April A-Z Challenge 2013

Two days ago I was certain I would sit this April out; today I decided I would kick myself if I did.

Last year my theme was Beautiful Things, and I picked 26 things that I consider to be worth calling beautiful. I'm taking a different approach this year.

I'll wrap up my first year teaching creative writing this May, and I have challenged my students to do many things with their writing and thinking. This blog challenge is my way of modeling creative writing.

It's in that spirit that I'm going to attempt to write one short story in 26 posts. I'll tie in the successive letters of the alphabet by using them as the first letter of each post.

Come along for the ride!

Age of Distraction

Doing research for my unit on Fahrenheit 451, I ran across a quote from a writer named Cory Doctorow. I wanted information mainly about the culture of distraction that we all live in now, or are at least tempted to live in, and his discipline is informing my daily writing routine.

  When I'm working on a story or novel, I set a modest daily goal - usually a page or two - and then I meet it every day, doing nothing else while I'm working on it. ...Writing a page every day gets me more than a novel a year...Twenty minutes is a short enough interval that it can be claimed from a sleep or meal-break.

I decided to give it a try, so I've been getting up a little bit earlier - scorning the snooze button - and writing a page a day. It hasn't been a week yet, but I've already produced six pages. This is my schedule:

530: Wake up, stumble to the den; read, pray
600: Write
630: Breakfast
700: Prepare for work
740 - 330: School
335 - 830: Family time (play w/ Thing 1 & Thing 2; lug Thing 3 around; converse with my lovely wife, bedtime)
830 - 1030: Edit my first book, blog, have an actual conversation with my wife, sleep

A few years ago I wrote my first book in the wee hours of the morning, and I had forgotten how much I enjoyed that process. The morning is quiet, and my thoughts have time to roam, and my pen has time to slowly create.

It's also a time free from technology.

At school I find myself glued to my computer when I don't have to be. That's the new habit, and if I don't make a time for myself to read, pray, and write - especially a time when all the noise hasn't begun - it won't happen.

The time is there. It's the shaping it for what we really want it for that's difficult.

Thank You to the Local Library for the Background!

I bought the books you see in the background at the library in our small town - these and another armful for $1 if I remember correctly. It's been a long time coming that I make a change to this blog, and I thought a stack of books would emit the right mood.

The top one is by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It's  called Tanglewood Tales and is full of retold Greek myths. I was pleasantly surprised, and a bit appalled, that no one else had snagged it. The market for old books is a shrinking one, I suppose.

Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days comes next. The torn edges have since been mended, but it's a great look here (and I'm torn about the white markings on both middle books; sometimes I think they add charm, sometimes they annoy me...). Side note: I can't help but think about Back to the Future every time I hear the name Jules Verne.

The Works of Robert Browning is next, and though I haven't cracked it, I've discovered notes and an inscription that links the book to our local college. The name is from an old family here, and the notes are written in a neat cursive - which is almost as rare as the old books.

The bottom book is called My Love Affair with the State of Maine. I confess I picked that one up because I haven't yet read anything set in that state. I still haven't...

And that's the history behind the new background, hope you enjoy!

Leisure to Digest

I'm going to subject my English II classes to Fahrenheit 451 this last nine weeks - I can't wait. My second time through the book was just as thrilling as the first. I found myself writing notes furiously as I didn't want to interrupt the pace of the plot; I almost feared I'd break the spell Bradbury crafted so well.

One of the many deep findings that I'll be emphasizing to my students is the part where Professor Faber is explaining to Montag what their culture really needs - besides books, that is. He says, and I'll paraphrase, we (yes, we) need three things: 1. Quality of information, 2. Leisure to digest it, and 3. Freedom to act on what we gain from the first two. Montag's initial reaction to the need for leisure is that there is plenty of off time, which is true. However, just like our culture, that off time is filled to the brim - and past the brim - with activity. It's not until the last few pages of the book that Montag experiences silence and true space to think. And at first it scares him.

Oh, how I see this filling of space with every spare moment we have because if we have to stop and think for even a minute even 45 seconds we might be alone with our thoughts and we might have a thought or that thought might be that we're alone or that we don't know why we're unhappy with what pop culture says should make us happy like our touch screens and our vast number of online friends that are swayed with the wind of the times...

These are some things we'll discuss:

We're forgetting how to be alone with our thoughts.

We're filling space with steam and smoke.

Being bored is okay.    No, really - it's great.

