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You’ve probably already been here as I’m never the earliest anywhere except the zoo, museums, playgrounds and places in which excessive queuing is involved. But here is an excerpt anyway and you can listen to the whole interview with Jonah Lehrer and read bits from his book.
I love these particular bits from the article:
On how Steve Jobs redesigned Pixar studios to maximize collaboration and creativity
“The original design for the Pixar studios consisted of three separate buildings, where they’d put the computer scientists in one building, and the animators in a second building and the third building would contain everybody else: the directors, the editors and so on. Steve realized that that was a terrible idea; that the real challenge of Pixar was getting people from these different cultures — these computer scientists and these cartoonists — to work together, to really collaborate. And so he insisted that Pixar studios just be one vast, cavernous space.”
On forcing people to meet and mingle … even if it’s in the bathroom
“[Jobs] insisted there be only two bathrooms in the entire Pixar studios, and that these would be in the central space. And of course this is very inconvenient. No one wants to have to walk 15 minutes to go to the bathroom. And yet Steve insisted that this is the one place everyone has to go every day. And now you can talk to people at Pixar and they all have their ‘bathroom story.’ They all talk about the great conversation they had while washing their hands.
” … He wanted there to be mixing. He knew that the human friction makes the sparks, and that when you’re talking about a creative endeavor that requires people from different cultures to come together, you have to force them to mix; that our natural tendency is to stay isolated, to talk to people who are just like us, who speak our private languages, who understand our problems. But that’s a big mistake. And so his design was to force people to come together even if it was just going to be in the bathroom.”
The bathroom! Right on! And this bit, too:
On why you should stop trying to harness your brain, and instead help your brain get out of its harness
“The question becomes, what happens if you hit the wall? Because we’ve all got experience with this. You’re working on a creative problem, and then all of a sudden that feeling of progress disappears … What you should do then — when you hit the wall — is get away from your desk. Step away from the office. Take a long walk. Daydream. Find some way to relax. Get those alpha waves. Alpha waves are a signal in the brain that’s closely correlated with states of relaxation. And what scientists have found is that when people are relaxed, they’re much more likely to have those big ‘A ha!’ moments, those moments of insight where these seemingly impossible problems get solved. So when you hit the wall, the best thing you can do is probably take a very long, warm shower. The answer will only arrive once you stop looking for it.”
Showers! I’m telling you! I’ve lived it! Er, live it. This newsflash is now over. Goodnight and have a playground tomorrow. I mean p l e a s a n t tomorrow. One that brings you one day closer to the opening of The Hunger Games movie. Or at least one containing peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Flaxseed peanut butter. Organic raspberry jelly. Homemade bread w/secret ingredients, including carrot puree, wheatgerm and super-finely-grated zucchini.
White bread??? Come on over and have mine.
And I do.
There’s always a period of curious fear between the first sweet-smelling breeze and the time when the rain comes cracking down.
—Don DeLillo
Yes. And a curious fear in the short time it takes to crack open the cover of White Noise and delve into the first page. He scares me. And enthralls me. But scares me enough that I haven’t read Falling Man yet. But I will. But kind of wish I already had. But I will. He is a writer I learn from and whose fiction haunts (me). His name reminds me of food, or a drink. Care for a DeLillo anyone? Yo, gimme a DeLillo on the rocks! DeLillo. Shaken. Not stirred. I’ll take a DeLillo with my Hitler Studies, thank you, and a pair of sunglasses. 1 flaming DeLillo, please, with a side of scallops. DeLillos for everyone, on the house! It’s raining. Non-acidic rain, we hope. Finally, it’s raining after the driest, hottest, windiest winter I can recall. It’s raining. Hard. The umbrellas have been located. Puddles were made use of. My little family is napping. The bookshelves are calling. Do you know where your DeLillo is?
In case you’re missing it, agent Michael Bourret from Dystel & Goderich and editor Molly O’Neill are conversing via their blogs about middle grade novels–what they look for, what they like, what middle grade is or might be or possibly isn’t but not necessarily. The conversation will continue for a couple of weeks, it seems, so if, like me, you are interested in such topics and eager to know which middle grade books these two think are excellent, lasting, possible contemporary classics, and such, you will want to click. Although the bottom line seems to be, as always, no matter the genre, style or lack thereof: just write something good.
And now? This:
No. Not mold. I want to eat them all. With a Guinness. And a shamrock stuck to my forehead.
