Is it Passion or is it Magic?

I am reading a really great book called The Fire in Fiction by Donald Maass. In it he says, the thing that makes a book great, the thing that is often called magic is really passion. Passion is the defining quality that makes a great book great.

I whole heartedly agree. But I do have to wonder if there isn’t some magic involved too. He says that many of the authors of these great books look back and say that the manuscript wrote itself. Obviously that is literally impossible, but I’m sure you’ve had this same experience a time or two when the words just flowed as if from somewhere else. You sat down and felt the inspiration of an image or scene so beautiful and unexpected and were somehow able to translate it perfectly from the vision in your head to words painting it on paper.

Maybe this is talent or imagination at work, but sometimes it feels like magic. Where do these amazing images and scenes come from? How did you miraculously translate them onto page, perfectly, without stumbling over your own head or tongue like you normally do?

I recently had such an experience. I wrote a short story from a scene that came to me while doing something mundane. I pulled into the driveway came inside and sat down and wrote a story I didn’t know from one scene in my head of a psychic watching a man in an interrogation room. The scene she saw was dramatically different than the one the detective or anyone else would see.

I posted this short on my writing samples blog and submitted it on twitter for #Fridayflash. The feedback I got was amazing. Maybe these people were just being kind because that is what you do when you read #fridayflash writing? I’m not sure. Even without the feedback I felt really good about this story when it was complete.

I have never been a psychic. I do not have a southern accent, though my main character came to me with one. I’ve never even been further south than Nevada. I have stood face to face with monsters but not the kind she did. So where then did this story, her voice come from?

I don’t have an answer to this question. But I would like believe there is a little magic in this world even if it doesn’t come in the form of pixie dust like we believed as children. Maybe though, this is the form it comes in for those of us who love to write.

(For those who are wondering about the above mentioned short here is the link: http://kickingyourselfintheface.blogspot.com/2009/10/sample-3.html Judge for yourself. Feel free to leave feedback if you’d like. I’m happy with it though and felt like it was a kind of magic and I’m sticking with that because I think we all need a little magic in our lives.)

The People you knew when you were young.

There is this song, I know it as The Sunscreen Song by Baz Lurhman others might recognize it as a graduation song. It's a song of advice and in it he says "The older you get the more you need the people you knew when you were young." I don't know if that is true or not. I venture to guess it probably is.

There is absolutely something about spending time with family or those you've grown up with that is different and special. I'm not sure what it is. If it's due to genetic bond or if it's caused by knowing someone so long that they know you better than everyone else. It is through this strange link it seems that magic can happen.

Today I spoke with my older brother on the phone and we were discussing music, something we often do. I was trying to think of a band that I knew he liked to compare them to a song I'd recently discovered that I knew he'd like. I described them as the robe wearing, love, bubbles and tree singing band or some fluffy silly thing. He knew exactly who I meant and said their name. (I wont say it because you might like them and be offended by my mental word associations.) Often with him much less of a description is needed and he is on the same page. I can name a time or a feeling and he knows what I'm referring to.

After my conversation I made the 55 mile trek to Anchorage to bring a friend some medication and have lunch with him in between his flights. Afterwords I went to hang out with my two younger brothers. Being with them is like getting in a time machine and traveling back to when I was 8 and there was no such thing as economic recession or health care reform or debt and gas/electric/mortgage bills. A time when the world was fun and you could get a stomach ache from laughing to hard cause everything was funny.

That is how it is with them. We got McDonalds and were eating when I realized I wanted my sweet and sour sauce but at the time having too little sleep my brain couldn't form the connections to think up the words so I said. "Where is..." (that is literally all I said.) and scrunched my fingers together. My brother bent over pulled out my sauce and handed it to me. You might say yeah no big if you had the nuggets its an obvious thing to ask for. I didn't even order nuggets I planned to steal some of his and hadn't gotten around to it yet.

We have our inside jokes as everyone does but we have so many and they are so silly. Anytime anyone says "I'm gonna kick you in the face." They hold up their hand and we all fall into hysterics. (I won't embarrass myself by explaining why. just know it's truly hilarious... to us.)

So in my long and convoluted way of saying it, what I am saying is that family is important. Maybe for you it isn't because they let you be a kid again or they know exactly what you mean to say even when all you say is. "You know that time when you did that thing." But they know things about you no one else ever will and they'll typically be there for you also when no one else will. So enjoy them while they are here. Hug them every chance you get. And if at all possible tell them you love them every time you say goodbye because you never know if those might be the last words you ever get to say to them.

Headphones

I love music. Currently I'm listening to Well Enough Alone by Chevelle on my Zune software. But that isn't the point of my blog. The point has to do with how I listen to music. I do enjoy having it as background music just coming out of my speakers often. Or in the car blasting at ridiculously high volumes.

I'm usually a source of entertainment for other drivers because I sing and dance (as much as one can dance while driving) along to the music while driving. I often get stares and smiles. There is something about seeing someone enjoying themselves that makes others happy for one reason or another.

Back to my point. (I am easily distracted, if you've read my blog you know this.) My favorite way to listen to music is on headphones. I like how when you listen to music on headphones it's like the music is inside your head. I love that because of this you get to hear things in the music you might not notice otherwise. I also like that when you have headphones on it's like you are in your own world and everyone else just exists around, but outside of it. (I could be crazy but its ok cause I like it.)

