I have been completely brainwashed by NBC.
Here I am, sitting eagerly in front of my television, ready to watch the whole, long evening of Olympics coverage just to see Michael Phelps swim for his 8th gold medal.
I swear that it's the Countdown To Michael Phelps that pops up on the right of the screen during any sport. "9 MINUTES TO PHELPS," it flashes. "5 MINUTES TO PHELPS!" Hallelujah, everyone, "2 MINUTES TO PHELPS!!!"
The swimmers look like alien sea-people to me, faintly disturbing in the boneless way that their arms and spines move, but I'm still here, waiting for the countdown. Someone in the NBC marketing department knows their stuff.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Thursday, August 14, 2008
and home again, with appearance by knight in shining armour
So, directly from the airport I went to see my sister dance (beautifully, as always) in a two and a half hour performance. Now, as much as I adore watching dance in general, and watching my sister dance in particular, after the Clarion-induced sleep deprivation, two and a half hours was a struggle. My eyes started to get that glass-eye feeling, that weird sensation when the eyeballs are staring really hard and are incapable of focussing on anything, and the eyelids forget what it's like to blink.
My sister was in this amazing piece of choreography by Ohad Naharin. It's a group dance done in chairs to a Jewish echad. The movement is visceral, explosive, and the sort of thing that makes me lean forward in my chair so I can feel the music vibrate my through my chest a bit. There's a snippet of the choreography in this video of Nederlands Dans Theatre.
Since then, I've been fitting myself back into this other life. For six weeks we were in an odd bubble, a suspended chunk of stretched out time cut off from the rest of the world, and coming back to a land where other things besides writing and story-telling exist is entirely strange. I miss my writing people. I spend too much time online, keeping up with our long email conversations and chatting (chatting! I never chat). I miss having them all there, just through the next door, or upstairs, or in the spaceship library, or ahead of me on one of our mad walks through the night... They're all still there though, just a bit more spread out, and that makes me indescribably happy. I love knowing that if I have the weird desire to talk about stories in the middle of the night, I'll have at least one wonderful somebody to call, no matter the time, because we're scattered across so many time zones.
An adventure:
While driving home from the city this afternoon, the car in front of me swerved and almost took out a car in the next lane. I had time to think, "why in all the world did they do that?" and then I saw that they did it to avoid the very large and flat piece of metal on the road in front of me. A truck prevented me from doing the same, so I just shrunk down into my seat and drove straight over. It was very loud. A few minutes later, I was driving along on a flat, rattling tire. I pulled over to the shoulder and rang up AAA for assistance (yes, I'm one of those lame girls who has absolutely no idea how to change a tire), when, miraculously, what should appear behind my car but a shiny white towtruck.
Apparently, there's a Freeway Service Patrol made up of lovely, helpful people who drive around the freeways in shiny towtrucks, looking for people in vehicular distress. My personal knight, a G. Menendez, put my spare tire on and sent me on my way with reassuring words. Then, he got into his towtruck and drove away. I felt like I had just seen a fairy godmother.
Hurrah for the Freeway Service Patrol.
My sister was in this amazing piece of choreography by Ohad Naharin. It's a group dance done in chairs to a Jewish echad. The movement is visceral, explosive, and the sort of thing that makes me lean forward in my chair so I can feel the music vibrate my through my chest a bit. There's a snippet of the choreography in this video of Nederlands Dans Theatre.
Since then, I've been fitting myself back into this other life. For six weeks we were in an odd bubble, a suspended chunk of stretched out time cut off from the rest of the world, and coming back to a land where other things besides writing and story-telling exist is entirely strange. I miss my writing people. I spend too much time online, keeping up with our long email conversations and chatting (chatting! I never chat). I miss having them all there, just through the next door, or upstairs, or in the spaceship library, or ahead of me on one of our mad walks through the night... They're all still there though, just a bit more spread out, and that makes me indescribably happy. I love knowing that if I have the weird desire to talk about stories in the middle of the night, I'll have at least one wonderful somebody to call, no matter the time, because we're scattered across so many time zones.
An adventure:
While driving home from the city this afternoon, the car in front of me swerved and almost took out a car in the next lane. I had time to think, "why in all the world did they do that?" and then I saw that they did it to avoid the very large and flat piece of metal on the road in front of me. A truck prevented me from doing the same, so I just shrunk down into my seat and drove straight over. It was very loud. A few minutes later, I was driving along on a flat, rattling tire. I pulled over to the shoulder and rang up AAA for assistance (yes, I'm one of those lame girls who has absolutely no idea how to change a tire), when, miraculously, what should appear behind my car but a shiny white towtruck.