With a house full of in-laws, 1 out-of-his-brain-with-excitement preschooler, visiting dogs, horrified puking and peeing everywhere cats, a small crew installing the new dishwasher and ceiling fans and outdoor sensor lighting, much celebrating involving caramel cakes, Seuss stuffs and misbehaving golfclubs, 1 courtesy-of-kind-in-laws date night and a head cold going on all weekend, it was crazy to try and make a grant deadline. On my way to the laundry room, my arms full of hose-soaked little-boy clothes, I paused to re-read the grant instruction sheet about to slip off the top of my dog’s sleeping crate. A cold feeling worked its way into my heart. The date I thought stated ‘postmarked by’ actually read ‘must be received by’. Big difference. Upon cramming and starting the washing machine, I quickly rescued the wireless printer from beneath a paint splattered tarp, dodged workers and ladders and closed myself in my bedroom office where for the next hour I tweaked my writing bio, revised essays, found a way to trim my writing sample from 2501 words to the grant limit of 2500, took a break to make Thai coconut soup, obliged requests for popsicles, apple juice, cereal bars, pretzels, binoculars and a butterfly net, poured over all grant materials again, excused myself and headed for Kinko’s/Fedex. Never mind that I had started compiling these grant materials a month ago. Never mind that obviously I really need to get my eyes checked. Never mind that I forgot to add the coconut milk to the Thai coconut soup. Deadline accomplished. Now—this clouds-covered Tuesday, company departed, the cats recovering, my son and I cozy in our quiet home, I with my laptop, he with his Batcave toy—back to revising. What? You’d like to ride your bike to the park? Why, of course, sweet manlet! Just let me sit beneath these silently whirling fan blades, wipe the perspiration from my brow, primal scream into a pillow, swallow some Advil, calm my fluttering heart and blow my nose, then I am yours for the molding. What? Mama is so funny? Ha ha! Oh, little lovecup–I am relieved you think so. May this never change.
I am repeat quoting. Visiting the museum this weekend, I was once again struck by Marcel Proust’s words high on a wall overlooking the displays of dinosaur bones. I am constantly trying to quickly evolve new eyes as I revise my novel and prepare to—well, send it to ‘someone’. Long walks are conducive to rapid eye evolvement. Also hot showers. And reading about James Cameron’s new expedition into the Mariana Trench, which is as exciting to me as a paleontologist discovering dinosaur poop (about which my amazed preschooler received a detailed lecture—from a lovely museum volunteer wandering the hall with poop in hand). Voyages of discovery. Right on! I’m ready. (But first I need to get my eyes checked…) 
Primarily youth driven and raising awareness.
We now return to our irregularly scheduled blogging—which finds PB in the Writing Armchair, fighting off a cold, examining plot details while thwarting the dog’s nightstick-like tail from knocking the Toshiba off her lap. Plus, there’s a husband in the mix, ironing his slacks, as bleary-eyed as PB since they stayed up into the wee hours of a TUESDAY yacking as though they hadn’t seen each other in years. They yacked about the husband’s writing. They yacked about her writing and then she yacked about her writing, caught herself, and yacked some more. They yacked about organic broccoli, wall stencils and remembering to breathe when bombarded by stress. They yack-touched upon Hemingway’s shock therapy, how to pronounce Fluke and whether or not dolphins sleep with one eye open. Yack, yack, yack.
We'll take him home. We'll call him Mike.
And now all she wants to do is yack about Kony, but the husband is smoothing creases from slacks she can’t be trusted to iron and watching Superman to see if it’s preschooler appropriate (of COURSE it isn’t!). So PB sits and types and thwarts the tail, enjoying the late evening domestics, thrusting herself obnoxiously back into the first person as my son snoozes and the cats eat their crunchies and claw the ottoman and the wind, finally, dies down–but now all I can hear is Marlon Brando’s nasal voice and that’s when it’s really time to stop blogging and give up for the night with a wish for the safety of all children everywhere—vast wishing, the giving kind.
Paging Mr. Bluebird...
