WILD by Cheryl Strayed--WINNER of First Edition Hardback!

Hi All,

Yes, it's been awhile and as promised in my April blog post, I am giving away a first edition hardback of Cheryl Strayed's Wild and have selected the winner from everyone who commented in April, both on my blog and via email or SheWrites.

I have a regular blog post coming soon, but news about Cheryl has catapulted me onto the internet (and out of working on two novels) to celebrate her news and give away this amazing memoir.


Yesterday, Oprah announced a new book club, saying she decided to revive the book club after reading Wild. She said, "I was like, 'where is the Oprah Winfrey show when you need to announce and tell everybody about his book?' I need the book club."

Here's the video announcement:

So without further fuss and champagne drinking, congrats to one of my SheWrites peeps in winning the book and maybe now joining Oprah's new book club to discuss Cheryl's Amazing Adventure.

JANNETTE ENG

Congrats, Jannette! I'm sure you'll love it. 

And thanks to all who commented on my blog post. I promised to follow up with constructive ideas on how to not get derailed by social media and I will, with a two-part post coming soon, the first one with advice by authors who have different ways of dealing with this, and the second part a compendium of hardcore tools, suggestions, advice and resources for anyone else who feels the pinch of social media on their time and creativity. Many of the tools are ones I've heard of or created for myself and can be adapted immediately. The last thing I want to do is take up your time in figuring out ways to gain time. Seems a little counterproductive, doesn't it?

Hope you're enjoying your life and being "wild" every so often!
Val



For the curious who love to read about people who have struggled and overcome some "big thing," whatever it is, in their life, I'm loving this new blog, "Re-inventing Karla." Check it out!

Re-inventing Karla

The Day My Dad Died

            The day my dad died I was one month shy of my nineteenth birthday and six months pregnant. I’d spent the day with my husband, whom I would divorce three years later, driving around Lake Winnisquam, looking for a place to rent so we wouldn’t be stuck in our second floor, two-room stuffy apartment in Laconia. I’d grown up on Lake Winnisquam and needed a place with fresh air where I could walk outside with my baby, barefoot, maybe even see the lake shimmer in the distance. If really lucky, we’d find a place where I could sit under a tree by the water and wade in to cool off on hot muggy days.

My brother and I at the lake

            We drove all afternoon and found a place, a small two-room cabin just down the road from my parents on Hill Road, across from the right-of-way that gave everyone on the opposite side of the road access to a swimming spot. The right-of-way, as we always called it, held memories of neighborhood swims and my first kiss from an out-of-town boy called Punk. When I needed space from my family or a retreat from a fight with my dad, I’d slip down to the right-of-way and sit under a big pine to daydream, cry or cool off.

            The day my dad died, we rented that cabin, relieved to find a place we could afford. I thought how lucky I was to be near my lake when the baby came. As we drove down Hill Road and approached my parent’s house, something happened that I’ve only been able to describe as a flash of light, as if an old-fashioned camera bulb had popped in my face and blinded me for a moment. I clutched at my rounded belly and said, “We have to stop. I need to see Dad.”

            I’d been taking Dad to the VA hospital in Vermont, checking on him for my mom when she was at work, but being so wrapped up in new-found love and baby making made me blind to how ill my dad was.

Dad, me and my brother Kent picking beans

            My husband didn’t like my father, so he drove past the salmon-colored ranch-style house that my father spent years remodeling, my life-long home only six months earlier. As we pulled out onto the Route 3, I glanced back at the house where my dad had tended his garden and raspberry bushes, a house that he insisted was “salmon-colored” not pink. The tiny porch wasn’t big enough for a chair, but it was a good place to get out of the weather and take off boots, to greet guests, to sit on the steps as a little kid with a friend or my brother or sister. I remember window boxes, having always had a soft spot for them, but I’m not sure they existed.

Kent, our Beagle King, Wendy & I

 Aunts, uncles, grandparents, friends, and co-workers would pass through that front door for parties, holidays, and summer gatherings. Christmas was our favorite holiday because mom always over did it with presents and Dad would complain that she was driving him to the poor house. When I think of my dad, I picture him sitting in his recliner, smoking Winstons, eating his Bridgemix and reading a book, if he wasn’t watching our new color television, the cause of one of my parents’ biggest arguments that left them not speaking for days and put us three kids on our best behavior because one thing we never doubted, even through the bad times was the great love our parents had for each other. I may have doubted my dad’s love for me at times, but I never doubted that my parents were in love.

Me with my mom and her sister Vera on our "porch"

            When my fights with Dad started, it was normal teenage fare, the whole unfairness of life. Why couldn’t I ride in cars with my friends? Why did I need to be home at that hour? Why couldn’t I hang out at the Tony’s Pizza Parlor? That’s when I became the cause of their arguments. Mom wanted to give me more freedom; Dad didn’t. Mom said the reason Dad and I fought was because we were too much alike. Dad said it wasn’t me he didn’t trust; it was boys.

            After leaving Hill Road, after deciding not to fight with my husband about stopping at my parents’ house, we drove in silence and when we reached our two-room apartment in Laconia, I trudged up the outside stairs, wanting to go back. We had just entered the apartment when the phone rang. My husband answered it, then handed the receiver to me.

            “Valerie, this is Dr. Robinson. I’m sorry. Your dad is dead. He shot himself.”

            I screamed and dropped the phone.

My son Jason was born three months later. I never doubted I was having a boy, even from the beginning. After Dad died, I was even more convinced it would be boy. I don’t remember picking out a girl’s name, although I know we did.

            Jason looks uncannily like his grandfather and has his wicked sense of humor and wit, his mannerisms, his work ethic, his sense of responsibility, but thankfully no health problems. I think my dad would have loved him. Or, would the two of them been too much alike and rubbed each other the wrong way? I don’t know.

