Alex Gordon's Blog, page 15

Bonsai Beginnings

(Note: this post was originally published two weeks ago at the BookView Café blog. I’ll be adding a follow-up post soon, and wanted to have the original over here, too. So, without further ado…)

Bonsai originated in China around 700AD, and was introduced in Japan about 400 years later. The Chinese term for the art, “Penjing,” and the Japanese word “bonsai” have the same general meaning, “tree in a tray/container.”

I recently became interested in learning more about bonsai because, well, I have one. It’s a ficus, which I received almost 14 years ago. All during that time, I treated it like a houseplant, watering it when the soil seemed dry, or because a week had passed since last I did it. I fed it regular plant food, and while I sometimes thought that I should be doing other things more specific to bonsai like trimming or moving to a larger pot, I didn’t because I feared damaging the tree.

Then, several years ago, I left the tree outside in the first chill of autumn. Ficus, as it turns out, are tropical/semi-tropical and aren’t meant to be exposed to 30-degree temperatures. Leaves browned and fell off, and the main branches died. I thought the tree a goner, but I kept caring for it, and over the last several years was rewarded as branches redeveloped and leaves returned. However, the branches were thin and haphazard—the tree had lost its shape. I wasn’t sure what to do next, and while I knew I could get information from books or You Tube videos, I do better with hands-on training. So, I decided to enroll in a six-week Bonsai Fundamentals class offered at the Chicago Botanic Garden.

My little ficus

Bonsai can be bought in final form, as my ficus was. They can also be purchased from nurseries, either as regular-size plants that can be trimmed down or as “pre-bonsai” that are already the right size but require shaping and training. They can also be made from “collected” plants or cuttings ranging from saplings to trees that are hundreds of years old. I liked that idea, so when a friend gave me a basket of shrubs and ground cover that included two errant mulberry saplings, I decided to try to develop them as well.

A ficus from the Midwest Bonsai Society May exhibit. Note smaller, fuller leaves and thicker branches.

So, over the last several weeks I’ve attended a bonsai show at the CBG, bought a few basic tools including shears for trimming leaves and thin branches, a root hook to clean dirt from root balls, and aluminum wire for training branches and securing trees in pots. Special wire cutters are available, but for now I’ll use a regular pair from the household toolbox. My goals are to learn how to maintain the ficus and nurse the mulberries. Developing a tree or shrub is not a project for the impatient. Repotting, wiring, and extensive trimming are all stressors, and therefore shouldn’t be done at the same time or even in the same year unless the tree is in desperate straits and you have nothing to lose. This means I have a couple of long-term projects ahead. I’m looking forward to the challenge.

On this day

I have an expandable business folder that’s filled with “how in hell have I managed to save this stuff over the years” kinds of things. My old Florida driver license (OMG those eyeglasses) and OSU student ID. College lab reports. High school essays with notes from teachers. The journal I kept during a 1973 trip to Europe.

The image on the front of the notecard. If that’s a mule being led up that hill, it’s likely a pretty good depiction of the drapery discussion.

And a letter from my Mom. Maybe at the time I saved it because of the notecard, part of a gift to Mom from one of my cousins who was living in Japan at the time. Rice paper, I assume, silky-shiny cream now browned and a little brittle with age.

Mom had sent me some money–I was in my last year of undergrad at USF–along with a few lines about work being done around the house. Nothing huge, just new drapes in the bedrooms. But Mom had gone through a rough spell health-wise, and financially things had been tough for a while. But by this time matters had improved, and Mom commented that maybe we’d finally turned the corner.

Those drapes, though. She and Dad were so tickled about how nice they looked that they took turns sneaking into the bedrooms and checking things out, “just like two kids.” She wrote that at first Dad hadn’t been too keen on spending money on drapes, but “you know me, I threaten here and there.”

