Emptying Tomorrow

What’s said in the marriage, stays in the marriage. Mostly because age is kind and I can’t remember the petty comments we’ve flung at each other over 21 years. The loving comments are said often enough they are ingrained in my heart.

But there is something Brendan said to me long ago which I will share with you: “Julie, you’re not happy unless you have something to worry about.” This resonates still because, well, it’s mostly true. I would cut the word “happy” –  worrying doesn’t make me happy. It makes me.

Let’s rewrite that sentence: “Julie, you’re not, unless you have something to worry about.” Anxiety is my fuel.

This terrific blog post about anxiety and the creative process flowed into my Twitter feed last week: Let’s Talk About Anxiety and the Creative Process. It got me to thinking about the nest of anxieties I create and where it fits into my writing life. Author Dan Blank reminds us we all bear the burden of uncertainty and our fears are relative – no more, no less than the guy in the coffee shop we are eavesdropping on. But in this up-by-the-bootstraps, My-Facebook-Life-Is-Perfect society, we are loath to name our anxieties lest they reveal the gross flaws in our character.

On the heels of Dan Blank’s blog post was an interview with comedian Marc Maron on WHYY’s Fresh Air. Maron is hilarious guy, clever and endearing. And a chronic fretter (Fretterer? Fretishist? Chronically fraught?). When asked by host Terri Gross if he related to the idea of suffering as inspiration for his creativity, Maron replied “…I have found that … I experience a tremendous amount of dread and fear and panic. I think that misery for people that incredibly anxious or frightened is something consistent. I think obsession sometimes works as almost a spirituality. You know, you have a routine that your brain kind of loops around that you call home, but that’s usually in defense of some other part of you that’s unruly. And for me, I think it’s anxiety and panic and worry and dread.” So what you’re saying, Mr. Maron, is that you are not, unless you have something to worry about. You bow at the altar of Dread. Hey, we’re a religion!

A couple of weeks ago I went out for a trail run. On uphill stretch I realized my heart was trying to leap from my throat. I stopped but could not catch my breath. This scared the shit out of me and made my heart race even faster, which made me panic more, which… A man passed me and we waved at one another. I thought it would be bad form to collapse in front of a stranger. Finally my heart slowed and my lungs opened. I hobbled back to the car, chilled and cowed by my body’s betrayal of my mind. I’d been on that same stretch only days before and bounded up the same path. I chalked it up to running on an empty stomach and tried to push away darker fears.

Early the next morning while sitting on the sofa, writing and drinking my morning joe, my heart zoomed. I could have been sitting in a cramped airplane seat in the middle of a 10-hour flight, the way the panic attack came on. Now I was scared. I know, I know, I should have called my doctor (new in town, I didn’t yet have a GP and I was one week away from a new health insurance plan taking effect. God Bless America, Land of It’s Cheaper to Die Than Visit the ER). The next day I sliced my coffee intake in half (a fun few days of withdrawal drudgery ensued) and all but eliminated alcohol. I wondered, at nearly 44, was this the start of hormone-induced perimenopause? I eat clean, I run, swim, bike, yoga – I’m fit as a fiddle. A little creaky and soft in many spots, but sheesh…

Although I couldn’t completely rule out a physical cause for my racing heart (and I do have a doctor’s appointment scheduled. In June.), I’m pretty attuned to my emotional heart. I knew all those tiny eggs in the nest of anxieties I’ve been incubating over the past several months were hatching in the warmth of spring. And some of them are full-grown birds of prey, coming home to roost. Here are my chicks and hawks, complete with ID bands so even if I set them free, we’ll keep track of each other:

Things I Worry About Constantly

• something will happen to Brendan and I will be alone
• I will contract a terminal illness (Cold comfort that I already have a terminal illness. It’s known as being born)
• I will fall victim again to depression and an Amber alert will have to be issued for my soul
• I will have another running injury and be denied the addictive substance I crave: endorphins
• I am irrelevant. This is wrapped up in the heartbreak of infertility, miscarriage and the failed attempts to adopt. I have a surplus of love that feels like it’s draining into a black hole of regret and sorrow
• Money. This is back again, after taking a few years’ hiatus. We’ve given up a lot to follow our hearts’ calling and the compromise, at least in the near future, is financial security
• I’m missing fundamental truth of my life, something that’s right in front of me. And I’m not getting any younger.

