Moving!

I'm consolidating! Please follow me to my new official website:

http://www.monicanawrocki.com/blog

Balance

Every day, I am pulled further into the world of technology. We all are. Whether we like it or not and whether we're ready or not. This is the world we live in.
At the front of the pack, directly behind the creators and promoters, are the enthusiasts who embrace each new innovation as it comes and apparently, can absorb how to use it in their sleep. They leap out of their beds each morning and check their phones to see what has changed overnight. And something always has.
Behind this crowd, the rest of us are spread from Eager to Reluctant and all points in between. At the back of the Reluctant group, a few people are actually chained to a small machine labelled Necessity and are being dragged. They keep their feet and shuffle along miserably for the most part, but are occasionally unable to keep up, actually stumbling into the dirt and being dragged until they can scramble to their feet again. See the one being dragged face down in the mud there? That's me.
I'm not saying I don't appreciate the wonders of technology. I love how easy it is to connect with people, most of all. Behind that are a hundred other things for which I am grateful. But my gratitude list would include things like, "Elimination of typewriter,"  and not, "Ability to sync all my devices and have my watch tell my car where to go."
I'm thinking of this as I sit and watch an eagle  above the lake, playing on the currents of the same wind that giggles its way down my stovepipe to tickle the flames which keep my fingers warm enough to type. The trees are swaying gently in unison - a tall, geeky, green campfire circle listening to Kumbaya. The lake is white capping - as though the resident trout are mooning us with their bellies: Not today, Fishers!
Yup, that's the same wind that regularly knocks trees down onto electrical wires and cuts the power to our little island. When that happens, we fire up the generator to run the well and light a lantern. The stove and oven run on propane and the house is heated by the wood stove. All we really miss when the power is out - is our gizmos. Recharging is possible with the generator, but low on the priority list behind fridges and freezers. And yet, I have noticed, I miss the electronics more and more. I have become addicted to my email. And for the first time this year, there is a tablet in the house. Now I don't have to go to the computer to check my mail. I love it.
I hate it.
The eagle is still playing in the wind, laughing at me, as I sit here with my nose stuck in my laptop, talking to you about being shackled to technology. I am resentful of every minute I spend learning how to use some program I need for my work, that I am not really interested in.
I am grateful for every connection I make with a friend, new or old, by pushing buttons. Miraculous.
Find the perfect balance, whispers the eagle as he tips his wings one way and then the other, finding the sweet spot, that lifts him up so effortlessly.

Shingles

From Monicapedia, the freak encyclopedia

Shingles
Herpes zoster blisters

Shingles, also known as zoster, herpes zoster, or zona, is a viral disease characterized by a painful skin rash with blisters and the urge to throw things. Two to four days before the rash occurs there may be pain or tingling in the area, and the patient is likely to buy something over-priced. The rash usually heals within two to four weeks; however, some people develop ongoing nerve pain which may last for months or years, a condition called postherpetic neuralgia. There have also been documented cases of postherpetic neuralgia-not wherein a patient insists they have pain when there is no evidence of nerve damage. This may be due to intense dislike of doing dishes and/or vacuuming.

Shingles is due to a reactivation of varicella zoster virus (VZV) within a person's body. Chickenpox is due to an initial infection with VZV. Once chickenpox has resolved, the virus may remain inactive in nerve cells. Risk factors for reactivation include older age, poor immune function, stress about publishing a book, and having had chickenpox before 18 months of age. How the virus remains in the body or subsequently re-activates, is not well understood. As a result, we can conclusively state that it may or may not be contagious. 

The shingles vaccine might decrease the chance of shingles by about half in those between the ages of 50 and 80. Or maybe not. It also decreases rates of postherpetic neuralgia, and if an outbreak occurs, its severity. Or not.  

If shingles develops, antiviral medications  can reduce the severity and duration of disease if started within 72 hours of the appearance of the rash.  Opioids may be used to help with the acute pain. Throwing things, taking Tylenol 3 with a shot of Cabernet Savignon, and watching entire seasons of Friends can also help with pain control.

Most patients report a layer of crazy-making itchiness, then a layer of numbness, and then, just below the skin, a layer of tiny bursts of pain that feel like static shocks being triggered randomly under the rash. It's quite a parfait, not unlike the dessert Rachel made on Friends. The pages of the cookbook stuck together, and she unwittingly combined the recipes for trifle and shepherd's pie.  She served a lovely confection with layers of whipped cream, custard, jam, sauteed peas and onions, browned hamburger and spongecake. For a few days at the beginning of the rash stage, most patients feel as though they just ate the entire thing.

Four out of five doctors recommend buying the patient something pretty.

Monicapedia acknowledges that the true stuff came from Wikipedia. With thanks, and apologies. 

Website!

 Well, it's done. James at Friesen Press did the heavy lifting, but I did the finishing myself and I'm pretty proud of it. I did okay, for a Troglodyke!
Check it out:
http://www.monicanawrocki.com/

Sequel Fever

Hey, look what I made! A strange feeling to finally hold the book in my hands. The culmination of years of work, thinking, reading, researching, thinking, writing, rewriting, thinking, more rewriting, editing, editing, editing.
I'm looking through it, seeing how Lisa's sketches came out in the final printing, reading snippets - of my own words. Weird.
There was a time, not so long ago, that I could not have read it--AGAIN. Too full. Like the one more bite of turkey that you know will push you over the edge.
There is so much work involved in writing a book. I can't imagine doing it again.
But I will.
You know how they say the pain of childbirth is quickly forgotten? (Personally, I can't imagine that, but I'll take your word for it, moms.) I imagine it's similar for any painful process that ends in a joyful addition to your life. And right now, I am enjoying looking at Lisa's beautiful cover art. I like running my hand over the matte finish. I'm fanning the pages in front of my nose.
I'm supposed to be working on promoting Full Moon. I have a to-do list the length of my arm. In my own defense, I also have Shingles, so most of my days are currently devoted to trying to rebound from this annoying and unpleasant virus. But as I begin to recover and have energy for a couple of office tasks per day, am I doing the things on my to-do list? Nope. Mostly, I sit at my desk and wonder what Maddy and Cat and Draggin are up to. I think about whether they would want to try another dive and see if they can visit their friends from 1941. And what is happening with Malila? Where are those grandsons of hers? What happened to the Tagawas?
My sister is already nagging about the "next book". Full disclosure: I've seen some scenes. Jotted them down. Might go read them right now.
Maybe it's the anti-viral medication and the painkillers talking, but I feel good. Good enough to start again? Well, a few sentences can't hurt . . .

