  Then on past Bowdoin College with it's lovely campus and painstakingly cared for old buildings. Brunswick is a town with lovely old homes.  Not far down the road (or should that be up the road) is the town of Bath, home of Bath Iron Works where they build huge ships for the United States Navy.  We waved hello as we past the Morring B and B and the Taste of Maine. We noticed that Suzie Ater had her sign out on a few houses for sale.  We traveled up over the bridge that brought us to some wet lands.  We went out past the Ledgeview Road following the meandering of U.S. 1.

The Shelter Institution and Montsweag Farm brought us into Wiscassett past Simpson's Seafood and a sign advertising "Solar Clothes Dryers"...(Is that a fancy name for a clothes line?). Another turn of the road held the sign to the Two Bridges Regional Jail, Blue Haven, and Big Al's Super Value. Wiscassett is Small Town USA.  The road curves on down a hill past some lovely homes, past the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office, "Real Eats" and the water of the Sheepscot River glistening like jewels lulling us right into Edgecomb.  6 miles from New Castle overlooking the Sheepscot River was a beautiful salt water farm. At the cut off to Booth Bay Harbor, up on the hill, sat Cod Cove Inn.

That took us into lovely little Maine town of Damariscotta.  Right on past the Pioneer Motel on the left and a church with no steeple.  Well actually the steeple was there next to the church, on the ground, surrounded with scaffolding.  Right in front of the church was a huge sign with a huge goal line set on it and the words that said it all: RAISE THE STEEPLE.  Beckoning us on were the signs to Nobelboro and Waldoboro, past the Duck Puddle Campground, Moody's Diner that has been there for years.  As usual, business was booming. Waldoboro passed in the blink of our eyes and all along the way there were antique stores with memories for sale.  We went through Warren and Thomaston that was established in 1605.  Thomaston is the home of the old Maine State Prison known as "Tommy Town" and on down the road was the General Knox Museum.

 The afternoon found us in Rockland home of the Dragon Cement Co. claimed in the Indian Claim Settlement.  The road dead ends and turns right into the Atlantic Ocean (well it doesn't turn right into the Atlantic...it turns right....looking right into the Atlantic).

We saw the Samoset Resort overlooking the ocean and the lighthouse with entry by way of a breakwater.

You just know there are people in these little quiet, picturesque, quaint little towns looking out their kitchen window at the glorious awesome view of the ocean thinking ' in a matter of weeks there will be throngs--masses of people, shoulder to shoulder tourists, all trying to squeeze out of a weekend or 2 weeks, a month, a summer-- whatever amount of time their real lives allot them --the joy and postcard fantasy that I know as home'.

Out of my window passed Camden with its old mansions that speaks of big old money.  When we rolled past Linconville, the fog rolled past us.  But as we neared Northport and moved north away from the water, the sky opened to a tender blue being kissed by sunshine.  You could see all the way to heaven.

I spied a bald headed man with a beard that hung down to his waist.  He looked like he had been sitting there on that porch for as long as the old house had been there.  Sitting and rocking as the world whizzed by.

On past Searsport where we saw an old house that had literally crumbled into itself.






Then up over a bridge to Bucksport and the Jonathan Buck Monument.  We stopped at the cemetery to see the tombstone and read about the legend of  Captain Buck 

Ellsworth seemed more commercialized and there were huge signs advertising the GREAT MAINE LUMBERJACK SHOW on U. S. 3-- not opened for the season--yet.

The water along our trip was ever-changing.  In some places it was in constant motion, some places with white caps...other places like sheets of glass.  All a writer's paradise.

This is the ride up the rugged coast of Maine. Beautiful, serene, quaint, post card picturesque.  This was the road that took us to Bar Harbor.

For the most part on this Easter weekend, Bar Harbor was closed.  The season not yet "open".  The hotels still stood silent.  The stores and parks and sidewalks patiently waiting, all being buffed and polished and readied for all that the coming weeks and months would bring.  We were able to see the exhibit at the Abbe Museum by a breathtakingly poignant  writer Mihku Paul Anderson that I met at a writing workshop at UNE. Mihku  We were able to take a beautiful ride around the island and into a small part of Acadia National Park that was opened. I was mesmerized by the beautiful homes, by water trickling down the mountain sides; trails of water rushing to become one tiny stream, tiny streams rushing together to become one small creek, creeks rushing to the river that poured into the bay that swirled around the rugged coast of Maine and into the Atlantic Ocean.

