Like Fire Balloons in the Sky: The Inspiration, The Courage, to Share

"I see me, my eyes filled with tears, because it was all over, the night was done. I knew there would never be another night like this.

No one said anything. We all just looked up at the sky and we breathed out and in and we all thought the same things, but nobody said. Someone finally had to say, though, didn't they? And that one is me."

— Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing

My fixation with Zen in the Art of Writing has probably spiraled out of control, into a strange place. (Not probably, clearly: after all, inspired by said book, I’m writing things like THE LAMP and THE MOUSE.)

But lately, I keep opening the book, in a desperate search for some inspiration, and keep feeling drawn back to the passage above. Out of context, it can mean anything and nothing. To give you the actual context, though: he's describing a final memory with his grandfather, lighting a fire balloon and releasing it into the sky on the Fourth of July in 1925. It's incredibly beautiful. It even inspired him to write a story called "The Fire Balloons," many years later. Bradbury also wrote about that night, and about his inspiration for the story, for The New Yorker:

But I could not let it go. It was so beautiful, with the light and shadows dancing inside. Only when Grandpa gave me a look, and a gentle nod of his head, did I at last let the balloon drift free, up past the porch, illuminating the faces of my family. It floated up above the apple trees, over the beginning-to-sleep town, and across the night among the stars.

We stood watching it for at least ten minutes, until we could no longer see it. By then, tears were streaming down my face, and Grandpa, not looking at me, would at last clear his throat and shuffle his feet. The relatives would begin to go into the house or around the lawn to their houses, leaving me to brush the tears away with fingers sulfured by the firecrackers. Late that night, I dreamed the fire balloon came back and drifted by my window.

Fire balloons or no fire balloons, I'm still drawn to this idea from the passage in Zen, of sitting quietly, looking up at the sky and relishing the moment. Not sure when, if at all, to say something.

It's like how I feel about writing; how I feel, specifically, about this blog. As I've strayed from posting on this blog—even neglecting my beloved Monday Mix Tapes for months, gasp!—I found myself losing inspiration in general. After only publishing a post here and there every couple of months, it's easier to think, maybe this blog has almost run its course. I don't know. But the more you wonder when is the right moment to say something (to write, rather), the more you continue to merely sit quietly. (In my case, this means getting an idea, thinking about it, and watching Frasier instead of writing, and sharing it.)

Maybe, like many things, this blog, and what I get out of it, is just not quite what it was before. And that’s okay. Maybe it’ll just be exactly what it is. Whatever that may be. Ultimately, though, I hope to never lose the inspiration to write, and to share, however that happens. And wherever it goes on the Internet, or even if it just stays in my journal.

Would releasing a fire balloon into the night with his grandfather have remained such a poignant memory for Bradbury, had he never written about it? Probably. But luckily he shared it, so we could see, if only for a moment, the way he saw it, looking up in the Illinois sky in 1925.

I’m certainly no Ray Bradbury, but I like the idea of saying something. There may never be another night like this, after all.

Like he wrote:

“And, after all, isn’t that what life is all about, the ability to go around back and come up inside other people’s heads to look out at the damned fool miracle and say: oh, so that’s how you see it!? Well, now, I must remember that.”

The Writing Experiment Concludes (With a Little More Joyce)

Well, it's been 10(ish) days, and the experiment has come to its final moment. The final post!

I'm kind of sad, to be honest. Sure, maybe y'all are sick of reading the words "the experiment" and equally sick of all my pontificating on the CRAFT, and DEDICATION, and WORK ETHIC, and shiiiat. But it's been a good 10(ish) days.

It was harder than I expected. I don't feel like I completely succeeded, as there was a day or two here and there where I didn't post, or I'd be highly productive one day and then feel completely spent the next.

But I guess that's why it was an experiment. Now I want to try another one, and see how I do. I'm not sure what that would be, exactly, but I'm open to suggestions.

I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to write about today. Marco and I spent all afternoon at the bookstore, me reading, him drawing, and of course I got all these "brilliant" (ha, ha), fleeting ideas at the strangest times. Like when I'm waiting in line for the bathroom, for instance. Those ideas are still floating around in my brain, somewhere, but for now, I wanted to keep the focus on writing, in general. So I thought I'd bring it full circle with some words of wisdom from Ms. Joyce Carol Oates, once again.

