And Then...

...there was that time I wrote a novel in 30 days. No, really. I did. I've been aware of National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, as it's better known, for years. I've never participated because I've always had an excuse about being too busy, or already in the middle of a project, or some other lame rationalization. So I decided this year was different; it was time to jump in and see what would happen.

For those unfamiliar with the project that became an international event, NaNoWriMo challenges writers of every skill level to write a 50,000 word first draft in 30 days. That's an average of 1667 words per day. And the less prepared you are, the better. The idea is to experience seat-of-your-pants-style creative writing. The very idea of which can make a perfectionist break out in hives, but I jumped in anyway, with an idea that didn't begin to take shape until about the middle of October. So I actually sat down to write a novel, without an outline and with a very vague idea of who the main characters were, in a month. And an amazing thing happened: the less I worried about sentence structure, finding the exact right word, knowing what would happen next, and how I'd get out of the corner I'd just written myself into, the story started flowing, the characters revealed who they were and the plot unfolded.

Freelance writer Chris Baty started NaNoWriMo in the Bay Area in July of 1999 with 21 participants. In 2000, it was moved to November, "to more fully take advantage of the miserable weather." Last year, over 400,000 participants labored over their keyboards and made something out of nothing. They conjured words out of thin air, coaxed characters out of their imaginations, created worlds and wrote novels. The Young Writer's Program, which started in 2004, is a writing workshop for K-12 students. Each year, more than 100,000 students and educators in over 2,000 classrooms around the world have participated. How cool is that? For those who've asked me what's next, the only thing I'm sure of is more writing.

Image courtesy of National Novel Writing Month

Ten Years

 

Ten years ago
Was the end of

An era

A legend

A way of life

Ten years ago

Was the beginning of

A new chapter

A new identity

A new way of life

Ten years taught me about

Accepting change and loss

Finding strength

Making peace with the past

Ten years ago today

I walked into an uncertain future

Today I look back

With fondness

With pride

With love for my tribe

Today I look back and

See how far I've come

Know I can find my way

Believe how far I can go

Still Amazed…With Good Reason

It will come as a surprise to exactly no one that I was one of the 15,000+ cheering, screaming, dancing fans in attendance at the Golden 1 Center Tuesday night, to catch the inaugural show by none other than Paul McCartney. Most people know that I've loved and adored Sir Paul since I was a teenager. My closest friends indulge my fangirl tendencies and politely listen to my raving about his genius. And while it's highly unlikely I'd hang with anyone who didn't at least like him, I readily acknowledge that I'm in the group wherein fan truly comes from fanatic. To those who fail to see the light, I could just state the obvious and point to his unrivaled success and other-worldly ability to crank out hit after hit (which I've done in the past), but what really sets Macca apart from his rock star royalty contemporaries is his natural ability to engage an audience.

It's obvious that he's a born performer, as were the other three Beatles, but Paul can face a club, an arena or a giant outdoor stadium and talk to the crowd as if we were all sitting in his living room. He's honed his between-songs banter over the years, but it never comes across as rehearsed or stilted; it really feels like we're having an intimate conversation, whether he's talking about the inspiration for a particular song, or telling a story about the early days of the Beatles. Tuesday night he talked about how nervous he and his Liverpool compadres were during their first recording session with George Martin, and said that he can still hear the nerves in his vocals on "Love Me Do" when he listens to that track.

The stand-out crowd-engaging moment from that night though, was courtesy of a 12-year-old. (The age range at his concerts is truly wonderful). People often bring hand-lettered signs to the shows, and Sir Paul has recently been inviting fans whose signs catch his eye onto the stage. This girl's sign read, "I’m 12 years old and I want to hold your hand." She was wearing a Beatles t-shirt and I'm sure her knees were shaking as she crossed that stage. Paul asked her name and said he wanted to hold her hand too, and then took one in both of his. Every person in that arena felt that girl's elation, and when Paul put his arm around her and she started to cry we all did too. Whether or not you're in regular contact with your inner fangirl, like, ahem, some of us, moments like that bring out the teenager in everyone. I'll be forever grateful that an artist I've admired for so long still wants to perform and bring joy to his legion of fans. No doubt about it, we’re still amazed...

