The blank page

There's that old question, 'In a perfect world, who would you invite to your dinner party?' People tend to choose people such as Nelson Mandela or world leaders whom they admire, which makes sense. Me? I'd forgo the dinner party for one really good, long meal in a quiet restaurant with the superb Irish novelist, Colm Toibin.

It's not just that I enjoy his novels so much; that I find him such a skilled writer, but also that he is so generous in sharing his practice and thinking with a wider audience. Since my thoughts and his thoughts often seem to collide, it would be so comforting to talk to him one-on-one and get his reassurance that my ideas, small in a way, very female thoughts and preoccupations, are worthy of exploration in story form. I think he'd say to me something like,

'Yes, forget the literary theory that you've been taught. That's no use, quite right. Those thoughts that have been simmering in your head for years, have the confidence to put them down on the blank page; fill it up with details of how your protagonists thinks and show, page by page, in a progressive rhythm how her mind and her behaviour starts to shift.'

I'd nod and say,

'That's okay? I don't need to be more clever than that? No back story? I can in fact just lay out the story scene by scene, slowly watch her evolve and transform...?'

And he'd smile and then look serious before he said,

'Absolutely. No back story. You don't need car crashes or fires. Just let her go about her days; that's fine. Don't trouble yourself with similes and metaphors; that's not your thing and it isn't required. Let your reader morph into the protagonist and let them come along with her, support her even when she's not behaving well. Don't worry about that. Trust your instincts. Stop taking advice from others when your instincts are working just fine.'

And, he'd emphasize the fiiiiiine in his gorgeous Irish accent and smile, and I'd look at him as the literary genius that he is and feel a glow of relief and gratitude that someone in the world took the trouble to put another writer's mind at ease.

But, more than that, I'd love to talk to him about his self-knowledge that he has different elements of him that can't really be fused together. My goodness, I relate to that. And, I'd love to discuss with him that sense of his separateness to other people; those moments when he walks by them and wishes, for that moment in time, that he could be them. I heard him say recently that he'd passed a group of revellers drinking beer on a Friday night in Dublin and he envied them their lives in that moment, when he, shopping in hand, was going home alone to work some more on his book.

Some university researcher recently wrote to me and asked me to complete a survey about why I wrote on the Internet. I started the survey, it seemed not too much to ask, until it dawned on me that the question was imbecilic, self-evident, and that I would decline to co-operate.

I write because I must write. A fully formed, integrated person is unlikely to have the need to write but a person who feels compelled to investigate not just their own lives but the lives of others has no option but to write. I don't write because I need people to respond and my lack of comments on the posts make that clear. I continue to write regardless of lack of comments. I write on the Internet in order to have an audience, naturally, but it can be a silent audience, just as a novel writer has, mostly, a silent audience.

At the heart of every piece of writing - be it a journal entry, blog post, a short story or a novel - is a preoccupation with something about living life. It might be a current pre-occupation with an issue such as loss, or (dis)connection, or silence and its effects, or some element of sexuality that needs unravelling in the writer's head. It's their way - my way - of expressing those thoughts that ramble about in the head and need some answers, exploration, breaking down, breaking open; moving past.

One of the elements of writing that has really troubled me is the morality of writing about characteristics, quirks and idiosyncratic aspects of people that I know. There was lots of discussion about that in my writer's course and I left the course with the sense that it was all too dangerous and maybe immoral. 'Not at all', Colm would say to me over the dessert. 'If you are not prepared to write about what you know, see, hear, and live, then I'll see what I can do about getting you into Law where you can put your morality to work. You're not a writer if you are skeamish about that.'

I'd give a quiet 'hooray' when he'd say that and I'd press on, a little less scared about the consequences of people finding themselves in my book, in some shape or form. 'I'm afraid it is part of being a writer', I'd explain to them when the complaints come in, 'that I use the material that surrounds me.' (Still, it terrifies me, that they'd know my thoughts in this way...)

I sometimes listen to a female friend speak, a happy sort of women, preocuppied with pleasurable endeavors such as planning the next holiday or shopping expedition. Or, those women I know that enjoy spending their time playing tennis and bridge. I so often think, 'Why can't I be more like them? Why does the thought of Bridge fill me with dread?' Should I share this thought with Toibin he'd probably take his hand up to his bald head and then bring it down again and make a sort of claw with his fingers, as he in inclined to do when making an important point.

'You can't be what you aren't. Writers tend not to be fully baked, you see, not integrated. That's why we can morph into other people, get inside their heads. We can't be like them. We must be solitary a good deal of the time. We must fill blank pages and that is all there is to it. Make peace with it. You can't change it.'

The advice is not unlike that I have been given for years here, in this power dynamic arena. 'You're designed to be an objekt. No thinki is best for cindi'.