The following is excerpted from her 1976 interview with The Paris Review (all emphasis is mine):

INTERVIEWER

Do you find emotional stability is necessary in order to write? Or can you get to work whatever your state of mind? Is your mood reflected in what you write? How do you describe that perfect state in which you can write from early morning into the afternoon?

OATES

One must be pitiless about this matter of “mood.” In a sense, the writing will create the mood. If art is, as I believe it to be, a genuinely transcendental function—a means by which we rise out of limited, parochial states of mind—then it should not matter very much what states of mind or emotion we are in. Generally I've found this to be true: I have forced myself to begin writing when I've been utterly exhausted, when I've felt my soul as thin as a playing card, when nothing has seemed worth enduring for another five minutes . . . and somehow the activity of writing changes everything. Or appears to do so. Joyce said of the underlying structure of Ulysses—the Odyssean parallel and parody—that he really didn't care whether it was plausible so long as it served as a bridge to get his “soldiers” across. Once they were across, what does it matter if the bridge collapses? One might say the same thing about the use of one's self as a means for the writing to get written. Once the soldiers are across the stream . . .

INTERVIEWER

Do you enjoy writing?

OATES

I do enjoy writing, yes. A great deal. And I feel somewhat at a loss, aimless and foolishly sentimental, and disconnected, when I've finished one work and haven't yet become absorbed in another. All of us who write, work out of a conviction that we are participating in some sort of communal activity. Whether my role is writing, or reading and responding, might not be very important. I take seriously Flaubert's statement that we must love one another in our art as the mystics love one another in God. By honoring one another's creation we honor something that deeply connects us all, and goes beyond us.

Of course, writing is only one activity out of a vast number of activities that constitute our lives. It seems to be the one that some of us have concentrated on, as if we were fated for it. Since I have a great deal of faith in the processes and the wisdom of the unconscious, and have learned from experience to take lightly the judgments of the ego and its inevitable doubts, I never find myself constrained to answer such questions. Life is energy, and energy is creativity. And even when we as individuals pass on, the energy is retained in the work of art, locked in it and awaiting release if only someone will take the time and the care to unlock it.

I particularly love what she says about how "the activity of writing changes everything"—because I agree with her. It does. Like the other night, when all I wanted to do was either go to sleep or watch another episode of Weeds, but instead I picked up my laptop and just wrote. I wrote as my eyes burned staring at the screen and the battery level on my Macbook flashed to red.

If nothing else, by trying out this little writing experiment, I was finally able to remember that feeling, that eyes burning from staring at the screen, adrenaline rush, that creative energy, that fucking feeling, that I can put words on a page and they can mean something, and that I can use "one's self as a means for the writing to get written."
 

Take 9: Mental Health Break

This little experiment has proven to be quite interesting (err, for me, at least). I've been thinking a lot about the actual act of writing, about discipline, about believing in my own abilities, and not making excuses for not working hard at a craft.

But I'm going to have to be real for a minute. If I don't step out of my brain a little bit and just relax, I'm going to go insane. Okay, maybe not insane, but let's just say I'm so deep in thought lately about writing, and life, and being motivated, that my head is starting to hurt. My social interactions are getting more awkward than usual. (I know, I didn't think it was possible either!)

Last Friday, in a post not directly for the experiment, I wrote this essay that I'm actually really proud of, and I think was directly inspired by all this writing. But today, all I can think of right now is everything I need to accomplish in a span of about three hours. I'm not inspired. I am stressed. 


But this actually brings up a relative point:

I think part of writing, or other creative endeavors, is also learning that sometimes (particularly when you've actually earned it), you have to give yourself a little mental health break. 

It's Friday. I have a party to go to tonight, and I still need a dress. I'm taking that mental health break now. But before I go...

I'm wondering, all of you creative types that I'm hoping and pretending are reading my blog:

When do you allow yourself a mental health break? How do you self-assess how hard you've worked, or how much you've accomplished? 


I hope that this doesn't end up being a rhetorical question! I really do want to know. I'm actually serious about this self-discipline bizness. Comment, why don't you. I double dare you.

The Writing Experiment, Take 8: An Obligation, A Habit, A Necessity

I have a confession to make:

I didn’t want to write today.

