heroes

I met Anne Lamott again last night. The first time I had just returned from Indonesia and was wrought with the emotion of transitioning home and, well, I was just nervous. She was one of my heroes in writing and life, and I wanted to tell her how reading Traveling Mercies was a watershed moment for me. The Cowgirl and I were the last in line, and I anxiously waited to have my moment. Of course, she was kind and gracious and listened while I told her that her book made me realize that it was ok to be a Christian and have the past I have and how it really helped me move forward with my life and past all that guilt for being so terrible. She listened thoughtfully, signed my tattered copy with care, asked a few questions and told the Cowgirl how much she liked her coat (it was a great coat).

Last night, though, I was at ease and excited, and the Cowgirl wore different great coat. We decided that maybe we needed a secret handshake with Anne so she would remember us from reading to reading. She has a new book – it’s fiction. [We don’t like her fiction nearly as much as her non-fiction, but would never tell her that.] She talked a lot about how tough it is for teenagers today and the array of drugs at their fingertips – her new book is about a good teenage girl’s fall from grace. She talked about the struggles parents have when their kids are getting into trouble but that they need to step up and be a parent rather than a buddy. She talked about her son, as she always does, and it turns out she’s a grandmother now.

As always, her hard truths were wrapped in humor, steadiness and grace. Several times she used the phrase “hero story” and how we are all just trying to create our own hero stories with our lives, complete with struggles and triumphs. Perhaps, more than anything, that resonated with me (that and how a writer needs to write at the same time everyday). I’ve been working so hard trying to tell the story of my life the past ten days or so, that I haven’t stopped to think about the story I’m in the middle of – the craziness of driving halfway across the country to confront the struggles every writer faces everywhere, being here at the same time as Anne Lamott (of all people), getting to go with the Cowgirl to see her again, having my favorite writer close out my own “writer’s retreat” – now that’s the stuff of great Plot!

So, maybe a big part of writing stories simply involves paying attention to the daily twists and turns, learning from them, appreciating them, and in a way, reading the stories that our lives are already telling… And maybe hero stories are more about the slow, quiet development of character rather than action-packed tales of red-cape wearing villain-fighters. Maybe what I need to remember is that the moment I’m in now is as priceless as the ones I’ve been struggling to recapture.

Anne quoted another author last night who said, "Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way." And that’s what I will leave here tomorrow having embraced – that this book is only going to happen one page, one paragraph, one sentence at a time, and that if I just keeping going I will get there eventually … at just the right time in my story.

eclipse

I read an article about eclipses today in Afar, my new favorite magazine, and realized that I may be in the middle of one, or several. Not that the sun has mysteriously darkened here or anything (Denver is quite sunny), but it’s definitely an appropriate astrological metaphor for where I’m at right now.

I came here like a pilgrim to begin Really Writing, and somewhere in my subconscious I must have thought that I would be done by the end of my stay. Finished!

Not really, but I thought I could at least slip into a coffee shop chair in an undistracting space and the muses would circle my head like the little birdies did Snow White. At least a little progress could be made, surely. I even had this nice little outline that I’d put together awhile back, and even more ideas in mind, but once I geared myself up to Begin, the subconscious solar eclipse began… the brilliant, spring day full of shiny ideas went slowly, dazzlingly dark.

This was just not going to be so simple.

Theme? Structure? I mean, I’d considered those things, but didn’t actually realize how succinctly they needed to be defined for both my publishing pitch and well, actually doing this project. How does one write in two sentences or less the Theme of one’s life, or add Structure to years of ramblings in hopes of making it more interesting than droning chronology?

I stared at my overflowing pages of personal history and wondered how on earth to stitch together the scraps of memories. And the sun slipped back from behind the shadows and it was day again… Day One, to be exact. Was I not done yet? Did I have a draft finished? Chapters then, what about chapters? No plot, no problem!

Questions and doubts poured in and I wondered if I was really up for this task. By then, Day Two had enveloped me and I didn’t have a THEME! I mean, I had themes, just way too many: small town girl travels the world; every southern girl is not a debutante nor do we aspire to be; how I’m finding my own healing through helping the hurting; and the list goes on and on… can’t I just do a chapter on each?

Did I mention this was hard?

Maybe to some it’s not so bad. Those professional writer-types who do this all the time and know the formulas and have cultivated their knack and rhythm and nightly sacrifice bad first drafts to the gods of creativity -- surely, it's easier for them. But, let’s be honest, I’m out of practice. How long has it been since I’ve written anything other than a proposal, a press release, or the exceptionally rare blog entry? My years of mass-production in grad school and Red Cross Part 1 are long gone.