Not on this list:

• Writing

I search for it. I listen for the scratching the door. But I feel no anxiety about my writing. This is not a matter of self-confidence – I have no illusions about my skills and talents. It’s simply the one open space in my life not crowded by my fears. Perhaps more importantly, I don’t feel anxious when I write. The world slips away and I don’t feel much of anything – not my belly, my bladder, my stiff neck or aching shoulders. I feel the story.

Nor do I entertain illusions about publication, as least not through the traditional channels. I’ve released myself from that pressure and those expectations. When I finish this monster and return to writing short stories before tackling the next long-form project, I’ll hope for the same publishing success as my recent short story endeavors. I’ll do all I can to bring my novel to the shelf, but I remind myself daily that the writing process is what brings me peace and fulfillment, not the reward of extrinsic acknowledgment.

Perhaps this is the fundamental truth about my life over which I seem to lose so much sleep. And I’m not getting any younger.

But I did run that damn hill again.

bending not breaking
admiralty inlet may 2013

Our anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrows, but only empties today of its strengths. Charles Spurgeon

Entering the Wilderness

“At times you have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover is yourself.” ― Alan Alda

This year – no longer new and fragile, but not yet settled in its skin – has been defined by intuition. I’ve held my intuition at arm’s length, examined it from all sides and shoved it back in the drawer. Only to take it out, shake it out, and embrace it at last.

Intuition is what you turn to when you have exhausted the alternatives. It’s the last entry name on your dance card, the partner ready with a firm hand and a sure foot to waltz you into the new day.

We knew, way back that dreadful New Year’s Eve day, that moving on was the only option worthy of our consideration. But we argued against it, fearing the unknown; fearful of losing the comfort and security which appeared like magic in our bank account every two weeks; of losing our identities, our community, our friends.

But we knew. I knew the moment I heard Brendan’s shaking voice on the telephone telling me he was coming home. He must have known several minutes before, standing up from his chair and standing up for his dignity. We would have to go.

And we did. We moved on, in our own time. In our own way. Ten weeks later – our decisions made, papers signed, notices given, bags packed, boxes filled – we turned faces westward, toward the water, toward the mountains. Toward home.

I gave in to intuition again last week, knowing that no matter how much you hope something will be the right thing, it can often be the wrong time. Or you’re not the right person. So I rinsed off my gumboots and set them on the back patio. Yesterday morning, I walked down the hill to a new job, one my gut tells me is the better choice.

Without tapping into intuition, creative writing is about as inspired as a grocery store list. It’s what compels a writer return to the page day after day. By releasing our creative unconscious, by listening deeply to our instincts, we connect with our characters and through them, our true stories are revealed.

I had a word count goal in mind for this first draft – something in the 110-115,000 range. A complete novel. Not a long one, but something of substance. Not that word count much matters in the dung heap of first drafts, but it gave me an end point from which I could see across a chasm of edits to less crappy drafts. I also allowed for Plan B – the Intuition Plan – that gave me an out if I felt Draft 1 was ready to be pillaged and plundered by my red pen in search of treasure worth salvaging.

Not surprisingly, the Intuition Plan was put into effect ’round about the time I unpacked the last box, set my office to rights, and this long winter of our discontent came to a close. I had a beginning, a bunch of middles, and an end. I had started to write circles around myself, falling into plot holes and bringing the earth down around me in my attempt to clamber out. It was time to bring scenes together, to strategize and lay out, in systematic fashion, the story’s arc. And to shake out the bogeys.

April 1, (no foolin’!), 90,000 words of Draft 1 became (magically!) Draft 2. While I was upending all other constants in my life, why not toss my writing routine into the mix?

