Monthly Archives: July 2008

Floral Treats

Poetry, ,

If you want to try something ambitious
Add petals to make meals delicious
Take some advice
On making meals nice
And serve up a dish that’s nutritious.

I know cos’ I have to the assurance
Of a certain blog writer, Sue Lawrence.
A web release states
That flowers are great
For cooking: I don’t need insurance

So when next you’re starting to forage
Try marigolds, roses or borage.
Enhance your provender
With nasturtiums, lavender
And maybe a small dose of courage.

When it’s time for the next Mother’s Day
Do not buy a bouquet or nosegay
But sit back and savour
That delicate flavour.
Don’t send flowers; eat them, I say!.

The Immigrants' Daughter by Mary Terzian

Non-fiction, , , , , ,

“Where do you come from?” asks the teacher of the adult class in Leopoldville, where I am registered for a course in Lingala. I hesitate.

It is a simple query that puts me in a quandary. Should I state my origins, nationality or citizenship?

“From my mother’s womb,” I want to tell him in short, but resist the urge.

Nobody asked me that kind of question in Cairo where I grew up. We were a known minority. The usual question was, “Are you Greek?” “Italian?” “Armenian?” or “What nationality are you?” if my name had not given it away already.

Now in Leopoldville, on an expatriate assignment with the United Nations, I stand out with my foreign accent, wavy hair, and possibly body language, gestures and all.

“From Egypt,” I mutter, to keep the conversation short. I wonder why he doesn’t ask the same question of the other students in class – half a dozen from the United Nations, five from the Swiss Red Cross and two businessmen.

“Egypt! C’est vrai?” he exclaims in French. “I thought they were all black!”

I feel uncomfortable in my skin but remain silent.

“Is your husband Egyptian too?”

“I don’t have a husband,” I blurt out, embarrassed to my core. At the ripe old age of thirty I am shelved as an old maid, all hopes gone.

“I want to show you to my friend. He has never seen an Egyptian.”

My cheeks burn. Am I the first Egyptian in town, the discovery of the century, or an antique from Pharaoh’s tombs? Should I be put on display with a distinct label slapped at my feet, “Imported African. Rare species. Handle with care”? How can I explain to my Congolese teacher that I am not a real specimen?

More than three thousand years of history define me as an Armenian, a descendant from the people living at the foot of Mount Ararat where Noah’s Ark settled. The mountain was in Armenian territory for centuries. Politics moved it beyond the national boundaries and we became immigrants. How shall I explain that the DNA in my Armenian blood will survive forever, irrespective of the citizenship I have?

“I’m . . . not a real Egyptian,” I mumble, trying to avert a misconception.

Fourteen pairs of eyes stare at me as if I have just come out of ghost town.

I look at them and shrink at the task ahead of me. How will Idefine in two sentences our family history? My parents are survivors ofthe waves of “ethnic cleansing” that swept the Ottoman Empire fromthe 1890s through the 1920s. Under the pressure of reform, demanded by the foreign powers to improve the lot of minorities, the OttomanGovernment “solved” the problem by reducing them in massive, harrowing, so- called “displacements” into the Arabian deserts of the Middle East. Thus, the “starving Armenians” came into existence – skeletal, homeless, wandering survivors seeking refuge wherever acountry offered asylum. Thanks to this “solution,” half the nation now lives in countries around the world, constituting the Armenian Diaspora.

“Who remembers the Armenians?” exclaimed Adolph Hitler to his officers on the eve of his invasion to Poland. We, and the membersof my parents’ generation do, suffering in silence. The effects of genocide were present in my mother’s glassy eyes and in my father’s angry temper. It affected us all and will probably have its effect on a few more generations. We are the extra- uterine children of Motherland with different citizenships. Once transplanted, always a foreigner. Migration is not our family business, nor is it a national pastime, but circumstances forced us abroad to create a safe haven elsewhere. Icannot explain all this in two sentences. Nobody will understand my dilemma.