In fact, the only reason I’m doing so now is because I can’t stop thinking, You said you were going to do this, Alison. Fucking follow through with something for once in your life.

But then I started rationalizing making excuses. I’m tired. It was a long day. I’m tired. I wanna watch another episode of Weeds. I’m tired.

And then I remembered my big, bold statement on, what was that? Day 3? About excuses?

Okay, okay, I told myself. I’ll turn on my computer and write something. Then you know what my lazy ass did? I thought, I’ll just find something I wrote before, and post it!

ha, ha! I am SO clever!

Or, not.

While I was looking through my old stuff, trying to get some inspiration looking for something to pass off as today’s writing, I noticed a pretty consistent theme. Take a wild fucking guess at this theme.

A whole lot of introductions, with no conclusions.

I seem to be full of ideas. These ideas last for about, oh, a paragraph or two, and then most of the time they trail off. I do this the most with short stories. Partly because I’m of two minds about my “talents” as a fiction writer. In fact, I was just thinking about this today: I’m not sure if I’m any good at writing fiction. And for once, I’m not trying to be self-deprecating. I’m actually just trying to be honest. Which leads me to the question(s):

Where do you draw the line between being honest with yourself, and giving up? How do you recognize when you’re doing one or the other?

In lieu of actually answering those questions, instead I’m going to play a little show and tell. Or something. Here are a couple of my beginnings with no end.

Take 7: What I Meant to Say

That last year I watched the sun set while you sang songs backed by a beautiful orchestra; that every time I hear "The Story" I get teary eyed; that I feel at home no matter where I am when I listen to your music; that once, I put "Someday Never Comes" on a mix for a friend and it said exactly what I wanted to, but couldn't; that seeing you in concert makes me think about my mother so much, it is both unbearable and wonderful all at once—

But that would have been crazy, so instead, when I met Brandi Carlile, my face turned beet red as she shook my hand and I heard myself say:

"I'm such a huge fan."

Then Ray LaMontagne took the stage, and aside from some mumbled "thank you's" in between songs, he spoke to the crowd only once, to tell us to "turn around and look at the moon" because it really was "quite lovely"—and it was. And as the big yellow moon rose up behind us, he sang this song:



In that moment, everything felt okay, and I no longer cared that I couldn't say all the things I wanted to say to Brandi, or that I can never seem to say everything I want to say when it counts the most, because the music said it all.



It's Day 7 in The Writing Experiment, and after driving back to Chicago in the rain, then sitting in rush hour traffic for two hours, all I really wanted to do was curl up in a ball and pass out. But because I'm experimenting with this little thing called discipline, instead, I went to the gym. And then I wrote this. Now I curl up in a ball and pass out.

In Short, No. 6: A Long, Winding Sentence (Again)

I'm in bed back home in Indiana, in my old bedroom that's no longer my room but still sorta feels like my room, after seeing a great show tonight in Indianapolis (Brandi Carlile & Ray LaMontagne, but more on that tomorrow, I promise.)

I'm sleepy, and it's technically Wednesday already, but dammit! I refuse to miss another day in my writing experiment, and since I haven't gone to bed yet it still counts. I'm in the mood to write another long, winding sentence inspired by the "things that stand out clear as pictures in our head."

When I first tried my man E.B. White's little experiment, it was about a year ago, and I was here in this same room. Funny how everything can change so drastically in one year in so many ways, and in many other ways nothing changes at all.

So if, right now, I were to once again, write about the things that really interested me in the past week, those things that “stand out clear as pictures in our head,” I'd probably discuss: the way I get so caught up in my own brain as I walk to and from work, sometimes I wonder if maybe I'm talking to myself out loud, and not actually just in my head, and every other pedestrian on the street hears my innermost thoughts; Brandi Carlile's suspenders; how my daydreams vary from thoughts of vinyl to a book deal to finally figuring out myself and everyone around me to owning Wonder Woman lipstick; and how I am in a passionate, but possibly unilateral, love/hate relationship with the city of Chicago, and how I only allow myself to admit that when I spend a night back in Indiana.

What a horrible, wonderful sentence that was to write. And now I feel both horrible and wonderful. Good night, good luck, whatever.