Every time I read those words, I laugh. My folks didn’t always have an easy time of it. There were low points. But some of the day to day things, the little victories, like prodding Dad to get things for the house, only to have him be as happy about the results as was she.

Thinking of you, Mom.

 

 

 

 

Crabapples

I have four types of crabapple trees in my yard. One isn’t blooming this year–it’s a biennial–which leaves the Louisa, the prairiefire, and the tree of unknown variety behind the garage.

The Louisa is a miniature weeping-willow variety with pale pink-white blossoms.

Louisa blossoms

 

The blossoms of tree behind the garage are a deeper pink.

garage tree

 

My favorite, the prairiefire, is more a shrub than a tree. It blooms later than the others, so that it’s at its peak when the others are fading. Its blossoms are deep magenta.

Prairiefire

 

They all fade too soon. Then I have to wait for the miniature roses, the hardy hibiscus, and the hydrangea.

What do you mean it’s May already??

Seriously, 2017, what is going on?

April was a busy month. I spent some time lobbying at the state level for the Sierra Club. I marched in both the March for Science and this past Saturday’s Climate March, and attended C2E2 as Alex Gordon in between. I saw Welcome to Night Vale’s All Hail the Glow Cloud show. I weeded, walked Gaby, started bowling again–something I haven’t done since I was a kid–spent too much time online, and wrote a little but not enough. Participated in a Spring Fling Giftcard Giveaway over on Facebook–seriously, there are reasons to follow my author pages over there. There will probably be other contests and promotions over the next few months…like this one for BookView Café! 12 Authors. 12 Free Books. . Follow this link to the giveaway page–even if you already have Code of Conduct, there are other great SF, fantasy, romance, and literary books to download.

Giveaway ends May 12

 

 

 

My Favorite Season

After a fake-out warm spell that was followed by seeming weeks of cold and wet, I’m finally seeing signs of spring as I walk around the neighborhood. Forsythia’s bright yellow is flaring here and there. In my yard, birds are clustered around the feeders, chowing down with intent in preparation for mating and nesting. The daffodils are several inches tall and bulged at the tip with buds, and the miniature roses by the back door are putting forth leaves.

And the crocuses are opening, little purple pops amid the green and brown.

They used to grow in a cluster, but they’ve scattered over the years thanks to the squirrels. I used to have gold and white ones as well, but while one does show up every so often, I think most of them have gone to that big greenhouse in the sky. So I make do with solid purple and white-and-purple striped, and that’s fine. They’ve been coming up every spring for well over twenty years, and their hardiness and persistence is inspiring. They make me want to get to work, clean out the garage, prep the lawn, plant more flowers and shrubs.

I love spring, especially the latter part as it edges into summer. Rich green lawn and foliage, bright blooms, and long days. My favorite time of year, when I feel like all things are possible.

Waiting for Spring

I don’t often spend Sunday mornings in the living room, laptop in lap. But it’s pouring, so the usual morning walk has been postponed until the rain stops. Breakfast has been had, and I’m debating a second cup of coffee. Gaby is dozing at the far end of the couch.

It’s actually kinda nice. Maybe I wouldn’t mind if it rained more often.

Anyway, it has been a while. Most of February and March was taken up with finding a new webhost and getting my site moved, including weeks-long delays during which the company I had initially chosen AND PAID UPFRONT TO MOVE MY SITE AS WELL AS FOR THREE YEARS’ WORTH OF HOSTING did pretty much nothing. So after I returned from a trip out West earlier this month, I sorted things out with the help of April, my inestimable PA, canceled deal with No Go Slow Host, moved to a different host, and got settled. Still one or two bugs to be worked out, but I have email and I can post and my website still works.

I haven’t been totally offline during that time. I have posted over at BookView Café about the art I found while wandering SeaTac Int’l Airport way too early in the morning and favorite revenge films. Daily trials and tribulations show up over on Facebook (links above and on the right-side links widgets). Twitter is proving a timesink, albeit an educational one.