Mom and Dad

            My dad was responsible right up to the end. On the day he died, he bought a new license and tags for the dog, made sure there was enough paint for one of us kids to finish the garage, and went to the barber for a haircut. He told mom all this in a letter he left, including letting mom know was no suicide clause in the insurance policy. The letter glows with his great love and adoration for my mom. He didn’t want to be a burden on the family and knew the way it was going, he would be. He included a p.s. to me, saying he was sorry he wouldn’t be there to see his first grandchild and, to the end, tried for humor by writing he hoped we wouldn’t give our baby his middle name, Horace.

            Our family still carries on his insistence of having manners, table manners being high on his list: elbows off the table, sit up straight, slow down. Dad would often say, “Don’t eat like your mother,” meaning the English way with knife and fork reversed and fork piled high.

            But this is also a man who sometimes did not eat what mom served for dinner, instead breaking Saltines into a bowl of milk after a day of working outside in the heat and humidity. He ate slowly, chewed each bite over and over, driving us kids crazy. This kind of control extended to the way he raised us. When he couldn’t control us and we fought him, he’d punish. “You might not love me,” he said once, “but one day you’ll respect me.” He was wrong. All I really wanted was to love him and be loved back, but he was a hard man to please and he took my rebellion personally.

            I have grandchildren now and, if I lavish them with love, it’s because sometimes all a teen needs is a hug and a “It will be okay. You’ll get through this.” Many times my fights with my dad might not have happened if I hadn’t felt judged and shamed, if I hadn’t felt my emotions being negated by a parental need to be perceived as in control and being seen as a perfect family.

            Don’t get me wrong. I’m not kidding myself here. Teens have their emotional needs and drives that often supersede anything parents can provide. Guiding teens through their teens is probably the hardest job there is as a parent because they’re competing with peers and hormones. Dad had two more children coming up fast behind me and I’m sure that crossed his mind as we battled and he grew more ill.

Dad

            And he was ill, more than I knew. He battled rheumatoid arthritis and prescription pills, and was unable to work toward the end. The only way out for him, as he concluded, was suicide. He did what he thought was the responsible thing, plus it would end his pain and sense of powerless. In his besieged mine, the only way our family would survive would be if he didn’t become a bigger financial and medical burden. I don't doubt that that indeed would have happened.

            Yet on the day he died, he didn’t realize he exchanged those possible burdens on us for bigger, emotional ones.

            Time has given me perspective and knowledge of suicide. Time has given me an understanding of how a need for control can also cause a loss of control. Some have said to me that suicide is the ultimate show of control, but I don't believe that in my dad's case that's true. If he hadn't been ill, he would have never given up. But when he couldn't be the husband and father he wanted to be, needed to be, he couldn't fake it anymore.

            Time has also, above all, shown me that perception should never overshadow love. I don’t care what others think about what my family goes through. We all have problems and I choose to be friends with people who share them and exchange knowledge so we can help out each other. The generation of our parents living in a “keeping up with the Joneses” and “what will the neighbors think” culture better be over because they’re faulty paradigms and destructive on so many levels, especially for a writer like myself who was conditioned to keep a lid on everything of importance and has had to fight to be free and express myself truthfully.

Kent and I in snow

            A few days ago, Mom said to me on the phone, “I wonder what our life would have been like if your dad had lived.” I couldn’t say. I couldn’t imagine it. I hope she visualized something sweet and carefree, something that, like in an act of creating fiction, she formed in her mind while erasing sickness, lack of money, a crazy political world that would have turned my dad apoplectic. I hope she saw her and Dad, retired by the lake, him fishing, her reading or talking on the phone. Maybe they even hold hands while sitting in chairs on the dock. 

Poppy day or Memorial Day around 1961

But maybe they would still be attending their American Legion activities, maybe still dancing as they always did so beautifully. I think she can create that in her mind, create her own story for a life they'd live now. I doubt very much that they would have ended up in Florida where she now lives. I think he’d had enough of hot and humid. But maybe, after shoveling snow one hard winter, he'd have been happy to join the snowbirds. Why not?

* * * * *

            I remember one winter day after a storm had dumped a foot or more of snow. Dad was out shoveling the walkway and I was playing on one of those high snow mounds the snowplow had left along the road. I dug a hole, probably one of those “digging to China” holes, and I dug it so deep, I couldn’t get out. When I realized this, I yelled over and over, “Dad! Dad!”

            When he finally heard me, he walked up the mound, looked down, shook his head and laughed. Then he reached down for my hand and lifted me out.

Dad, my mom's mom Nannie Smith holding me, and Mom

 

In Loving Memory

Albert Horace Brooks ~ April 3, 1916 to April 30, 1970.

Why I Haven’t Blogged in Over Two Months

            First, my heartfelt thanks to all of you who responded to my last post, “Being Cheryl Strayed.” You energized me. You made me believe in myself again and my writing. When I read your comments, I wanted to reach out and hug you all and let you know how much I believe in you.

I hope you’re all still digging deep for that authentic self, the one you always carry, the one that sometimes gets layered over with other people’s expectations, perceptions, and needs. The one that gets lost in our modern world, the world that keeps us so distracted we forget who we are and what makes us powerful creative beings. A toast to all of us.

            Now to tell you what happened after I wrote my last post. And it wasn’t what I expected, not by a long shot.

I truly expected to have a mega burst of creative energy. I was raw, open, and a little scared, but raring to go, especially to finish my novel.

            Instead, I found myself drop kicked to the ground. I just couldn’t get up. I couldn’t find the energy to write, to keep up with my responsibilities, to even be excited about the novel. What was wrong? What was happening? When I finally dragged myself to my feet and examined myself, I had a whole new problem to figure out and another layer to dig through.

