Why stories matter

My reading and thinking lately has explored that which is common to us all - that our experiences in childhood  lead us to behave in certain maladaptive ways in adulthood. Alain de Botton's 'The Course of Love' explores this in novel form, though for many readers the philosophy was too preachy and/or interrupted the text in a way that was not to their liking. Don't let that put you off. There is enlightening material there and characters with specificity, even if de Botton's inclination is to 'tell us' rather than 'show us'.

Tim Parks' 'Tom and Mary: A Love Story' explores the breakdown of a marriage in what I call true novel form, and how one thing leads to the other. Small incremental missteps or misunderstandings eventually makes for the disintegration of the union. "If he is going to work all night, I may as well go to bed" thinks Mary. Mary takes the dog out for a late walk. "I may as well go to bed," thinks Thomas and by the time she joins him he is "sound asleep, face to the wall." And so it goes on every night, harder and harder to break the cycle.

The truth is that there are precious few happy long marriages in novels. It could be argued that a happy marriage makes for boring reading but fascinating, I think, that so few novelists have even attempted this scenario; quite the opposite in fact. Romances don't count because most romances end with the marriage ceremony itself or some early part of the union. I'm talking about a marriage going the distance and being fundamentally happy. That doesn't happen in novels hardly at all.

Relatedness is so fundamental to the human psyche that as people we try hard to get this right, often with little understanding as to what might be wrong. For some people, this pulls them back inside themselves which can have them unravelling the damage, perhaps with positive outcome, or to a marriage councillor. Or, as my Indian friend said to me yesterday we learn that 'what cannot be cured, must be endured'. My point is that in the process of relating to others we are finding out about ourselves and that's a preoccupation for some novelists because novelists are, I think, simply trying to work things out in the same way as non-writers, but for writers they do that with ink or the keyboard.

Many relationship therapists focus on the well being of the individual and couples emphasizing that bodily contact - sex - is the answer in the end. If you don't feel like sex, try it anyway because often arousal comes before desire, they say. In this way, we are reminded all over again that touch is a lovely thing. We have connected; related. We feel more human. We feel more alive and at peace.

Fundamentally, novelists explore in various ways the universal themes of being human, why humans do what they do, what they do, and how or what might make for some change/improvement. I truly believe that we read stories because we want to believe that people are capable of change; of being better. Maybe that is not a conscious thought but in a novel of several hundred pages there is the opportunity for a character to grow, to adapt, to endure, to survive, to transform and to transcend. Even if it is just two sentences of hope at the end of a 800 page novel, we hold out for it; relish it.

My audience here is not Australian but I am Australian and I was reminded this morning what makes that matter; what being Australian means. I have only read one of Richard Flanagan's novels, The Narrow Road to the Deep North. Set in WW2 in a POW camp on the Thai Burma death railway, this brilliant novel lays before the reader scenes where we see what happens when people are pushed to their limits. It took me weeks to think about food in the same way again. How does one eat a plate of healthy food knowing what these men have been through; how malnourished and dehumanized they were? I'm not good reading about or watching brutality and yet the exemplary writing demanded that I go on.

Richard was a keynote speaker at the most recent Melbourne Writers Festival. I caught the talk on podcast this morning and was reminded that what is particular to a character in an Australian novel or to a person in an Australian scenario is not the end of the story. He told the audience a bit of his school life in Tasmania. He talked of a school bully going up to a boy sitting quietly eating his lunch and bashing his head back against a brick wall, not once but three times. As the bully walked off the boy sitting beside the victim called out, "Why?" and the bully replied "Because I can." The school was so rough that staff were less interested in consequences as they were in keeping the peace, Richard explained. It was an experience that has never left him.

He then went on to talk about Australian stories and that none resonated so much with him as the stories of recent times. In fact, he was talking about the recording of incidents in detention centres for immigrants who had entered  Australia illegally, or were in process. (I am not entirely sure who can be detained in this way.) The little 'stories' told of people in complete despair, people who weren't expressing themselves with a keyboard but with thread when they sewed their mouths shut or with flame when they set themselves on fire; people who had lost hope in life.

Richard's brief for the lecture was to try to answer the question why writing matters. This is what I took from it: that we write to explore that which is more important than our individual souls; because things matter; because it is a way to assert freedom and to find meaning. So fascinating, yes, that we write about individual souls to explore that which is more important than our individual souls?!

"Cruel is cruel", said Richard. "Evil is evil", he said. If a Government behaves in a certain way "because it can" is that not enough reason to use the keyboard to remind the reader of what it is to be human? "Australia has lost its way," he said. It sent a chill down my spine. Has Australia lost its way or have we collectively, universally, forgotten what's right and decent?

In my thinking day by day I do tend to focus on the individual and how he interacts with those closest to him or her. I do that because I've had this feeling for a long time that if we look after those in our family and everyone looks after those in their family, those they love, that's maybe the best that most people can do. But, it's not the whole story at all. The Australian ethos for as long as I can remember has been 'a fair go' and if that's in peril, that needs to be expressed loud and clear. Cruelty is cruelty. Evil is evil.

Perhaps what is common to the interaction between a couple or a much bigger story such as immigration detention is for each and every individual to take a moment to walk in the other's shoes. No matter what the issue or situation, that can't possibly hurt. From the smallest to the largest of stories, they are all about the human experience and what it means to be human; that although we are perfectly imperfect we need to hold ourselves to high account.