I also went on a 5-day writers retreat, which was why I wound up roaming SeaTac Int’l’s Concourse A during the small hours. It took place in Quinault, Washington, on the shores of Lake Quinault. This was the first time I visited the Olympic Peninsula and the Rainforest National Park, and I was looking forward to it.

Misty morning on Lake Quinault

Most of the mornings were misty, as it rained most every day (early March on the Olympic Peninsula–go figure). But that made for good writing weather–I didn’t hit a high word count, but I did work through a rough chapter that had fought me for a while. So, when Saturday morning dawned sunny, I felt quite justified in taking a hike around the nearby woods.

The lake on a sunny morning

 

World’s largest spruce and a woman in a very yellow jacket

About the tree

Just a short walk from the compound stands the World’s Largest Spruce Tree, which is even more impressive when you’re stumbling over its roots trying to get your footing so you can have your photo taken. There are a number of record-setting trees in the area, but the spruce is the one within easy walking distance. If I go back next year–and I want to go back–I’l try to build in extra time to see the others.

 

 

 

 

Gatton Falls

Along the Gatton Falls trail

I then hiked a mile or so until I arrived at Gatton Falls. The trail is narrow and twisty, with ferns, moss, and evergreens close on both sides. I really liked it.

The retreat ended too soon, and then I was back home dealing with website migration, taxes, and life in general. But I have been working–hope to post snippets of both jani Kilian and Lauren Reardon wips over the next few weeks.

It’s almost April already. The time passes too quickly.

 

The Songs That Tell the Story

I like having music play while I’m writing, but I usually stick with instrumental/ambient because I find the words too distracting. I like classical, particularly music of the Baroque. When it comes to ambient, Timothy Wenzel and Brian Eno are favorites. Takashi Suzuki. 2002.

But sometimes a song with lyrics triggers something with respect to the story I’m working on. A scene. A feeling that reinforces a story line. And every so often, a character. I don’t go looking for these songs–like wands and wizards, the songs find the characters, and not every character gets a song. In my Jani Kilian series, no particular song found Jani. Each of the men in her life, however, had one find them.

Lucien Pascal, my engineered sociopath-assassin–has had a lot of darkness in his life. Some of it, he brought down on himself. But too many things were done to him at too young an age, and he alludes to them during his rare moments of self-reflection. When I hear Depeche Mode’s “Walking in My Shoes,” I think of him:

Now I’m not looking for absolution

Forgiveness for the things I do

But before you come to any conclusions

Try walking in my shoes

John Shroud, Jani’s on-again off-again lover, sees himself as a benevolent force, a benefactor. His song is “Time of the Season” by The Zombies :

What’s your name? 

Who’s your daddy? 

 Is he rich like me?

Niall Pierce is Jani’s best friend. He’s come a long way since the criminal life of his youth, but there are times when his past and present collide. His song is “Stolen Car” by Beth Orton:

You were sitting

Your fingers like fuses

Your eyes were cinnamon

Unlike the Jani books, the supernatural thrillers I wrote under the name Alex Gordon had specific theme songs. I forget when, over the course of writing Gideon, I first heard Vashti Bunyan’s The Train Song, but I remember it was used in an NFL commercial, eerie images of athletes marching into a stadium. The song inspired thoughts of a more private search, a journey that would end in confrontation:

It’s so many miles and so long since I’ve met you

Don’t even know what I’ll find when I get to you

But suddenly now, I know where I belong

It’s many hundred miles but it won’t be long

I found “Shivers,” the instrumental that served as Jericho’s theme, in a more roundabout way. A favorite show is A Chef’s Life, about Chef Vivian Howard’s life in Eastern North Carolina. The incidental music caught my attention–I hunted online, and found it had been composed by the North Carolina band Shark Quest. So off I went to iTunes, where I found their albums, played various excerpts, and found “Shivers.” It has a country feel, with the bell-ringing guitar that I love. Outdoor music. Walking in the woods music.

