In So Much for That, a Lionel Shriver novel I recently read, there's a wonderful paragraph towards the end where the main character - his wife is dying, he's lost his job, his life's ambition is slipping away from him - makes a list (I love a list).
'Thank-you notes and surreptitious sponging of gravy stains; heat-crimped packaging that only opened with pruning shears, and incompatible software. Ramadan, Columbus Day, and picnics. National self-determination, recipes for banana bread, and Amazon.com. Bungee-cord jumping, suicide bombing, and falling in love. Space stations, purdah, and male pattern baldness. Right-to-life protests, self-defrosting refrigerators, and hemlines; Christmas-tree air-fresheners, presidential assassinations, and ten-year retrospectives on the fall of apartheid. Micro-lending, woodworm treatments, and anti-vivisection leagues. West Bank settlements and genetically modified cron; nuclear antoproliferation states, National Salt Awareness Week, and fluoridated water. Narco states, dust ruffles, and bus shelter vandalism; lucky numbers, favourite colours, and button collections. Tribal scarring and Polka Album of the Year Awards, tea ceremonies, buzz cuts, and alternative energy. Feature films, the Fifth Amendment, and weather forecasts; Arctic exploration, affirmative action, and cell phone contracts. The South Beach Diet, elder abuse, and the Battle of Waterloo; burkhas, bedsteads, and the designated hitter rule; heirlooms, insoles, and the European Union. From IEDs, GDPs, and MP3s to Gore-Tex, gas shortages, and gardening tips; he was sick of it, man. Of people and their shit.'
What I wouldn't give to be able to write like that.
Showing posts with label paperback writer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label paperback writer. Show all posts
Monday, December 30, 2013
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
being a lady
You know how a lady reserves the right to change her mind? Yeah, I'm calling that one.
I've realised to be true what a couple of my nearest and dearest probably realised some time ago: I ain't no mommy blogger. At least not a South African one. At least not a South African one who will anytime soon produce the kind of material which'll entice any of the (limited number) of mommy-blogger type advertisers out (t)here.
At least not a South African one who will fit the mold or care to work particularly hard at doing so.
It's complicated. But that is what it is.
The good news: I've liberated myself of some truly tedious twitter follows and blog subscriptions - I'm not playing that 'networking' game no more.
The silly part: I now have two blogs for the same kind of content.
The other silly part: this blog's followers keep growing, despite my not generating any actual blog posts.
Further to that silly part: my followers on the other blog are holding steady, despite my generating lots of blog posts for it and despite very healthy traffic over there (lots of which is from here).
So I've got followers here who go there to spy on me, followers there who know nothing about here, loyal readers there who don't actually 'follow' me anywhere, youspinmerightroundbabyrightroundlikearecordbabyrightroundrightround ...
And all of this because I want to be a writer. A moniker I've had many opportunities to test out of late, what with the girls starting new schools and my meeting new people as a result. People who ask me what I do, and dry-mouthed I answer 'I write' which leads to a whole bunch of inevitable questions which I don't really know how to answer.
'Oh you know ... um ... here and there ... working on some stuff ... look! squirrels!'
What I've written lately:
not many blog posts, here or there
copious lists
the bones of a short film screenplay
the bones of 3 articles for submissions to various publications, none of which are near submission ready
half a letter to my granny
detailed instructions for my nanny
far, far, far too many facebook status updates
I'm not really sure what to do about all of this ...
Hello Oh For the Love of Blog! Happy 2012!
I've realised to be true what a couple of my nearest and dearest probably realised some time ago: I ain't no mommy blogger. At least not a South African one. At least not a South African one who will anytime soon produce the kind of material which'll entice any of the (limited number) of mommy-blogger type advertisers out (t)here.
At least not a South African one who will fit the mold or care to work particularly hard at doing so.
It's complicated. But that is what it is.
The good news: I've liberated myself of some truly tedious twitter follows and blog subscriptions - I'm not playing that 'networking' game no more.