Poetry Slam Tuesdays: Using All Our Words

My friend Mike sent me this poem last week—a bit of inspiration as I embarked on my writing experiment—and I am in love with it. Enjoy.

The Quiet World
By Jeffrey McDaniel

In an effort to get people to look
into each other's eyes more,
and also to appease the mutes,
the government has decided
to allot each person exactly one hundred
and sixty-seven words, per day.

When the phone rings, I put it to my ear
without saying hello. In the restaurant
I point at chicken noodle soup.
I am adjusting well to the new way.

Late at night, I call my long distance lover,
proudly say I only used fifty-nine today.
I saved the rest for you.

When she doesn't respond,
I know she's used up all her words,
so I slowly whisper I love you
thirty-two and a third times.
After that, we just sit on the line
and listen to each other breathe.

Do you write poems? Do you read poems? How about you send me one, and maybe it'll be on the next poetry slam! NEAT! Email me at alisonhamm@gmail.com or get in touch on the Tweeter.

The Experiment, No. 5: Gaining Some Perspective

Every day on my walk from the train to my office building, it never fails to jar me as I pass a different homeless person on each corner—sometimes two at a corner—holding up a makeshift cardboard sign, jingling a plastic cup of change, or even worse, just sleeping on the street as people walk past.

I feel frustrated as people walk past them, not seeming to care in the slightest, but then I have to take a deep breath and realize that I'm not doing anything different most of the time. What am I supposed to do? I feel helpless, walking past, thinking that even if I gave each one of them $1, or even $5, that's not going to do much at all.

My buddy, the man on the milk crate, isn't as consistently in his same spot now that it's warmed up outside. Sometimes, he's gone for a solid week, and I worry and wonder where he is, and if he's okay. But he always comes back. He was looking pretty rough for awhile, and then disappeared for a week or so. I had started thinking he was gone for good, but then one evening after work, he was back, sitting on his milk crate. It took me a second to realize it was him—it was the first time I'd seen him without a hat, and he'd shaved his head and had some "new" shoes that looked about two sizes too small.

Where'd he get his head shaved? How'd he get those shoes? How does he survive? 

I think that maybe, I don't want to know the answers to all those questions. Today he was nowhere to be found. There was a different man sitting on his milk crate, which happens sometimes. The first time I noticed this, I got a little riled up, wondering if someone had stolen my "friend's" seat. But he was back on it the next day. Maybe they take shifts. I have no idea.

There were some new people out today.  A young couple sat holding a sign with a picture of a baby taped to it: "Please. We R Homeless n Hungry. Help us Feed Our Baby."

I almost walked into traffic as I turned back to look at that sign. And I hate to admit it, but it wasn't out of a pang of sympathy right then, it was a shot of skepticism. A series of different, much less kind questions popped to mind.

Where's this baby? If someone's watching the baby, wouldn't that same person help them eat? Do they even have a baby? Are they addicts?

I didn't give the couple money. I didn't give any one money today. I haven't, in fact, even helped out the man on the milk crate with some spare change lately.

The Writing Experiment, No. 4: Embracing the Writer Within

I was looking for some inspiration for my 4th post in my 10-part writing experiment, and bless you, New Yorker, you gave it to me. (Do you think when my New Yorker subscription runs out, I’ll have nothing to write?)

What great timing for my favorite issue of the year to be sitting patiently in my mailbox waiting for me! It’s the Summer Fiction issue! New Yorker geeks everywhere, rejoice!

And of course, it’s packed with big name writers: Jeffrey Eugenides, Junot Diaz, Vladimir Nabokov, and Jhumpa Lahiri, to name a few. Not surprisingly, it was Pulitzer Prize-winner Lahiri’s personal essay, “Trading Stories,” that inspired this post. Lahiri happens to be one of my favorite authors—her novel, The Namesake, and two short story collections, Interpreter of Maladies and Unaccustomed Earth, are some of the most beautiful pieces of writing I’ve ever read.