The Turtle (not the yoga pose)

Take it to the page, said my mentor years ago.
I try. I do. But I have two responses to stress and/or anxiety:
1) Turtle
2) Blathering idiot. (That's a blithering idiot who can't stop talking. Or writing.)
I like the blathering. After all, that's how I process. Just this morning, I sat by the wood stove and wrote page after page . . .  and burned them. "Fire pages" help me sort through my thoughts - and trust me when I tell you that 99% of them aren't good for much besides fire starter. Such as . . . today's To-do list (which looks suspiciously like yesterday's), my feelings about coffee grinders, how dull my pencil is getting and how far it is to the sharpener, why I'm such a slow reader. You know, that stuff.
But today's pages had me trying to identify why, for the past several weeks, I have stopped blathering and become this girl:

Well, partly, it's because I was taking pictures of sea turtles. Nice, eh?
But also, it is because I have been struck with a paralyzing anxiety about the release of my first novel for kids, Full Moon Lagoon. It's called New Book Jitters, and it's a real thing.
I have been working on this book for years and am thrilled to have it ready to share, because that was the point, right? And I've known for a month now that is was ready to sell and it took me until four days ago to share that little secret with anyone.
I finally jumped off that cliff by calling my sister. When she answered, I said, "I'm freaking out!" (I wasn't really; I just love drama and knew that I needed the kind of push only a big sister can provide.) Before we were even off the phone, she'd posted an announcement to Facebook and I was pretty much obliged to jump.
And so it begins. The past few days were fun - lots of messages of congratulations that I'm finally finished and many good wishes. That wave of affirmation has moved on and I am floating in the trough between the waves, (not unlike the noble sea turtle), wondering if the next wave - the one after people have actually read the book - will be a fun ride, or a slam into the sand that knocks me senseless.
I'm grateful to have made it this far, don't get my wrong. I've had all the support and good luck I could hope for. So I'm trying not to winge. But I need to figure out why launching this book has put me into turtle mode.
I am at the part of the publishing journey  that requires my most un-turtle-esque self. The "putting it out there" part. And all I can think is how quiet and peaceful it is inside my shell.
I don't remember feeling this anxious about my non-fiction book and it was very personal. It was just me talking and sharing thoughts and feelings on a pretty intimate level. That should have freaked me out. But somehow, it didn't. I think it is because there was nothing to "evaluate". Readers could judge me of course, but I'm okay with that. You could read what is essentially a memoir and you could say, You're okay. Or you could read it and say, You're an idiot. And I'm okay with that.
But this is a creation. Inherent in that is the whole "good and bad" thing - a concept of which I am not a fan.
I don't want it in my classroom, infecting my students' joy and creativity in learning and, apparently, I don't want to have to deal with it in my own creative work. You can like it or not, that's just taste. But the idea that my art must be declared "good or bad" chokes creativity.
So, here I am. I think I know why I've been turtling and I think I know there's nothing I can do about what's making me nervous.
I do want to share this novel with kids so it's time to stop blathering about it and do it:
Head out, now, and move forward judiciously.
And trust the thick shell.

Happy Halloween Hormones

As you know, my other ongoing saga (besides writer's schlock) is the peri-menopause roller coaster. This does not help me with the challenges of writing and so, today, on Take a Witch to Work Day, I'd like to pause from the serious business of character development, in order to pay homage to the cast of characters currently starring in the Monica show.

The problem isn't so much that I'm dealing with temporary multiple personalities; the problem is trying to guess which one is gonna crawl out of bed every morning. And believe me, it's as much a surprise to me as it is to my increasingly nervous partner. I have found ways to live with Itchy, Bitchy, Sweaty, Sleepy, Bloated, Forgetful and Psycho (although I'd prefer to call her something else - maybe She Who Must Not Be Named.) All of these things are livable. It's the combined effects and the unpredictability that get ya.

If I could get up in the morning and find a little note on my bedside table letting me know who's in charge each day, that would be very helpful. 

Dear Mon, It is I, Bloated. Don't even try the green slacks - you'll just feel bad. Have  a great day.

Or, maybe this:

Dear Mon, If you didn't make a list yesterday, you may as well cancel today. Stay in bed. Love, Forgetful.

Or:

Dear Mon, Itchy and Sweaty here. Just wanted to let you know that whatever you choose to wear today will be unbearable by 1:00 pm. Love you!

And if it's You Know Who, there'd just be a dead rodent or something. Not pleasant, but at least I'd know. Sometimes I don't know it's her until I find myself yelling at the shower for being too wet.

The good news is; today, I am free to be. I am wearing my witch hat as I type this and I look forward to a day of guilt-free witching. I think I'll start by pretending the vacuum is broken. Then, I'll lie and say some kids told me they are coming to trick or treat tonight and I'll go buy candy. Then I'll eat it. (There are no kids - I live on the dark side of the moon.) 

However you spend your day today, remember: It's Halloween! Embrace your inner witch!

