Wednesday, August 27, 2008

It's here!


Voila our book!

I'm really excited about this. It's just the kind of book that would have helped me a ton when I was a new mother. None of that vague "motherhood is the highest, holiest calling" stuff--this is real, not-ignoring-the-struggles stuff--and yet it manages to instill hope and remind me why I made the choice to become a mother. I'm enjoying these essays for the first time because I wouldn't let myself read them in draft form before publication. (There are no essays by me--just five or so poems.) And these are amazing essays! I'm so proud to be association with these girls.

My only (teeny, tiny) complaint is that for the price they're charging ($19.95), I wish that they had worked a little harder on getting the resolution right on the gorgeous photos that Maralise took. I saw the photos in their digital version and they are breathtaking. But someone screwed up somewhere in the production and several of them are grainy or smudgy-looking. That's too bad for such a beautiful book.
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Breaking Dawn

Well, I read it.

Non-spoiler response: it was pretty good. There were some things I didn’t like (see Spoilered Response, below), but I kept reading it and was glad to spend a little more time with these characters. As I’ve said before, I think that if the story and characters don’t grip you enough to make it worth reading even when you see little things that bother you (needs tightening, too much growling, hissing, wincing, brow-lifting, sensuality, etc.), then you’re not a natural member of her audience anyway. I think there’s a place for beach reading in this world, and I’m not embarrassed to say that I kept reading. Also, I am all-out jealous of Meyer for her imagination and ability to pull it all off.

I do want to discuss one thing here that has bothered me since the beginning. Meyer has said in an interview (I’m too lazy to look it up now but you could probably find it with a google search) that one of the LDS elements she sees in her books is a great belief in free agency.

I strongly, strongly disagree.

It is the lack of free agency in the main romantic relationship that makes it unbelievable to me and highly unsatisfying. Think about it: why are Edward and Bella drawn toward each other? He: can’t read her thoughts and likes how she smells. Nothing else on his part to show why he is enchanted by her, why he would wait hundreds of years for her (and remember how much older he is!). She: finds him very, very attractive physically. Oh, and likes his superhero powers.

Are these things the basis of a long relationship?

I’ve never been a believer in the soul mate theory. I think that love is a choice and that in order for a relationship to last past the honeymoon it must continue to be a choice, and that the partners must always remember that they made this choice freely. We make the choice based on the Spirit and also on the things we observe about the person we want to love. (And remember that infatuation and love are not the same thing.) Bella’s and Edward’s romance has seemed so opposite of everything I find romantic because they are both so PASSIVE in the whole thing. The infatuation HAPPENS to them, having nothing to do with actually knowing each other and being together.

Which is why I have always rooted for Jacob. I am a sucker for relationships that begin as best friends, anyway. But when we see Bella and Jacob interact, we can believe in the relationship. It’s obvious they like each other, have a good feeling together, are seeing each other realistically. THAT’s the kind of relationship that a marriage should be built on.

And this whole imprinting thing. DUH—can you get any FURTHER AWAY FROM FREEDOM OF CHOICE? SHEESH!!!!

OK, now for the Spoiler response:





























































First, I have to say that I predicted Jacob’s subject of imprinting way before it happened, and I was a little disappointed to be right. I hate it when my predictions are right.
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Second, and as a continuation of my argument that Edward’s love for Bella is not believable and certainly not something to base a marriage on: the whole thing about Edward not being able to read Bella’s thoughts and thus being drawn to her leads to trouble when we see that he might, eventually, read all of her thoughts someday. So there goes any sense of mystery or otherness in the relationship. I can’t believe a relationship would work in that situation. Really. I think people need some otherness in their marriages—otherwise, why marry at all? Who wants to be married to themselves?

Speaking of thought-reading, why didn’t Aro see Charlie when he read all of Edward’s thoughts? Wouldn’t he have used that as an excuse to attack? (They are not keeping the secret.) I mean, sure, Charlie doesn’t know EXACTLY, but I doubt Aro would be picky about that.

And what about Jasper’s giving away the secret to the lawyer guy?

Here are some other loose threads that bugged me. If Bella is allowed to let him read her thoughts when he gets inside her shield, why couldn’t he read them when she was protecting everyone within her shield during the showdown?

And what happened with Leah? There was so much plot time on her that I thought we’d see some resolution there, but that whole subplot just dropped off.

