Week two of Nanowrimo is drawing to a close. I’m at 23,045 words on Birdie’s Journal, which is slightly ahead of the strict schedule of 1667 words a day. It’s been an exhilarating process so far, though I can imagine that if I hadn’t done my page-a-day for so long already it would be more intense. The idea is to let that first draft out without any editing at all, but I can’t resist tweaks here and there. It doesn’t slow me down much.

Never having done this before, I didn’t really know what to expect. There have been several pleasant surprises along the way. One is the mood boost I’ve gotten from writing so much. Rather than exhausting me, the process seems to rev me up. The second surprise was the collection of fun pep talks. So far, in addition to those from Nanowrimo’s founding father, Chris Baty, I’ve received messages from Phillip Pullman, Jonathan Stroud, and Katherine Paterson. Where else can you get free writing advice from the bigwigs? The third surprise has been the forums. Now, I’ve begun to appreciate that the forums could be the biggest procrastination tool of the whole process. Thousands upon thousands of messages await. But I posted a question and have received several thoughtful and insightful responses. I’m grateful to my fellow Wrimos for taking the time to share their experiences with me.

I doubt that the novel will be done at 50,000 words, but I see its shape more clearly than I usually do at this point in a story. So, a big tip of the hat to Chris Baty and his dedicated team.

This week may top all others in immensity of psychic energy experienced, used, and drained away. Election day I volunteered as a monitor at the local school where two precincts were voting, and then did a shift as a runner, taking food out to poll watchers and bringing back the lists of folks who still might need reminding to go vote. That night provided a huge catharsis for the tension, hope, anxiety, yearning, and work of the campaign season. Barack Obama’s speech, the footage of Jesse Jackson in tears, the crowds of joyous Americans…I’m so very grateful that I lived to see the day. I appreciated the seriousness of Obama’s speech, the lack of cheap promises for easy fixes. His eloquence, as always, touched my heart. The next day, I thought more about what having Michelle Obama as a first lady will mean to this country. During the campaign, I received a recorded call from her, and was impressed by the measured cadence of her voice, the calm that she evoked. Thank you, America, for making this possible.

The Saturday before the election, I started Nanowrimo. I’d never signed up in previous years, because it seemed silly to churn out yet another first draft to sit among the other first drafts that have piled up over the years, awaiting their turns at thorough editing. But this year, I had a dream that, when I worked it with some friends, pointed me clearly toward writing the novel I’d been toying with starting. (The dream also had layers about the election, all entwined together as dream symbols so often are.) So I figured I’d give it a try. After all, it wouldn’t be so different from what I’ve been doing for nine years, right? The pages would just pile up faster.

Actually, so far, that’s turned out to be true. My writing sessions take longer, of course, since I’m writing about five or six times as much per day as my previous minimum. But it’s not the first time I’ve had work pour through me this steadily, and this novel is truly begging to be written. Today, I worked the dream again with Jeremy Taylor, and found more affirmation that writing the novel is the right thing to be doing now, in part because its themes tie in deeply with the question of race in America. I’m so very grateful that two intelligent, well-spoken, responsible individuals will be our next president and first lady. And I’m grateful, in the way I was grateful when the Berlin Wall fell, that a historic barrier has finally crumbled. I am hopeful that Barack and Michelle can, by being themselves, erode the negative projections that we’ve historically visited on people with African ancestry in this country. Though, as I write that, I’m reminded that if we go back far enough in our human ancestry, we all have our roots in that rich continent.

I hope I can grasp hold of my own squirmy projections long enough to dissect them in the writing of this novel. I hope that this process shines light on my own shadows and brings to conscious awareness any unconscious prejudices I still lug around. Jeremy Taylor suggested that I consider the following: How have I been changed by this prodigious effort to conjure non-material truth and put it on the page?

Making myself available to the story comes easily now, after all the years of practice. Understanding how the story changes me is a new, unfamiliar idea. It’s an effort that I would be wise to make in regards to the election of our new president, as well. How does this new story for America change me, and how does it change our collective understanding of who we are as a nation?

For the second year in a row, we’ve had an extraordinary crop of Concord grapes. The weather has held so that the grapes have ripened fully on the vine, and no late spring freeze nipped the buds, so here we have glorious abundance. Which translates into not-so-glorious work. Jelly, of course, and juice, but this year we’ve added something new to our repertoire: grape-apple leather. It’s labor intensive, but I know that all it has in it is grapes and apples, and it’s delicious. I get to live out my childhood fantasies of being incredibly resourceful (ala Laura Ingalls Wilder), with the aid of modern appliances like my food processor and food dehydrator.