548a.m. Pretty dark through the curtains. No birdsong. The bed is mine, S walking the dog, the boy snoozing anywhere from the next 15 minutes to the next hour. Barely awake, I feel the effects from gazing at my work until 1a.m: the world’s largest cat (it is boulder-stout and woolly) sits on my head. The real cat, 1 of 3 lounging around here, sighs audibly at my feet (almost every breath that leaves him has a sound tucked in it). He noses my right foot. The comforter is thick, but I feel his teeth anyway as he holds my big toe in his mouth, hoping the pressure will get me up and filling his bowl with wet stuffs. I dreamt about an ex-boyfriend–a duplicitious stockbroker (is there any other kind) who lied to himself, then me. All month I’ve been having ex-boyfriend dreams (certain disastrous choices, walking and talking). Maddening. Let go, I urge myself when meditating, of the past. But I thought I had–but there he was, a ghost harrassing. Over the weekend a friend’s friend suggested I go f*** myself. A stranger’s response to my comment that he not berate my friend over objections to Rush Limbaugh’s (I feel dirty writing that name) attack on Sandra Fluke. If you don’t like what he says, don’t listen to his show! My friend’s friend wrote. I responded: You don’t have to listen to RL’s show to know what he said. Obviously his comments are on every major newsfeed, network. Probably because I used obviously.
Go F yourself.
Then I really felt dirty. Disturbed. And so foolish for engaging. I deleted my comment. We are usually off the grid in this house. It tends to make for clear(er) thinking and fosters creativity (unless it’s 1 or 6a.m.). We don’t have cable. My son is confused by commercials the rare occasions when he sees them at a relative’s house. He doesn’t understand why we can’t pause TV shows so he can run to the potty. When I present him with a new book, he gasps with delight and immediately sits down to ‘read’ it. Here, we watch DVD’s, not networks, and listen to a blatantly eclectic mix of music when we play in my son’s room. I don’t check in on Yahoo News. I avoid people.com. I only look at CNN if there’s an earthquake, tornado near Des Moines, or a country afflicted with a natural disaster. I never click on links written in caps and punctuation marks telling me I must know why those freaky three sisters are dabbing tears from their fake eyelashes. Writers live here–with hulu, sometimes, but writers–and a precious forming mind–live here, mostly off the grid. What can you do to promote world peace? Go home and love your family. Mother Teresa. All weekend I focused on loving my family and sweeping my own doorstep, not others’, which is impossible anyway. “No!” I whisper to the cat and he jumps off the bed with a noise and stalks from the room complaining. “Mama! I’m awake!” Outside, the jingle of the dog’s collar. An unmistakable clunk as the front door opens. “Helloooo, family,” S says softly. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
"Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference."
Lifted from poet Susan Rich's website--oh, visit her!
Famous Marketplace, Chiang Mai
Bright Spot Through Wires
I pointed out Griffith Observatory.
He said: through those wires?
I said: Yes. He nodded
as if he had no qualms
with my particular mangy view
of heterogeneous city. I think,
in fact, he was preoccupied,
having left prescription glasses
inside, high on my kitchen counter
with the rest of his emptied pockets—
metal-ish mannish items: clipped
bills, a pocket knife. Could he see
the bright dome of the observatory?
He saw the wires. On a clear day, I
pressed, you can see the Hollywood sign.
I wasn’t looking at him, not directly,
but caught his nod—the type of slow
solo nod one might give mortality.
I liked it. But I was worried: I invited
him here to my balcony of sky and scape
to watch the sun drop, this dusk confined
by haze like a sad sea creature netted,
hauled to a surface, forced
on display. One thought dug
into me like nails: you can’t see it.
You can’t see it. You can’t…
Later, after pan-fried tilapia and red
potatoes, he confessed he was a dolphin
in another life. And in yet another, a sea
turtle. I was astonished. He struck me
as a man of logic like narrow ladders,
simple-cousin equations applied to both office
and home (should he ever visit there), compass
brain clicking, green, chartable eyes. Perhaps
he was, in fact, a lunatic. I liked it. And I
had to know: How did you die?
1. ripped to tatters by sharks drunk on the blood of seals—
too close, reckless, too close.
2. a simple drift to the bottom of a fathom,
an acute sense of 100 years
following like a pleasant
fluttering
shroud.
I liked it. Slasher death. Gentle death.
I sipped my yellow wine, I laughed out loud
and at that moment the green eyes slipped
from mine
and I was lost.
Midnight, city light wriggly as live bait,
the kiss a mild struggle reeking of déjà vu
and off he went. This is what happened next:
On the balcony—nursing a burn, dis-
secting the kiss—I watched his headlights
coast and bob down the one-way street
I live on, a dusky rise named for canyon
echoes and echoing mayhem down there
(invite someone new into that). The distant
howl of a famished coyote became brakes
whining, then screaming. Reverberation
whumped the far canyon wall, then my
wall, a city slit of instant war. I closed
my eyes, tuned in: what happened.
Get The Hell Off Me. Then, nothing.
