Heroes

I think it is true that we are each of us, the heroes of our own stories.

We go about our days, trying as best as we can to get by in whatever life situation surrounds us. Frequently mired in the minutiae of daily existence, tunnel vision takes hold amongst the laundry and the dinner making, the dog walking, the going to work, the paying bills and so on. I am luckier than most as far as responsibilities go. My life is essentially my own. Still on many days it is tough to look up and outward from where I sit. As someone who crafts stories, I like a hero to root for. We all do. The phenomenal success of summer blockbusters like the Avengers and Batman prove how hero starved we can be. I liked Batman. The Avengers was a good romp. But if I have to imagine a heroic archetype I prefer the every day guy, the underdog, the uphill climber. And I don’t have to look very far for examples in my own life. But unlike the caped crusader, my experience of hero today is wearing spandex cycling shorts and sweat as opposed to tights and a mask.

With hundreds of other heroes just like him, earlier this morning my friend Marc started his annual 600km bike ride from Toronto to Montreal in support of the People with Aids Foundation. This grassroots community organization exists to make a positive difference in the lives of those living with HIV/AIDS. It pains me to accept that 30 years in, over 30 million people are still living with HIV/AID making organizations like PWA as necessary as ever.

Earlier this week, in the opening speeches of the International AIDS Conference in Washington, DC, probably the most salient point made was that AIDS the disease is caused by a virus, but the AIDS epidemic is not. The AIDS epidemic is fuelled by stigma, violence and indifference. It’s powerful stuff. And it’s true. We have treatment and vaccine. Yet, frequently forget compassion. Drug cocktails abound, but kindness and dignity for those who are sick are lacking. I know that a world without AIDS is possible in my lifetime. But, like every hero’s journey, seeing the end to the AIDS epidemic will be won one step (or pedal) forward at a time.

I often seek inspiration from my favourite writers and poets. These words from Rilke give me hope.

In the name of the best within you, do not sacrifice this world to those who are its worst. In the name of the values that keep you alive, do not let your vision of man be distorted by the ugly, the cowardly, the mindless in those who have never achieved his title. Do not lose your knowledge that man’s proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desire can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it’s yours.


The world we desire can be won. It exists. It is possible. Now there’s a heroic sentiment if ever I heard one.

How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.

January.

The last time I blogged. 

It was six whole months ago.

But you knew that, I suspect.

I am nothing if not the typical new blogger.  Rampantly prolific in the first year, weaning slightly rounding into the second year and all but non-existent by the time I hit my third year. 

The pitiful thing is, I actually enjoyed blogging.  It helped kick start my own writing at times, gave me a forum to gab, to muse, to post a wee rant, to share something notable. No plausible excuse for not making it here sooner.  Hell, why even bother offering up one if it existed.  Where have I been these past months?  Nowhere and everywhere.  Just living my life.  Writing some but not tons. Supping. Laughing. Hiccuping. Celebrating. Strolling. Loving. Unloving. Gaining. Losing. Discovering. Shaking fists. Shaking hands. Shaking head. Gobs of good stuff. Really bad stuff too. The heartbreaking and joyful. Just my life.

When I thought about blogging at all, what I missed most was the book reviews, the pondering aloud about writing, about life and love and hope. Even more, just the act of writing at all.

So, because I can, I begin again. It's easy enough to start with books.  They are an omnipresence in my life.  I just cracked open the new Anne Rice novel, The Wolf Gift.  Having loved The Witching Hour so many years ago and slogged through Rice's vampire saga, why not take in her version of werewolf legend.  Over the past few months I have enjoyed several wonderful books:  A Discovery of Witches (Deborah Harkness), Love in the Time of Cholera (Gabriel Garcia Marquez) - in truth that one was a re-read.  It is after all my favourite book. Also, Say Her Name (Francisco Goldman), The Hunger Games Trilogy (Suzanne Collins) and George R.R. Martin's Game of Thrones.  I'll post a review of at least one of these soon.

As for my own writing, I am still working at Lillian's story.  Things are coming together and I have shared a number of sections with a few select folks and received good feedback.  Well that is if "hurry and finish it, will ya" is considered positive feedback. I honestly had no idea how hard this would be when I began.  Some days I'm making grand progress, other days it feels like I'm trying to catch a jello baseball. It's all wiggly and sticky and losing shape.  But luckily, I've recently found a muse, another writer and friend. He's encouragement. He's commiseration. He's task master.  All rolled into one. Just what I need. And, if that don't kick my darling Lillian to the finish, an upcoming few weeks off of solitary staycationing will help immensely.