The solitude, the fresh air, the ducks bobbing like tiny white buoys in the water. The foam of the water slapping against the jutting rocks.  I sat on the edge of a mountain in the park and thought what a writer's paradise this was--a writer's paradise surrounded by nature where imagination doesn't have to ask permission to run wild.

Someday we will go back when the season is in full swing, when the traffic is bumper to bumper, when there are lines outside the restaurants and ice cream parlors, when the hotels, motels and bed and breakfasts are filled to capacity.  We'll be there when there is laughter in the air, walkers on the trails, boats and tours and people--lots and lots of people. None of that was there this weekend but it was perfect for us.  It was what we needed. A quiet escape, a long easy ride up a beautiful coast.  This weekend started out to be about the destination, but it turned out to be about the journey.....and really isn't that what's important.

When Whoever's in New England's Through With You....

I'm a southern girl. Born in New Orleans. Became an adult in south Texas (after years of traveling). I miss the sticky heat, the drawl, the smell of good Tex-Mex food (heavy sigh), the fields of Blue Bonnets this time of year , the slow pace, the warm smiles, moss dripping like gray cotton candy off the branches, the warm pungent seductive aroma of the magnolias....the grits....ahhh the south.

But as I was driving to work this morning and the rain was trickling down my windshield, I could see tiny buds on the trees and tulips valiantly pushing their little green hands out of the ground as if to say, "hey, hello, we're back--spring is on the way."  That's the thing about New England.....the very distinct seasons.  The Spring that brings renewal, hope and a sense that you can start anew no matter what the past has dealt you.  The Summer with it's relative coolness and just a hint of heat so you can say, ah yes, summer.  Fall in New England, need I

say more.....crisp air, brilliant reds, yellows, golds and every variation in between as Mother Nature celebrates before bringing out her winter coat.

And of course, Winter, white, cold, blustery, sometimes frustrating, sometimes wonderland, always long.

I always learn so many things no matter where I live. The south gave me warmth in the air and in my soul. The north gives me hope and compartments of time in her seasons. Time to work through things and time in which to look forward.

I am trying as I've been taught--to bloom where I am. To savor my surroundings and dig in. To call it 'home' no matter where I find myself. To 'find myself' in the world where I exist at any given time.

Every place is beautiful. Every place is full of history. Every place has something I'll remember and miss when I'm not there. Every place a potential story just waiting to be written.

I'm a southern girl and I miss the south....but for now I'm a northern girl and I'm here till 'Whatever's in New England's through with me'. If the time ever comes that I go back south, on some morning when I'm driving and the rain is trickling down my windshield, I'll hear New England whispering (to paraphrase the song) "You know its not too late 'cause you'll always have a home to come back to"

Why do I write--or not?

This morning when I was on my treadmill reading (well reading while I was walking), what I was reading made me think about my writing (or lack thereof). Among other books, I am currently reading Writing Begins with the Breath: Embodying Your Authentic Voice by Larraine Herring. Larraine is a writer, author and teacher. In the chapter titled Self-Awareness she talks about how you should consider why you write by turning the question around and considering why you don't write or why you procrastinate in your writing.

That got me to thinking and had I not still had a half hour left on the treadmill, I would have sat right down and written my thoughts on this. But instead I avoided the act of writing by prioritizing my exercise above my writing. So why do I do that? Is the exercise more important than the writing? Perhaps for my physical and future wellness the exercise is something I should not push to the side. But for my mental wellness I need to write. Larraine explains in another chapter that writing is just like showing up for exercise. Weight loss and good health will occur if I keep showing up for the exercise and writing will take me places if only I'd keep showing up.

So why do I not put my writing up at the top of my priority list? Perhaps it is because the writing is mine, the writing is for me, the writing is my joy,release, escape. And because I have just recently, early into my 60s made time for me. It is a long story, briefly covered in some of my other post (I think). A story of a caretaker and someone that always tried to please everyone else but herself. That was me. And so perhaps that was the void I never could fill. Perhaps there is some truth in the words "to thine own self be true". Only in brief moments throughout the last 45 years or so have I taken more than just a day or two (perhaps a week) to be true to myself and to acknowledge the voice crying inside me, the spirit calling out my name from some far off place, the aching that will not go away, the burning need to write. That voice, that calling,keeps showing up, keeps begging to be recognized as real and important, will not let go no matter how far I push it aside. And now it demands to be heard. It has broken free from the depths of my being and is racing through every vessel, every pore, every thought. It will no longer take no for an answer. It will no longer be pushed aside while I take care of someone else.