Navigating our inner worlds

A  Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara came to my attention this week. In an effort to make a decision as to whether to purchase a copy of the novel I am reading reviews by people who have read it. Goodreads is a great site for this sort of thing. One reader listed the many things he liked about the novel and the things he didn't like about the novel. On the negative side, he mentioned that he found something narcissistic about a story that only detailed the landmarks of the characters' lives and not the landmarks of the historical time period. As an example, the characters were living through the 2001 time period and yet there is no mention of the economic downturn or of 9/11.

Obviously I can't yet have an opinion as to whether not including a more external world for the characters to inhabit was a good idea or not, but I am wondering about this strategy in a more general sense. For example, I rarely mention the world at large in this web journal, perhaps thinking it more appropriate not to do so. I doubt anybody cares about my opinion of the American Presidential election, for example, even though I follow the events quite closely and was thrilled for Hillary Clinton to finally have the Democratic Party nomination. She is more than qualified for the job. She is level headed with an overwhelming desire to do good. And, as I see it, there's no viable choice. But, that's an aside. The world I present here is my internal world, by and large unconcerned with the material world just outside my door.

As I think back to Nora Webster, Colm Toibin directs his focus to Nora's inner world, and the world of her family; her private life. She goes to work and we learn of the office politics, giving us a greater understanding of the substance of Nora, but by and large, that's about as far as it goes. Certainly, we learn of the slow explosion of Ireland through what Nora sees on the television. We understand that just beyond the borders of Enniscorthy there lies an unreliable and conflicting world, but it's backdrop to the story. Our concern is Nora; what she thinks, who she is, and the decisions she makes.

I wonder if it holds any importance for a reader here to know my physical world; perhaps my choice of clothing or the kind of furniture in my house. Co-incidentally, I happened to read a short piece of writing this morning that suggested that we should be aware of the energy in used objects before we buy them, and this resonated since I often have a reaction to an pre-owned object that compells me not to buy it.

I am at this moment sitting at a dining table that we bought from a newly divorced woman in Connecticut who was moving to New York City, thirty-five years now. She told us that her family had sat around it for many happy and momentous occasions and she asked us to take good care of it. It's always had a good vibe and we've never considered replacing it. But, it's rare for me to feel this way about pre-owned objects. Somehow, on a visceral level, I understand this idea of 'energy' that surrounds objects, and people.

If objects give off energy then surely so do people, houses, neighbourhoods, news reports, the weather, the events that surround us as we go about our day. It would be a difficult thing to write about me, or perhaps anyone, without an understanding of how fast my mind thinks, and changes, moment by moment according to my environment. I might look out onto the garden and feel a glow of satisfaction that my lilly pilly hedge has finally begun to mature into a lovely shape but a minute later in walking into the boys' bathroom I may despair that they will ever be aware enough of their own surroundings to want to keep them tidy.

In terms of world events, it can be problematic to ascertain if we come to know more of a person in terms of how they relate to their world at large. I may hear of a sad event on the radio but not allow it to disrupt my day or bring me down. Whilst one interpretation is that that sounds heartless, some people can't afford to take into their soul sad news because to live so close to their skin is too painful. I suspect this is what is happening to my daughter. So much like me, she worries about the children with whom she works. On an intellectual level she knows she can't protect the children once they go home, but she would if she could, and that makes her job hard.

(Note: A day after writing this post a family member found it a part of his job to attend the aftermath of a 20 year old man who had taken his life by jumping in front of a train. I'm 'wearing' this tragedy today. It's hard to take it off and put it away, but with virtually no control or input into the lives of others unknown, we are forced to do this every day of our lives and to content ourselves with making any small impact that we can for the benefit of others.)

I remember the time of 9/11. I remember the following Saturday and talking to parents on the sideline of a childrens' soccor match and that sense of gloom that hung over the world as we talked of an event so far away, and yet we had all been in the building. 'There but for the grace of God go I', we all thought privately, I am sure. There's a natural response to keep your loved ones particularly close at such times.

At about the same time, one of my sons was attacked but the other perpetrators called the man off, thank God. Soon thereafter, someone tried to steal his backpack in the city and by then he'd had enough. He punched the man in the nose and that made him drop the backpack and run off empty handed. Now, these events did have a bearing on his state of mind and how he responds to the world. It's hard for anyone, I think, to relate to events in a meaningful way or for the events to significantly and permanently alter him or her, unless there is some sort of personal experience with those world events. We can feel real empathy and compassion for others going through traumatic experiences but it's hard to crawl inside their skin and their minds unless we've had something akin to that experience ourselves. I think it is why we read, to crawl inside other peoples' skins.

Whilst setting is a fundamental element of story, character development is what matters most in terms of a reading experience, I think. I am quintessentially Australian and that's part of my story, but how important is that to the reader when reading my words in a web journal? I suspect that the reader is more interested in the disgorgement of my mind, wherever it is placed in the world. Maybe I am blonde or brunette, skinny or wide hipped. I don't need to tell you since your imagination will fill in the gaps. You'll put me in a house of your own choosing and surround me with beautiful or garrish objects. This keeps the focus on the words and your engagement and agreement, or not, with the words.

I know that some readers want to be taken to a detailed visual world. It is something that I work on in my novel writing feeling that it has been a weakness, but still there is an instinctual part of me that feels that the intelligent reader does want to use their imagination; to relate on a personal level to the material, or perhaps simply to have a connection to the feelings expressed. It was a mistake, I think, for Hillary to wear that US$12,000 jacket because it takes the focus off her message and onto her personal choices. It says something about her, we figure; something that we'd prefer not to know. It feels like, well, it feels like a poor choice, and we don't want her having poor choices, not given the role she will play in the world. Still, if that's the worst of the choices, there is no harm done. It makes no sense to expect perfect people.