As I cleared my throat and cracked my knuckles to begin writing here again, I had a hard time finding a place to start.  So much has happened in the past six months.  I've had enough family drama to last a decade.  My job has expanded in scope and responsibility.  I've broken bones, mended a broken heart that I thought had healed, feted friends, planned and taken getaways. I've packed enough living into these months to fill a story book or two, so there's plenty to spare for blogging.  If I know anything at all, it is that how we spend our days is, of course, as the brilliant Annie Dillard has said, how we live our lives.  And this gal, she lives by writing. 

NaNo Update - Day 4

The most common impediment to my creativity is procrastination. I'm a fantastic putting it off til another day kind of girl. When I actually sit down to do some work, I am usually productive, even demiurgic occasionally. It is just getting my arse into the chair that has posed problematic. That is why I like the NaNoWriMo challenge. Because of the looming 30 day deadline, I don't have the luxury to procrastinate too much. If I get too far behind, it would become physically impossible for me to complete by midnight November 30th. As failure, epic or otherwise, is not an option I have to keep a close eye on my totals and pace.

Entering my first weekend, I am scheduled to hit the 10,000 mark sometime on Saturday. Right now, just shy of 4,500 words, I have my work cut out for me. Am I worried? Hell no! Well maybe a little bit. But we write on. What choice is there?

Stats after last night look like this:

Coffees drank: 15
Most wince worthy cliché written: rising star in our midst
Hours spent writing: 10.5 *
Deaths/Murders: none
Best line so far: Shall I have you for breakfast?
Chocolates consumed: 15
Most time squandery distraction: brand new e-reader
Take out ordered: none
Words written: 4,467
Characters introduced: 7 of 12 (so far)
Favourite word written: inveigle
Social / family functions attended: none
Motivation level (scale of one to ten): 8

* An average day's 1,667 takes just under three hours to write. My pace is not bad all things considered. Especially if I include all the time spent banging my head on the desk trying to find the right words.

Will sound triumphant horn of jubilation when I hit the 10,000 mark this weekend. Listen for it!

NaNo Update - Day 3

I'm still loving this writing process. I say "still" because yesteday was not the most of productive days. Last year when this happened (a few times actually) I panicked. Big time. But this year, I know it is not that big a deal. I can catch up. It's still early. But last night there was absolutely no helping it. While working away, I could literally feel myself falling asleep. You know the feeling - eyes burning, head heavy and bobbing forward some, pillows temptingly cozy and warm. I just couldn't do it. With only 600 or so words written, I switched off the light and went to bed.

I was into work early today, and will leave early. My evening plan involves throwing in a quick load of laundry while the pooches settle down after their walk and firing up the laptop for a good several hours. By the end of the day today, I should be around 6,670 words. No problemo she says confidently. That's a mere 2,600 give or take tonight. Sheesh!

My stats look like this right now:

Coffees drank: 12
Most wince worthy cliché written: Who did they think they were dealing with?
Hours spent writing: 9
Deaths/Murders: none
Best line so far: an itinerant splash of Jamieson’s browning the envelope as Basil’s fist pounded the bar mid tirade
Chocolates consumed: 14
Take out ordered: none
Words written: 4,001
Characters introduced: 7 of 12 (so far)
Favourite word written: curvaceousness
Social / family functions attended: none
Motivation level (scale of one to ten): 7

Curvaceousness.... a very good word! Grin.

It's the most wonderful time of the year....

It's that time again.
I've been itching to begin.
Now, only 28 days left.
The annual NANOWRIMO (that is National Novel Writing Month) challenge is right around the corner.

The website has just been relaunched for the 2010 season. I have updated my profile and posted the summary of my novel which you can find here.

As work on Lillian Munsch is winding down to prepare for NaNo, I am starting to shift gears towards my new story - a murder mystery. The unofficial title is "A Fair to Remember - A Basil McNabb Mystery". If I like this character and genre, I may write more stories with Basil as main character. But that is getting way too far ahead of myself (shocking I know).

In the meantime, we edit and tweak and are still rewriting Lillian's story through October, being reasonably on track for my self imposed Thanksgiving deadline.

For now, off I go with the usual intentions of posting more frequently; but knowing, realistically, once November begins I'll be lucky if I can get my 1,674 words per day done, let alone have time to post a blog entry.

But, I will try!

Really.

I promise.

:)

Who knew?

