A writer "retreats"

The writer in me was craving some peace and quiet, some long-term sitting time, some mental room in which to grow and nurture a thought plucked from thin air.

The rest of my daily life was having absolutely none of that idea!  The last few years have gone by with the speed and fury of a cyclone, carved up by job, commute, new grandbaby, elderly relatives in decline, funerals, household chores, writers’ conferences, wrestling with nature rather than ceding the field of battle over my ten little flower beds, and…of late…the addition of two “spare” cats to the household while their owners (my children) went temporarily overseas.

It seemed that I could hold no train of thought for longer than five minutes, and I was wilting from the lack. A dear friend of mine who I had first met at an idyllic writers’ retreat led by the late poet Norbert Blei was headed back to the idyll earlier this summer for a glorious full week away from reality.

I knew full well the value of that environment, and that recharging of the soul. I had experienced it for myself three times in the past decade, driving north along the western shore of Lake Michigan to “The Clearing” in Door County, a collection of log cabins and larger gathering places and campfire pits set on the shore of Green Bay, augmented by three hearty meals a day with the plates whisked away by the staff so that “the writers” could get back to work…or not. Another year, when my checking account permitted but my work schedule forbade my going up to The Clearing  I rented a tiny cottage on the lake and repaired there for a week of replenishing solitude. I hiked shaded trails, lived mostly like a hermit, and wrote…and napped…a lot.

Oh, this year as my friend prepared to launch into her writer’s Eden, I was so jealous! But a combination of scheduling problems and finances conspired to keep me from going with this time. A week away from home at a place like The Clearing is never cheap. Add to it the post-divorce costs associated with parking the dog in a kennel for a week and paying someone to drive over to feed the cats and make them feel validated, and the idea of a week-long getaway rapidly rose to the level of “pipe dream.”

Still…I knew I needed to recharge. Badly. And so I improvised.

I co-opted my youngest son and his wife, newly returned from a semester abroad “across the pond” in Ireland, to move in to the house while I’d be gone and play zookeepers to Lucky the dog and the four felines who had kept me in conversation, kitty litter and carpet shampoo for a number of months. One of the cats was theirs, and while I had grown incredibly fond of little Finnigan over the course of seven months, there was payback to be reaped. Knowing that the cats would not be “home alone” and full of mischief was a HUGE weight off my shoulders.

Then I got on line and started looking for a cheap motel room for an entire TWO DAYS that my other commitments didn’t cut into.  And lo and behold, I found a lovely place just two miles from Kohler Andrae state park, site of what I consider the loveliest beach in the state of Wisconsin. SOLD!! I booked the room and started to pack.

My needs, when you got right down to it, were very simple: a bed and a bathroom, breakfast, free WiFi, and above all, peace and quiet. Armed with my laptop computer, a picnic basket full of “gluten free” snacks and fruits, and several cans of Diet Coke, I set out to recharge my batteries.

It didn’t take long. I could feel both life and creativity flooding into me before I even stepped on to the sandy path leading from the parking lot to the beach. I felt my state of eternal vigilance and rapid responsiveness—dog, cats, elderly mother, kids, work, laundry, boyfriend, and the occasional raccoon in the garage—relax, and new trains of thought start to grow and evolve. I felt the daily realities and timetables and litter box maintenance fly right out of my head on the breeze, to be replaced by whimsy, and mischievousness, and, dare I say it, imagination.

Leaving the motel for the first time to head toward the beach, I drove past the ruins of an older motel, in full swing of being reclaimed by nature. It gave off the disturbing feel of the Bates Motel…about twenty years after abandonment when Norman Bates got locked up at the end of “Psycho.” It was desolate…and atmospheric…and I stopped to snap a lot of photos. A place that creepy has just got to find a spot in a story some day!

An early morning trip to the shore revealed that I was indeed the first person there, and I walked into sand shrouded in mist rising from the rains of the night before. The sand between the grass in the dunes was still pockmarked by raindrops, and I set my little blanket a few hundred feet from a gathering of seagulls at the water’s edge. While I am a rabid fan of Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s book “Gift From the Sea,” I admit I broke her cardinal rule that the shore is no place to work, but a place to replenish. And so I wrote.

I was writing “old school,” of course. I had left my iPhone in the car’s glove compartment, and the laptop back at the motel room. I was equipped with those most antiquated forms of writing accoutrements—a pen and a pad of paper.  But sitting there, surrounded by wind and waves and footprints in the sand, the thoughts and images just kept coming as though Pandora’s box had been opened. And every piece of dialogue that I jotted down, every shred of character development or backstory that emerged, invariably led to more. It would have been criminal NOT to write it all down! Nefariousness, clues, atmospherics, troubled families, emotional scars, observations of modern society—they all would have flared and then disappeared on the wind like leaves in autumn, gone for good if not pinned to the paper.

