Worksheet from Martha Alderson’s “Plot Whisperer” workshop with Jordan Rosenfeld: Writer Path.
You’d think I had other things to do, but I just reread this how-to and wanted to share some thoughts while they were still fresh in my mind. I’m a great re-reader of books (see last Monday’s blog), and needed a kick in the pants this month to get me back on track with my revisions. Herewith, my review of SK’s On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft.
Stephen King began writing his book on the craft of writing to delve into the language and show fledgling writers something about how it’s done, or how he does it, anyway. Midway through the manuscript, he was gravely injured in a well-publicized accident and almost died. That experience shapes the rest of the book and gives the ultimate section of On Writing a particularly poignant tone. This section was serialized in The New Yorker, and those who haven’t read it already may turn directly to it with good cause: King’s story is powerful personal drama. But turn back to the beginning for an equally powerful, if much lighter, look into King’s development as a writer.
In the first section, “C.V,” King mines his memory for early glimpses of the evolving writer, in hilarious tidbits. King is not the pop-horror hack that many of his critics claim him to be; in On Writing, King is on his game: intelligent, bluntly honest, profanely funny. He tells how he came to succeed as a writer and what mistakes he’s made along the way, including an alcohol and drug problem that nearly cost him his marriage. In the center section, “Toolbox,” King gives the nuts, bolts, and how-tos of writing, none of which are unexpected nor too revelatory. His advice is mostly practical: “Avoid bullshit,” he says, among other bons mots. As a how-to-write book, you could do worse, or better, than this one. As a peek into the King psyche and wit, On Writing is a must-read.
* * *
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
by Stephen King
Scribner 2000
$25.00 288 pages
ISBN 0-684-85352-3
I like to re-read my books. I mean, a lot. Once a year, some of them.
This week I re-read an old favorite: 84 Charing Cross Road, along with its sequel (in the same book!), The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street. This is a wonderfully funny and sweet true story, told in correspondence between a New York playwright-freelance writer, and a bookshop employee in London. 84 Charing Cross was the address of the bookstore, Marks & Co. They began their correspondence in 1949 and it ends after 20 years — I won’t tell you how. But it was made into a wonderful movie with Anthony Hopkins and Ann Bancroft. See it, some day, if you haven’t. It’s sweet and bookish and nerdy and just as fun every time. The second book is when Helene Hanff, the NY writer, finally goes to London to visit and meet all the friends she only knew through letters. She hopes to find the “England of literature,” and she does!
My eldest daughter, Mia, took a semester to live and work in London so I went to visit her there. We saw a show one night — can’t remember which one, but it was in Covent Garden, and right nearby is Charing Cross Road. I forced her to walk with me to the corner at 84 Charing Cross. And I was so disappointed to find a Pizza Hut instead of a bookstore. My photo card burned out on me so I did not get the last set of photos I wanted. But here’s what it looks like now.
I had many years of yearning for England like a salmon yearns for its stream of origin. It took until my mid-thirties to get there, but I had a lovely adventure. I’ve been there three times, and each time I go, I find someone or something from England’s literary past to enjoy in person.
We once spent an afternoon in a taxi, chatting away at the driver as he drove us around. We stopped at Abbey Road for the zebra crossing (pictures gone!) and drove around St. John’s Wood, Primrose Hill and Regent’s Park (and no photos!). Do you know Primrose Hill? It’s where the dalmations in Dodie Smith’s 101 Dalmations went for the Twilight Barking. I had to see it! And see it I did. (I still curse the technology fail of my last batch of photos; the Cloud had not quite come into its own in 2006, and neither had Instagram/Facebook). It was a good visit to London, and I hope I have more ahead of me.
I re-read 84 Charing Cross Road in an afternoon on the sofa, feeling comforted by the visit with an old friend. I closed my eyes and dreamed myself back with a cup of tea and a Tube ticket and a jar of Branston Pickle on the table. Marmalade and lush gardens and blue plaques on the buildings to say which famous person had lived there. Rain, rain, and sometimes sun.
I re-read my books to renew my friendship. To slide into the arms of memory. To make room in a story for myself, and what I need right then: familiarity, warmth, a rose garden with no thorns.
More on this topic soon.
I lost my leather jacket about three weeks ago. I had it on, I took it off, I laid it down, I apparently left it wherever I was and now it has vanished, seemingly forever.
