A Writer Afoot » Writing life

Showing up

Barbara Samuel — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 19:50:10 +0000

Pretty sure I’ve posted a blog that says more or less this same thing at least 63 times, but it’s worth saying again. I get more work done, more good pages, more excellent rewriting done when I actually put myself in the chair during my most productive hours (8 am to 12 pm) and…uh…work.

It sounds so simple, but it isn’t, actually. I have to bypass the Internet, even a little glimpse into it. Not just for the reason that it distracts me, and I can find something to do, but because it changes the direction of my thoughts, pulls me into the world instead of pulling me into myself. I used to walk the dog right after breakfast, but I make him wait now until I take my morning break. I do not answer the phone. I don’t do anything but go to the office with my coffee in hand and sit down at my desk. I’m allowed to write a journal or lists of things I’d like to accomplish or even lists of scenes. I don’t even let myself do a meditation right there in the corner, which is all set up for it. Even that can be a way for me to avoid going into the world of my novel.

I can journal, etc, for 20 minutes, then I have to open the file and get moving. Usually what happens is that I can’t go into it cold–it feels too challenging, too scary for my still emergent creativity–so I find a spot I know I want to tweak, or one I know I’m going to like, and I read there. I change a word or two, rewrite a sentence here, a sentence there. I read aloud to get the cadence right, maybe, or play with subtext or echoes. This always works to pull me back into the world of the book at hand, and out of my own head and life and agitations.

And surprise! By 11 or sometimes even by 9:30, I’ve done my pages for the day and I am free to do other things. Like today, when I am headed out to Barnes and Noble for a coffee and a nice amble. Maybe I’ll look at journals for my upcoming travels.

How do you trick yourself to do things?

The Monday After

Barbara Samuel — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 20:59:47 +0000

It is the Monday morning after the busy, family- and food-rich holiday of Thanksgiving. Technically, I should be digging back into my book, because I didn’t work at all last week, but there is a sweet quiet in my office and I find all I want to do is soak in it. I turned Pandora radio to the Baroque Classical station and although the dog is sitting very, very close by to be sure I don’t forget he needs his walk, I am alone for the first time in five days.

Now, I realize that many people do not like to be alone all that much, but writers tend to require vast amounts of solitude. Coming into my office this morning felt like entering a church. My sanctuary, complete with altar in the corner, and all my books and music, the posters on the wall and the calendars, all my tools of creativity. There is a small, stuffed orange bear that someone gave me at a conference, while I was in the midst of writing The Lost Recipe for Happiness, which has a restaurant named The Orange Bear. I took it as a good sign.

It is not a particularly tidy place—there are too many little collections of things, too many papers and photos and feathers and books for that—but I do like to keep it clean, and most Saturday afternoons, I collect all the scattered notes I’ve written, the sixteen pens and dry erase markers I’ve been using, the printed pages from the MIP, and put everything where they belong. This Monday morning, nothing has been put away because I was busy with Thanksgiving, and that’s the way it should be. I forget that I need a transition day after a big rush—after Thanksgiving or a vacation or the RWA conference. I need to collect myself, come back to the quiet of my mind.

It isn’t that I don’t love Thanksgiving. It’s one of my favorites. (“They’re all your favorites,” said my ex once.) I love big fat turkeys and stuffing and an ambling walk with family members. I love having my children around, adore the luxury of time to listen to them talk about their lives. I love the cooking, the preparation, all of it.

I also love this, the Monday morning after. Christopher Robin and Miles are off to work. Ian is back to his home in Washington DC. There is no shopping I must accomplish, no urgent cleaning tasks. The dishwasher is humming with an ordinary load of breakfast dishes. Outside it is a crisp blue Colorado day. In my office, my sanctuary, I am writing.

As I put words on the page, at first in a scattered way, then a little more solidly, I feel my spirit coming to light, nourished by this simple, ordinary act. Here is where I am most myself, here in this quiet, coolly lit room, putting words on the page. Here, when I am in my own mind. Here, where I have space and time to reflect and think and imagine.

