Singing into the Void

What does a mommy blogger do when her kids get a little older and tell her they don't want her to write their story, any story about them anymore?

Some of them get a day job. The rest of us write about our cats or go a little crazy or both.

But what do you do when you lose your voice? What do you do when you think you might go the rest of your life without anyone listening to you?

I was the youngest of three children. My worst fear, my biggest complaint about being the third was that no one listened to me. No one believed what I told them. It has been a residual fear through my adulthood. Somehow I got louder and more insistent at first. Then, when people interrupted me, when they looked at their phones while I was talking, when they cut off my conversation mid-story, when they put on the headphones so they could join their friends in videoland even though I was in the room talking to them, I realized I needed to go off to write.

But what then?

What if I've been writing here for seven years and all of those little blips on my stats are just corporate robots checking to see if I've mentioned their products again?

It helps that a few of you told me that you read this here. Thank you for that.

But am I mostly talking in a void?

I'm still trying to get back onto my feet after being fired from volunteering at the school. Did I tell you about that?

Probably. It's run through my head so many times, I forget where I've mentioned it. I'm like that girl whose crummy boyfriend broke up with her on Valentine's Day by texting her then ghosting her when she asked him to explain. None of her friends liked him anyway, but they have to listen to the story over and over until she gets it all worked out in her head, until she figures out a way to move forward instead of looking back. That's me, going over and over what I think was my mistake until I figure the whole thing out, until I can get closure on something none of the people involved have explained to me. Except I haven't quite figured it out without those missing pieces.

Yesterday, I stood in line at the grocery store and looked at Oprah's newest magazine cover. She looked fabulous, with wild hair flying out from her head like electricity. And there was an article about being your most authentic you. It's what Oprah is best at conveying, to be your most true self.

"You are not your looks," it said. "You are not your job. Find your essence."

I wanted to find my essence. Last month, I lost that job before I even earned any money, the job I'd been volunteering to do for two and a half years, the place where I'd volunteered for eleven years. I keep telling you about that, don't I?

I do. Sorry.

I'm having trouble getting through it, separating myself from that identity I had as a volunteer for children. Maybe I was too proud of that role. Maybe it was time that it ended so I could find my own true essence.

The problem is that I haven't found it yet.

The country may be in a Constitutional crisis, but I'm in a crisis of consciousness. Who am I? What is the meaning of my life?

Who am I without that crummy boyfriend? That contentious job?

See what I mean?

But that time after an awful boyfriend abandons us or after we're fired from a job where some people were dismissive of us, it is an important time, a time for introspection, a time to reset our own internals.

Did you ever notice that when you're at a job or in a relationship where there is animosity, you start to change, you become more like the people who bother you?

I'm afraid I was feeling rather superior, sort of entitled to that attention that I expected from being a dedicated volunteer. I was feeling irritated that some of these people had never bothered to get to know me in the eleven years I was there, had acted like I wasn't worth their time. Maybe I took up too much of that energy into my soul. Maybe I can get to be a better person by having lost this particular job, even if I did love trying to help those kids that I worked with. I can give up that pride and irritation.

The problem with eating this humble pie is that I've begun to question why anyone would want to listen to my story here. I've lost my voice and though I'm trying to get it back, I'm wondering at the futility of writing into the void.

And yet.

The bird sings. The sun shines. The fog leaves a sweet taste in the air.

I have always written. I have notebooks that go back to when I was thirteen.  Before I could write, I used to scribble words on a piece of paper in little rows, talking out my stories as I wrote, until my brother laughed at what I was trying so desperately to do. I hated when people laughed at me. I still do.

So I will keep writing because that is what I do. It helps me figure out what I have to say. It might or might not be read. It might or might not touch someone's heart. Today, I'm not writing about my sweet son or about my cute cats.

Today, I'm just singing into the void, trying to hear my own voice.

Thank you for listening, jb

A Cozy Cat Bed

I still feel as though I've lost my voice, but I'm going to try to say something nice here anyway.

I'm waiting for something to occur to me. I'm waiting... Waiting... waiting...

Nothing.

So, Blitz decided it's a hazard to sit under my chair. I liked having him within reach, but it was awful getting up and realizing that when I moved the chair, I inadvertently whacked the kitten who'd been sitting under there waiting for me to be done. I also worried the chair would collapse some day and all I'd have left is a furry pancake of a kitty.

Now, he's sitting about five feet away on the floor. He's safe from evil chair legs, but I can't reach him to pet him when I'm thinking. The ideal workspace would have a warmed platform to the left of the keyboard where a cat could lie within reach of much needed petting.

