Category: Work
Sunday, Aug 7, 2011 | The Juliet Stories, Work, Writing |
I am working again today, my third consecutive day, though perhaps with less enthusiasm and energy than on days one and two. Friday, I ploughed with confidence through the first two stories, slow and steady, and with the phrase “take heart,” in my mind.
Yesterday, I tackled my nemesis and felt satisfied. I wrote a new scene for another story and felt calm. And then I spent hours waiting for a couple of words to arrive: dialogue that must say enough but not too much, that will illuminate, leave space for mystery, and not confuse the reader. Oh, and complete a story with a few final rhythmic beats, too. Harder than you might think.
And this is the easy stage. Except maybe it’s not. Maybe there isn’t an easy stage. Yes, the stories are structurally sound. They are thoroughly imagined. That intensive and demanding work is long since done. But we’re down to the details, the nitty-gritty, the word here that could be stronger, the paragraph there that is too vague, the stray fluff that if left in might distract a reader, might sap energy from the larger story.
It’s work that makes me feel like pulling my hair out, like running for hours (in the opposite direction). I know these stories all too well. Can I walk through such familiar terrain and observe with fresh eyes? I cannot. It is impossible. The best I can do is force myself to pay attention, slow down, creep along, praying for a depth of concentration that will allow me to finish what I’ve started. To see it through to the end.
It should be easy. A word here, a word there. Grace notes.
That’s a musical term, but I’m hearing it differently all of a sudden. Notes that grace the whole; but also, notes that arrive by grace.
That sums up the work I need to do today, and the work I’ve been doing. Waiting for grace. Sitting with my stories, picking slowly through them, hoping for grace. I can’t rip the words out of thin air. I have to invite them over. And be here when they arrive. They’re whimsical, fickle, unreliable guests. There’s no predicting how they’ll surprise me.
Which is why I’m still hanging around waiting, I suppose. It’s tedious. But somehow I trust I won’t be bored, in the end. Neither will you, dear reader, I hope.
Friday, Jul 29, 2011 | Work, Writing |
I’ve sorted out the first few weeks of August.
Yes, that feels worthy of the headline. I just could not get my head around the planning, but with some help from Kevin, and from friends, have marked out a number of solid consecutive days, starting next week.
I also talked all of the kids into a week-long, morning VBS program at a church down the street (Vacation Bible School, that is). It’s, um, free. (The photo above illustrates the enthusiasm expressed by all the kids toward this proposed plan; I think they’ll enjoy it more than they expect).
And all of this should tide me over until my babysitter returns. My only regret is that I’ve had to cancel some fun summery week-day plans during the next two weeks. But if work goes smoothly, I hope to reschedule fun at the end of the month. Fun is always more fun when a weight has been lifted.
Wednesday, Jul 27, 2011 | Kids, The Juliet Stories, Work, Writing |
My editor has returned my book, with the line edits. The treatment is fairly light, except for two stories, one brand-new, which is admittedly underwritten, and the other, which has been a nemesis for years now; both need more work, and quiet thought. Every time I look at her message, a faint wave of fear washes over me. Because it’s summertime. Because my babysitter has extended her stay in Germany through mid-August. Because I may need to spend our week of family holiday, when Kevin has time off, holed up and working, rather than hanging out with my family. There may be — must be — alternatives, but my brain has yet to plot these out. Basically, I need to schedule time away from the children. Quite a lot of time.
July is coming to a close. In my mind, August magically turns into a month of productivity. But what are the children doing, exactly, while I’m confined at my desk, deep in concentration? Imagine us stepping into a parallel universe, one I believed existed pre-motherhood. The children play quietly at my feet; the older ones fetch snacks for the younger ones; no one poops; no one makes up songs with lyrics offensive to anyone else, and sure to draw ire; birds chirp and soft breezes soothe through open windows; words flow from my fingertips; we all wear crisply ironed linens — why not?; their hair is brushed and their nails are clipped and supper will be a picnic already prepared and waiting for us in a basket. As soon as I’ve solved this tricky handling of plot and character — no, it won’t take long — we will dance merrily outside to the bug-free, itch-free grass to eat it.
Alternatively, I need to find some childcare options, and mark out on the calendar a bank of whole days and weeks, and get this done. Yikes. Here comes August.
Thursday, Jul 7, 2011 | Money, Siblings, Spirit, Work, Writing |
My friend Rebecca wrote this thought-provoking post on ‘thin spaces’, the Celtic concept of places (or moments) where the spirit world comes very near to our world. We can reach through and touch it; or it brushes us. She asked where we find our thin spaces. It might be a physical place, or it might be an experience. It might be something we can seek out, or it might be something that we can’t, that just comes upon us.
Here is my short list, the things that jumped immediately into my mind:
– being with someone during labour and birth
– sometimes while writing, when the words seem to come from beyond me
– when someone reads a poem out loud
– when my body is working very hard and my mind becomes very quiet
I was out with my siblings last night (and Kevin!), and I was thinking about how all five of us Snyder kids are both creative and impractical (thank heavens Kevin is practical). I don’t mean we’re disorganized or incapable of functioning in the world, but I do think we look at some practical things, such as work and earning a living, differently. Somehow, we must have been raised to value the making of things more than the buying of things. I think within that is some quiet value, never spoken of, of thin spaces. And our thin spaces maybe aren’t that profitable, but we were raised to choose unprofitable over practical if unprofitable feeds us in other ways.