I felt dissatisfied with the explanations about why Alice had Bella get the ID cards and all. I think that ought to have been fleshed out a little more.

Some of the story was a little too much for me, stomach-wise. I did not like the whole baby-eats-its-way-out stuff. It was a very clever way of getting us through the whole Bella becomes vampire thing, though. But if I hadn’t already been so involved with these characters (over all the books), I may have been done at that point.

I did enjoy all of the pack/werewolf stuff. (I just love Jacob, I guess.) And I kept reading, which is really the mark of a success IMO. I’m glad I read them all.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

More Stake Conference

Our General Authority was Elder Bruce Porter, and he gave two fantastic talks that were very nourishing to me. (I also really enjoyed his wife’s talks.) He said just the kinds of things I always pray to hear at stake conference. Here are some of my favorites:

We spend too much time in the church talking about lesser things. Too much time as individuals sq1ueezing every minute to get stuff done. We view ourselves as machines. His father wrote to him while he was on his mission, “Dear son, are you paying enough attention to rest, exercise, good food, prayer and scriptures? If you don’t, you will simply spin your wheels. You will be relying on your OWN mind.”

The song, “I Did It My Way” will be sung by those in the Telestial Kingdom.

This is not a gospel of guilt. Sometimes no matter what choice you make (like whether to go to stake temple night or back to school night or help your ailing mother) you feel guilty. DON’T. “If one of your kids needs you and the Holy Ghost tells you you should miss temple night to spend time with him, you would OFFEND THE LORD by going to temple night.” “We need never feel guilty for not doing things that are good so long as we are doing other things that are good that we feel prompted to do.”


They were both great talks. So keep the little suggestion I’m going to make here in perspective.

He was talking about how women in particular struggle with too much guilt. As an illustration, he told about a woman he knows who has ten children and who “keeps an impeccable household” (at this point I nudged Rog) who was discouraged because she felt she fell so short of what she should be. He, of course, reassured her that she was doing fine and needed to lighten up on herself. I told Rog, “That story would be so much more powerful if he would mention that her house WASN’T impeccable.”

And another comment was that he believed that “all mothers who try should get a free pass into heaven.” Probably that’s true, because everyone who tries should get to heaven, because the act of trying shows which way their hearts yearn. But NOT just because she is a mother. I buck at the age-old angel-mother stereotype that just because we’re mothers (or women) we are naturally more spiritual. This kind of rhetoric doesn’t help those of us who are hungry to be told HOW to measure (the Lord’s way) how we are doing, and how to know when and how we need to improve. The hardest thing about parenting is that there is no way to tell how you’re doing, no discernible relationship (at least at first) between effort/intention and results. Obviously, there must be a way to be doing things wrong and a way to be doing them right, but it’s so hard to tell what that way is.

The answer, of course, is that the only judgment anyone should make of themselves is just to assess how we are doing in our efforts at discipleship. Nothing else really matters.

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Steak Conference

So I’m sitting in stake conference, feeling rather smug that our kids are behaving so well. They are allowed to bring notebooks and pens to stake conference (but not to regular Sunday meetings) and they were doodling away very quietly. An hour or so into the meeting, 7-year-old passes me his notebook so that I can appreciate his artwork.

The page is titled “Steak in a Circle,” and pictures a large circle with, yes, a piece of raw-looking marbled meat in it.

So can you tell me what this particular piece of art says about the psyche of my child? Couldn’t he draw something nice, like a flower? Or even the typical violent jedi pictures that abound at our house? What’s with the slab of flesh?

(By the way, he followed it up with “Flower in an oval,” at my request. But the next one was a croquet mallet pounding a lectern and microphone. Psychotherapists here we come.)

Friday, August 22, 2008

Writing Seminar 101 (glorified book report)

Well, I told you I’m not writing these days. But I’ve been doing a lot of reading. Particularly, reading about writing—at least, that’s what I read a lot of before I decided to break up with my novel. So I thought I'd share some of the stuff I've been learning lately. This is really not a book report but just some of the notes I took. Hope you enjoy them.

The following notes are from Fiction First Aid: Instant Remedies for Novels, Stories and Scripts by Raymond Obstfeld. This was a pretty interesting book about the nuts and bolts of constructing (well, fixing) a novel. There was a TON of info in this book, but I wrote down only the things that I felt were most interesting to ME, so that’s what you’ll get here.