Petting is good for a human. It makes us live longer, reduces the potential of a heart attack. (That was in some study I read recently. I love studies like that.) It's also good for a person who feels like she's lost her voice.

For Christmas, I got the cats one of those snuggly cat beds. When Nick put it on his head, he reminded me of Johnny Carson in the turban doing Carnac the Magnificent. I know that makes me old, but I still miss Johnny Carson.

Did you watch it? Did you remember the originals? I know, the references are out of date, but did you see that thing on his head? It was a cat bed with bling. That's the kind of cat bed I bought the cats for Christmas, all plushy and cozy. Without the bling, though.

I wanted to crawl into it. I did. It wasn't big enough.

I wanted a hat like that. It wasn't small enough.

The cats won't have a thing to do with it. When we put Seth down into it, he snuggled in for about five minutes then got out and shook himself as if we'd asked him to sit in an iron box for an hour. What an inconvenience, he seemed to say. Then, when I put the thing in my lap as I sat on the couch, he chose Mike's lap instead, even if Mike had a laptop hogging most of it.

The thing got a little attention after Nick put it on his head, then took it off and sat on it for a while, but only a cursory sniff. Seth likes how his teenage boy smells. Then, he sat down on one of the flattened pillows instead, you know, one of the pillows that smells like wet dog.

Blitz?

Blitz claws his way out immediately if I set him down onto it. It's as if he's trying to escape an iron box full of nails.

What the hell?

I should put it on the couch under the furry blankets for a month. Then, maybe it will stink enough like wet dog that someone will snuggle up with it. Or maybe I should do some alterations and wear it on my head.

Thank you for listening, jb

Fog and Peace

Yesterday, I hiked with my nephew and his friend up Mt. Si.

I take that back. I didn't hike with my nephew and his friend. I hiked by myself three-quarters of the way up Mt. Si. I walked slowly. I stopped three times to eat lunch to take care of my blood sugar when I felt it drop. I took pictures of those little holes burrowed under the trunks of trees where animals lived. I talked to lots of people. I was silent in between.

It was great.

I've gotten so slow that I hate hiking with people and trying to keep up. If I need to keep up, I hike myself into a state of dizziness. If I have to keep up and can't, I feel bad the whole way, as if I'm doing something to the person who has the miserable job of staying behind with me.

When I let them go on, assure them that I'm fine, I'll come along at my own pace, I let myself feel the joy of hiking again. Oh, I love the endorphins.

Within two-tenths of a mile, I told my nephew and his friend to take the dogs and head on up at their own pace. I wanted Teddy to get to the snow if he could. He loves snow. I wanted to stay on the wet side and look at stuff, dawdle.

Just past seven-tenths of a mile, I began to get shaky and I stopped to eat. I felt ridiculous, but I needed to stop. I had a beautiful salad of spinach, ham, and strawberries. I should try ham and pineapple sometime, a Hawaiian salad. That would be good. I laid my rain pants on a rock and looked out through the trees.

A woman stopped to say what a nice picnic I was having. We talked for a while. She was slow like I was. She told me she was recovering from an injury. This was a woman I'd have been good friends with if she lived anywhere near me.

"No two people share the same hike," she said.

Heraclitus said, "No man steps in the same river twice for it's not the same river and he's not the same man."

I wanted to talk about that more, but the conversation tripped along ahead of me. I like thinking about that line, how many times I've gone back to the same spot by the river. And then she was gone, off on her own adventure. It was quiet again.

I petted every dog that came up to me on the trail. I'm pretty sure they were drawn by the smell of ham on my fingers. Along came a black and white border collie asking to be petted. He'd been leaping up the trail. The person with him was a lithe and cheerful woman. I liked her on sight.

She was a person with a calm and cheerfulness that floated around her like a cloud. I wanted to breathe in that air. I'm not the most calm and cheerful person most of the time. I wonder if I'll ever let go of the rush and ease into an easier mode of being. Will it be a conscious choice or will I be a crabby old woman for the rest of my life?

This morning after good exercise outside yesterday, I feel calm, relaxed. I should get good exercise every day. Teddy would like that too.

On that trail, each person who stopped to talk to me gave me their own tiny gift. One man told me about hiking Mt. Everest. Oh I could feel his passion for the quest. After his guide had said they must turn back, he'd met a man who was hypothermic and helped him, gave him his spare coat, called on his radio for help. It was a story full of generosity and heartbreak. I was awed by his persistence.