Laced through all the grape and apple fun, is talk (endless!) and thoughts of the elections. In order to stifle the number of phone calls coming in, I voted early. Since it took me 20 minutes just to fill in all the little rectangles with the drying-out pen in the booth, I was glad that I’d prepped my choices ahead of time and that I hadn’t waited until election day. There was steady traffic while I was there, and cheerful staff/volunteers.

Of all the issues on the Colorado ballot, the most offensive is Amendment 48, the so-called “personhood” amendment. The mysteries of when exactly spirit enters flesh and life truly begins are beyond me, but to involve the legal system in miscarriages is draconian in the extreme. I’ve known several women, good mothers all, who miscarried early in pregnancy, either before or after, or both, carrying other babies to term. Amendment 48 would open the door for women such as these to be investigated, charged with child abuse or even murder. The women I know who’ve been through a miscarriage had enough grief to deal with without the horrors of politics intruding in their health care. Even the Catholic Conference doesn’t support it.

It’s a free country, so people of all leanings can try to change the laws to suit their own agendas. Thanks to our founding fathers, we have the ability to argue our positions in public and to vote against the policies that would take us down the road away from freedom.

I urge you to vote thoughtfully and carefully, with a view to our country’s future as a free democratic republic.

I just heard from my dear friend, Janet Fogg, that her novel, Soliloquy, had received a contract offer. I’ll wait to divulge details until the deal is done, but I’m too excited to just sit on it. For seventeen and a half years, Janet and I have been part of a critique group together. Once a month, we’ve brought our chapters and our comments, shared our hopes and provided support. And laughs, lots of laughs.

Robert A. Johnson, the Jungian analyst, offers the idea of the “slender threads” that shape our lives. The moments, meetings, and little shifts that may not seem to have much portent at the time, but as we look back in our lives, we see how crucial they’ve been. Meeting Janet, in a Lifelong Learning class on How to Get Published, was one of those pivotal moments. Carol Cail, the instructor, told the class we might want to find or form a critique group in order to help each other along the way. Janet and I agreed to start one, and a couple other students joined in as well. But the group shrunk, and Janet and I added new members, my sister Karen, my best friend’s mom, Shirley, my niece Zhenille, and finally our token male, Paul. And the group coalesced.

Over these seventeen years, I’ve watched Janet’s writing grow, have witnessed the droughts when her “real” job took over all her time, and have leaned heavily on her and the rest of the group when my own disappointments seemed enough to make me want to stop writing altogether. When I was at my lowest ebb, and announced one night at dinner that I intended to quit writing, my husband asked if that meant I was going to stop going to critique group. It was unimaginable to me that I would give it up. That slender thread had become a sturdy safety line.

So Janet’s great news is great news for me, too. Three cheers to success—it’s definitely time to stop and have a party!

I returned late last night from a five day workshop led by Robert Moss called The Return of the Seer. I had read several of Robert’s books, and watched his DVD set The Way of the Dreamer, but I knew from my dreamwork experience that reading or watching doesn’t lead to the same level of understanding as doing.

As a confirmation that I was on the right path, my travels there went incredibly smoothly, including having my suitcase be the first off the plane in Hartford. Flying into Hartford, I noticed several red cars in the driveways below, and had the thought, “I’ll get a red rental car.” Never having had a red rental car, this was an unusual thought, but sure enough, it was red. It had my birth month and year on the license plate, too. The license plate came up at several discussions throughout the week and various people teased other interesting meanings from the combination of numbers and letters on it.

The week itself was full of deeper coincidences and surprising moments. The clincher, for me, came early in the week. In groups of four, we took turns being the focus of a “journey” conducted by the other three. These journeys were a kind of waking dream, which I found very similar to the experience of writing fiction: just watching what unfolded in my mind, not judging, but observing. In the second of the journeys, the three of us who were journeying had startlingly consistent visions. I reported mine second, so was able to hear what I had seen (and noted in my journal before anyone spoke) described by someone else. There were variations in what we saw, but the similarities outweighed the variations. The experience was very affirming for me, confirming that these journeys were more than “just” imagination, especially since what we saw resonated very clearly with the person we were journeying for. To my Raven Journey brother and sisters, I will be forever grateful for that gift. And of course, to Robert, for facilitating the experience with the heartbeat of his drum and the raven imagery.

