People Love to See What People Do

This lyric popped into my head today. From the musical Ragtime, lyrics by Lynn Ahrens. The character singing it is a filmmaker and I've always loved it because I think it may be the simplest, truest explanation for why we read stories and watch films. Yes. People love to see what people do.

life shines from the shadow screen
comical yet infinitely true.
people love to see what people do,
here where everyone is someone new.

Don't Mess With the Lobster Man

I feel the need to share this.

There is a restaurant around the corner from my apartment. A cozy French restaurant specializing in fish. We are not quite regulars but we do go there often, particularly in the winter when it's too cold to walk too far.

Some time ago, the owner, a proud Frenchman who always wears a Fedora, became the subject of many blog posts and articles. Apparently, a patron sent back his lobster twice because it was undercooked and, like any proud chef, the owner did not appreciate this because, he yelled, it was not undercooked and he only serves the freshest and finest fish at his establishment.

Then... the owner threw a lobster at the customer.

This, of course, makes me ridiculously happy because I happen to love crazy people. And I especially love crazy people who are passionate about food.

Last week, the owner opened a wine bar next door to the restaurant. I will, no doubt become a regular there because I like wine. But he just announced the name of the bar. And guess what he named it?! Guess!

The Flying Lobster!

I'm dying.

Sorry. I don't get out much.

Wait For Me

Blerg.

If I spoke that is about all that would come out. Or the wa-wa nonsense talk that comes from the adults in the Peanuts cartoons.

Apparently, I was a well-behaved child. But... my God you could whine, says my mother. I was very particular about how to make a proper cheese sandwich. I did not like to leave the swingset. I refused to stand on long lines.

Nothing much has changed.

I live in a neighborhood full of children. When I walk to the subway they crowd the sidewalks on their wobbling scooters, spill out of yellow schoolbuses, run when they're supposed to be walking.

Always, there is one little girl standing at the top of the steps, dragging a too-heavy backpack, sun stinging her eyes, hair in a wild tangle at her waist. And she's so ridiculously dramatic. The frivolous girl in a period piece. The one who is in constant need of smelling salts. Wait for me. She always cries. Whhhhy will no one waaaaait for me? Puhlease somebody just waaaait for me.

I hear ya, kid. Lately, I can't catch up to anybody or anything. I can't quite seem to get there.

A Stolen Story- Celebrate The Joy

This weekend I visited Tyler's Aunt and Uncle in Connecticut. They are moving from their fairytale house, a geodesic dome, with acres of runaway land. Butternut squash moves through their vegetable garden like a swamp thing. The wood burning stove stretches way up to the dome ceiling and the fire cackles as they make their way through endless bottles of wine.

But they're ready to leave it, much to everyone else's dismay, and a new home waits for them in Maryland, while they wait to sell the dome. And so they find themselves in a holding pattern. In their minds, they are in Maryland already. They are ready for that new life. But, physically, they are in the same place they've always been.

I sympathize with this feeling. In recent months I've felt that I know where I want to be and I can't quite get there. I'm ready to be married to Tyler but we've somehow been caught in an unintentional, epic-long engagement. I know where I want to be professionally but it's taking a while to get there. My goal of published author is now four years in the making (at least twenty-four years in the dreaming stage) and it doesn't seem any closer, no matter how many words have been written, no matter how much I'd like to measure progress in other terms.

But Tyler's Aunt told me about an experience in a recent yoga class that changed her attitude and, after hearing it, it changed mine.

While stretching on her mat during class, her hand brushed against her husband's and so they stayed that way, for a moment, holding hands. When the teacher instructed they go into a resting pose, they immediately let go, shifting, following instructions, getting into the correct position.

Apparently, the teacher had seen them holding hands and told them to go back to that moment. "Celebrate the joy you have," he said.

Of course, she told me that story, and it touched me. I knew I had to have it. It's probably time I admit that I don't have any of my own stories. I steal them. I sneak out with them through the always open door.

We Fix Computers

For some reason I've held on to my Dell laptop for almost ten years now. It has been through a lot. At one point, the hard drive died and I temporarily lost everything I had ever written. A few years later, my backup drive died and I officially lost everything I had ever written.

That was the day an entire writing life vanished. I spent a few weeks in denial. Technically, the work still existed. I just couldn't retrieve it. When it hit me that was a problem, I did not panic. I actually became completely zen about the whole thing. I thought, It doesn't matter. Maybe all that work was meant to be a secret anyway.

Over a year ago, I dropped the laptop and a screw disappeared. Apparently, the screw was important because the laptop screen managed to detach itself from the keyboard. Somehow, and I do not, for the life of me, know how this is possible: it still worked. And, so, I went about my days, using hefty books to lift up the flopping screen, moving the laptop around the apartment, trying to figure out which wall would work best for me to prop it up on, so I could continue with my work.

