A Familiar Journey

The morning was damp, hazy. I rode my bicycle to work for the first time in weeks, took the familiar journey.  It went (it goes) like this:

My bike plunks off the curb.  I adjust to the concrete, to the wobble of my handlebars. I ride the wrong way, for just a brief moment, in that I know the way but traffic along this one small street runs opposite, so I tuck myself at the edge, aware that I'm where I shouldn't be.

The stoplight is never long but I watch the corner market.  I remember when it burned, the notes that were left on the windows, we miss you.  Now it's bright and open and I know the owner's smile because it sits beneath an unshaven gray shadow and it's kinder than most.

Clinton Street is wet and crowded but the crossing guard, our favorite, stands at the park, the one where we sat with Tyler's cousins and a little girl, lost in play, wandered towards us because she thought she was ours until she realized she wasn't and toddled away.  The crossing guard is little but sturdy and her glasses are fogged or maybe they're smudged and she doesn't mind it.  She shouts things we've come to expect, Come on bikers!  Hey baby doll!  Watch out for these maniacs!  She points at cars and shakes her head.  In the summer we miss her, and those weeks, this fall, when the road was closed, we wondered where she went.  Because her voice is my morning.  Her voice is the moment you think you are sitting alone and someone sits beside you.

I take the road up and around towards the Manhattan bridge.  I know the ground beneath me, the way it curls first, then slopes just enough for my tires to slow.  Soon, I mark the East river, it's middle.  This is where the road flattens, then slips away from itself, a downhill sled. This is where the air changes. The faint smell of fish.  Cooking oil climbs like a chimney swell from unknown stoves.  No one glances from the rushing carts and they take chances, like a gazelle's very first leap, across the painted lines of street.

I always want to stop here, on the path, where the old women in their winter bundle coats stand in Tai Chi formation across the damp grass.  I always think I will stop, someday, to take their photograph, to capture something I've otherwise been unable to keep.  Sometimes they are still and I think I'm caught in the hush of their whisper.

Sometimes they are dancing.

First Bike Commute of the Year

There aren't the right words for getting to live a blue sky day.  I rode to and from work for the first time this year.  Over the Manhattan bridge.  The North side.  Slipped straight through the warm breeze.  

New York City has never looked so bright and full of blue.

"You're Afraid of Me"

I rode my bicycle home from work yesterday, waited at a stoplight on 22nd and 5th Avenue. I waited in the street, my foot on the curb, ready to spring forward as soon as the light changed.

A pedestrian, an older man, stopped in the crosswalk, asked me if I was a 'racer'.

I shook my head, "No."

"Well you have a really nice bike. I like it," he said, still standing in the middle of the street.

I thanked him.

Then he patted me repeatedly on the shoulder, the way you would an obedient dog.

"So, you're not racing? You just ride around. From work or something?"

I looked to the stoplight, eager for it to change. "I just commute this way," I told him.

"That's a good thing." Then he pat my shoulder. Again.

He must have seen my hesitation because he followed with, "People are not nice to one another anymore. So this must be shocking to you. You're afraid of me. That's fine."

"I'm not afraid of y--" I tried. Because I wasn't. But he had already walked off.

I thought about this conversation as I pedalled home. I don't like to leave a conversation feeling as if I have been scolded, feeling as if I am an example of what 'people' have become. I wondered what level of engagement I owed this stranger, if I owed him anything at all.

But I also wondered, is it true? Are we no longer accustomed to 'nice'?

(It still does not change the fact that I do not like to be pet by anyone.)

Taking Risks

When the weather cooperates, I ride my bike to work. I gather my things, my backpack bulging on my back, and I ride over the Manhattan bridge. The first moments of my morning are spent looking at the skyline of lower Manhattan. The Hudson River glistens underneath the sun. And you can see the Statue of Liberty in the distance. I see it all again in the evening as the sun sets in the sky.