On this historic day, I'm hard pressed to comment on anything more significant than the inauguration of President Barack Obama. Watching his speech today, I was particularly struck by his comments about the responsibility of the "have nations" to the rest of the world.

"To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds.
And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the worlds resources without regard to effect.

For the world has changed, and we must change with it."

Regardless of the expectations and difficulties that lay ahead, today, in the world, a good thing happened. I look hopefully to what the future holds. And, if this feeling is not sufficient to buoy one's spirits, I was pleased to find out that evidently, Barack Obama is Irish!

See for yourself:

No one as Irish as Barack OBama

O'Leary, O'Reilly, O'Hare and O'Hara

There's no one as Irish as Barack O'Bama

You don't believe me, I hear you say But Barack's as Irish, as was JFK

His granddaddy's daddy came from Moneygall

A small Irish village, well known to you all

Toor a loo, toor a loo, toor a loo, toor a lama

There's no one as Irish As Barack O'Bama

He's as Irish as bacon and cabbage and stew

He's Hawaiian he's Kenyan American too

He’s in the white house, He took his chance

Now let’s see Barack do Riverdance

Toor a loo, toor a loo, toor a loo, toor a lama

There's no one as Irish As Barack O'Bama

From Kerry and cork to old Donegal

Let’s hear it for Barack from old moneygall

From the lakes if Killarney to old Connemara

There’s no one as Irish as Barack O’Bama

O'Leary, O'Reilly, O'Hare and O'Hara

There's no one as Irish as Barack O'Bama

From the old blarney stone to the great hill of Tara

There's no one as Irish as Barack O'Bama

2008 the white house is green,

their cheering in Mayo and in Skibereen.

The Irish in Kenya, and in Yokahama,

Are cheering for President Barack O’Bama

O'Leary, O'Reilly, O'Hare and O'Hara

There's no one as Irish as Barack O'Bama

The Hockey Moms gone, and so is McCain

They are cheering in Texas and in Borrisokane,

In Moneygall town, the greatest of drama,

for our Famous president Barack o Bama

Toor a loo, toor a loo, toor a loo, toor a lama

There's no one as Irish As Barack O'Bama

The great Stephen Neill, a great man of God,

He proved that Barack was from the Auld Sod

They came by bus and they came by car,

to celebrate Barack in Ollie Hayes’s Bar

O'Leary, O'Reilly, O'Hare and O'Hara

There's no one as Irish as Barack O'Bama

By
Hardy Drew

Once you choose hope, anything's possible. (Christopher Reeve)

Getting off the subway this morning at Dundas Station, there were several paramedics examining a man laying on his back on the platform, near the ticket booth. The police and TTC security were there sheltering the man from prying eyes and encouraging commuters to keep moving. As I walked past, I heard one of the paramedics ask the man “were you trying to kill yourself”. This surprised me. He looked ok. Unhurt, awake, sober.

I’m a hopeful person. I rebound easily to the ups and few downs that life has thrown me and try to be positive about life, living presently, looking forward not back. I have no idea what was going on with this man on the subway floor this morning, but he got me thinking about hope. With my recent bout of Obamamania waning, as I read the headlines this weekend of the bombing in Gaza, the doomsday economic predictions for 2009 and the panic which ensued at the indications of another tsunami off Indonesia’s coast, hope seemed farthest from my mind. And yet, there as if to salve the hurts of the world, tucked on the back of one section of the Globe I found Ian Brown’s monthly installment of his correspondence with L’Arche founder, Jean Vanier.

I love reading letters. As a communication method, in this day of instant messaging and skype, letters are nearly extinct. But reading letters seem to me wonderfully permanent, more thoughtful and intimate. Brown and Vanier discuss many things, not the least of which is Brown’s parenting of a disabled son and Vanier’s life work building communities for the disabled around the world. What struck me about this weekend’s installment was the simplicity of Vanier’s words. Brown was asking about pacifism and the notion of a just war in this day and age. Vanier’s message is simple. Peace is the answer. Intentional, consistent, loving welcome of the difference amongst each of us is the road to peace.

Some might find this thinking naive. I find it encouraging. And so I hope.
I hope the man from the subway is ok.
I hope the fighting stops in Gaza.
I hope I can resist chocolate.
I hope to make a living as a writer.
I hope my sisters give up smoking.
I hope the economic crisis stabilizes without too much hardship for those on the edge.
I hope to romp and laugh and play more.
I hope the Leafs win the Stanley Cup.
I hope to learn a new language.
I hope for peace.
It's possible.