making crazy*** work for you

john fleuvog's.  hand made.  half price.

my friend andi told me about  the maria bamford series.  maybe you already know about it?

when i watched the first episode, i was all

YES.

because this is what it's about, people.

to make good art, you have to embrace the mental, but not let it destroy you.  a very, very fine line.  i've been walking both sides of it for as long as i can remember.

so have a lot of other cool people i know.

while i don't want to make generalizations that are too sweeping or unsubstantiated

(YES I DO.)

it just seems like

to make art,

you have to know how to work the continuum of normal to freaky really hard and well.

does that make a modicum of sense?????

(NEW NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION:  LEARN TO WORK THE CRAZY REALLY HARD AND WELL.)

so, here's your saturday goal:

watch an episode of the maria bamford show.

totally attainable goal.

you're welcome.

*** i know "crazy" can be an offensive.  i've searched for an alternative, but haven't come up with a good one:  "mad" is too hipster, "insane" is too crazy, "kooky" too frivolous & perky, & c.  what's the word that means: fun, stupid, sad, manic, depressed, staying in bed all day and staying out all night, crashing and soaring all at the same time?

finishing the manuscript

from the holiday card we never sent.  i love the colors, and these two finished manuscripts.

i started this project the gentian weaves & her fringes, a collection of poems using material from emily dickinson, in 2008.  it seems to take five years for me to finish a larger project--and not because i'm not spending enough time on it daily, but i need that much time for conscious and unconscious forces to do their work.

like other projects i've finished of this same scale, i thought it was finished after two years, but it really, really wasn't.

i need a lot of time away from things to figure out what they need to do.  it really doesn't seem like it's up to me. it really doesn't seem that, if i had worked on nothing but this project for a year,  crammed all five years of work into a single year, it would have had the same outcome.  at all.

so, so, so   ::::    i think i'm really done!  i'm sure i'll do a few more tweaks.  but for now, i'm gonna do as my dear husband recommends and freeze the design.

finding a publisher for a work like this is at least another year's worth of work. 

now i can move on to something new.

yay!

as (one of) my (many) therapist(s) said: you love beginnings.  you need to learn to make middles more fun.  it's true!  what i just did was a middle of sort.  it won't really be done until the book is published, and i feel proud for getting through the stills.

i need to celebrate.  this is the first completed new year's resolution of 2013.

what should i do?

here's the table of contents.  i think it  looks pretty cool, and will look even cooler in a real book:

 

a sudden (((bright coin)))........ 8

ambuscade of clover........ 9

angels babble........ 10

beetle’s ordination........ 13

buttercups rannunculae........ 15

chartered (((from my otter’s window)))........ 17

(((daffodils))) :: (((my blondines)))::........ 19

declined day—phantom’s bare & groping feet........ 20

((dim)) & unsuspected tenderness........ 21

eyes—little trees—........ 24

& favorite tints........ 26

gaunt swimmers ransomed........ 29

globe—bashful—humming........ 30

(((green cartiers)))—........ 31

*(((hoard of gems)))........ 33

(((   i died)))........ 35

i gather idle (((bumble-bees)))........ 36

jointed—........ 38

king’s fork........ 40

lost—the stolid bee........ 42

my tree........ 44

(((moth-star dropt))) last night &........ 45

night hid her throes:........ 47

(((o))) heart-sodden &........ 49

our antiquary ransacks august........ 50

pare this apple........ 52

& pauper’s slit &........ 53

(((parceled))) in yellow tulle—........ 54

peeps onto that sleeping egg........ 55

quivering—........ 57

ragged phoebes (((tremor)))........ 59

rapt: morning::........ 60

:: rouge november—........ 61

september’s escutcheon........ 63

snow falls april (across the altar)........ 64

the child is a small ear........ 67

the (((timbral))) flickers—........ 69

this (((broily))) day........ 70

***throng of acorns........ 71

unfrequented & august........ 73

vane turns in zephyret........ 75

we have slendered ourselves........ 77

window’s anodyne does not fail—........ 78

extacy &&&&&........ 80

yclept........ 82

zinnia?........ 84

feelings

allison janney, the only celeb i really cared about.  photo by lorri vodi rupard.

coming down from 10 days of crazy juggling--between the kids & house, teaching & school, film screenings, press events, & review writing,  i let my little blog go.

& i'm feeling a bit blue.