In addition to those and other journeys, we practiced Lightning Dreamwork and participated in dream theater. What’s so striking about dreamwork retreats in general is how quickly and deeply the participants get to the core of what matters to them. I don’t know what most of my new friends do for a living in the waking world, but I know what moves them in their hearts. Such meetings are not luxuries, as one participant pointed out, but necessities. We need to find deeper connections with one another in this world.

The other great gift of the week was gaining a true understanding of how essential it is to believe and trust one’s own experience. It’s a good and useful thing to study with the teachers who have years of experience of their own, who can lead the way more surely than we might stumble across it by ourselves, but it’s crucial to experience the spiritual and numinous for oneself. As Jeremy Taylor often says, “I know this to be true, and it’s much too important for you to take my word for it.” Now I understand that more deeply than ever. Everyone’s experience of the dream world, whether sleeping dreams or waking dreams or shamanic journeys, is individual, and everyone must come to her or his own understanding of what that experience means.

I’m grateful to Robert and to all the participants of the workshop for helping me to deepen my understanding.

Watching Barack Obama’s speech at the DNC, I couldn’t help but slip into awe at the power of words, especially when delivered by a gifted orator. Thoughts carefully expressed, even complex thoughts, can persuade and inspire. My ten-year-old was as engrossed as I was in the speech, and discussed it with me afterward. Oh, to have a president who can use language so eloquently that he can communicate to children and adults. What a gift that would be for the United States and the world, to resort to words instead of guns when conflicts arise.

Rather than the President of Malapropism, we could have the President of Eloquence.

I was also struck by the power of words at an entirely different event in Denver earlier in August—the World Science Fiction Convention. I’d never been to this particular Con before, and was mildly disappointed not to see Klingons. There were plenty of folks in costume, but mostly it was just normally dressed people there to hear and meet their favorite authors and filmmakers. My favorite panel was the one with Lois McMaster Bujold, Patricia Wrede, and Lillian Stewart Carl, who discussed their long friendship and enduring writer’s circle. It never ceases to amaze me how writers love to support other writers with their enthusiasm and feedback. Here’s a tip of the hat to the Uff das, CLC, and The Wild Folk of the West, who have all kept me going even when words are hard to come by.

In every moment of life, there are endings and beginnings—breaths, heartbeats, seconds ticking on a clock. But sometimes in life, there are bigger endings and beginnings. On a human scale, the largest of these are birth and death, of course, but within each life are the moments we use to mark the trail. Graduations, relationships, changing roles in family life. Growing up, growing older.

I had a few of those landmarks recently. In April I mailed off Bone Temple, after an intensive effort to revise based on feedback from both Martha Mihalick’s critique from the RMC-SCBWI Fall 2007 conference, and the Wild Folk of the West. Getting it off my desk felt like a completion, though indeed I hoped it wasn’t really an ending, but a beginning of a new relationship with an editor. What every writer hopes for, of course.

In May, I finished the requirements for my Certificate from The Marin Institute for Projective Dreamwork. Certainly an ending and a beginning rolled into one. I framed the certificate and displayed it in my newly-rented office space, glad to have its company as I led dream exploration workshops. Also in May, I mailed off a short story, hoping for some success to mark my path. And, the biggest ending and beginning, by which I see my life divided into two—I gave up eating wheat and gluten, and achieved unexpected health.

I rested, for a couple of weeks, in the uncertainty of what to expect next. Well, rested isn’t exactly the word. I kept busy with all the usual duties of home and work, took a trip to Crested Butte and then to South Carolina, planted and weeded in the garden, tended the elderly cat, hosted several gatherings of family and friends, and generally stayed busy.

Then the beginnings started arriving. Further suggestions for revision from Martha. My short story accepted. A new computer. New ideas. More ideas than I can contain, during a time (summer) when my duties as mom trump my usual work time. Yet even that has a new beginning, as I explained to my kids that I needed some uninterrupted writing time during the day. They understood, and have been honoring my request.

And so, back to the new rewrite: another time through the novel weaving in more elements, deepening my own understanding of the full implications of the story. I faced it at first with some reluctance, but now the ideas are flowing and the process is fun again. Hang on, it’s the beginning of another ride.

Another great Pikes Peak Writers Conference is already over. From reading reports of other attendees, it sounds like I missed some terrific sessions, but I attended some terrific sessions too. The first was the Friday Read & Critique, with Liz Scheier offering her comments on our opening pages. I always learn something new at these sessions, and it’s always great to have a professional’s opinion on what’s working and what isn’t.

