Maureen Bush's Blog, page 10

An Evening With Neil Gaiman

Last Night I got to hang out with Neil Gaiman, with my daughter and 1098 other fans. Tickets were free (part of the University of Calgary Distinguished Writers Program), but everyone had to have a ticket so the event wasn’t mobbed. I scored two, in an on-line registration that sold out in 16 seconds.

Gaiman is a wonderful writer, a wonderful reader of his work (with a beautiful reading voice), and funny on-stage. His voice and words washed over us, as he wove spells with his stories. He read short stories and poems, but nothing from his newest books.

He also spoke, in his understated but very funny way. “So the lovely thing about being me is that they let you do whatever you want. And it’s brilliant.” He was referring to what kind of stories he writes – he said his agent wouldn’t tell him how much a British editor offered for him to keep writing stories like American Gods, because his agent knew he likes to write whatever he wants, not what someone else wants.

And I think he nailed the value of story, especially for children who are learning about the world: “You go away and come back knowing things you didn’t know before.”

Now to work, back into my own stories, newly inspired.

Maureen

The Treadmill Saga

It shouldn’t be this much work to get a treadmill. It has become an expedition, in the Winnie The Pooh sense. It’s coming from the States, delayed by storms. For a while there, I’m not sure UPS knew where it was. I have to build a table­ for the exact measurements that will fit (once the table saw at Home Depot is repaired).

I need to move all the stuff stored in that corner, and find new homes for things – boxes of books, boxes of research material, weird little frogs I’ve been given because I write fantasy. This has triggered an excavation of other parts of the office, and the discovery that the totally overloaded IKEA shelves have bent the brackets holding them to the wall, so they could slump and sag.

We’re hauling loads of papers to the recycling bin, finding new corners to store things, sorting and tossing and finding dust balls.

What I’m loving is having less stuff in the office. There’s something about clutter that weighs on me. Less frees me, lets me create more, and encourages me to find more stuff to get rid of. Is this a temporary urge, or will I dig deeper into corners, searching more more to toss and recycle and give away and repurpose and … hmmm – this is kind of fun.

I’m not sure my husband agrees, as he hauls boxes of trombone music and sorts it into a filing cabinet in another room, or digs through the ever-growing collection of computer bits, figuring out what we need and what we don’t (like the 2006 hard drive backup.)

Next step: how good are our carpentry skills, as we attempt to build a desk that will 1. be the right size, 2. not fall over if I fall and land on it, and 3. not look like something I should fall on and destroy.

Maureen

I am becoming a treadhead

After years of longing and envy, I have finally figured out how to put a treadmill in my office. A long winter, with too many days too cold or too icy for walking in the park, inspired me to actually look into it. Could I find a small enough treadmill to fit in my small, crowded office?

Well, no. They’re big suckers. Except I found one, without arms (just a remote control console), that’s intended for desks, not running. It’s in the states, so delivery is a little complicated, but I’m hoping to have it in a couple of weeks.

I’ll need to build a small desk (Home Depot, here I come) to fit in the very tight spot allocated for it. And I can’t build it until the treadmill is here, so we can confirm exactly how it fits (just barely, I suspect).

Then comes the big questions: will I love it, or will it become a dreadmill, taunting me from the corner? Will my klutz factor kick in, and throw me off the treadmill, into the adjacent window or the corner of my desk? Will I be able to write on it?

Stay tuned…

Maureen

 

Writing on Silence

I have nothing to blog about. I’ve been watching meditation teachings on-line, vicariously participating in a meditation retreat in Australia, and my mind is quiet. I can write, but I have nothing I need to blog about.

Not a thing.

This is the perfect state for writing, when I can simply slip into the story and write, without the distractions of a busy mind. Of course, life around me is busy: visits with family, phone calls, appointments, the course I’m teaching  – I need to prepare for it, and attend. And I need to blog something, even when there’s simply quiet inside.

And so I struggle to write about silence, when I’d rather be writing in silence, immersed in my stories.

Maureen

Creatures In the Garden

My battle with the squirrels continues. I bought a new birdfeeder, a mesh cylinder I fill with nuts for woodpeckers and flickers. But the squirrels are determined to break in. They’ve bent back the edge of the wire mesh, untied two of the three knots holding it up, and chewed half-way through the rope. I’ve now threaded a plastic lid on the rope above the feeder, and that seems to have stopped them, for now.

Their attention has returned, instead, to the metal basket holding suet. Yesterday I spotted a squirrel sitting on the tree branch, holding the basket, having hauled it up by its rope. I yelled at the squirrel and he dropped it and ran away, leaving the basket hanging open, empty.