No sirens. No helicopter wielding
a surefire beam. I thought:
this is all new. You don’t know—
how could you when I ask questions
in the middle of a surefire kiss, but I
had a title I died for. Too close. So
reckless! Get off me…What
happened. Nothing. Except that I
died. I did. I
died.
He left in time
(green eyes slipping).
Oh, yes:
he also died a soldier’s death in WWII. Shot in the head.
He’s not saying it’s real. Not one of his lives,
lives. But he’s open: what can’t be proven might
be true.
I like it. How can I
not.
cue yoga music (wooden flutes and small gongs tapped with thought and care)
Remember in the movie Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs when Flynt pulls up that kitten bit on his computer screen and 3 hours fly by? Or maybe you don’t as, unlike me, you have not seen the movie 40,000 times because your preschooler is ever-enthralled with it (kittens, falling hamburgers, ratbirds and all). In any case (though not to be rude) imagine the flowers pictured here as those kittens as I work madly on a scecret project that comes with a deadline. No matter the outcome of this project, I do know that TBTW (my MG novel) is benefitting from the close attention—and despite my recent birthday and various forms of paralyses when it comes to a joyous celebration involving number combinations that include 4 but not 5 or 108 less a certain amount, etc. Flower Power!
Endured 7 years of rejection before his first novel was published (the first novel out of the many he'd already written, never giving up--there was no stopping him).
Most of us are called on to perform tasks far beyond what we can do. Our capabilities seldom match our aspirations, and we are often woefully unprepared. To this extent, we are all Assistant Pig-Keepers at heart.
—Lloyd Alexander
I am not going to blog about my Kindle Fire. I’m done with that and am still shocked I dedicated an entire post to the nifty little sucker. However, the KF did come in handy this latest trip north—I didn’t have to cart a stack of books with me and since I was reading for research purposes, what a treat to travel lighter—although what does that mean, really, when traveling with a preschooler except that the space in my suitcase reserved for my books was filled instead with his toys. One of them a space shuttle as big as a dachsund. And a spiky stegosaurus my mind transformed into a live iguana each time I saw it peeking through my sweaters, causing me to scream a little as I packed…
This trip I was engrossed in Lloyd Alexander’s The Book Of Three, the first book in The Chronicles Of Prydain, featuring Taran, Assistant Pig-Keeper—finding his way to hero status through adventures, mishaps and accompanied or hindered by all manner of odd characters with twisty or twin-consonant-filled names no mortal can properly pronounce. (When I was 10 and a dedicated bookworm, I remember enjoying wrapping my mind around the Welsh words as I was gripped by the story from page 1.) In addition to the sensory titillation received when reading long forgotten ancient words of yore, like vexed, I recommend the action sequences for learning purposes, if you happen to be writing a book involving action involving more than a duel. Stampede-ish battles? This is your book.
I wish I still had my copy from childhood. The cover was much better.
Sir Hero Alexander’s pacing and visuals have much to teach. I especially love when we first meet the Cauldron-Born and he has them gallop towards Taran, dismount mid-gallop and run, weapons raised, without breaking stride, towards their terrified target. Nice! Effectively scary. Also interesting are Lord Of The Rings similarities and a character resembling (in character) Rowling’s Dobby–or, rather, Dobby resembles Gurgi. The unceasing chain of influence and inspiration (traced back to the beginning of the beginning of fairytales). Fflewddur Fflam! No, I don’t need a tissue.
My rock!
“If a child is to keep his inborn sense of wonder, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in.”
—Rachel Carson
I rediscover the world through my son as I watch him make games out of rocks exposed by the minus tide. So many possibilities for the imagination. Taking a closer look at shape, lines, gaps. Not taking a single portion of beach for granted, finding the new in all of it. When was the last time you 
draped yourself over a sunwarmed rock and closed your eyes? Jumped. Ran for no reason except that it feels good. Found a half-buried starfish, tossed it back. Picked up a shell glistening with sea water, kept it. Faced the wind and shouted. Poked anemones (gently). Teaching him about the beach teaches me to look more closely at just about everything. Ah, you’re thinking. Now she’s going to bring her writing into it–closer readings, experimenting whilst revising her novels (ad nauseum), etc…
Well, yes.
Happy weekend! What? It’s Sunday evening? Well, writing and beachcombing are grand time suckers in this family. Fortunately. See you next week. Take care of your sense of wonder.