Buzzword Bingo

I like word games as much as the next grammar geek, but I must confess that I'm growing weary of rewriting my résumé and tweaking state applications to contain just the right words that will be picked up by the bots and then hopefully land in front of a human. I understand the game: pour over the job description, select that perfect combination of words or phrases that will somehow indicate my being the best fit for that particular position, incorporate them into my work experience and, voila! The bots will swipe right. (I suspect chicken bones, hemlock and runes are also involved, but I can't prove it). I understand how the game works, but I'm tired of it.

However, since I have no choice but to continue playing if I'm going to land a gig, I need to figure out how to deal with this nonsense. So I choose sarcasm (duh), which will surprise no one. The recurring hits are just begging for a top ten list, so here they are, in no particular order:

Compelling. As opposed to what, boring as hell?
Strategic vision. Presumably a strategy is in place before hiring begins...
Web savvy. Does this really even need to be stated?
Multi-faceted. Two-faced?
Digital expert. h/t to Rojer, does this mean an expert thumb twiddler?
Implement (verb). Just say "start" or "put in place."
Collaboration. Just once I'd like to see this described as "playing nicely with others."
Analytical thinker. Wait. You want me to think and be able to analyze stuff?
Stakeholder. I'm not even sure why this one bugs me, it just does.
Facilitation. I'd like to see this one as "make stuff happen."

Of course, all of the above are perfectly benign, when encountered by themselves. It's seeing them day after day in a multitude of job listings that's making my head hurt. I'm thinking of making scorecards and setting up online matches for my similarly displaced compatriots. And, since thinking of this analogy, I can't help but picture Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons saying, "Worst bingo game ever!" 

The Continuing Saga of “This isn’t What I Planned…”

Unemployment misconception #437: Being out of work, I'll post on my blog every week. Nope...it hasn't turned out that way. Granted, I am putting serious hours into the job search, tweaking my resume this way and that, trying to make my skill set and work history sound compelling. There's another INFP stumbling block - I'm so over talking about myself. But even with all of that, I can't claim I'm putting in 40 hours a week, so why am I not cranking out the blog posts, or writing much of anything lately?

I'm really not sure. We've all heard, or possibly given, the advice to put the angst (or fear, anger, depression, etc.) into the art. And it makes sense. Great art comes from great upheaval. When all is well and we're cruising along with no conflicts, there's no edge, which is boring. So given my current unemployed status, frustration at the less than robust job market, and general feeling of "what the hell do I do next?" I should be writing like crazy. It appears my muse isn't so fond of angst. Or, it might be that I have very little tolerance for my own whininess and I just don't want to explore what's going on in my head right now. Most of my former colleagues are in the same boat, and things really could be much worse, but I'm pretty fed up with this week, with events ranging from ridiculous to annoying to disappointing to are you freaking kidding me?

It started with an email informing me that my online application was reviewed but I don't possess the desired qualifications to warrant an interview. Then, another day passed without a phone call about a job I interviewed for on the first. It's starting to look like the decision has been made but it has nothing to do with me. Awesome. Here's something I couldn't make up: I received a physical letter thanking me for going paperless. Seriously. The winner though, was an email sent at 5:30 this afternoon, telling me my application is being reviewed but they need my unofficial college transcript, by Friday at 4 PM. Um, what?? My transcript? In two days? I had no idea I'd ever need to even think about that again. So I went to Sac State's website, jumped through the required hoops and $26 later was promised a "rushed" copy, in three days. Super. I'm sure I'll see the humor in all of this...eventually, and possibly even be inspired. Perhaps my muse leans toward off-beat humor, which would surprise no one.

What’s an INFP to Do?

Somehow it's the end of August, and after my company was sold and the entire staff laid off at the beginning of June, I've spent the bulk of the summer looking for work. Applying for jobs, taking state tests and figuring out how to navigate the state application process (that particular bit of fun deserved an entire post of its own) have been at the forefront of my summer activities. I've revised, re-written or tweaked my résumé for each application. All of this in the hope, of course, of landing interviews, which have been few and far between. I did have an interview at the end of July, my first in ten years. Yes, I survived, no, I didn't get the gig. I didn't even make it to the second round. Sigh...

A decade (or more) between job interviews is what happens when you tend to stay put and not job-hop. I've never possessed, or even understood the kind of energy required to pretty much always have an eye out for the next gig. I'm not career-driven and apparently never will be, so that way of thinking will always be foreign to me. Are there really personality types who don’t mind being the FNG every few years?

