Writing | Bethany Bassett

Tag: Writing

Fireworks

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 6 Comments

I have to remind myself to calm down.

This is only the third day of early alarms. Only three morning hours pulled away from the stars and given to the words that tug on their leashes. 686 words the first day, 738 yesterday, 505 this morning—not many, but almost 2000 more than I started the week with.

This is something to celebrate.

This is something to take in stride.

As it goes every time a writing project lights up my mind with fireworks, I treat inspiration like a house ablaze. Every moment is an emergency with exclamation points and a fierce dread of what will happen if I don’t write twenty pages NOW. I kick myself under the desk for being such a slow writer. (I mean, my paragraphs come together about as quickly as Medieval cathedrals… and that’s with coffee.) I compare the timeline of my life to other authors and bemoan that I’m three years overdue for my Great American Novel. The housework falls behind and the girls entertain themselves while I stare at my computer screen, trying to coax a few more sentences out of a tired afternoon.

This sense of urgency was hardwired into me a long time ago—admittedly in a religious context, but so effectively that I fill up each day’s schedule with an impossible number of tasks and then feel guilty for not finishing. My mind fights continuously against my brain, my heart, and my energy levels to accomplish more, more, now, now… and it’s worse when it’s something I love.

I so appreciate the Julia Cameron quote Christina posted a few days ago:

“Most of us live with a continual sense of emergency. We have a fear that we are too late and not enough to wrestle a happy destiny from the hands of the gods. What if there is no emergency? What if there is no need to wrestle? What if our only need is receptivity and a gentle openness to guidance? What if, like the Arabian horses grazing outside my window, we are simply able to trust?”

That there are more days to this life, more hidden springs of inspiration, more quiet hours of words set free in sequence, is a concept both foreign and wonderful to me. It whispers that I can write without sacrificing my girls’ childhoods or my own sanity. It means that a few hundred words a day are enough. It gives me permission to walk toward the fireworks without grasping or giving up and to write a book over a ten-year span if that’s how long it takes.

(Though I really hope it doesn’t.)

4Nov

NaI’llHaveToCheckTheCalendarMo

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My autumn fantasies have never strayed far from the pencil aisle. As soon as I knew how to put graphite and imagination together, I was writing books… even if they were only a frothy whip of princess lore and Southern Baptist morals (“Thou shalt not smoke”) scribbled on handfuls of printer paper. At the start of each semester throughout high school and college, I read syllabi like campaign promises. (A portfolio of deadline-inspired masterpieces by spring! New skills learned! World peace!) Since graduating, I’ve consistently imagined fall mornings spent at my desk with orange leaves filtering sunlight onto the pages of my half-written memoir.

And now, another November is here—NaBloNoPoWriWhateverMo—and it feels like every other linguistically-gifted person on the planet is publishing daily blog entries and composing chapbooks and penning novels. After getting home at 10:30 last night from piano practice, I washed the days’ worth of dishes and pictured entire chains of American coffee shops swirling with warm cinnamon and the happy clacking of laptop keys. The thought landed in my sternum like a well-aimed punch.

I want to be there too, at the little table in the corner with headphones of my own artsy music drowning out the artsy music on the stereo, a tall gingerbread mocha within reach, my muse at the next table leaning over to whisper brilliant sentences every time I get stuck. I would even be delighted with a few uninterrupted hours each day at my own desk, inspiration venturing out of its hole to see what all the quiet’s about. I cannot quell this longing to write—maybe not for a living, but for a life, yes. However, this autumn seems to have conspired with its last five predecessors to keep me away from blank pages and novelty espresso beverages, and I’m questioning once again if “author” will ever come after my name. The [grossly pessimistic] idea that this dream may never have a fighting chance is a pillow of porcupine quills when I lay down at night.

The glitch in all my moping is this: I’ve been too busy to write because I’m actually starting to have some semblance of a life. A checking the calendar, leaving the house, having actual social interactions kind of life that takes an embarrassing amount out of me by the end of the day. I am forever making mistakes in Italian and having to talk myself off mental ledges mid-sentence (my inner perfectionist can be pretty dramatic), and it takes real effort to stop comparing my clothes and figure to those of my supermodel friends. Plus, simply being around people zaps my energy rather than recharging it. I’ve been ready for bed at 9:30 for weeks now. See? Embarrassing.

But as embarrassing and challenging and draining as this Having A Life is, it feels good. Or if not good, exactly, then a step in goodness’s direction… a few more inches up the muddy, rewarding path to relationships. So this won’t be the November I write my Great American Novel, but I am stocking up on real-life inspiration for future stories. And while my pillow may be lined with porcupine quills, I’ve been sleeping beautifully.

