On the 1,000 word a day front

Overall, I am doing well. Technically, I am behind because of life happening - we moved, both my husband and I got colds and there were a few nights that instead of staying up after he and the baby were asleep, I really just had to go to bed too. (Currently, both he and the baby are napping, and I am still getting over my cold and would like to be napping too, but I am in that place of either I stay up now, and have a coffee later or I stay up tonight. I opted for the former.) If I had written my 1,000 words a day, I'd have 15,000 words and probably over 30 pages. I don't have that. I'm more around 25. But the point of the exercise is not to come up with something new to flog myself over. The point is to develop a habit. I am developing the habit.
Still, there are things I want to ask Michael Chabon: a 1,000 words a day even when you're sick? Do you ever call in sick to your desk? On days that you move? Days that you have the all over achey feeling? Days that you take your family to the zoo? Even on weekends?
I also want to ask how long it takes him. And then, how long does he spend revising and when does he go back and revise?
My 1,000 words are coming pretty easily right now, but when I go back to read over what I have written, I find I have ended up with a story where I have thrown everything and the kitchen sink into it. I don't have a story that's finished that I could send to my sister and other trusted readers and say, "read this before I send it somewhere." I do feel like part of my 1,000 words and developing the habit is also figuring out my process, and right now I feel like I'm expelling a lot of crap. I almost feel like I should be writing 2,000 words a day just to get it out of my system and have things to manipulate, revise, edit, delete, focus in on.
I told my sister this, and she said, "Right, like cleaning out the cobwebs." This is generally what it feels like for me when I write in my journal and purge. Like I am cleaning out the cobwebs of the attic. And this is the image I saw in my mind when she said this. Of that ideal old attic full of cool family furniture and vintage clothes, and me dusting things off and cleaning out the cobwebs.
This morning when I was waking up, I decided that cleaning out the cobwebs is not what this feels like. This feels like what my body is doing at the end of this cold: mainly, coughing up nasty tasting gloppy greenish phlegm and blowing my nose, draining my sinuses until I see stars. Writing right now is expelling sticky stuff that hurts when you cough it up. I suspect most of it will get deleted and thrown in the little trash can on my computer.
My sister reminded me of Elizabeth Gilbert's talk on creativity at the TED conference. Gilbert says our job is to just show up and the creative genius who sits in the corner that gives you stuff to channel will eventually come. So I am showing up. But still. This is where I hate being a day and 12 hours ahead of my sister. If I was in the states, I'd be pestering her with phone calls, asking, "Really?" "I just have to show up? Should I lit a candle or make an offering like people here do when they want to please the gods?"
National Novel Writing Month begins on Sunday. Tomorrow for me. I emailed my husband my first draft and various other notes and writings for him to print off at work today so I can rewrite the thing over the next 30 days (not quite the aim of the project - I am adapting it for my needs - we all agree that it's time for me to finish something in my life). So beginning tomorrow, I have to write more than my 1,000 words. I suspect there will be a lot more phlegm in my life. Maybe mid-month, I'll hit the cobwebs.

The New Thing in Life that Makes Me Happy

are these hands. I found them in a Chinese antique store in Chinatown. Everything in the store was 50% (so these were S$10 - in USD $7.50) for a limited time only. When I asked the sales lady how long her sale was, she said, "Until Christmas."
At home I have an odd collection of doll hands and feet that freaks out my husband. These hands are growing on him, and I often find them arranged in various positions. They are just the right amount of cool and creepy. I keep hoping I'll find more things like this in my explorations of the city and I probably will in some of our travels, but in Chinatown it is rather a challenge. I mean, a little Chinatown in your house can be nice (the dishes, Chinese silk pajamas, even a kimono, a nice pair of chopsticks) and some of the kitsch can be cool in the right house (those weird plastic cats that wave their paws), but dear god, I fear the house that was furnished only out of Chinatown.