Late last week, I received a call and set up an interview for later this week. So here I am, preparing for said interview, reviewing the job description, learning about the agency and coming up with answers to likely questions about my work habits, ability to play nicely with others, blah, blah, blah. But, in true INFP fashion, the thing that's most likely to make me break out in hives is the dreaded, "Tell us about yourself." I'm desperately hoping no one does that anymore. I know I can't get away with saying, "I'm an introvert and I freaking hate having to do this," but I sincerely wish I could just point to my résumé. Obviously it was deemed good enough to get me in the door or they wouldn’t have called me. As is typical of me, I'll worry about this until I arrive for the inquisition and then come up with something on the spot that I won't remember later. If the stars align, perhaps at least one of the interviewers will be of a like Myers-Briggs type. We introverts like to stick together. Separately, of course...

Attack of the Acronym

I've been submitting state applications at a pretty steady pace for the past two months, and I feel like I finally have it down. There's a learning curve just like anything else, of course, and a few friends have given me some very helpful advice, but it's really been like having to learn a whole new language, between the government-speak of the job descriptions and duty statements, not to mention the alphabet soup of SSAs, SSMs, AGPAs, SOQs and KSAs... OMFG...

It occurred to me that being frustrated at what seemed to be willful obfuscation was getting me nowhere fast. I needed to adjust my mindset and look at the process like a puzzle, a cryptic code to be cracked. I was, after all, dealing with words. So the game took on a new pattern: search the job listings, read the descriptions to find what looked like it might be a good fit, tweak the application and résumé to align with the duty statement and submit. And repeat. And repeat again. Each time I run down the checklist and think, this one is ready to go, and hit submit or drop an application package into the mail, I experience a sense of satisfaction that has nothing to do with the fact that my efforts may eventually land me my next gig. It's about solving the puzzle. It's about persevering and figuring it out. But I don't think I can add "state-speak" to my skill set under Additional Languages...

This is My Escape

I was talking to a friend the other day about writing fiction vs. writing non-fiction. I'd asked if a piece she's currently working on is a story or an essay. She said, "Oh, it’s non-fiction. I don't do fiction." We went on to discuss the motivations for different kinds of writing and it struck me that while I've written plenty of non-fiction, including newsletter articles for my last job and pieces for Yuba-Sutter Community Magazine, fiction is my comfort zone. It's an escape mechanism for me, as I like what happens in the worlds I create much more than what goes on in this one, especially lately. (What the hell, 2016??)

But setting aside the insanity that is the current political climate and the horrendous hits the music world has taken this year, I have to admit that I've always used fiction as an escape, from the stories I made up as a child, to the painfully awkward pieces I wrote as a teen, to my first novel. And I'm reasonably sure that if you were to ask ten different writers what fiction is to them, you're likely to get ten different answers. Carrying on with that train of thought, ask ten different readers what fiction is to them and get as many different answers.

Fiction might be dismissed by some as lightweight, or less important than non-fiction, especially if it isn't "literature," but I contend that a piece that's meant to entertain and offer a temporary respite from the woes of the world can also educate, enlighten and offer insight into the human condition.

And Then...

Sometimes you make plans—big plans, for big change—and everything comes together without incident. But sometimes, the Universe says, "Really? Think again..." A little over a month ago, I thought I was going to sell my house and move into a neighborhood I was keen to get into. In fact, I'd accepted an offer, and then a half-hour after digi-signing papers, I went into a company meeting wherein my colleagues and I learned our company had been sold and the new owners were going to close the office. Um...okay, so I wouldn't be selling my house, or moving, I'd be looking for a new job. <sarcasm>Fabulous! I'm so good at that!</sarcasm>

Now that I've had time to truly digest this turn of events, dust off the resume, deal with severance paperwork and file for unemployment, it's really sinking in how different this experience is from the last time I was in this predicament, an unfathomable almost ten years ago. When Tower was sold to a liquidation firm and we were all ousted, I had no idea how to be unemployed. I was completely freaked out about, well, everything. How would I pay my bills? Would I have to subsist on ramen? And the emotional element...I'd lost not only my livelihood, but my extended family and community as well. I spent far too much time alone and worrying, growing ever more depressed by the job listings I was compulsively pouring over every day. I'm still not sure how I resisted the impulse to throw my computer out the window upon seeing "Human Directional" (yes, that’s what they call the guys who wave signs around on street corners) under "Marketing jobs recommended for Denise."