It's not entirely possible to stop thinking, for me at least; not just random thoughts about 'to do' lists, but thoughts about characters and why they do what they do; how they think; what matters to them and what will happen to them.

So, the opportunity to close off the mind, the opposite of endless thoughts, is a great relief. It is, in fact, more than a relief. There is a feeling of being moored again; no longer swimming about in a turbulent sea, but tied to the pier; anchored. There is a sense, a visceral sense, of being cared for and understood for the entity that cindi is, in love with the no thinking, deeply felt physical state. There is a peace that transcends over her; a state to which  I am always going to want to return.

 It's a funny thing but it doesn't really matter, I don't think, that nearly everyone doesn't get that; doesn't get who we really are and what we really need to do, so long as someone gets it; so long as we can make peace with ourselves. People can't change us all that much and that makes sense given the struggle that we have making changes in ourselves. I have had a pen in my hand since the earliest age, my mother tells me, so it makes sense that I feel compelled to spend time with the blank page. It, I, must be filled.

Comfort, the kinky way

In 'real life' when I think about being comforted I think of the usual 'girlie' things, like soft words, big hugs and gentle kisses. I think of him telling me that it will all be all right; that he will be all right and I will be all right. I think of smiles and then laughs and after that, all is right in my world. I respond very well to a positive and upbeat approach. If he is upbeat then I'm upbeat.

In my thoughts, say, when I am waking in the morning and I'm in that world between being awake and being asleep, 'comfort' takes on a different face. Take this morning, for example:

I'm naked and he's called me to him. He says that he needs to spank me for disobeying him. The spanks on my bottom with the hairbrush should be received as a symbol of his will and his love for me and that my staying still to receive them is a symbol of my understanding that his will prevails and that I am receiving the spanks with love.


He asks me to climb over his knee and he begins to spank me with his hand. They're getting harder and I so very much want to wiggle away from his hand but he reminds me every now and again that I must stay still and accept the correction. A wiggling girl is a girl who has not accepted the importance of the spanking in her life. If I should wiggle it's a sign to him that he must spank harder and longer until I recognize the futility of wiggling.


Now, he takes up the wooden bath brush that stings so viciously. He tells me that he is going to turn over the counter and that when the sands all drift down the spanking will be over. Only three minutes. Can I be a good girl and stay still for three minutes while my bottom is well spanked?


What else is there to say? I tell him that I will do my best. He tells me that I must give into it and to just accept it; to let it pass through me and to allow the discomfort to guide me to better behavior in the future. He tells me that he is sure that I can be still; that I understand how important it is to receive this correction.


I try to hold onto his words; to please him by staying still but the heat is rising and I'm desperate to get away from that brush. I try to focus on the sands but there are so many of them still to pass through the little outlet and I begin to howl to the moon, to relieve the heat of my bottom and distract myself. Or, do I howl because I have to do something?!


When I have quietened again and just let myself surrender to the brush he tells me that perhaps next time when I have a mind to disobey I may remember the feeling of lying helplessly over his knee and I may choose differently. Do I think I may choose differently next time, he wants to know?


"Yes, Sir, yes, very differently," I assure him.


I am keeping a close eye on the sands now and it is not too long to go. Maybe five seconds, four seconds, three seconds, two seconds, one second...


"Time, Sir!"


He checks the timer. 


"Ahhhh, so it is, that's a good girl."


He rubs his hand over my bottom and I welcome the relief of the rubbing.


"Come to Daddy."


I curl up in his arms and he gives me a big hug, a rub of my back and then my bottom.


"All better now. My little girl is a good girl again."


He coos into my ear how proud he is of me and how this is just a little aberration. He's sure the correction has set me back on track and that I won't do it again.


"You won't do it again, will you darling?"


"No, Sir, not ever ever again."


"I thought not. Good girls don't disobey, do they?"


"No, they don't."


"Why don't they disobey, darling?"


"Because they are good."


"Yes. And, perhaps they may need to be spanked very soundly if they disobey. Do good girls like to be spanked very soundly."


"They don't like that at all!"


"No. So fortunate that you are a good girl, my darling. I wouldn't want to have to do that again. I won't have to do that again, will I darling?"


"I doubt it."


"I do too."


"Now, run along, there's a good girl."


"Yes, Sir."


And, then my day began. Such a comforting start to it.

We

We say so much and yet say so little of what we mean.
We talk to each other and yet misunderstandings are rife.
We think our motives are understood.
We wonder why the other is not co-operating.

We aim to please one another.
We want the other to be happy.
We act naturally but purposefully for the other's good.
We live by a code only known to us.

We get closer and it feels so good.
We misstep unwittingly and some distance returns.
We correct.
We reconnect.