Still, the birds are happy. We have a regular flow of sparrows, redpolls, chickadees, woodpeckers, pigeons, magpies, and flickers, depending on which feeder is full. Bunnies have left droppings underneath, so they must be scavenging, and the squirrels are ever present.

It helps me miss my garden less, buried in huge piles of snow.

Maureen

 

How’s The Writing?

I’m teaching Writing For Children Part II at the Alexandra Writers Centre. We’re focusing on writing itself, as the students found writing was the hardest thing last term – stealing time from jobs and kids and home life to stake out a little writing time. I’ve decided we’ll talk about that at the beginning of each class: How was your writing week?

And I’ll go first. Every week. If I have a really bad writing week I’ll have to fess up, and if I have a great writing week I can share the how-did-that-happen.

Simply knowing I have to talk about my week on Tuesday has settled me back into the writing routine I lost over Christmas. Well, before that. Late November. And it was gone during the flooding and when we travelled and… somehow it feels like a fractured year. Now I’m trying to push past the distraction to settle into a solid writing routine again, a minimum of two hours every morning focused on writing or rewriting, rather than editing or admin work or email or blogging or one of the other endless tasks that arise to distract me further.

It feels good, settled and balanced. I want to go deeper, to write more, and still the distractions arise. I’m glad, now, for an eight week course to keep me aware of exactly how I’m doing. How’s the writing?

Maureen

This is not the book you’re looking for

I tried the “ask a friend” trick on Facebook, trying to find a book I vaguely remembered reading years ago.

There were moving sidewalks, like in airports, but in a series at faster and faster speeds. I googled it and found one possibility: The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov. Art Slade suggested Heinlein’s The Roads Must Roll, but the Wiki description wasn’t at all familiar to me; I don’t think I’ve ever read it. Eric Orchard found a wiki sight on moving walkways with some sci fi books listed, including The Roads Must Roll and The Caves of Steel. Danny Levinson suggested Heinlein, too, and then asked for more clues. And – ah ha – he found the scene on-line, in Galaxy Magazine November 1953. It is, indeed. The Caves of Steel.

Thank you to everyone for doing my research for me.  And thanks for the brilliant minds that give us this computing power.

If I was in a rush I could just read it on-line at the Galaxy Magazine at the Internet Archive, but I’d rather read a paper book. The Calgary Public Library doesn’t have it on paper, so I’ve put it on hold with the province-wide library system.

And voila – my work is done.

Maureen

 

Writing Joy

I’m back from another writing retreat in Canmore, alone in a lovely condo, a wonderful treat courtesy of in-laws.

I’ve been malingering over a cold-ish thing for a while, and not writing much. I’d been getting writing related work done, but the writing itself? That immersion in a story? Not so much.

I worried that would continue in Canmore, but my first afternoon I settled in to work, and felt excited by my stories for the first time in weeks. There’s this thing that happens to writers, in the middle of a project, or when sick, and definitely when both converge, when the work all seems terrible. That’s a good time to walk away, and do something else for a while.

That’s all I’ve been seeing for a while, so it was a thrill to – well, to be thrilled again. To feel that tingling up my back, as I read a section of story that works, that does what I want it to do – and leaves me wanting to move forward, to find out what happens next. Because that’s the joy in a story, in reading it and in writing it. And without that, there’s simply no point in bothering.

I’m back in Calgary again, organizing myself for a week of hard work. As I do, I will lift my teacup and salute the mountains, and thank them (and my wonderfully supportive family) for a return to writing joy.

Maureen

Winter Hibernation

Our snow is formidably deep, and the Christmas tree is stuffed into a snowbank. When it falls over as the snow melts, that’ll be spring.

In the meantime, we light candles, and go snowshoeing, and light a fire some nights, and enjoy the sun on the clear days.

I’ve hung birdfeeders in the garden, and battle with the squirrels, desperate to get what they think is their share (all of it), vs what I think is their share (whatever leftovers fall to the ground). We have a new winner every day.

Birds fight for their share, too: pigeons and magpies of course, and a lovely big flicker and little woodpeckers with red tufts on their heads, sparrows and chickadees and redpolls. I think bunnies are coming at night, leaving little gifts as they forage under the birdfeeders. Well, I shouldn’t really call them bunnies. When they hop away we see how incredibly long they are.

And I wait for the days to lengthen, and page through a gardening catalogue, dreaming of spring.

Maureen

 

 

 

Skating At Lake Louise

According to a CNN article, the skating rink at Lake Louise is one of the most beautiful in the world. Every time we go to the mountains, I marvel at how lucky we are to live so close to such beauty.

Maureen