Each of us is made up of a gamut of choices; to be humble, aggressive, assertive, greedy, determined, caring; to impusively make choices for today or to take the long term view. Mistakes are inevitable. We never stop learning, if we choose to learn.  Some people have no interest in personal growth. It is a fact of life.

There is so much writing advice out there but at the end of the day, if you are going to write stories for the enrichment of other people, you just have to tell your story, exposing the complexity of being human in whatever setting your characters happen to live.

Self-belief

I am becoming more comfortable now with this need to write. I'm understanding more about the need to wrestle with the themes and preoccupations of my life and to shape them into a story.

For many years, there  was no time to write. Four busy children and a fully occupied husband absorbed my time. As well, in those child rearing years I didn't have the strong desire to write that I do now. There was adequate succor for me bringing up the children. There was also plenty of worry. It can deplete desire to be creative in another medium.

It is true that my husband would say from time to time that I should sit down and write, but the impetus was not coming from within. I give full credit for my entry into a writing life to my psychologist, who I saw for about ten sessions a few years ago now.

'What would you really like to do?'
'Well, I'm not sure that I have any talent, but I'd like to do a writing course.'
'I don't doubt that you have talent. What is really stopping you?'

I don't remember what I said. I've been sitting here for a few minutes trying to reconstruct that conversation. I probably said that the children still took up a lot of time and I wasn't sure which course to pick. I no doubt gave her any excuse that I could come up with in the moment.

What I didn't say was that I had zero confidence; that the thought of actually doing what I really wanted to do filled me with fear and anxiety, because somewhere in the doing of the course it would be proven categorically that I had no talent.

I do remember her telling me to research writing courses and that next time we met I should let her know which course I had decided on and my reasons for choosing that particular course. She was tough under that sweet surface of hers!

I did do the research and I chose a course that would give me a smattering of choices for a possible writing life; subjects concerning journalism, writing critiques, writing film scripts, adapting one form of writing to another, starting a novel, and so on. I was hedging my bets; that if I was useless in one form of writing I might be better in another. Truthfully, I really wanted to go to the same institution that my youngest son attends now, but it is highly selective and I simply didn't think that I could ever be chosen. So, I downplayed my interest in it.

She was happy with my selection and explanation of my choice, though she did question me about the generalist, academic nature of my selection.  I think she would have been happier with a course that focused specifically on creative writing. It probably would have been a wiser choice, in retrospect, although the course I did expanded my mind and that's a good thing. She was happy enough until I said that I wouldn't enrol in the upcoming study period but rather wait until the new year which was in several months.

'Oh no you don't,' she said more forcefully than any other statement she had ever made, or would make to me. 'You're enrolling right now!' So, I did. I felt I had no choice and that was probably also a good thing.

I remember beginning the very first subject and there were twelve in all. I remember thinking, 'Well, I haven't a clue how to do this so I have nothing to lose.' I remember it being a huge accomplishment in my mind when I could find all the material and sites and discussion boards; you name it. Technologically, I was a dinosaur being drawn into a new era.

I remember having to choose another writing student as a writing buddy and I quickly formed the impression that one young man would be ideal for me. His style of writing and interests were entirely different to mine, but he was smart, witty, open and friendly. We got on very well given all the differences. I remember him having to formally critique a piece of writing of mine for the first time. I had made so many fundamental mistakes but he saw something fresh and honest in the writing and he's always been encouraging to me. I remember getting a Distinction for that subject and that gave me some slight optimism in my own ability to survive the course.

I remember taking on two subjects the next semester and at one point half way through the semester my nerve cracked. I wrote to the tutor of my 'Writing History' subject and said that I had taken on too much and perhaps should withdraw from her subject. She wrote back to say that was unnecessary since I was well on my way to a very high score. There it was again, a fundamental refusal to believe in myself, and to be genuinely shocked at the positive comments she made.

I remember getting back the result of one story I had submitted and the tutor noting in her comments   that she was sure that I would be published very soon.  I thought she was 'bullshitting'. I wanted to believe it. I just did not.

I remember writing to another writing student and sharing with her that I had no faith in my own ability at all. She wrote back and said, 'Sweetie, if you have no confidence in your own ability then we are all doomed. Everybody on that discussion board can see you have ability.' More bullshitting. It was kind, but it didn't mean anything to me.

Conversely, I took constructive criticism very personally. I didn't disagree with it. It just went straight to my soul as a wound. High Distinctions did little to deter me from my fundamental belief that I was winging it somehow; tricking them.

Towards the end of the course another writing student asked for stories for her online literary magazine. I sent her a story that I wrote immediately the course was over. It was a story for myself; relief from the academic rigours of the MA; kinky. She liked it and published it. But, guess what? I showed it to no-one and only mentioned it in passing to the family. She asked for more. I have yet to provide them.

Then, something shifted. I had read Elizabeth Strout's The Burgess Boys and loved it. I listened to her being interviewed on a podcast and something about her comments about her writing life resonated with me. Then, I starting reading Colm Toibin - his collection of short stories The Empty Family, and two of his novels, Brooklyn and Nora Webster. I listened to everything I could find where he was being interviewed. Then, I returned to Strout and did the same thing.

Ever so gradually it began to sink into my psyche; the sort of writer that I was, what it was possible to do, and how it was possible to do it; that I'd make many mistakes before I could produce something I was happy with; that I wasn't a normal person at all but a writer who must write; that the events and preoccupations of my life were enough to create many stories.

I am what is known as a spare writer, and a writer who needs to create characters with rich internal worlds, and that was acceptable. But, I needed to work on creating muscular sentences. I needed to sit down every day and write so that the writing would improve. I wasn't talentless, but nor could I be lazy. This is what I learned from those podcasts and Utube videos. God bless the Internet.