& i missed you.

i had many thoughts, feelings (or "feeleens" as it's pronounced in utah), and epiphanies.  but i've grown wary of my epiphanies.  because when the epiphanic moment wears off, it's a huge, huge bummer, and i feel like a fool for having believed it.

i think i'll share any way.  because really, dear readers, sometimes i can't distinguish between true inspiration, too much caffeine, or my daily bipolaresque roller coaster ride of emotions.  maybe you can help me sort it out.  maybe writing it here, for the little portion of the world that visits me in cyberspace to examine, will help me know when to

as kenny rogers so eloquently put it:

know when to hold 'em

know when to fold 'em

know when to walk away

& know when to run.

so here are the Most Important thoughts and feelings i had as a result of attending sundance:

1)  writers need to learn how to create characters, need to do better at fleshing out rather than creating types or making corrective statements to the world with their so-called characters.  also, the absence of smiling or happiness does not = profundity.

2)  filmmakers need better writers.  i saw really superb acting, cinematography and even better editing skillz in practice, but without a good writer, you're screwed.

3) (here's the part you need to help me with--am i just totally delusional and manic right now?)  10 films in 20 years.  i have a plan.  woody allenesque.  come up with a modest budget that i can sustain and fund every two years, a style of filmmaking that looks great even without $$$, and a guerilla film company that is locavore in nature, but maxivore in impact.

4)  filmmaking for social change.  something different from redford's approach, not that his isn't great and super important, but a new angle on it.  something to do with open source, something to do with positive and real work by women.

5) will the high adrenaline, complex multi-tasking and hat wearing, and mix of visual, aural, language, and action of film making, if i am lucky and smart enough to do it, be enough to keep me happy for 20 years?

Week One Funk

We met this congenial fellow last night.  I'm trying to channel his seemingly perpetual good mood today.

Rough start to a new year, but I'm trying not to see it as a bad thing.

I'm trying to sit with and feel out my funk.

In spite of it, I've been writing.  Here's the lastest regarding my book project:

Pages:  76
Word count:  18,229

I'm a pretty slow and careful writer, so I'm hoping the book doesn't need much revising and that I can get this in by the end of Feb deadline.

tentacle head

from rebecaa solnit's infinite city--a text i'm reading for the mapping salt lake city workshop.

i loved what julie wrote the other day about her new commitment to putting all her eggs in one basket.

i have a tendency, too, of putting many eggs in many baskets.

am i hedging my bets?

afraid of going all in and not succeeding?

bored?

distracted?

these are all things i'm trying to tease out.

one thing i know for sure:  when i decide to focus on one thing, i suddenly develop an almost irresistable  urge to do something else.  as soon as i get, for instance, some success with publishing, i suddenly want to open a restaurant.  i'm writing a book of poems, and an idea for a screenplay tentacles out of my brain, wraps around that crazy organ, and squeezes.

what is this?  a psychological hang-up?  adhd?  something i should try to tamp out?  or a phenomenon i should try to embrace and work with rather than against?

this week, i'm working on many disparate, but somehow connected, projects:

1) final draft of poetry manuscript--in progress for five years now.

2) revision of non-fiction piece for a rad workshop i'm taking on mapping salt lake city for my ph.d program (another project that has given me about a million ideas that i'm trying to reign in.)  here's a link to infinite city by rebecca solnit, a text that inspired the creation of this course.

3) setting up interviews with publicists for sundance.  did i mention i'm covering the film festival for toronto's the gate?

4) finalizing my intro to creative writing course on canvas.

5) and, with ingrid in town, another tentacle-brained gal, i'm being urged to write a cookbook and start a youtube series.

okay, all you smart people.  what does a person do with flailing tentacles?  i'm feeling way out of control.

mommy's back-to-school outfit

julie selected the dress for me online.  i tried to make it work and weather appropriate.

the good thing about teaching is that you get two back-to-school outfits a year, a fall and a winter selection.

readers, it's hell out there.  eleven degrees, air like pea soup--my eyes, ears, throat, chest and nose are itching, burning and watering.  and i'm not sick.  people who don't live here think that the worst thing about living here is the mormons.  it's definitely not.  the people who do live here will tell you:  it's the very air you breathe.  we're trying to get by until wednesday, when a storm will hopefully clean out the muck.  pray for us.

so with all the heavy, cold air out there, i awoke feeling, as aretha says, "so uninspired," with no idea what to wear.  this is what i came up with.  i'm not saying that it's the most amazing outfit in the world, but this:  you haven't beaten me into submission yet, soul sucking pollution.  i'm standing, and i'm wearing an outfit, complete with earrings, cowboy boots, and lipstick.

one more thing:  i'm really inspired by julie's specific goals for writing this week.  i hope she won't mind if i copy her and put this week's writing goals down for bloggerly accountability:

1) write X and Y poems for gentian.
2) make copy edits in gentian document (i've already done the edits by hand)
3) print out draft of complete edited gentian manuscript to bring to writer's group on thursday.