In this essay, she writes about her love of reading and writing, but more specifically, about her journey to becoming a writer. For anyone not familiar with Lahiri, I think The Atlantic interviewer Isaac Chotiner describes her well, naming her “the acclaimed chronicler of the Bengali-immigrant experience”:

Both of her previous books—Interpreter of Maladies (a 2000 story collection that earned her the Pulitzer Prize), and The Namesake, a 2003 novel that later took shape as a popular film— explored the cultural dissonances experienced by immigrants caught between the culture of their Indian birthplace and the unfamiliar ways of their adopted home. In Unaccustomed Earth, a collection of eight short stories, Lahiri continues to explore this theme, this time with a focus on the lives of second-generation immigrants who must navigate both the traditional values of their immigrant parents and the mainstream American values of their peers.

It makes sense that the sort of “cultural dissonances” she writes of in her fiction also played a huge role in Lahiri’s journey to becoming a writer. In her essay, she writes about her parents, “For though they had created me, and reared me, and lived with me day after day, I knew I was a stranger to them, an American child. In spite of our closeness, I feared that I was alien.”

Many of Lahiri’s characters also have these types of fears toward, and relationships with, their parents. What I’ve found most beautiful and fascinating as I’ve read her works, though, is how this is coupled with powerful moments of her characters understanding and feeling close with their parents. While the cultural dissonance she often describes is specific to the Bengali-immigrant experience, I think the parent-child relationships are also completely universal. I think it’s fair to say that the very definition of “dissonance”— “a tension or clash resulting from the combination of two disharmonious or unsuitable elements”—sums up the teenager-parent dynamic. (Not that all of her characters are teens, but you get what I’m saying.)

It’s both astounding and a relief to me that a writer of Lahiri’s caliber has also experienced the same kind of self-doubt I grapple with in life, and particularly, with my writing. She discusses her deep love of books as a child, writing:

In life, especially as a young girl, I was afraid to participate in social activities. I worried about what others might make of me, how they might judge. But when I read I was free of this worry.

While Lahiri says that as an adolescent, she used writing as a vehicle to make friends and connect with others, later, she somewhat rejected the writer in her— “Though the compulsion to invent stories remained, self-doubt began to undermine it”—and instead, she focused on practicing music, performing in plays, and then later, decided she wanted to be a journalist (while also studying literature in college). Sounds familiar! I also “channelled my energy” into studying journalism and English lit. Yet still, as a student, and even now, more often than I’d like to admit, I feel intimidated by the act of writing. Lahiri writes:

At twenty-one, the writer in me was like a fly in the room—alive but insignificant, aimless, something that unsettled me whenever I grew aware of it, and which, for the most part, left me alone. I was not at a stage where I needed to worry about rejection from others. My insecurity was systemic, and preemptive, insuring that, before anyone else had the opportunity, I had already rejected myself.

Luckily, she quit rejecting herself, and embraced the writing.

Insecurity will get you. It’s terrifying to put yourself out there, whether it’s in life, or on the page. I think that, in life, in writing, whatever, it’s the moments when you embrace that fear and just fucking go for it, that the most beautiful things can happen. Like Lahiri writes, “writing stories is one of the most assertive things a person can do...Being a writer means taking the leap from listening to saying, ‘Listen to me.’”

In Brief, No. 3: Excuses, Excuses

Remember when I was going to write something every day for 10 days, got really excited, wrote two in one day, and then wrote nothing yesterday?

Shit. HOW EMBARRASSING.

The lame excuse I already used once this morning: "I mean, I wrote two in one day, so, it's like, still technically Day 3, so I'm not really behind."

Shut up, Alison.

When did I get so great at making excuses? I'm sure my dad would love to answer that question. I've probably been making excuses to get out of things since I learned how to speak. It's pretty silly.

Excuses that ran through my mind last night and this morning:
1. I'm not sure what I want to write about right now.
2. Hungry.
3. Sleepy.
4. But I can do it later!

Basically, I am an infant.

When I went on the Google just now and typed my favorite word, "excuses," I found this article, "How to Kill Your Excuses"—it's brief, and it's really all common sense, so why don't I stop being an infant and actually use some common sense? Once, someone told me, "You're such a smart girl, but sometimes you act like you have no common sense."

Ouch. But in retrospect, a valid point. Thank you, person who shall remain nameless. Like this article says, I'm ready to kill my excuses "like the miserable maggots they are."