            It was morning, a few weeks after the last blog post when I dragged myself out of bed and realized I was anxious and depressed. I’m not one to be depressed. It’s just not me. I took my usual half hour to wake up, my usual easing into the day. Dan was downstairs, drinking his coffee and reading the paper. He knows not to talk to me first thing and woe is he who asks, “What should we have for dinner tonight?”

            I stumbled around, heated water for tea, and tried to remember what my last thoughts were before I fell asleep and what I’d dreamed about. I often use sleep and dreams to solve problems. When I’m fully in tune with myself (happy, excited, adventurous, expectant), I go to bed with a story problem and sometimes wake up with a solution. My dreams are vivid, Technicolor, intense, full story dreams with a beginning, middle and end. Sometimes they are simply stories. Sometimes they are a collage of recent personal events and fears, or my fears for the world. Before 911, I had, like many people did, dreams of being in a tall building that was crumbling around me.

            But that morning I couldn’t remember anything about my dreams or what I’d wanted to process before I fell asleep.

While my tea brewed, I wiped down the sink, put dishes away from the night before, and read part of the paper standing up at the counter. I grabbed pencil and paper and wrote down a few groceries we needed. My fuzzy morning brain was waking up, but I wasn’t happy. I plunked down on the kitchen stool. When was the last time I was happy in the morning? When had I last woke up feeling excited, adventurous, expectant? I couldn’t remember.

Okay, the best way to push through all this was to prepare for the day. I flipped to a new sheet of paper and decided to write down what I would do that day. I started a list:

Write a blog post.

Then it came back to me, what I’d gone to bed mulling over and worrying about—I could not come up with a subject to blog about.

I’d never had a problem writing this blog. Never. I did think about what my readers would find interesting, but for the most part, my topics came from what I found interesting. Readers would find it worth reading or not. Sure, I worried about execution, the old “Can I pull this off? Or will I sound like an idiot?” I didn’t worry too much about the last part. I’ve sounded like an idiot before and it didn’t kill me.

Okay. So the problem was a topic for the blog. Easy then. Quit trying so hard. I could do a follow up to the reader comments from the last entry. I’d take the “Being Cheryl Strayed” to another level. I wrote that down on my list. I could write about my decision to drop the pirate persona, how I now found it tedious, and I’d explain why.

Nah, that wasn’t even interesting.

I took a deep breath. My mind was all over the place with ideas but I just couldn’t get excited about any of them. Okay, don’t panic. I’d set that aside for the moment. I would make a list of everything I needed to do and start working on that. Crossing things off a list was always therapeutic. I wrote:

Check your Facebook page because you’ve let that go.

You forgot to check ValinParis account for comments.

Post the Cheryl Strayed piece to Women Writing the West Yahoo users group.

Set up Hootsuite; need to follow hashtag groups.

Goodreads—woefully out of date!

Go through all your email; needs attention!

Respond to SheWrites messages and post to groups.

Write the column for Books By the Bed.

I set the pencil down. I felt a little sick. I stared at the list.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

I took my now cold tea to my writing room and stood there, looking at my library of novels and reference books, the stacks of literary magazines and the binders full of research. A partial manuscript was tucked in my laptop bag with all my revision notes.

Reading area in my writing room

What used to make me happy, excited, adventurous, expectant was writing. Writing fiction. Why wasn’t I devoting every waking—and sleeping—moment to finishing my novel? That’s what I used to fall asleep with—characters, story, plot problems, structure possibilities. I know I can’t do that all the time, but I remember when I’d wake up in that fuzzy first hour, noodling ideas and excited about perhaps a scene I needed to finish.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

Internet.

That’s why I couldn’t move, couldn’t be excited, was depressed. I’d been letting all this online networking and social media—creating a web presence, as they call it—take over. What was the use of having all this “presence” if I didn’t have a finished novel? What good did it do anyway? Who were these people who said you had to have a web presence if you wanted to be an author? Who were these gurus who insisted that this new world of publishing demanded an author FB/Tweet/blog/Google+/Klout/Pinterest, etc.?

I drank my cold tea and pushed away that old Puritan who said, “How dare you question authority.” What authority, I asked? I used to work in advertising and marketing. I understood the old caveat emptor warning. So I asked myself, Who is selling us on the idea of all this social media and internet marketing?

I don’t begrudge anyone the opportunity to recognize a need and create a service to fill that need. They have to make a living and they do give away lots of good info before asking you to buy something. I subscribe to three of these social media gurus e-newsletters, so I asked myself, What roped me in?

 Use of their urgent language? Use of their authoritative tone? The fear of not doing it?

“If you don’t do this, you won’t succeed.”

Well, maybe. But does anyone have the numbers to prove this? Sure, I want to be successful. I want to be ready for the moment when my book is published. But what price am I paying?

            If I’m sacrificing my happiness, my creativity, the immersion time I need to write, if I don’t have time anymore to read other novels, why bother? I’d even dragged these demands to Colonyhouse retreats because when you’re on that many sites, you have to keep up on a daily basis. You have to get online and be “present.”

            No, I said to myself that morning. Not if it means you can’t be fully present in your writing. In that wonderful creative half-awake state that morning, not once had I thought about my novel.

            Not once.

I had to do something drastic.

So I did. I dropped all my social media activities and went on a blog hiatus. Just like that.

Once again, I was back in the land of the writer. I went to bed with my novel, woke up with it, noodled it in the car, devoted myself to it for a month, and fell in love again. The novel grew stronger and deeper with this immersion; the writing was some of my best.

I finished April 1, the deadline I’d first set for myself, and that’s not an April Fool’s joke. The novel is now out with five readers and I’m happier than I’ve been in … damn, I can’t remember when. Probably sometime before I dove into the social media. Even Dan has commented on how much happier I seem.

