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Look for the February 2004 release of The Usual Rules in paperback!
September 2 , 2008
Dear Friends,
For the last month, I’ve been living at The MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire, where I’ve had the great good fortune of a two month artist’s residency. I’m living -- without car, phone, or internet -- in a beautiful little studio in the woods, where no cars come by and the only human face I see for most of the day is that of the man who comes by to deliver my lunch basket. Around four, most days, I walk the mile long path through the woods to the main lodge, where -- if the weather is good, and sometimes even if it isn’t -- I join a few of the more stalwart types here and head off to a nearby pond to swim. We’re back just in time for dinner, followed by a round or two of ping pong. Unless there’s a political convention going on (because I had to watch Obama, Kennedy, Clinton, Biden and the rest, and will tune in again this week -- gritting my teeth -- for the McCain Gang) I’m usually back at my cabin, in bed, by half past nine, ready to start the routine again the next morning.
Not a lot of variation to my days here -- but maybe that very fact has contributed to the success I’ve had here with my work. All the action (most, anyway) takes place on my laptop, at the little desk where I’m sitting as I write this, with a family of deer just outside the window, munching on leaves. (And this morning, when I walked in the woods, I ran into a badger.)
I finished the first draft of a new book here this past month, and my hope is that next month will bring more good work. The new book is a memoir, set against the backdrop of my comings and goings over the last seven years, between the two places I have come to call home: California and Lake Atitlan, Guatemala. If I were asked to say what this one is about (and if you’ve taken a writing workshop with me, you know I always say a writer should be able to answer that question before she sits down to write) I’d tell you it’s about my quest to locate a new source of meaning in my life, following the departure from home of my youngest child. It’s about finding and making a home, in a culture far from my own, about being a parent (holding on, letting go), about growing older, surviving losses, and carrying on. It’s about what I have come to know about the true nature of wealth (which has very little to do with money in the bank). It’s a book about love, I think -- and the question I’ve struggled with, as to whether it’s possible to love a partner without losing myself. Rather than tell you more about that one, I’m hoping you’ll read the book.
The period of years chronicled in the new book -- the summer of 2001, to the present -- included a great many changes: not only the end of my days of having children at home, but a great deal of moving around, from one coast to the other, from north to south. Relationships began and ended, I wrote books, turned fifty, and eventually got to the place I am now, where fifty came to look young.
But perhaps the most consistent part of my experience over these years -- besides loving my children and friends, and the baking of pies -- has been the teaching of memoir workshops. And so, embedded in the story of my own life, is my ongoing meditation on the nature of telling one’s story, and the lessons learned in those workshops. Not only what I’ve taught, but what I’ve learned. One of the possible titles for the book, in fact, is The Memoir Workshop. I’m also drawn to the title Dia de Carino -- because Valentine’s Day (Dia De Carino) is both a favorite of mine, and a national holiday in Guatemala. I think this says something about the priorities held dear in that country I love.
I talk a fair bit in the new book about how to tell a story, which requires a person not simply to write what happened in her life, but -- this comes first -- to understand it. But even once you imagine you’ve located your themes and story, the act of writing, if you engage in it fully, is likely to involve revelation and discovery, too. That has certainly been so for me, here in my little cabin in the woods.
Here’s one lesson I’ve learned about writing, this month: There is no substitute for time and space to work, without the usual distractions of life. These last weeks, living as I have in a community of artists, with all the usual demands of home removed, have allowed me to focus in a way I hadn’t known for a very long time. I always tell my students that a day you begin with checking email is already less of a day for creative exploration. Answer the phone, pay a bill... your mind moves in a different direction, and it’s hard coming back.
Few people get the extraordinary gift I’ve known these last few weeks, of unbroken time to think and work. For those of you who long for it, I want to say, I have never felt more committed to providing that kind of atmosphere for you, at the writing workshops I host at Lake Atitlan. The environment is less totally geared to silent work, of course -- because I’m also hosting workshops, and readings, and group discussions and meals. But it’s always my hope that the atmosphere we work so hard to create for those who join me at the lake will lay the groundwork for inspired creative work. (And depending on how you choose to view your time at the lake, you can either fill your days with workshops and discussions, or preserve part of each day for your own writing. Or -- best of all -- stay on with us after the workshop, for a writing retreat of your own.)
If you didn’t receive my letter, last month, describing the upcoming Winter 2009 Lake Atitlan Writing Workshops (the master class with me, in February, or the two March weeks, in which I’ll be joined by Ann Hood, Mindy Lewis, and others), you can find out about them by clicking the link above. Remember that the earlier you sign up, the better room selection you’ll have.
If you’ve been interested, but are sitting on the fence, I hope you’ll be in touch with any questions that can help you make a decision that's right for you. (And of course you know, I’ll do my best to persuade you to join us.) I also want to mention to anyone reading this who is a teacher, that many teachers have managed to get their workshop experience at least partly funded by professional development grants. If a letter from me will make a difference, I’m happy to provide that.
I’ll be here in New Hampshire, writing, through the end of September. For any readers in the Chicago area, I wanted to let you know that I’ll be speaking about writing (and about my novel The Usual Rules) and meeting with kids at Hinsdale High School there, on Friday, October 3, and -- with Tom Perotta, Ann Hood, Gail Tsukayama and many others -- participating in a fundraiser for the Ragdale Artists’ Colony, in Lake Forest, on October 4.
And you might want to pick up the October issue of MORE magazine, for a story by me about two of my favorite topics -- breasts, and my mother. (I guess that would be three of my favorite topics?)
I just have to add here, that as much as I’ve worked to focus my concentration here on work -- and for the most part, I’ve done that -- I could not tear myself away from the Democratic National Convention last week. (And I’ll be watching again this week, to see what the Republicans have to say for themselves.)
There has never been a time in my life as a citizen and voter when any election has felt as important. I won’t be out there baking pies for my candidate this fall, as I did the last time, but I mean to support, in every way I can, the candidate who stands for change. If you share my belief that we are on the brink of a historic moment that will affect the lives of our children and grandchildren -- not to mention the too-little-mentioned children of Iraq, and those in so many other places on the globe whose lives have been diminished or shattered by the policies of the last eight years of the Bush administration, as well as the millions struggling here at home -- I hope you will join me in doing all you can to elect Obama and Biden.
With friendship,
RECOMMEND JOYCEMAYNARD.COM TO A FRIEND
