Tag: ritual

Snow Day

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A heavy, thick snow fell overnight, the deepest we’ve had so far in our new house.

Santa Fe doesn’t cope well with snow, so schools and state offices were declared closed by 7am. It’s a good day to tuck in.

Of course, for me it should be no different than most days. I work from home, for both the writing and the day job, unless I’m on travel. I don’t have any meetings in town today, which is good. I had one yesterday and the one tomorrow morning — I might just call in, since the storm is predicted to keep going. Most of the people “at” that meeting are on the phone anyway.

But for today, I feel only like curling up by the fire with a book.

I don’t know what it is about a deep snow that leads me to feel like it’s not a work day. Perhaps it goes back to childhood programming, when a big snow meant no school. Just as David’s school is canceled. He’s off-routine already, talking to classmates about whether school would be closed. Asking me to speculate. Asking me if I’m writing on my blog, which I am, just like I am at this time every day, but he’s usually too busy getting ready to be bothered that I’m not engaging in conversation with him.

So, some of it is being off-pattern. Not the usual day at all.

Maybe there’s something to the hibernating, as well. My atavistic animal spirit is tucking itself into its den, sleepy and satisfied to nap it out.

But the internet window is bright and full of sunshine and busy activity.

Hi-ho, hi-ho!

Deck the Halls With… What Exactly?

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You know, I’m such a creature of habit.

Perhaps, a believer in ritual. Which sounds ever so much better.

But, I’ve discovered, just tonight, that part of my blockage on Christmas decoration stems from not knowing where stuff GOES. My friend, amazing author Keena Kincaid, who will be guest blogging here tomorrow, is a gypsy. She forever moves from place to place, so getting out her Christmas decorations becomes a common thread.

For me, I find myself paralyzed that I can’t hang the stockings on the kiva. What do I do?? Perhaps if I had less OTHER stuff to do, I’d feel more creative.

What it comes to is, I can’t do the decorating by rote.

I can’t simply recreate what I’ve done before and have done. Some of the things just flat out don’t match. At least I’ve made piles now, of what does match and what doesn’t.

I know, I know — it sounds nuts and you wonder why I care.

I can’t explain why I care. It has to do with blending. With art. With being part of the landscape and the season and the feeling. I have something in me that wants to become part of a place. That longs to be in harmony, perhaps.

Speaking of which, I’ve learned that “luminarias” are little bonfires and the candles in bags are “farolitas.” If you have the fake-y farolitas, with electricity like we do, they’re “electrolitas.” Which I feel certain is not a traditional word.

I’m getting there. The poinsettia lights look lovely over the kiva mantle. I’ve a pile of outside lights in amber and gold, to match the farolitas.

I have an idea for hanging the stockings, too.

Hmm. Is that the stirrings of creativity I feel? Welcome! Welcome and, dare I say, gods bless us, every one.

A Wing and a Blog

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I’m posting from the airplane today.

Well, more precisely, I’m drafting this on the airplane. I believe, though, that the day is not far off that we will be able to post to our blogs and continue our internet connectedness from the air. Yes, I’ve become one of those business travelers you see, who pull out their laptops as soon as they give the go ahead to use electronic devices that don’t broadcast a signal. Have you noticed that some of the newer airplanes have a little light for electronic device use now? The light-up icons for seatbelts and our symbiotic technology now displayed where the cigarette emblem used to be.

I have no idea what the implications of that may be. Perhaps we’ve only traded one kind of encroaching cancer for another. Feeding our lives into just another bad habit.
But it makes a difference to me, as much as I travel for the day job, to keep up with my connectedness. I wrote my 1K first, cozied into my cocoon of Bose headphones playing the very same writing music as I play in my skylit studio at home. (There’s a bit of my ritual, replicated there.) It feels good to have that done. My numbers safely recorded for the day. Then I replied to a few emails, set aside because other things had been on fire. They can leisurely wend their way over the ‘net when I land.

Now for this. As much as I ranted about computers disrupting my ritual, here the technology allows me to bring pieces of my life with me. Everything I accomplish here in 5C is one less thing I’ll have to sandwich elsewhere into my life.

Not a bad deal at all.

Creativity, Discipline and Nora — Oh My!

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Sometimes I wonder if there’s really a limit to creative energy, or if I just tend to think so.

I got in my 1K again today (yay! horns, confetti, ect!), but now I don’t feel like writing my blog. Alas.

Sometimes I think it’s just discipline. Halle made an interesting comment on the Ritual & Madness post that she’s come to believe that ritual is all about discipline, and that the emotional response to disruption is simply knowing how hard it is to regain the discipline. I think she’s got a great point there. I’ve read about authors who write in hugely disciplined ways. The beyond-prolific Nora Roberts says she writes eight hours a day. (Some out there will claim this is because she’s doing factory-genre writing, rather than true Art, but that’s neither here nor there.) And many novelists started out as journalists; they often cite that kind of disciplined, churn-out-articles-every-day writing as what built their ability to write consistently.

For myself, I find I don’t seem to write — to compose — for more than a couple of hours at a time. I have a whole day to write, and I find myself composing for two hours or so, and revising the rest. That and doing business, like queries, submissions, etc.

What with my dream of being a full-time writer, I wonder if that means I’ll still write about two hours a day and dork around for the rest…

That’s what dreams are all about!