Elizabeth Dutton's Blog, page 4

coda

This has nothing to do with me or my writing or my ramblings. It’s just beautiful and tender. Watch this and enjoy:

CODA

If I ever need to publish under a pen name…

” 

This is an oldie but a goodie I wrote a while back:

 Untapped literary genre: HIPSTER ROMANCE

When Jesse accidentally runs into Camille with his fixed gear bike, breaking her self-built Lomo camera, it looks like things are off to a rocky start for the pair. Jesse smooths his mustache and invites Camille to a vegan craft beer festival to make it up to her. He is shocked when she accepts and that evening in front of a savory gluten-free pie food truck, romance is kindled and they begin the long process of “hanging out.” But things aren’t all smooth sailing for the sort-of-couple-I-guess, as Jesse fights for his dream to become a graphic designer (of which there are simply not enough in the world) and quit his day job at the sustainable coffee collective, just as Camille sees the collective as her opportunity to find a distributor for her sea salt and bacon topped caramel quinoa balls. 

Jesse was a bad boy, known to be involved in an underground kombucha manufacturing operation. But Camille was no saint, either. If anyone found out that she was from Orinda and was in a sorority at San Diego State, her image would be shattered. Besides, all she really wanted now was to keep it real, to use hash tags, to support the plight of some sort of South American peoples, to find the ultimate 90s workout video on VHS to use as part of an art installation she hoped to one day complete. 

Further stress is added with the sudden return of Camille’s former sort-of boyfriend, Marc, who has come back to town after training as an artisan book binder in Vermont. At some point, Marc will try to woo Camille with a book of Okkervil River lyrics he hand-bound in dried and cured kale leaves, stitched together with threads from an old Corona poncho. 

A tale full of longing, ironic haircuts, urban farming, unexplained monetary sources, and analog devices, this story is one you will want to say you’ve already read when someone mentions it.

these poems

These poems I write — for some time I’ve seen them as either distractions or as a way to clear the mental decks to get cooking on fiction. I’ve now come to realize that these poems move my fiction forward and move me forward, as well. Wholly beneficial all the way around.

“Lineage”

I’ve the blood

of Jean d’Arc

in the thin blue veins

tracing my pale body.

I sacrifice.

I tremble.

I burn.

–

I’ve the blood

of the Morrígan

feeding my green eyes,

repairing my stone heart.

I am a crone.

I am a darling bud.

I dispatch the crow without a thought.

–

I’ve the blood

of Mokosh

heaving my chest,

spinning my mind.

I wander.

I create and take away.

I unravel purls and threads of lies, exposing sad deceit.

–

I am my own three fates

from endless branches of many trees;

a forest of strength brought me here.

Roots to tip

shaken by storms,

still standing,

holding the line.

the ocean

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I heard a story last night about a local kid, maybe 10 years old, who had never seen the ocean (even though it’s only 2 hours away). After days of mandated, insipid testing, the teachers felt the kids deserved a field trip and decided to take the class to the aquarium at Myrtle Beach and then have a picnic lunch at the state park beach. Now, the teacher knew this boy hadn’t ever been to the beach. Because she is loving and insightful, she really LISTENED to the boy instead of just hearing that he’d never seen the ocean. She understood what that meant.

When they got to the beach, the boy almost couldn’t process what he was seeing. The teacher — with no judgment, just compassion — allowed the boy to be in awe of what he was seeing.

The boy slowly made his way down the steps and onto the sand. He stared at the water with a huge grin and complete wonder. The teacher allowed him this silence and discovery. The boy put his towel down on the sand and just stared at the water.

I’ll take a moment here to insert myself into the story to say that I cannot remember a time of not knowing the ocean. It has always been a part of my life, but I still stand in awe when I see it.

After a while, the teacher joined the student to sit and quietly watch the vast expanse before them. She gently answered the questions he had — that the water doesn’t fall off the earth because of gravity, that his observation that it looked curved was correct because they were seeing the curve of the earth — and they enjoyed the vastness, the possibilities. The boy even got a chance to wade around in the waves and wiggle his bare toes in the sand. Everything in that moment was awe, wonder, and possibility.