Writing process nonsense

Have you ever driven in a snowstorm? I mean a real white-out. I've done it a few times and it's horrible. You waited one minute too long to get off the road and find a place to wait it out and now it's too late. If you pull over, you're stuck and at risk of getting hit by the next idiot who waited one minute too long. Now, all you can do is grit your teeth, lean over the wheel you have in a white-knuckle death grip, and stare at the two red dots in front of you. The tail lights of the car in front of you are all that exist. You are staying in the tire ruts by feel now, and praying for the driver of the car in front of you like he or she is your dearest love.
I am in the midst of a writing snowstorm. The wind is howling around me with the voices of characters. The snippets of scenes I was driving toward with such anticipation are swirling into a whiteout of indistinguishable blur.
Sitting here at the keyboard, with undeniably white knuckles, I am focused on the tail lights of the last scene I wrote but I have no idea where it is leading me. Right now, I just need to keep moving forward and not think about the possibility of it getting worse.
So, I'm writing about the writing which makes me think about the story which, in theory, should keep my wheels in the ruts until I can see again.  (I'm still taking suggestions for Jackie's Homeword that pulls her out of the Vale and brings her to the waking world. That was a few posts back.)
Thanks for indulging me - if I brought up POV or plot structure to the dog once more . . .
So . . .
I have about 50 pages of something. Well, mostly nothing, but some of it could end up being something. Right now, it's a bunch of scenes that have popped into my head and demanded recording. Today, I have them spread out across my office and while it would seem the logical next step is to put these in order and read them, what I see in my head is a bunch of disgruntled actors.
The seven principle characters of this tale (as it now exists) are milling about the semi-lit, cluttered stage of a dusty theatre. They are each bent over their own script muttering about how little is available to them. I hear their questions from my place behind the typewriter in the fourth row:
"But my script starts half way through. What's happened to me before this? And where is the end of the script? What happens to me next?"
I have no answers for any of these questions, so I ignore them and pretend to write. See how I strike each key with confidence? C-o-n-f-i-d-e-n-c-e.
"Okay," mutters the lead. "I see where you're going with this, but what is my motivation?"
My head pops up. That one I can answer.
Jackie: Your motivation is to know your mom who you lost as a child. When you realize that the mysterious things occurring in your dreams are somehow connected to her, you grab that thin rope with both hands. When you begin to finally understand yourself after all your floundering, you tighten your grip. When the ramifications of the outcome are revealed, you plant your feet firmly and square your shoulders. But when you realize that your little sister Desi, is the key to it all - and is in grave danger - that's when you suddenly embody your best self. And you think that your superhero cloak is your mom's - that 'finding' her has changed the outcome. But no, Jackie, it was you all along.

See? That helps. Thanks for listening. I think I see the back bumper of the car in front of me.

Creativity

I am fairly typical in that I tend to communicate when I feel good. In terms of this blog, you don't hear from me on the bad days. But today, I am plunging into new territory to share where I am in the new writing project, and it ain't pretty.
The process of writing is (I assume) completely unique to every person. There are some generalities, some 'schools of thought' that might categorize us to some degree. But how we actually go about gettin' a book from A to Z will have as many variations as there are writers.
I have written three long stories now - a 'practice' Young Adult novel, and two Middle Grades stories. One of the latter is in early draft, let-the-yeast-rise mode, and the second is about to be released into the world in the next few months.
Now, I am in the early stages of another YA novel and am hyper-aware of the process. After three outings to get the basics of construction, I am attempting to move into a more artful approach to the process. Don't sound like an artist at all, do I?
I was going to list all the reasons why I am so left-brained but since that's a myth, and I'm giving up labels for Lent, I'll just tell you that I am not a stereotypical artist (I can't give up all the labels at once. How will I communicate?)
I think I have a decent imagination and competent communication skills. Turns out, you can't do a mash-up of those two things and get a book.
So, I am learning as I go, but for me, the bigger challenge is cultivating my true creativity, which, I gotta say, feels like a tenuous thing most days. I have ideas, I have some skill, I have a good work ethic. I am eager to learn and improve. What I lack is faith in the creative process.
I imagine people who grew up in an atmosphere of creativity are less fearful about this chaotic state in which I find myself. I imagine. I don't know. Maybe it's this uncomfortable for everyone.
Right now, I have more questions than answers. I see some characters clearly, others change a bit from day to day. I hear voices (in a good way) and then when I write one of those nice clear voices, I just hear me. I feel the texture of the dream world called The Vale, but I don't convey it adequately. I know bits and pieces, and I desperately want to be patient and wait to hear the story, rather than force it, but the other part of me (currently eschewing labels such as Virgo) is demanding qualitative evidence of progress.
I find myself doing weird things - or at least they seem weird to practical Me:
Yesterday I listened to a physics lecture on cosmology about the amount of "space" in the universe that is not what we know as matter. It was practically (had I understood the damn math) an invitation to find The Vale. Really.
I'm reading Genetics for Dummies because my villain is a Geneticist (and it took me almost an entire morning to decide if he worked at a University or ran a private lab.) I look through magazines and try to find the facial features of the characters I see in my head. I stare at a painting called, Out of this Dream, which I am convinced has something to tell me about the novel. I ask my characters questions as though I'm hosting a show called, "Welcome to my Novel". In the bottom of my backpack lives a blank, hand-made leather-bound journal that I used as inspiration for the one in my story. I want to make it look older and more worn. I don't know why. Stop asking.
It would be extremely helpful if a small fairy-god-mother type character would show up right now and tell me which of my recent weirdnesses can be filed under "creative work" and which are concerning behaviours I really shouldn't be writing about in a public forum.
I think I am allowing my creativity to direct me, but there is a strong possibility that I am losing it, tottering on the brink of sanity, with a brick of menopausal hormones tied to my waist.
I think I`ll go stare at the picture. Here, hold these bricks.

Don't throw the hatchet at your sister when the sun is going down.

I've heard some crazy lines in my life, but here's the topper:

"Don't throw the hatchet . . . "

No, no, that's no the end of it. Listen:

"Don't throw the hatchet at your sister . . ."

Still not it. Wait for it . . .

"Don't throw the hatchet at your sister when the sun is going down."

Just sit with that for a moment. Throwing a hatchet isn't the problem for mom. Throwing the hatchet at your sister doesn't faze her. But throwing the hatchet at your sister as the sun is going down? Nope, Too dangerous. Here comes Mom.

I love rural life.

What would Charles Dickens do?

So, I'm driving home from the gym this morning and I suddenly see a classroom with a kid asleep at a table and everyone in a panic around her. They can't wake her and are considering calling 9-1-1. The kid, I realize, is Jackie Stark, the protagonist of a story that doesn't exist. Yet.
Back to the classroom.
Just as the teacher decides to call an ambulance, Jackie's friend Martin returns from his trip to the washroom and quickly assesses the situation. This is what Jackie had been trying to tell him - that sometimes she gets trapped in the Vale and can't get out. In the waking world, it looks like she is unconscious, completely unresponsive. Last week, she told him a word and made him memorize it. It is the word that will snap her out of her state - the one word that can travel into the Vale, find her, and release her from whatever holds her there. He pushes through the crowd of students and asks the teacher to wait before calling the ambulance. He puts his hand on her back and leans down to whisper her Home Word into her ear.

But . . . I don't know the word yet.

Also, I think the reason there is such an age gap between Jackie and her little sister Desi is that there was another child who didn't live. A boy. But I don't know what happened to him. I'm a little worried there may have been foul play.