“Not a real Egyptian? What do you mean? Where do yourparents come from?” asks a man who eyes me curiously, taking over the queries from the teacher. The determination of my nationality takesprecedence over Lingala. “They come from Turkey.”

“Are you Turkish?”

“Certainly not.”

“Then what do you consider yourself?”

Good question. I have been a floater all my life, a thin cloud flirting with the sun, daring it rather to disperse me. How can I explain my ethnic longevity? “Armenian,” I say, with a smirk. I know it will not register.

“Armenian? With an Egyptian passport?”

“It’s complicated. I’ll explain after class.”

The teacher takes over. We start the first lesson in Lingala. I sit there like a freak of nature. How did I end up here?

I am going through a period of adjustment in Leopoldville and an intense degree of cultural shock, coming from a conservative country. I am lost in this Babylon of United Nations. Last week I invited two compatriots from Egypt to lunch as a payback for their courtesy on my arrival. In this remote city of Leopoldville, one suddenly becomes friends with strangers holding similar passports. They treated me likek kin, even though I do not speak Arabic well. They advised me that life in Leo is built around entertainment, to escape boredom. So it was my turn. We walked home at noon, all three of us, from across the street, the United Nations headquarters, to find my meticulously prepared hot lunch in the refrigerator! I was indignant beyond control.

“Why didn’t you cook it?” I hollered at M’bala, the houseboy.

“You say one o’clock!” M’bala shot back angrily, showing his index and grumbling in an incomprehensible language. My instructions were to cook for one hour.

I joined this class as a last ditch effort to communicate with him and other locals. Sometimes, in my ivory tower of despair, I question myself: is this the expatriate experience I dreamed about? Have I done the right thing by changing the course of my destiny?

Living alone should not be a problem, I thought, before setting out on this journey. I lived in Alexandria on my own, about three hours away from home. Working with the United Nations was an honorable solution to leaving the parental roof. I didn’t care for Father’s iron rules but I missed my conversations with Berj, my younger brother. The older one, Kev, had repatriated to Armenia, fifteen years ago. He was only eighteen then. He hoped to find a better life in Motherland and meet our Aunt Ebrouk there, Mama’s much-talked-about sister, who repatriated from Lebanon. Was he looking for the same thing I was – a place to fit in?

Now it looked as if f I had left my identity behind and more than that. Old friendships, community presence, extended family, and a world of minor pleasures taken for granted, like a handshake, a nod of recognition, eye contact with an acquaintance, a smile from across the street, or a hug from a friend had disappeared. Did anybody miss me? Was I already forgotten? Perhaps I should not mention my origins at all, but then I don’t want to mislead this man who wants to show me around as an Egyptian. I know some of my new classmates will corner me with more questions by the end of class. I am not mistaken.

“That’s interesting,” says Walter, the Swiss gentleman sitting to my left, engaging me in conversation as class disperses. He is intent on finding out who I am. Fair hair, blue eyes, five foot eight in height, strong muscular build, he is attractive enough to shake my soul. “How can you be Armenian when you’re Egyptian?”

“Have you heard of Armenians?” I ask.

“Yes, vaguely. I really don’t know who they are.”

“Armenia is in Asia Minor, right below the Caucasus, but we live all over the world.” While I wait for the information to gel, I add, to ease the process. “It’s part of the Soviet Union, you know.”

An eerie silence hangs in the air for a moment:

“Are you a communist?”

“No, for heaven’s sake.”

“I still don’t understand. What’s Armenia like?”

“I don’t know. I never lived there.” “Then where did you grow up?”

“In Cairo.”

“How was it growing up in Cairo?” “We had pharaohs for teachers and rode camels to school.”

Walter’s hearty laughter eases my tensions. I can’t imagine that working for good grades, fighting with siblings, rebelling against parents, and waiting for a knight in shining armor is any different elsewhere. Am I mistaken? For the first time in my life, I feel like a hybrid, not knowing exactly what the Motherland looks like, what our original traditions are and what superimposed customs have seeped into our culture. This class teaches me more than Lingala – the need to redefine myself.