The line at the top of my blog says "Someday, Somewhere, Somehow...to write a book and have it published--hopefully in this lifetime". Perhaps that will happen and perhaps it will not. But this I know. This is what is important...that I listen to my calling, that I show up everyday and that I write. I am a writer. I always have been.

Writing in La La Land

One of the things writing teachers tell you is to take notes, be observant, jot down ideas, record things you see, however insignificant, write out dreams you can remember--you just never know when those thoughts, ideas, observances or dreams might be just what you are looking for when you are writing.

OK. So get this. I'm standing in a lobby of a very tall building. I'm very sleepy, groggy, fighting desperately to open my eyes. I'm standing in front of a window that is a credit union in the lobby of this building (like an order window)...you don't go in and talk to the loan officer, you just order it at the order window. But I needed to wake up enough to explain to the loan officer at the window why I needed to borrow the money. I told him I was working for an organization that did compassionate shipping and clothing for morbidly obese people. We made boxes they could be shipped in (OK this part confuses me just as much as it's confusing you) and we make clothes that have to have support around the waist. The only thing we've come up with to use is what I keep calling "cotillion wire". The credit union loan officer does not know what "cotillion wire" is. I keep saying, "You know, like in the movie 'Gone with the Wind', the women wore the big hoop skirts to the Cotillions. The wire hoops held the skirts of their dresses out in a big circle." I kept repeating that, but they never could understand. In the meantime, I am still so sleepy, I can barely keep my eyes opened. I sit down on a chair in the lobby and doze off. Occasionally I wake up long enough to hear a voice on a loud speaker saying "My number is 3378 (or whatever 4-digit number they were) and the reason I want to be heard on the afternoon salute to Joel Ward is (and they'd state their reason) (Joel Ward is a man I used to work with years ago who recently passed away). I could rarely remember what they'd say past their number because I kept dozing off.

I finally woke up enough to realize I was very very late from returning on my lunch break and tried to find my way to the elevator (stopping at another counter to see how to get a number so I too could be on the afternoon salute to Joel Ward). But as you can probably guess by now, I found the elevator, stood in front of it and dozed off. I could barely see the up and down button. I heard a man's voice asking if I was going up or down. "Up", I said. My eyelids were weighed down like tiny bricks on each eyelash. The doors of the elevator opened and I was moving in slow motion like in the movie "10" where Bo Derek runs across the beach, like my feet are stuck in sludge. The doors are closing and I'm trying to get on. I turn sideways and slide in--but the elevator is 2-part, one compartment behind the other and I miss the first compartment and slide into the second. The second compartment is an express elevator that goes directly from the lobby to the 64th floor. There are two men on the elevator with boxes of 'packing popcorn' and bubble wrap. The 'packing popcorn' is all sticky and full of glue and it keeps flying out of the box and sticking to me. The two men act like they don't even see me in the elevator. At one point I am frantically trying to get a piece of this sticky gunk off my finger that has attached itself to me and feels like a leach sucking the blood in a jungle river. They get off on the 64th floor with all their boxes. I, of course, have again gotten very groggy. I can barely see the numbers on the elevator to go back down--on the ride down it appears the elevator stops on all the floors. I hit a button that seems to show floors 10-11-12. The elevator bypasses 12 and 11 and stops on the 10th floor. I get off, look around still in a daze. I am in an office I am familiar with but haven't worked in since 1995. A man whose face is familiar (from that time period), but whose name escapes me completely says "Hey Peg" and seeing how confused I look follows up with "10th floor". I ask him how to get to the 12th floor like it's my first time ever to be in this situation. He giving me a look like he thinks I'm two fries short of a happy meal, points to some stairs and says, "Up two flights, just like everyday". I'm fully awake now and run up the stairs wondering how in the hell I'm going to explain taking so long for lunch. I open the door to the 12th floor, look at the clock over the receptionist's desk and realize I'm only 3 minutes late.