            I've heard the argument for balancing both, limiting my time online, giving myself one hour in the evening, etc. etc. But let’s be honest. How many of you have been online for an hour? It’s more along the lines of look at the clock and gasp because three hours have gone by. And never mind trying to return to your writing, fully present in that. No, you’re concentration, that precious immersion in story, has been infected. With internet.

            As many of you know, the gift of being a writer is the joy of noodling an idea, slurping it around the mouth, playing with the creative food. It’s about immersion. When I’m writing, even the bad days are good. Even when I’m writing drivel, the days are better than anything else.

            I did have pangs of guilt for not being on all those internet sites I’d joined. But it didn’t depress me or make me anxious. After the novel was done, I decided to clear up my writing room, weed out saved articles and old magazines. Spring was in the air and I like order. As I went through articles I had saved, I came across one that took away any residual guilt about my dropping out from the internet.

The article, “Inner Space: Clearing Some Room for Inspiration,” by Frank Bures examines the same problem I’d been dealing with and that many creative people face. When I was online every day to do my social media, I had what Bures admitted he developed, what researcher Linda Stone calls “continuous partial attention.”

Continuous partial attention.

Lake Winnisquam

Ping! I couldn’t stay in the story or daydream or be in the warm fuzzy creative space upon waking. My focus was chopped up into too many small bites. I yearned for my childhood days when I would spend hours sitting under a tree beside Lake Winnisquam, making up stories that I’d spin into words later on paper.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m organized. I have systems. I keep great files. I’m pretty good at time management.

This, however, is something entirely different. Overuse of the internet slices and dices your brain. It damages your focus, your creative headspace.

So here we are in this modern tech age when we are expected to be online every day to create a presence and it’s rupturing the connection to our creativity? And what of our writerly isolation and prolonged sitting? (Lots of new info on how dangerous that is.) I know I have even more reason to limit that “online presence.”

I do love my online communities, the amazing, helpful, wonderful people, the great resources. But I will from now on be absent when writing and promise to give you a heads up.

And yes, I finished my novel. Relief! Happiness! Fulfillment!

For fun—after the novel was done—I ran the first page of it through the website “I Write Like …” and came up with David Foster Wallace. Yes, go ahead and play with the site. Drop a chunk of your writing into the box and see who pops up. I wanted my writing to be like Margaret Atwood’s, but David’s would definitely do.

I’m celebrating, both the finish of my novel and my new freedom. You’ve been with me for almost a year and a half, given me support and courage, and for that I’m giving away a copy of Cheryl’s memoir Wild. If you leave a comment, your name goes into the hat. Either use the comment box or send to the ValinParis email.

Also, I would love to have your reactions to my story. Do you have similar stories and concerns? What are they? Have you experienced a negative effect on your writing from being on the internet? Or not? I’m really curious. I know we have to market our books once they’re published, but is all this social media necessary and does it work? What do you refuse to do? What do you think is really necessary? How do you make those decisions?

Thanks again for being there, for reading this. Please join the conversation. In the meantime, ask yourself this: what is running around inside your head when you wake up? Does it make you happy or anxious? Why?

And for your information, I won’t be blogging weekly. I’ll blog when I’m inspired and want to reach out to you.

Until then, hugs all ‘round.

Val

p.s. If anyone heard the NPR Morning Edition story about this same subject/issue, please let me know when you heard it and if there's a link to it. I didn't hear it, but was told about it. Thanks!

Also, if you're interested, check out the books I'm reading, Books Beside the Bed, at We Wanted to Be Writers.

Confession: Being Cheryl Strayed

My confession—

This is the most difficult blog post I’ve written so far. It’s about being emotionally naked as a writer. It’s about being vulnerable.

I hate that.

But I swore to myself I wouldn’t post it until I was naked on the page although I gave myself some leeway: it didn’t matter if the piece had flaws or awkward prose; it didn’t matter if I stumbled; it only mattered that I let go. This time I needed to truly examine myself. On the page. For the whole world to see.

This is my humble and terrifying attempt.

* * * * * *

About a month ago, my Litchix crewmate Chris Scofield sent a link to an essay in The Sun magazine. I remembered reading Cheryl Strayed’s story “The Love of My life” years ago when it was first published. I remembered thinking at the time, “How can she love her mother like a lover? How is that possible?” I remembered feeling a little sick and sad for her. I remembered being a little repulsed. But I never forgot that story, and I’ve read everything of hers since, including her novel Torch.

This time, after rereading, I felt sad for me. I’d been writing for over twenty years and couldn’t get a novel published. Cheryl at twenty-three sent her first short story to a contest, won first prize, sent a copy of the story to Alice Munro—yes, that Alice Munro—and Alice wrote back within two weeks, ending her letter with "I wasn't writing nearly so well at your age."

So I printed out “The Love of My Life” and read it six more times. I underlined. I highlighted. I sat with it. I carried it with me, as if by osmosis I could find the secret to writing like her.

I highlighted her first sentence:

“The first time I cheated on my husband, my mother had been dead for exactly one week.”

I highlighted and underlined the paragraph’s last sentence:

“I was raw, fragile, vicious with grief. I would do anything.”

Raw. Fragile. Vicious.

I’d been there.

I would do anything.

Pause.

Had I been there?

No.

I would not do anything. Emotions did not control me. I controlled emotions. By suppressing them.

And there it was. Years of conditioning. Years of growing up in New Hampshire where never exposing yourself or your emotions was considered a strength. If you did, there were consequences.