I bought that jacket when I was 19, at Coddingtown Mall in Santa Rosa, where I had taken the bus after classes at the junior college. I was working part-time for my father in his then-new brass wind-chime factory (housed in a barn on our rural property). I strung wind-chimes together: three knots for the center, five knots for the pipes, a jerk and a flourish and it was done. I made 60 cents apiece for assembly and $5 an hour for poly-bagging. I couldn’t usually string more than two batches, because my father was working ahead of me, and if I worked too fast, he’d have to stop polishing brass or cutting parts and set me up. That messed up his rhythm and made him irritable.
So I played the radio loud, heavy metal music to cover the sounds of the drill press and band saw, breathed through my hot face-mask to avoid the brass dust and assorted other toxins in the air, and strung wind-chimes.
I earned about $40 per week, put most of it into the bank and spent a little on bus fare and snacks at school. I was taking classes in general ed and journalism, and going to see lots of bands perform. I liked reviewing music and had wangled my way up to entertainment editor at the college newspaper. I got to emcee shows and introduce the different bands that played at lunchtime on campus. I wrote a column called “Park’s Peek at Entertainment,” where I used such scintillating lines as, “Be there or be a hexagon.” I thought I had found my niche.
I definitely had the look down. I had a punky haircut. I had the de rigueur ear piercings, black eyeliner and pencil-leg jeans. I had vintage red leather pumps. I even had fishnet stockings at the ready. But one thing was missing. Obviously. A leather jacket.
So I took about $20 with me to the mall and went straight to Wilson’s House of Leather, where about two minutes confirmed that I was never going to be able to afford a leather coat. Disappointed, I walked down the mall, poking into shops and stores, until I happened across an old favorite, Foxmore’s Casuals. And there I saw the perfect jacket. It was black and supple, hip-length and double-breasted, its sleeves just the right cut. It sat on my shoulders like a guardian angel: snug, protective, devastatingly cool. The $80 didn’t stop me because I knew at Foxmore’s I could buy it on layaway. So I did. And four weeks later I had my jacket.
I loved that jacket with the zeal of a convert. I wore it everywhere, including in the rain – which I discovered was a big mistake. But you can’t tell a 19-year-old anything, so I learned those kinds of lessons the hard way. I wore the jacket with my mini-skirts, I wore it over jeans, I wore it to school and out to clubs at night. In that jacket I felt tall and tough; I felt smart and pretty; I felt cool and confident. It gave me that certain élan when I went to interview a band. It gave me authority when I took the microphone to introduce the metalheads who were playing that gig. It gave me an edge, which is what a petite, tongue-tied girl with no street smarts from Petaluma needed.
A year later I moved to San Francisco to finish college. The jacket came with me, but when I found myself married and expecting a child, the jacket went into the closet. I moved from San Francisco to Concord, to Oakland, to San Leandro, and had three children along the way. Having babies put some meat on my bones and I couldn’t fit the jacket anymore. As a mom, pushing the double-stroller and serving on PTA, I didn’t even think about the jacket. But I kept it as a relic from my misspent youth. When my eldest hit about 14, she found it in the closet and wore it once in a while, just for fun. My daughters grew, my marriage crumbled and we sold the house in San Leandro. Somehow, the jacket came along to Alameda, taking up space in another closet.
A few years ago I noticed that leather jackets were getting shorter and a retro look was back in style. I took that coat out of the closet one day, slipped my hands into the sleeves and felt it settle on my shoulders like the arm of an old friend. The satin lining was intact, the leather as supple as ever and it fit me even better than before. And the timing was perfect; somehow, in the midst of all the life-changes going on around me, I needed it – that boost of confidence — again.
Friends, if you’ve seen me in the past two years, I’ll wager that at least once you saw me in that jacket. I loved that jacket, I tell you, because it was me: not just me now, but me when I was 19, before the footprints of life had marked me, before the wear and tear that three children can wreak upon a woman’s body or that losing love (and finding it again) can bring to a woman’s heart. That jacket remembered the curve of my arm, the jut of my shoulders and never failed to remind me of where I came from and where I am now.
Ah, well, though. It’s gone. What can I say? I’ll buy another one come fall. I’ll get something new, with the rich, earthy smell of leather and a lining so silky that my fingertips will float through the sleeves. This one will have pockets I can actually use and maybe a zipper, and when I wear it I’ll feel 10 feet tall. I’ll wear it till I’m 90. Watch for me.
I don’t know about you, but sometimes I feel like a monkey in a cage. (Is this guy holding a banana or giving the thumbs up?) I have so much going on in my life that sometimes I need to run around and scream and throw fruit and all my toys and pound on the glass. Fling poo, perhaps.