3 Areas of Character Development for Major and Minor Characters:

1. Background. For minors, it’s not necessary to give much info, if any about their past unless: a) the past is somehow linked with the protagonist or the plot, or b) you can provide one event that defines who they are (defines the kind of person he is, explains his motivation, or foreshadows a choice he may make later in the story).

2. Internal conflict.

3. Personality.

Protagonists must be at least one: likeable, compelling, redeemable.

Making a character likeable:

1. Give her a sense of humor.
2. Give her a seemingly impossible task to perform.
3. Give her an emotional motive for her actions.
4. Give her intelligence that promises insight.

It’s endearing to make her vulnerable but make sure she is not whiny about her flaws. The less she TALKS about it, the better.

Idea for getting to know your character: in your character’s voice, complete the following: “My mother always . . . “ and “My father never . . .”

Types of protagonists:

1. Boss: someone with control over main character (MC)’s life
2. Family: someone with control over mc’s emotional life
3. Criminal: someone who can be overcome by force
4. Land: SETTING embodies what MC must face within herself.

To improve antagonist and characterization:

1. unique personality
2. unpredictable actions (avoid clichéd evil acts)
3. empathetic motivation.

Protagonist overcomes antagonist by:

1. Direct confrontation
2. Overcoming need to defeat antagonist at all.

The Defining Scene: scene that defines the antagonist, both sympathetically and unsympathetically. Usually this is the scene that introduces him to the reader.

Ask about antagonist:
What do I want most out of life?
What do I most fear losing?
Where’s my moral line; what would I stop short of doing?
Why am I like this?
Am I comfortable with who I am?

Theme:
Plot is what happens. Character is to whom it happens. Theme is why the plot happens.

Symbols come in five varieties:
title, homage plot, character names, objects, settings

How to revise:
Do it chapter by chapter or scene by scene. Do it five times (for each scene/chapter, then move on), in this order:
1. Structure. Goal is a compelling plot. Look for too passive/talking heads, no build-up/anticlimactic.
2. Texture. Goal is to sharpen descriptive passages to make characters, setting and action more vivid. Look for too much/little description, clichéd word choices, too many adjectives, info dump, info in wrong places.
3. Dialogue. Goal is to elicit character personality through conversation. Look for too many/few tag lines or tag lines in wrong places, bland or melodramatic dialogue.
4. Editing. Goal is to tighten pace and continuity. Look for repetition, both outright and through implication, and for slow passages.
5. Blending. Look for soft spots, unclear character motivations, actions that seem contrived. (You can fix these by adding scenes earlier to show motivation or stakes.)

I thought this was definitely a worthwhile read, especially for someone who has tried a novel and wants to learn how to fix it.

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Boston

Yes, I've been ignoring you.

Because I was out of town. I'd like to tell you about my week, but first we need to get some business out of the way. My friend Courtney is helping her sister's family because of the tragic accident that happened to them. You probably know Courtney's blog, but if you haven't been there lately, trot on over and see what happened and what you can do to help.

And now, for a travelogue . . .

Nope. Not going to do it. Travelogues are pretty boring to read, don't you think? I'm not a fan of them, nor of the family-report types of blogs either. (Not to imply that I don't adore YOURS, though.) And, admit it, the only reason you still read mine is that I rarely report on my kids or my trips (well, excepting Panama, I admit). So I won't give you a travelogue.

But I will say that I never realized how barren and dry this place was until I saw the northeast. Gorgeous, lush, woodsy suburbs with colonial houses tucked into them like cabins. Why would people go camping when their back yards look like the woodsy Utah canyons? I saw some beautiful, beautiful land. And then we flew west and I watched the brown get closer and closer and then we landed in it and now I'm home. Sigh.

But I always, always love coming home. And the World's Best Husband had the house SPOTLESS for me. And it was so nice to see and touch and smell all my boys again. I've got a great life. Just need to get over the jet lag now.

Anyone want squash? The garden took over the back yard while I was gone. It's the ongoing curse of the over-fertile garden plot and the vegetable-reluctant family.

Monday, August 11, 2008

Not writing.

Well, I’m not. I mean, I DID make the deadline for revising my poem for Irreantum (whew!), but other than that I’ve done a Fat Lot of Nothing. And I feel just fine about that.