Early morning sessions with my blue Pilot and Moleskine, scribbling to fill blank pages with scenes and silliness became, after a few awkward attempts, early morning sessions with my red Pilot and 8.5 x 11 Helvetica-filled Hammermill.

And hours – at all hours – of retyping and tweaking, shuffling pages and shaking my head.

I worried that editing would mean an end to creating. Yet, despite the taking away that is inherent to the revision process, Draft 2 finds itself 5,000 new words the richer. And I’m still in the early scenes. I’m have a sense of what Draft 3 will entail (You didn’t think this would be over any time soon did you? Honey, we’re just getting started): the fleshing out and enriching of detail, the gathering of historical minutiae, most of which will be discarded in…Draft 4? I jest. Or not.

But Draft 1 – there it is, on the table, in black and white. Now being sliced and diced into something resembling a story by my fine point red pen.

I’m still a bit wobbly – one month into this new life – my emotions giddy but uncertain, like a colt taking his first steps. The world around me is so fresh, brimming with the vibrant colors of new growth, the richness of blossoms and sea air, the madness of wind and the changing tides. I feel that delicious disconnect of being far away on holiday, in a place that is so beautiful you feel simultaneously calmed and energized. But I’m not on holiday. I’m in the wilderness of my intuition. And I think I’ll stay here awhile.

I guess my feet know where they want me to go

Spring entered as she should: with hair tangled and knotted, streaming in the wind. She shivered as the sea air pierced the holes in her ratty sweater, but her bare toes burrowed in the sand, the only surface which absorbed the sun’s fragile warmth. Tossed between two seasons, one wan and weary of red fingers and runny noses, the other brazen and heady with the scent of lilacs and sweat, Spring arrived to claim her equinox.

And so have I arrived on the other side of winter. It began in a stew of anger and bewilderment, passed into determination and defiance, ending at last in hope.

Had you told me at Winter’s Solstice that the turning of the seasons would find us not just in a new home several zip codes distant, starting new jobs – hell, completely new lives – I would have thought it not impossible, but not likely. Had you told me what we would have gone through to get here, I would have slammed the door in your face. Absent a door, I probably would have asked you to get me silly drunk.

But we did what we seem to do best: we took the pieces that remained and we rebuilt. I hope we did it with dignity. I hope what we left will make it easier for someone else to stand up and say “No.” Or whatever form of “You will not fuck with me” one is comfortable with issuing (see above comment about dignity). I hope the truth we shared will be set free.

But that is in the past. It belongs to Winter. This moment, in its blossoming present, belongs to Spring.

I find myself in this town which seems to capture all the precious places that have shaped my character and spoken to my heart. It is the pastoral peace of my childhood, in the gentle climes of Oregon’s Willamette Valley and the mountain-to-coast splendor of the Olympic Peninsula, (where I am once again, a short drive from the home of my formative years). It is the feisty mix of town and gown of central Washington, where hyper-educated ivory tower types knock elbows at the bar with old timers who have more sense than money. It is the casual warmth of New Zealand, the muddy cheerfulness of Ireland, the pride and passion for place and history of France. It is a place of such profound beauty that my heart skips with joy each time I wander out the door.

In fact, I looked up from the keyboard a few minutes ago and gasped at the crimson sky. I grabbed my iPhone, shoved my feet into my polka dot gumboots and ran, in my pajamas, to the top of Quincy Street where I could get a clear view of the sunrise over the Cascades. And to take this photo for you.

I cannot make sense of what happened this Winter. I can neither believe the cliché “It was meant to be,” nor in a cosmic manipulation of circumstances that made this end – this beginning – inevitable. I do believe that we took back control of our lives, at least as much as the universe allowed. Without knowing the outcome, we set out the intention to move forward with hearts open to possibilities.

And now I have what I have so long wished for: a room of my own and a part-time job that will allow me the hours and energy to write, in a community steeped in creativity. Water and forest surround this peninsula in the rainshadow of the Olympics. It reaches for Canada while turning its pert backside to the Big Smoke smothered by rain.

