The Blog By the Side of the Road

It's been too long since I've updated this blog. It's like the dead skunk lying by the side of the road that you try hard to ignore every time you drive past it Aaargh. I'm still struggling somewhat with the writer's block that I'm now convinced is nothing but the winter doldrums. Whatever.

I find the long, gray days of winter dreary and confining. One of the reasons I enjoy skiing is that it gets me outside exercising while taking in some beautiful scenery. Dennis and I recently took in a few days up at Jiminy Peak, Massachusetts. It was nice to get out in the crisp air and sunshine. Running also helps, albeit on a treadmill. It gets the heart pumping, fires up the neurotransmitters in my brain and helps release those ever so helpful endorphins into my bloodstream. So I've been getting to the gym as often as I can to run and lift weights. It all helps. Slowly, I'm beginning to find my way out of the doldrums. After running 6 miles yesterday, I added several pages to my novel and completed a poem I'd been toying with. Maybe I'm on an upswing.

People have various methods of finding their way out of writer's block or mental impasses. One friend hits the kitchen when she gets stuck. Maybe something about the aromatic smell of cooking food stimulates other parts of her brain. Another friend settles down into a marathon reading session that could last anywhere for a few days to several weeks. She says that other people's writing inspires her. I understand. Yet another person I know knits. Some people scrapbook, paint, draw or sew. Whatever it takes to get you writing is what you should do. Often I'll paint when I'm stuck. Like skiing or running, painting completely absorbs me, transports me to another world.

What do you do when writer's block strikes? Do you do anything outside of writing or research? If so, I'd love to hear about it.

Winter Blahs.

Here it is January - a brand new year - and while most writers I know are full of enthusiastic resolutions to write more consistently and more often, I am floundering. I can't seem to get past the blank screen looming in my brain like a relic from a drive-in movie theater. Eeek!

There are two words for this: writer's block. I guess nearly every writer goes through it some time. This is a first for me. Somehow, I've always been able to work through my writing gaps but this time it's lasting far too long. Maybe the consistent cold and stretch of gray, wintry skies are paralyzing me. At any rate, it worries me. I know it will pass. Eventually. I hope it will pass. In the meantime, what's a writer to do?

Here are some things I've been occupying myself with in place of writing: running, drawing, cleaning out the attic, browsing the web, reading, doing the NY Times crossword puzzle, playing online Scrabble, cleaning out my closet. All good ways to pass the time but none involve writing. They won't help me get where I want to go.

This afternoon I reread my WIP and added two sentences to an abandoned chapter. Maybe this signals the beginning of the end of my case of writer's block. I hope so. Tonight I'm going to look at it again and maybe add a couple more sentences. Perhaps I'll finish the whole damn chapter and then move on to the next one.

What do you do when you're stuck? Anybody have any useful suggestions. If so, please, share them. I beg you.

Christmases Past

I recently came across a couple of old photographs from Christmases past. When I was a kid, my family often got together with the families of our Irish friends for Christmas eve to share Irish whiskey, snacks and lots of good cheer. Somehow the night always came to an end with everybody sitting around the floor singing - usually into a tape recorder for Grandma Fay back home in Ireland or my Grandma Coulthard back in England. I loved sitting around the rug in a big semi-circle, wrapped in love and security and hoping that each and every Christmas time would always be like this. After all, that's what it was all about - being with family and the people I love.

Oh yeah, it was fun to get presents too. For years my sister Vicky, a die hard tomboy, got a cowboy suit for Christmas, complete with holster and badge. My presents varied. One year I got a nurses kit, even though I hated blood and hospitals. What I really wanted was an artist's kit. The following year I got a box of 100 Crayola crayons laid out side-by-side in a colorful array. Although they were beautiful, somehow, I knew real artists didn't color. They painted. So, the next year I asked for paints for Christmas and this time I got a box of water colors and a couple of paint-by-number kits. I was sure that real artists didn't pant by number either.

Somewhere along the way, I kind of gave up asking for anything in the way of art supplies and made do with what I had. Instead, I received books, a blacklight poster of butterflies, plants, clothes and lots of other things I loved and wanted. I knew my parents sacrificed much to get us nice gifts and I appreciated every one of them, tied up beautifully with a pretty ribbon and Christmas giftwrap. What I remember most, I guess, is the love that went into each and every Christmas. The presents may be gone now, but the memory of all that love still remains, wrapped around me like a cozy quilt on a frosty winter night.

Running and Writing

I recently started running again, albeit slowly. Now that I've picked up a little bit more speed (very little, I might add) and have gotten past the point where I'm clutching my side, gasping for breath and stopping every few hundred feet to take a walking break, I'm enjoying it. I even entered a few races this fall. While I didn't set any course records, I did manage to take a minute and 20 seconds off my time from the end of October to the beginning of December. Hope twinkles like a star in the early night sky. If I can run through the winter - at least 15-18 miles a week - maybe I can take another two minutes off my time by spring. Perhaps more!

When I write, as when I run, I always have a short term and a long term goal in sight. With running it might be to take another 15 seconds off my race time or to run hard to the end of the block so my body begins to learn the feeling of moving fast. With writing, it might be to find an unforced rhyme, to work through a particularly difficult scene like a fight or an escape scene, to crawl inside my mc's head and communicate her fears and her hopes or to finally make it through to the end of the chapter.

Long term goals are easier. Why do I run? Because it's a challenge and I love a challenge and the feeling of accomplishment I experience when I've completed a long run or a tough race. I like the afterburn and the way running sculpts my muscles. My longterm goal is to improve my health and get off all my diabetes meds - for good.