 

I listened to both songs over and over as I wrote. According to iTunes, I’ve listened to The Train Song almost 300 times. I only listened to “Shivers” 55 times, but I didn’t find it until Jericho was well on its way.

The Great Decluttering of [insert year here]

Decluttering–it’s all the rage, the subject of classes, TV shows, and bestselling books. I have lost track of the number of times I pledged to once and for all dispatch all the books I will never read, clothes I will never wear, old financial records I don’t need to save anymore. The odd piece of furniture, old tools, handbags and costume jewelry and general household detritus.

But, for all I wish I could regain control of my space, I always seem to fall short of the mark. Toward the end of last year, I had made some dents, cleaning out a couple of bookcases, organizing the armoire in my bedroom, and freeing up drawer space in the spare bedroom. In the process, I found things I had forgotten I had. For instance, the half-dozen pairs of sunglasses, including a very nice pair of Smiths that have to be at least 25 years old. I bought them because hey, we have the same name. Also, the frames are purple. I love purple.

I know that one rule of thumb for this process is that if you haven’t used or worn something in the previous year or two, you should get rid of it. I can’t always agree with that. Sometimes you do lose track of things that you really liked or that went out of style and then came back in, which is my way of saying that I will be keeping the sunglasses.

That said, the one thing that has always stopped these clean-out sessions in their tracks wasn’t that I didn’t want to get rid of things after all, but  that I didn’t know how best to get rid of them. I don’t want to deal with the hassle of a garage sale, and simply tossing the stuff in the trash is wasteful and in the case of some electronics and household chemicals, ill-advised if not illegal. So I talked to friends, then poked around online, and found that I have more options than I thought. Not all of them are free, but they’re out there.

The Give Back Box is a free service that allows you to use an old Amazon shipping box or other cardboard box to send clothing or household goods to Goodwill. The US Internal Revenue Service Publication 526, Charitable Contributions and Publication 561, Determining the Value of Donated Property, contain guidelines for defining charitable contributions and in general how to estimate value. Goodwill has also put together guidelines for calculating the worth of donated items. In addition, this Donation Calculator references valuations from several charities (the online spreadsheet showed up in Firefox, but not in Safari). Some Habitat for Humanity websites also have guidelines for estimating the value of donations of appliances, building materials, and tools.

For me, that means spreadsheets and photographs for tax purposes. Yea, spreadsheets.

When it comes to clothing, I always forget about resale/consignment shops, which are a good option for my old office clothes and dressy coats I haven’t worn in years.

Old VCR tapes are currently one of the banes of my existence. Some resale shops may take the old movies, but I doubt they would want the scores of History Channel WWII programs that my dad recorded. Companies like GreenDisk can recycle the tapes, along with electronics such as laptops etc, though the service is not free. Local municipal agencies–in my case, the Solid Waste Agency of Lake County, accept all sorts of household waste, including chemical and electronic. My local OfficeMax accepted an old printer of mine for recycling, and they also give credit for returned ink cartridges if you make in-store purchases. Check the website for details.

Lots of places accept donated books. My local library. Goodwill. A number of online charities.

So, with some work, I hope to  finally, FINALLY, get rid of the junk. I will try to recycle most of the things I no longer want, and minimize the garbage destined for the landfill.

How about you? I know there are any number of recycling and donation options I’ve missed, so if you have favorites, please do post them.

Five Books

Posts about influential books are pretty common. Writers discuss stories that inspired them, helped them work through dry spells, challenged them to become better. Some lists are chock-full of literary classics. Others are whimsical, with favorite books featuring dogs, or cake baking, or cake-baking dogs.

My list is in-between, five books that are the equivalent of comfort food, or favorite recipes. These are the books I revisit consistently. Sometimes I reread from the beginning; other times, just a favorite scene or story. I want them with me on that desert island, that journey to Mars.