OK. Now I know you're probably either laughing your head off or wondering where I slipped off the deep end of the world into La La Looneyville. But that's how dreams work. I can relate to Joel Ward. I worked with him. He passed away. But where the heck did the 64-story building, the "cotillion wire", the shipping obese people (to who knows where and why), the sticky 'packing popcorn--bloodsucking leach' scenes come from? And for that matter how would I ever fit any of that into a novel. Well I guess stranger things have happened. I've read some pretty imaginative books with some pretty far out scenes. So who knows. I'll stick these notes away and maybe one of these days, when I least expect it, I'll be looking for a character or a building or a box of sticky 'packing popcorn' to put in a chapter and I'll refer back to that wacky dream. That's what make fiction writing so much fun. It doesn't have to be true. It just has to fit into the story that is believable enough for the reader to want to read on.

'til I write again. Take care.

Shut up and write!

I just realized that I have been TALKING way too much about wanting to write and not doing what a writer must do.....WRITE.

On any given day I have a thousand things running around in my brain--kind of like a car that stops at a stop light and everyone in the car jumps out to play "Chinese Fire Drill". When all the characters get back in the car, they have changed--not only places, but appearances and thoughts. They jump out at the next stop light to yet change again. And I think to myself that I should write those thoughts down, write how each character looks each time they change, write down their thoughts, think about what they are doing, may be doing, have done and how it might fit into a not yet formed or written story.

But lately all I seem to do is just think about writing, yearn to write, ache to write, plan to write...a story, an article, a poem, a book. I am (in my writing study) reading a fabulous blog by a young woman named Laraine Herring. She is a teacher, writer, author, counselor, a playwright and an editor. But mostly to me, she is an inspiration, telling me (through her blog)...as they say 'not necessarily what I want to hear, but what I need to hear' (but secretly...it is what I want to hear). I can not begin to tell you the words of wisdom I have gleaned from her writing, her teaching and her thoughts.

I am learning to listen more, observe more, and write notes about things I see, hear and feel. I am learning to not be afraid of my past, my personal thoughts, my concerns of the future, my love and devotion to certain people and places, present and past--the secrets of my heart--how ordinary my life seems. I am learning we all have a story and each one is unique. We all have fantasies, wishes, dreams and ordinary lives that might or might not seem ordinary to a reader. We should write.

I am learning that it's time to lighten my load--that less is more. I am learning that I can "not color" my hair and the world will not stop because all of a sudden I have decided to grow old gracefully, naturally--salt and pepper gray. It is actually very freeing. I can talk myself out of the bed at 4:30 in the morning to get on the treadmill for an hour, so I don't have to do it in the afternoon when I come home so tired. I can get used to taking care of my body so that the approaching 'older' years will not be laden with aches, pains and illness. I'm getting used to the peaceful safe retreat I now call home. It is freeing.

I am putting down on paper things that bother me. By writing my thoughts and anguishes down, I get them off my chest, out of my heart, beyond the "Chinese Fire Drill" chaos of no direction in my head. For right now I will not share all the thoughts because I don't want the whole world to know (am I an optimist or a fool to think the whole world will read my blog?) I guess I will really be free when I feel comfortable enough to share my ghosts--past and present. I am seeing as Laraine Herring wrote in her blog, that writing frees every part of my world. And as a happenstance acquaintance once told me, write it down, hold out my arms (hands in a meditation pose), deep breath in, deep breath out and let it go.

I have said a thousand times (or more) that I never seem to have the time to write. Writers make the time to write. Writers must be disciplined. Every book that I read (about writing) tells me that I must write, write, write and write some more. So this has become my new lunch half hour. I will eat a bite (or not) and write during this short window of time. Hey it's a start. And of course, as quickly as it started, my half hour is done. Times up. (for today anyway)

WAY TOO LONG

Geeze...just shoot me. I can never seem to find the time to get on my blog and write. Other's like Thepioneerwoman.com, intothehermitage and mytartelette not only write, but have great recipes, great picture and fabulous give aways. I feel like I am in the dark ages of blogging. I think it is time for me to retire so I can spend more time writing! OK, once again I am going to publicly promise to try to write more often and enhance my blog. If you know of any great books, websites, or seminars that will get me into the real blogging game, please write a comment.