One of the independent businessmen has heard our conversation.

“Did you say Rumanian? I didn’t really catch it,” he butts in.

“No, Armenian.”

Good Lord! With such titans as politician Anastase Mikoyan, composer Aram Khatchatourian, and writer William Saroyan, Armenians should have carved a page in history, but they haven’t. Raised eyebrows size me up. I realize that if I make a wrong move now all other Armenians around the globe will be judged by my behavior. I may not be a chip off the old block. In fact, I may even be the black sheep of my community, but, to the uninitiated, I am now the single specimen that represents the mass. This “where do you come from?” scenario follows me during my vagaries, from the Congo through travels in Europe, my transfer to Togo, my attempted stay in Lebanon, and to my permanent residence in the United States.

As an immigrant, I am the suspicious new strain of virus wherever I settle. The immunization system of the local community produces antibodies to arrest the spread of invasive elements of my type. Landlords look for the transient in me. Educational institutions detect an accent and frown upon certificates earned abroad. They devise elaborate schemes to deny me college entrance, but they don’t know how stubborn and persistent this strain of virus can be. Employment agencies shrug off my international experience as they give me an obscure slot. To preserve dignity, I hoist my ethnic pride and pray. Will I ever be accepted as an integral part of the local community where I will feel comfortable in my skin?

“Why can’t you give up being Armenian?” Caroline, a roommate in my migrant life, asks. Like my classmates in the Congo she is puzzled.

“How can I?” I reply. “My forefathers were massacred for their Christian faith and identity. I can’t betray them.”

I wonder if she understands what it is like. Can one expect pears from a transplanted apple tree? Heritage runs in my DNA. It squats in my womb. I need to keep language and ethnicity intact in order to keep the communication lines open with my extended familyand between the generations strewn across the world.

“My best friend never invites me to her Armenian Club,” acolleague complains. “She’s so clannish!” “She’s doing you a favor,” I offer, “do you blame her?” “How’s that? I find it rude.” “Wouldn’t you feel left out in a community where everybodyspeaks his ethnic language, down to the dialect? Most know each otheranyway.” “I never thought of that.” Should I mention that we treat the seventh generation still asfamily? That nobody is once or twice removed? That our theory ofrelativity is more complex than Einstein’s? Where does all this leave me? Like all children born in theDiaspora I persist on foreign soil by standing close to the local ethnicoasis, the expatriate Motherland, where I feel safe and secure in beingme, while making forays into the local culture. We cajole our parents,but keep pace with the world. We end up living a double life,externally the law-abiding citizen, internally the conservativetraditionalist. No wonder the question “Where do you come from?”follows me from the Congo to California, where I have lived longerthan in Egypt. This book defines my roots and perhaps will help promoteawareness of the problems of many immigrants like me who, forvarious reasons – ethnic cleansing, political dissidence, unfamiliarreligious practice, or, simply, lust for the unknown – travel the world insearch of a haven where they keep their splintered souls together.

Read more…Mary Terzian
website: www.maryterzian.com
Author: The Immigrants’ Daughter
Winner: Best Books 2006 Award
Finalist: National Indie Excellence 2007 Book Award, both in multicultural, non-fiction category

Just A Song at Twilight by Alex Drinkwater

Free Writing

Just A Song at Twilight (.doc)

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Just a Song at Twilight

 

 

by

 

 

Alex Drinkwater, Jr.

The red eyes of his Best Friend glowed at him from one corner as Felix entered the dark room. He looked back toward the door for a second and reached for the light switch. Even in the glare of 100-watt bulbs, the place seemed empty in spite of its ample furnishings. He staggered into the middle of the room, as if he were drunk, though he was sober. A drink, that was the ticket. He needed a drink.

The refrigerator contained beer and wine, and very little else. He reached for a bottle of strong German brew. No, two bottles. They just filled a one-liter mug he had brought back from a trip to Germany. The first gulp was a big one, a much-needed one. He looked around, the telephone on the wall catching

his eye. Should he call her? No, it would do no good. The result would be the same.