Lately, I haven't stopped to take it in. Because I am just trying to get where I need to go. And, the past few weeks, it seems that everyone is on edge. Even more so than usual. The traffic is maddening. Other bikers are not paying attention. Cars are whizzing past me like I am invisible. People are smacking their cab doors into my hand and I am left purple and bruised.

I am not a reckless biker. I follow the rules. I stop at lights. I use the bike lanes. I try my best. But it seems I'm not getting anywhere.

And I watch other bikers as they ride the wrong way down the streets, as they cut in front of cars, ring their bell through intersections where they don't have the right-of-way. Yes, it's dangerous. No, if I were them, I wouldn't test it.

But, you know what? They are getting somewhere.

As someone who has spent most of her life trying to do the right thing, I wonder about this. A lot.

How can you be seen and heard and still follow the rules? How do you get somewhere and still play it safe?

When I write, I think: here is a place to take risks. Here is a place to be reckless.

I don't know how many times I've asked myself why I write. There is no real answer, I'm sure. But I think that must be one of the reasons. And I hope I am taking enough risks there. I hope I can find other places in my life to take the right risks.

Flat. Down. Up.

I rode my bicycle through Prospect park on Saturday, thinking about my writing, about this blog. I can not tell you how many blog posts I have 'written' while I've pedalled, how many plot holes I have worked out while gripping my pink handlebars (It's almost time for new tape, what color do you suggest?)

On this particular ride, I was thinking a lot about my novel, with it's completed first draft, which sits until I can sit with it. I have designated Friday afternoon as the time to do that. To read it, in it's entirety and see what can be done. Since I began writing the book, I've struggled to define one of the most important characters. She is a catalyst for everything that happens to my main character and I have danced around her for 72,000 words. There are decisions that need to be made and there are literal blank pages waiting for me to make them. I have lost sleep over this woman. She has made me insane.

My ride through Prospect Park did not provide any breakthroughs but I am very, very close to figuring things out.

What I did realize is how cathartic it is to ride this particular loop. I begin on a flat road, then I dip down a long hill where I fly and feel free. At the end, there is a steep slope upwards and I sweat and curse to myself the entire time. While I'm climbing, I think, I'm going home. There is no way I can do this again. But then I come to that flat and I take off for another round.

As I tried to sort through this mess of a character, I thought about what I was doing. I thought about the loop. And it made me feel better. Not just about my book but about life in general. Flat. Down. Up. And how natural it is to start again. I realize it's cliche, these hills and valleys. But to feel it, really feel it, makes me know it's true. Because that's what it's really like...to move across the earth this way.

Summer In the City

I began the week shaken, having fallen off of my bicycle on 13th Street and University Place bright and early Monday morning. I was on my way to work and my bike took off ahead of me, the tires skidding on a wet surface I didn't see. I rose up from the ground with unsteady legs, my right side bloody and skinned and swelling.

As soon as I realized I was in the middle of the street, I was sent into a panic. Instead of lifting my bike and dusting myself off, I took off running to the sidewalk, dragging my bicycle behind me like it was a tantruming child, by the handlebars, with the pedals and spokes scraping across the grey concrete.

I knew that the city would not stop for me, even if strangers were on hand to see if I was okay, my only response to nod incoherently while my heart pounded inside my chest-- because the streets are relentless that way. Nothing stops moving. Cars and food carts and delivery trucks barrelled behind me and they did not stop. And I still had to get to work. Later still, I would have to get all the way back home.

I found myself in all kinds of minor predicaments throughout the week. Trying to place my bandaged arm and my black and blue thigh in just the right position while I slept, sitting in an air conditionless room in the 90 degree heat attempting to write something that made any kind of sense, even carrying an 8 foot wooden beam through crowded streets that did not want to make room for me.

I love this city. I really do. I see it as a my playground. My home. But sometimes I forget that it is bigger than me.