In the past few weeks my internal world has changed. The possibilities seem endless. I am beginning to talk to my family in a new way. My writing is my work I told them; not housework or cooking or arranging things. I'll do my share, I said, the lion's share, of course. But, I wanted them to pull in too. I want time to sit and hone my craft.

On Tuesday, I noticed myself slip. I'd exercised in the morning and the plan was to get to my Meditation group at noon. However, the state of the house overwhelmed me. In the end I wasn't going to be able to meditate in a group knowing that I had endless things to do at home. I stayed home and sorted so that I could write later in a clear and tidy space. In my defence I am not the sort of person that needs to clean the entire house in order to write, but nor can I alter my mind such that I can write surrounded by mess. It's not even an excuse. It's just the environment I need to be able to enter my sub-conscious and draw out what I need for the scenes.

I remembered this morning a lovely man who was a correspondent of mine for some time. He wasn't shy in sharing his opinions with me and he said that it was funny that I longed to travel and yet I loved to be at home. I finally figured this out. I do desperately want to write. It's a huge need. I look to the outside world for inspiration and energy, but I look to my internal world and my home as the place where creativity lives. This makes home very important to me.

I have a very long way to go, but there is a modicum of belief in myself right now. I have my fingers crossed that I can build on this small start.

A glimmer of insight through the fog

When I can achieve that 'doll' frame of mind, it is really a wonderfully simple inner life. The news of the day starts to fade in its importance. I often float through the day oblivious to the outside world; not so much 'in my head' as without much news worthy, noteworthy thought.

Naturally, the doll frame of mind comes and goes. I do have to attend to worldly issues and it occurred to me that I best get in touch with someone at my academic institution to ask when class starts for my last subject in the MA. A senior tutor replied to my inquiry and took the opportunity to remind me that she'd like to receive a story for the Institution's magazine. How do I to tell her that I have been in 'doll mode' for the past few months and have not written a thing, except one unsuitably smutty story? Hmmmmmmmm

It was time to get back to putting words down on the blank page. Without a clear idea of where I was going I had a go but was soon distracted onto other sites (e.g. tumblr). I deleted the page and settled down for the night. Would my head ever focus again?

Through the doll haze, for several weeks now, even a short story has seemed such a huge ask. When I read I normally have a pencil at the ready to mark what I particularly love, and a note book to write down thoughts that come to me as I read, to explore in story form sometime later.

Nothing. I've done nothing that I know works for me, except to one day have this inkling, this sense that Richard Flanagan's various points of view that he uses in The Narrow Road to the Deep South - to shift from the mindset of an Australin prisoner in Burma during WW11 to the Japanese Colonel's perspective, from Dorrigo's inner landscape to that of his wife, or his lover - gave the story a richness that I wanted to explore in my own writing (although I wouldn't attempt anything as challenging). I told myself that inklings are worth something. 

I've been watching for free lectures from the Iowa Writers' Workshop and felt compelled to send for Andrew Sean Greer's The Story of a Marriage. His talk affected me in some indiscernible way and I wanted to read his latest story. With a glass of white wine in one hand and his little book in the other, some vague reminder of the writer's life returned to me. More than that, the uncomplicated nature of the sentences gave me hope that it wasn't necessary to write particularly poetically to tell a story well. There's not a metaphor to be had in the following paragraph, save the first sentence, and yet it has us thinking, draws us in.

Beauty is a warping lens. He had the kind of looks that are always greeted by grins and handshakes, extra glances, stares held for a moment longer than usual; a smile and a face not easily forgotten. Even the way he held a cigarette, or leaned over to tie his shoe, had a certain masculine grace that made you want to sketch him. What a distorted, confusing way to live. To be offered jobs and rides and free drinks - "It's on the house, sweetie" - to sense a room changing as you move through it. Watched everywhere you go. To be someone people long to possess, and to be used to this feeling; to be wanted so immediately, so often, that you have never known yourself what you might want.

Thirty something pages later we learn that Holland was once the lover of Buzz, the 'friend' who has come calling regularly and befriended Pearlie. Holland wants him back and is prepared to broker a deal with Pearlie.

After Flanagan's ambitious tale of the lives of the men who helped with the building of the Burma Railway under sufferage this is a deceptively simple story of a marriage. I was instantly pulled into it.  I found myself interested in the construction of single sentences, in putting myself in the author's seat and imagining how Greer orchestrated the tale. I was starting to think like a writer again.

Responses to the novel have been mixed. Some readers adore the book while others have complaints about being deceived (by omission) for a time that Pearlie and Holland are black. It occurred to me what a long and hard road it is to write fiction. One reviewer even said of Flanagan's brilliant saga that a 'red camelia' occurring a few times during the book was a 'literary devise' that she found too co-incidental. My goodness, but we are picky!

Of course, Hemingway had this idea that we must write only what is 'true'. Jim Carrey spoke to a room full of creative arts students in recent times and told them that the creative and performing arts industry was the last place on earth where they could write and act out what is 'true'.

'What's your truth?' I often ask myself, and particularly as recently as this weekend when I read a long post by another tutor of mine who called for stories for a new world; the kind of stories that poeple are searching for now to help them live their lives better.

If, for me, the correct answer to that calling is to write stories about finding connection, my characters must first experience disconnection, alienation and confusion. Dorrrigo (based in part on Weary Dunlop) never does find the sort of connection he seeks, except in times of crisis. He's a man that needs a crisis before he can 'step up'. Holland, for all his beauty in action, as typified in the above paragraph, is deeply disconnected. Gay and living in the 1950s in America, a quiet marriage to Pearlie is a good place to hide, but not one that allows him to feel much of  a connection to her or anyone else.