After my breakup with my novel, I guess I’m just taking a general break. Part of it, though, is a result of reading The Artist’s Way, by Julie Cameron. I’m going to report on this book more later, but what I’ll tell about now is her suggestion that we take a week off of reading. (What? Yes, you heard me.) Her point is that some of us (not mentioning any names) use reading like a drug, filling up all of our empty moments with words so that we are not hearing our true selves and our own thoughts much.

GUILTY.

So she suggests we stop reading for a week. I haven’t done that, but I’m considering it. I’m also considering taking a LONG break from writing, for the same reason: to be able to hear more clearly my true self, to learn what I want to be doing and how and why. I’ve been putting so much pressure on myself to produce, especially since I have now reached the time of life when I had planned to Get Serious about writing. And it has become like a job, something I dread, something I’m in a hurry to do and to see results from. I’m not playing anymore, and so I have squelched my creativity and lost the joy.

I plan to get it back. I have faith that it will come back. I’ve never been able to quit writing for long. I believe God wants me to be writing and approves of my joy in it. I just need to get back to that faithful place where I accept it, relish it, enjoy it without expecting anything to come of it (agents, contracts, fame and fortune). I like me better when I don’t care so much whether my stuff is getting approval. So I’m taking a break to get all that gunk out of my system. I’ll start again fresh sometime.

Thursday, August 07, 2008

That Phase

Well, I made it. I’m there.

My baby went to kindergarten this week.

I have been anticipating this stage for a long, long time (about twelve years, seven months, to be exact—ever since Mr. Colic entered my life and I realized that my life wouldn’t be my own for a very, very long time). I’m not ashamed to admit that I have looked forward to this. It would be much more socially-acceptable to say that I am devastated because I love spending time with my kids so much. But I’m not. I do enjoy my kids, sometimes. But I really, really like having some discretionary time with no one nearby to whine at me. I’m not embarrassed about this.

So what did I do with my first day? I’ll tell you. I walked the Big Guy to school, and cried the teeniest, tiniest little bit—-not because I was sad, but because I’m a big boob at those times when I’m supposed to be nostalgic. The whole “this would be an important scene in the movie of my life” thing gets to me. It WAS touching to see those little guys, feeling so big, march off into the school. Here’s a poem I wrote about the experience when his older brother went:

To Jon, On The First Day of Kindergarten

So eager to get there, you were, as was I--
both of us waiting so long for this day--
skipping along, with your big backpack flapping
(the Star Wars one from your big brother, too big)
and your new "big boy" haircut,
you catch sight of the door.

That's it. You are gone now,
breaking away to join up behind
all the kids facing forward in shiny new shoes.

I've been facing forward myself—but not now!
I stand and I stare at the back of your head
(there! you turn and wave shyly and blow me a kiss)
and wonder, and wonder, do I even know you?
Can I even say that I ever have known you?

One line of little souls, facing the doors,
A parallel line of camera-strapped moms.

I give up the care of your body by inches.
But what of your soul? Have I touched it at all?

I won't panic, I tell myself, still there is time--
The mornings are gone but there are the afternoons.
Tightly I'll cling to them, not looking forward,
so tightly, I'll cling, to the very last inch.

(Only this time I wasn't so regretful. That kid is ready. I'm ready. Bring it on.)

Anyway, then I walked home and I did Lesson 1 in my Power-Glide Spanish course. Then I took a long nap and read something for fun. Finally, I practiced guitar, which I haven’t done for years. It was FANTASTIC.

I was smiling when they got home.

Sunday, August 03, 2008

Why does it always happen . . .

. . . that one kid brings home some junky dollar-toy from a birthday party favor bag like, oh, say a kazoo, for example, and plays with it for a few minutes and then for the next two weeks it turns up in all sorts of places around the house and finally I lay down the law and it ends up in the bottom of the toybox never to be played with again and so when I finally get around to cleaning out the toybox I throw it in the garbage [take a huge breath here] and then the very, very next day the boy’s brother brings home a duplicate of that very kazoo from another birthday party and suddenly kazoos are in fashion--in great demand, even--and boy #1 tears his room apart looking for the kazoo that is now sitting under banana peels in the dumpster and then there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth when he finds out the truth and the whining goes on for longer than the child every played with the thing in the first place? Huh? Huh? Yes, I’m talking to you. Tell me, why does that always happen?