Stay

We had a long weekend in the States and I spent most of it moving through the sunshine, as if I'd been let loose from the angry rain. I rode over it's reflections on the pavement with my bike, watched it slice through the trees as I hiked and, with my hair in the grass, I let it soak right through me.

On Saturday we went to Governor's Island which, in it's own strange way, is an inspiration for my current work in progress, Rabbit Island. Governor's Island is the kind of place I know I'll be talking about in years to come. I'll come back to New York City and learn of it's fate. I'll shake my head in dismay.

"Remember when the ferries were free?" I'll say. "When you could ride your bike wherever you wanted and there were no cars? Remember the abandoned houses and the dormitories? How everything was all fenced in? The weird art installation in the church? The miniature golf course that looked like something your old hippie neighbor had scrambled together in his yard and let the neighborhood kids play for free? Remember when we signed a waiver to look inside a castle? How we peaked our heads inside a darkened room and listened to an audio recording about trading a boat for a bit of dust? Remember?"

Every time I'm there I want to change the cliche because it should be: 'nothing strange can stay'. But I hope that Governor's Island does.

After that, we took the ferry back and looked at the Brooklyn Bridge, all covered in white tarp and construction. "What a terrible time to take a picture of the Brooklyn Bridge," I told Tyler.

And so, he snapped a picture anyway.

Competition

I've been thinking a little bit about competition these days. I haven't really competed in anything seriously since high school when I participated in a variety of sports teams. And after high school, I no longer participated in those sports. I never became competitive about grades at the university or climbing the corporate ladder in the work place.

Even now, I participate in activities that challenge no one but myself. I bike, not to win races, but to prove to myself that I can climb a hill or go a distance I never thought I could. And I write stories only to prove to myself that I can.

As I thought about this, I noticed a trend. In a way, I'm always in a competition between the Melissa, last week, and the Melissa, this week. The Melissa, this week, wants to win. She wants to bike a little farther. To get up the hill a little faster. To write a better story than the last one. Everything is an inner competition that doesn't involve anyone else.

I wonder about that. Are you a competitive person? Do you compete with others? Or yourself?

Moonlight

In daylight, Prospect Park is full of life. Smoke rises from barbecue grills. I always hear laughter and the music of drums. I am often pedalling on my bike and the sun can barely sneak through all the trees to light the way. There are long meadows of green, covered with picnic blankets and bare feet.

On Saturday night, I took a moonlight bike ride through this familiar place. And it became strange. New. I should have expected that this life continues even in the darkness. But I didn't know.

A bride and groom danced on the steps.

It was the perfect night for a midnight swim.

Even a waterfall I never knew existed, barely visible in the darkness, snuck down into the earth below us.

I've always been told that I live in a city that never sleeps. But it always surprises me to learn that truly never does...

Full Time Write-ah

I had the day off today, so I decided to take the opportunity to write full time for a day. I consider this the 'ultimate' dream. Here's how it went:

9:30am: Get out of bed (Cut me some slack. It's a vacation day after all)

9:30am -10am: Open the google reader, check e-mail, and comment on blogs.

10am -10:40am: Eat breakfast, get dressed, and put BBQ pulled pork in the slow cooker.

10:40am - 10:42am: Change my outfit in order to avoid beginning to write.

10:42am - 10:44am: Decide to bring a purple pen instead of a black pen in order to avoid beginning to write.

10:44am - 10:46am: Decide to eat a few jelly-beans in order to avoid beginning to write.

10:46am - 10:50am: Decide to put dishes away from last night in order to avoid beginning to write.

10:50am - 1pm: Go to community garden across the street, sit in an Adirondack chair, and read and analyze with notes Parts II and III of my novel. Discover I am actually engrossed in my own novel (these two parts have been sitting for about a month)

1pm - 2:55pm: Return home, prepare lunch, and decide to revise a bunch of scenes based on my notes.

2:55pm - 3:05pm: Become paranoid that my novel (coming in at 76,000 words) is too short. Frantically google everything I can about word count.