Apparently, there's a Freeway Service Patrol made up of lovely, helpful people who drive around the freeways in shiny towtrucks, looking for people in vehicular distress. My personal knight, a G. Menendez, put my spare tire on and sent me on my way with reassuring words. Then, he got into his towtruck and drove away. I felt like I had just seen a fairy godmother.
Hurrah for the Freeway Service Patrol.
Saturday, August 9, 2008
goodbyes
Sometimes, goodbyes are really, really hard. Like when you’ve just spent six weeks with some of the most fascinating, intelligent, and wonderful people… and now you’re leaving them, without knowing when and if you’ll see them again. It’s quite distressing.
Saturday, August 2, 2008
beneath the cliffs of doom
There is this gorgeous beach a short walk from our campus. It's at the bottom of some steep bluffs, so you can either take a very sloped, but paved road, or you can walk out to the para-gliding center and clamber down a crumbling, rocky set of stairs that make you feel like you're Indiana Jones. Obviously, we prefer the stairs. The very last bit disintegrates into a sandy slide that you have to take at a jog. If you try to make measured, careful steps, your feet start slipping out from under you.
Stairs or road, either way you get one of those breathtaking and entirely Californian views:
Though, if you take the stairs, you get to pass the Salk Institute, which looks like nothing so much as a place where mad scientists breed nightmare creatures for nefarious ends. It is a gloriously forbidding building made up of cement blocks and very few windows, with turrets and sad patio furniture and signs that say "NO LAB COATS IN THE CAFETERIA".
We've taken Kelly, Mary Anne, and Nalo to the beach. Other times we've just skipped off there on our own and admired the sunset. It's a nice, sandy beach, but it is at the bottom of some cliffs, and one of my favourite things about it are the signs telling you to beware the cliffs that may fall on top of your head.
We went to the beach this morning (down the stairs this time), and then we had some Mexican food, and then I fell asleep on the couch in the middle of reading a story, and now I'm having a think about what I'm going to write for next week. There are little hints of lycanthropy, Victorian circuses, and fairy tales swimming through my head, but nothing solid enough to start writing on yet. Hopefully, I'll find a trail to follow this evening and pick my way along the messy bits that are my first drafts.
Stairs or road, either way you get one of those breathtaking and entirely Californian views:
Though, if you take the stairs, you get to pass the Salk Institute, which looks like nothing so much as a place where mad scientists breed nightmare creatures for nefarious ends. It is a gloriously forbidding building made up of cement blocks and very few windows, with turrets and sad patio furniture and signs that say "NO LAB COATS IN THE CAFETERIA".We've taken Kelly, Mary Anne, and Nalo to the beach. Other times we've just skipped off there on our own and admired the sunset. It's a nice, sandy beach, but it is at the bottom of some cliffs, and one of my favourite things about it are the signs telling you to beware the cliffs that may fall on top of your head.
We went to the beach this morning (down the stairs this time), and then we had some Mexican food, and then I fell asleep on the couch in the middle of reading a story, and now I'm having a think about what I'm going to write for next week. There are little hints of lycanthropy, Victorian circuses, and fairy tales swimming through my head, but nothing solid enough to start writing on yet. Hopefully, I'll find a trail to follow this evening and pick my way along the messy bits that are my first drafts.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
tiredness
Hullo. I'm just back from getting one of the lovely custodians here to unlock my room. I popped into my room to check on my computer and popped back out to go for a walk, and the second--the very second!--that I shut my door, I realised that my keys were still sitting on my desk, no doubt luxuriating in their uselessness.
My head is all foggy with too little sleep.
I had to turn in a story this afternoon, and because my head was being stubborn and resisting thinking in "story", I couldn't get down to it properly until yesterday afternoon. Then I had to write and write and write. The story came out all lumpy and amorphous, but at least it's on paper (though I had to delete some TRULY awful and maudlin lines that probably occurred to me at three o'clock in the morning), and that makes it easier to think about. Someday, I want to be able to tell a proper story, something with characters to love and a real yarn down the middle. Right now, it's hard for me to think of anything even remotely like that, but once a story is out of my head, it's so much easier to look at it and see where the wobbly bits are.
Neil says that you have to walk a fine line between giving a reader everything and leaving them enough space to make art. I've been thinking about that quite a bit lately. I don't think I've been able to work that balancing act properly yet, but it's a thought that's fascinating to poke at from different directions.
My head is all foggy with too little sleep.