I know we aren’t supposed to identify ourselves by the work we do—that it is somehow seen as a flaw of our essential humanity—but honestly, I am a writer. That’s not just what I do. It is a huge part of who I am. It is how I process everything. As I write these words, snippets of the holidays come floating back—the laughter of my eldest son, the pleasure my father took in the apple-blackberry crumble I made for CR, the huge amounts of help my youngest son offered getting things ready and clean and together, the walk I had with my mother. There are the small, poignant moments of recognition—this is Sasha’s last Thanksgiving. Ian has found his home, and it is a long, long way from me. The comfort is that he’s doing work he loves as madly as I love mine, and only the proper choice of a spouse will make so much of an impact on his quality of life.

This is all part of my post-holiday ritual, coming into my office with an extra cup of coffee, grounding myself with the act of writing. My dog needs a walk, and I need to read the pages I’ve been writing, and then, perhaps, by the end of the day, I’ll be able to write a page or two. By tomorrow, I’ll be fully back, and ready to write more productively.

How do you ground yourself after the big roar of a major holiday? Do you have rituals?

Slow cooked, spicy, chunky apple butter

Barbara Samuel — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 22:37:52 +0000

Technically, I suppose, apple butter is smooth. I originally made this recipe last winter and pureed it afterward. Since, however, my main use for this particular condiment is in my morning oatmeal, I have found I much prefer it to be left chunky. Recipe is adapted from one I found at The Art of Homemaking.

SLOW COOKED CHUNKY, SPICY APPLE BUTTER

Apples enough to fill a crock pot–about 10-12 good sized apples.
2 T cinnamon
5-6 whole cloves
1 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 vanilla bean, scraped and broken into pieces
6-8 oz hard apple cider

Wash, core, and peel the apples. Slice them into good size slices and fill the crock pot. Add the spices, salt and cider, and cook on low for 18-24 hours. Smell it like every good thing all night long, and stir sometimes to keep the spices moving. When they’re very dark and soft, use a potato masher or two butter knives to break the apples into small chunks. Ladle into jars and freeze, or if you eat it as fast as we do, just pile the jars in the back of the fridge. Also very good on French toast or buckwheat pancakes.

Do you have an easy winter recipe to share with us?

Meeting bears up close

Barbara Samuel — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 02:55:19 +0000

Anyone who has read here for any length of time knows that I have bear worries when I hike. I even have dreams about them sometimes, but I’m not willing to give up hiking.

Today, to celebrate my birthday, Christopher Robin arranged a surprise: he took me to the zoo for a “Grizzly Bear Encounter.” We went behind the scenes, into the back rooms, and even into the enclosure to learn more about grizzlies.

The best part was feeding a grizzly bear through a grate, looking at his giant head and incredible paws and realizing they’re like dogs, kind of. Savage dogs. Dogs that weigh 600 pounds, but definitely dog-like in aspect and attitudes. They’re curious. They’re smart. They’re not particularly friendly if they don’t feel like it and they will definitely kill you for food if they are hungry, but for some reason, looking into those giant faces made me GET it on some deep level.

I also realized it is completely silly NOT to carry bear spray when I hike in the deep woods by myself. The trainers told me that. And they never, ever go into the enclosures with the bears. That says something, don’t you think?

It’s equally silly to demonize wildlife and make it into something Disney-esque. I can be at peace with bears if I know and understand what they are. Can we have a cheer for CR for understanding that and giving me such a cool birthday present? For a YouTube video, check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLRW3wGs4v0

The heady alchemy of baking bread

Barbara Samuel — Thu, 21 May 2009 16:12:53 +0000

It’s a cold winter afternoon, the kind when winter blisters past the windows, turning everything blue. Inside, I am kneading bread. Not in a bread machine but with my own palms and wrists. The dough is whole wheat, heavy and thick, and it takes muscle to punch it down, to knead and fold and press, then turn it, fold it, press it again. Over and over. For such a glutinous dough, it will take ten minutes to break it down, then a couple of hours to rise and lighten, another round of kneading before I nestle it into glass bread pans to rise one more time.

I love everything about baking bread, beginning with the geeky pleasure of yeast, a science experiment in every foil envelope. As a beginner, I read somewhere that you should sprinkle the yeast over a small dish of warm water into which a teaspoon of sugar had been dissolved, and it’s a trick that has never failed me—yeast that is too old or somehow flawed will not grow on this petri dish of food.