And this elusive lengthy genre? It’s new challenge and requires the structure and forethought that my blogs (confessionally) do not get. And how easily (like now) do I slip back into that very unstructured structure to “get into the groove” and get the words flowing (also known as procrastinating.)

But is this perpetual cycle of dark and light, hope and discouragement, ups and downs, just part of this process that I’m just going to have to get used to? Realizing that really (really) Inspiration does not appear on command -- no matter how long we’ve followed the proverbial “seat of pants in seat of chair” command for writers everywhere. Some days are going to feel/seem more “productive” than others, whatever we’re doing, right? This is all part of the process, regardless of our chosen profession…

I was writing a friend earlier and described the last few days of my stay in the Rockies as the first time I’ve begun to relax amid the flurry of the last few months, but that the writing was coming along in baby steps. Seeing that, though, reminded me of my own words = God had not brought me to the precipice of a cliff and asked me to jump, He had simply brought me to the edge of a stream and asked me to hop.

I guess I should lighten up… mostly on myself. Baby steps do count as a hop forward and are really not so bad, seeing as how I’ve only been at this four days. It’s ok that I’m not done yet :)

stories

The plane was about to touch down in Atlanta as I flipped closed the back cover of Don Miller’s most recent book. In it, Don shares about the process of turning his best-seller Blue Like Jazz into a movie. With the help of two film-makers, he learns story-writing basics for the big screen and discovered a whole new world of characters, conflict, inciting incidents, and fundamentally, that when characters overcome conflict (particularly against insurmountable odds), it makes the best stories.

Through it all, he is compelled to begin telling a “better story” with his own life, because as he puts it, no one wants to watch a movie about a guy staring at a TV. So, he gets up off the couch (literally and physically) and launches into the world to live an epic, or at least more memorable, life.

Needless to say, I loved the book. And though I have had it in my hands at the bookstore more than once, it wasn’t until early last week that I went through with what turned out to be a very timely purchase. Despite many points of connecting with him, though, Don also accurately pointed out what may be our primary difference -- “People who are living good stories are too busy to write about them.” (p. 97)

It’s not that I think mine is anything amazing – this crazy path is certainly something that I didn’t consciously follow or construct. But as the narrative of my life has unfolded -- with each move, each trip, each friend-- I gradually realized that something was being told through my life (and through all of our lives) that was much, much Bigger than me. So, as many of you know, I decided about two months ago to hit the pause button and at least try to write this all down before I forget how I got here.

Yet, when I reached for the pause button, I must have accidentally hit fast-forward. I looked around and found myself in Haiti amid both terrible tragedy and irrepressible hope, then I zipped back to Baltimore/DC and had way too little time with my amazing friends before seeing all my earthly belongings shoved into a truck and driven away. I stopped in at my favorite Tennessee homestead on the way to my new city, then suddenly I was surrounded again by all my stuff, but it was all still in boxes that were all over the house. And then the phone started ringing -- “Why, yes, I would love to do that project for you!”

I mean, wasn’t it just like Don -- I was too busy living to have time to write? Not entirely. Buried within someone else’s rambling memoir and his descriptions of conflict and struggle and how those develop true character, I realized what may be my biggest obstacle to overcome yet, one which I’m avoiding with all of my perpetual busy-ness... telling my own story, truthfully.

The Cowgirl and I affectionately call it The Veil -- it’s the line between all those things that everyone knows happened but never talks about, versus what’s ok to discuss at the dinner table -- the taboo topics compared to the safe topics, or for us at least, all of our rowdy, rebellious years versus the women we’ve become today.

I’ve known it was coming. From that first outline I sketched out a few months ago and realized my story had to be much longer than one year in Indonesia; I knew. It had to start in Mississippi, where it began. The Veil was going to have to be drawn. Having grown and become (hopefully) something better than the little devil I was during my late teens particularly, the thought of re-visiting years that are repressed for a reason is, to me, much more mortifying than a short-term consulting job in one of the world’s most undeveloped countries (which I’ve already, fearlessly, agreed to do).

The thought of drudging back through the dark years, shining a spotlight on all the yucky things about myself (then and now), is one part of this writing project that I had not really even allowed myself to consider. The rest -- world travel, adventures, funny people, exciting work, weird food, whatever -- all of that? Covered. Check and check. But if I really want to share a Good Story, if I want the character, my character, to grow and develop, and become someone that has the courage to face insurmountable challenges and overcome crisis, I am going to have to do it myself.

After years now of running furiously forward, I need to have the guts now to stop, turn around, and walk deliberately backwards. I need to figure out why my life has become this particular story and be willing to a hold up a mirror to the character of me and see what’s really there.

Insurmountable obstacle? We shall see…