And I'm pretty sure that the stupid woman from the car dealership who is dating Jackie's dad is involved in some way, but I don't know how.

This is the garden of a new story. At one end, I'm still putting nutrients into the soil and preparing the beds, and at the other end, things are sprouting. And some are growing into baby stalks already. I'm all over the place and at this stage, I'm not entirely sure which shoots are weeds and which are going to produce something I can sink my teeth into.

It's not going fast, and I'm determined not to rush things. I had a dream the other night in which I lost control of my car and it flew off a cliff ala Thelma and Louise (but Shannon and Monica) and the one line I could still hear as I woke, was, "Why the hell was I going so fast?" If that's not a sign, what is?

But it is agonizing. I want to have something to show for every hour - a word count. I need to be able to measure my progress. I'm a Virgo.

But, I am determined to let this story come to me. It may be a disaster, but I have to try it this way.
So, I go to the gym, and clip the dog's hair, and make fajitas for dinner and while I'm doing these things, I think about Jackie. And Desi. And Martin. And the evil Jackson Kraft.

I'm  prepping the beds of my garden.
I'm collecting questions and planting them like mystery seeds.
It is the best of times. It is the worst of times.

Why do you write?

"What do you do to stay motivated, to keep a steady belief in yourself and your writing?  There’s a persistent voice in my head asking ‘what’s the point,’ and what are you going to do with all these words anyway?"

These words appeared on my screen yesterday in an email from a friend and I have been thinking about them ever since. Why do I write? 
There have been many answers to this question through the centuries, so I thought about some of the classic responses I've heard or read, and the very first thing that jumped into my head was, "Because I must."
Did you just roll your eyes? Me, too. But since it popped so insistently into my head yesterday, I gently put it aside for consideration and carried on.
My writing started with a simple desire to process. After the most intense period of teaching in my life, I began to write my memories, feelings, impressions, lessons . . . and before you know it, it was starting to look and feel like a book. I was a writer! Creative non-fiction, mostly. Ways to process my own experience and clarify for myself, who I am and where I fit into the grand scheme. E.M Forster summed it up for me: How can I tell what I think until I see what I say?
Slowly, my tastes wandered into fiction.
My fictional characters have taught me as much about my life as the real people in it. We are all mirrors for one another. When someone rubs me the wrong way, I take a closer look because, inevitably, the thing that bugs me about them is something that bugs me about myself.
Every time I bring one of the voices in my head to life (I heard it, you know what I mean), that new character has a little of me somewhere in them. Yes, even the villains. Especially the villains.
Every character is a chance to take a real close look at that fascinating connection between experience, thoughts, feelings, and behaviour.
Here's a little example of what I mean. I wrote a young adult novel with a fifteen year old protagonist who loses her dad to cancer. That scenario mirrors my own life. In early writing group explorations, I kept getting negative feedback about the main character. People didn't connect with her; they liked her friend better. No-one could quite put their finger on why. It took me a long time to suss it out: I was writing that kid with a very real chip on my shoulder. I was giving her ample opportunity to grieve normally, act out, be a normal teenager.
And I was annoyed with her.
Somewhere deep inside me  a voice whispered, Just suck it up, Kiddo. I had to.  I was impatient with her acting her age. And it was wrecking my writing. I had to go back and do some work around my own fifteen year old self - a lot of work, actually. And then, the writing changed.
I think it is safe to say that I have learned something about myself through almost every piece of writing I've done.
I certainly don't think that is every writer's experience, but it is mine. Writing is my Sociology, Psychology, and Theology studies, all in one.
So why is this important for me?
That leads me to the Big One: Why Are We Here?
The best answer I can find for that age-old question comes from the Dalai Lama: We are here to be happy. I don't think he's talking about the "happy" we're being sold by North American culture; the one that's all about "fun". I think he's talking about real joy.
I'm all in for that.
Visualize a world where everyone is happy. Content. Satisfied with what they have. Full of love. Can you see that world? It's so different from the mess we've made.
So, next question: Is it possible to be truly happy if you don't really know yourself? If you don't understand yourself? I'm  thinking . . . nope.
So, if I want to change the world, I must be happy. If I want to be happy, I must understand myself. To understand myself - and this is just MY way - I must write.
Why do I write?
Because I must.

Hague Lake Haiku

My seasonal love affair with the lake started up early this year. There was a bit of carry over, in fact, as I spent the end of each school day basking in the sunshine on the softball diamond, then dragged my over-heated body down the hill to be baptized in the fresh.
The lake and I were in full swing by mid-May and my first big swim of the season came about six weeks earlier than usual. I wondered if my enthusiasm would wane by now, end of July, height of "Stupid Season" as one local calls the busy tourist season that balloons our quiet dot in the ocean to a bustling epicentre of all things summer. But no, I've only lost some muscle strength - still nursing a slight shoulder injury from said softball. I can't swim the big swims right now, but that doesn't stop me.
I bring my equally enamoured dog, Jed, to the lake in the morning. I wear my Just in Case under my shorts and t-shirt. I should probably change the name of this bathing suit to For Sure: every morning this summer seems to come to us bright and warm. Jed and I tumble down the moss bluff to a new, recently discovered  beach, and the old boy takes his exercise before the heat of these days sends him and his dark fur inside to guard the couch.
Sometimes, my joy to be swimming in a beautiful lake every day is so intense I don't know what to do with it - besides the occasional mermaid flip. At least once a week, I wish I had gills. After a morning refresher, or an hour long swim in the late afternoon when my work is done, or an evening dip on a particularly warm day, I emerge each time dripping with gratitude.
Every day, I say good morning to my lake from the house - out the window in the winter months and from the deck all summer, over a cup of coffee. Contemplating the surface from above is a balm and an inspiration, but nothing triggers my creativity like the water holding me completely; the beach sounds muted, then obliterated around the back side of the island, the solitude, the complete tranquility of moments shared with no one but my lake.
I offer up a few fun verses in tribute to the other love of my life . . .

Hague Lake Haiku

Mr. Tanager:
Your head is disguised
by the crab apples you stalk

One hundred flight paths
cross our clear blue lake -
everyone going nowhere

We all love the lake:
The yoga dude smokes
before sun salutations

My dog swims with joy;
lake is his life-force,
dry fur is his Kryptonite

Coyote Pack

At long last, the year I've been dreaming of  . . . I've finished my term teaching position and will return to being a substitute this fall, with no worries about getting another term or even how many days of work I'll get.  I'm jumping off the cliffs of creativity for real this time . . . with the safety net of a Canada Council Grant lying solidly below me. Yippee!