The Flash Fiction workshop with Bret Wright was a delight, and a great addition to the usual Friday offerings. I learned a lot, laughed a lot, and thought the time went far too quickly.

Then it was off for more laughter and some stunning visuals at the Graphic Novel workshop offered by Walt and Weezie Simonson. I am in awe of the talent we saw in that room. And the Simonsons were a great addition to the conference—as friendly and accessible as anyone who has ever been on the Pikes Peak faculty.

Friday evening’s keynote speech, by Carol Berg, was a highlight I’ll always cherish. It’s not every conference that one of the keynoters is a friend, and her talk brought back wonderful memories of that early conference when I met Carol and we sat around with several others, enjoying a glass of wine in our room, laying the foundations of friendships. It was also great to have a fantasy writer up there at the podium, representing the oldest of all the storytelling forms. Thanks, Carol!

Children’s writers have the best discussions at their parties—when I walked in, the topic was poisons. And yes, we got busted by the fun police again this year. We make each other laugh, a little too loudly, I guess. So we headed for the lobby, where we had the delight of chatting with agent Cherry Weiner, who besides being a force of nature is one of the funniest women on the planet.

Saturday morning brought more great conversations, with Steve Saffel (thanks for the Spiderman pin!) and Walt and Weezie and my usual buddies. I enjoyed my manuscript critique from Pat LoBrutto, who offered some key insights into making my work shine and encouraged me to find an agent. Thanks, Pat!

And then the pitch session. Though the woman in the waiting room tried to help us relax, in truth, I’ve been through so many pitches over the years that I didn’t feel nervous. Laurie McLean opened the conversation with great ease and made the ten minutes fly. Thanks, Laurie, for making it easy to explain my stories, even though I stumbled over some of the words—more tired or nervous than I thought I was!

David Liss’s lunch talk had us all laughing—intentionally—and reminded me of my long-gone days of grad school. As a historian, I’m picky about historical fiction, but David’s talk was a great pitch for his books.

By Saturday afternoon, I was so tired that I desperately needed a nap, which I didn’t get, and my knees were aching from the hours of sitting. Still, I enjoyed Kenny Golde’s workshop on Hollywood, and David Liss’s workshop on character. And then I had reached the end of my ability to absorb anything more and disappeared for a rest. Of course, I still had the Flash Fiction prompt, “They said it couldn’t be done,” knocking around in my head, bumping up against a story my dad had told me. So I took some time to write a story and make some edits, and read it to my roommate, Janet Fogg. Janet offered a gentle critique, which incited a few more edits, and then I copied it over to make sure I got it turned in before dinner.

The awards banquet was a blast, with my fellow fantasy advocate, Cheryl Reifsnyder, receiving first place in the Children’s category, and my critique group “cousin,” Karen Albright Lin, receiving second in Mainstream. It’s always a great thing to see friends going up there to the front.

The down side to it all was that a dear friend had taken ill Saturday afternoon, and missed half the conference, huddled in her hotel room. She’s recovering well, but we missed her company.

Sunday’s workshops started off with a bang, or a thunderstorm, or a soundtrack. I went to Laura Hayden’s talk on subliminal music, and enjoyed the opportunity to actually write at a writer’s conference. And then got even more of a chance at Walt and Weezie’s First Draft workshop. Thanks to all the great writers in that room who read their work. I always love seeing the different stories that come from the same prompt, and I’ll never forget the image of rings of people surrounding a bear and her cub.

Then the last workshop—Kim Reid’s on memoir. I’ve already started reading her new book, No Place Safe: A Family Memoir, and it drew me in immediately. Thanks, Kim, for sharing the wisdom you learned along the way.

I’d agreed to drive three of the faculty to the airport, which meant I’d miss the lunch speech and the announcement of the Flash Fiction contest winners. During the fifty minutes I was gone, my story was read aloud as the first place winner. Janet collected the prize for me, and I was reminded of my father-in-law’s words—No good deed goes unpunished. So, I was sorry to miss the fun of hearing my story read aloud to the crowd, but I’m looking forward to seeing it published in Apollo’s Lyre next winter. Thanks, Bret, for the great workshop on writing Flash Fiction. I’m sure I wouldn’t have done so well without it.