Older, and hopefully at least a bit wiser this time around, I intend to do pretty much everything completely differently. No more searching job listings for three hours every morning. No more self-imposed exile because I think I shouldn't burn the gas. I know I do better with structure, so I do in fact have a daily schedule of sorts, but along with the job search, it includes time for bike rides, lots of reading and writing. I'm also volunteering at the Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services and the Friends of the Sacramento Library Book Den which has been great fun so far. How can shelving books in a warehouse for four hours make me so happy? In the wise words of a friend, "Once, therefore always, a bookseller."

I don't know how long it will take for me to land my next gig, but I know it will happen. I knew that intellectually last time, but this time I know it emotionally too.      

A Place for My Stuff

Nothing makes you take a good look at your possessions and consider embracing a minimalist lifestyle like contemplating a move. I don't mean the basics, like furniture or clothing, but the things we all accumulate, which seem to multiply exponentially the longer you stay at a given address. I've been cleaning out closets, trying to decide what I really need, while wondering how on earth I have so much when I thought I was already pretty much a minimalist. Add my book habit to the mix and, um...I have an awful lot of stuff.

Book junkie tendencies aside, I think Mr. Carlin was on to something, even before rampant consumerism became such a thing. Why do we allow our possessions to define us? What is it that makes us think an amazing personal library or prestigious art or music collection speaks to our character or what kind of people we are?

Doing a thorough spring cleaning or a pre-moving junk toss always reminds me of a book I purchased for the Tower stores many years ago, called, Material World: A Global Family Portrait. If any of us were to pile all of our possessions around us outside our homes, how would we feel? Proud? Surprised? Embarrassed? (And how much would be tossed prior to the exercise?) Is this just what happens in a consumer-driven culture? I read an article a few years ago, in which the author advised spending money on experiences rather than things. Good advice that I've tried to take that to heart, but looking at my possessions, and contemplating packing every last one into a box, moving and then unpacking them, tells me I have a ways to go. More experiences, fewer things. More living, less collecting. As long as I have a place for my important stuff...

Tell Me What You See

People-watching is always an enjoyable activity, but it's a particularly useful one for writers. (As is eavesdropping, but that's a topic for another post). This past Friday night, I was in Nevada City to see my favorite local band, Saint Ashbury, play at Cooper's bar. Watching people interact in bars is pretty fascinating anyway, but small town bars filled with locals? Gold mine.

My friends and I arrived about 20 minutes before the band was due to go on and as we stood near the stage chatting, an older guy of indeterminate age walked by. He was balding, but his long white hair touched his shoulders and he had a long white beard to match. He was wearing a t-shirt, spandex exercise pants and white athletic socks, sans shoes. The woman I was talking to smiled at my raised eyebrow, and whispered, "That’s J_____.  He went home to change into those pants so he can dance tonight." Apparently J is a regular at Cooper's, and dance he did, by himself, with a lady friend roughly his age, and any woman who happened to be on the dance floor, including me. Amusement at his outfit aside, I started watching J be in the moment and enjoy the evening. He was content just to listen to the music and let it move him. His stockinged feet slid around the old wooden floor and he was in heaven.

I also met a couple who'd gotten married at the county court house earlier that day. The woman was dressed like most of us in the bar: sweater, jeans and boots. But the man, he had gone all out. He was wearing a vintage suit, complete with a white shirt, skinny tie, a fedora and black and white wing tips. I didn't ask, but was dying to know if she had attended their ceremony dressed as she was while her groom had pulled out all the stops.

People-watching is great fun, especially in cities like San Francisco or New York, but there's something inherently sweet about the eccentricities found in the small towns in the foothills. There's a delightful lack of self-consciousness, and I had the sense that no one--including the woman who was around my age and way over-dressed for a hole-in-the-wall bar on a rainy night--was trying too hard or thinking too much about how they looked. They were just out to have a good time on a Friday night.

Will J, the dressed up woman or the newlyweds (or some iteration of them) appear in my writing at some point? It's entirely possible. If we pay attention, real life shows us things we couldn't possibly make up. Power to the people...