Naked Once More is the 4th and final book in Elizabeth Peter’s series featuring librarian-turned-romance author Jacquelyn Kirby. In this entry, Kirby competes with other authors for the chance to finish a manuscript started by Kathleen Darcy, a young woman who wrote one mega-bestseller and then vanished, an apparent suicide.

I still have the paperback I bought in the early 1990s, around the time I started writing for publication. Because I knew next to nothing about the publishing world, I found Kirby’s observations informative, daunting, amusing. Later, I developed quite a bit of sympathy for Darcy, the character around whom the story revolves. I recalled sensing a little of the resentment she experienced as she sought to juggle family life and writing life, the desire for that “room of one’s own.” In short, I found this book at a time when I kinda needed it.

Since then, I’ve tried to read the other Kirby stories, but have yet to finish them. None of them hooked me as did Naked. But I like Jacqueline Kirby, so I will keep trying.

 

Good Omens. What can I say? Gaiman and Pratchett, a perfect melding. I enjoy all the characters, but my favorite sections are the ones featuring Aziraphale and Crowley. I can hear them bicker. I adore their bickering. My internal casting director long ago cast Ian Richardson as Aziraphale and a twenty-something Rupert Everett as Crowley, but now I think Peter Capaldi and Benedict Cumberbatch would also fill the bill.

Here’s a link to a BBC interview with Gaiman about how Good Omens came about.

 

 

Danse Macabre. Stephen King is almost as well known for his books on writing as he is for his horror and fantasy. Danse was his first excursion, published in 1979. Like his other nonfiction books, it’s part autobiography,  part horror discussion and critique. What scared him. Which films, television series, and stories inspired or, in a few cases, disappointed him. His extended discussions of books such as The House Next Door and Ghost Story, both the film and written versions of works such as The Haunting of Hill House, provide valuable insight into scary story construction. The autobiographical sections about his youth, his absent father, the struggles and the success, offered inspiration, a case study of writer development.

 

 

 

The Dark Descent, edited by David Hartwell, came out in the 1980s. A history of the dark suspense and horror genres, it contains stories from the 1800s to the 1980s, some of which are among my favorite short stories. These include “Sticks” by Karl Edward Wagner, which I believe was one of the inspirations for the film “The Blair Witch Project,” and “The Autopsy” by Michael Shea. “Crouch End” and “The Reach,” both by Stephen King. “Vandy, Vandy” by Manly Wade Wellman. When I yearn for a comfort scare, I reach for this book.

Yes, there are such things as comfort scares.

 

 

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy/Smiley’s People by John Le Carré. I know, two books. But to me, they’re a single work, a tight weaving that I can’t tease apart. My Lord of the Rings. As I was writing the Jani Kilian books, I reread sections over and over, soaking up Le Carré’s descriptions of the spy’s life and the types of personalities it attracts, the intelligence bureaucracy and infighting. He also writes marvelous, moody descriptions of settings. There’s an extended scene at the end of Smiley’s People in which George Smiley and others wait at one end of a Cold War Berlin bridge for a defector that I think is a perfect combination of setting, mood, and action.

 

 

 

So, those are my indispensable books. What are yours?

 

Indoor garden

Warning: nothing but flowers ahead.

I’ve never had much luck with indoor flowering plants. Green plants, no problem–philodendrons, palms, schefflera. Anything that wasn’t all green leaves, nope.

My luck may have changed this year. All three African violets are blooming, including the one that almost died in the spring due to, I think, overwatering.

 

 

 

The violet on the far right is the one that came back from the brink. The buds look light in color–I’m wondering if they’ll be pink or even white. I was sure it was a purple flowering plant, but maybe not.

The kalanchoe is going nuts as well, and while the prayer plant has slowed down, there still appears to be one tiny flower starting to bud.

  

The prayer plant flowers are adorable, like teeny tiny orchids. Here’s a photo from back in September:

All this color in the dead of winter is enlivening.