If the water is too hot, you will kill the yeast; if it is too cold, it won’t get moving. This matter of water temperature caused me no end of consternation for the longest time—what, exactly did lukewarm feel like? How would you know? In my early bread baking days, I might have spent every last dime on my little pile of ingredients and I had two very small boys to cart around, so going back to the store for yeast that I accidentally killed was not usually an option. I knew too hot was much more dangerous than not hot enough, so I’d err on the side of caution and wait anxiously for the bubbling evidence that the power behind the bread was actually going to work, that those sandy, heady granules were actually growing.

I fell so in love with yeast that my specialty became sourdough, which I grew in a pungent crock, loosely covered with cheesecloth, for days before baking. All the bubbling, boiling, living movement made me feel like a mad scientist, or maybe a medieval healer, tending to the village with my potions.

After the boiling came the mixing, flour and salt, butter or oil, water or sometimes milk. Then additions—oatmeal or raisins or spices; sugar or wheat germ or nuts—stirred into the sticky mix, making it heavy and cold.

And then comes the hard labor of kneading, which I am convinced could save the sorry soul of the worst degenerate; that simple, soothing thump and turn, fold and press, transforming glop into a smooth warm ball, as pliable and sleek as young flesh. Ten minutes of alchemy to work through a thorny problem or complain to the heavens or hum under your breath.A boy might sit at the table with you, kneading his own bread into edible shapes.

That baby bottom ball of dough then goes into an oiled bowl, covered with one of those very thin dishtowels that used to be so common and now are a little harder to find. Set the bowl in a warm place to rise. This is delicate in high altitudes—the rising can sometimes go very fast, but not if it is a very dry or cold day. Then you need to warm the oven a tiny bit, turn it off, and set the bowl inside for an hour or two, whenever the dough puffs up to twice its size and pushes at the towel you’ve put over it.

The last little bit of total fun comes in punching down that big pile of puffy stuff. Sometimes it lets go of a happy sigh as the air leaves it. To me it sounds like the bread knows its journey is nearly done. Now you knead it a little more and shape it into loaves that are tucked into pans to rise, or perhaps you want rolls today and just shape them into balls in your hand, or you’re going to be fancy and braid it. It rises again and then you bake it and it fills the house—the yard, the neighborhood—with that heady, promising, homey aroma.(I have often wondered if that perfume couldn’t sure a good many ills in the world—I mean, how can you yell at someone when your head is filled with that?) I imagine that it halted the fighting of two lovers, make a man rethink his departure from his family, smoothes the aching heart of a young girl.

At last, the bread is done, and of course, you must eat it the moment comes out of the oven, hot and dripping with butter or maybe a little jam. You can give it away, because there will always be more, more, more.

Have you ever fallen in love with a process?

The last month of a book and Pikes Peak Writers Conference

Barbara Samuel — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 14:59:16 +0000

Two news tidbits this morning:

Monthly blog post up at Writer Unboxed: The Last Month of a Book (or “I am pregnant beyond all ability to describe it” ). Which I wrote Monday.

Tuesday morning, the Pikes Peak Writers Conference called with an emergency. One of their keynote speakers is unable to fly and they asked if I could possibly fill in. I said yes so fast I think the organizer was startled, but I think I’m starved for the company of my tribe, and it will be good to drink it all in, and for some reason, teaching and speaking energizes me. So it will be fun.

But you can laugh at me if you want. I understand. The universe is chuckling, too. I like that about the universe!

Anyone in Colorado Springs this weekend?

Invitation to writers: Artful Balance

Barbara Samuel — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 19:25:50 +0000

(and other creative people)

For a couple of months, we’ve been working behind the scenes to create a gathering place that’s joyful, supportive, and energizing. ARTFUL BALANCE is a forum to help nuture the arty side of our lives, and be mindful in the pursuit of a writing (or whatever your art is–cooking counts, photography, painting, whatever). The forum model seems to be the best idea, both to spread out moderating duties and keep out spammers, etc. You’ll have to register in order to participate, but it’s easy.

If you’re interested in craft discussions, check out well-established and nitty-gritty Cherry Forums.

Go to ARTFUL BALANCE to register and join the discussion. We’re just getting started. This morning, I posted the three points of reading, writing and Internet fasting that are a great way to nourish yourself and give your work the room it needs to grow and bloom under rekindling the magic pratice.

Come on over.