I remember my brother the day after my dad shot himself. The police came to the house with the gun. My brother started crying. The policeman, still holding the gun, said, “Stop crying. You’re the man of the house now.” And Kent stopped crying. Has he cried since? Probably. Has he fully grieved my dad? I have no idea. For me it took twenty years and the death of my two dogs to crack me open. Months of crying, sometimes sobbing until I felt sick. But the grief finally turned to a manageable level and eventually disappeared. I did this by myself, sometimes in bed next to my husband.

But those years of conditioning, of being the oldest, the caregiver, kept my emotions bottled up. Oh, I acted out, fought against the strict rules and unfairness of my parents’ world, but that’s a normal reaction to parents who rule by reward and punishment. I wanted to be good girl, but in this case, it was impossible to live up to the standards without being lobotomized. It was dangerous to show emotions, too, so I went head on with my folks, thwarting their rules. My mom would prefer to forget those teenage rebellious acts and prefers me as a little girl. As mom puts it still, “You were always such a good girl. When you were upset, you went to your room and closed the door.”

Closed the door.

Yes, I did.

Cheryl Strayed

So when I read Cheryl’s essay again, that door creaked open a bit. I needed to see how I either compared to her or not. I had a life as intense as hers, feelings as vicious. I suppose you could say that since my dad gave or withheld love depending on my obedience, then getting pregnant by a bi-polar, alcoholic Vietnam Vet with PTSD was an in-your-face act of rebellion. Oh, I was madly in love with the guy. He did look like George Harrison. But once my parents started talking to me again, we followed a pretty standard path—marriage, work, living near my parents. Then my dad committed suicide. But I had a husband who loved me. I soon had a baby to care for and love. My husband, in a few years soon to be my ex, at the time proved himself worthy, helping the family, shoring up my sister, being there for me. For a while, it seemed I had done something good, accidentally good, but good nonetheless.

I turn back to Cheryl’s story. After her mother’s death, she had sex with some risky, possibly dangerous characters. She destroyed her marriage with a good man. She shot heroin. That’s how vicious her grief was.

Damn. Was I lacking? Did I not love my father enough? Did I not show my grief enough? Did I actually have enough grief?

Some would say I was simply trying to replace a father who didn’t know how to love by finding someone who could, someone who would accept me without conditions on my behavior. But as they say, love is blind. What they should say is youth is blind. I wanted to live and love. Cheryl wanted to join her mother. She wanted to die. At least that’s how I see it.

Thankfully, she didn’t. But the risks she took were outside anything I could take. Her grief drove her there. My grief drove me in a different direction. Different roads, different drivers.

Perhaps the key to our differences is this—I lost someone every year of high school. My best friend’s mother. The neighbor boy. A girlfriend’s brother whom I had a crush on. My best friend, Diane. I knew grief in many different forms. I’d grown up with death.

My dad’s death the year after I graduated made me want to save people. My ex husband. My sister. Friends. I would not lose one more person.

So what prevents me from writing about this? Where’s the rawness, the fragility, the viciousness of Cheryl’s grief in my writing? What am I afraid of? Am I afraid that I’ll hurt someone? Am I afraid of divulging someone’s secrets or showing them in a negative light? No. Not really. Writing with heart and empathy prevents this. Writing about our lives is not about vendetta or judgment, and Cheryl and I both write without those.

I ask myself again, "What am I afraid of?" Truthfully, nothing. Anyone who knows me can attest to that. I can write about my father who shot himself in the family Oldsmobile out in the woods at his favorite hunting spot. He left a letter. He bought dog tags that day and got a haircut. He loved my mother with the love of a teenage boy. The night he died, I curled up with my husband and cried myself to sleep. My brother was probably left alone now that he was the man of the family. My mother slipped into my sister’s bed, curled up against her, and cried all night, and many nights for years to come.

And then we went on. I’m sure we were back at work or school within two weeks. I was one month short of nineteen, newly married, and six months pregnant. My brother was seventeen, my sister thirteen, mom forty-seven. We went back to the lives we were living before dad died.

Cheryl says that everyone tries to help you through your grief by telling stories that are similar. I doubt if anyone told her a story where they went out and fucked every available man or tried heroin, but I bet there are stories just as intense. What makes Cheryl’s story so different is in the telling, is in the way she puts you in her shoes and doesn’t apologize and at the same time seems just as surprised by her actions as the reader does. She could not imagine a life without her mother. She wanted to die. That’s how she handled her emotions.

Hers was the cry of a child. I picture a three year old abandoned on the street in a strange town, and it’s raining. She screams. She screams out to those walking past and grabs their legs. She won’t let go. And when one pushes her away, she grabs another and another until somewhere amongst all those people asks “Where’s your family?” She didn’t have any. No other family members appear in her stories. She has nowhere to turn, so she decides to hike the Pacific Coast Trail. A pilgrimage of sorts? Another risky, do or die act? Yes. Another physical act that walks/hikes/sweats away her grief. She’s written about it in her new memoir Wild, out in March. Will she ever put her mother’s ghost to rest? I don’t know. Maybe her mother’s gift is the gift of story. Maybe that’s what she gave Cheryl by dying young. Her mother became her muse.

 

Cheryl reading a funny/hairaising bit from WILD

And me? Well, I’ve come to the conclusion that what I write about is different from Cheryl. I take risks, I’m not afraid about what my family or friends think, but I rub up against life in my own way. I, too, had sex with lots of men after my divorce from, as Cheryl would write it, the Bi-polar Vietnam Vet George Harrison Look Alike. But I had sex because I was free of my family and could do it my way. I liked having sex. I felt empowered by it. As I remember either my dad or husband saying, “You never know someone until you either work or sleep with them.” I’d say that’s true. Also, I was looking for love and seeing who was out there. I knew their names, I asked them questions about their lives, I had short relationships that didn’t work out. But I remained friends with most of them. I sure as hell wasn’t going to confuse love with just sex. So I took care of that. I wasn’t trying to find my dad. I didn’t need another control freak, but I did want a man with a sense of honor and humor. And I found him eventually.