And I’m terrified. Terrified by paychecks gone “Poof!” in the breeze, terrified by the budget that marches in columns more red than black. Terrified by the cursor that blinks black on a white, white, empty, empty screen. If we’re talking clichés, how about “Be careful what you wish for”?

But I can’t squelch the hope and joy which blooms inside, anymore than I can halt Spring. And who would ever wish to?

My writing routine has been torn asunder by the move, the transition, the emotional strain of our bittersweet farewell to Seattle, the risk we took by not leaving quietly, the physical wrenching of two people in their mid-40′s tackling the same moves they made with disquieting regularity in their mid-20′s.

The routines are the first thing to go in a move. The challenge is to embrace the new while clinging to those most dear. I have more time to write but a more wily work schedule; I must be ready to crack my knuckles and call upon my muses at odd hours and in unlikely places. But my morning pages are immutable: the last routine to go in the final throes of moving, the first to return.

The story hasn’t stalled completely; I have worked on scenes here and there these past weeks (those morning sessions). I am so close to the end of this first draft that I am tempted to begin a rewrite to fill in the missing parts and call it Draft 2. But I’ve latched onto a magical final word count for Draft 1 and for the moment, until I get back into the groove, I work toward that end before I allowing myself to edit. But I have written the ending.

Now I write just below that ending, trusting I will know when it is time to stop. And to begin, again.

“Country Road”

written and performed by James Taylor -from Sweet Baby James, 1970

Take to the highway, won’t you lend me your name?

Your way and my way seem to be one and the same.

Mamma don’t understand it, she wants to know where I’ve been.

I’d have to be some kind of natural born fool to want to pass that way again,

But I could feel it on a country road.Sail on home to Jesus, won’t you good girls and boys.

I’m all in pieces, you can have your own choice.

But I can hear a heavenly band full of angels and they’re coming to set me free.

I don’t know nothing ’bout the why or when but I can tell that it’s bound to be,

because I could feel it, child, yeah, on a country road.I guess my feet know where they want me to go walking on a country road.

Take to the highway, won’t you lend me your name?

Your way and my way seem to be one and the same.

Mamma don’t understand it, she wants to know where I’ve been.

I’d have to be some kind of natural born fool to want to pass that way again,

But I could feel it on a country road.

Walk on down, walk on down, walk on down, walk on down, walk on down a country road.

Na na na na na na na na na na na, country road, yeah, walking on a country road…

© James Taylor

Wherever I lay my hat…

I have a scrapbook of images that falls somewhere between idea and dream. It is a collection of home interiors and exteriors carefully snipped from the pages of a few favorite shelter magazines.  As you rifle through the glossy pages, themes become apparent: light, comfort, wood, glass, stone, minimal furnishings, natural colors, bare floors, living spaces that radiate from an open kitchen- all oriented toward the out-of-doors, where sandstone and gravel paths wind among raised bed and butterfly gardens.

Brendan and I haunt our favorite neighborhoods on long walks, passing lovely homes for sale. We try them on in our mind’s eye, sizing up a west-facing backyard that would be perfect for a garden, a garage that could hold Brendan’s growing collection of beer-and wine-making apparatus, a fenced yard for the dogs we long to bring home, and the small room at the front of the house that would make a perfect writing space for me. We adore the closely knit community of Phinney-Greenwood, the old world elegance of Queen Anne, the hipster-chic of Wallingford. We envision ourselves walking to favorite coffee shops, to pubs for Friday night IPAs, running on the paths that surround Green Lake or overlook the Olympics, and making the easy bike commute to our workplaces.

But we never take those next steps: the visit our credit union to talk about financing, the call to a real estate agent, not even the Sunday open house to see what $357,000 buys these days (current median home price in our Ballard neighborhood). Experience curbs our enthusiasm; a desire for freedom supersedes our most fervent nesting instincts.

Because we have been there. Four mortgages. First in Illinois, then twice in Washington state, most recently on New Zealand’s South Island. We’ve been renting since we returned stateside at the end of 2007. And we have no plans for anything grander in the near future.