There were breaks in my action, of course. I can’t sit by the shore and not be lulled by the sight of rolling whitecaps. Or stretch out full-length and watch clouds pass by…or even just close my eyes and listen to the sounds of the wind and water. This is truly my favorite beach, reminiscent in size and endless, unbroken horizon of the shore at the edge of the ocean. While you may not spy any dolphins playing in the surf at daybreak, I personally find that the dearth of sharks and jellyfish is more than a fair trade-off.

And so it went. A trip to the beach followed by the trek back to the motel to read and research and type, after a quick shower to remove sand and sunblock. Write, rinse and repeat.

I will drive back toward reality and routine in a few hours, but not before I return to the beach one more time with pen and paper in hand. As I chatted the day before with the motel manager, he offered up the location of yet another “inspirational” place for a writer to visit, known to the locals yet off the beaten path. If I had another day or two to spare, I’m sure I’d find my way there, drawn by the promise of broken foundations and ruined buildings, grown-over gardens, and cliffs at the shore.  I’m keeping the exact location of that one to myself.

Because I just know there has to be a “next time.”

"Tagged" in a BLOG TOUR!!

At this age—let’s just say “over thirty”—you don’t get too many invitations to play a game of “tag.” You remember those! Running across summer lawns and darting around trees and bushes, trying to outrun your buddies to get to the “free” zone before someone caught you and then you were IT. But being invited to join a virtual “blog tour” has been just as much fun for this grown-up author…and didn't even require breaking a sweat! That’s what happened recently, just in time to promote my new book, When the Shoe Fits…Essays of Love, Life and Second Chances. This would be my “best of” collection of essays from my first three books, and includes riffs on turbo-dating, power tools, shoes, motherhood, and the view from the back of a Harley. I got “tagged” for the tour by author Catherine Fitzpatrick, author of Going on Nine, a YA novel that’s a “coming of age” story set in St. Louis in 1956.

While Catherine and I haven’t met YET, the wonderful thing about the world wide web is how you can get to know folks anyway. I’d describe Catherine as a “dame,” in the sense that Lauren Bacall was a “dame”—accomplished, incredibly smart, talented and FUNNY! As a kick-ass journalist, Catherine was in Manhattan to cover New York Fashion Week for Wisconsin’s largest newspaper on September 11, 2001. At first word of the terrorist attacks, she rushed to Ground Zero and filed award-winning eyewitness reports. A front page of the newspaper edition containing one of her 9/11 dispatches is among those memorialized in Washington D.C.’s Newseum. Now she writes fiction, and she and her husband will be exiting the Midwest soon for a new life in Florida.

THANK YOU CATHERINE for inviting me into this tour! 

NOW THE BLOG TOUR AUTHOR QUESTIONS...

“What am I working on”—several things at once! But at this exact moment, I’m under the gun in the next two weeks to create an exhibit catalog for “Resting Places,” a joint art show between moi and artist Erico Ortiz that opens October 4, 2014 at Inspiration Studios in West Allis, Wisconsin near Milwaukee. I’ve developed a minor obsession with taking photographs in small rural cemeteries, and the show will feature twenty-one of my graveyard photos matched up with Erico’s abstract and impressionistic paintings inspired by nature.

After that, I’ll pick up where I left off in writing (1) a YA novel that contains NO vampires, werewolves, mermaids or dystopian societies, (2) a first-in-a-series suspense novel featuring a female prosecuting attorney (go figure!), and (3) a children’s book revolving around a kitten and…oh, I need to keep some things secret!

“How does my work differ from others in its genre?” Well, the genre for all my books up to now would be considered a mashup of slice-of-life essays and memoir. Some are about the happy stuff, others about the heartaches, and all are about what we take away from those things. I can’t remember who he was quoting when I interviewed him many years ago, but Bill Moyers told me that we all look at the world through the lens of our own experience. So while I often say that I write about things that are common experiences—joy, love, motherhood, divorce, reinvention, death, chocolate and shoes—it’s MY cracked lens you’re seeing them through! I've been compared to Erma Bombeck, Ernest Hemingway, and Carrie Bradshaw from "Sex and the City." Go figure! I'm still trying to figure out the Hemingway thing...