It also linked to this video. Next time I make an excuse for something, I'm going to think about this:

The Experiment, Part Deux: ‘In My Sauvignon Fierce, Freaking Out’

Let me preface this by saying: I was so excited and inspired by the feedback from my first post in the "experiment" that I couldn't wait until tomorrow to do the second one. But mostly because I got a completely unexpected text from my cousin Micaela—I never knew she'd read anything I'd ever written!—that made me want to write for a week straight. If you're reading: Thank you, cousin.

As I start this, my second post in “The Writing Experiment” files, I’m already thinking to myself, Christ, Al, you’re so predictable. Yep, I started by writing about a female writer who inspired me, and now I’m launching into a post fueled by The National lyrics.

Whatever. It’s happening.

So maybe you’ve stumbled upon this blog before. If so, then you’ve picked up on my obsession with a certain band, and a certain songwriter. Ahem. In fact, the song I’m about to talk about, I’ve already posted a video to, not so long ago. IN FACT, I’ve actually already written an essay inspired by this song. Lucky for you, I didn’t post it here. Instead, three of my unlucky friends received it in their email inboxes, because it was something I didn’t feel like sharing with the Interwebs.

This is the song. It’s called, “Baby, We’ll Be Fine.” Some lyrics:

"All night I lay on my pillow and pray
For my boss to stop me in the hallway
Lay my head on his shoulder and say
Son, I've been hearing good things

I wake up without warning and go flying around the house
In my sauvignon fierce, freaking out
Take a forty-five minute shower and kiss the mirror
And say, look at me
Baby, we'll be fine
All we gotta do is be brave and be kind

I put on an argyle sweater and put on a smile
I don't know how to do this
I'm so sorry for everything"

This past fall, I saw The National for the first time in Indianapolis. My anticipation to this show was akin to anticipation over my first sexual experience. Seriously. I have never been as excited about a concert as I was about this one. And if you know me, that is a big statement to make, because I get really fucking excited about concerts. I was so excited about this concert, as a matter of fact, that I listened to The National even more than usual (which basically means I exclusively listened to The National for a solid week), and the day of the concert, I was ready to go, pacing around the house three solid hours before the show started. (As it turned out, it was a good thing I had gotten ready early, because I left my ticket at my dad’s house and ended up driving an unnecessary hour and a half just to make it to the show on time.)

The good news is, the concert was a much better time than … Yeah.

Back to the song, and away from uncomfortable comparisons. One reason I love this particular song so much is how it affects me in so many different ways, on so many levels. Overall, I’m always a sucker for a song with some sad, desperate longing for something that’s just outside of your grasp, but you feel like it shouldn’t be: “All night I lay on my pillow and pray/For my boss to stop me in the hallway.” Then that feeling is coupled with the hope, that stubborn hope that, you know what? Baby, we’ll be fine!

I love the sense of longing, coupled with this frantic, anxious behavior. He’s “flying around the house,” but then taking a ridiculously long shower, followed by a pep talk in front of the mirror. This behavior is me, in a nut shell. I don’t mind admitting it.

I sensed this sort of anxiety and heightened excitement—but also a little bit of a “Fuck it, I’m just gonna do what I do” attitude— the two times I’ve seen The National. Matt Berninger alternates between screaming in the mic, just really fucking killing it, to pacing around in circles, looking down, and clutching his wine glass. The second time I saw them, this past Easter in Chicago, during one song (I forget which! Shit!) he fucked up a line and the mic stand fell.

Standing in the packed crowd, surrounded by people who pretty clearly were mostly there to see Arcade Fire, I actually felt scared at that moment. I wanted to run up to the stage and say, “Matt! It’s okay!” Not that he would have cared. He retaliated by taking several huge gulps out of his wine, picking up the mic, and screaming, just screaming, the rest of the song.

Allllllll riiiiight, Matt, I get it.

I have a tendency to apologize, a lot. I say “I’m sorry” almost as much as I cry about shit. And I cry, a lot. I don’t know why. I don’t know why I’m so damn intense about everything. Maybe I have a desperate longing for something that is a little out of my grasp. Maybe I just want my boss to stop me in the hallway and say, “We’ve been hearing good things!”

But the good news is, like Matt Berninger and the rest of The National (I’d like to think), I also have this hope, this stubborn hope, that baby, we’ll be fine.

All we’ve gotta do is be brave, and be kind.