Writing every day

Barbara Samuel — Sat, 31 May 2008 01:52:20 +0000

Haven’t been talking about writing much lately. That doesn’t mean I’m not doing it–I am writing, every day. The book in progress, which is still in the stages where I can’t talk about it yet, and essays and lots of emails to friends and family.

Which is what writing is all about. Showing up, opening up, letting it flow. So often, we can dramatize the whole thing to make ourselves the center of this wild, tossing ocean, and instead, we can just go to the computer and put our hands on the keys, or open a notebook and uncap a good pen, and start writing. Journals count. Blogs count. A good letter (even email, as long as it is a letter, not a note) counts. Pages you might use someday in some unyet discovered something count.

Writing is what keeps me sane. It’s both physical and mental. Grounding and inspiring. Easy and hard. Do you make writing hard for yourself? Is there some little something you could to do give yourself permission to let it flow?

Busy, busy

Barbara Samuel — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 14:52:47 +0000

Working on the copy edit of Elena’s book this week. I am rarely so happy with a book at this stage (actually, I usually hate them with a great and terrible ferocity during CEs), and I can’t wait for you to meet these people. Next spring: The Lost Recipe for Happiness is the title.

Also, I keep forgetting to tell you that I am blogging at Writer Unboxed on the 4th Wednesday of every month.

Training hard, working hard, sleeping quite a bit in between. With all those miles, you think I’d be miraculously thinner, but I am sorry to report I am my same sturdy (healthy, thank you heavens!) self.

Creative Commons photo by venkane.

Filling hungry hearts

Barbara Samuel — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 15:37:44 +0000

In my family, the humans are divided into those who are very, very private and protect every thought and emotion carefully, and those who are driven to share emotions and experiences. My mother, who is one of the private ones, has often told me it is a gift that I can pin emotions and experiences into words, stories that eventually makes sense, for those who cannot do it.

The flip side is, of course, that my drive to put words to experience, and then share those words, make the private ones feel slightly seasick. I’m currently engaged in a voice class, and writers nearly all have wounds–large or small–that come from a private (or “proper”) person attempting to stifle the writer who wants to EXPRESS EVERYTHING. Blue! Sex! Apples! Decaying body! Dawn! Incest! (And a big fat fly just landed on my coffee, trying to drink it all up–ick.) Working through some of those wounds can be enormously freeing, but it’s hard to get the idea across that the drive to do this is not an indulgence, but a calling.

Listening this morning to Krishna Das (while Leo the cat took his seat beside me, purring accompaniment) I was settling into a prayerful period and getting quiet so the day’s work might emerge a little more easily. This sometimes feels like a waste of time, really, that I should just get on with it, start writing already, but experience has taught me that even a ten minute meditative period at the start of a work day is a good thing. Like walking, it brings far more into my life than such a simple thing seems it should deliver.

As Leo and I contemplated the flickering candle flame, the words of Sri Hanuman Chaleesa penetrated my morning brain:

“Calling out to hungry hearts
Everywhere through endless time
You who wander you who thirst
I offer you this heart of mine.
Calling all you hungry spirits
Everywhere through endless time.
Calling all you hungry hearts
All the lost and left behind
Gather round and share this meal
Your joy and your sorrow
I make it mine”

I imagined a beautiful table, laid with a rich cloth and beautiful dishes of colorful food, and music in the corner, and hungry people coming in to eat and drink, their gray souls coming back to life. And I thought of my mother thanking me for a story she needed to read. I thought of the slim, well-tended woman who came up to me at a booksigning in Santa Fe and wanted to confess her sin of pouring milk over her husband’s car. I thought of the students in my current voice class, writing their way into accepting the call to do their own work, and how brave they are to wade in, to prepare the feast, to open themselves up to life and experience in such bold ways, letting everything in. See everything, even the ugly and painful. Be open to all experiences, all of them, uncomfortable and beautiful, painful and transporting. It’s part of the bargain we make before we show up on this plane, I think.

How lovely! Writing is like cooking, then, isn’t it? Feeding hearts and souls instead of bellies!

All work is holy. I’m thankful for accountants to put my finances in order, and my own teachers, and my sister the nurse, and CR, the computer wizard, who makes this communication possible. But each one must believe in the holiness of their own call, and then we are all enriched.

What satisfies you most about your own work?