I had to turn in a story this afternoon, and because my head was being stubborn and resisting thinking in "story", I couldn't get down to it properly until yesterday afternoon. Then I had to write and write and write. The story came out all lumpy and amorphous, but at least it's on paper (though I had to delete some TRULY awful and maudlin lines that probably occurred to me at three o'clock in the morning), and that makes it easier to think about. Someday, I want to be able to tell a proper story, something with characters to love and a real yarn down the middle. Right now, it's hard for me to think of anything even remotely like that, but once a story is out of my head, it's so much easier to look at it and see where the wobbly bits are.
Neil says that you have to walk a fine line between giving a reader everything and leaving them enough space to make art. I've been thinking about that quite a bit lately. I don't think I've been able to work that balancing act properly yet, but it's a thought that's fascinating to poke at from different directions.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Owls and Cricket
It's entirely because of Neil Gaiman that I'm here at Clarion. Not just because I love his work (which I do), but because I only found out about Clarion through his blog. I had never heard of Clarion before, so when he mentioned that he was teaching, I followed the link and poked around the Clarion website and decided that this was a very cool thing and that I should apply, if only for the excuse to write two stories.
My supply of stories is very thin, and I didn't have any stories at all that fit the word limit for the application. So I wrote two new ones and had much fun. Thank you, Mr. Gaiman.
Neil is lovely, he really is. He is very kind and generous, with his time and thoughts, and he tells fantastic stories. He does these voices that are just hilarious. Some that I remember in particular: Harlan Ellison, William Shatner, and this wonderful, elderly librarian voice that made my stomach hurt from laughing too much.
Random reasons for happiness this week:
1. The cricket players and owls who arrived on Neil's first day.
2. The discussion of story, which broke all sorts of new holes in my head to let in more light.
3. Watching Liam McKean do breakdancing moves... The boy is a miniature Renaissance man and he can dance his feet off. I am such a fan.
4. A Saturday afternoon of NOT going to ComicCon and instead lounging about on the grass and getting lightly roasted while talking about radio plays.
5. Hearing about the Danse Macabre, the Mack-a-bray, in a chapter from The Graveyard Book which says, in a few sentences, what it feels like when you're really dancing, when it's going so well that you forget that you ever had to learn the steps.
6. Dancing until 3:30 in the morning to Neil's odd, and yet wonderfully appropriate, DJ-ing skills.
7. Getting picked up for a huge hug, which I've always felt are the best sort of hugs anyway.
8. Tea. Lots and lots of tea. The only way to survive critiquing SEVEN stories in one evening is to drink copious amounts of tea.
...And this is all on top of insightful and articulate teaching. Neil is very, very good at what he does, and he is able to articulate his thoughts about it, which is what makes for good teaching. He spots out the weaknesses in what you're doing now and points you towards other paths that you might not have noticed, but which you can explore, if you like, and find interesting things.
Some suggestions from Neil:
Angela Carter
Martin Millar
Gene Wolfe (Peace in particular)
"The Gardener" by Rudyard Kipling
Drowning By Numbers, a film by Peter Greenaway
I'll be missing him so much! Next up though are the wonderful Geoff Ryman and Nalo Hopkinson. Geoff has been around and he is very tall and very lovely. Nalo comes in later this evening and I can't wait to meet her.
My supply of stories is very thin, and I didn't have any stories at all that fit the word limit for the application. So I wrote two new ones and had much fun. Thank you, Mr. Gaiman.
Neil is lovely, he really is. He is very kind and generous, with his time and thoughts, and he tells fantastic stories. He does these voices that are just hilarious. Some that I remember in particular: Harlan Ellison, William Shatner, and this wonderful, elderly librarian voice that made my stomach hurt from laughing too much.
Random reasons for happiness this week:
1. The cricket players and owls who arrived on Neil's first day.
2. The discussion of story, which broke all sorts of new holes in my head to let in more light.
3. Watching Liam McKean do breakdancing moves... The boy is a miniature Renaissance man and he can dance his feet off. I am such a fan.
4. A Saturday afternoon of NOT going to ComicCon and instead lounging about on the grass and getting lightly roasted while talking about radio plays.
5. Hearing about the Danse Macabre, the Mack-a-bray, in a chapter from The Graveyard Book which says, in a few sentences, what it feels like when you're really dancing, when it's going so well that you forget that you ever had to learn the steps.
6. Dancing until 3:30 in the morning to Neil's odd, and yet wonderfully appropriate, DJ-ing skills.
7. Getting picked up for a huge hug, which I've always felt are the best sort of hugs anyway.
8. Tea. Lots and lots of tea. The only way to survive critiquing SEVEN stories in one evening is to drink copious amounts of tea.
...And this is all on top of insightful and articulate teaching. Neil is very, very good at what he does, and he is able to articulate his thoughts about it, which is what makes for good teaching. He spots out the weaknesses in what you're doing now and points you towards other paths that you might not have noticed, but which you can explore, if you like, and find interesting things.