A Billion Stars Look Very Different Today…

2016 hasn't been very kind to the entertainment world so far. David Bowie. Alan Rickman. Glenn Frey. What is going on?? The web is packed with celebrity tributes and remembrances, and of course Facebook is full of posts expressing grief over the loss of these artists whose work touched so many lives. High-profile celebrity deaths seem to neatly divide people into two distinct camps: those who don't understand mourning the loss of someone you've never met, and those who get it. (Guess which camp I'm in).

Not to take anything away from Mr. Rickman, who was an absolutely brilliant actor, and by all accounts I've read, a stellar human being, but losing a musician, especially a multi-faceted, brilliant artist like David Bowie, or an architect of a classic sub-genre like Glenn Frey, hits harder and cuts more deeply. Growing up listening to someone's music can influence everything from who we choose to hang out with to the way we see the world. I'll wager that most of us can name at least one musician or band that we absolutely feel spoke to us, for us and about us, (especially during our teens and early 20s).

It's difficult to quantify the impact of an artist like David Bowie. I keep reading words like "visionary" and "genius," and while appropriate, they fall short. Glenn Frey, a kid from Detroit with a gift for writing songs became an integral part of the 1970s Southern California sound. Their art is their legacy, and the music remains, but the loss is all too real...and the stars do look very different today. Thank you for all the incredible music, gentlemen, and the peaceful, easy feelings you inspired. 

Promises Kept

Reading a new book by a favorite author featuring returning characters is like getting together again with old friends. It just feels...right. I've been a fan of Robert Crais since my early days at Tower Books and have therefore been hanging out with Elvis Cole and Joe Pike for quite a long time.

One of RC's great strengths is his ability to keep his signature characters fresh, and reveal a bit more about them in each book. The Promise, the 16^th novel in the Elvis-Joe series, brings Scott and Maggie from Suspect into Elvis and Joe's world. It's risky to mess with a successful franchise, especially one with a large fan base, but Crais pulls it off. The Promise really is one of those books you don't want to put down. (No, I will not use the term, 'unputdownable,' even though Dictionary.com claims it's a word). I finished it after midnight.

My theory as to why RC's books are so successful is that his characters touch something in all of us. From Elvis' wise cracks and Pinocchio clock making up for his lost childhood, to Joe's sunglasses hiding the pain in his impossibly blue eyes, to Scott's efforts to repair what's broken within, and even Maggie the German Shepherd, who understands that pack comes first, i.e. take care of your own, we can all relate on some level. And we want very much for each character to triumph over adversity and find what they're looking for.

A good novel draws readers in, makes them form emotional attachments with the characters and creates a personal interest in the outcome. The Promise does all that and more.  

We All Shine On

Nothing slows down time like a good book. Or, more precisely, finding a book I can't put down forces me to make better use of my time. Amid the holiday craziness of extra hours at work, more socializing than usual and the mad rush to get everything done, I got completely lost in Anthony Doerr's "All the Light We Cannot See."

It's a complex story, with wonderful character development, and Doerr's stunning use of language and vivid imagery makes it a pleasure to read. But it went deeper for me. Perhaps it's because I'm the daughter and granddaughter of people who survived World War II by living in a cellar in Brussels while Hitler's army bombed Belgium. Maybe having an emotional link with such a dark time in history made me immediately bond with Marie-Laure, a young blind girl, as I pictured her making her way up and down the winding stairs in her uncle's tall house by the sea, in Saint Malo. Marie-Laure is only a few years older than my mother was at the beginning of the war, when nearly everything she had known changed dramatically.

I also developed a deep empathy for Werner, the young German soldier who is cast into the ugliness of war when he's just a small-for-his-age 14-year-old. Given my heritage, the Germans were of course the enemy, but I just couldn't see Werner that way. He was a boy, an orphan who ended up at an academy for Hitler Youth thanks to his expertise building and fixing radios. His and Marie-Laure's stories come together in Saint Malo, near the end of the war, as Germany loses its hold on France. Strangers and enemies, barely more than children, they experience the illumination of human connection. For a story full of the darkness of war, Doerr's novel is also full of light: sunlight on the ocean, the sea breeze drifting into the window of Marie-Laure's tiny bedroom, Werner's need to be decent, even in brutal circumstances, and kindness against a backdrop of brutality. Not all light can be seen, but it certainly can be felt.