But one thing…there are many extremely gifted writers who peel everything back to the bone when they’re writing their memoirs, and lay bare a lot of ugly and painfull stuff. I tend to focus more on the positives, or at least to draw a forgiving screen across some of the worst. I don't want my readers to wince. Though once in a while they may want to grab a hankie...

“Why do I write what I do?” That’s an interesting question! I have often joked that with these essay collections, I was an “accidental author.” My life as a professional writer started when I was about 21 and began writing for the Milwaukee Sentinel daily newspaper as a stringer. Then I worked for the larger Milwaukee Journal on staff for a while, and turned to freelance magazine when I started a family. Then, years later, the horseback riding accident that broke my back and put me in a body cast for a while turned me toward law school and I thought writing was behind me.

Then the writing itch came back a few years later, and I started working on that novel about the female prosecutor. I got about eight chapters written, but then kept getting interrupted by serial family emergencies, some of which were taking me out of town on a regular basis. The novel got set aside, naturally. But some friends dragged/pushed/pulled me into starting my “Running with Stilettos” blog. I found I could sit and write short stuff, and it kept the top of my head from flying off.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the emergencies are behind me and I can once again pick up a project that requires a long-running train of thought!

“How does my writing process work?” Ha ha ha ha…catch as catch can!! When the kids (who are now all grown up and out of the nest) were small, I would write when they were napping. Or,  if I was really cramming for a deadline, I’d get up at four in the morning to finish a project. Waiting for inspiration to strike while an editor somewhere was tapping her foot on the floor was never a luxury I could afford. Now, years later, I still feel like I’m fitting it in around the edges of everything else—work, commute, pets, yard work, connecting with my children. BUT…if something has to come out, sometimes I’ll just drop everything and write notes on anything that’s within reach. Like the back of a manila envelope in the car. Or  the “notes” section of my iPhone. And I get a lot of inspiration from nature, which I get a slow-motion tour of every day while I’m walking Lucky and The Meatball in the woods.

And NOW, to pass the torch to three other accomplished writers who I am privileged to know and recommend! First at bat…
  

Angela Lam Turpin, a self-described “California girl” who spends her days

working in real estate and finance and the hours before dawn writing literary short stories,

paranormal romance, crime thrillers, and effervescent women's fiction better known as chick-lit. Her short stories explore the depths of human emotion from hope to despair, and the heroines in her novels fight the challenges of their lives with pluck and courage.  (The literary apples don’t fall far from the tree, since Angela is one of the most resilient people I know!) She is best known for her wry humor, realistic plots, and engaging characters. Her latest book is The Human Act and Other Stories, a collection of short stories that explore sexual identity, poverty, romantic love, parenthood, eating disorders, infidelity, and family relationships, effortlessly carrying the reader from the inner city to suburbia.
 

Next up,  David W. Berner, a Chicago-area college professor and broadcaster who I first encountered when we were both reading essays to a crowd at The Beauty Bar on
Chicago’s near North side on a Sunday night. David’s first book, "Accidental Lessons," is a memoir drawn from his mid-life decision to spend a challenging year as a public school teacher with kids would could politely be called “at risk” and the profound lessons he drew from it. His most recent book, Any Road Will Take You There: A Journey of Fathers and Sons, is drawn from his 5,000 mile road trip with his teenaged sons as they retrace Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road” adventures.  I’ve always been a big fan of time spent in a car with my own children, and the emotional tributaries that reveal themselves when the rubber meets the road.
   

And finally, there’s Holly Sullivan McClure, who I first met in the enchanted environs of St. Simons Island, Georgia several years ago when I attended my first Scribblers Retreat Writers' Conference as a guest speaker. Holly could be the dictionary definition of “eclectic,” inasmuch as she is an author, a story-teller, a literary agent, a writing coach,

and an ordained priest in the Celtic Christian Church! Raised by storytellers, preachers, and bluegrass musicians, she is a child of the Smoky Mountains with a Cherokee mom and a father whose people came from the Scottish Highlands, Holly draws on her heritage for inspiration. In her latest book, The Vessel of Scion, warrior priests

protect an ancient blood line from an enemy determined to eradicate it from the world. Faith and reality collide as final prophecies come to pass, and two children hold the key to whether good or evil will win out.

Now Angela, David and Holly, officially you guys are “IT”!

International Wee Lamb Rescue

In a manner of speaking, we had been in the company of ghosts all day, and were still looking for more.