So for these reasons even at home I listen to music on my headphones while cleaning, writing, working out or just because. I'm a small person coming in at just under 5 feet. And as a small person most of my parts are also small. My ears for instance look normal sized in proportion, but they are yes you guessed it small. So I cannot wear those ever popular ear buds they do not fit in my ears, and the newer inner ear squishy things don't stay either. (Ear plugs don't stay either incase you were going to argue that if ear plugs fit so do those types of earbuds.)

I have discovered that I do like the over the ear behind the head combo because the clip on kind don't typically stay well on my small ears. But I have recently found a pair of Sony brand retractable cord over the ear clip on's that do stay put and have a beautiful sound. These are the cause of my rant this evening. I take them everywhere with me along with my trusty Zune. Though being in a hurry after work Thursday I forgot them at work. Sad. And since it is a long weekend for me I've been without them for nearly two days now.

Somehow I've lost all my cheapy pairs so I hunted down my favorite pair that due to a faulty wire only plays in one ear. I tried to perform electrical surgery but was mostly unsuccessful. I was only successful for long enough to be reminded of why they are my favorite ones. The sound they produced for the 20 seconds of life I was able to extend was like hearing music after being forced to live in silence for a year. You adapt and forget how great it could be but once reminded it is hard to go back to the way it was. Phillips no longer makes the over the ear behind the head version of these particular headphones anymore. But after last nights 20 seconds of bliss I think I'll have to accept the silly over the top of the head style as a sacrifice where the benefit far out weighs the cost.

I don't remember what my original point was for this blog. I'm sure it got lost somewhere in there. But in closing. Music makes the world brighter, and a good pair of headphones allows you a world where you have your own soundtrack.

(I probably shouldn't blog at 2:30 in the morning.)

Please Don't Leave Me and other things I never think or say

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Balance

Today on the commute home I was very lucky to be the passenger. I was able to spend much of the hour drive looking out the window at a world that has gone from alive and green to set afire in shades that range from brilliant gold to pale yellow and even a few hardier trees still holding on to their green.

It is these differences that make the view so extraordinary. I was watching the endless forests pass by when I was struck by the beauty of a single tree that had such intense golden leaves intermingled with the paler less magnificent ones. And I realized that it wasn't the beauty of this one tree alone or the sea of ordinary that made this scene so awe inspiring, it was how in their contrast they both complimented each other, that caused me to stop and take notice.

I hadn't intended for this blog to be anything more than about the beauty of fall in Alaska but as I typed the above words I realized that in these trees there are lessons to be had. Like these trees, life works much the same way. Sometimes we are the magnificent golden one that people stop to take notice of and sometimes we are the paler ordinary ones that help to highlight the brilliant shimmering gold in our midst. Whichever we are at the moment we have an important roll and neither would be quite as special without the other.

(maybe I shouldn't be allowed to have soda it makes me loopy and I had two cherry cokes today. Be afraid. Be very afraid! Or count your blessings that you don't live or work with me.)

And sometimes you're just lunch. hehe

Falling down the stairs

Yes I did this very stupid thing today. I fell down the stairs this morning on my way to take the dogs outside. And while it is very stupid and pretty painful. (The doctor said I shocked all the tendons in my right leg and I'll be more sore tomorrow and the next day.) It is also comical.

When I got home from the doctors my roommate asked me if I were watching it happen instead of being the one it happened to would I have laughed. I'm going to give away some of my horrible character here. I thought about it for a second. Didn't need more than that to know that; yes I would have pointed and laughed instead of saying. "Oh my gosh are you ok?" But see, its me, so it's ok that I'd point and laugh.

He was trying to determine if it was only funny when my small and portly little dog does it. She is a wealth of hysteria and amusement to me. She has put on a sizable amount of weight and since occasionally misses the steps as she is running up them and hilarity ensues. I often point and laugh till I nearly pee my pants.

But I've had my share of point and be laughed at moments myself. Luckily I live on a little over 2 acres in a rural community so usually my only witnesses are my two dogs who handle it much more gracefully than I do. They are very concerned and dote on me till I lift myself up, dust myself off and get on with whatever I was doing. (usually laughing through the pain at what would have surely been a perfect youtube video had I been filming.)

So my question is does this make me a bad person?

Here is a perfect example of something I'd nearly wet myself laughing at.

Bacon Spam!

Ah Bacon Spam, the most perfect meat to ever come in a can.

Your probably laughing now, thinking I'm joking. I'm not. Or you might be saying: "Well yeah because no meat that comes in a can is good." You'd be wrong again. Spacon as I like to call it, is so absolutely wonderful.

So you may be wondering why this crazy woman is yammering on about processed meat.

Well, I was just frying up some of this culinary miracle when I got sidetracked by the book I'm currently reading. (An Abundance of Katherines by John Green) And well some of my yummy spacon fries (slices cut into spears shaped like french fries only yummier) got a little too much face time with the pan. The wonderful thing about spam is that if this happens all is not lost. Unless you turn it effectively into charcoal the squishy center is usually preserved by the harder fried outer casing. So you can eat them anyways without much effect on the delicious flavor.

So in short everyone should try some yummy spacon today! Gotta run though my spacon is calling!