I have been thinking a lot about that story the teacher told me last night (I LOVE running into friends and neighbors at local restaurants and such). I fell asleep thinking about it, woke up with it on my mind. I thought of it as I drove down here to Columbia for the Book Festival, admiring the farm roads, fields, and peach orchards full of impending fruit as I made my way toward the freeways that still (despite insane traffic and crazier drivers) managed to be beautifully insulated on either side by dense varieties of hardwood trees in every shade of green.

I want to live that awe, that wonder, that endless possibility all the time. Every moment. Not just when staring at the ocean and not just when remarking on a vista. And I want to be the kind of loving, compassionate, insightful person that teacher is who can bring those indelible moments into the lives of others. She gave that kid such a gift.

That is the reason we’re all here. Give, receive, enjoy.

Be in awe.

xo

let’s make a deal

Driftwood is available as a THE Kindle Daily Deal at Amazon today and today only! Act now!

Click → HERE ← to get your paws on the digital version for a song (I guess songs are $1.99). For less than the cost of a cup of coffee, you can help support this struggling author.

If you already own the hard copy, get yourself a digital backup. If you have been waiting for the price to come down, today is your day. Tell a friend. Pass this on. Call your local radio stations (sample script: “Hey! First time caller, long time listener here. I just had to tell the morning zoo crew that today’s Kindle Daily Deal is Driftwood, a really great novel that I heard Kanye West has been saying he wish he had written because it is so amazing. Just thought I’d let everyone know what all the cool kids are up to. Oh, and can I send a song request out to [insert friend’s name here]? Can you play some Chaka Kahn? Hello? You still there?)

Let’s do this people. Get that deal, son!

xo

song of the day

This song drove me to work this morning.

It makes me feel like my soul is going to explode out of me like bags and bags of glitttery confetti. (That’s a good thing). I feel like an ocean being warmed by the sun (oh, how I wish I’d written that line).

Make today a lovely one.

xo

the struggle is real

A few updates for my few readers:

I will be appearing at the “Coming of Age” panel this Saturday at 9:30 a.m. at the South Carolina Book Festival in Columbia. It’s free. You should come. Who knows what will happen.
I finished my poetry collection but have decided not to shop it anywhere. I think I just needed to clear the decks. Whatever.
I am in the process (still) of adapting Driftwood to a screenplay. Work and life have been getting in the way. The time is now, though.
At the same time, I am working on my next novel, The Sorrow Hand. This one is going to be…sinister. It’s dark and complicated and I love it. Basically, Driftwood is like a breezy Eagles song and The Sorrow Hand is like Nick Cave and Black Cat Music in a dark alley.

That said, let’s get down to brass tacks.

awesome:

air conditioning

having my very own first new car that I bought all by my damned self

bruises (I don’t know why, but I am a fan — perhaps because I bruise so easily, I might as well get used to them)

my garden

pasta salad, heavy on the fresh basil

my creative writing students (BRILLIANT — it was an honor to work with them this semester)

baby birds successfully leaving the nest and seen feasting from the suet feeder

dogs, even muddy and rascally ones

trip planning

the love of loyal friends

written letters (but emails are fab, too)

the wild chamomile ringing one of my lawns and the meadow — smells heavenly when mown

being able to choose my own path and hold my own worth

non-awesome:

humidity

uncertainty (although I should embrace it, I really can’t)

that sick feeling you get when you realize you’ve been made a fool (again)

pointless meetings

medications (having to take them, having to switch them)

needing a pedicure but not liking people touching me

homesickness for somewhere that may not really be home anymore

*****

Remember, everyone, that I love you. Even when I don’t.

xo

who runs the world? nerds.

