Monday Moanings - October 20, 2014

Turning Leaves

No shoulda, woulda, coulda's sit on the window ledge blocking my view of the world outside my door. There's not a moan in sight. The weekend writing retreat at Fern Resort was everything I had hoped it would be and though I did not do much writing, I did accomplish my goal. The goal seemed simple enough: to re-engage with the manuscript that has languished for nearly a year in the bottom desk drawer. Did the story still have energy? Was the story still worth telling? Did the writing still excite me? 

I'd been to the writing retreats offered by Writescape's Gwynn Scheltema and Ruth Walker and knew the fine talent and support that this weekend would have on offer. The companion workbook for the retreat announced the theme of Turning Leaves 2014, "Bridge to Your Words" 

I was dumbfounded when I saw that -- I had no idea that the entire program had been designed for ME. I'm sure Ruth and Gwynn didn't know that either! But there it was in my hands, and the rest, as they say is history; well perhaps not quite so dramatic nor of any great import on the world stage but still, for me, a really big deal! 

I crossed the bridge into the pages of the memoir. It was like entering the old family homestead, full of smells, tastes, sights, sounds, and touches. I took the time to reintroduce myself gently, politely, allowing the tale to reintroduce itself to me. And I fell in love with the manuscript again. I fell in love with the words and the story.

I am profoundly grateful not only to Gwynn & Ruth for their expertise and generousity, but also to Barbara Kyle, the guest author at the retreat. Her enthusiasm and insights on the craft of writing as well as her interest in each one the participants, was pure gift. The opportunity to explore, learn and write in community with other writers of all genres, all experience levels, for a weekend was also a gift. Thank you all!

Now, I gotta get to work. Catch up with you later.

©2014 April Hoeller

Thursday, or Thereabouts - August 7, 2014

"Write about what should not be forgotten." Isabel Allende

Oh look! It's 'Throwback Thursday' again. Can I throw it back?
I limped into today via a Wednesday marred by a migraine and a nasty flare up of tendonitis in my right foot. In my efforts to salvage something useful out of the day I decided to clean the finch feeder and not only did I ram a screwdriver into my finger trying to remove the bottom plate, but I then forgot where I put an integral piece to reassemble it again. Not to worry, my love is an expert here - not at remembering things (he's no better than I am), but rather at fixing things - so problem solved and finches have food. Perhaps I should have written down where I put the all important part.

I took refuge in the kitchen. As I turned the fish in the skillet for supper a deep penetrating hum emerged from the oven. I jumped back at the distinctive sound of unrestrained electrical current. With a strange kind of thud, the noise ceased and stove top lights went out. "Well that was interesting!" Mr. Fixit offered. He'll figure it all out in due course, but in the mean time I have no oven, though the stove top is now working.

Is it any wonder that my approach to today, Thursday, is tentative at best? The headache is gone but the painful foot remains. Based on past experience, a few physio treatments to alleviate the acute stage accompanied by RICE (rest, ice, compression, elevation) and 6 (SIX!) weeks from now I'll be back on track. Well, now what?

"Write about what should not be forgotten." popped up in a window on my laptop screen. The words grabbed my attention and instead of my usual disinterested nod, they garnered a full stop, look and listen as a deep resonance reverberated inside me.

For months the memoir about my journey with my mother through Alzheimer's Disease has languished in the bottom of a desk drawer. The story has all but disappeared from my radar. Oh I know the untidy melange of typewritten and hand inked pages is sitting there. I even occasionally give the drawer a kick to see if anything is alive in there. Nope. I chide myself for not getting on with the job, and therein lies the root cause of my inaction - the memoir has become a job, a boring, tedious chore devoid of all enthusiasm and out of sight. Where are the days when a passion-filled pen spewed out pages filled with a heart rending tale?
Why am I writing this memoir anyway?


Today the words of Isabel Allende answered my question. I took the time to search out the context of the quoted words, an interview titled "Why I Write." The full quote is even more instructive for me:

"...Maybe the most important reason for writing is to prevent erosion of time, so that memories will not be blown away by the wind. Write to register history, and name each thing. Write what should not be forgotten."

This may not be sufficient kindling to fire up my fountain pen, but it has opened up the drawer to let some light in, and where there is light there is energy.






Though a search on her name, "Irene Hoersch Cudbird" reveals her place in history, my mother did not change the world on any great scale, in any grand way. But she did shape my place in the world, how I experience and interpret life around me, and she still does so to this day. There are important stories to write, wisdom and truth, love and laughter that should not be forgotten.

©2014 April Hoeller

Monday Moanings, November 4, 2013

NaNoWriMo - My Lite Version

It all began on Friday...

Image courtesy of
National Novel Writing Month

NaNoWriMo, a whole 30 days of intensive writing, a kind of writer's marathon (check out this link for details on the official scoop). Now I'm not a registered participant because firstly I'm not writing a novel and secondly, I'm not that driven, and so I'm doing a 'Lite' version. My approach is a little more relaxed because I've learned, finally, that it's okay to give myself permission to have fun, to accept the better offer when it comes along without obligingly picking up a side order of guilt, and it's okay to attend to my own well being.

So on Friday, Day 1 of NaNoWriMo, I spent a good chunk of the day with my sisters instead of writing. We had a great day together revisiting some of the wonderful stories of our childhood. We laughed a lot, learned a story or two one or more of us didn't know and simply revelled in time together. With a bit of a stretch I could claim that this was valuable research for the memoir I'm writing, but in truth no actual writing occurred, not a single word.