The rain was falling soft and steady on the green hills of Ireland’s County Meath as we strode up the steep ridged slopes of earth known as the Hill of Tara.  After first touring the 12^th century Malahide Castle near Dublin, and then the 5,000 year old Neolithic stone passage tomb known as Newgrange earlier in the day, we were closing out our day’s ramblings steeped in the mythology of ancient Ireland and the Seat of Kings.

I was traveling with my son, Robert, and my daughter-in-law, Hannah, and we had the entire “heritage site” to ourselves now that visiting hours were long over.  The only exception was a flock of sheep that now inhabited the site where kingship rituals had been performed thousands of years earlier.  The Stone of Destiny stood atop one of the two sets of concentric circles that formed the site, and nearby, entirely wreathed by fencing and with a tarp over the entrance, stood a small Neolithic tomb known as the Mound of the Hostages.  The lush, emerald countryside fell away from the hills in all directions, and we breathed in the damp air, conjuring earlier times in our imaginations.  The only sound was the occasional bleating of the sheep, and the smoosh-ing sounds our feet made in the soft, lumpy grass.

Our curiosity finally sated and our clothes quite wet from the rain, we slowly started to make our way back across the fields to where we had parked the car. As we walked by the Mound of the Hostages, we noticed a small lamb, pure white from tip to tail, stranded inside the fence around the mound. His mother hovered nearby, clearly distressed, and both lamb and ewe kept the whole baa baa sheep conversation going. The entire mound was encircled by a high metal fence, and the opening was locked. On the far side of the mound, the bottom of the fence cleared the grass with a few gaps large enough for the lamb to have wriggled inside. However, both “lambkin” and his mother were on the other side of the enclosure.

A couple approached from the far side of the mound, clearly tourists as ourselves. The man was tall, and wore a classic Irish “driving hat.” His female companion was shorter, and carried an umbrella. The pair examined the fence, and the man finally found a spot to pull the fence apart and enter the enclosure. He clearly had his mind set on capturing the lamb and reuniting him with his mother. The lamb, of course, knew nothing of those benign intentions, and scampered away like he had springs for hooves. 

I called to Robert, and suggested that he get in there as well to help. Nice idea…but the lamb was still too quick.  Finally Hannah got in there as well, and with the three of them working in concert, the tall man in the driving hat finally grabbed the lamb from behind and quickly hustled him through the gap in the fence as his companion held it open.

Lamb and ewe fled the scene together, and with a few words of congratulations, we all scattered as well. Judging by our accents, the man in the cap sounded Polish, his lady-friend sounded English, and of course, we were “the Americans.” Really, of the thousands of tourists who must tread across the Hill of Tara, how many can say that they were part of a rescue operation that involved a Pole, a Brit, and three Yanks rescuing an Irish sheep?

The rescue adventure behind us, we turned back toward the car, and pondered on the pressing need of two of us to use a “ladies room” before we set out to drive another couple of hours in the rain back to Galway. We walked past the site’s visitor center—once a charming little church devoted to St. Patrick—but the center was long locked up.  Farther down the hill stood a gift shop/tea room that looked like it was deserted as well. A strand of lights strung from the eaves of the tea room beckoned like the lights of Brigadoon, though, and Hannah and I decided to check the place out anyway. As we approached the tea room, we could see that it was entirely dark.  Slightly daunted…but still somewhat desperate…we walked on a little further. Lo and behold, there were doors to the facilities for ladies and gents! But…they were locked.   With dispirited shrugs, we pressed on to the main door of the shop, from which a little light shone. It STILL looked deserted, but when Hannah pushed on the door, it opened!

Glory Halleluiah! We stepped inside the little gift shop, and a young man finally stepped out from behind the scenes. We sketched out our basic needs, which included a fancy coffee for me.  He explained that we’d have to get our drinks “takeaway,” since there would be no room to seat us.  Could he throw some whipped cream on top of my “mocha” coffee?  Of course, he said.  Could he make a hot chocolate, Hannah asked hopefully.  “Only with marshmallows,” he replied with a smile. Ah, bliss!

We paid for our drinks, and finally left the shop just as the private wedding party that was the cause of the restaurant being open at this hour began to arrive.  Settled back into the car, we turned our attention to the task of finding our way back to Galway, as the lights on the restaurant receded in the rear view mirror.

All in all, it had been an extraordinary day. A medieval castle, prehistoric tombs, a wee lamb rescue, a fortuitous pit stop entirely off its regular schedule, and the most delicious fancy coffee that I had in Ireland. As I drove through the rain and night fell upon us, I couldn’t stop thinking of magic, and ghosts, and luck, and Brigadoon…