As did Cheryl. She found a husband and had children and can boast that she’s one of the finest writers alive. She did good. So did I. I could leave it there, but it’s not about us. It’s about writers.

My essay about my relationship with my dad

And you can see what we go through. The comparisons. The constant re-examination. The lottery-like odds of winning a New York publishing contract. I write novels and I can’t tell you why New York publishers haven’t picked one up yet. I’ve won awards and residencies and have short pieces published. But all this worry and comparison to Cheryl could be explained by where I’m at now. I’m finishing a novel and once again, I’m putting myself out there. Naked again. I’ve probably written this blog to work through my anxiety. I’m sure I wrote this blog because Miss Gonna Be a Great Writer Who Is Loved By Alice Munro showed up at the right time for me to use her. Sorry Cheryl. I do adore your writing and you.

“Trust the process,” everyone tells a writer.

Yes, well, you can say that all day to a writer, but in the end, you have to trust yourself. And that can be the hardest part of the whole damn journey.

Yours, as always,

Captain Val

Coming Up!
Who the hell knows? I'm trying to finish a novel, for landlubber's sake!

For more about Cheryl:
Cheryl comes out as Sugar, the advice columnist on The Rumpus
Cheryl is featured in the March issue of Vogue 
Click here for Cheryl's website

The Muse is Back and Dishes Inspiration

Hello, everyone!

Sparrow here, Captain Val’s muse. Thank you for all the support you’ve given her lately and, new pirates, welcome aboard the Gobsmacked.

I’m once again filling in for Captain Val as she is a tad bit overwhelmed (taxes, polishing her novel, family, a short trip to Ashland, and, well, life). For those who remember my last post (read it here), she did apologize for calling me flighty. I’m not upset anymore. She needs me. And what’s a muse for?

            Of course, now I have to think of something muse-like to write about. As my role is to inspire and sprinkle some kind of writerly fairy dust, I decided that perhaps the lot of you could stand a little sparkle also. It’s January, it’s winter, the holidays are over, and don’t you feel a little … well, just a smidgen in need? of encouragement? of love? of inspiration?

            Good. Now that’s settled, let’s start with a bit of humor, sent by Kathryn Lang and found at Jason Love’s website.

            Isn’t it refreshing to see that writers can make fun of themselves—well most of them. I do understand your angst. We all have it. But if writing is like dealing with cancerous tumors, as one writer told Captain Val, stop writing and become a pilot or a nurse, anything that gives you joy. Life is short!

            Now, onward to inspiration.

I am not a writer, just a muse. So I turn to others, your kin, with their words of wisdom. Think of what I offer as your very own goody grab bag.

            Let’s start at the beginning. 2012. How did you approach the new year? Resolutions? A to-do list of all the things you want to fix or make or change? Now that we're in the year of the dragon, let's do something auspicious. Ellen Goodman has a the right idea.

"We spend January 1st walking through our lives, room by room, drawing up a list of work to be done, cracks to be patched. Maybe this year, to balance the list, we ought to walk through the rooms of our lives ... not looking for flaws, but for potential."

Potential. I like that! Thank you Becky Green Aaronson for posting this.

Barbara Sullivan, Captain Val’s go to advisor on all things literary, uses this idea of potential when guiding her through a rewrite. I paraphrase here:

Don’t look at what isn’t working. Read through your novel. Look for and highlight all the passages, scenes, descriptions that knock you out. The ones that cheer you as in “I can’t believe I wrote that!” That’s the good stuff you want to tap. That gives you the potential, the scaffolding, for everything else.

            Captain Val’s crewmate, Chris Scofield, sent this quote from Josephine Demott Robinson, a circus performer in the first half of the 20th century. Her advice not to let failure deter you is sound and is the idea that you need to encourage your efforts. Like the inferred note of self-assessment too, not so bad, a little more practice and you'll get there, an applicable bit of inspiration for everyone. For writers, this can be what you need during each rewrite.

"Never mind if you fall far short of the thing you want to do, encourage your effort. If no one else will say it to you, say it to yourself. ‘Not so bad.’ It will make the next effort easier and better."

            Do you encourage your efforts? Do you give yourself credit for every growth jump you take? Captain Val doesn’t wait to publish before she rewards herself. She rewards the levels of efforts it takes to get there. If she finishes an application to a residency, she celebrates. If she finishes a first draft, she celebrates. Every rewrite, every move to the next professional level is cause for celebration according to her. (Yes, she does like to celebrate!)

           Another bit for those who love the crazy free-spirited Jack Kerouac. In 1958, he wrote a letter to Don Allen and included a 30-point list of “essentials” that he titled “Belief and Technique for Modern Prose.” You can read the entire list on Lists of Note, but here are numbers 14-17:

·  Like Proust be an old teahead of time

·  Telling the true story of the world in interior monolog

·  The jewel center of interest is the eye within the eye

·  Write in recollection and amazement for yourself

 The ultimate inspiration for February and the Year of the Dragon? Kristen Lamb’s treasure chest blog Warrior Writers offers “Three Steps to Freedom: Grab Hold of your Brilliant Future.” What a title! And this is not just for writers. Everyone! Read this. Please! Here’s a taste:

This blog is dedicated to helping writers holistically. We are more than robots sitting at a desk pounding out word count. We have hopes, dreams, fears, bad habits and baggage. …

Three Lessons of Confession

Confess the Real Emotion—Name It and Claim It

One of the first things that offered me a new sense of empowerment was when I learned to confess the real emotion I was feeling.