A Plodding March

I'm not the only writer in our house...

The road back to a normal writing schedule is proving tiresome. I could blame yet another "first" year of teaching - as this year I'm teaching two new grades - or I could cast my woes of troubled progress on to house projects, health issues, little people who have to eat every day and want me to play Star Wars...the list is extensive.

But the real problem is me; I can track all my former success back to a well disciplined approach. In 2008, I wrote a small book while learning my way as a new dad and working a full time job. All it took was 30 minutes a day. In the span of one spring and summer, I wrote over 32,000 words. Not all that impressive, I know, but it was my first project, and my only one finished to date.

And now, well, I have so many fragments, so many ideas, so many notes that I want to pursue, but I lack the discipline to sit and pound out that first messy draft.

One victory: with the help of the resident editor (my lovely wife), I was able to submit a poem and a short story to a contest.

Another victory: I'm completing a short post here.

One step at a time...

Bleak House, by Charles Dickens

I read Charles Dickens because I know I will love his characters; it's been weeks since I finished Bleak House and whenever I see the cover of the book, or my mind slips for a moment into thoughts of reading, Esther, Mr. Jarndyce, and Jo force their way into my life and make themselves comfortable.

I've not read everything Dickens wrote, though I intend to try, and choosing what to try next is a painful process. I suppose the reasons are obvious; the main one is that the books are thick and take large amounts of brain power to digest (I hate that word in regard to books - digest. As though I could consume even one page containing someone like Lady Dedlock. So I'll say his books take large amounts of brain power to engage. Better). The point is I have to choose what I read carefully.

And so, when I chose to read Bleak House, I chose it because I first read some criticism on the book by an author I admire: G.K. Chesterton. It only took one sentence, and in that sentence Chesterton said he believed Bleak House to be Dickens's best novel.

So I read it. Eight weeks later, approximately one week per one hundred pages, I'm not sure it is the best Dickens novel - but deciding that wasn't my objective in reading the book. As I said, I read Dickens to live with his characters, to invite them into my daily life as I invade theirs.

When I was done with Bleak House, I read Chesterton's full introduction to it, the same one that inspired my choice. And mostly, I have to disagree. The novel may very well be the best Dickens wrote; the fog of Chancery may seep into every crevice of every setting, and indeed, it does. However, the emphasis Chesterton puts on Richard and his development, or rather his falling apart, seems lacking. Richard occupies an important part of the story, but it's not the essence, the fullness of the story.

And, to give Chesterton a break, who can capture the fullness of a Dickens novel in ten pages? Nor will I in one post.

My point is this: how can I judge a whole novel on one character - not to mention a densely populated Dickens novel? The other characters cry out, "What about us?"

What about the Lady Dedlock and her pride? One dislikes the very room she's in, her distaste for everyone is so appalling. Yet, there she is, later in the book, taking my attention and making me see her cold nature for what it is: shame, honor, and love.

What about the Lord of the Dedlock house? Dickens creates the ass of a man simply to turn us once again when the events surrounding his fleeing wife only evoke pain in his proud heart - pain that is deepened because of his blindness and ignorance toward her. Forgiveness becomes his namesake.

And what about Sir George? The law-writer with no name? Esther? What about Caddy and her long-suffering?

Books could be written about the depths of human nature scraped from each and every character, and it's doubtful I'll forget any of them. The best novel of Charles Dickens? I don't know, but I do know this: Dickens didn't just write novels, he created an artful copy of humanity that no one should miss.

Overcast

A January morning isn't supposed to make me think of spring. But there it is: the mist casting itself across my eyes, the rain meandering down the bark of trees (it's green, the bark is, and I think of moss growing in quiet places where water trickles from stream to river).

I walk. It's not more than one block and my ears ache, the cold seeping in and reminding me it's winter yet. Birds are silent but for the swoosh of wings and the clatter of branches. High above the branches of a bare Elm sway - but slowly with the gentle wind.

My dreams fade and I'm unaware. It's there that my mind is cleaned, and the tap of keys remind me of the darkness that was and is no more.

Smoke curls from a roof of neighbors, only one light is on. The hush of rain, the swiftness of clouds, the settling cold - I am still. May my thoughts be stilled, may these clouds slow me as they send the slow rain.

Should I miss the rain (how would I know?), tragedy seeps too, and slipping past, the waters may speak, but will I hear? May I not miss the rain, may I not miss you.