Heretic? Yes. However, one thing is certain: having a Kindle Fire will not stop me from buying books. Ever. Actual books, not the virtual kind that pale and irritate on the screen when compared to the hearty, my precious, real deals I can hold, weep on without worrying about elotrocution, peel from my cheek after falling asleep on, stack creatively, place a coffee mug on, shelve with other lovely titles, worship each time I walk by my collection. I love my modest home library and anticipate its expansion into an immense home library. This will never change about me. Hopefully a love of books will never change for my son, either, who is being brought up not on Gameboys, but literature that comes in those things you have to open up. Once hooked, hooked for life, I hope.
This was my selling point: since I am in the Straits Of Revision for 2 novels, I can take my Kindle Fire-In-My-A** to coffee shops, the shady bench outside my son’s classroom as I wait to take him home, the doctor’s office, the—hm. Pedicurist (although can’t remember the last time I visited there). Bus stop (ditto). Um–Albertson’s check-out line (although if they don’t see me fuming, how will they know to open another register?). The line at the Redbox machine (but I’m so on top of Redbox I pre-order and pick up by 7a.m., thus avoiding insufferable movie-title-perusing types). Anywhere, really, when out and the free moment arises to check on my work. This way, I do not have to cart my laptop with me. Not that I do. But now I don’t have to. Even though I don’t, certainly not to the pedicurist or bus stop, which I never visit anyway. But now I am saved from having to cart it to the Redbox line I never stand in…No:
I do not need a Kindle Fire.
But it will come in handy. Especially when scrolling through poetry journals I have no intention of purchasing hard copies of (unless my poems are in them). And for me, there is A LOT of scrolling to be done. What I mean is (oh, thank you kind waiter refilling my coffee cup): revision and research, ladies and gentlemen! Ready, set———-oooh! My Facebook feed is all vibrant with color…And see? 
I just open the red cover and there is my KF. Close, open, close, open. And these charming things called “skins” attach to the back of KF’s. Ha ha! Nice shelves! Maybe I’ll subscribe to the New Yorker again–virtually–oooooooh. I hear music. Etc…
A writer and his cat at work
1. In modern war…you will die like a dog for no good reason.
2. Man is not made for defeat.
—Ernest Hemingway
I regret not going into Hemingway’s house when I was in Key West. Instead I stood out on the sidewalk, by the pretty brick wall, a gazing idiot in her little sundress and flipflops. I felt shy, as if he was alive and in the house, disgusted by me ogling the arching windows and shade scattering palms. I was in shock that he had lived in the cheerful tropics. The manly man, safari man, war hero prolific in a precious city infested with twinkle lights and laughter? I had a drink in Captain Tony’s/Sloppy Joe’s (not a Teacher’s and soda or a Papa Dobles, another regret)–of course I did–searching, as any Hemingway fanatic will when visiting ‘his’ town. I brooded over my Amstel Light, irked by the happy people everywhere I looked. Why the hell didn’t I go in the house? I thought, wanting things. I vowed to return to 907 Whitehead Street, even though snooping through the homes of famous dead people I admire gives me not answers, not insight into idols and legends, but the creeps.
Papa? Is that you?
But then I was overcome by the white beaches and fantastic snorkeling, bewitched by the sunsets viewed from the bricks of Mallory Square. I laughed, even under water. I ate conch fritters with a huge smile on my sunburned face. I had one of the best meals of my life at Louie’s Backyard. I purchased twinkle lights and packed them reverently in my suitcase. I did not return to the Hemingway Home And Museum. I got it. Key West is magical, or as Papa himself said: “It’s the best place I’ve ever been anytime, anywhere, flowers, tamarind trees, guava trees, coconut palms…Got tight last night on absinthe and did knife tricks.”
Sharing this delightful list after a harrowing dentist appointment for my son (and his parents), in which despite kiddie valium being administered, despite the unfortunately Hannibal-Lecter-like restraints and despite the nose mask pumping in “giggle stuff”, my son raged quite effectively at having his mouth poked and a few of his teeth saved. Part of me is glad he is so strong and has so much fight in him. The other part of me feels as if she was eaten by a tornado. Yet another top secret part of me wonders whose side of the family the offending teeth came from as my teeth are fine—now—so obviously on my husband’s side of the family someone had teeth issues in the grand manner of George Washington. And then I scold myself for such top secret thoughts as seeing my son drugged was so emotionally debilitating I had to leave the room, go to the car, take deep breaths and phone lifelines before returning to my little family. I cannot imagine what it’s like for parents with hospitalized children. If dentist torture is the worst we ever have to go through, I’ll take it. And write about it later. And be grateful my husband and I are competent tag-teamers for a boy who is usually a fireball of good health. And now, borrowing from numbers 7 and 8, I shall not be a draught-horse, nor work with pleasure only, but retire to my bed office and keep human (with hatches closed down tight–but no bloody cleavers flashing, thank you, H.M.).