Yesterday I cleaned my office like a knife-juggler searching for a contact lens five minutes before the show. It's clean and I'm ready!
In the cleaning, I found many things that I'd forgotten. Unfinished stories, essays, projects, ideas . . . I know what I need to do first, but then what? The grant project seems the furthest from my mind right now. I am excited about other things. I have moth-belly. Last night I was so excited about getting a good night's sleep and getting to my computer this morning, that I couldn't sleep.
The last time I had to make the adjustment from teacher-brain to writer-brain, I went house-sitting and had a three-week workshop with a one-eyed dachshund-terrier named Doug. And no offense to Doug, but it took all three weeks to really get my pen moving.
This time, I was lucky enough to have Ivan Coyote coming to my little island to do a writing/storytelling workshop two days after school finished. And luckier still, my dear friend was planning to take it as well. And then, because cosmic good fortune apparently does come in threes, I really liked every member of the group in my workshop and felt completely at ease . . . and free to write. Ivan's teaching style was a perfect match for my learning style and we made good use of every minute of our five days. On Thursday night, Ivan performed and I sat and listened, transfixed.
I'm still processing all the learning. Little dragonflies of wisdom fly through my dreams and land one at a time in my conscious mind. I look forward to discovering each one and applying it to my practice.
I'm sharing a piece here that came out of a list of watershed moments in my life, and hospital waiting rooms played a role in several of mine.
So, with a heart full of gratitude for an amazing week of writing and listening, I'd like to share a piece that is the result of my workshop experience. Thank you to Ivan and the rest of the pack!

Waiting Room

I’m 14 years old, and the walls of this waiting room are so ugly, I can smell them. My cousin Carla and I are eating mojos and throwing the wrappers at my other cousin, Brenda – 10 points for cleavage. Jerry and Brian are having wheelchair races down the only hallway without a nurse’s station.

When Carla and I celebrate a banana mojo bullseye a little too exuberantly, Brenda stomps off in a huff, digging mini paper wads out of her cleavage and muttering about disrespect.

Carla climbs onto a chair to turn the TV to the other channel. She plops back down, looks at me and sees that I’ve left again – my mind drifting down the hallway to Dad’s room, where Mom sits beside him on a hard plastic chair. She won’t be talking to Auntie Elsie or Uncle Bill. I know she’s just sitting there, hollow. Waiting.

Every room in a hospital is a waiting room.

Carla smacks my corduroyed thigh with the back of her hand. “Hey.”

“What?” I ask, coming back, seeing a table of magazines materialize in front of me; a TV; a cousin.

She frowns at me – we have the same frown but different smiles. “He’s gonna be okay, you know.”

Everything in me shifts infinitesimally backward, as though her words have reached out and shoved me, and for the first time, I see clearly that he will not be okay.

Carla is from the heathen branch of the family. She doesn’t speak Christian. She doesn’t say, “God will heal him,” or “You just have to have faith.”

Her words are not stirred up by murky images of God. The mud settles to the bottom and I see clearly that he will not be okay. He will die.

My heart sinks into the mud along with my feet but there is some relief in knowing that I can finally stop swimming.

I’m 29 years old and we’re lined up along the hallway outside of ICU – a makeshift waiting room - a gaggle of dykes lining the wall like geese on a log. We lean against the wall and each other, taking turns on a bench the colour of caramel pudding forgotten in the back of the fridge.

The group has been here for 12 hours - the culmination of many days of coming in shifts, one or two at a time. Wiping Janet’s face and wetting her mouth, keeping vigil as she made her peace somewhere deep in the coma. She should have been gone by now, according to the “experts”, but they don’t know Janet. Remember that double overtime ball-hockey game? When it was over, every one of us collapsed where we were, gasping for air, and Janet . . . Janet, did a victory lap. Always the smallest, but the strongest. In every way.

But Lymphoma was too much for our sinewy friend. She faced it head on, chose the risky bone marrow transplant to “try and get her life back.” That’s how she put it in the letter she wrote to us all -- just in case. Her partner Beth delivered it to our house one day a month or so after the funeral.

I shift from one sitting bone to the other and glance across the hall at Janet’s parents on the other bench; they look black and white in the dim light of this narrow enclosure with no windows, no air, no hope. 

They are still as winter birds, these Mennonite parents who keep losing their girl – first to agnosticism, then to “the gays”, and now to cancer. I can’t look at Janet’s mom – the pain in her face makes my chest ache. She is thin, like Janet, and she clutches her husband’s hand like it’s the tiller of a boat headed for the falls. His plaid shirt is a tartan of despair. Grey on darker grey.

We should be comforting them, but they don’t want us.

They tolerate our presence because they understand that we are Janet’s family, too, this group of women; a hockey team, a touch football team, a spongee team, and once a year for the gay bar’s tournament, a softball team. But always a family.

Two families here in this hall, and every heart breaking.

I straighten my shoulders and look at Janet’s mom. Her eyes stop flitting back and forth between the air vent and the emergency light and fall to mine. How can I tell her how sorry I am when she doesn’t want to talk to me?

I picture Janet in my mind, her smile like sunlight sparks on a lake and I feel my love for her – let it shine through my eyes. Then, I multiply it by a mother’s million and for a fraction of a second I feel what I see in her mom’s eyes and it is almost unbearable. Simultaneously, we each surrender a tear. She nods at me. I nod back.

We will go our separate ways.

I’m 45 years old and I’ve been in this waiting room since 7:30 a.m. It’s 3:00 p.m. now and all I have to report is that the number of bicycles in the brick courtyard below the hallway windows has dropped from 48 to 41. I’m expecting a Tour de France outa here around 3:30 or 4:00 at the shift change . . . but I’ll still be here.

The health-conscious sector of the St. Paul’s Hospital staff will get on those bikes and whip past their colleagues who are lighting up – and there are plenty of those  – I’ve seen the smoking courtyard, too  – it’s on the far end of my pacing route. They’ll get on those bikes and zoom frantically away from this place where time drags, crawls on its knees, stops, and does u-turns.

And I’ll still be here.