3:05pm: Convince myself that my novel is absolutely too short. Decide to go biking instead of confront this.

3:06pm: Put my biking tights on and decide to calm down. Convince myself that my novel is definitely just the right length.

3:07pm: Put on my shirt. Decide that my novel is absolutely too short.

3:08pm: Put on socks and decide to calm down. Convince myself that my novel is definitely just the right length.

3:09pm: Put on my biking shoes and try to decide whether I'm too lazy to make my novel longer or unable to make it longer.

3:10pm: Fill up my water bottle and convince myself that I'm too lazy to make it longer.

3:11pm: Find my keys and convince myself that I am really just unable to make it longer.

3:12: Find my helmet and convince myself that I'm too lazy to make it longer.

3:13pm - 4:30pm: Take 3 loops around Prospect Park and decide that I can not think about my novel anymore because I have my new clipless pedals on my bike and new cycling shoes and I am now completely TRAPPED on my bike at all times and if I forget to clip out at the right time, I will fall and die. This is an excellent distraction.

4:30pm - 5pm: Return home to an apartment smelling like BBQ pulled pork. Lift weights while watching The Golden Girls. Embrace that fact that my novel might be the right length but that it might not and that I might be able to make it longer but I might not.

5pm - 5:20pm: Begin this blog post. Eat frozen strawberries while smelling BBQ pulled pork. Wonder when Tyler will come home from work so I can eat delicious smelling BBQ pulled pork.

5:20pm - 7:20pm: Work on more revisions. Specifically character introductions of 6 secondary characters and replacing my crutch words: "was" "it seemed" "ridiculous" and "simply". Receive a call from an agitated Tyler that the F train has suspended service several miles from our apartment. Continue smelling BBQ pulled pork and wonder when I will eat delicious smelling BBQ pulled pork. Then, remember that I am lucky to be a full time writer for a day and do not have to deal with commuting.

7:27pm: Decide to continue writing this blog post since I've found and replaced 200 instances of "it seemed". Determine I will never write "it seemed" in my lifetime in order to avoid ever having to do that again.

7:28pm: Decide that I actually can not look at my manuscript without going completely insane, throwing up, or gaining 500 pounds as I eat ALL of the Easter candy (yes I am almost 30 years old and my mother sends me Easter candy). Dread impending line edits over the next two weeks. Feel proud I worked for a total of 6 hours in one day.

How lucky I am to be a part time full time writer.

Time to Write

As the warm weather begins to find its way to the Northeast, I've been thinking a lot about my writing schedule. Or the lack of one...

I value time spent outdoors and when it's sunny, I do not like to stay inside and write. My schedule is flimsy, to say the least, and it is flexible. I don't plan to write every day. I write when I have 'time' to write. I give up activities to write. And I give up writing to engage in activities. There's no rhyme or reason to any of it.

These are the things I will give up writing for (and not feel guilty)
Spending time with Tyler
Dinner or drinks with friends and family
Visits with friends and family
A Bike Ride
A hike
Working Out
Taking the night off after a particularly difficult/emotional/stressful day at work
Cooking
Eating
Showering
Sleeping

Here are things I give up writing for (and feel guilty)
Being on facebook
Watching television
Blogging
Reading blogs
Browsing the internet

Now, it should be said that I don't have the hours from 7:30am to 7pm to write. These are the hours I spend working full time and travelling to and from the office. I like to go to bed no later than 12:30am. And I consider that late.

So, you see, that I have roughly 5 hours per night to do everything else. There are several things pulling me away that make me feel guilty (I have to think about those). And there are even more things pulling me away from writing that I value or are absolutely necessary. I think my priorities are pretty appropriate. But if any of the non-necessity activities become available to me at any given time then the manuscript gets placed in a drawer. And it never. Gets. Done.

This makes me think I need an actual schedule. I'm not sure how it's going to work, but I think something needs to be put in place. The flexibility is great, but perhaps it's getting out of hand. Perhaps the things I value need a more specific time slot (my goodness, has it really come to that?) Whatever the case, I'm mulling it over...