Pet the dog, people. Pet the dog.
Some writers, critics, and other assorted literati sniff at plotting as a tool of craft. A synonym of plotting, in this mindset, is slumming, something decent people just don’t do.
—James Scott Bell
Whose seminar I attended this morning in Burbank for almost 3 hours, using my hair to cover my right eye so no one would notice the burst blood vessel I received from yesterday’s yoga session (that’s what I get for not remembering to breathe in the Superman pose). My stomach wouldn’t stop growling. Loudly. I think it was agitated by the aroma of the free mints on the table I sat near, and the fact that I’d had only a smoothie for breakfast. I heard my stomach. So did others. I also heard the following: LOCK SYSTEM. A great plot is the record of how a character deals with death. Why is something a formula??? Because it works!!! At this point I suddenly became distracted by a movie poster of Scream 3 on the wall. Was that Chris Rock’s face? From where I sat I couldn’t read the credits. I began obsessing on whether or not it was, in fact, Chris Rock and if it was, what the he** was he doing in a Scream 3. I haven’t seen Scream 3 (obviously). I haven’t even seen Scream 2. But I had to know if it was Chris Rock. I HAD TO KNOW. Since the classroom was smallish and I was seated in the 2nd row, it suddenly occurred to me that JSB might notice that I was craning my neck and squinting at the poster. My stomach growled. My red eye twitched. I pulled myself together and floated back into the seminar. And I heard: Q FACTOR! Translation software for your imagination. Types of lead characters. Pet the dog. Beginning. Middle. End. THE STAKES MUST BE DEATH. At this point, I really wanted to look at that poster again—but I didn’t. Instead, I heard (and copied down) a quote by Robert Newton Peck: A plot is two dogs and one bone. Clips from City Slickers, Moonstruck and The Fugitive were interspersed between more advice and more quotes, such as this one by Alfred Hitchcock: A great story is life with the dull parts taken out. Oh, I gleaned much today, startled to discover that aspects of the “formula” referred to throughout the seminar actually live in my children’s novel–which was written organically, with non-organic coffee standing by and not a plot-sheet in sight. As I mentioned earlier, reading about craft, attending lectures and seminars on craft? Difficult for me. But I’m making myself read and listen because it’s just not a bad idea to revisit some basics. Plus, I wouldn’t have been given the wonderful term PET THE DOG if I had skipped the seminar (my monster eye, general fatigue—I have good excuses to be a homebody and honor a certain little man’s request to sit in his room of primary colors and play with the Bat Cave). JSB is a thorough lecturer. And he’s read The Hunger Games. In fact, I think he’s read every book on the planet and seen every movie ever made. He is a walking/lecturing resource. Go see him if you can.
Most bewitching oaks in Los Angeles
This was the morning: camellias and oak trees. And koi ponds, a small, very green lake with coots and mallards drifting, a Japanese garden with an unattended snack bar my son immediately took over, stepping behind the counter (which came up to his nose), ordering me to order french fries and a hangaburger, then ordering me to speak to his bird (which he ‘materialized’ from a refrigerator that wouldn’t open). He held the bird out to me on his hand. When I took the bird with my forefinger and spoke to it, he took it back with his forefinger and gave it many kisses. Oh, life. 8 years ago if someone had showed me this little scene? I wouldn’t have believed it. Miracles abound. In wastelands, in previously established routines, in Los Angeles. And I don’t know what the bejeezus it is about oak trees, but they are magic. They calm me, shutting down panic-bits I wasn’t even aware I was harboring. When there are enough oaks to make a puzzle of the sky, I can’t help but stop and gaze and listen. Old and snaggle-leaved, kinked branches wending with a surprising grace—a definite peace transfers to the gazer…Someday I hope whatever house we live in is surrounded by oak trees, indefinitely.
reading writing typing typing typing
Askew , a poetry journal, accepted a poem of mine for their May issue. It’s nice to have an acceptance so early in the year, providing me with impetus to keep submitting my work even when the day starts at 5:30a.m. and could end at 9:00p.m.—unless I ignore my pillows and cozy bed and write, revise or crawl into huluplus for an hour (a wretched temptation). I’ve read Askew for years and am an admirer of co-editor and poet Marsha de la O. There’s an earthy, mysterious quality to her work that I respond to—and I’m forever interested in the work of Californian poets. Plus, Askew is Ventura based—a local. So grateful when locals accept my work—Chaparral, Solo, Runes (very sad they’re gone now), Santa Barbara Independent. I feel so much more part of a writing community. When I start writing things like, so much more part of I know it’s time to sign off. It’s almost 10p.m. Do you know where your favorite writing chair is? Phoning the corner bar and telling mine to get its indented (and unfortunately patterned) cushions home this instant.