The silly part: I now have two blogs for the same kind of content.
The other silly part: this blog's followers keep growing, despite my not generating any actual blog posts.
Further to that silly part: my followers on the other blog are holding steady, despite my generating lots of blog posts for it and despite very healthy traffic over there (lots of which is from here).
So I've got followers here who go there to spy on me, followers there who know nothing about here, loyal readers there who don't actually 'follow' me anywhere, youspinmerightroundbabyrightroundlikearecordbabyrightroundrightround ...
And all of this because I want to be a writer. A moniker I've had many opportunities to test out of late, what with the girls starting new schools and my meeting new people as a result. People who ask me what I do, and dry-mouthed I answer 'I write' which leads to a whole bunch of inevitable questions which I don't really know how to answer.
'Oh you know ... um ... here and there ... working on some stuff ... look! squirrels!'
What I've written lately:
not many blog posts, here or there
copious lists
the bones of a short film screenplay
the bones of 3 articles for submissions to various publications, none of which are near submission ready
half a letter to my granny
detailed instructions for my nanny
far, far, far too many facebook status updates
I'm not really sure what to do about all of this ...
Hello Oh For the Love of Blog! Happy 2012!
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
on writing #1
I blog to write.
I love to write, I always have. For a number of years I lost touch with the astounding satisfaction it gives me but it was through this blog that I found my way back. And now it's kind of all I want to do.
And when I say all I want to do I'm being quite serious.
I have days when I wake at 4am and I wish, I long to be able to get out of bed, make tea and just write and write and write. I just know I'll produce great material in those moments. I can feel the flame, I can almost taste it, and to have to suppress the desire feels like a crime.
Like spending a sunny day indoors with the curtains drawn. Like eating 4 slices of toast just before Christmas dinner.
But I have to suppress it. I have to tell myself to go back to sleep because I know I need those last few hours before the girls wake up. They need me to get those few more hours sleep.
For if I succumbed to the muse and got up, even if I produced something of staggering genius in that time, the rest of our day would be foul, I know this. There would be tears and snapping and it would be all because I didn't enough sleep and that ... that also feels like a crime.
It's not fair on me to have to suppress this urge to write, it hurts me. But it's not fair on them to consciously jeopardise our day before its even started, that will hurt all of us.
I'm not really sure what the solution is.
The muse is not always that untimely, but the time just never seems to be right for her.
12 noon finds Stella asleep, me writing feverishly and then ack, 12.25 - school run!
3pm, I'm struck by inspiration, my fingertips start tingling, but there's just no way I can extricate myself from afternoon snack/play dough construction/planned trip to the park.
7.30pm, the girls are in bed, the muse hopefully pokes her head up, but I've a husband I've missed all day, my own dinner to savour with him in the quiet of the adult-only evening calm, bits and bobs to clear up and arrange for the morning and then maybe, just maybe, a couple of hours writing, when I'm tired and quite often at my least inspired.
It's not fair on me to have to suppress this urge to write, it physically hurts me. But I'm not really sure what the solution is.
But I may have found a place to look for it. In a stolen 15 minutes one afternoon recently I read this column from Literary Mama and have subsequently had enough light bulb moments to brighten up the gloom I'd started sinking into on this one.
Get this Molly, you're not the first 'literary mama' to feel like this. And duh, as with anything, there are books you can read, conversations you can have, resources you can use to help yourself find ways around your current dilemma.
By stepping back from the problem, viewing it from another angle, the way forward has become clearer.
Motherhood and writing, they're not so different really.
The kids, the muse, two equally willful and independent entities, neither very keen to be tamed, neither particularly concerned with making my life any easier.
Two currents running through my life which equally inspire me and throw me into despair, equally demanding and, when they work, ultimately rewarding.
Both forces which, realistically, require me to step up and lay the ground rules, be the parent, create the boundaries and live by them myself.
I have to ask myself why the muse chose to return now, in these arguably busiest years of my life. Where was she when I had spans of free time (or so it always seems when I remember the pre-baby years)?
