Winging It

 

Copyright Glo Lewis 6/25/2023

 

Dear Readers of My Blog, 💛

 

Winging It:

You may have noticed that my blog posts jump around from one topic to another in a somewhat random order, and this is because just as you are not taking an official class, likewise, I am not officially teaching a class. And yet, in a way, I am. Because I take this blog very seriously. There may only be one person out there checking in to see if I have done another post with my health and writing tips, and if so, here I am again. And you are important.

Intrusive Thoughts:

Today, I want to begin with the subject of intrusive thoughts and their impact on our mental health. This kind of thought process normally occurs when we are under stress or feeling anxiety. If nothing else, random, unhelpful thoughts, are an unwanted distraction. They normally show up, unbeckoned, but sometimes, if we indulge a resentful memory, here come the intrusive thoughts. For me, I am devoting this year of 2023 to forgiveness as a concept, and so, in that vein, I am actively working on mentally reminding myself that I forgive that person who comes up within a resentful memory. However, I noticed that I was slipping up in my forgiveness mode and allowing resentment to creep back in. Since I don’t want to be “that person,” who instead of living life in the present in old age is continually looking back into a field of poor choices and bad memories, I had to examine how I could do better. And I discovered that acceptance is key. When I accept that for some circumstances that have occurred in my life there will be no justice, I can live with that. Because it’s the truth. That aperture in time has passed. So, I recommend to my readers that if you find yourself getting caught up in resentful memories, see if it will help you to accept that the justice window has passed, necessitating your move into the present. The Serenity Prayer also helps me. You know: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” It’s the coupling of the Serenity Prayer with the acceptance that the time for justice has passed that seems to be the right formula for residing in the Present. A third mental health tonic that I happened upon while analyzing my own thought process, was that I can mentally invite a person into my mind, with the proviso that their presence must be a positive memory, or they will be ousted until another time; this includes myself— no self-flagellation for decisions made in times past. As Oprah has said, “When we know better, we do better.”

How to Decide What to Write About:

When I was in the Master’s in Writing Program at Portland State University, one of the graduate-level classes that I took was Italian Literature. While reading literature crafted by Italian writers, and being half Italian myself, I decided that I could contribute to the body of Italian literature for my thesis novel by authoring an Italian story, which is how my novel, Avezzano and New York, came about. Prior to this decision, I had really wanted to create a contemporary story. I didn’t want to get bogged down in research for a historical fiction novel, but that’s what happened. So instead of finishing my novel for my thesis, I had to submit parts of several short stories that I was simultaneously working on for other graduate courses within the master’s program, along with the first 99 pages of Avezzano. Ultimately, Avezzano and New York in its entirety, took me six long years to research and write.

Write What You Know:

But back to how to decide what to write about, the prevailing wisdom is to write what you know. If you’ve had failed marriages, for example, you can talk about those in memoir without naming names or by creating fictional names for prior spouses and partners; then you can discuss red flags, or exit plans, or even potentially dangerous situations in which you found yourself with a spouse. Remember this piece of information: You can’t defame the dead. So, if you are writing about someone who has died, you are not at risk of a lawsuit. However, if you always write the truth, even about the dead, you stand on firm ground.

If you write about what you know, that can be incorporated into fiction as well. You can draw upon circumstances or insights; all writers do, I believe. You can remember dialogue from relationships of any kind, or from strangers whom you’ve eavesdropped on at some point either accidentally or on purpose. I once overheard a co-worker say, “Sleeping and drinking coffee are what I do best,” a line that I instantly fell in love with and so later had a character in Avezzano say it. If one has lived at all, they have a rich tapestry of memories from which to draw. I recommend jotting down in a notebook every idea, memory, name, place, bit of dialogue, etc., that will suggest a subject for you. Then contemplate each notation and see which of those concepts give you the most joy and inspiration for writing. Bear in mind that a memoir can be about a lifetime, a season, such as one summer, or even about a day. So, brainstorm without feeling overwhelmed. Another technique is simply to begin and see what develops on the page. Remember, you can cut during revision time. If your goal is a memoir, be mindful of how your subject matter makes you feel, as between the creation of your story and the editing phase, you could be living with your decisions for a long time. If your history is too painful to capture when you are ready to confront it, you have one or two options: You can abandon that project or subject at that time, possibly revisiting it in the future, and move on to another of your possibilities, or you can experiment with fictionalizing the narrative; this is writing what you know, just as memoir is.

Show-- Don’t Tell:

In fiction, someone once advised, “we lie to tell the truth.” Essentially, then, say one’s father was abusive, you can create a fictional father with a name other than your own father’s, and rather than say, “he is abusive,” you show—don’t tell. So, for example, you might write the following:

“Our bedroom door flew open, and the soft ambient light of the hall stood innocently tentative in the opening, before the palpable violence that was about to erupt. Reeking of Screwdrivers and bar smoke, Dad yanked us from sleep, manhandled us against our bedroom wall, a loud crack of plaster piercing the inky, still night. He slapped us, and then, as my sister and I stole quick glances at each other, Dad shoved our smoldering faces into the shadows mottling the stucco. And then he slammed his fists into our kidneys repeatedly, bent over and gyrating back and forth, grunting like a prizefighter, while tears streamed down our cheeks, salting our trembling lips, and our young bodies shook with terror for our lives. We were just teenage girls, who had been schooled by years of fear not to cry out or seek help in any way. Fingers to her mouth, Mother muttered impotently from the corridor, ‘Oh dear, oh dear…’”

Naturally, when writing the “show” part, we must do some telling; it’s unavoidable. But set the scene by “showing,” as much as possible; again, this is done by painting a picture with significant words. Illustratively, in the paragraph above, I have used the word “impotently” to describe how the mother’s words failed massively, which in this instance means they were without power or the ability to do something; the application of this word is supported by the mother’s actual, ineffective words. She doesn’t, for example, shout, “What the hell are you doing to the kids?” while dialing or threatening to call the police. Rather, she frets, “Oh dear, oh dear,” and trails off with the use of ellipsis. This crime scene in all its nuances is far more powerful than telling, for example, that the father was brutal. The showing of what brutal looks like speaks volumes.

Artistry:

The process of creating art takes time and sometimes a willingness to cross over our own burning coals. But one of the fastest ways to arrive at an artful destination is to comb over your prose, using the “Search” field at the very top and center of the “Word” document, when in doubt about overusing any word. Then type in the word you are searching for in your document, and where you’ve used it too often or near where you employed it previously, google a synonym for it that seems to fit the definition. In conclusion, consult Thesaurus.com or Google to discover and replace overused words with synonyms that make sense; they must be apt replacements for your original words, or superior ones, as it’s far better to repeat a word than to use an inappropriate one, so pay attention.

One final edict today from the writer, Jack London: To write well, read, read, read, and write, write, write. And my own motto: Just do your best. If we are striving for our best, ultimately, we can’t go wrong.

 

God Bless, and more to come soon…Glo