We endure.
We hold onto something dear.
We patienctly wait for matters to unfold.
We give thanks for having found one another.

Play

As a mother of four children and a woman who was trained to be a high school teacher, I watched with fascination last night a documentary about children’s play. American children, it was proposed, were at risk of losing essential free play in their lives. So competitive had American parents become on their children’s behalf and so terrified of what might befall a child if left unsupervised, their free play time was evaporating. We saw footage of very young children, less than eight years old saying that they felt “stressed” (I wondered how they learned that word...) They relayed that they were always expected to be doing something.

The vast majority of parents around the world would be inclined to agree that team sports build character. I agree that sometimes team sports build character and I also agree that sometimes team sports are just counterproductive. I saw evidence of both scenarios with my own children. It has to be the right sort of team and the right sort of sport with the right sort of coach to be a positive experience, in my opinion. When I saw one son being sidelined and the coach acting like a control freak weirdo, I suggested to my son that he might be better able to fill in his Sunday afternoon. He was just so relieved that he didn’t need to handle any more of our expectations of him. Instead, he did what he really wanted to do: highly competitive and challenging stuff but on a whole other level. As one expert on children’s play reported, team sports have the potential to build character.

And another thing: The researchers discovered that in team sports some kids hold back. They don’t want to make a mistake in front of the screaming onlookers. But, take those kids and put them with other kids in a smaller situation, such as their own neighbourhood away from the screaming parents and they became leaders on the sports fields.

But, I digress. The important point made, based on considerable research is that free play situations for children are essential to build their emotion intelligence; to develop problem solving strategies and conflict resolution strategies.

It was fascinating to watch what happened on a primary school playground when adults made available equipment other than balls and bats. They scattered into the trees, a variety of coloured scarves, and what do you know! Suddenly, many children were using those scarves to imagine all sorts of scenarios. They were, for forty minutes, different people in far off lands. The playground came alive with the sounds of children at play: happy, bubbly, creative children. It was a sight to see!

When I moved to America, I was just a simple Aussie girl with my own simple notions of bringing up children. If they wanted to play in a mud puddle on a stinking hot day, that was fine by me. That is what free, creative Australian children do. I was shocked to discover that this was a real novelty to the American parents who looked on. They had never seen such a thing: the abandon of a child who has sat on the sidelines all sticky hot summer day to watch his older brother in a soccer tournament simply have enough, take off all his clothes and wade through the puddle stark naked. To me, it was the most normal event in the entire world.

My two eldest children adored the Robin Williams’ Captain Hook movie, ‘Hook’, and I loved it too. It was so filled with an imaginative spirit that it was impossible not to fall in love with it. Imagine my confusion, therefore, when I found myself involved in a conversation with American mothers full of complaint about the movie. They thought it just “silly”. I just kept my mouth closed. Their world of bringing up children was something totally alien to me.

When we left America, we were snowed in for almost a week. Everything had gone. We had nothing in the house but some cardboard boxes. Never fear! We also had some masking tape and my daughter got to work to make a “house”. For three days, she and her younger brother played in their house, blissfully happy and content.

With my two younger children, I had to accept that their sort of play was going to be different. They both adored the screen and whilst they had full and varied extra-curricular lives in the form of music and sport and drama and so on, their creative play might have them in the library at lunchtime working with another aficionado of animation or whatever, putting together a movie. So be it. We are all different. A ball is not going to appeal to every kid just as one sort of recreation is not going to appeal to all adults.

As the child psychologist in the documentary said in so many words: It is about raising a resilient child. In this world the most important thing we learn to do is to adapt. Children must be resilient enough to adapt to life’s challenges. They can’t learn this skill wrapped in cotton wool, constantly supervised.

Whilst free play for my children was something that I instinctively understood and provided, it hadn’t occurred to me that I also needed free play; the opportunity to lose myself in a world of my own invention, or to have the opportunity to adapt to someone else’s version of a wonderful world.

My husband, too, perhaps didn’t understand that. He was a child who really knew how to play. With a large farm as his playground, he and his siblings were very creative and free indeed. But as he grew older, he may have lost sight of its importance.

Nowadays, we play freely and often with one another. And each time we do, we gain something: the opportunity to lose ourselves in our own creativity; an opportunity to be free and unencumbered. You are never too old or too young to want or need to play in a way most suited to you.

A soul kiss

“I’ve been trying not to notice
But girl you shine so bright
Like a shooting star
In the darkness of the night”

I have a Ray Charles CD in the music player in my bedroom at the moment, and these words play over and over in my mind.