We field the question “Do you think you’ll ever settle down and buy a house?” often enough that we’ve canned our reply. We give each other that look- a half-smile and a chuckle that’s supposed to convey irony. One of us summarizes nearly twenty years of marriage with a gently exhaled  ”Weeelll….” and it’s usually Brendan who says “We’ve been homeowners. Four times over. Next house we buy will be the last one. And it will have a vineyard, so…” And he trails off. The questioner might think he’s kidding. I know he’s not, though we haven’t quite worked out the details of the vineyard plan, which now include asking Greek’s prime minister George Papandreou to allow the European debt deal to proceed so our 401(k)s stop hemorrhaging.

Our previous homes were each modest affairs that needed varying degrees of TLC. We replaced flooring, carpeting, furnaces, plumbing, doors; we sanded, stripped, painted, rototilled, hammered; jacked up one house to repair a foundation, installed a central heating system in another. We landscaped, planted gardens and trees, laid down walkways, and built fences. Our work paid off: homes #1 and #3 each sold within days of entering the market. Home #2 never even had a For Sale sign posted- it was in and out before the ink was dry on the estate agent contract. But we escaped by the skin of our teeth with house #4: Our sweet little bungalow in Cheviot, New Zealand entered the market in mid-2007 as housing bubbles worldwide began to pop and vanish, releasing dreams and life savings into the ether.

Since the housing boom went bust, this nation has had its first real conversations questioning the value the American dream, the one that culminates in home ownership. We’re considering that it may not be the best investment in our futures, relative to our incomes and goals. And one cannot escape the central irony of the economic downturn living in Seattle: now that home prices are nearing the reasonable, descending from the stratospheric stupidity of the mid-2000s, credit is tight, incomes are falling, and consumer confidence is low.

After so many years of owning, after the thousands of dollars and buckets of sweat equity poured into restoring and renovating, I no longer equate stability and security with owning a home. If anything, I feel a greater sense of security because we are free from the commitment of a mortgage and the obligation of upkeep. The ability to make a change at nearly a moment’s notice is both liberating and reassuring. I feel a greater connection to my career, chosen and pursued for the love of it, not the money. And I feel less afraid to take chances and pursue other goals because our only obligation is a rent check.

But that doesn’t mean we don’t dream. On the contrary- we have so many! I have a scrapbook full of them as my shelter vision slowly takes shape. But I’m willing to lay a different sort of foundation, to savor the freedom we have now and take time to build our future. Somehow, life at 42 feels far less urgent than it did at 32.

And from our little apartment, we walk to our favorite coffee shops, to the pub for Friday night IPAs, run on the paths that surround Green Lake or overlook the Olympics, and make the easy bike commute to our workplaces. Somebody else mows the lawn.

I could live here…Or here.  Definitely here.

This, however, would make me commit hara-kiri

Just A Homework Assignment

I’m currently enrolled in an essay writing course taught by writer and journalist Amy Paturel. Our first assignment was to craft a profile of ourself as a writer. How’s that for a stretch of the imagination?

Profile of a Writer-in-Progress

I ran my tenth half-marathon three weeks ago.  I completed my first long-distance race in November 2003 and I have run at least one half-marathon every year since.

So yes, I run. But I stumble when calling myself a runner. Runners are sleek, long-legged creatures who speak of fartleks, negative splits, performance shoes, PR’s. Runners are “A” personality types who train to qualify for Boston, layout their gear the night before, and eat meals calibrated to maximize protein and carbohydrate loads.

Me? I’ve got ten pounds I can’t seem to outrun, no matter how fast I sprint on interval days. I’ve followed several Runner’s World training programs, but in all these years I’ve never broken out of the Intermediate Category. My running togs are crammed into a dresser drawer; early mornings find me cursing quietly as I sort out black shorts from dark blue shirts. I finally sprang for a fancy Garmin GPS sports watch a few months ago. Now I have an accurate-to-the-footfall accounting of how slow I am. Yes, I run. But I feel ridiculous saying “I am a runner.”