There's a trend on Instagram - the unlikely hiker.

This man fell into that category, shorter, Asian, different than your usual lean adrenaline junkie. I asked him to write the book about his mountains. He told me there were plenty of those books. But at least he spent the time and told me some of his stories, amazing stories. I breathed in those stories like a child at bedtime.

And then it was quiet in the forest again. A fog crept between the trees. A yellow-bellied sapsucker tapped at a dead tree at eye level. He didn't even move to the back of the tree out of sight like they usually do.

I felt a calm creep between the cracks in my soul.

This.

This was what I had needed when my nephew asked me to hike and I had said yes knowing full well I could never keep up with them.

I met up with them again near the trailhead. Dusk had arrived and I'd turned back downhill because I didn't want to trip down that steep trail in the dark. Fewer people stopped to talk now. Fewer people passed my way. Dogs coming back down were worn out, wet, and muddy, ready for a good meal at home and the comfort of their beds.

At seven-tenths of a mile, at the marker for the Talus loop, my stiff knee began to be finished, my toenails were tired of bouncing off the toes of my boots. I slowed way down and kept tension on my knees as I stepped down each of the the steep steps. I made a point of alternating feet. I'm left-footed. Usually, it's my right knee that takes most of the stress of the downhill climb. I needed to spread it out.

The fog and the dripping became a steadier rain. It flattened my hair and dripped down the back of my neck.

When Teddy and the rest of them caught up with me, he nuzzled his head into my legs and groaned. I could dry him off. I could find him his cozy place to lie down. I could get him home to a good meal and time on the couch.

My nephew, his friend, and I came off the mountain alternating stories of snow, the summit, and people on the trail.

I didn't tell them about the yellow-bellied sapsucker and how the bird was relaxed enough with me to let me watch him eat his dinner. I could never have conveyed the calm of that moment, a forest quietly dripping, the hollow tap of the bird finding bugs to eat, the fog making a safe place for both of us.

The peace.

Thank you for listening, jb

The Family Embrace

This morning, Mike did his usual thing of picking up Seth and carrying him around and petting him. Seth has come to expect that and when Mike is in a hurry, Seth will pace in front of him crying for what we call Pick-Me-Up time. As usual, Mike carried Seth like a football, if a football reached out and put his front paws around Mike's wrist in a hug. Nick and I gathered around them so Seth received love with five hands, six if you count the football clutch.

"Petting, petting, petting," Nick said in a robot voice.

"Too. Much. Petting," Mike said.

I put my hands on Seth without petting him so it wasn't really too much petting. Seth loved when we gathered around him in this family embrace. I used the time to pat Nick on his shoulder and back too. I didn't like bugging a seventeen-year-old for hugs, but he and I both needed the contact. I just had to try to be cool about it. It was almost impossible for me to be cool, but Pick-Me-Up was the perfect time and Nick didn't pull away.

Blitz paced back and forth around us, crying.

What the heck? Blitz hated being picked up, except when it was time for him to eat. I'd been picking him up to hug him and he almost always groaned as I tucked my arm under his butt the way Mike did with Seth. Blitz wouldn't let me roll him over and cradle him like a baby. There was a whole lot of wrestling and clawing going on when I tried to cradle him, so I usually tucked him in like a football. Still, he groaned, accepted it, then wrestled with me to get down when I hugged him too long.

This morning though, Blitz paced and cried.

That cat was so incredibly worried about getting fair treatment, even treatment that he didn't like, especially when he could see Seth reveling in it. Pick me up into the family embrace.

So, I picked him up and tucked him under my arm. Then, while Mike still held and petted Seth, I stood with Blitz and Nick turned to pet him too. The family embrace. This was what we did. Blitz grew up thinking this was how cats were supposed to be treated. I think Blitz would be surprised about how different life might be in another family.

I always thought that fitting in was such a human thing or maybe a dog thing, you know, pack mentality. But I never thought it went further than that.

I was wrong. After watching Blitz, I realized that animals worked to fit in, to do what everybody else was doing. It wouldn't surprise me now, after the Blitz lesson, if you told me that all animals worked to fit in, to do what everyone around them were doing, just so they could feel the family embrace. Their survival might depend on it or maybe it was love. How was I to know?

Thank you for listening, jb

If Your Teachers Were Comedians

I have an interview today for a part-time job that I've been doing for two years now.

Can you believe that I'm nervous?