And many thanks to all the great folks who put the conference together and made sure it ran as smoothly as always. It’s such a fun weekend, with plenty of work and play, old friends and new. I always meet people I really enjoy, and hear delightful stories. No wonder the Pikes Peak Writers Conference has such a great reputation. No wonder I’ve been eleven times.

This has been a week of walking through memory. Lots of things have triggered it, including reading Natalie Goldberg’s book on writing memoir, Old Friend from Far Away. She writes that memoir is the exploration of memory, of how we remember.

The next trigger actually consists of several related triggers. I have a college reunion coming up in the fall, and a high school reunion in ’09. Trying to decide whether to attend the college reunion, which is far enough away to involve air travel and hotels, I got back in touch with some friends from those days, to see whether they’re planning to attend. And I got back in touch with people I knew in high school in the same week. One offered, in his email, a brief paragraph of remembered lines from the plays we were in and commented how strange it is that memory shines such a bright light on certain scenes. Others recede into the mists.

Talking with old friends made me think about things like how we change and don’t change. Of course I’ve changed since I was on the verge of adulthood—every experience in the decades since those days has shaped my understanding of the world and of myself. But in some essentials, I haven’t changed. One friend offered a snapshot of how he remembers my personality, and those things are still true. As I see it, the underlying qualities of who I am don’t change, but how I act on those qualities and how I relate to others based on my level of understanding of my own motivations changes dramatically over the years.

Today brought two more triggers for memory. On campus today for a Conference on World Affairs talk, I walked into a building where I used to have an office, and where I once taught a large lecture class. The smell of old wood and new carpet greeted me as I faced the long flight of stairs leading up, a flight I climbed countless times years ago. I remembered professors, students, moments of being in front of the class. Good and bad memories rose up. On the way out, a young man held the door for me, and it occurred to me that he’s likely half my age. How did that happen?

But the deepest trigger is that today was Paul’s, my father-in-law’s, birthday. I think of him every day, seeing his art in my house, seeing his smile sometimes on my husband’s face. Paul died almost four years ago, and if I let myself experience it, the grief is just as fresh now as it was then. I miss the conversations we used to have, the way he’d get down on the floor and play with his grandkids, his sense of humor.

Riding home on the bus, I listened to a song that always reminds me of him, having heard it within a few weeks of his death. It’s by Bailey Jester, called “Voice Across the Water.” The line “I’d give anything right now to see you standing here” always touches my grief. But today, thinking of memory and times past, I also heard this line in a new way: “Now I find myself a prisoner on this ancient shore…” The risk of plunging too deeply into memory is losing connection with the present. The past is a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there.

Last Saturday I attended a workshop offered by Cynthia Morris through the Rocky Mountain Chapter of SCBWI. The focus was on creating a vision of success and then mapping out the immediate goals to use as stair steps to reach that vision. While I didn’t feel a great need for the goal-setting reminders, since I’m intensely focused right now on revising my manuscript, I still got a lot out of the workshop.

I attended to reconnect with some of the people in the network that Cynthia calls my “creative tribe.” I have several, overlapping, smaller tribes, but by far the biggest network of writers I’ve come to know and love and trust are children’s writers associated with RMC-SCBWI. Some live nearby and I don’t see them nearly often enough, so I was glad to have the chance to catch up, even a little.

Of the exercises and pearls of wisdom that Cynthia offered, I found two to be incredibly helpful. One was to write a letter to myself from my muse. I’m on very good terms with my muse, having shown up at the page faithfully every day for about 8 1/2 years. I show up, my muse shows up. Especially for first drafts, which sometimes flow through me as if I’m just taking dictation. So my letter offered affirmation of the mutual respect I have with my muse.

Revisions can be harder for me, which leads to the other jewel Cynthia dropped in my lap. “The creative process can be uncomfortable.” It looks so simple as I type it, but I needed to hear it. I’d been struggling with a particular revision in my book, trying to address a problem that members of my critique group, the Wild Folk of the West, had pointed out. I figured out how to work it, for the most part, but writing it made me squirm. I liked the version I already had, but could see the validity of the critique. I wrestled with it. I let it roam around in my subconscious. I wrote the new scene, not at all sure it would work. I questioned whether it fit, since the writing of it made me so uncomfortable.

After hearing Cynthia, I took to heart the premise that the creation itself can be uncomfortable. That emotion doesn’t mean the new version won’t work. In fact, as I know from my daily writing practice where sometimes the muse is sleepy and sometimes she’s on fire, a new reader probably won’t be able to tell which parts were uncomfortable and which parts flowed. That’s the magic of the process.