I was in my early thirties when I first felt compelled to cross a finish line. Yet,the desire to write has been in me since I could tie a pair of tennies on my own. I have wanted to write since 1975, when I read Louise M. Fitzhugh’s classic “Harriet the Spy,” at the age of six. But the intent faded over the years to a “Wouldn’t that be lovely?’ dream as I pursued graduate work and created a career developing study abroad programs. I traveled, I schmoozed in various ivory towers, I had articles published in Transitions Abroad, a chapter in a textbook, and I contributed to our department newsletters.

But that was work; it didn’t make me a writer. Writers attend Tuesday evening writer groups; they have bulletin boards covered in Post-Its that detail characters and plot threads; they have MFA’s, manuscripts, agents, and a folder full of rejection letters that prove the prodigiousness of their efforts.

Two years ago I stopped keeping a journal, a practice I had started in 1975, inspired by Harriet and her notebooks. After a year’s hiatus, I was aching to write. I wanted to be free from recording the minutiae of my day, yet be accountable to an audience. So last summer, I began this blog. I construct essays and book reviews and my reward is a writer’s rush such as I never experienced scribbling in my journal. It’s like a runner’s high. Even when it hurts, and I suck, and I’m injured, and it rains, and I’m just not in the mood, running feels ridiculously good. Similarly, once the page begins to fill with words, the literary endorphins flow.

I am a self-taught writer; my classroom is the endless library of fiction and non-fiction that I live to read. I can conjugate the past conditional of irregular ˆre verbs in French, but I can’t keep straight when, in English, to use a semi-colon or when a simple comma will do. I absorb the advice of the accomplished: Stephen King makes me think twice before employing an adverb; Natalie Goldberg fills me with guilt for not writing enough; William Faulkner compels me to murder my darlings; William Zinsser just scares the crap out of me.

Returning to the page in this blog has given me the courage to find my voice and to pursue fiction writing. I enrolled in a two-year, non-residency fiction writing program late last autumn. My writer-mentor critiques my assignments. I bask in or shrink with her feedback. I rewrite and carry on. I attend the occasional workshop at The Richard Hugo House, a writing center in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood. I soak in the amazing writer juju and soothe my sense of inadequacy when we read our efforts aloud with the knowledge that I am taking essential risks. By risking, I will learn.

I find myself using the essay to mine my memory for inspiration. I search for sensations, images, encounters, even fragments of conversation that I can pin to my mental bulletin board. I am learning to listen and to look for the smallest details that will spark my imagination and ignite a new story. Based on the work I have submitted as part of my writing program, I am now working on a series of short stories inspired by my experiences living in Appalachia, the Rockies, central Africa, France, Japan, and New Zealand. And I dream of a stone cottage in the Languedoc where I would write to the sound of goat bells in the garrigue.

My first short story – and I mean first, as in written and submitted – was published last month.Thirty-six years after a precocious eleven year-old from Manhattan’s Upper East Side – sporting black-rimmed spectacles, with a penchant for tomato sandwiches, and mentored by a Dostoevsky-quoting nanny - entered my life and inspired me to write, I have published my first story. Just don’t ask me to call myself a writer.

N.B. I am now four weeks into Amy’s essay writing course and preparing a couple of non-fiction pieces to submit to magazines in the coming months. The class been hugely beneficial – I highly recommend it – Amy is an amazing writer and teacher. And I’m keeping a journal again. 

 

Chancing upon Serenity

I  created a new running route last week, heading north and west through Phinney and Greenwood. It was then that I chanced upon the Sakya Monastery, on the corner of 1st and 83rd. It rises like warm sunshine in a tranquil, leafy neighborhood. I returned this morning to take a few photos of this Buddhist monastery, for it made me consider my themes of Safety and Security and their sisters, Serenity and Peace.

I am feeling frustrated as I desire time to write and reflect, but must now dash off to work.  But I will return to share how I was introduced to the works Vietnamese Buddhist philosopher Thich Nhat Hanh.