Yours in poetry and nimbly (numbly?) typing fingers,
PB
making spinach muffins, scrubbing toilets, picking up dog poop, Googling Albert Einstein, surfing the Ikea website, pain...
“Writers are notorious for using any reason to keep from working: over-researching, retyping, going to meetings, waxing the floors–anything.”
—Gloria Steinem
I opened the door to my son’s classroom and an invisible claw grabbed the muscles in my right side and clenched. Twisted while clenching. Clenched as if my muscles were Playdough. Or my sad morning cinnamon waffles. I sank into a kiddie chair with a fixed smile on my face, repeating, “Ha ha ha!”, as though I was laughing. A teacher hurried over. In soft (so as not to arouse kiddie suspicion), urgent tones and many run-ons, she said: “Are you all right? Should I call a doctor? What are you feeling do you want some water? Can you describe the pain is it your muscles kidneys? Have you experienced this before what day is it today? What planet are you on? When was the last time you studied Einstein’s theory of relativity? Is this a stunt to avoid your writing? Why did you tattle on that one girl when you were in the 2nd grade who’s your daddy?” Etc.
I wanted to primal scream in a roomful of four year olds. I wanted to rip my right side from my body and feed it to the classroom pet bunny. I wanted to run screaming into the playground and impale myself on a kiddie rake. Instead, I pretended I was fine and, because I couldn’t walk, stalked to the minivan, still smiling.
I screamed the entire five minutes back to my house. FIX IT FIX IT FIX IT, I pleaded into the phone as I writhed upon the bed. My husband was a professional masseuse in another life, but he couldn’t leave the office to come and save me. He spoke to me in polite fragments (because the whole office was listening): Hot shower. Breathe. Advil. Pillows. Under. Knees! Tennis ball. Below. Lower back. No screaming. Breathing. Forgive. Self. For not knowing. String Theory. Write. Write. Write.
I took 4 Advil, screamed into my favorite pillow and lay on the bed regretting skipping my yoga workouts since December 29th, when I got that stomach virus followed by the flu followed by a cold followed by insomnia. Were the yoga goddesses punishing me? Was I clenching up from lack of sleep? Was I feeling guilty for not understanding time/space continuums, therefore taking my ignorance out on the muscles on the right side of my body? Was I coming up with fresh and particularly horrifying ways to avoid my writing?
2 hours later I got off the bed like nothing had ever been eating me alive and drove to pick up my son. Currently, apart from a faint twinging if I reach out with my right arm, it’s like nothing happened. Yet……Tomorrow I will start with 10 sun salutations and ease back into Om. Right? Yes, of course. I can imagine myself doing sun salutations. In imagination lies hope (who said that???).
It’s supposed to rain tomorrow. My husband is taking our son to the library so I may experience some quiet writing time. I think a cat peed on the bathroom tile. The dog’s ears still need cleaning. The washed muffin tin has residue.
There’s just no escaping some things.