"How do you work like that?" Tyler asked.

"I don't know. It's not a big deal."

After working like that for about a year, I was walking through my neighborhood and saw a Grand Opening flag and a sign that read: We Fix Computers. So I walked into a nearly empty room which had just one folding chair, a desk, and a few empty bookshelves. I walked up to a young man, his dark hair sticking up every which way, huge wire-framed glasses that took over his face and I asked, "Do you fix computers?" And he said, "Yes. We fix computers."

So I gave him my computer, shook his hand, found out his name is Ken, and became the first customer at the no-name We Fix Computers store.

Before Ken fixed it, he asked me how quickly I needed it back and whether or not I needed it for work. I shrugged and said, "I don't really need it. I just write on it."

And Ken said, "You're a writer?"

Despite the fact that I write things. Despite the fact that I actually write for a living, it did not exactly occur to me to refer to myself that way. "I guess so."

"If you're a writer than you must really need this computer."

Again. Dumbfounded. "I guess so."

"I'll order the parts and fix it as fast as I can."

I see Ken nearly every weekday. Our lives are timed in such a way that when I leave the subway, he heads towards it. And we smile and wave and nod.

I am grateful that Ken was there. Is there. To remind me that the work matters. That it is a big deal. That it doesn't have to stay a secret.

I *Do* Write This

Today, I'm reporting over at Laurel Garver's blog for the Thestral Gazette.

I've never really been one to try fan fiction but when Laurel came up with the idea to start a newspaper based on Harry Potter and she asked me to write a piece or two, I thought it might allow me to live out a fantasy I have to write fake news for The Onion.

And it did! It has been fun.

I often put myself in a box when I write. I think, I don't write fan fiction. I don't write flash fiction. I don't write essays. I don't write book reviews. I don't write historicals. I don't write...

My goodness, what do I write?

Lately, I want to stretch myself as far as I can as a writer. Maybe I do write this. Or that. To use the old cliche, how will I ever know if I don't try?

So, if you feel so inclined, hop over to my post and see what happened when Gilderoy Lockhart, a celebrity author who actually erased his own memory, decided to write another book.

And I'd love to hear your thoughts about stretching yourself as a writer, about taking on projects you never thought you would take on.

Mary Karr, Nelson George, and a Story Sorta Song

On Sunday, I attended the Brooklyn Book Festival. It was quite a treat to be surrounded by so many books and authors. To celebrate books so close to home. The amount of panels and signings were overwhelming. Unmanageable really. So, like everything in my life these days, I had to choose carefully how to spend my time.

I decided to attend a talk with memoirist Mary Karr and the author and music critic Nelson George who were there to discuss music and literature. I'm embarrassed to admit that I have not read any of their work -- soon to be remedied because I actually felt real fear that Mary Karr would smack me or eat me alive if I didn't read her books, no real basis for that, just a feeling -- but the topic interested me more than any other on the schedule.

Among the many things discussed, there were musings on the rhythm and movement of cities, how each place has a specific music history, and the way musical styles influence writing styles. For example, George feels that Karr's writing sounds like whisky and honky-tonk. When he writes, he is attracted to a style that is concise but forcefully expressive, like James Brown.

Karr told a story about waiting for a singer to show up to a recording session for a record she is working on. When the singer did arrive, four hours late, she nailed the song in one take and left everybody in the room so overcome with emotion, they were sobbing.

Both Karr and George think that this rush of feeling, this immediacy, is what writers try to capture when they write.

Since music is important to the story I am telling right now, since I'm working with two singing fools in my novel, poor Adelaine and Luna, this discussion sent my brain into overdrive. I apologize, in advance, for the brain dump that comes next.

As many of you know, I love musical theater. But I know that a lot of people do not. They dislike the idea of telling a narrative through music and spectacle. I argue that musicals are not always about the big happy-clappy-snappy numbers. They rarely follow that show within a show structure anymore. The musicals I love are the shows that allow characters to speak and then step out into an actual and metaphorical spotlight and express their feelings through song.

I want to write a book that feels like that kind of musical. A story that steps away in those big moments and assaults you with the emotion, the way a powerful ballad does.

I don't think it's possible to take the feeling of live music and trap it inside the pages of a book. How could it ever feel the way a real voice or instrument feels? It can't be possible to tame the beat and measure it in words instead of notes.

But, in the same way that cities have their own music histories, I think that people have their own music histories. Music must flow through a life the way it moves through a space. Without getting too heady, too out-there (too late for that?) I think there must be a way to make music run through a character and come out in a way that feels a little bit like a recording, at least, of a song.

So I'm going to try to get my story sorta song right. I'll most likely fail. But, it seems I can only do one thing at a time these days (try as I might to do a thousand.) And this is time well spent.