Look ma! No strings!
Nov 21, 2004 Writing
I’m writing this from my laptop while sitting on our couch watching the baby bang around her toys. Yes, that’s right; we broke down and got an airport. That means I’m wireless. That means I no longer have to sit in the cold, dark, dank basement typing away while my toes freeze. That also means that there is no special place to go hide (and work) and that I’ve waved good-bye to ergonomic comforts!
The theory is that now I can huddle at the kitchen table and enjoy the boys’ company while I work in the evenings after Madison has gone to sleep. Brett and Noah play mad games of Uno, Squeezed Out (thrift store score — $.50), and Chess in the evenings and I miss them down in my dungeon. Also, this lets me get to Madison when she wakes from her nap without breaking my neck leaping over various stored items in our basement.
I’m not sure how I feel about it. Because our iMac is kinda old, I’m not sure that we can get it onto the wireless network. I certainly don’t want to try cracking it open to install the airport card. That’s best left to braver men, like Brett. So until I have time to unplug the airport, plug the cable into my iMac and send myself all my email addresses, you will not hear from me. I cannot write you. Please write me, if you like, so I can add you to my address book.
Now I need to get off the internet and work on an essay that’s been languishing.
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good writing vs. not-so-good
Nov 20, 2004 Writing
I dislike that last entry so I’m adding a new one straight away.
I have a friend who writes because it’s a sure way (for her) to make money. She’s made a study of the market, she’s applied herself, and she collects the check. She doesn’t even particularly like to write but she knows she’s good at it so she figured it would be a good way to make money and stay home with her family. (As an aside, she is no longer writing because she’s gotten into another aspect of the industry, which she enjoys more.)
My friend has been a great marketing mentor to me. My platitudes get in the way sometimes and her practical point of view has helped me hop down off my high-horse. I like talking to her about it and I like that she respects my own art vs. cash struggle even though she doesn’t share it.
One of the things we’ve talked about in the past is a particular writer — very successful — who is, in my opinion, not very good. My friend argues that by being successful, this writer has proven that she’s good. After all, people read this writer, she makes a lot of money, and her books are pleasant. (I’m not naming her here because if I were her and I googled myself and happened to find this conversation, it would make me sad. Suffice to say that she’s well and unhappily aware that she is the subject of these kinds of conversations.)
“Who are you to say she isn’t an artist?” my friend said to me. “Do you dislike her just because so many other people like her so much?”
Good question. I am a snob about books. (Ask my mother.) But I’ve been thinking about this a lot. What makes a writer good to me? I need to know this because I struggle all of the time with what little success I’ve had. It’s not just that old Groucho Marx thinking (you know, that anything I am able to do must by definition not be worth doing kinda like the club he would not join because they would have him). Sometimes I look at a thing I’ve written — that people like — and I can’t be proud of it.
This week I read three books right in a row (and sometimes simultaneously — one book in the living room and one at the kitchen table and one in the bedroom). Two were very good. One was fiction lite. What made the fiction lite book fiction lite? What made the other two so much better?
The lite book was an easy read, enjoyable, moved quickly, had lots of nice similes and metaphors. More people are likely to read it because it’s pretty easy to fit into a busy life.
The other two were more dense, more difficult, required more attention and had lots of nice similies and metaphors. Less people are likely to read them — at least nowadays, they may have been popular in their time — because they are more demanding.
But is the lite book a lite book by virtue of its ease? Yes, in part, I think. The lite book was fun but forgettable. The prose moved quickly but slipped away quickly, too. I might vaguely remember the plot but there was nothing in the book that made me stop and stare off into the middle distance to contemplate a thought. There was not one line I re-read for the pure joy of it.
I don’t want to disparage fiction-lite because there’s certainly a place for it. It’s nice to have a quick, easy read and many of those kinds of books can be life-changing or inspiring. And it’s not easy to write like that (although those who can seem to do it with alarming speed and productivity). But for me, most of the time I’d rather be challenged in my reading.