My new 1000 words a day project: 15 October - 15 April

I have been in Singapore almost two weeks. My sister who regularly works with the Chinese says that for every time zone you travel, it takes one day of jet lag to adjust. So for the fifteen time zones or hours that we are now ahead, it should take us 15 days to adjust. We landed on the second, losing a day in travel. According to this calculation I have two days left of adjustment and jet lag. We did, I admit, adjust to the hour difference rather quickly. It seemed by the end of the first weekend – within three days that we were going to sleep at 10 pm and waking up at 7am just like we did at home. But it was also by the end of the first weekend that I realized adjusting to a new country and dealing with jet lag requires far more than getting onto the new country’s schedule. This occurred to me after I hit overwhelm when viewing a potential apartment to rent. I had been in one of those funky spaces where I just couldn’t articulate the source of my grumpiness or out of sortness and somehow saying I was jetlagged didn’t fit. It wasn’t until later that I realized – in the middle of the lease negotiations my husband had launched into - that I felt things were moving fast. And they weren’t moving that fast – just the normal rate they move when you move to a new city and are trying to get settled in. It was just my ability to process everything that had slowed down. It wasn’t until later in the week when I went to cross the street and looked the wrong way (almost getting hit by a car) that it felt like everything – all the changes from the last year – seemed to come rushing to my forehead to the cacophonous place of overwhelm in my forehead.
Singapore is a small country and while it is a densely populated city, it is not an overly large one. As a country it might be bigger than the city of New York; the densely populated area though is probably smaller or about the same size. I think there’s less subways here. At any rate, in general so far it is a pretty easy place to find your way around except that there’s an unusual amount of malls and a lot of things underground that can be hard to place or at least for me it can be hard to get my bearings.
What I’ve struggled with the first two weeks is finding things to do that entertain me as well as my baby. In Los Angeles, I had lots of friends who were moms so even if we spent the day at one of the many museums, we did so with our babies so they had someone their own age to engage and interact with and we did baby centered things too – mostly take them swimming. I haven’t yet made any mom friends. I haven’t made any friends here yet and I haven’t found much for Fyo to do. I’ve taken him to the art museum, the National Museum, a printmaking gallery, the Botanical Gardens, the National Library – probably next week we’ll head to the Asian Civilization Museum. These are the kinds of things I enjoy – But I’m a museum addict. I got addicted in LA. Singapore is new to the awareness that the arts are important; even so they’ve made an admirable effort in investing in the arts with free symphony concerts in the Botanical gardens and their museums, galleries, public art spaces, etc. Mostly, there are a ton of design schools here. There’s also a lot of things for older children to do – by older I of course mean like four. Even two. For a baby who is crawling almost walking and almost one – I’m struggling. We’re taking him to the zoo (which is supposed to be fantastic) on his birthday, in the meantime I feel like I really have to be creative thinking of things to do during the day. Today we went to the Toy museum. I let him crawl around the downstairs Starbucks so he could explore something. Today, as I was trying to think of things to do with my not-quite-year-old I realized that I was already bored. I mean, really, my biggest challenge of the day is trying to get baby and me out of the house so we can avoid the maid but still get baby the necessary naptime. Getting me my naptime is extra credit though it is most successful when it occurs during baby’s. My day and my life boil down to naptime scheduling. Naptime scheduling is what I pay (okay – what my husband pays) my student loans for and why I have a Master’s degree. Probably not ironic that I’m reading Betty Freidan’s The Feminine Mystique right now (for novel research – which I said I’d go back to November 1 as part of National Novel Writing Month).
As my sister says, I need a design problem or something like a project for my mind to chew on while I am trying to work out the day’s activities. This is not new information. I’ve known and realized for a while that as a new mom who isn’t working outside the home I do need my own project or source of satisfaction and fulfillment. Ideally, my time off from working to be with my newborn is also supposed to go to my novel or writing. It hasn’t much yet.
I just read NPR’s Guy Raz’s interview with Michael Chabon about his latest book on fatherhood. Chabon says that for him, writing 1000 words a day is as much part of his day as making all of his kids’ next day lunches before he goes to bed at night. Chabon has four kids. They’re school age but whatever. If a parent of four children can write 1000 words a day and make lunches surely I as a parent of one could write 1000 words a day. I also realized, if you can’t learn discipline from having a baby or the ability to develop a daily habit then what can I hope to teach him? How will I possibly have any authority when it comes time to tell him to do his homework? (Not to mention if we home school it would end up in utter disaster and disarray). So then I decided to launch a 1000 word a day project. For the next 6 months I’m here – October 15 to April 15 – I’m writing a 1000 words a day. It will include some novel, some new mom essayish things, probably some thoughts on losing a step-parent then abandoning the remaining parent as you move across the planet and who knows what else.
This will probably feel like flossing. Something I hate but have to do everyday anyway so that my teeth don’t fall out of my mouth. I’ll most likely end up writing my 1000 words everyday so that my brain doesn’t fall out of my head or that my sanity doesn’t fall out of my brain. Something like that. Anyway, it's more about the daily habit than anything.
My other natural inclination is to write my 1000 words a day and then to lock them up in the recesses in my journal or notebook. But ever present Rob Brezny is on to me. My horoscope this week says that usual business advice is to not tell everything you know, but it’s time to chuck that out the window and from now on tell everything I know. He says, “The act of sharing connects me to fresh sources. Open-hearted communication doesn't weaken me, but just the reverse: It feeds my vitality. This is the approach I recommend to you in the coming days, Capricorn. Do indeed tell everything you know.” Eeek. Me who tries to avoid vulnerability and public embarrassment at all costs now has to embrace her humanity, all her flaws, spelling errors and typos, and share it with the world. Yikes. So with that in mind, I’m posting my first 1000 words to my little space of internet. At least living in Singapore, I have the illusion of feeling like I’m hiding in the recesses of the planet. Oh – and this is word number 1431.