(i've had a goal to do these three things for months now.  let's see if putting it on the blog motivates me to get it done this week.)

anyone else out there have goals for the week?

vision 2013

screenplay related.  but i can't talk about the details yet.

emily dickinson book, dark and light sides, luxury snowflake.

i spent the day with two daughters and d.j. and some rad teachers making vision boards for 2013.  it's not new year's eve yet, but i have a super definite idea of what i want to do this year.

an apartment in n.y.c.

or more like a ton of ideas that i tried to reign in, but then decided relinquish restraint (what's the point? it's not in my skill set to do things in a logical or sensible order or with any kind of inclination towards reasonable expectations.)

singing times.

so i went ahead and put them all out there.

learn to relax.

they're kind of embarrassing, people!

luxury snowflake cut by eva.  one side is from a tiffany ad, one from a fur coat ad.  but it's not about things, but about a feeling of luxury and an appreciation of everything that's so intense i can hardly stand it.

they're kind of like a list a seven-year old might have when asked what she wants to be when she grows up:  a professional ballerina, a doctor, an olympic swimmer and a teacher.  all at the same time.


well, i decided to stop fighting the urge to do everything all at once and just embrace it.

dietrich.  big time hollywood.

we'll see how it goes.

i wasn't going to show them publicly, but i changed my mind.  because if i'm going to do any of the things on this list, it's going to require allowing a lot of embarrassment, overcoming shyness (the internet is so beautiful for shy persons), acknowledging what my real goals are, and putting "it" all out there.

"it"?  what are you?  where are you?  

and, to be frank, a year of blogging has brought out the exhibitionist in me.  for better of for worse, it's the truth.

2013 new year's resolutions:

1. complete all of the requirements for my ph.d.

2. find publisher for my book of poems, the gentian weaves her fringes, poems written over the past five years using words form emily dickinson's poetic lexicon.

3. complete new screenplay.  and win academy award for screen writing in a subsequent year.

4. learn to truly relax when i have down time.

5. continue yoga practice.

6.  get shoulders fixed.

7.  wrap the year in a feeling of luxury--i.e. love everything so much that it is more beautiful and more luxurious than a tiffany ring or a fur coat.

8.  sing in a choir or band.

9.  only do things that are in concert with my values or roots.

10.  find a job that will allow me to spend half my time in n.y.c.  have residence in n.y.c. and utah.

okay.

that was embarrassing.

go ahead and laugh.

because laughing makes you feel better, i've heard.

xo

the beginning is the end

off to bookclub in purple tights, metallic skirt.

i keep thinking back to the beginning of GITP, since we're coming up on the end of our daily blogging project, and wondering if we did what we set out to do.  and trying to remember what it was, exactly, that we were trying to do.

i recall something about "getting out of a tight place," and also a thing about examining the whole concept of tight places.  for me, hard-core blogging ended up being a daily confrontation with things that felt hard to me, and then a daily test:  is this really something that should be getting me down, or are my priorities out of whack?

it was shocking how many times the answer was:  your priorities are out of whack.

so thank you blog, for helping me realize that, for instance, eight loads of laundry that need folding is not something to get down about.  that money troubles are going to come and go, that big projects and deadlines are a real blessing because i'm doing work that is interesting, of my choosing, and that i believe has inherent value aesthetically, personally, and to other people.

so today when i got a little freaked out by "so much to do," thinking about you, dear blog, made me realize that if i complained about my to-do list it would sound really whiny and self-indulgent.  you made me completely turn my perspective on the day around, or as my people say:  you turned my frown upside down.

this is probably the best thing to come out of 2012 and GITP.

the more i consider it, the more majorly awesome this seems.

legwear:  purple tights

inspiration:  you!

looking forward to:  book club, the mindy project, and a productive work day tomorrow

p.s.--does anyone remember their new year's resolutions?  tomorrow i want to figure out if i did any of mine.  tomorrow.  tonight i'm gonna relax.