Why wasn't I feverishly writing at 4am then?
Because I didn't have the inspiration I do now perhaps?
Could it be that these little creatures which seem to come between me and my writing now are the very reasons the urge to write is so strong within me?
I'm not done pondering this one, and I'm still not sure how to make more time to write. But write I must, it's becoming as essential as breathing, and I seem to be able to make time to do that everyday.
I love to write, I always have. For a number of years I lost touch with the astounding satisfaction it gives me but it was through this blog that I found my way back. And now it's kind of all I want to do.
And when I say all I want to do I'm being quite serious.
I have days when I wake at 4am and I wish, I long to be able to get out of bed, make tea and just write and write and write. I just know I'll produce great material in those moments. I can feel the flame, I can almost taste it, and to have to suppress the desire feels like a crime.
Like spending a sunny day indoors with the curtains drawn. Like eating 4 slices of toast just before Christmas dinner.
But I have to suppress it. I have to tell myself to go back to sleep because I know I need those last few hours before the girls wake up. They need me to get those few more hours sleep.
For if I succumbed to the muse and got up, even if I produced something of staggering genius in that time, the rest of our day would be foul, I know this. There would be tears and snapping and it would be all because I didn't enough sleep and that ... that also feels like a crime.
It's not fair on me to have to suppress this urge to write, it hurts me. But it's not fair on them to consciously jeopardise our day before its even started, that will hurt all of us.
I'm not really sure what the solution is.
The muse is not always that untimely, but the time just never seems to be right for her.
12 noon finds Stella asleep, me writing feverishly and then ack, 12.25 - school run!
3pm, I'm struck by inspiration, my fingertips start tingling, but there's just no way I can extricate myself from afternoon snack/play dough construction/planned trip to the park.
7.30pm, the girls are in bed, the muse hopefully pokes her head up, but I've a husband I've missed all day, my own dinner to savour with him in the quiet of the adult-only evening calm, bits and bobs to clear up and arrange for the morning and then maybe, just maybe, a couple of hours writing, when I'm tired and quite often at my least inspired.
It's not fair on me to have to suppress this urge to write, it physically hurts me. But I'm not really sure what the solution is.
But I may have found a place to look for it. In a stolen 15 minutes one afternoon recently I read this column from Literary Mama and have subsequently had enough light bulb moments to brighten up the gloom I'd started sinking into on this one.
Get this Molly, you're not the first 'literary mama' to feel like this. And duh, as with anything, there are books you can read, conversations you can have, resources you can use to help yourself find ways around your current dilemma.
By stepping back from the problem, viewing it from another angle, the way forward has become clearer.
Motherhood and writing, they're not so different really.
The kids, the muse, two equally willful and independent entities, neither very keen to be tamed, neither particularly concerned with making my life any easier.
Two currents running through my life which equally inspire me and throw me into despair, equally demanding and, when they work, ultimately rewarding.
Both forces which, realistically, require me to step up and lay the ground rules, be the parent, create the boundaries and live by them myself.
I have to ask myself why the muse chose to return now, in these arguably busiest years of my life. Where was she when I had spans of free time (or so it always seems when I remember the pre-baby years)?
Why wasn't I feverishly writing at 4am then?
Because I didn't have the inspiration I do now perhaps?
Could it be that these little creatures which seem to come between me and my writing now are the very reasons the urge to write is so strong within me?
I'm not done pondering this one, and I'm still not sure how to make more time to write. But write I must, it's becoming as essential as breathing, and I seem to be able to make time to do that everyday.
Monday, July 25, 2011
the first day
This morning I got up before the girls, and rushed to dress and wash my face before any demands were made of me.
I managed to eat breakfast at the same time as feeding them, got Frieda off to school, some ducks in a row for Stella's morning with her nanny, my laptop etc packed, mascara applied and left the house at 09h05 looking mostly presentable and sort of real-worldy.
