Whiskey?!

Yesterday I told stories at an English immersion school in Familleureux, here in Belgium. I had four performances before lunch, under the influence of jetlag, but it went well all the same. In the second set, for the youngest children, I told Robert Munsch's story Mortimer. In this story, Mortimer doesn't want to go to sleep. Everybody in his family goes upstairs to tell him to go to sleep. After each try, they go downstairs for a nice cup of... I wait for the kids to tell me.

Yesterday, I said, "Mortimer's father sat down in the living room with a nice cup of..."

One of the teachers called out, "whiskey!"

Some days, it's hard to compose myself after a moment like that, but I did. I laughed about it with her afterwards.

On a serious note, this would never, ever, ever happen in the US. Occasionally a kid will suggest beer or wine, but a teacher would never suggest whiskey. Is it just because we live in politically correct times, or is it the long streak of puritanism?

Jetlag

That was yesterday at O'Hare Airport in Chicago. Now I'm in Belgium, feeling like my eyes are full of sand.

Here's my method for minimizing jetlag:
Drink lots of water.
Don't eat the supper on the plane. Do eat the breakfast.
Take a melatonin just after embarking.
Put earplugs in and pull the blanket over the head in an attempt to sleep.
After arriving, have no more than a two-hour nap.
Stay awake until at least 9 p.m.
Take a melatonin before bed. Do this every day until the jetlag is over.
Ignore the urge to get up at 2 a.m.
Get on the local schedule as quickly as possible.

The hardest part is staying awake until 9 on this first day. Wish me luck!

Shaking loose writer's block

Yesterday I wrote about Natalie Goldberg's book Wild Mind: Living the Writer's Life.

In 1996, I was influenced by another book, one that helped me get out of writer's block. Georgelle Hirliman had writer's block in the 80s, so she installed herself in the window of a bookstore and invited people to ask her questions. She had a typewriter on which she wrote answers. 

I loved the idea and decided to combine it with Wild Mind writing. I went to my favorite coffee shop and set up a whiteboard (with permission of the owners), inviting topics. I promised to write nonstop for five minutes on any topic at all. I was honor-bound to accept all suggestions. I wrote the rules for writing practice on the whiteboard. I did this one evening a month for about a year. Sometimes friends would write with me. I kept a carbon copy of each of my pieces and gave the original to the person who gave the topic. Sometimes I got tips. Usually I got a free coffee. 

Here are a few of the pieces:

Gymnastics floor routine

Okay, here's my first routine: three baboon lopes, a leopard roar and a snake slither, two monkey leaps forward then a chimpersault backwards. A dogrun to the left, catpaw tiptoe to the right. Wave to the crowds, bow, accept the flowers thrown by the loyal fans. What? The judges need to see it again? Oh, no! What did I do?

            I think it was two coiled springs backward, one mattress spring forward, a quadruple spring day with no April showers to the left...no, that wasn't it. I think I started with a guitar strum in the key of Z, then eased my way up to an organ chord with trumpets and piccolo. Or was it the rotini, double twist cappuccino, basil pesto on my toes, back flapjack, quarter pounder, two all beef patties, one taco grande and then for the finale, baked Alaska? Rats! I wish I could remember the way this floor routine was supposed to go.

Apologies to my mother for this one:

There goes the neighborhood

Yup, it all went downhill when the Howes moved in. That house was beautiful, with its wall in front, the white pebbled path, the pillars. But now there are always kids around, their bikes thrown down in the driveway, their runny noses and skinned knees offending our senses. It would be different if they had some money, but they don't. The noise, too, oh my Lord, the constant bickering of the younger children pierces a hole right through my brain sometimes. The white pebbled path has clumps of dirt in it from the last time the children had friends over. They had a war in the front yard with the wild onions. I don't imagine their mother was happy about that, though who knows, there never seem to be any parents around. If there were, they would put a stop to that nasty little pet cemetery the children put next to the church wall. It doesn't even have pets—just dead pigeons and squirrels. And I do wish the children had never learned to play the church bells, which they do at the oddest times.

A nod of respect to B. Kliban's cartoons here:

Those aren't raisins!     

Children love petting zoos, especially those with deer in pens. Every summer Mac worked the zoo, explaining to the children how deer really lived in the wild, what they ate, how they survived the winter. He'd make sure the children didn't throw their hotdog buns into the pen, make sure the deer always had water, pass out handfuls of grain pellets for the kids to feed the animals.

            He didn't really like his job, but he liked the deer and it was an easy way to spend the summer, standing around outside. He'd have to clean out the pens, sure, but that wasn't such hard work. Mac always left a some deer droppings near the edge of the pen, for sheer entertainment value. He kept a tally of the number of times a day he heard it, usually coming from a parent but occasionally from an older sister or brother or friend. "Get that out of your mouth! Those aren't raisins!" It was almost always too late.  

It worked. I was able to shake loose my creativity by doing this. I may try it again someday.

Writing my way into stories

I learn through my pen hand, possibly more than through my tappitytapping fingers on the keyboard. In the early 1990s, my sister introduced me to Natalie Goldberg's book Wild Mind. 

In it, Goldberg sets out "Rules for Writing Practice": 

1. Keep your hand moving.

2. Lose control.

3. Be specific.

4. Don't think.

5. Don't worry about spelling, punctuation, grammar.

6. You are free to write the worst junk in America.

7. Go for the jugular.

These are genius. Of course, this is for writing practice, for stretching and flexing your creative muscles, not for final drafts. 

When I moved to Kansas in 1993, my sister and I met often downtown in a cafe or doughnut shop (Jennings Daylight Donuts, long gone now) to write together using the exercises in the book, writing and then reading aloud to each other. 

The more I wrote, the more I understood my world of story. I began to write about the characters, settings and actions in whatever story I was working on for performances. I wrote backstory, stuff that you need to know but never say out loud. I wrote real estate ads for settings, personal ads for characters, and letters from one character to another.  I also found new stories unexpectedly. 

In the mid-90s, I offered classes to storytellers and others interested in trying this method out. We wrote, read, talked, wrote some more. I love writing with other people, hearing the gems they put down on paper. We all have the feeling that what we've written is total garbage, and then, between the writing and reading, it transforms into something strong and true. 

I no longer offer those classes, but my sister and I still write together weekly, and I teach kids about Wild Mind writing, with variations. Last week I worked with a small group of high school students, teaching them this method. Each had a unique and wonderful voice. It was an honor to hear them. 

Thank you, Natalie!