On Not Reading and Weeding

I've been finding Week 4 of AW really frustrating.  The no reading thing has been difficult, and I'm afraid I'm losing brain cells because of it.  On the upside, I'm just as glad to have an excuse not to read some of the things I insist on reading:  the subway papers (as surprisingly interesting as they are sometimes), and the magazines that pile up in our apartment:  Rolling Stone, Time Out, L Magazine, the Lo-Down (art directed by one of our early guest bloggers, Kim).  There are so many to distract me! 

So this part as been good.  I've also been listening to music more, mostly in the way of YouTube clips and channels.  A had an XTC channel going last night when I was cleaning out the kids' room to prepare it for painting, hauling up armload after armload of weeded picture books.   I must have collected next to a thousand for my kids over the years.  And while, we are holding onto a lot, I'm getting rid of a lot, too, dispersing them around, trying to sell some to a local used bookstore.

 Instead of reading, I've been reorganizing and weeding (in library land, we call this "de-selecting") my own book collection.  I've also been building decorative book towers like the one above, based on this shelving unit pictured below. 

It's been frustrating, however, maddening handling all my books without being able to read any of them.

Since this is still a six-month assessment, one of my New Year's resolutions was to see more live music, so tonight I saw Joseph Arthur, the same musician I saw (in the same venue) on Jan 1.  From the stage that night, JA read his New Year's resolutions.  Tonight, I wanted to ask him how they were going.

Equinox Assessment

First cone of the season at Ray's Candy Store on Avenue A 

It's the Spring Equinox! Yeah!--although I wonder if we've heard it given our wimpy little winter. Now it's been 2012 for almost three months, and I thought I'd take a minute to see what I've done that I wanted to do when I was thinking about this year--the night Lara and I started this blog--on Dec 31st. 

Have I checked anything off my list? 

 Where are my New Year's Resolutions anyway? I just checked two different places!--help! 

 Ok, here's what I remember: 

1. More yoga! Really? I've only been to one, maybe two formal yoga classes this year. I practice at home, but it's not the same. 

2. Write and submit fiction. I've written. I really have, but have I submitted anything anywhere? No. And I just heard some disappointing news in this regard about an hour ago. (March, you are a killing me! Really!!) 

3. Try and get out of my tight place and thinking less tightly. Well, more yoga would help with this. But I am trying to breathe more consciously and more deeply. And I am keeping up with a journal, and trying to be more conscious of how I move through the day. 

4. More love.  Just like the sign above says!  Need to work on this.

5. More light!  Needs work!

6. More tights! I actually did well with this one! On Sunday, I wore my yellow tights. I saw daffodils everywhere. Today, however, it was so warm that I peeled off my leggings on a public sidewalk. 

 On January 1, 2012 I went to hear this singer/songwriter Joseph Arthur play. He read his New Year's resolutions--numbering about 40--from the stage. One of his was: "Let dreams learn how to be true." This I'm definitely going to work on for the next three months. 

 What about you?

that greeny flower

i spent a couple of hours with william carlos williams' poem "asphodel, that greeny flower" this morning (one hour of this study time was during church this morning, testimony meeting, which my hilarious daughter lovingly calls 'open mic night.')

it's a beautiful confessional love poem, about gardens, love, forgiveness, death, the sea, hell, and the way in which the atom bomb changed love, forgiveness, and the poetic line forever.

"I bring you/ a last flower. Don't think// that because I say this/ in a poem/ it can be treated lightly// or that the facts will not uphold it./ Are not facts flowers/ and flowers facts// or poems flowers/ or all works of the imagination,/ interchangeable?"

williams asks his wife's forgiveness for his infidelity and his inattention to her because of the time he spent living two lives crammed into one. you want to think he's a d-bag (he's always asking forgiveness--remember the plums? i always thought the speaker in that poem was a little d-baggy), but he manages to come across as so honest and vulnerable and broken that we forgive him, and in the end, she forgives him, too. he writes from the winter time, but imagines spring, and her forgiveness enables a sort of new flowering, albeit by a pale and odorless flower, for williams at the end of his life.