I got into my car and drove exactly two and a half blocks to my brother's house, where I set up my laptop on his dining room table and, for three hours, wrote.
None of this sounds vaguely exceptional. But for me it was profoundly so.
Today I executed a plan I hatched back in January. Today I took the first step in overcoming extreme threshold anxiety. Today I hope to remember as the day I became a writer.
Or maybe today should just be remembered for that exceptional rainbow this morning, or for the cold and blustery walk in Kirstenbosch the girls and I took together this afternoon, all three of us walking. Or for how Stella roared at some American tourists and Frieda made us stop so she could breast-feed her doll on a bench.
Maybe I'll just remember today as the first day that Stella grabbed her spoon from me and ate an entire bowl of pasta on her own while I did. something. else.
Maybe today should pass unmarked, and not singled out for glory, but in my mind I feel a switch clicked today. I just hope it was turning the light on.
I managed to eat breakfast at the same time as feeding them, got Frieda off to school, some ducks in a row for Stella's morning with her nanny, my laptop etc packed, mascara applied and left the house at 09h05 looking mostly presentable and sort of real-worldy.
I got into my car and drove exactly two and a half blocks to my brother's house, where I set up my laptop on his dining room table and, for three hours, wrote.
None of this sounds vaguely exceptional. But for me it was profoundly so.
Today I executed a plan I hatched back in January. Today I took the first step in overcoming extreme threshold anxiety. Today I hope to remember as the day I became a writer.
Or maybe today should just be remembered for that exceptional rainbow this morning, or for the cold and blustery walk in Kirstenbosch the girls and I took together this afternoon, all three of us walking. Or for how Stella roared at some American tourists and Frieda made us stop so she could breast-feed her doll on a bench.
Maybe I'll just remember today as the first day that Stella grabbed her spoon from me and ate an entire bowl of pasta on her own while I did. something. else.
Maybe today should pass unmarked, and not singled out for glory, but in my mind I feel a switch clicked today. I just hope it was turning the light on.
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
wah wah wah dot
I've been round and about doing other things on the internets recently...
I guest-blogged my version of how to make cake pops over at domestic sensualist, julochka and Bee's very fab food blog.
My penguin cupcakes appeared on a cupcake tumblr but now I've lost the link and can't actually justify any more time spent searching for it. Especially as anytime I google 'penguin cupcakes' I get back to me - that post alone accounts for two thirds of the traffic I get on this blog.
Then I wrote a post for a Cape Town destination blog and get this, they edited me! Shocking. Content and style. Hurrmpf.
I've been hatching a number of plans to start writing more commercially, but editing ... [narrow slitty-eyed glare], not sure how I feel about that ...
Oh ja and then of course I've been pinning. And pinning. And pinning. And pinning. In fact someone should make one of those cheesy blog labels saying 'Gone Pinning' 'cos I'm sure there's more than a few lean blogs out there as a result.
Ooooo it's an (p)interesting thing Pinterest. Crap name, interesting concept, fascinating participation. I've a deep and meaningful one brewing about this ...
I guest-blogged my version of how to make cake pops over at domestic sensualist, julochka and Bee's very fab food blog.
My penguin cupcakes appeared on a cupcake tumblr but now I've lost the link and can't actually justify any more time spent searching for it. Especially as anytime I google 'penguin cupcakes' I get back to me - that post alone accounts for two thirds of the traffic I get on this blog.
Then I wrote a post for a Cape Town destination blog and get this, they edited me! Shocking. Content and style. Hurrmpf.
I've been hatching a number of plans to start writing more commercially, but editing ... [narrow slitty-eyed glare], not sure how I feel about that ...
Oh ja and then of course I've been pinning. And pinning. And pinning. And pinning. In fact someone should make one of those cheesy blog labels saying 'Gone Pinning' 'cos I'm sure there's more than a few lean blogs out there as a result.
Ooooo it's an (p)interesting thing Pinterest. Crap name, interesting concept, fascinating participation. I've a deep and meaningful one brewing about this ...
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