Click here to read this blog: Kristen Lamb’s WarriorWriters

            Ah, there’s my call to duty. Seems as if the Captain needs me for a few hours while she polishes her novel.

My inner child at the moment

             BUT before I go, I want a word with the guy who wrote “Housebreaking Your Muse.” I beg your pardon! Muses are not DOGS! How demeaning! Muses everywhere demand an apology. I know you were trying to be cute, but muses are energy, light, intuition, not a bad pup that needs its nose rubbed in its pee. It’s the writer who needs training, focus, meditation … whatever! Muses are always there for our captains. So, please! No more!

            Sigh.

            Again, gentle readers, thank you for letting me be here. Captain Val will be back next week.

            In the meantime, what inspires you? Can you see the potential instead of what doesn't work? In fact, tell us how you're going to change your outlook, how you'll approach your project from now on. Will you now approach your writing with a fresh new attitude? What will you do? What will be your reward for the first step you take?
            Oh, what fun! Captain Val would love to hear from you, and you don’t need to be a writer to do this. I think February should be The Potential Month, See the Possibilities Month. Now I’m excited!

            For now, until next time, much love,

            Sparrow
 p.s. And don't forget to call on your Muse for help! (But please, don't use a dog whistle.)

Coming Soon!

Captain Val Throws a Creative Soiree with her Crew
Waiting for Wild and Why I'll Read Everything Cheryl Strayed Writes

How a Research Trip to Paris went Aground and What Saved It

Interview with Diane Prokop, Book Reviewer - Part II

Here it is, maties! Second half of my interview with Diane Prokop. Enjoy!

Max and Jazz with their human

Tell me about Wordstock. My readers would like to see you in action.

Michael Ondaatje at Wordstock

Wordstock Literary Fest is crazy for me. I have back-to-back readings and interviews for two days. This year I interviewed Anne Enright and Anna Solomon and did event coverage for Michael Ondaatje, Isabel Wilkerson, Barry Lopez, Steve Almond, Peter Mountford, Charles Yu, and others I can’t recall at the moment. Plus, I wanted to get all my first editions signed, so I would do the interview, record the reading, take pics and then rush to the signing area. It was during a signing that I met Jennifer Egan. When she saw my press pass she asked me - with a smile on her face - why I hadn’t asked to interview her. I told her that I didn’t think she would have time. She laughed and gave me her email address and said to contact her, which I will definitely do. Lovely lady! I still haven’t posted all the Wordstock coverage to my site yet.

What was the funniest encounter with an author?

A lot of what gets said in an interview is “off the record.” In other words, until those authors die, I’ll have to keep it to myself. I stand by the journalists code of ethics for the most part. However, it’s amazing to me what an author will share with me “on the record” and later I will listen to it and make a decision not to write about it. I guess I’m trying to protect them from themselves. Some of it is extremely funny, but if they’re trashing their publisher or their readers, that’s something that’s better left off the page. Maybe they’re having a bad day or are letting off some steam. Hopefully, when their next book comes around, they’ll remember my discretion and agree to another interview. Sometimes I think I’m missing an opportunity to make a big splash with a little dirt on a famous author, but in the end, it’s not worth it to me.

What was the most horrifying?

Nothing horrifying has ever happened to me, but I did embarrass myself big time with Richard Price. I am a huge fan of his and have read everything he’s written. When he visited Powell’s, I wasn’t doing my blog yet and was just there as a fan. He seemed very nervous while he was reading. His knuckles were white where they grasped the lectern. He wasn’t happy with some of the audience questions about his books being made into movies either. I should have picked up on all this, but unfortunately I was too excited about meeting him to notice, except in retrospect. When I got to the signing table, he asked me a question, which I thought for some insane reason was, “Are you a writer?” I was like, Wow! He wants to talk about life and the world of writing, so I started rambling. At one point I even said, “I’m a writer and I’m working on a novel but it’s not going very well.” When I finally checked back into reality, I realized he was looking at me with what can only be described as supreme pity and then he said rather curtly, “Could you please just tell me what you want me to write in your book.” All he had wanted was my name so he could inscribe my book. He wrote something and I ran. Later, I saw he had written, “To Diane, You will find a writing job.” If I ever have the chance to meet him again, I

promise to be on my best behavior! Later I read that he was going through a divorce so that would have explained his less than happy mood. It also taught me a lesson as a fan and certainly as a reviewer and that is, “It’s not about me.” When I meet with an author, I try to keep my mouth shut and just listen.

Another time I was at a reading of Joseph O’Neill who wrote Netherland. Sometimes people are too shy to be the first to ask a question so I’ll ask one of the standards to get things going. There were about 150 people in the room, but no one spoke up when he opened it up to questions. He had just been interviewed on stage, so I didn’t have any questions about his book that hadn’t already been asked. Without thinking, I asked him what he was working on and when did he expect it to be published. The on-stage interviewer chimed in and said that he was wondering the same thing. Well, that turned out to be the wrong question because apparently he had been dealing with a severe case of writer’s block for quite some time. I forget exactly what he said in response, but it was something along the lines of “I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT THAT!” I remember wanting to crawl under my chair. I’ve since learned never to ask an author when his new book is coming out unless I already know the answer.

What author do you most want to meet? Why?

The author I was most excited about meeting this year was Anne Enright. I’ve been a huge fan of hers since she wrote The Gathering and then fell in love all over again this year with The Forgotten Waltz. She has her finger on the pulse of the times we’re living in and she’s very funny. She’s a completely fearless writer. I approached her publicist about interviewing her and when they said yes, I immediately started to sweat. I listened to every audio clip I could find of her being interviewed and grew more and more nervous. Talk about not suffering fools gladly! I heard her dress down plenty of interviewers on those clips. I was 20 minutes early to the interview and was having heart palpitations by the time she breezed into the room. I could feel her presence before she opened her mouth. Her book is about a woman who cheats on her husband and is totally self-absorbed. The first thing I said to her was, “So this is obviously an autobiography?” For a moment she froze and then she burst out laughing, and it was all good from there. It was an amazing hour that I’ll never forget. I’ll be posting that interview the first part of January.