I spent far too long talking this morning to a friend after my exercise class. She puts on a brave front but she's had considerable concerns to bear over her life. I've often wondered at how she hasn't journeyed into the land of despair, rather than remain forever forbearing. Finally, she wanted to share with someone that her step-daughter has competed with her for her father's attentions for the past 32 years and that she hates her. I hope my shock at her use of the word wasn't visible.

It finally sunk in. It's not just me that's complicated. We're all complicated, all flawed. This is why the character arc is so essential because innately we know this about the human race and stories need for central characters to learn something so that we can learn something; so that we have an opportunity to be better than we are.

Yes, Dorrigo let his opportunity to find that connection in his life pass through his fingers, but we say to ourselves, don't we, that we must never do that ourselves; that we won't make that mistake?

I've written down these thoughts as they have come to me so that I can return to them, before they fade away. In doll mode, thoughts do come sometimes, and then they very quickly fade away...

Writing and thinking about yourself

Isn't it interesting what the Internet can allow us to do. We can fabricate a persona. We can declare that we believe in ideas or a way of life that simply are merely a figment of our imagination. We can make our lives sound more interesting or more intense than they really are. It's a bit of sport, I guess. Or, perhaps it is a bit like crafting a story. Maybe the reality isn't nearly so interesting as the story. Change a few details, turn things around, give it a different ending and you've got the hallmarks of a story.

It hasn't been this way for me; not at all. I've written the odd story or anecdote but it was clear that this was what it was - or, it was to me. The rest has been my very real and intensely true feelings and experiences. I'm not always proud of those feelings but I declare them to be true; real; authentic.

I'm not at all sure how many people there truly are out there who genuinely are affected and aided by my words. I receive the odd email that suggests that there has been a strong bond and connection with my words; that what I have felt, so have other people.

I know this. I've experienced something profound. I hold it in my soul now. It's a sense of my complete person - a desire, deeply felt on a daily basis to interact with another human being on this planet that understands me and accepts me for all that I am; who knows me as I know myself. This is an incredibly rare opportunity.

I read copious amounts of spiritual words and they all boil down to the fact that to know yourself is one of life's true gifts. You have to really understand who you are. Strip away everything - the spouse, the children, the possessions, the career and what stands there? Who are you?

This is what this has all been about for me - establishing who I am, what matters to me, the whole me and the expression of that entity.

Robert Bly says that we put all the things that people don't like about us 'in the bag'. So, most of our being goes into the bag by the time we are through our childhood. We spend the first 20 years of our lives putting things in the bag and we spend the rest of our lives trying to take them back out. Unless we do an investigation of ourselves we die with the best part of ourselves locked in the bag.

Why would anyone want this? Don't people want to know who they really are? Is there some reason to always live in the light, frightened of the shadow?

We had a man at work who was the Marketing Manager. A cardboard cut out was made of him for promotional purposes. My boss referred to it as 'the paper cut out of the paper cut out".

No-one should want to be a paper cut out. There must be substance.

Who are you in your entirety? That's the question. Time spent writing about 'you' isn't time wasted, but make it authentic. Make it real. Or, don't waste your time.

Sexual liberation

I went to a session recently where there was a panel of erotic/porn writers talking about their work. In their discussion there was talk of the institution of marriage and it was made clear that it was passe (imagine a mark above the e) to have female characters remain in, or return to, their marriages. Notions of women's sexuality had gone beyond that idea, they said. It almost felt wrong to remain committed to a relationship that was average when there was so much untapped potential out there, at least in terms of telling a story that involved women's sexuality.

Even Elizabeth Strout, author of The Burgess Boys, a self-confessed conservative woman from Connecticut, had some concerns about her character Helen, also a conservative woman from Connecticut whose husband has been unfaithful, accepting Jim back. Part of her, she said, wanted Helen to go out and grow.

Helen is very interesting actually because there's a paragraph in the book that alludes to Helen feeling uncomfortable about some other person having been found to have whips and rope and nipple clamps in their house. She's not being judgmental about them here. She's jealous, because thoughts have crossed her mind but she's put them aside; certainly not discussed them with Jim. And, here the exploration of Helen's sexuality remains; locked.

It's an important next stage of women's rights to live a full life, I think, this exploration of their abundant potential for sexual fulfillment. I cast no blame per se, for there is nothing to be gained by blaming anyone, but many the married woman has had a tepid sex life and that's no longer something that is seen as being acceptable or necessary.

This is all very personally interesting to me because if I allow my protagonist to go off and satiate her appetites (such as Emma in The Secret Lives of Emma), does she have an incentive to return to her marriage? Naturally, love, commitment, duty, family, a long past together and so on are important factors, but if she is sexually fulfilled in very new ways 'out there' can she return to what she already knows? Logic tells me that she can only return if what she is returning to has also grown; enlarged; transformed. Is it possible for both people in a marriage to grow such as they can complete one another again together? Is there acceptance of the notion that it is just as much about the two individuals as it as about the union of the two individuals? Are husbands ready to accept that?

As I see it, this generation is more savvy and more gun shy about marriage. They still want a lifetime partner, eventually. The desire for a mate seems to be hardwired into us, but they are in no rush and they seem to want to try out a lot of partners. You can say that the boys are in relentless pursuit of the next catch, but lots of girls want to play in this way. They aren't in a rush to settle down either, until they are, and then they want a man to commit to them, because that's the way life works on the whole. We understand the importance of family.