“Shit.”

Felix made his way to the leather chair in front of his Best

Friend. He practically fell into it, spilling a large amount of beer. The tears slid down his cheeks, mingling with the suds in his lap.

She walked into her house, her new boyfriend right behind her. She put her purse down on the table in the hallway and smiled at him. The smile did little to cover her melancholy mood. “Well, here we are. Can I take your coat?”

The balding but handsome southerner handed her his jacket,

smiling back. “Sure, babe. Any other clothes you want me to take off?”

“Take it easy, Garry. We just got here.” She hung his jacket in the closet. “Sit down. I’ll open the wine.”

“Okay.” He sat in her living room, the smile of conquest already on his face. And why not? Hell, he had worked for this, taking her away from That Jerk.

Meg joined him on the couch, placing two glasses of White Zinfandel in front of them. She flipped back her long, blonde hair in the manner Felix had always found so endearing. “Well,

here we are,” she repeated. Her voice betrayed her nervousness.

Garry tried to slip an arm around her. She got up.

“What’s the matter, Meg?” He took her hand as she stood

next to him.

Her lips quivered for a second before she spoke. “I don’t

know. I — I guess I’m still a little shook up.”

“Shook up over what? Over Felix? Come on, that guy never

gave you anything but grief. So now he’s the one that’s crying, the hell with him.”

“I know.” She lowered her head. After a moment she looked up. “How about some music?”

“Okay, sure. Whatever you like.”

She walked over to the rack of stereo equipment in the corner, opened the glass doors, and selected an album of Broadway show music. The CD Felix had given her was placed in the CD player He had helped her buy, and she went back to the couch to listen to it with Someone Else. This was not lost on her, even as Someone Else held her hand . . .

Felix sat in silence, staring at his Best Friend, but

thinking of Her. The empty mug lay on its side on the floor, a few cigarette butts smoldered in the ashtray, a picture of Meg lay next to the mug. The lights of his Best friend glowed along

the wall in front of him, beckoning, waiting. He looked at it, an oak rack literally full of the finest audio equipment. It was all analogue, from the beautiful Oracle turntable to the big Audio Research tube preamp and huge tube power amplifiers. First class, right down to the expensive interconnects and speaker wires. And those speakers. Four Infinity monsters, woofers in two square towers, the rest of the drivers in two oak units, curved and graceful, powered by those big glass-tubes, soaking up watts like water, and sounding like Valhalla’s orchestra. Tens of thousands it had cost him but, after all, the source of his beloved music was his Best Friend. Now it was his only friend. He stood up and stared back at the glow of the amplifiers which were always on, always ready. In times of sorrow, there was always the music.


Garry put down his glass of wine and pulled Meg close to

him. He kissed her lips. She did not resist. “Meg, forget that guy. It’s you and me now,” he said in his soft Georgia accent.

She looked down at her feet, now shoeless. “I know. I just can’t get the whole episode out of my mind. He was so — so adamant. He screamed at me, he blamed everything on me. Me! I tried to convince him for years that I was right for him, and he just laughed at me.” She looked at him. “Garry, how much could

I take? I put up with it for years!”

He touched her lips with his finger. “Shhhh. Take it easy. That’s all over now. He got what he deserved, what he asked for.” He kissed her again, and his hand brushed one of her breasts . . .

What to play? What was appropriate in these circumstances? Felix’s eyes darted back and forth over the enormous collection of records, from Bach to Wagner. Wagner, that was it! He pulled out the six-record set of Sir Georg Solti’s version of Gotterdammerung — the Twilight of the Gods.

The Someone Else could control himself no longer. He took

her hand. “Meg, don’t you think it’s time we went to bed?”

She shuttered slightly as she heard the words, and closed her eyes. She knew she was ready physically for her new lover — it was her mind that balked. “I — I guess so.”

He tried to look concerned, though his body grew impatient. “Now wait — if you’re not sure . . . “

Opening her eyes, she turned to him and squeezed his hand. “No, I’m sure. I’ve wanted to for some time, really. It’s just that, well, as long as I was seeing him . . . “

He stood suddenly, pulling her up with him. “Forget him. You’re mine now.”