So, tell me, please. How flexible are you with your writing time?

Do you write every day at a specific time no matter what?

Do you give up the things you value in order to write?

What things take precedence over your writing?

What things take precedence over your writing that maybe shouldn't?

Inquiring minds want to know...

A Winter Tree Perspective

You've all seen how nostalgic I've been for biking in these cold months. Well, thank you mother nature, for giving me two glorious biking days in the middle of January. 45 suddenly feels like beach weather (I choose to ignore the cold air in my lungs going up the hill in prospect park and my nose running as I pedal up Union Street...)

And I want to thank the winter tree. The winter tree affords me a completely new perspective. When I rode the loop through Prospect Park yesterday, I saw everything through the bare branches. Don't get me wrong, I love the lushness of every tree come Spring, but to be able to see through all that, right into the park is a lovely thing. It's also quite fantastic that I only have a view of New York City from my apartment...in the winter. Because of the winter tree. That makes me smile.

Yesterday, I reached my goal of finishing the revisions for Part I of my novel. February 15th is my next deadline, the revisions for Part II. This is going to be a lot more difficult. Part I of my novel was a lot more polished. It came before the whole 'I've got to get this 1st draft over with or I'm going to jump out of a window' feeling. The pacing in Part II is quite wonky and there are some very obvious plot holes. It also requires a lot more new scenes than the Part I revisions did, so I'm back to the terrifying blank page.

My fingers are crossed that Part I has become a winter tree. That I was able to trim all the leaves back so I could see a little bit better for Part II. I guess I'm about to take a look and see...

Biking Memory #2

I had no idea I had so many biking memories, until the weather got too cold to bike. I guess this is what happens when you grow up in the suburbs and live your summers outside, sunrise to sunset.

We glanced at the darkening skies, only a quick glance, before continuing on. At that time, the streets in our neighborhood were new to us. We'd never been on them before, by ourselves, our hands gripping the handlebars whose rainbow streamers fluttered in the wind. I felt the smallest drop of rain and ignored it. We wanted to keep riding, see how far we could go before we couldn't go anymore. The rain fell harder, but it was warm against our skin. A summer rain that didn't leave a chill. Soon, it was pouring. We didn't think about our tires skidding, our hair and clothes getting soaked, our parents probably wondering where we were, we only thought about going farther, never turning back around.

I think that's what I love about biking, it makes the streets you walk and drive on every day seem new. You can always go a little bit farther and see what else there is to see.

And, there's no disclaimer here. I firmly advocate biking in the rain.

Biking Memory

Now that the frost is nipping at people's noses and it's dark and dreary at 4pm, it has become impossible to do one of my favorite things. Bike. Every year I come to this point, constantly checking weather.com hoping that there's a weekend day above 40 degrees (that's my biking temperature cut-off). It doesn't happen often and when it does, I still battle cold winds and numb cheeks, and I find it difficult (and sometimes painful!) to do the long bike rides Tyler and I so desperately enjoy. This year, due to busy and/or rainy weekends this fall, my biking season ended much earlier than it should have. Now I find myself even more restless than usual as the cold weather drops in and overstays it's welcome.

Every once and a while I like to nestle in a memory. Today of course my mind wanders to days of biking...

Before our annual block party, all the kids that lived on the same tiny street of my childhood home participated in a strange ritual. It took place in the morning, as our parents dragged out patio tables and chairs to the street, set up the bbq and placed toys on the lawn. We all hopped on our banana seat bicycles and proceeded to line up and ride in a tight circle. Around and around, over and over again, in a swirling, dizzying, wonderful circle. I remember how important it was that we participate in this ritual year after year on that special day. A day we looked forward to all summer. It's a blurry memory and I really only envision the dizzy, grey concrete underneath my bicycle tire. But I love that memory. And I always wonder when we broke away from the circle, one by one, and parted ways.