Day 2 - Saturday I was snookered by a TMJ/migraine tag team that effectively blocked all incentive to write, and replaced it with fatigue and an aura of unremitting gloom, coincidentally matching the weather. Again no writing, not a single word, unless I can count a grocery list.

Day 3 - Behold! A day of glorious redemption! A full day, crisp, bright and AWAY at Writing from the Centre. Many thanks to my friends Elaine and Janis for the time, space and great food. Sunday, I put words on paper, the ink flowed from a fully charged fountain pen, (which I had to refill half way through the day!), my brain actually formed sentences and put them together into meaningful paragraphs and the coherent (relatively - as is typical of first draft) pages stacked up. I estimate the word count to be just shy of 2000, but it matters more to me that I wrote, that I knocked off an episode or two of the book and that feels good, really good!

Day 4 - Well of course it's Monday and there is no sense in moaning about it. I'm off to the gym then the afternoon is clear for another luxurious stretch of writing. I'm thinking a modest goal of 1500 words a day is doable and if I manage that on 5 days out of 7, I'll reach 30,000 by month's end, which is just about what I need to flesh out the middle section of the memoir.

So here's my goal for NaNoWriMo Lite: Complete the first draft of Section B, currently titled "As Time Goes By" by November 30.

Cover me! I'm going in...

©2013 April Hoeller

Thursday Thermals - April 11, 2013

I promised an update today on my serious 'bum in chair' writing and here it is: some 3000 more words have  made it onto paper since Monday afternoon, for a total of 17,517 since January 20th (see Monday Moanings - April 8). Woo hoo! This is especially gratifying as for some reason I chose to focus on my mother's last months on this earth for this part of the memoir, and the weather here in my part of the world has been nothing short of miserable - enough to suck back the ink in any pen.

Spring has been pretty much a non-starter this year, reluctant would be a generous description. My current 'forecast' is that this season of promise will amount to the two or three days between the furnace going off and the air conditioner coming on. You heard it here first!

I confess to being somewhat of a weather geek. First thing every morning after a passing glance at the outdoor thermometer, I fling open the drapes and scan the sky, then it's over to my PC for a check of the weather radar and forecasts (multiple sources). I love a good thunderstorm and marvel at its development in the clouds. It's in my genes.

My Dad, Bev Cudbird, was a weatherman, a meteorologist with Environment Canada until retirement and then the staff meteorologist for radio station CFRB from the late seventies to the early 1980's. I like to think he pioneered that media role. Of course radio has some definite advantages over TV; presenters don't have to worry about what they're wearing, and as in my Dad's case, one doesn't even have to be in the studio. Most of Dad's broadcasts came from the upstairs den in my parents' condo in Etobicoke. If you listened carefully to some of those broadcasts you could hear the chattering of the two teletype machines that spewed out the latest observations and forecasts on reams of newsprint paper.

For Dad there was no room for moaning and groaning about the weather, though there was plenty of room  to chastise forecasters for spending so much time peering at radar and studying forecast models, that they forgot to look out the window. I can see him now, tearing off a sheet from the teletype, looking at the latest official forecast, ripping it in two and yelling, "Look out the goddam window!"

He would take a day like today with its snow, cold and ice pellets and tell us how good this is for soil moisture and lake levels, how good this is for food crops - bright green peas, long orange carrots and later in the season, bright red tomatoes, warm from the garden. So that's how I'm going to look at today - a luscious tomato in the making!

Thanks Dad!

Monday Moanings - April 8, 2013

My book – a memoir about the journey with my mother through Alzheimer’s – needs work. Actually it needs words, some serious bum in chair, pencil in hand time. Some 15,000 words are already done as part of my effort to produce a full manuscript by the end of December, but I’ve got to get another 12K down by April 24th.
Well that’s less than a thousand words a day – no problem! But here’s what happens:

Saturday dawned with great intentions and to be fair I did spend a couple of hours mapping out the story so far; the pieces already written and those yet to be written were laid out chronologically.  Indeed a worthy pursuit, but no actual writing was done.

Sunday arrived. It too was filled with writing plans and good intentions, but I fretted away the morning – that timeline thingy I produced Saturday sucked me into a web of ‘shoulds’, ‘oughts’ and ‘oh my god, what have I forgottens’! It was the perfect sinkhole for a recovering perfectionist. I then spent the afternoon reading through the email diary (all the emails exchanged among my sisters and others) of the journey, almost a book in itself. Again a good piece of research, and I did find a few gems I’d forgotten about, but still no writing.

Monday brings new resolve: Hello my name is April and I am a perfectionist. It has been eighteen hours since my last relapse. And today I am writing – first this blog and then on to a section of the memoir I mapped out last night when sleep eluded me.

I gotta get going folks. My brain is already well into the memoir section while my fingers scribble hard and fast to finish these words. Meet me back here Thursday and I’ll give you an update.
Ciao!

Addendum: I really would be remiss if I didn’t offer some comment on the passing of Dame Margaret Thatcher. If you have not seen the movie, “The Iron Lady” with Meryl Streep in the leading role, do search it out; a great portrayal of a truly remarkable woman. The heavenly host is rumbling today, ‘Brace yourselves, Maggie has come home!’