Men are so attracted to a woman’s look. They are so visual, so smitten by a woman’s smile, or eyes, or the way her skirt caresses her ass. They notice her shoes, her stockings, her fingers, and the way she shakes her head and the movement of her hair. Nothing escapes them. I noticed a man watching me as I walked back to the car this morning, after taking the dog for her beauty session (read: clip and wash). I loved that he looked but of course, as soon as he saw me watching him watching me, he looked away. Don’t they teach guys to hold a woman’s gaze a little longer than that? Not that I was interested, but still, guys have to know these things!

Anyway, the point is, that the internet is an amazing sky, really, when you think about it. And a girl can shine bright without even being seen. Her mind can be like a shooting star. And, a man’s mind can be like a shooting star, too. It makes me wonder. Do we put too much stock into appearance? Is it not the mind that is more alluring than the body? I don’t know the answer. But, for two people to have a discussion that lasts a lifetime, surely it is the two minds that must be attracted, too.

When a person opens their mind to another; their heart, their soul and their mind, and the other person listens, it is uplifting. It is like a delectable little piece of ‘love’. It is a “soul kiss”. Janus taught me that phrase and I love it. When he used it, it wasn’t quite like that. We’d had a tiff and were making up and he asked me to tell him what I loved about him. You don’t need to be in love to give someone a soul kiss. But, you do need to really listen to someone well enough for them to know that you are listening carefully and that you care.

Take a risk! Give someone a soul kiss and see the joy you bring, to them and to yourself!

My Impropriety

Dear Readers,

A few days ago, I wrote about a ‘chat’ conversation I had with a friend of mine who happens to be a dominant man. You may remember that in that conversation he encouraged me to be a good girl and go and ask for my correction. I wrote the post, being very careful not to mention the man by name, of course. However, after I put up the post, I must admit, I had some misgivings, for I confess that I did not seek his permission before excerpting the discussion on this little blog of mine.

The weekend went by and there was no irate email to be found in my inbox, but still, I knew my behaviour lacked propriety. On Monday evening, that little window of his was open again. I felt I had to take the bull by the horns; face my demons, so to speak.

I’ve tried to write a summary of our conversation for you; to give you a sense of the flavour of the conversation, without actually writing down the conversation. But, I think you’ll agree the conversation is priceless, and thus, with his consent, I provide you all with part of the transcript:

“Are you cross?”
“Not in the slightest.”
“Are you sure?”
“Quite sure. Would you prefer that I were cross?"
“No. I thought you might have something to say about a post of mine.”
“Let's be more direct.”
“About writing up our last 'chat', in a sense.”
“Would you like to hear my thoughts on that post, Vesta?”
“Yes please, but remember, you said, you weren't cross.”
“Then, you need to ask to hear my thoughts.”
“May I please have your thoughts about that post, if you would be so kind?”
“Why, certainly. It made me laugh. It tickled me to have made enough of an impact to find my way into a post of yours.”
“Oh, that's grand. Perfect.”
“However, there was some impropriety involved.”
“I love that you have a sense of humour. There's always a catch...”
“Always. Don't you think it would've been the proper and polite thing to ask me if I wouldn't mind our conversation being excerpted in a post?”
“You are absolutely right. It has been on my mind. It was impolite of me. I feel bad about that.
Is there something I can do to make it up to you...other than to apologize and request your permission in future?”
“ Hmmm You can compose a post that lists the various ways in which you most recently have been a bad girl.”
“You ALMOST had that idea on the tip of your tongue...”
“And then appeal to your readers what would be the proper way in which to deal with your impropriety.”
“Surely you jest.”
“Why would you think I'd jest?”
“You have a good sense of humour! Is there any other way...?”
“So, what needs to be done is clear then, yes?”
“Are you enjoying my discomfort?”
“I hadn't noticed much discomfort.”
“What had you noticed, then?”
“Back pedalling.”
“Oh, I don't want to be seen as a back pedaller. Can you give me a bit more direction on this post you have in mind? If you would be so kind...”
“You are to explicitly state that you were reprimanded for a transgression and part of your punishment is to list 25 things in which you were a bad girl. Then, explain to your audience that you are instructed to turn to them for feedback as proper punishment for those 25 things.” and so on.

There you have it, dear readers...the situation as it unfolded. Let it not be said that I put my own spin on this situation. I have admitted my fault, and I have accepted the consequences.

Next time I write to you, I will post a list of 25 ways in which I have recently been a bad girl. Please understand if the items on the list are occasionally lame. When you are a good girl much of the time, one must really stretch to locate 25 things. It was specifically made clear to me that ‘thoughts’ should be a part of the list, and so I will reveal a little of my thinking rather than just bad behaviour. As you now know, I have also been asked to call upon you, my readers, to suggest suitable ways to deal with my impropriety.

I am certainly working on ‘the list’, and will post again as soon as possible. A deadline has been imposed and the clock is ticking.

Yours sincerely,
Vesta