I do wonder and that's all it is, wondering, if men are struggling to keep abreast of the changes in thinking on relationships. If women are less prepared to put up with things, what then? I know that I'm very close to my elastic limit on the limitations I have put on myself - to put everybody else's needs ahead of my own; to be the 'support company' of the cadet unit, to be the reliable one who sends everybody else off fully equipped for a wonderfully fulfilling time. The support company is an essential part of the unit, of course, but where's the fun for them?

I'm smiling as I write this for I just remembered something. I was in my late 20s. My boss was twice my age and I was complaining that I got to stay in the office and mind the shop whilst he got to travel and have fun. "Well you go off with Kevin (the Chairman) to Sydney, then," he said. "Let's see how you  like that!" Of course, he knew I couldn't think of anything worse. The other side of the fence isn't necessarily as green as you might think, was his point.

Another time I said that it was all right for him. He was sitting on his side of the desk! "Well, let's change spots," he said, and he came and took my chair and I took his. He pretended to be me, always good for a bit of acting, was he, while I laughed away sitting in his big chair. Nope! I wasn't meant for that chair at all. He had made his point.

I don't want to manage the money, or make the trades, or wear the pants. That's not what I mean. I just don't always want to have to wait until every other member of the family has all their needs met before I can do what I want to do. I want for my wants to be as important as their wants. When I explore this thought with my husband I can see his mind processing the danger. "She's getting feisty as she ages," I can hear him thinking.

But, when you are surrounded by thoughts that women have rights - and not just to vote but to live a full and satisfying life in every way - it's impossible to not hear the call.  "Move over," we seem to be saying to men collectively. "Make some space!" "Listen to my fantasies, because I have a plentiful store and let's get on with the business of satisfying them!"

In my opinion, this is the tip of the iceberg and there is no going back. A woman has a bountiful libido; a rich and very naughty mental file of fantasies. This is the new message. The woman who wants to have her goals taken seriously has been with us for while. I have just been slow in insisting that mine be taken seriously.  But, the sexually liberated woman has arrived and look out, because she is not going away.

Writing impulses

Writers sometimes keep journals about their project(s) and within those journals are all sort of contemplations about why they are hooked on a particular topic or idea, who their characters are and why they do what they do. These diaries can be filled with contemplative reflections that go on in a stream of writing way for pages at a time, or just a note; some little snippet of an idea to be considered on some other day.

I'm deeply immersed in one such diary at the moment and considering the motives of the two main characters in the story. I feel I know what she wants but I am not entirely sure of what the male character stands to get; not at all sure what is motivating him. Well, sometimes, I am sure of what he wants and sometimes he just confuses me. But then, is that I, the writer of these characters that is feeling different today than I did yesterday, just as all our emotions and thoughts fluctuate somewhat from day to day, or is it my vision of Daniel that is seeing things in some sort of new light; something that I didn't see there before? At the end of the day, it is all perception, not some truth of the matter, I think.

Of course, we don't necessarily want to be seen under a bright, neon light. We may have no desire whatsoever for someone to understand us in our entirety and so it is with the writer's process - some characters are tricky; some choose not to reveal themselves in any complex and complete way. That's why we write notes, trying to pin them down; to make sense of behavior that seems to have no logic of its own.

Diaries are used for catharsis, too. Moments of anger, frustration and joy ask to be cataloged in a diary. I've no idea why exactly except that for some people there's an instinct working that tells them to 'write it down' and so we do; the heartbreaks, the moments of happiness; a sudden burst of understanding about a situation. We write down changes too. We notice, our intuition notices that there has been a change within us and our intellect goes to work to try to figure what it was that our intuition noted. Since we learned language we've felt right about getting things down.

I've noticed all morning that I feel different than I did, say, last week. Yes, a weekend away in the country stimulates my senses and getting out of the city is enlivening for my spirits. But, it's more than that. My body, over the past five days or so has been stimulated (used) and having expressed myself in this way (that is, felt deeply and contentedly objectified several times over) my mind is in a state of peace; not empty but slowed right down. I've no desire today to do, but rather just to sit with myself. Never mind that I have writing to do. I'm doing the writing that I'm not required to do, as you can see.

This is no permanent 'fix'. There's still a long way to go before I could feel that the situation has settled such that every day is an authentic day, or a day in which all is in its place in my world, but I don't feel any longer that sense that I'm living in my own little nightmare, unable to make it go away. It's back to that feeling of contentedness (even though nothing has actually changed other than the use, and my sense of things, and my feelings about all that), and that understanding of the contentedness that it is no permanent state. What I mean is that I know that I am a slew of emotions that alter and change without my being able to set them in a particular way. All I can do is notice them; be aware of them; celebrate them when I feel as I do now; as if I have walked out of the primordial swamp intact; alive. "I am alive!" What a wonderful feeling is that!

Of course, the idea is that when one is enlightened enough, one simply accepts each new day and each new set of feelings as they change and transform as being 'right'. If one is simply awareness, one looks in on the situations of life and accepts all that happens; all that one thinks.

I'm not explaining it well, because at this moment I am writing as if I were writing in one of my hand written diaries, none too worried about being logical; just exploring an idea. The best I can do is to say that I am very aware of this moment where my fingers are gliding over the letters of the laptop; where I sit here at the big round table with myself, surrounded by pages that offer endless ideas about the creative process and feel...content. I have no particular needs. I'm not even focused on doing the task at hand (as is obvious) but rather sitting with myself, whoever that is.

As I woke this morning I remembered, quite out of the blue, that I had a conversation with a woman about two years ago now. She used to look after me when I was a little girl, She cooked for me mostly but she also talked to me a lot. There had been a gap of about 20 years since I saw her last and the first thing she said to me was "I'd have known you anywhere. You haven't changed at all." I didn't like to ask then what I woke up wishing that I had asked. "Who is that little girl you know so well? What was I like? Tell me about myself."