Today at the Botanical Garden in Singapore

was a white orchid.

For b

Tonight's mushrooms.
Friday's lunch: Laksa soup (a kind of curry with coconut milk, fish and noodles) some kind of toast I can 't remember what and two soft boiled eggs with coffee (K had tea).

Oh it's the little things...

like microwave buttons that let you know you are overseas. (It's blurry - I'll go back and fix it - K has the camera. I just wanted to post because I am trying to post everyday diary style.)

It may seem belated but here we are anyway...

My step-dad Mike died May 11th of this year, but it was just two days ago that while I was putting my son down for his nap that it truly occurred to me that he was dead. I had expected the realization would smack me in the face when I walked in the door of my mother's house when I returned home. It didn't. Instead it landed steadily on my shoulders across the planet in Singapore. At any rate, as I start to grapple with this whole grieving thing as well as adjusting to this funny little South East Asian country, I thought I'd post the comments I wrote for his service - only because I promised myself I would. I think it's part of my process.

My mother often reminds me of how I first met my step-father, Mike Meade when I was 3 months old. She and my father owned a record store and they needed a computer programmer. She found Mike in the yellow pages and when she met with him to explain what they needed done, she brought me along. I of course don’t remember this, but this did begin both of my parents’ connection with Mike. My dad and him became good friends and my dad also became a computer programmer; he often said that Mike Meade taught him everything he knew about computers.
Mike and my mother reconnected and started dating when I was twelve and he moved in with us when I was thirteen. When I told my dad that my mother was seeing Mike he said, “Oh good, you’ll both be in good hands. Mike and my mom got married June 3, 1990, my junior year of high school. I don’t know of anyone who will disagree with me when I say he was the best thing that ever happened to my mom. Mike was my step-father for 23 years.
The step-parent and child relationship is a different kind of relationship for whatever reason I can’t quite put my finger on what makes it so. I have often thought that some parents and children are well matched, where parents easily meet the needs of their children or parents and children are not well-matched and the parents struggle in knowing what their children need. As a step-dad and daughter, Mike and I were very well-suited to one another.
He did do fatherly things with me. He came to my dance recitals, he gave me my first summer job. He taught me how to drive (and in doing so, he succeeded where other had failed). On Christmas Eve, we’d always go Christmas shopping for mom. When I was nineteen, my boyfriend wanted a socket set for his birthday. Mike came with me to Sears to help me pick one out. He explained to me why you always want good tools and then proceeded to walk out with a new table saw and shop vac. The following Spring, Mike was helping me change my bicycle tire. I needed a new tube for the tire so we went over to the Bike Gallery on Sandy Blvd – and we both walked out with new bikes. We weren’t allowed to shop together after this, but it was these kind of excursions where in addition to being a father to me, he also became my cohort and my co-conspiritor.
Just because of the way things worked out I did end up spending a lot of one on one time with him without my mom. His office and my high school were both downtown so I occasionally stopped in on my way to dance class. My first two years of college, I was a courier downtown and would often stop by when it was slow. On rainy days, I’d walk in and he’d put a space heater at my feet. I had a knack for always showing up on office potluck days and he’d tease me about how I’d eat the entire office under the table.
Because I so often saw him on a daily basis, we had a lot of conversations and we had a relationship where we could talk about a lot of different things. In addition to mom, work, my boyfriend (or relationship at the time), school, we’d also talk about books, movies or music. Mike would often read books I liked and we would talk about them. He was interested in everything, so it was easy to find things for him to read. On his night table alone, I found The Collected Poems of William Butler Yeats, Cormac McCarthy’s The road, Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, The Shaker Legacy, Killer Angels by Michael Shaara and the Holy Bible. He never finished college, but he was one of the most educated men I know.