 

 

on aging and loyalty and kindred spirits

 

I recently hit a birthday milestone, if you’re into that kind of thing. That’s right, I turned 21.  ::eye roll:: Ok, fine. I turned 55.  ::double eye roll::

I was recently out in my storage studio rummaging around for something or another when I came across my old creepers. I’d purchased them on Haight more than 20 years ago and there they were in a box. I took them back into the house  and cleaned them up and they looked good as ever (or as good as creepers ever looked). 

They still fit. It seemed a sort of ridiculous mid-life crisis thing to start wearing them again, but one morning I put them on just to see how bad it would be. They were actually cute. As I walked from my closet back through my bedroom my initial thoughts were on all the shows I’d seen while wearing them. All the college classes they’d walked me to. 

But soon I felt an imbalance. I felt like in Terminator 2 when the T-1000 gets all frozen up and starts to break apart and collapse as he runs then walks then falls to pieces (like poor Patsy Cline). 

It turns out that the soles of decades old creepers don’t hold up so well in storage. The thick platforms were literally crumbling beneath me. It started in the left side and made me walk with a limp. Then the right side blew and I was stumbling all over. 

THANK JAH it happened *before* I went to work. I swapped the shoes out, headed to work and spent the day  sporadically chuckling at that morning’s scene. 

Like everyone/everything else, I am getting old. I’ve been told I look younger than my age, but it’s all a construct anyway. If this were the Middle Ages, I’d already be dead (or burned at the stake for witchcraft for typing out this odd manifesto on a tiny glowing rectangle). The shoes were a sign to me that nothing gold can stay, Pony Boy. I am not, thankfully, the same person I was 20 years ago. Neither are my shoes. 

Some (actually many) of my friends are the same — in name and genetics. But like me, they’ve evolved. Aged. Grown. 

Some have not. Some are still fixated on “glory days” or are so possessed by crippling insecurity (and I say this as someone with an advanced degree in the Insecurity Arts) that they are unable to let things change. Or go. Or evolve. The biggest part of getting older is being able to admit when you’re wrong or to be able to calmly see the other side of an argument instead of spinning out because you are confronted with the fact that you are not, actually, the center of the universe or even the smartest person in the room. It’s rough, but it has to happen. And the older you get, the more impossible it is to float through life on lies and bravado. We basically have to wise up and own up to survive. 

As we grow older, loyalties change. I’ve spent my life laying it all on the line for others only to realize that loyalty to myself must be first and foremost. People treat you the way you treat yourself. That was a hard lesson learned. And it’s a process. But at least I am learning. 

Those who stick with you through the years are your true kindred spirits. They GET you. You aren’t a way to pass the time or a networking contact or an oddity or a means of leverage or a plaything. You connect. You are patient with each other. You celebrate each other. You are honest with each other out of love, rather than some urge to break another person down. You are truly loyal. You don’t walk away. 

I am fortunate to have a solid group of kindred spirits as I move through this temporary earthly plane. We carry each other. We understand each other. And I wouldn’t have made it FORTY YEARS (there, I said it) on this planet without them. 

Take a moment today (or not; I don’t give a shit what you do) to tell your kindred spirits that you love them. We can never hear that kind of thing enough. Tell them they are valuable and you are thankful they are in your life. You’ll feel wise and connected and real. Authentic. Immediate. Here. 

And be careful with your shoes out there. 

xo

I’m the biggest invisible girl in the world

 

I am working on adapting Driftwood into a screenplay. It’s slow going because I have a shit ton of essays to grade and I also have to re-learn screenplay format. Excuses. 

I am still tumbling the next book around in my head and on note cards and in journals. It is getting sleeker and more scenes are emerging. I have this cool friend who is a retired cop with a kickass collection of classic Fords. I need to talk to him about weird cases and Southern justice. 

 Right now I feel invisible. I am very much not. I am too present In this world. I take up too much space. But my students don’t seem to hear a word I say. I pass through days and public space unnoticed. I felt this way while living in Scotland. Odd. My calls and texts go unanswered. My emails and words unread. Am I here? I suppose. 

I am here and exhausted. 

I still love you all, of course. And I hope from my core that you are fulfilled and peaceful. 

xo