I'm beginning to think that no matter the subject of our writing, at the end of the day we inject every situation and every character with a part of ourselves, because the most fascinating part of any human being's journey through life remains the eternal question, 'Who am I?' We may never know.

The place of writing in healing

Around about now, about five or so days after I have I written in this web journal, I'm ready to write something again. There's some thought that has been mulling about my head that eventually comes out in words on this page.

This isn't entirely welcome really. The part of me that is referred to as 'bimbo' - that entity that has no time or space for worrying thought - isn't the least concerned with expression through words (logical thought and the dictates of good English) and hence entries here aren't seen as positive for her.

'Bimbo' is not at all encouraged to worry. Worrying thoughts are really off limits. She'll be heard but that's it. Her worrying will be cut off at the pass. She's not to worry, she's told. She's to apply herself to bimbo thoughts. If she persists she's reminded that this is not acceptable. It's not her place to worry.

Once upon a time, I was troubled by this situation. It felt that the part of me that is not remotely bimbo, inclined to fuss and stress over other people's grief, for example, was not being validated. What I've come to see is that this strong tendency (who I am I kidding, it's a rule) to not allow me to stress out and to direct me to return to my bimbo roots, is a great blessing.

As I become more and more comfortable with embracing bimbo, the simple side of my nature that longs for someone else to take charge, to give direction and to insist that I stop worrying and being troubled by what happens to other people - their challenges, their grief, their troubled souls - I'm much more quickly able to release myself from having to feel the pain of the world as if it were my own. As this has happened, I'm sometimes lost for a topic on this web journal. It's not possible to sit and write logically about a topic when I'm perfectly happy just existing; just living; not requiring words.

I simply adore the release of 'bimbo speeki'. With no need whatsoever to spell correctly, to capitalize, or even to be grammatical, I'm released from the real world and given permission to enter 'wonderland'. I'm given the key to the trapdoor. 'Fuck this world. I'm going to wonderland.' Yes, the bimbo laughed at that and related to that.

It's magical there. It's a world where pleasure is the number one priority. There's discipline, for sure. A bimbo is subject to following instructions and sometimes those instructions are very challenging. However, in the bimbo state of mind all instructions are perfectly fine. Challenges are welcome. New ways of thinking and opportunities to draw down walls that may have held the bimbo back are torn down.

It's  not easy to explain the process whereby the bimbo is encouraged to be free at the same time as she is kept under a close eye and made to do as she is told. It is something of a contradiction, I think. Yet, this is the way that it is. Constrained quite tight she has the freedom to fly high. She's given the magic feather and there she goes; marvelously invigorated by sticking to the plan laid out for her.

No words can convey what this means to me. To think that anyone is willing to devise for me a plan that brings me such a sense of liberation and ease; that anyone is willing to be patient enough with me to wait and wait for me to reach goals that allow that sense of liberation; that's the fairy dust right there; that's the key to wonderland.

Sometimes I say, because I simply must, 'Thank you. Thank you for this' and those words are met with some degree of discomfort, because the truth, apparently, is that it's not being done just for me.

That leads me to wonder. Does anyone do anything completely selflessly? A parent may think they are selfless but deep down all relationships we have say something about us; about our needs and wants; about what fulfills us; completes us; sustains and restores us.

That I don't write here as often as I once did is a good thing. I am resolving my mind's questions and doubts in a quieter way; much more conscious that to give my mind a rest is not to write more, but to write less; that to restore my mind to a peaceful state I can empty my mind; find refuge in the bimbo state; this moment; this status and position.

Readers and writers

There have been several scientific studies done lately on literature over time and one such study reported that "the use of words with emotional content in books has steadily decreased throughout the last century". So, if one looks at such key emotional words as anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness and surprise, it appears that "the emotional content of word usage in published English has been decreasing, with the exception of words associated with fear". This surprised me because it seems to be at odds with the notion that we are more interested in expressing ourselves and our thoughts now, for example, via Twitter.

The research study also showed that since the 1960s American English and British English literature have been diverging such that there is more emotion to be found in American literature. Is it possible that emotionalism is a luxury of economic growth, they wonder. And, is it possible that authors are more interested in expressing their fears than any other emotional state? This reminds me a bit of research about health and food, with one research study counteracting the other research study and all of us wondering what we are supposed to eat and how we are supposed to remain healthy. Intuitively we really know exactly what to do, but we don't necessarily follow that intuition that tells us to lay off the cake and get out and run.

What makes all of this scientific study about literature so interesting, I think, is that at the end of the day we can't be at all sure what to make of the findings. The authors of this study are open about that.

"While the trends found in this study are very clear, their interpretation is still open. A remaining question, the authors say, is whether word usage represents real behavior in a population, or possibly an absence of that behavior which is increasingly played out via literary fiction. Books may not reflect the real population any more than catwalk models reflect the average body."

In line with this, I do wonder about the popularity of '50 Shades of Grey' and whether we can draw any conclusions at all as to changes in Western society regarding BDSM practices or power exchange relationships. Did people read the book because they wanted to experience BDSM or to enter a power exchange? Or, are they reading about something that fascinates them because it is NOT in their lives and most likely never will be? If given the chance, would they enter freely or sprint in the other direction?

I understand that there has been an increase in the purchases of some play paraphernalia (e.g. handcuffs) and maybe more people want to play a little in the bedroom, giving up and taking control. However, I am not at all sure that this phenomenon really tells us anything about what is going on in our societies. 

