Slothful Inspiration

Yesterday I took a much needed lazy day and the snow and wind outside encouraged indoor pursuits, filling me with a desire to nap. After a whirlwind week of home trailer repair, working on the barn office floor, taming a large(and vengeful) thornbush, raking the vegetable garden, and a visit from Mr. W.'s cousin(great fun!But I think next time, I will forego the butter on the movie popcorn. The after-effects were part of the lazy day inspiration), a day of lounging on the couch with a heating pad on my sore, knotted shoulder was wonderful.

What did I do? Obviously, I did not blog. I did read (Middlemarch, my continuing attempt at filling the literary gaps in my education), but mainly, I channeled my inner sofa vegetable, occasionaly straining my clicker-finger.

I watched part of Avatar and my favorite pieces of The Proposal- how I love that movie. I flicked back and forth, until, perusing the guide, I found Immortal Beloved on the Indie channel.

It's one of my favorite flicks. There is no one who can do genius/crazy like Gary Oldman. Imagine my delight, when in the beginning scenes. I recognized the square in front of Prague Castle. So there I was, lounging on my couch, sharing an afternoon with Beethoven and Prague.

Being the dork that I am, I grabbed my Kindle and downloaded the writings of Herr Ludwig and read excerpts as I listened to the dialogue. Very interesting. Very, very enlightening. I scratched just the surface, but I found ideas as stunning and complex as his music. And of course, there is the ideal of his "Unsterbliche Geliebte" (Immortal Beloved). And no one knows who she was.

So where did all this creative stirring take me?

I would love to say that it inspired a frenzy of ideas, sending me screaming to my computer to relieve the pressure of my fecund imagination, birthing exiting stories and pages of brilliance.

It did stir things up a bit. I jotted down a few new thoughts. Then watched The Bounty Hunter. Yeah. That killed all intellectual stimulation. I could feel my Muse writhing in the corners. I think she had a few vivid homicidal thoughts directed at yours truly during that irretreivable hour-and-a half. Though maybe she hated me more when I attempted "Moonlight Sonata" on my severely out-of-tune piano. Pathetic. I know. Especially when you consider that in the many, many, tortuous years of lessons, some at a reputable music school, I never mastered reading music...

There are always recordings by people who can actually play Beethoven and the books on my Kindle to relight the creative flame. Despite the dousing of the creative flame by stale romantic comedy, ideas are still swirling around my Muse, who is desparately trying to capture and tame them into something coherent.

I'll let you know how that works out.

Late Night Writing

It's too late to write much here. I've been working on what I have ambitiously renamed my Best Fantasy Novel Ever (BFNE). Someone I respect told me in no uncertain terms that if I called it the Crappy Fantasy Novel, that is what it would be. So here's to thinking positively.

I have Pandora set on Lorenna McKennitt and I feel as if I am finding my way back from a dream.

In it, there is this confused young man. Is he bespelled by his father, the Mad King, or by the admiration of the intriguing girl who inhabits his tent. She is as much a prisoner as he in this armed camp. He could set her free, return her to the family that fears for her safety. He could return her to the mother who is convinced her daughter is dead.

With the click of the mouse and the removal of earbuds, I leave the smoky cacophany of an archaic army, and these characters, who are dear to my heart. After all, I have carried them around in one form or another since the eighth grade.

They are saved and waiting for tomorrow, when I will write their immediate fate. Though if I am honest I will see them sooner, as soon as sleep takes me, I will return.

Manhattan Adventure

I missed the train. And since I had an appointment with a dermatologist at 11:30, waiting for the next train was not an option. That was how, after a few minutes bitching and berating myself for not loking up the train schedule the night before-something I normally do, I found myself heading toward the Big Apple in the car.

It's not that I don't know how to get there. In this age of GPS and smartphones, you can always find your way. It was more the terror of throwing myself into that crazy mix of taxis, busses, police cars, and nutty drivers all vying for the same road real estate as me. Yes, they are all crazy!

Luckily, it was MLK day and the streets were almost tranquil. There was even street parking available, if I could decipher what exactly the parking rules were. Signs abound, but what they actually tell you leaves a lot to the imagination.

The first lot I pulled into quoted an obscene price for a parking space, so after twenty rotations around 5th and Madison-look! It's the Met and now, Jonathan Adler's boutique, the Met, there's the Dr.'s office, Jonathan Adler, Met- I settled on parking in the museum lot. Go figure, it was cheaper. Bonus. I stil had 45 minutes to kill before the earliest I was willing to show up for my appointment. Around the blocks again, texting and walking, hood up because I forgot a hat, wondering if anybody was noticing me passing the same windows twenty times.