With writing, it's always to complete my work in progress and eventually find a home for it. Much harder to do than say. The real joy is in the doing, in the time spent treading the streets of my neighborhood or sitting before my computer and rising to the challenge of a blank page - of making something out of nothing more than my thoughts and dreams.

Giving Thanks

Thanksgiving is knocking on the back door and it's time to ponder the things I'm thankful for. Here are just a few that I deeply appreciate.

1. My family - a generous, talented and supportive husband and two wonderful, kind sons who I'm proud of.

2. Perseverance - It requires perseverance to succeed at anything. So while I may not be the most talented artist, the most gifted writer or the fastest runner, I do have a strong work ethic and an ability to stick to something and eventually reap results.

3. My health. Though it may sound trite, I took my health for granted until I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. Despite being prescribed more medication, my blood sugar continued to spiral upward. I was frustrated until I discovered a better way of eating; I became a vegan. Changing to a plant based diet has not only helped me lose 20 pounds hanging around my waist and hips but helped me bring my blood sugar almost back to normal. I still have another 10 to lose but I'm getting there.

4. Good friends. Sometimes I need a sounding board, somebody to go shopping with or to attend an art opening with. My friends enrich my life in so many ways and I'm grateful for each and every one of them.

5. Books - old books, new books, tomes of poetry and picture books. I love to hold a book in my hands, to run my fingers along its spine and breathe in its slightly musty odor. I especially love the warmth and cozy comfort of a whole wall of books filled with stories upon stories. Keep your Kindle, I still love the old-fashioned, low tech book.

6. Art Supplies - paint brushes, pencils, kneaded erasers, tubes of oil paints and the creamy expanse of a sheet of drawing paper or a length of linen canvas. Whenever I'm around art materials, I practically tingle with excitement.

7. My Parents. Though they're gone now, they live on in my thoughts and in my heart. I miss them deeply and am fortunate to have been raised by two people who loved me and understood the importance of books and education.

Of course there are hundreds of other little things I'm grateful for like Post-It Notes, hot tea served in a china cup or pink peonies, but this is my list of the things that matter most to me.

How about you? What are you most thankful for?

Marathons

For me, November means heaps of leaves, savory home cooked soups, dressing in layers to take a run in the brisk air and of course, The New York City Marathon. Last Sunday we had a NY Marathon breakfast with some friends from our Monday night running group. We gathered around the tv to cheer on some local favorites - Cathleen Kelly, Brendan Barrett and Richard Velazquez - while we tracked their progress online. Meanwhile, my husband made everybody omelets to go along with the fruit salad and NY bagels. Somebody brought pumpkin bread and someone else, mimosa fixings and we were ready to enjoy the morning.

It was great to fun watch the race with a group of people who appreciate running. A tremendous amount of time goes into training for a marathon - months and months, to be truthful. Despite potholes, freezing temperatures, biting winds, rain, shin splits, a side stitch or an overwhelming desire to stop and go home, the runner presses on until he/she crosses the finish line.

As I watched the runners clock mile after mile, I couldn't help but think that writing a novel is another kind of marathon. Like a runner, the author must push on if he wants to complete his book. Of course, there are always distractions - the tv, the internet, the phone, invitations to dinner, a sudden urge to sleep. But deep inside the writer knows that if he really wants to call himself a writer, he must ignore all the diversions and press forward to the end.

This month hundreds - maybe thousands - of writers are participating in NaNoWriMo. That means they've committed themselves to completing a first draft of a novel by the end of November and it must be at least 50,000 words long. It doesn't have to be good. In truth, most of the NaNo novels are far far from polished. The idea is to get it down. Later you can go back and revise it, to shape it into something compelling, into something that perhaps even sparkles.

People tackle other marathons, too - marathons of the spirit and the body, such as disease, poverty and other misfortunes. And like those runners crossing the finish line, there's a wonderful yet painful joy in finally making it to the end, in knowing that they've endured or have accomplished something few others have done. I couldn't do NaNoWriMo this year, due to some pending deadlines on other projects but I may try this on my own sometime, just to see how far I get.

Get Up and Move vs. Butt In Chair

"Do you have a secret that makes you so productive?
Want to know my secret? BIC.
That’s right. BIC. Butt in chair. There is no other single thing that will help you more to become a writer."
-Jane Yolen

As a writer who hopes to one day have her own book published, the most important thing I can do is to write, a task which entails applying my butt to the chair, according to the grand dame of children's literature, Jane Yolen. Often for an hour or more each day. The same can be said for artists, although I must admit, many do stand as they paint. The arts I love mean using your mind and your memory as well as your imagination more than your body.

This is great for my writing and my art; not so great for my physique or my diabetes 2 which I've been battling hard this summer. A few months ago, my blood sugar was spiraling out of control and I was, well, chubbed out. According to all the recommendations for women my size, I was within the normal weight range but I was not happy. I had love handles, felt sluggish and tired and my usual size 4 was getting harder and harder to squeeze into. Something had to be done about it. And soon.

I did some research on the internet and found Dr. Fuhrman's website. Fuhrman is a family MD who specializes in nutrition and disease reversal. According to him, I just might be able to reverse - or improve - my diabetes. So I began following a vegan diet and exercising vigorously 5 days a week. To most people, a vegan diet sounds extreme. In actuality, it's amazingly diverse. Over the course of any given day, I often eat as many as 20 different kinds of foods. For exercise, I either run for half an hour or ride my bike for an hour or longer. The weight came off. Since the third week in July, I have dropped 17 pounds and gone down a size or two. My blood sugar has plummeted and I no longer take as much medication to control it.

My writing and art? I'm still at it. I've learned to apply the same philosophy to my life as I applied to my library when building a collection. Balance. As a writer, an artist, and a diabetic, I need to balance the needs of my body with the needs of my soul otherwise, I may not be around long enough to see any book published.