Safety in Political Expression

This week several Puget Sound residents became victims of gun violence. Two young men shot each other down in a state park in front of families enjoying a Saturday picnic on the shores of Lake Sammamish. Saturday night, an intruder murdered a young mother and one of her children; another child remains in critical condition at Harborview. And last night, a woman who went out into her street to determine the source of a domestic dispute was shot. Accidentally? Does it matter? She is dead, at the hands of a person with a gun.

I have rarely felt secure expressing my outrage, or even simply my opinion, in matters where politics are deeply entrenched. I do not think quickly on my feet. I am intuitive, not argumentative; I cannot retain an encyclopedic set of facts and figures in my head to add objective weight to my subjective assertions. I value discussion, but I abhor combative confrontation.

My political and social beliefs are a reflection of my values, what I regard as moral and ethical. I regard others’ stances as reflecting the same about them. Entering into a confrontational debate with someone who I consider a friend or a loved one nearly always results in deep disappointment and hurt. I see in them a set of values that I do not understand and it makes me question the foundation of our relationship.

I have spent some time reading the opinions of a Facebook friend via his posts on a political blog. He writes with vitriol, contempt, and scorn, spewing forth opinions as acidic as the bile that must churn in his gut. It has made me so sad to witness his anger. And it has turned me away from posting links to op-eds or articles of a political nature to my own Facebook profile. I don’t want to be a part of that same pool of people who are driven by headlines. It doesn’t mean that I pay any less attention or that my opinions are any less firm; it means that I need to find a balance between the safety of remaining silent and the rightness of speaking my mind.

Last night, I read a line in David Mitchell’s The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, a line written by an author my age, spoken by a Dutch physician living in Japan in the early 19th century: ” …So  little is actually worthy of either belief or disbelief. Better to strive to coexist than seek to disprove…”

The first sentence I find terribly sad, the second I take to heart. I do find so much worthy of belief, of holding to the light, of fighting for. But I believe little is gained in argument. Debate, yes, but in this era of screaming heads posing as journalists, vapid tweets and hyper-polarized political parties, Debate has been trampled on and left for dead by its mightier but less worthy opponent, Argument.

Writing allows me to take a step back, to take the time I need to formulate coherent thought, to research beliefs so that they can take the shape of well-reasoned opinion.

But in this instance I let intuition take over, I let the certainty of my heart speak, I let what I know to be moral ring through.

Access to and possession of guns, in the name of a distorted interpretation of the Second Amendment, has made this country far less safe and secure. Recent Supreme Court rulings represent an erosion of effective gun laws and set this nation on a frightening path of increased violence.

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence is at work in every state to enact and retain sensible gun laws.  I have to believe that we are better as a nation, united, than the angry voices of those who believe their personal rights- rights defined by lobbyists, not the Constitution- are more valuable than the lives of their fellow citizens.

Beginnings

Main Entry: ¹safe·ty

Pronunciation: \ˈsāf-tē\

Function: noun

Inflected Form(s): plural safeties

Etymology: Middle English saufte, from Anglo-French salveté, saufté, from salf safe

Date: 14th century

1 : the condition of being safe from undergoing or causing hurt, injury, or loss

Main Entry: se·cu·ri·ty

Pronunciation: \si-ˈkyu̇r-ə-tē\

Function: noun

Inflected Form(s): plural se·cu·ri·ties

Date: 15th century

1 : the quality or state of being secure: as a : freedom from danger : safety b : freedom from fear or anxiety

I have thought a lot about safety and security this week, as I commit to writing. I consider what brings me here, to transform thought into concrete phrase, in a potentially public, but currently  controlled environment. I think of the rewards and complications of revealing private thoughts in a public forum.

I think, too, of what will be lost by playing it safe, by withholding that which I would choose to share because I fear criticism (my own being the most harsh), being misunderstood, judged or perhaps worst of all, disregarded.

I  set myself the task of identifying those environments where I feel safe and secure as a writer and those where I feel less safe from hurt, less free from fear and anxiety. Those writing environments represent my life.