Waiting for my partner, who, in 25 years together has almost never made me wait; is always ready first, sitting in the car when I get there, early riser, early to the airport, zip, zip, zip.

But she’s sure taking our time now.

And when I’m done with this waiting room, there’ll be others. Maybe another surgery, or more chemo, MRI’s, CT scans, the offices of every ologist you ever heard of including an oncology dentist. Who knew?

And eventually, inevitably, the transplant.

I’ll wait, and I’ll find things to count, and I’ll talk to the god I decided many years ago did not exist. I’ll propose deals and negotiate in business-like terms that bear no resemblance to the lyrical pleas of my youth.

I’ll pace. I’ll worry.

I’ll sit. I’ll doubt. I’ll rail.

I’ll wait.

My Pie-day Friday

Days that start out Cream of Wheat (blech) and end up chocolate cream pie! You know what I'm talking about. I had one of those on Friday.
A migraine headache hit me on Thursday and I barely had it under control as I took two ferries to town that evening - arriving the night before is necessary to make a morning engagement. Thankfully it was a smooth sailing, as I was already mucho nauseated. There was no way I could cancel the workshop I was presenting - it had been booked since November. On Friday morning, I awoke to an uneasy truce in my body, the headache and related effects lurking behind a thin veneer of pain killers, searching for a way through.
I arrived to find the parking lot full at 8:15 and at least one meeting underway. I met my wonderful host, Tina, and we chatted a bit before the staff gathered in her classroom.
Whenever I present a workshop, my number one goal is to encourage teachers. Being a teacher, I know how tired and beaten down you can feel by May. So, I talked about my favourite topic - Positive Conflict - and tried not to bog us down with new concepts. Perhaps it's the same in all professions, but teaching sometimes feels like a series of treadmills you can't keep up with - including programs and new initiatives we are expected to learn, embrace and implement in the course of a morning workshop. I like to think my workshops offer an opportunity to slow life down for a morning, to re-frame what we already know, and to revisit the compassion and passion we teachers can lose sight of on our treadmills. The children can become a blur sometimes, can't they?
So I started out with a joke or two, received politely, if not skeptically, as the group tried to assess whether I was funny or crazy. (No harm in a bit of both, I always say.) But as the morning progressed and my head and stomach felt better, I soon recognized that I was preaching to the choir.
Excellent comments, questions, and challenges led to great discussion and we ended the morning with the staff brainstorming strategies for specific kids. Perfect!
I have only recently started offering workshops again, but back in the day when I did a bit more of this, I was always fighting the tide of negativity that can arise out of trying to deal with impossible situations with limited resources. Since I moved to BC a decade ago, I have watched with dismay as school resources have dwindled like a river in a drought. I went into Friday's workshop fully prepared to listen to the expressions of frustration that I hear rising out of public schools across the province. (It sometimes feels as though we have become secret agents, sneaking around behind the government's back, finding ways to deliver quality care to our students in spite of them.)
But the expected wave of complaints never came. This group spent their time and energy on solutions and I was thrilled to sit and listen to them discuss their most difficult children with real affection and concern - the very things bad policy can beat right out of a teacher.
I have taken a step back from teaching - happy to be a substitute and term teacher.  From that widened perspective and slower pace, it is easier for me to see what amazing people we have in the public education system.
I went to Ripple Rock School on Friday, thinking my morning would entail more giving than taking. But as I pulled out of the parking lot on a beautiful spring day, I thought about the group sitting around the lunch table together as I left, still making plans for kids . . . and the sun felt that much warmer. My headache was gone, pushed aside by a thick layer of inspiration, topped with hope.
Chocolate cream pie! Thanks, Ripple Rock.




Monica is the author of "Thanks for chucking that at the wall instead of me."

Cocktail Hour

Did you ever go through that phase in your teens and early twenties where creating new cocktails out of affordable ingredients seemed like an entirely appropriate use of time and energy? My experience with this was limited to watching the members of my hockey team get creative with a blender, but I think the evolution of that period of development is the one I'm in now; concocting interesting literary cocktails out of various authors.

I like to have a few books on the go at a time so that I have a choice; generally, we're talking two or three but somehow I have managed to start six books in the past little while and I'm worried I might have a problem. What are the early signs of addiction? Mixing genres? Starting cocktail hour earlier everyday? Reading in secret?

I'm usually reading a book about writing and much to my surprise, my favourite so far is On Writing by Stephen King. It's surprising because I don't care for his novels. That's entirely about content, though, not style, and the man can create characters like nobody's business.
At the moment, instead of one book like On Writing, which is practical advice in an easy-to-read style, I am filling that need with two different books. One is much more creative and inspirational than my usual choices and the other is much more academic than what I would normally select. So, in the "learning" category, I am reading (and doing - there are practice exercises) What It Is by Lynda Barry. This book is gorgeous and fun, with over 200 pages of hand-written notes and drawings and collage and everything a writer could want to get him or her going in the morning! Right brain all the way. Because I have a fairly ambidextrous brain, I am balancing this uncharacteristic romp in artsy-fartsy land with Daniel Kahneman. Yes, the guy who won a Nobel Prize in economics. I know! Normally any of those words would make my mid-range IQ run for cover, but Thinking Fast and Slow is about the brain and that topic fascinates me. I've already learned about the "The Invisible Gorilla" study which I had never heard of. This was a study about what the brain attends to. A video was taped of two "teams" of people, one team in black shirts and one in white. Each team was each given a basketball and told to pass the ball to members of their team. The people simply moved about in a small circle and passed the ball back and forth.The viewers were instructed to count the passes made by the team in white and to ignore the team in black. Part way through the video, a woman in a gorilla suit walked into the middle of the scene and pounded her chest, then walked off screen. She was visible for about 9 seconds of the video, yet about half the viewers did not notice her. Better yet, when told there had been a gorilla on-screen, they did not believe it! As Daniel said, "We can be blind to the obvious, and we are also blind to our blindness."
On making this interesting discovery, I opted to blow by the ramifications on the accuracy my own perceptions, and consider the implications for writing fiction. Do we, as readers, generally take into account our ability to be blind to our own blindness as we read? And what of the characters? Who's blind and who isn't? In which situations? How can I utilize this little tidbit in creating story? Interesting, yes?
And, just in case those two radical departures from my usual pattern aren't covering all the bases for my writer-self, I've thrown in The Novel by James Michener. Yes, it is exactly what it sounds like - a novel about the creation of a novel.

