Like I said in my last post, this week just disappeared from under me. I missed all self-imposed deadlines and some assigned ones, too. And I feel like I'm barely hanging on to this project.
I've been writing and thinking. Mostly thinking and not being great at the writing. This story is at once too big and too small. I feel like I could sit down and write the whole thing out in 10 pages. But the nuances would be lost, the meaning. Which is where I'm getting stuck. It feels fragmented, and my brain does, too.
My grandmother lived several lives. She persistently left people behind. She changed always, and always one step ahead of the times. 50's housewife/mother with the cropped pants and cat-eye glasses to beatnik in a black turtleneck with a girlfriend in SF to a mod gogo cage dancer to a romantic Renaissance hippie to sleek designer babe. She left two husbands, left two separate families and her two children. She left friends, she left places, she left her body. And when she didn't come back, she left silence. This silence that I don't think I can break into.
All that's left to do is circle around and around her dying story in hopes of finding a way in. The people closest to her didn't know much about her. The one's we've turned to to answer all the questions just don't know. Ultimately, she is a mystery. And I think she wanted it that way.
These days I just wish two things - that someone would open the door to greet me and tell me I look just like her, and that I could hear her sing.
i know what you mean about that feeling that such a big thing subject matter idea person place can more easily be compacted into less when you know it can be more because it is an overwhelming pressure to feel like you should put it all. i guess it feels like either it should be short sweet and to the point in contrast to the fear of writing so much and never feeling like it is enough, or complete, something is missing. i think to release the pressure of making it a whole life story or the idea that the thesis limits of 35-50 pages might help to remove some of that pressure? i feel confident with what you have shared so far that this story has many directions to go and various stories to tell. i like the poetic elements you have taken to it here in the blog as you do in the workshop pieces.
ReplyDeletei think you both have big tasks but very impressive books in front of you. Think of the thesis as a way to get the craft down Pick one moment of their stories and put all your vision into it to see what works and doesn't. But don't get paralyzed.
ReplyDeletee
I'm definitely with you, feeling like you could write the story in 10 pages...I find myself stressing about how I'm going to make it to 30+ pages when I feel like I can't get anything down. But like Heidi said, and judging from the little bits of your scenes in the piece you sent us to workshop, the story definitely has promise and you can take it in so many directions. Just those snippets of individual scenes and characters that you presented us with last week drew me in and made me that much more interested to see what becomes of it, and I'm confident that you can turn it into something great!
ReplyDeleteI echo Elmaz - pick one moment. You know enough, and you feel enough into the mystery for it to unfold. Don't pin yourself down to the "facts." Free write in to find your way out. You might discover something you didn't expect. Light!
ReplyDelete