I volunteer at the school, working with students to help them write. With one guy, I simply used Natalie Goldberg's advice for freewriting to break his writer's block. That's all it took before he didn't need me any more. I worked with that same guy for two years, but the best thing I did for him was to repeat what I said on that first day. Keep your hands moving on the keyboard. Don't correct anything yet. Stay focused for as long as you can and each time you break, take note of how long you kept up the good focus. Then, for subsequent freewrites, try to extend it just a little bit longer until you can write continuously for twenty minutes at a time without stopping. Then, if you have a shitty first draft according to Anne Lamott's good advice, you can run through it word by word and clean it up.

I'm doing a freewrite now. Can you tell?

I do it all the time, sit down and write until I know what it is that I want to say. I hardly ever know what I want to tell you when I sit down to a blank screen. I just keep writing until something pops up. Today, it's a way for me to think about that interview and what I would do differently with students if they let me.

I'm writing about writing again. Do you mind? Wouldn't you rather I write about kittens or dogs playing games? Wouldn't you rather hear something funny?

Me too. I'd rather, but today I have an interview and I'm trying to prepare for it. What if they ask me what my weaknesses are?

I get distracted. I'm not serious enough, but the high school students generally like that even if the staff doesn't. I don't often use the words gerund, preposition, pronoun, conjunction with a student when we're talking about their writing.

Conjunction junction. What's your function?

Are you old enough to remember that?

You know, I'm not sure if there's a deep benefit to learning much besides noun, verb, adjective. I tell my students to read their work aloud, that their minds know when the grammar is correct. Then we talk about 'ain't.' I like to use the word 'vernacular' with them. I get to try my Indiana twang on then.

"Y'all ain't gonna let me ride shotgun, ain't ya?" I say with my best hometown dialect. And any of my students will invariably agree with me that this is not correct grammar. I tell them it's great to use in dialog if they can.

Then, if I'm really on it, I pull out an English accent and say, "But you would most likely smash up the lorry if you were to ride where you might be seen wearing that bloody ugly jumper.'

Then, suddenly they know what 'vernacular' means and I can work them through hearing the grammar, correct and vernacular. Then we can talk about our narrator. Sometimes a whole book is written in the vernacular, I tell them, but they'd better be careful using that for an English teacher. It had better be done in a way that their teachers know it's intentional and not an unfortunate accident that will leave them with a C or a D in class.

You know, I honestly think that the school system should hire smart stand-up comics as teachers. Can you imagine taking that class as you're getting your Masters Degree in Education? Getting and Keeping Students' Attention 101. How to Engage your Reluctant Student through Humor 102.

When you go listen to a stand-up comic, you never look away if she's funny. It doesn't matter if she's talking about how her mother goes on and on about gout while unloading Depends and Exlax chocolate from a grocery bag on a hot day. You're not going to look away. Even though there's just a woman, a microphone, and a footstool hosting a glass of water on the stage. You're not going to look away because you might miss something she does with her face up there. You'd hate it if everybody laughed and you missed it.

Yes, I really believe that that teachers should be able to entertain their students. I think that humor is a challenging but engaging art form. I think that it should be encouraged, that kids making presentations should be told that being funny will keep all eyes and ears on them while they are trying to make a point.

I don't think I should say that in my interview at the school today, do you?

Thank you for listening, jb

Running with the Dogs

Teddy has been really sad during all this kitten stuff. Why is he sitting here waiting to go to the park? Why isn't he the star of the show instead of the ratty little kitten who's afraid of everything?

Teddy's really cute when he sits on top of three blankets and two pillows on the cold leather couch. Teddy's adorable at the dog park when he gets three puppies to grab onto his stick all at the same time. Teddy's awesome when he sees the girl's cross-country team run through the park and he wants to join the girls cross-country team and run with them every day. Teddy loves girls.

Teddy is probably right. He would make a really good dog for a book.

Actually, Teddy was born to be in the movies instead of a book. He's completely photogenic. I get a lot of attention being the ordinary woman who brings him to the park.

"What breed is she?" a girl will ask.

"He's a mix, a shelter dog," I reply.

"Sorry, he. He's so pretty, he looks like a girl. No way, he's a shelter dog? He looks like one of those Korean dogs, a jindo?"

"Nope. Sorry. His mother was an Australian shepherd mix."

"He looks just like a jindo."

Her face isn't as friendly now. Did I hold the line too long?

"Well, you never know," I say, just trying to be nice. I'm not willing to pay $75 to find out what his DNA says he is, but I'd almost guarantee there isn't a bit of jindo in him. How often do you see lab mixes at the park?

And how often do you see jindos?