He was never one of those step parents who, when I called home, would immediately hand the phone over to my mother. Often, we’d talk half an hour before he’d tell me that she wasn’t home. And he often called me on his way to work or while he was running errands. Truth be told, he called me more than my mother does.
I could go on and on about Mike and all the things we did together and talked about. And I don’t know if I can capture what an important part of my life he was or how much he did for me. As a college English professor, I do feel I should have some esoteric quote from some dead poet that captures what he was for me, but I don’t. The only thing I can think of that does begin to capture our relationship is that scene toward the end of Finding Nemo where Dorie says to Marlin, “I don’t know. I can’t remember. But when I look at you, I’m home.”
What I’m thankful for with Mike is that we could talk about anything and I don’t know how common that is in parent-child relationships. When he and mom visited my husband, baby, and me in February, he and I would walk the dogs at night. Now when I look back, these are some of my most favorite conversations. The last couple of years Mike had started doing a lot of personal growth work – not because he had any particular problems, but as he told me, he just thought he could be happier. He took some personal development courses at Landmark Education, he started going back to AA meetings, he went to therapy – first to individual sessions and then to group sessions. On our dog walks, I asked him about his most recent group. He said there were several women about my age in the group and it was funny, he said, apparently, he looked like a dad and just his presence brought up their dad issues. But he said, it was funny; he was able to talk with them and he helped them resolve their dad issues. He said it felt good to make a difference. I said, Mikey you know it’s funny, I don’t have any dad issues with you. And not that I’m the kind of person who doesn’t have issues. I have a lot of issues with a lot of people. But I don’t have any issues with you and I never have. And I said, you know you make a difference and we have a Mike Meade fan club with several of us in it – and we think you should be sainted. Though the Pope isn’t exactly taking my calls so I don’t know if you stand much of a chance.
He said, well I have a few regrets and I often think I could have done more or said more. But Mike always did right by me. Mike was the kind of person where it was just a bit lighter when he was around. Often I felt better after talking to him. I felt a little more relaxed. I felt heard and like he was interested in what I was saying or like I was saying something that he hadn’t thought about before. I felt happier and I always felt loved. And for me this was the difference he made. He wasn’t up for the Nobel Peace Prize and he didn’t dig wells for poor villages. But he did leave all of a little better than he found us. And I don’t know many people who can say that.

For yesterday's lunch...

Fyo and I had a date with Kent. Rather than the usual variety of noodle or rice dishes, we went to a Swiss restaurant & deli and found ourselves face to face with a crepe. While it was something we could probably find in the states it was ridiculously good anyway. Argula with feta cheese on the inside, smoked salmon on top with tomatoes and capers and creme fraiche. Yum. For dessert we had a scoop of Carmelita ice cream. Ice cream in Singapore is expensive - a pint of Ben & Jerry's is $15! So this one scoop cost $5.00. Otherwise, I would have made Kent get another one.

Enoki Mushroom

I totally bought a mushroom because I thought it was pretty. An Enoki mushroom. I had to look up on the internet how to use it because the wrapper was entirely in Japanese. My new favorite past time is to go to the store and shop aisle by aisle so I see everything. I end up spending a good chunk of time in the spice and vegetable aisles and end up coming home with minced lemongrass and packages of shitaki mushrooms that cost a dollar but in the states would be five.

Singapore Inspirations

I'm thinking of beginning a series of photos entitled, "Ode to Briana" as all the pictures will be of the local markets and the food we're finding and eating. These are dragon fruits. I have no idea what they are, how they taste or how to eat them, but I think they are beautiful.