There has been a big call for fantasy in the past few years and perhaps '50 Shades of Grey' fulfilled a desire to read about something intense without ever having to actually go there. As someone who is obsessed with experiencing power exchange authentically I want to read about the thought processes of someone who wants what I want and a man who instinctively can give a girl like me what she wants. One study I read about today mentioned that the most successful books favor verbs that describe thought-processing and that's definitely the sort of book that appeals to me. I want to get inside the characters’ heads and find out what makes them tick.

Do we read to experience something we don't know about, do we desire to relate to the characters in some way, or is it all far more complex than that? If I think about scenes in novels that turned me on, pages that I dog-eared and read over and over again, it related to the authentic nature of an experience - a daughter that was called into her father's study for a spanking, for example.

I always need to know the back story of such a happening. It's not the action itself that matters to me but how the girl came to be in this situation and why she sees this person as her authority figure; how that makes her feel; why she doesn't run for the hills when he produces a cane or a strap. Yet, there are other people who are happy to read about a spanking in space, on some make believe planet; some fantasy situation that is impossible to believe. It's the fantasy aspect of it that turns them on.

Frankly, all I took away from the studies for sure is that an author must be true to him or herself. Maybe there are readers and maybe there are not for what one writes, but trying to write via scientific research only leads to confusion.

My love affair

This is an exercise I have begun - a daily writing exercise wherein I don't try to be clever or profound, just allow the words to come through me - whatever comes, comes. This is what came today. It interested me to read it over because I do often feel that my writing life is a illicit love affair - that I steal whatever time I can to be by myself with the page. They are supportive, for sure, but not entirely comfortable with this continuous caller. So, I take my chances where I can and try not to have them offended by the blank page that I find so intoxicating. I love them all, but the blank page calls and I am off dancing again.


'The world as I see it is lives in my fingertips. No matter how close I feel to people around me, how interested I am in what is going on about me, I need to experience the world through my fingertips. The thoughts, feelings and impressions that resonate through my mind and body need to find expression by being transplanted onto a page.

I have a special relationship with the blank page. It craves to be filled just as I crave to be emptied and freed from those thoughts. Those thoughts and impressions need a home, away from me; separate to me.

It is too crowded, my head. If the thoughts aren’t transferred to the page they rummage about in my brain, never quite taking any particular shape. The page gives them some shape, not necessarily a final destination, but the page is a holding place until my brain reads the words and determines what to do with them – eliminate them, ignore them, transform them; tease and manipulate them until they form an acceptable shape; until some patterns emerge.

I remain unconvinced that this relationship I have with the page is understood. There is a certain jealousy felt; a sense of competition raids the air; a need to disrupt and influence the meeting as if it were the enemy. The very notion that the page matters most must be dispelled and only evidence such as me not spending quiet, uninterrupted time with the page is good enough.

I comply. I endeavor to stay away from the page and to be able to live this way – in the moment, surrounded by other people’s words. For a time it is enough, until the page demands my attention; insists that it be filled with my thoughts and words.

The page was my first intense, love affair. It will also be my last. However, only I can know this fact. We meet in the dark, in the early morning, in stolen moments during the day. I’m his muse and he’s my dominant. I do as he says. I am at his beck and call. I do his bidding. Honestly, I simply can’t stay away. I’m besotted. Hooked.'

Just when I thought I was out...

Ever since I began my writing for assessment in my course I've handed in something at least a little bit kinky, or at least with something naughty about the story. This time, I was committed to playing it straight and work with a narrative entirely non-kinky. The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides was entirely appropriate, I decided, to launch myself into real literature and to give smut a break. I determined that to be a serious writer that is what I needed to do. Work with the material of a Pulitzer Prize winner and a writer of whom I am in awe and I was heading on the right track, was my estimation.

Ah! But, I would not be entirely right at all. For Jeffrey is perfectly capable of a little smut himself and he handles the material deftly.

One night in their unit, Leonard asked "What's your most secret sexual fantasy?"
...

To placate him, Madeleine thought for a moment, "This'll sound weird, but I guess it would be to be pampered."

...

And, for the next hour or so, Leonard went about fulfilling it.
\...

She was frightened to ask Leonard what his secret fantasy was. But in the spirit of reciprocity, a day or so later she did ask. Leonard's fantasy was the inverse of hers. He wanted a sleeping girl, a sleeping beauty.

...

Well, that was easy," she said afterward.

"You got off lucky. It could have been a slave-master sort of deal."

"Right."

"It could have involved enemas."

"Enough!"

The spirit of exploration that now dominated their bedroom had a strong effect on Madeleine. It led her, a little while later, to confess to Leonard one night, when he wanted to repeat the hairdresser scenario that being pampered wasn't really her secret fantasy. Her *secret* secret fantasy was something she'd never told anyone and could barely admit to herself. It was this: whenever Madeleine masturbated (this was hard in itself to confess to) she pictured herself as a little girl, being spanked. She didn't know why she did this. She had no memory of being spanked as a girl. Her parents hadn't believed in spanking. And it wasn't really a fantasy of hers; that is, she didn't want Leonard to spank her. But, for some reason, thinking about herself as a little girl being spanked had always helped her to have an orgasm when was touching herself."

So, here's what I think about all that.

(1) The writing in this scene turns me on much more than the writing in 50 Shades of Grey.
(2) I'm feeling slightly all powerful and am not at all inclined to tell you if Leonard does spank Madeleine (but could be bribed to do so...).
(3) I really really want to work with this narrative source now.
(4) All through the book I had this sense that Madeleine felt rather like me. The above is evidence of this fact.

So, as Al Pacino would say, "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in."