Some suggestions from Neil:
Angela Carter
Martin Millar
Gene Wolfe (Peace in particular)
"The Gardener" by Rudyard Kipling
Drowning By Numbers, a film by Peter Greenaway
I'll be missing him so much! Next up though are the wonderful Geoff Ryman and Nalo Hopkinson. Geoff has been around and he is very tall and very lovely. Nalo comes in later this evening and I can't wait to meet her.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Clarion, or, why sleep is irrelevant.
Hullo.
I haven't been writing here, mainly because I am very lazy. I am incredibly lazy. Supremely lazy. Extraordinarily and over-the-top lazy. Writing in any kind of journal is one of those projects that are doomed to fall by the wayside for me.
However, right now I'm at the Clarion workshop in San Diego, and since I have been a horrible friend and fallen behind on all phone calls, I thought I'd write a bit here, make it a big letter of sorts. Six weeks is a long time, especially when you're drenching yourself in an unfamiliar world, and I feel like I've crammed in more new thoughts and ideas than could possibly fit.
So. Clarion is kind of fantastic. Right before I left for San Diego, I got really unenthusiastic about the idea of spending six weeks writing instead of dancing. I even thought about pulling out so that I could spend the summer in the studio doing boring physical therapy and moping about (when I look back, I'm not sure why this seemed so tempting, but dancers are crazy). But then I told myself to get it together and go. At least I'd be able to find out whether writing stories was really as fun as I thought it was.
It turns out that, not only are stories fun, they're also fascinating, frustrating, and addictive. The way you can create a version of a truth out of all the loose scraps rattling around in your head is interesting to me. In dance, you can't really stand apart from what you're making, so having something that sits outside of you when you finish working is really odd, but wonderful to me.
A recommendation to all of my bookish friends: try some Kelly Link. Kelly was our instructor for week one and I hadn't read any of her work before I got accepted to the program, but I'm now a solid fan. Her stories are flat out weird, but they're also intensely honest. Sometimes I don't understand what is going on in her stories, but it doesn't matter because, somehow, they slip in and make sense in all the shadowy, dreamy parts of your head. She introduced me to the term "night logic," which is now my favourite way of saying, well, that was weird, but I completely got it.
The people here are wonderful. I won't describe them now because it will take too long and it's so beautiful outside that I want to run out there and take a walk while it's still afternoon. Just take my word for it and know that they're great. Except for when they tempt you into staying up all night and going into workshop the next morning on zero sleep. Just say no. It may be fun, but the words start to come out of your mouth in the wrong order.
I haven't been writing here, mainly because I am very lazy. I am incredibly lazy. Supremely lazy. Extraordinarily and over-the-top lazy. Writing in any kind of journal is one of those projects that are doomed to fall by the wayside for me.
However, right now I'm at the Clarion workshop in San Diego, and since I have been a horrible friend and fallen behind on all phone calls, I thought I'd write a bit here, make it a big letter of sorts. Six weeks is a long time, especially when you're drenching yourself in an unfamiliar world, and I feel like I've crammed in more new thoughts and ideas than could possibly fit.
So. Clarion is kind of fantastic. Right before I left for San Diego, I got really unenthusiastic about the idea of spending six weeks writing instead of dancing. I even thought about pulling out so that I could spend the summer in the studio doing boring physical therapy and moping about (when I look back, I'm not sure why this seemed so tempting, but dancers are crazy). But then I told myself to get it together and go. At least I'd be able to find out whether writing stories was really as fun as I thought it was.
It turns out that, not only are stories fun, they're also fascinating, frustrating, and addictive. The way you can create a version of a truth out of all the loose scraps rattling around in your head is interesting to me. In dance, you can't really stand apart from what you're making, so having something that sits outside of you when you finish working is really odd, but wonderful to me.
A recommendation to all of my bookish friends: try some Kelly Link. Kelly was our instructor for week one and I hadn't read any of her work before I got accepted to the program, but I'm now a solid fan. Her stories are flat out weird, but they're also intensely honest. Sometimes I don't understand what is going on in her stories, but it doesn't matter because, somehow, they slip in and make sense in all the shadowy, dreamy parts of your head. She introduced me to the term "night logic," which is now my favourite way of saying, well, that was weird, but I completely got it.
The people here are wonderful. I won't describe them now because it will take too long and it's so beautiful outside that I want to run out there and take a walk while it's still afternoon. Just take my word for it and know that they're great. Except for when they tempt you into staying up all night and going into workshop the next morning on zero sleep. Just say no. It may be fun, but the words start to come out of your mouth in the wrong order.
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