The angry chords of Siegfried’s Funeral Music growled out of

the big Infinities, woofers throbbing, walls shuddering. Felix finished another mug of beer just as the music started. “Damn!”

he shouted. “Damn!”

Brunnhilde, holy bride!

Wake up! Open your eyes!

Who has enwrapped you in sleep again?

Felix closed his eyes, listening to Siegfried singing even as he died. The vassals came and carried him on his shield.

“Oh, Meg . . . “

Garry pawed her even as they walked toward the bedroom.

“Hey, take it easy,” she said, pulling away somewhat, “we’re almost there.”

“I’m sorry, babe. It’s just that I’ve waited so long for this moment, you know?”

“I know. Just one thing, Garry. Don’t call me `Babe,’ okay? My name is Meg.”

Almost sheepishly, he said “Sorry.” He kissed her again.

After a few moments, she broke away.

“Let me go brush my teeth, okay? Make yourself comfortable.” She walked into the bathroom as he sat on the bed, staring after her. She closed the door and faced the mirror. Her green eyes looked back at her. “Meg, what are you doing?” she asked herself, softly.

Felix slumped in the big chair, his head in his hands as the

music faded away. The tonearm cruised into the last groove effortlessly, silently, and lifted up as the massive

platter stopped its rotation. It waited for its master . . .

He remembered their last conversation on the telephone.

“Meg, please. I love you,” he had said, only the day before.

“Stop it.”

“I do! I do love you, that’s all there is to it!”

“How can you say that?” She had almost screamed into the receiver. “All these years, you treated me like dirt! And now you love me? Why, because I finally found somebody else?”

He’d paused for a moment. “I don’t know. Maybe it took the thought of actually losing you to wake me up. All I know is I don’t want to lose you, especially to — to him!”

“What’s wrong with him? He treats me like something

special, not like you treated me. He cares! Do you even know

what that means?”

He paused again. “Meg?”

“What?”

“Have you slept with him?” His voice almost cracked as he said the words.

She sighed audibly. “Is that what you’re worried about? After all the times you cheated on me? Suddenly you worry about who I sleep with?”

“That’s all in the past, dammit! Meg, if you screw that damned redneck I’ll . . . ” His voice tailed off.

“You’ll what?”

“I’ll die.” It was a whisper.

There was a long silence, and then she spoke. “Felix, don’t be silly. Grow up. No, to answer your question, it hasn’t happened yet. But he wants to, and so do I.”

He closed his eyes. His tears flowed down his face.

She heard his sob. “Felix?”

“Wh — what?”

“Will you stop? I’m hanging up.”

“No, please . . . “

Click.

He opened his eyes. First he stared at the turntable. Then at the telephone. Maybe, just maybe. What did he have to lose?

“What the hell, why not?”

He dialed. It rang.

Meg walked toward the bed, naked. Garry waited in anticipation, rapidly discarding his own clothes as she approached. “Oh Meg, honey!” They embraced. The phone rang.

“What the hell, don’t answer it.”

“No, it may be my mother.” She pulled away.

“Meg — shit.” He sat back on the bed.

She picked it up. “Hello?”

A sad voice on the other end. “Meg? It’s me.”

“Felix?” The surprise was written on her face.

Garry stood up. “Don’t tell me it’s that asshole. Damn!”

Meg held up her hand. “Felix, what do you want?”

“Meg, who’s there?” Anguish, despair. He knew she was not alone.

“Give me that.” Garry snatched the phone from her hand.

“Look, Bud, why don’t you just face facts? She’s mine now, and I’m about to make love to her. Now leave us alone.”

Click.

Felix stared at the receiver for a long moment and let it drop. As the instrument swung on its cord, he made his way back to his Best Friend, oblivious to the incessant beeping coming

from the uncradled phone.

“Garry, why did you do that?”

“Meg, he had it coming. Please forget him and come to me.”