"after a lifetime,/ it is as if// a sweet-scented flower/ were poised/ and for me did open."

this took me to new years, the snow outside, a very faint glimmer of spring at the edges of my imagination. i always go through the same process at new year's time:

1) i vow to not make any resolutions
2) then i vow to only make one resolution
3) then i vow to make only three resolutions
4) then i make a whole complicated list
5) the next year i realize that i sort of did one or two things on the list
6) i repeat the process, often including some of the resolutions that i've made year after year and not even been moderately successful in keeping

so.

here's my long and unwieldy list, which i probably won't keep, but is at least an expression of intent:

MUSIC

this year i did less music than in almost any year of my life. sad. maybe that's why i feel empty? thus i want to:

*take voice lessons
*sing in church choir
*rehearse once a week with lalage
*start a youtube channel for lalage

POETRY

i have a chapbook and two complete manuscripts of poems pretty much ready to go, but lacked the wherewithal to send to publishers, etc. last year. am toying with the idea of publishing them under christian's record label, and circumventing the vast amount of time and money it takes to get a "real" publisher to put them out (i spent two years and probably 1500 bucks on submission fees and mailing fees getting Alburnum published). would love to hear other poets' thoughts. i know it totally de-legitimizes your work to self-publish in the eyes of certain people, but if you look carefully, it's pretty much a racket. and hey, william blake did it.

but, as i've said before on my other blog, one of my rules is no work on publication unless i'm spending a certain amount of time writing.

*continue daily poetic practice
*publish a physic at the table--chapbook
*publish gentian weaves her fringes--full length book
*revise and send out four windows with flamboyant tracery--full length book

HEALTH

*get outside more (this is one i make every year and NEVER do. i can't explain my aversion to the outdoors. could it be agoraphobia?)
*continue yoga practice
*drink more water
*limit screen time

SCREENWRITING

two screenplays i want to write, and i'll just give their code names below in case someone decides to steal my amazing ideas and make millions off of them.

*alice
*francesca

SPIRITUAL/EMOTIONAL

*judge less (another every year res--i think i got a little better on this one this year, even if only i can tell)
*pay attention more

i really, really love new year's resolutions, i have to say. i have a penchant for starting over. my therapist once told me, "you're good at beginnings. we have to figure out how to make the middles more fun for you."

a good thought. i'm working on it.

but i figure it's totally legit to start over again in january, so here i am.

where are you?

p.s. legwear: leopard tights. and i wore my new pearl colored h&m dress. i spotted women at church wearing: black tights, grey woolen tights, blue striped tights, houndstooth tights. it's tights season here in utah. i spotted younger girls in red tights, mustard tights, sparkly tights, black tights and white tights. it's a festival of legwear.

Heat Seeking

On the last day inside the holiday bubble, S got out--for the first time--the Fairy Cards I picked up at Golden Braid Books in Salt Lake City on New Year's Day 2011. I had never interacted with them and still not sure what I think of tarot (Fairy Cards are along the same lines), etc, but I asked the following question of them. "What can I do this year to be more productive?" Stella pulled, at random/sight unseen, the three cards pictured here: 1. Ask for What You Want: "Let the universe and other people know what you need." 2. Practice, Practice, Practice: "Polish your skills and talent and increase your confidence." And this one was weird: 3. Pregnancy and Birth: "Big change." I'm choosing to read that one as a metaphor.

All of these things are great and I have to keep them in my head. Won't you help?

It's January 2nd--my spouse's birthday. Kids go back to school tomorrow. I go back to work, my paid work and my work work, which I'm too shy to talk about here yet.

Not too shy to write about tights: Because it's cold today, I wore thick gray ribbed tights from Uniqlo. Newish, bought just before Xmas, they are supposed to be imbued with heat seeking "Japanese technology." I'm not even kidding; they are really that warm. I'm going to try and generate this kind of heat all year.

The Crow

Lara, this post will be short, because this New Year's Day consisted of hosting in-laws in back-to-back activities, but I managed to wear tights, plain black tights that one might wear to a job interview although I'm still in a holiday bubble. With them, I wore flat boots of leather so soft the boots go on like socks. Hours later, I went home and changed into red Frye engineer boots that I've almost broken in, because I wanted something that hurt a little for the live music I was going to see later.

Lara, I like your last post a lot. I went to see a performer named Joseph Arthur, who is a cross between William S. Burroughs and Chris Robinson from the Black Crows, and with something of the dead drug addled comic Mitch Hedberg. He made me wonder what it would be like to live in art all day, even when you are parenting, even when you are irritated or totally exhausted, or worse: jealous.

He read some of his 2012 resolutions--he had about 40 of them--from the stage and I jotted some down in my brand new red Moleskin appointment book:

--Eclipse fear.
--Let dreams learn how to be true.
--Carve from invisible stone your true love.
--Be generous.
--Accept yourself with love.

By the way, I burst into tears and sobbed during one of his songs. And by the way, the crow used to be easy for me, too, and now I can't do it at all.