Now, as a writer of young adult and middle grades fiction, I like to always have one of those on the go and so at present, I am on a John Green kick. (With about a gazillion kids.) Looking for Alaska and The Fault in our Stars  are well worth the read at any age. Mr. Green has not unthroned Markus Zusak (The Book Thief), as my favourite, but he is making an impressive run.

Next, if I am lucky enough to get a piece published in an anthology or magazine, I read the entire publication. So, I am also reading Sisters Born, Sisters Found, an anthology edited by Laura McHale Holland. I have a poem called Pink Ribbons  on page 255.

Lastly, my reading for pure joy (although, it gets harder and harder to turn off my writer brain-when I read - but that's mostly a good thing). I am about to slip under the surface of another Ann-Marie McDonald dream - Adult Onset beckons luminously. I have to read it soon, as my partner has just finished it, and my sister arrives from Ottawa soon, and this book is first up for discussion at the Three Sisters Book & Coffee Club. I can't wait.

Speaking of mixing cocktails, I wonder what the effect will be to read Ann-Marie right after another favourite, Marion Toews? I just finished Summer of my Amazing Luck,  which I have been meaning to read for ages and just found at a thrift store recently. I loved it and will let you know what level of intoxication one achieves by almost two-fisting Toews and McDonald. Bit like doing shots of Kingsolver and Ozeki back to back. I've done that and let me tell you . . . it's fun, but it lingers! So much to think about.

Crikey, I'm feeling a bit thirsty . . . must be 4:15 somewhere in the world!
Happy reading, everyone!

Lest we forget what?

On our sleepy little island, Remembrance Day was observed in different ways. Groups gathered around radios to listen to the CBC, met at various memorial spots on the island, or, like me, congregated at the store for two minutes of silence, the playing of taps, and a cup of coffee. As the 11th hour approached, little boys chased each other around the parking lot while the adults stood in the sun and talked quietly about how high the lake is this year and whose apples are storing well. We moved into the market, and made our way past the deli counter to the tables where people gather daily for chats, meetings, and food. As I stood between the garden gloves and the magazine rack, I looked around at the dozen or so people and wondered about their war stories. This being Canada, the stories could have been from any number of countries.

Mine is from Germany and it is the story that I have shared with many students over the years during discussions of Remembrance Day.  I edit out the horrors of my grandmother's experience and focus on her children.

My father and his siblings lived in a boxcar and stole potatoes from the fields in order to survive after the Russian army threw them out of their home to use it as housing quarters. My grandfather had been conscripted, captured, and left to worry from his POW camp for the family he was not allowed to contact. 

I am very selective about what I tell students, but I want them to understand that we are talking about real people, to understand that peace is a gift which people in many parts of the world have had ripped away. I want them to take in the difficult concept that elsewhere in this world, people are born, live a lifetime, and die without ever knowing peace.

For me, Remembrance Day is a day of mourning for all the loss the world has suffered because we as a species have not evolved past war. It is also my annual marker to check and make sure that I have not forgotten and that I am doing my part to educate the next generation. A few days ago, the world marked the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall. Many people watched the celebrations from either side of the West Bank Wall. Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.

When I was a young adult, I learned about the internment of thousands of Japanese Canadians from the west coast. A young adult! How had I managed to get through an entire Canadian public education without knowing about our shameful past?

Teaching my students about the internment was my first real encounter with the story. I chose to teach A Child in Prison Camp by Shizuye Takashima and wondered why this was not a required component of study in Canadian History.

Here on Cortes, three Japanese Canadian families are mentioned in the local archives of the early years, although only one, the Nakatsuis, were living here at the time of the internment. In her book, Destination Cortez Island, A sailor's life along the BC coast (1999), June Cameron described "Jap ranch," as it was known, as a well-kept property. She called it, "aesthetically pleasing as well as tidy and purposeful" (p.200). June also had this to say about the Nakatsui family (she used a different spelling of the name than my research supplied):

As neighbours, they were courteous and well-liked, but after Pearl Harbour and the alleged sightings of submarines off the B.C. coast, even before the declaration of war, the locals became understandably nervous. The Nakasuis were evacuated to internment camps along with all Japanese people living on the coast, and the fruit from their orchard was left to rot. When we went by in the fall to pick some apples to take back to the city with us, we found their home stripped of belongings. Unwanted objects littered the ground. It made me ashamed to be a Canadian." (p. 199)

I told my Cortes Island students about the internment in general and we discussed it at length. But it remained a story from "out there." Not quite an abstract idea, but one they couldn't quite connect to. So, I led them out to the display board in the hallway where a picture of the island's first school bus was proudly displayed.

That truck, one of few on the island at the time, was also the vehicle used to transport the Nakatsui family from their home. As the children stared at the picture, I told them about our Japanese Canadian internment--and theory became reality.

Over the years, the elephants in the living room of our collective past have slowly begun to trumpet and I stand amazed and humbled by the stories from my First Nations neighbours, my Japanese Canadian neighbours, my Chinese Canadian neighbours . . . and on it goes.

Shame and guilt are useless, energy-draining emotions; knowledge is power. I want the next generation to be equipped with knowledge. And so . . .

In the summer of 2015, Salmonberry Publishing and I will be launching a middle-grades novel called Full Moon Lagoon.  I am very proud of this book. The story is an action-packed adventure set here on Cortes. It is my hope that the children for whom it was written will have a fun read, close the book and turn to an adult to ask, "Did the government really make all the Japanese Canadians move like that?"

Yes, they did.

And we must never forget.