She stared at him for a second, and then walked over to him. She walked on those long, beautiful legs that Felix had enjoyed


for so long. Now she was about to wrap them around Someone Else.

Carefully, Felix lifted the record off the turntable and placed it in its sleeve. He took out record number six, the last scene of the last act of the opera Twilight of the Gods. He

placed it on the turntable. He left the tonearm poised over the record’s edge for a moment and went into the bedroom. From his closet, Felix retrieved something in a leather case. Something

he had always thought was beautiful, but She had thought was ugly. He brought it out, took it out of the case, regarded it for a moment, and leaned it against his chair. He started the music.

Garry kissed Meg all over her smooth body. How unlike Felix he was! He looked different, smelled different, felt

different. She wanted him, now. It was time. Time to begin anew! Why should she feel guilty? What did she owe Him? She looked into the eyes of her new friend. “Garry, I . . . I want you in me.”

Felix sat and stared at the lights as the tonearm descended, and closed his eyes as Brunnhilde began her soliloquy. Sadly, mournfully, the horns and woodwinds began the Immolation scene.


Pile up on high mighty logs

there on the bank of the Rhine

He thought of all the years, all the loving, all the arguments. He thought of her naked. With Someone Else . . .

high and bright let the flames rise

that shall consume the noble body

of the greatest of heroes.

Meg slid down beneath him, spreading her legs, her eyes

open wide. He leaned over her, his arms outstretched, his body poised, ready . . .

Felix stared at the ceiling as Brunnhilde mourned the Hero,

Siegfried. What was left for him? What could he be without Her?

All things, all now I know:

all is clear to my eyes.

The wings of thy ravens I hear rustling . . .

He took out the ring and contemplated it. The ring he

bought for Her, the ring She had refused. “You’re a day late,

and a dollar short,” she had said.

Accursed Ring! Dread Ring!

I grasp the gold and give it away.

He threw the ring against the wall. The diamond broke loose from its mounting and rolled onto the carpet, its glitter lost in the shadows. Felix slumped in the chair, his eyes wet, his body almost limb, his mind numb.

Seven years! Seven years it had been since anyone had entered her but Him. “Ohhhh,” she moaned as Garry plunged into her, finally.

Felix raised the carbine and chambered a round. Brunnhilde took the firebrand and instructed the vassals to light the pyre.

For it is the twilight of the gods.

See — I throw the firebrand into

Valhalla’s glorious citadel!

“Oh, my God, oh Garry.” She cried out as the shuddering

orgasm took over her body. He stiffened and climaxed almost at the same time . . .

To clasp him to me, to be held fast in his arms,

to be united with him, by the power of love!

The crack of the carbine was almost smothered as the music thundered from the big Infinities, signaling the end of Valhalla as the Rhine overflowed its banks and the flames leapt to engulf

Wotan’s once mighty castle.

Siegfried! Siegfried! See!

Your wife greets you joyfully!

In her bed, Meg sighed as Garry lay, spent, on top of her.

In his chair, Felix lay in silence as the blood poured from his mouth, trickling down his arm and onto Meg’s photograph. The long, last chord of Gotterdammerung faded away.

The tonearm rose. The platter stopped its rotation. It waited for its master.

THE END

Note

All quotations from Gotterdammerung (Twilight of the Gods) by Richard Wagner translated from the original German libretto.

Conceived

Poetry, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Thoughts and images

In mutual attraction

Move closer to

One another;

Electricity flares

As they seek

Deep embrace;

Energy writhes

While nape of

An “S“‘s neck

Is cooled by the

Breath of an “h” –

“Shhhh”….

Can you hear the

Beads of apostrophes

Drip on white sheets?

Can you feel the

Pure bliss

As climactic waves

Of fluid expression

Fertilize ideas?

“Ahhhh”…

All becomes calm

As fetal notions gestate

And a composition

Begins to form;

A poem is born.