—
Why yes, I did begin every sentence of that last paragraph with a conjunction. Watch free will triumph over the English degree!

31Aug

Colors Blend

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“I hold everything that is—
sand, time, the tree of the rain,
everything is alive so that I can be alive:
without moving I can see it all…”
~ Pablo Neruda

I imagine myself creating collages from wisps of words and these late-summer colors that will flutter away too soon.

I imagine myself writing at the desk in my corner nook with the autumn-tinted curtains and the window overlooking the fig tree, maybe wearing glasses, certainly with a mug of something inspiring.

I imagine myself flowing with the energy that produces firm abdominals and freshly baked cinnamon rolls, open eyes before the first alarm and no snoozing.

I imagine myself hanging my personality on the line and letting the breeze smooth away the wrinkles.

I imagine myself dissolving the judgment I feel (or conjure) at church in a jar of full-strength understanding until the colors blend together and I realize nothing is going to explode.

I imagine myself floating away on a Nickel Creek song into the dragonfly blue with a cloud bank pillow and the sun playing grace notes on my eyelids.

I imagine myself drinking in the love around me with thirsty pores and watching the too-tired, upset-stomach, bad-mother days blossom into life more abundant.

28Jul

Fishbowl Invitation

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These summer days have been custom-fitted with a fisheye lens. We unpack, we clean, we eat salad, we sleep in puddles of melted motivation. Our priorities have adjusted to the demands of changing homes, not to mention the brick-baking heat and the reality of two girls at home, and the hours arch and flex strangely. My writing time keeps slipping outside the bubble where it waits, nose to glass, to be invited back in.

I see it, of course. Each day shifts through a hundred nuances I wish I could bottle and share or weave into a Ray Bradbury book. I’d love to invite each of you up to our balcony at dusk, when the fading sunlight plays alchemist on the city. We’d pick mint for our mojitos and debate in whispers over the exact color shimmering off the buildings below. Orange? Pink? Mother-of-Pearl? Enchantment?

I’d have a printout of my thoughts from the day ready if conversation began to lag. You could read how absurdly long it took to get myself and the girls ready for a morning walk to the park and how, by the middle of our steep climb back, I would cheerfully have exchanged my children for a day at the spa. Before you had too much time to judge, you would read on to where Natalie hung socks on the laundry line with me while we sang “Old MacDonald” (and Sophie occasionally interrupted her own “E-I-E-I-O” to point at the sun and shriek “THE MOON?”) and how love for these two girls of mine pulsed against the confines of my sanity. You would read how NieNie’s latest entry pulled my heart into pieces and how a line from Elliot Smith brought back the thrill of diving into the blogging world seven (seven!) years ago.

You would get a little dizzy from the way my mind flits from friend to friend, the way I still miss my best friend at age six, the hopes I hold for current acquaintances. You would reach the paragraph with all the secrets, at which point I would decide it’s time for a chocolate-whiskey-and-beer cupcake and four consecutive rounds of Balderdash. Secrets are secrets, after all. But this is my wish-upon-a-star in writing—to put myself in words and invite you to share.