I had to google 'white korean dog' to even remember what the breed name was. No, the odds are pretty low that Teddy is a jindo mix. Pretty damned low. Most of the dogs out there ranging around and impregnating other dogs are either pit bull or lab mixes. Now and then, you get husky mutt puppies, but not jindos. People with jindos aren't letting them range around the neighborhood, impregnating female dogs.

But what 's the point of arguing with people? It doesn't change their minds. I can feel in the conversation when it begins to make them mad. I don't go past that point. I don't want to be that woman who alienates everyone at the dog park. And then the next time Teddy shows up, these same people don't want to pet him because I was the crabby old woman who told them they were idiots.

No, I want Teddy to be well-loved at the park. So, I nod my head and ask her questions about her dog. I want people to talk to me while we watch Teddy lope along with the other dogs, leaping neatly over a dog who stops abruptly.

So yeah, maybe I will tell you more stories about Teddy. He's quite an unusual dog, even if he doesn't have a drop of jindo blood in his veins.

Later though. Right now, I have to take him to the park so he can run with the dogs.

Thank you for listening, jb

Flying or Riding the Wave

Now and then, I dream I can fly.

It's never easy in those dreams. The best I can do is fly to the treetops and that is with great effort. When I fly, I am a great bird with small wings, never intended for much besides hopping leaps. I'm a turkey, working with every muscle of my body, every single muscle to get off the ground. I wake up sore when I dream I can fly. I'll lie in bed, barely removed from the dream of flight, sweating like a runner.

I feel like that now.

I promised myself that I wouldn't write about writing here, but it's hard not to. I published two books this fall. Marketing my books is complicated and I don't fly easily. I have to work very hard to get into the air. Writing is easy, but marketing is hard. Getting my books airborne takes every bit of muscle in my body and quite a bit of air from my lungs. After readings, I feel as though I've worked out. I'm pretty good at public speaking. I get my audiences to sing then the rest just flows out of me. But it's not just talking in front of people. It's sending queries and press releases and entering contests of dubious value. I want to go back to writing. Writing is more like letting water flow around your knees. It makes me a little wobbly until I let it float me up. I can float forever.

Today, I wondered why I never dream I swim the oceans, the rivers, the lakes. Water is my forte. Ah, yes. I have dreamed I flowed down a river. It was invigorating, crashing, dodging rocks, rolling out of the holes and down the chutes.

I am a sucker for a book with water on the cover. I assume I can swim in those words. Or drown. On Instagram, I follow a photographer of water, Andrew Semark. Just go look at his waves for a little while, just sit with them. Put them on a big screen. Buy prints for your walls. (No, this isn't an advertisement. He has no idea how much I love his photos.) Feel the power and the softness in his waves. I could drown in that softness. I could feel that power.

Water is resolute. If it needs to move, it will move no matter what's in its way, slip through your fingers, fling down trees, carve cliffs, pull a swimmer out to sea. One drop at a time, water changes everything.

"Never underestimate the power of water," Mike once said to the news crew when they interviewed him after a flood dug a twelve foot ditch and piled gravel on the highway six feet thick. I've felt that power. I felt it grab at my ankles as we piled sandbags around that new ditch to save a house and a garage. That water was going to flow. We were lucky we could guide it away from the house. That water rolled concrete blocks down onto the highway. It took three days for the department of transportation to move the pile of rocks after the flood. Never underestimate the water.

Yet, when I'm in the water, I feel so free. My parents called me a waterbug when I was little, a fish. When I was six and saw the ocean for the first time, a wave slapped me out of my father's hands and swirled me back onto the beach. I loved that honest wave. That feeling never left me. Even at fifty-seven, put me into a bathing suit in the water, and I can glide, dive, leap out of the water, and dive back down until I feel the pressure of the water on my eardrums. I am a child again in waves, a leaf in a current, and always that kid with wet shoes after a walk.

Maybe I shouldn't try to fly with my books. Maybe I need to dive deep and swim with them. Maybe I need to find the other fish, dolphins, whales, and urchins instead of trying to connect with birds and stars.

What do you think? Are you a bird flying or a creature of the sea?

I can tell it's past time for me to go to sleep. Dreamy or ridiculous. I can't tell which. But tonight, I want to dream of the depths, to crash into the air then dive back down into the blue, to slap my tail on the surface, to spiral, to flip and roll. I want to feel the softness, the resolution of the water on my soul. I want the water to carry me out, to pull me inexorably along the length of the coast.

I want to ride that wave.

Thank you for listening, jb