© 2008

Torrid Fates

Poetry

i’ll fold the sea.
and beneath its madness wing
refuge of you. and to me
what scent you sing
will set us living free.

such face, my lover,
of your likeness
within oldest fire
posing as the torrid Fates,
without soft touch and of true word.
drying off brightly the salt of young.

into what holy fold
dost my fingers probe?
from whence this total cold?
not yet, no, for today
is the day of the sun,
and as the music’s vibratos
wish it true

i’ll fold the sea.
and beneath its madness wing
refuge of you. and to me
what scent you sing
will set us living free.

Writing While You Sleep: Harnessing Your Subconscious

Free Writing, , ,

Nearly every writer I know (myself included) prefers the aftermath of writing–having written–to the actual act of writing itself. And every writer I know would pay dearly to find a way to make the tyranny of facing the blank screen more bearable. Well, there is a way, and it’s as simple as falling asleep.

Yes, falling asleep. When someone is trying to make a decision, we tell them to “sleep on it” for a reason–because the subconscious works on ideas and orders them for you while you are asleep. But not only can you help your brain to do this while slumbering, you can harness your subconscious during waking hours, too.

“Each of us possesses a brilliantly creative subconscious mind,” says screenwriter Cynthia Whitcomb. “Most of the time we don’t give it credit for its creativity.”

The trick is to feed your subconscious mind the direction it craves. I learned this when I was faced with writing two big projects at once. My natural inclination was to wring my hands and moan and groan about my inability to write two things at the same time. While deeply absorbed in one project, nagging voices about the other one would pop up. You should be working on the memoir, the voice would say. How are you going to get it done on time when you are focusing on the novel?

Out of desperation, I learned a way to subvert the negative voice. My subconscious is working on it, I would reply. While I initially started saying this only to shut up the cacophony of voices, to my surprise, my subconscious really did follow my direction, and when I switched to working on my novel, all sorts of ideas were at the ready.

So I decided it would be to my benefit to learn how to coddle my “second brain.” The most important thing is to get in the habit of telling your subconscious what you need. Be specific. For example, how can I show Carrie’s unhappiness with Bart in chapter eight? Every time you think about your project, repeat the problem: I’m working on Carrie’s unhappiness. Now you’ve imprinted your subconscious with your writing need. How to encourage it to provide an answer? There are several ways:

  1. Sleep on it. Write down your problem and review it before you climb into bed. Or, read a few pages of your manuscript and tell your subconscious, Tomorrow I want to finish this scene.
  2. Take power naps. Follow the above procedure during the day, and give yourself ten or fifteen minutes to close your eyes and doze. Often I lean my head back against my chair for a snooze and have to keep sitting up to write as the ideas flow.
  3. Exercise. Review your problem before taking a walk or starting your daily yoga session. Sometimes just getting up from your computer and changing location is enough to jog the brain.
  4. Engage in repetitive activity. Sew, knit, weed, plant flowers, dust, vacuum. Something about the repetition allows ideas to come up in the spaces between.
  5. Drive. Nothing like a mini-road trip to free the brain.
  6. Concentrate on something else. How many times have you sat down to pay bills only to have the best idea for your screenplay yet? (Which means, of course, you get to delay paying the bills for a while while you run to your computer.)

With all of these activities it is vital for you to carry pen and paper with you. No, you won’t remember the idea you had while rounding the curve on the tenth lap of the track. You’ll forget the brilliant snippet of dialogue you invented while gardening if you don’t write it down. Carrying pen and paper is a signal you’re ready. When you start stoking the subconscious it will respond, and if you are not ready and receptive, believe me, it will shut back down. Like a muscle, the more you use your subconscious, the stronger it gets.

Finally, returning to the topic of sleep, let us not forget about dreams, which are a powerful source of story ideas, symbolism and imagery. The best way to remember dreams echoes the technique for stoking your subconscious–get in the habit of writing them down as soon as you awake. Since you are carrying paper and pen with you everywhere, this won’t be a problem, right?

Respect and revere your “second brain” with these simple steps and you’ll be amazed at how hard it will work for you. Before you know it, you’ll even be writing in your sleep.