Introducing . . . Cortes Art Space

Okay, you know how last time I said I was blogging when I should have been working on baseboards for the apartment? Well, the baseboards are done and so is the website for our new art space. (Patience, first I must pontificate sufficiently.)
Shanny and I have a home with two apartments in it. Since 2005, when we bought our home, we have endeavoured to provide a home for someone else here on our little island. We have made some wonderful friends this way, but in recent years with our local economy not recovering from the recession as it has elsewhere, we have had more broken leases than honoured ones. There just isn't any work here.
So, we decided that this must be a sign. If the most practical application of the space isn't working out for either party, why be practical?
As you know, I have used house-sitting as my way of getting writing retreats on the cheap. And that works for me, but the chances of landing in a really creative environment are not high.
We live in a very inspiring place, which begs the question; why do I need to leave paradise and find retreats? Short answer: the responsibilities and routines of daily life are the pieces of furniture blockading the door to my metaphoric room of creativity. (Nice, ya? Just thought of it.)
I'll still need to get off the island to find solitude, but the rest of the world should come here! (One at a time please. Line-up in an orderly fashion - you're in Canada, now.)
We live at a lake with a beautiful sandy beach. The ocean is a ten minute walk away. You can walk different beaches every day.
The apartment is now equipped with an easel, worktable, desk, yoga equipment, small but deadly fiction library and of course, a very comfortable living space, recently beautified by the art work of our dear friend, David Ellingsen. (Okay, go check him out, but then come back. I'm not done and you haven't seen the apartment yet.) http://www.davidellingsen.com/
Did you check out "Obsolete Delete"? No? Go back. It's under Environmenal 1.
See? When I grow up, I'm gonna own that whole collection.
Okay, back to the apartment. It's lovely and it looks out over the lake and has its own yard and deck and if anyone is really needing a doggy-snuggle, we'll let you borrow Jedidiah Wiggle-bottom Happy-feet Puddle-jumper Jonassen. You can call him Jed. (Springer/Golden with a very big heart).
Point is, we have a great place and we want to share it with artists. Seriously, if you can't get inspired on Cortes Island, you're just not trying.
Alright, you have been most patient and you may go look at the website now, and consider this your official invitation. Come and write or paint or think about painting or write about thinking or . . .
http://www.cortesartspace.com/

p.s. Jed is really into yoga.

Swirling Head Syndrome

I am suffering from Swirling Head Syndrome. (That's not real but guess what is? . . . S.P.L.A.T. the society for the prevention of little amphibian tragedies. I kid you not.)
See what I mean? I have no focus. I am thinking about 20 things at once most of the time. I'm pretty good at multitasking (most teachers are) but what I am experiencing is something more like my brain being shot by a ray gun that disrupts synopsis and causes constant interruptions to . . .
What was I saying?
The source of the current problem is partly hormonal ( I believe we covered that earlier in Writer's Blah, June). 
However, it's been stepped up significantly with my arrival at the intersection of Necessity and Dreams. The road which led me here was paved with things like a long and discouraging teacher's strike which has left me broke and quite disillusioned about the future of public education in this province and country. On the other hand, possibilities have also arrived on the horizon, some with more appeal than others. Some with more potential than others.
So here I am, redecorating the apartment to create a space for artists and writers to work and live. (I'm supposed to be working on the baseboards right now!)
I'm also writing - not nearly as much as I should be or want to be - but I have my usual 2 or 3 projects on the go. I'm tutoring and working as a TTOC at the school. I'm revisiting the idea of facilitating workshops for teachers and educational assistants. I'm starting an Artists in the Schools program with a talented visual artist so we can offer mixed-media theme studies for students. I'm starting the process of publishing my middle-grades novel, and entertaining the possibility of joining a publishing cooperative as a project manager. I'm supporting a friend who is running for local office and I haven't finished my Halloween costume.
And then, of course, there's everyday life with the usual demands we all face, including weekly therapy sessions with a partner thrown into a spiral of depression by the dismal performance of the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
The challenge here is that, at present, none of these things generate any income except tutoring and subbing, and our little school is not generating much of the latter right now.
So here I am at the intersection of Necessity and Dreams and I'm getting a neck spasm from looking one way, and then the other.
This is a busy corner. There are lots of us milling about, muttering to ourselves about building a house right here where these two roads meet. Can following your dreams pay your bills?
Ah, the eternal question.


Monica is the author of "Thanks for chucking that at the wall instead of me."

Noticing

When I first moved to Cortes Island, I promised myself I’d never stop noticing the wonders of this place: being able to walk by the ocean every day, seeing seals and eagles. Walking to the lagoon to dig clams and pick oysters. And I moved from Winnipeg so I didn’t want to stop noticing being able to breathe in winter without a wool scarf. In fact, I keep an empty corner in the storage room where my boots, parka, mits, toques, jumper cables, antifreeze, snow shovel and mosquito repellent should be stored. I love that empty corner. I notice that corner.

          I also didn’t want to stop noticing the changes to my lifestyle. What was once a 30 minute drive to work with a cardboard cup of coffee, has become a five minute walk up the hill with a mason jar of Roibos tea. I used to swim in chlorine for an hour – 40 laps  –  then spend an hour getting the chlorine out of my pores, my hair, my swimsuit. Now I swim an hour in a lake with water so clean I can drink it. Just one lap – around the island and home again. No products necessary. No swimsuit necessary.

          But you know, noticing takes some effort. Daily life is what it is and eventually things begin to slide under the radar undetected.  Sometimes I worry that I might be losing my perspective. Let me give you an example.

          A while back, my friend Patty and I decided to go to a dance at the Gorge hall on the other side of the island. She called up her buddy Tom to ask if she could borrow the car he’s always talking about but never actually driving anywhere.

          Sure, he said. It’ll be in the parking lot of the Tak – it’s green. Help yourself.

          On Saturday, I met Patty at the Tak and she led me to a green Ford of undetermined age, whose keys dangled merrily from the ignition. We struck out and were over half way to the Gorge when we came across Jake and Silent Bill hitch hiking.

         Need a lift to the dance?

Yup. Who’s car? Jake asked.

Tom’s.

You sure?

Patty and I looked at each other. You sure? I asked her.

Jake’s head was out the window, scrutinizing the outside of the vehicle. This car looks a lot like Valerie’s, he said. Silent Bill nodded vigorously.

Who?

You know Val, who works at the Tak.

Patty reached across me and rifled through the glove box until she came up with a registration.

Oops, she said. We took the wrong car. She sucked the inside of her cheek for a moment. Well, the closest phone is at the Gorge. She put Val’s car into gear and pulled back onto the road.

At the hall, I wandered off while Patty called the Tak on the payphone. When she rejoined me, I asked what happened.

We have to put it back where we found it. By tomorrow morning.

Sounds good, I said, spilling a bit of roibois tea from my mason jar onto the dance floor as my knees were clipped by a naked toddler chasing a dog.

Do you notice anything weird about all this? I asked Patty.

Na, she said. That’s how it always smells. It’s patchouli.