What advice can you give authors for giving a good reading?

Lidia Yuknavitch

Josh Ritter

Author events are unnatural. Authors need training and advice to make that important connection with the audience. I always say, “Be humble and self-deprecating. Talk a little bit about the genesis of your book. Read from your book for five minutes - ten, if you must. Take questions for 30 minutes and play the guitar, if possible.” I’m kidding about the guitar, sort of. One of the best readings I went to was for Josh Ritter’s book, Bright’s Passage. Because of the bubble I live in, I was the only one in a room of 300 that didn’t know he was a famous musician. He stood a couple feet from me and between reading passages from his book, he played his guitar and sang. It was fantastic! Afterwards, he talked to me, gave me a hug and told me to let him know when my review was up. Sure, I thought. I contacted him via Twitter when I put up my post, and he gave me the ultimate nod when he re-tweeted that info to seventeen thousand of his fans. He also gave me permission to post my bootleg audio clips of the songs he played. Needless to say, I had a lot of hits for that stuff and still do. Powell’s sold every copy of his book that night. Patti Smith and Rosanne Cash were the same format, but at a paid author event, and it worked really well, but I didn’t get to meet them because I hadn’t started my blog yet. The Chronology of Water author, Lidia Yuknavitch, gave a riveting reading in which she stripped down to a Speedo swimsuit and pretty much cried throughout the entire thing. The audience adored her. So I would say be creative, be your most authentic self, and always expect the unexpected.

Charles Frazier

For instance, it’s raining and this is your debut novel. Three people show up. Treat them like royalty. Instead of standing at the front of the room, sit down with them and chat. At a reading not too long ago, a fan had a seizure and the author had to ask if there was a doctor in the audience - there was. Several readings have brought out some interesting fans. Turn of Mind, the mystery by Alice LaPlante about a doctor with Alzheimer’s, had several people with varying degrees of Alzheimer’s in the audience - great questions! At another reading, someone blurted out a question while the author was in the middle of his opening. When he asked her, in the nicest way possible, to hang on for a bit and he would get back to her, the fan got up and walked out. Several times in the signing line, I’ve been manhandled by impatient fans. The last time was at Charles Frazier’s reading, and I barely missed being thrown to the floor by someone who said that since she had been the first one to the store that day, she should be the first in line. One night a woman in the back of a room crowded with hundreds of people asked if her son could get his book signed first because it was past his bedtime. It was 8:30 and the “boy” turned out to be 14 years old, but everyone was gracious and let him go first. He was humiliated and just kept saying, “I hate my mother.” People will ask you anything that pops into their heads, so be prepared to say no to some questions. Sometimes the audience has no questions at all, so have a story or two on hand to tell. Finally, most people do not go out on a work night in the driving rain to give you a hard time. They are there because they like your work. Be kind and generous.

What about readers? Some online reviewers are actually paid by the author or publisher to write reviews for them.

I personally don’t know any reviewers who are paid by the author or publisher. I know that some publications do sponsor book reviews, which means they pay a reviewer to read it. That’s not something I would ever do.

What did you read as a teenager?

I remember my life changing in high school when I read James Baldwin and Jack Kerouac. It shifted again in college, when I took workshops with beat poets Gary Snyder and Allen Ginsberg. I was very much a child of the sixties even though I actually graduated high school in the 70s. The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, Rights In Conflict, Soul on Ice - well, you get the picture. My junior year in high school I read the dictionary from cover to cover. Can’t remember why. Maybe because I heard that every book ever written was contained in there.

Can you describe your taste in novels?

I like reading about the human condition, so I would say literary fiction, memoir, essays, travel and humor. Once in awhile I’ll break from those genres as I did recently for Stephen King’s 11/22/63, which I loved.

What is your quirkiest attribute as a reviewer?

My quirkiest attribute would have to be how much work I put into promoting an author I like. I’ve even picked them up at their hotels and driven them to their readings. Like I said, it’s personal with me.

If you were transported into the body of one fictional character, who would it be?

Even though I don’t read much sci-fi, I’ve always been fascinated with time travel. So any character who travels through time. That’s probably a result of being a two-time cancer survivor. Who wouldn’t want to travel back before you realized you were mortal.

What question have you never been asked that you’ve always wanted to be asked? And what’s the answer?

No one ever asks me anything about why I do what I do, so Val, I want to thank you for being the first and one and only. If there were just one question I always thought should be asked, it would be this: Is every book reviewer a frustrated novelist?

The answer is, of course, a resounding yes! I’ve been hard at work on my novel, “Nod,” for a few years now.

 --------------------------

(FYI: Diane reviews primarily lit fiction, memoir, travel, and some humor. She doesn't read YA, romance, vampire, and rarely science fiction. You can get a flavor of her reading tastes by going to her site.)

To follow Diane, click on any of these links:
Diane's Book Blog
Diane on Twitter 
Diane on Facebook 
Diane on Goodreads 
 

Thank you, Diane, for such a forthright and informative interview! And to thank you, readers and fellow pirates, I will select five questions from you to present to Diane and will post her answers in a future blog. Here's your opportunity to ask those burning questions (or the ones I forgot to ask!) and hear what she has to say. So send your questions to me ValinParis (at) earthlink (dot) net and I'll post them with the answers. Until then ...

Stay dry and keep readin'! It's our only defense against ignorance.

Your Captain, Author and Book Lover,

Captain Val 

Coming Up!

Who knows? Stay tuned!