We hit town late afternoon-ish and I immediately honor the request for the museum and its entertaining dinosaur footprints indented in cement, pgymy mammoth bones, taxidermied (the fraying sort) mountain animals and vultures, buttons igniting barn owl shrieks and snake rattles and of course there is the excavating pit filled with sand and paint brushes and impossible-to-completely-uncover plastic bones and although he nixes the planetarium show, I admit the gift shop is fun with its bottled goo and Jupiter Juice, dinosaur eggs and display of alarmingly priced, richly colored pashminas I almost can’t resist. When it is time to leave, I try again: The beach? No, he quips, blowing into his straw so intensely the carton of organic milk sounds like a mini-cauldron in full boil. It isn’t until we’re half way to the beach that the solution hits me: Tide pools? Silence. Then, Yes, yes, yes! Hermit crabs! And he carries on from there, so that when I pull into the beach’s lot, he is antsy to escape the car. I roll up our jeans and ferry him, like the little lord he is, across the parking lot to the rocky path and down we go, hand in hand, into five o’ clock sun dazzling our eyes as it jazzes up the water, the surf mild, the tide out, exposing rocks adorned in colonies of button-sized sea anemones and tide pools teeming with hermits and, to his joy, the bare feet of fellow children. He joins a pack of exploring kids as I perch on a rock, controlling urges to shout at him to be careful, biting my knuckles when he slips into a pool and soaks his jeans and most of his shirt. When he picks himself up and laughs at the gold sky, I take a breath. And another. Mental notes for my ocean-infested novel(s) come so fast I scold myself for not showing up with a pen and notebook in my pockets. As he cavorts, splashing and screaming with the others, I steal glances at the ocean’s mingling ribbons of plum, sapphire, teal and, eventually, out there, beyond that island’s rolling spine, shocking fire-pinks. I feel so grateful when I’m by the sea. Slapped awake in a dream. Pushed into reverie that is not so vague, not so misty. It’s why I keep coming back. Well, and because I revel in his (fickle) love for it. When he commands me to look as he jumps from the same rock he first slipped from, back into the same deep pool, I do, with applause. The first beach visit of 2012 reddens our cheeks and, by the time we head for the minivan—soaked, sand-caked—we are ravenous. I knew you’d like it, I think, but don’t say because I told you so bothers me, even though I told you so is not what I mean. After buckling him into his seat, I pull a shell from my pocket, its ridges striped white and black. He takes it from me with a tiny gasp, turns it over in fingers no doubt younger than the shell. Usually I throw the good ones back, give them a second chance for obscurity (preservation?)—but (unlike the dashing pashminas at the museum) I couldn’t resist it, secreting it in my pocket, waiting for this moment, the sort only poems accurately describe—and inevitably embellish.
The blood jet is poetry/there is no stopping it.
—Sylvia Plath
I could stare at this photo for hours…
Road Trip
Recently writer Beth Hull turned me on to the Spring Spirit conference, an annual SCBWI California North/Central event held in Rocklin, CA. This year, I’m excited to say I will be attending. The lineup is top notch, including the YA Muses I am always mentioning (wisely), there are lectures/panels to choose from and for one full day I get to do nothing but learn in the company of MG and YA writers and illustrators. I have enjoyed my local SCBWI Writer’s Days, especially when my novel won that SPECIAL MENTION I’m mentioning again, however this day-long conference is a whole other—it’s late, I’m just going to say animal. Worth looking into if you’re in the area—or not, like me. I may even stay overnight at one of those things we have in this country called HOTELS, ALOOOOONE, use an indoor pool and “free” gym, order room service—ALOOOONE*—and watch HBO revise my novel, having been so inspired from the conference. Looking to be a very un-cruel April.
*Will, however (although not perversely), miss my husband and child the entire time and be longing to share my hotel experience with them, should I have one. Seriously.
Yours truly,
Ms. Homebody
Night Llamas. Comprendes?
In search of my cell phone after promising myself I would never need to go in search of it again: 10 agonizing minutes (during which husband is emailed to please call so cell phone will announce its location—he calls—after I’ve found it—in my Ugg boot behind the chair piled in rough drafts of my children’s novel, the top page of which has been shredded by kitty claws).
Time spent ransacking kitchen drawers and cupboards for the bread machine blade/dough kneading gadget even though not making bread until weekend: 7 agonizing minutes (husband put it away, so…)
Time spent fuming about that one thing that one ex-boyfriend said twenty years ago that still chaps my hide—until I catch myself fuming and take deep breaths, focusing on LETTING GO OF THE PAST and FORGIVENESSSSSSS: really only a few (progress!).
Time spent staring out living room windows at struggling yard imagining new decking, Mexican-red umbrellas, voluminous bougainvilla hiding unfortunate paint job of back wall, shiny silver BBQ number with exciting extra burners, patio table set in beading pitchers of margaritas and desert rose patterned trays filled with savory tapas, twinkle lights twinkling from eaves, smily visitors lounging, laughter and fun as I don a fashionable sombrero, wave gaily at my son trotting the llama around the lawn and signal the mariachi band to begin their set: too numerous to count.
Time spent revising children’s novel: 2 hours (at patio table covered in pine needles from latest windstorm and set in plastic tumbler filled with protein drink, a pile of remote control toys that need new batteries and a struggling potted lavender plant).
Number of minutes spent procrastinating, fuming about past or daydreaming during 2 hours of revision time: none.
Ahhhh. There we go, PB. Bliss. Just get there a little faster. And maybe dispose of that cereal bar.
PB Rippey Writes 
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