So in lieu of an Italian balcony blogfest*, here’s a question for you: What would you like to read more about? Any pressing inquiries you’d like to see addressed? A topic that’s been on your mind lately? Something you’d like to know about me? Glassy-eyed summer days or not, this blog is ready for some friendly conversation. (Cocktails optional but recommended.)

~~~

*As lovely as the idea is, teensy matters like distance, time, and money make it unlikely. Annoying matters, those. However, if you’re ever coming through central Italy, do let me know, and we’ll try to make some magic happen.

21May

Slumbering Magic

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At least once a year, I read Ray Bradbuary’s Dandelion Wine cover to cover. It has been a soul tradition since I first picked up the paperback at age 15 and lost a bit of my heart among the pages. And who wouldn’t? The book is a celebration of childhood and summertime equally, of life and death and the daily discoveries that make them so much more, written in the most delicious prose I’ve ever tasted.

“His breath raked over his teeth, going in ice, coming out fire. Ten thousand individual hairs grew a millionth of an inch on his head. He heard the twin hearts beating in each ear, the third heart beating in his throat, the two hearts throbbing his wrists, the real heart pounding his chest. The million pores on his body opened.
I’m really alive! he thought. I never knew it before…” *

Magic.

Every time I venture into its pages, I am twelve-year-old Douglas Spaulding. I suddenly feel the need for tennis shoes and old-fashioned lime-vanilla ice, plus a sip of the mysterious dandelion wine just to try. I experience all the curiosity and fear and wondering joy woven into the stories. But despite how much I love the book, my heart floods with a soft pale-pink sadness at the end of each chapter because I wish it were mine. The writing. The nostalgia. The memories in print.

I have a hard time explaining the way Dandelion Wine tugs at me because it’s not jealousy… yet it is. I dearly want to write a book that captures people’s imaginations in the same way, and I think I could. I feel the magic slumbering just beneath the surface of my ability. But I’m missing the nostalgia, and that’s one thing a writer can’t make up. My childhood memories will never make the cut for an exploration of whimsy, and this dear adult life of mine needs a few more years to brew still.

So I take the book for what it was to me at 15—a miraculous first date with metaphors—and what it is to me now—a diamond trembling with a thousand emotional hues. My sadness is not an enemy, nor is it the face of defeat. Rather, it’s the whispered promise of nostalgia in my future. You will write of your own magic one day, you will…

—

* I had a ridiculously hard time choosing an exemplary passage from the book because every sentence in the thing is perfect. Some lazy day this summer, pour yourself a tall glass of lemonade, pick up a copy of Dandelion Wine, and read until your toes begin to tingle. That’s an order.

13Jan

The Valley of Strange

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I’m not often intimidated by an empty page. First sentences are some of my favorite things in the world, if you want to know the truth. Ending a piece… well, that’s where the palm-sweating and ~~cursing~~ grumbling come into effect… but I adore sitting down and unlocking the possibilities of a blank document. At least, I did before this January broadsided me.

My brain hasn’t checked out exactly, but it has locked itself in a steel-plated door marked “Authorized Personnel Only” to browse classified information without me. I’m no longer authorized, it would seem. Even personal letters I’ve written over the last few weeks have fought tooth and nail and blunderbuss to avoid being committed to paper. I have four (or five?) drafts of a special story collecting dust on my hard drive, and I’ve actually ignored a couple of writing offers. How can I explain? My brain is being a poopy-head?

I have been trying to carry on the illusion of professionalism by sitting at my computer instead of giving in to the power of the nap (as my body has been screaming at me to do… stupid body), but that first sentence is always just out of my reach. So instead of writing, I’ve been immersing myself in others’ stories. Others’ spacious and hearty lives, others’ intricacies and hues and incredible feats. And somewhere between empathy and actual motivation to get off my chair and live is the Valley of Strange.

Perhaps you’ve been to the Valley of Strange too. The scenery is fairly typical—sticky counters, dust piles under the couch, forty-five stacks of papers that were important two months ago—but none of it looks familiar. It’s like waking up to a lavender sky fleeced in turquoise clouds. Shoes are misplaced, words are forgotten, emotions are hazy. No moment registers quite like it should. Breathing just feels… strange.

I keep thinking of a comment Stephanie made last week, about how this sounds like an important time in my life. I sure do hope she’s right, because otherwise, I don’t know what to make of being locked out of my own story. I have to hope that something big is happening in my brain behind those closed doors, that there’s a mountain of AWESOME on the other side of this valley. Yes, awesome with a capital everything, plus clarity and purpose and enough Red Bull to fuel my explosive motivation. Yes, please.

26Nov

Mismatched Socks

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Thirteen minutes, by my calculations, until the girls are awake… or at least half-awake, rosy from sleep, and needing closeness. Such little time, and as always—do I do, or do I write?

I think constantly these days about something Jenn Mattern once wrote, about her writing not being widely accepted because it was too haphazard. Too funny and too serious all at once with no firm publishable constant. That’s me, I think. My writing style is as steadfast as mismatched socks… much like my days, swooping from hilarity to dejection and always the vague sense that I’m not getting it right. I hesitate so often to blog because I just don’t know where to take this next. This isn’t a mommy blog or an ex-pat blog or a humor blog or a depression blog. It’s the unwashed contents of my brain, and who really wants to see that?

I’m in wildly different emotional territory than I was a year ago, but I can still feel these gray mornings tugging like gravity. I lie in bed until the last possible moment and wish and wish I knew what to expect throughout the day. The week. The month. Every uncharted moment faces me like a linebacker as I try to figure out if I am really as messy as I feel right now. Who knows? Maybe these daily giggles and heartaches are more of a gorgeous mosaic rather than a mess. I can’t help but hope so, at any rate… And until I figure out what kind of mosaic it is, this will just have to be a haphazard blog. Thank you for braving me.

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