I think many people choose the work they choose because it brings them closer to those thin spaces. What’s your work? Does it take you to unexpected moments or places of peace / calm / meditation / joy / insight / grace / giving / acceptance / fill-in-the-blank-with-your-word-for-a-thin-space?
Wednesday, Jul 6, 2011 | Kids, Money, Mothering, Parenting, Work |
My girl takes after me. I like to write my ideas down. I have to write my ideas down, more precisely. It’s my version of “thinking out loud,” and I recommend it to my older children when they are having trouble with anything: mean siblings, unfair situations, anger management, you name it.
Yesterday, I took my own advice. The big kids are at overnight camp, and the little kids are at a dance camp during the mornings, just for this week; and I have no projects on the go. I’ve completed the triathlon, and the related Chatelaine.com blog. I am waiting for line edits on The Juliet Stories. I seem unwilling to commit to a new character and a new story, just yet. I am at the crux of something. Restless. Curious. So I spent the morning talking to myself in terrible printing (barely legible, even to me) inside the pages of a handy notebook.
Did anything come of it? But of course! If not exactly peace of mind, then peace of purpose.
My mother has a phrase she uses often: She likes to “stay open to the possibilities.” And while there’s plenty to recommend the idea, I’ve decided that rather than staying open to the possibilities, I prefer to pursue, invite, and seek out possibilities–and when the time is right, to choose and to commit, which is kind of the opposite of staying open to more and more and more. Commitment means closing off possibilities–at least, some of them. But it also means believing in the possibilities before you and available to you, and not forever hoping that something better may be waiting around the corner. It’s kind of like getting married. When I commit, I like to get it right. That comes with a certain amount (okay, a giant unreasonable amount) of agonizing and analyzing.
But I’m seeing that commitment can be lighter than that, too. I have before me a flexible year. Certain elements are inflexible: my youngest is still a preschooler for whom I am the primary caregiver. But depending on my income generation, there are childcare options to supplement my responsibilities. And I am at home. I can juggle. I’m not tied to the structured hours of a 9-5 job.
One thing became very clear during yesterday’s brainstorming: I am finding more satisfaction from expanding my working life–my public life, essentially. To connect, to be engaged with the world–it’s what I want.
Something clear to me at this exact moment, as my littlest leans his face onto my leg and says, “I’m bored!” is that I’m not a great mother when I’m typing on the computer or trying to think. The balance … is so imperfect.
Friday, Jun 10, 2011 | Chores, Kids, Mothering, The Juliet Stories, Work, Writing |
Ever feel like you’re just not into the domestic necessities? I can usually find some smidgen to enjoy in some portion of the daily chores that Must Be Done. But not right now.
Right now, due to soccer-all-the-time, I am washing dishes in a grumpy stupor after 9pm. “Remember when I got to wash dishes right after supper while listening to ‘As It Happens’?” I said to Kevin last night, who was also in the kitchen, putting together lunches for school. “Who knew that was such a treat?”
And hanging laundry–an often peaceful activity, a moment of quiet in a noisy day–right now, feels like a relentless intrusion on my time. There’s so much of it and so many stages to the doing of it: gathering, washing, carrying the basket up and down stairs, hanging inside or outside, gathering, folding. The only thing I refuse to do is to put away the stacks of clothes neatly piled and arranged from youngest to oldest, on my bed. C’mon. It’s the least they can do.
Even cooking is not drawing me these days. I haven’t baked bread in over a week. I’ve been stocking up at the half-off shelf at our nearest grocery store (and because our grocery store is frequented by a lot of students, the half-off bread is usually the best they sell: multi-grain or spelt or Red Fife wheat).
I haven’t baked a cookie, square, or cake in ages. I offered my two youngest a half-bag of cheesies to snack on while we sat waiting in the hallway for AppleApple to be done her final piano lesson. I’d assumed we’d be alone, because the music school is pretty much shut down, but of course there was a mother across from us, watching my offspring coat themselves in sticky orange powder. I pretended no shame.
Maybe I wasn’t even pretending, come to think of it.
I am consumed, right now, by two major projects. One is the triathlon, which will happen next weekend (not this one). I am training heavily, and it is eating a great deal of my time, mentally and physically. What I’ll do after it is over, I just cannot fathom. I can’t really think that far. I love the early mornings, but they take a toll. I would like to get together with friends and enjoy a drink of an evening, again, for example. But meantime, I am aimed like an arrow at a target, with a focus I just can’t turn off.
My other major target, on which I feel just as significantly and undistractedly aimed, is my Juliet Stories, several of which I am reworking in quite radical ways. I am rolling with ideas, especially after a conversation this morning with my editor, and trying to be patient and to work within the limits of the time that is put aside for writing work. I am grateful to Kevin, who is taking over everything this weekend, so that I can write.
And so the kids are eating cheesies, and I am resenting the laundry, and we are doing a lot of last-minute barbequeing.
I just realized something. It’s not pretending. There’s no shame. I’ve lost whatever guilt I once had, as a mother, about pursuing interests that don’t revolve around my children and my household. Right now, I am wired tight as can be, focused, excited, energized, exhausted, stretched, and it’s all good.