My appointment was uneventful, if you call having a chunk of shin removed for biopsy, even though I was assured, "Don't lose sleep over this. I am almost 100% positive it's nothing." But being a Melanoma survivor, it's always good to be paranoid.

I strolled out of the office with two tiny stitches, a pressure bandage, a numb shin, freedom from worry, and a day in NY awaiting. What to do?

Hey, there's the Met!

It was the first time I could meander through the galleries without worrying about anything but myself. I said hello to "Little Archer" (I do believe it is a Michaelangelo, but have no concrete reason why), wandered through the Greek and Roman displays, and found myself in the Polynesian galleries. Oh, this is new.

I didn't examine anything closely, rather I let myself absorb the massive entirety of the museum. The variety was what I took in, this immense history of art. It resonated in a deep and vital piece of my consciousness; this evidence of a consistent need within the human psyche to create beauty and document our tenuous existences.

It was what I needed. Did it fuel the fires of creativity? Did I come home with new ideas, plug into my laptop and while away hourse in a frenzy of productivity? No.

I left the Met and walked eight blocks to the nearest Shake Shack, where I pigged down a burger, cheese fries and a root beer float. Awesome. In my defense, I did observe some of NY's finest characters and filed them away for future reference.

I went back to the car, paid my parking fee, and got myself out of the city with little trouble. My shin was beginning to throb, and guilt from my food orgy set in, but it was a wonderful experience. The city, with it's art, culture, and plethora of personalities and eaves-dropping opportunities, seems closer than ever.

Old Thoughts and New Words

I’ll chalk it up to too much self-examination
And Sarah McLaughlin.

That's the first line to a poem I started writing years ago. I like it.

It's the pressure that gets to me. It's a burden imposed by no one but myself and it is substantial. I have this need to be doing something meaningfully beautiful, to produce the kind of writing that I love to read. Sometimes I come close. However, those moments where I have dipped a toe into the well of creative exquisiteness spring from the mire of emotional suffering.

I am not suffering right now, therefore I feel I have lost a needed edge. When I am happy, my writing is more clinical and academic, when I am down, it is more visceral. Perhaps that is the nature of creativity. Genius is frequently linked to madness.

These are just thoughts and ponderings to release me from the restraint of insecurity. I guess I am still afraid to let go and embrace a writing life.

So here I am, Sarah McLaughlin on my iPod, revisiting some of my unfinished thoughts and attempting to think new ones. Now, I can hear my sister saying, "Is somebody depressed?" Absolutely not. It's more of an examination of where I was, compared to where I am. Sort of the reverse of Black Swan- saw the movie the other night and it was fabulous. Even Mr. W., who I fully expected to hate it, kept saying, "Wow! Just wow!" My point is (without spoiling the movie for others) is that there are two pieces of my self, that I am trying to get comfortable with and integrate for the betterment of my chosen craft. In short, I want to be perfect or maybe I am just afraid to fall short of my own expectations of perfections. And, like her, I am the only one standing in my way. I need to kick my own ass.

At least my revisitations have led me to a new word, a word I think defines what I am trying to do for myself: omphaloskepsis. I'm not really sure it's real, since I have not found it in three different dictionaries. The closest I came was Omphalos(a stone that is, according to the followers of the Temple of Apollo, the center of the world) in the New College Dictionary.

According to my copy of The Thinker's Thesaurus (thanks to the NYC weekend girls!), omphaloskepis is a synonym for meditation as in "staring at one's belly button as an aid to meditation."
It goes on to cite a usage:
"The point of [Paul Goodman's philosophy], as near as I can make it out, is to achieve a kind of omphaloskepsis, repeatedly examining yourself and your motives and connections with the world around [you], and thus achieving health, or at least avoiding neurosis, by putting forth, as much and as continuously as possible, the authentic self. (Kirkpatrick Sale, review of Crazy Hope and Finite Experience: Essays of Paul Goodman, Nation, 4/10/1995.)"

Wow.
I love it.
Yes, I am aware I am a total geek, dork, dweeb, etc., etc., etc...

This is most of the working copy of the poem that opens this post- it's neither finished, nor abandoned yet.

I’ll chalk it up to too much self-examination
And Sarah McLaughlin.
Somewhere between Fear and Possession
The road entranced- unfurling beneath
My car’s speeding tires, as I
Meditate on love and friendship,
And last night’s dinner conversation.

I drive by habit, the road’s undulations more familiar
Than my own skin.
Pavement is evident and explainable.

Melancholy songs fuel my rambling thoughts-
What you tried to tell me-
Reminding me of all the times I listened
Without hearing.

Too bad omphaloskepsis doesn't really fit in the poem, but it would work as a title, don't you think?
Or maybe I need a new playlist.