This entry isn’t coming along well either. Damn. It’s just that it scares me to think that I’m only good enough to write lite when I want to write complicated. And then I wonder if giving in and being happy with lite would be selling-out or accepting my limitations?
Well, I’ll finish off by quoting from one of the books I read, At Mrs Lippincote’s by Elizabeth Taylor: Read the rest of this entry »
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Too many groups
Nov 20, 2004 Friends
I have this blessing that’s really kind of a curse, which is that there’s a huge social support system for pretty much every little piece of my life. I have my central friends — women who have been a part of my life since Noah was a lap-baby — but then there are all of these opportunities to make other friends and I don’t have enough time for the friends I have!
Let’s see, there is:
–sisterhood at synagogue (I would love to strengthen my Jewish community experience);
–the unschooling support group (it would be nice to have some unschooling support but being unschoolers, their support group is actually a monthly gab-fest and I don’t have the time or energy for more of those);
–the adoption support group (I don’t feel like I need anything there but I like to keep an eye on ‘em in case an issue comes up for which I need some help);
–the transracial family support group (same thing, could be useful in the future).
And I’d love to find an in real life writing group. Meanwhile, I can’t keep track of my much beloved friends as much as I’d like plus Noah has a social life that is threatening to become disconnected from my own. That’s how it is as kids get big — they start making their own friends, darnit, without any consideration for their mothers who have to at least get along. Fortunately, most of his friends are children of my friends so this is good. And one of these women is going to get her regular weekly open house playdate going again so I can see all of my friends at once while Noah visits with his.
If I can, I try to consolidate my social life by bringing people from one part of it to the central part of it. I’m always trying to fix my friends up with each other. This works pretty well although back when I was a teenager, I’d get unhappy if they liked each other better than they liked me. I’m much more tolerant of that nowadays. If they like each other, great; I can kill two birds with one stone by doing tag-team visits.
I have nice friends. They’re interesting, they’re opinionated and they’re smart. Whenever we have a group get-together, I am a little amazed by my social riches. All these incredible women and I get to have them in my life. Fabulous! Now if I could just make room for more…
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Tags: Noah, transracial, unschool, unschooling
Getting ready for Chanukah
Nov 18, 2004 Judaism
How cute is this set? That’ll be our first night’s gift. I think I’d eventually like to get the Shabbat and Passover sets, too.
Noah is getting harder to buy for nowadays. His interests are more specific and expensive. Since we celebrate both holidays and then his birthday is just about a month after Christmas, it’s an awful lot of challenging shopping to do. And then, too, the grandparents want advice on what to get him.
Some people have asked if we’re going to celebrate Kwanzaa now and I said that we have enough December holidays for the time being. Besides, Kwanzaa means nothing to Madison’s birth family so it’s not like we’re stinting on her heritage. If either of the kids decide they’d like to try on celebrating it, we’ll revisit it then but for now, we’ll stick to the two we already have.
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IP Banning
Nov 17, 2004 Feminism/Politics
I’ve had a couple of nasty right-wing oriented comments on my entries. I finally banned one guy’s IP from commenting but generally I don’t like to do that. I welcome opposing points of view here but this particular one (in the entry below) was so clearly flame-bait that I just banned the guy.
I wouldn’t go to a conservative blog and rant and rave at anyone because it’s rude and not very helpful. Even if they wrote that “bedwtting liberal up-bringing” will result in deserved ass-kicking of children on their own blog, well, that’s why browsers have buttons that allow us to leave such sites. (And let the record show that I have never felt that my conservative friends’ kids deserve to have their asses kicked. Quite the contrary but then I’m a LIBERAL and that means that I spend all of this time defending diversity and supporting freedom of speech, often putting me on the side of nasty folks like Mr. Galt. Ironic, eh?)
So let me just say, I welcome conservative commentary here if it’s polite and meant to further discourse. ‘Cuz ain’t that what America’s all about???
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Tags: Erica