And then the opportunity comes up to attend a weekend in peaceful surroundings with other like-minded souls: A writing retreat dedicated to getting ME, the writer, out of my life and into my project for three blissful days. I heard, I signed up, I went.
Two intelligent, articulate women showing the key to successful scenes and plots? Oh. My. A weekend of peaceful writing/plotting/thinking, along with yoga, vegetarian meals and a beautiful temple space for meditation, redwoods and hillsides for hikes, and other writers/authors making progress on their paths, sharing their struggles and triumphs. It was outstanding.
The last writing conference I went to was the Napa Valley Writers’ Conference, in about 2000, before I had published any of my longer works, and I was really struggling with my edge Catholic story, Tongues of Angels. I was able to show the opening chapter to Michael Cunningham and chat with Jane Smiley about my story, and they were both so encouraging that I was able to keep going on my path to publication. It was an excellent experience.
Jordan Rosenfeld (L) and Martha Alderson (R) under the classic plot line that changes everything.
But I don’t often spend the money (these are always pricey — note that it was 15 years ago since the last one) or take the needed time to write unobstructed. As we speak, my living room is awash in boxes and trash bags from moving our belongings out of our vacation cabin because we rented it out long-term. I can’t even see the floor in one room and the dining table is only a memory under a pile of paper. My husband is away on a business trip which means I am single-parenting this week, and I have major deadlines.
How does one create the sense of retreat in the midst of a battle zone? I’m not sure it’s possible. But I won’t let that good momentum, that energy and sense of direction go to waste. I’m getting organized today, right now, to move forward and put these new ideas and skills into practice.
It’s time to get serious about the next step in my work. It’s time to make the leap. Get ready. Here I go.
At the time I began to learn how to drive, I must admit, I knew nothing about cars. All I knew was what I had learned in the portable classroom at Petaluma High School.
The thin newsprint pages of the California Department of Motor Vehicles Handbook offered plenty of theoretical information, what-ifs and wherefores, but nothing in the way of practical how-tos. In that classroom, awash with fluorescent light, crowded with graffiti-emblazoned student desks, I took my turn at the faux driving console to test my reflexes. When the light changed from green to red, “Hit the brakes,” we were told. I did, though how fast my reflexes were, I can’t say; still, I was certainly acquiring a valuable skill.
I was learning how to drive, how to get from A to B in a new kind of vehicle. At home on the backroads of Sonoma County, in 12 acres of empty fields and fallen-down chicken barns, I had learned to ride a horse and drive a pony cart. I could rollerskate and ride a bicycle; I could even ice skate backwards.
But I knew nothing of cars. In my mind, they were like wayward horses that had to be held to a tight rein, else they’d veer from the trail. As with a pony cart, one would have to be careful not to turn too quickly or the whole thing would tip over. A sense of balance surely helped. On roller skates or a bicycle, one didn’t go far without a little effort, and I knew I would have to push hard on a gas or brake pedal to make the car respond. On the other hand, like ice-skating backwards, the whole thing looked deceptively easy, but with a little practice I could soon show off my graces.
After months of waiting, I got my chance. Mr. Donovan, the Driver’s Ed teacher, finally said it was my turn to drive. Raymond T., another student, was my driving partner. We showed up at the abandoned high school at 9 a.m. on an overcast Saturday, ready to take a spin behind the wheel. My boyfriend, Devin, had found great humor at the thought of me driving. He found it so funny that he’d invited a group of his friends to come and watch. The teenaged boys, members of the cross-country running team, stood around in running shorts and ratty tee shirts, all elbows and long legs and acne, waiting to laugh at the dumb blonde.
When Mr. Donovan came out of the building and unlocked the car, he nodded at me, “You first.” I exchanged glances with Raymond, who, cool and self-assured, shrugged and got into the back seat. I got into the front seat and closed the door, the vinyl chilly against the back of my legs. Devin and his friends jostled together and waited for the fun to begin.
Mr. Donovan handed me the key and I pushed it into the ignition. I had never done this thing before. I didn’t even know which way to turn it. Guessing, I got it the first time, and the engine started with a satisfying roar. I waited for Mr. Donovan to tell me what to do next, to teach me how to drive.
“Well?” he urged. “Drive it out of the lot.”
I took the wheel tightly in my hands, knowing that if I didn’t hold on, it would jerk away and we’d all die a grisly death. Gingerly, I eased one hand down to the automatic gearshift on the steering column. Gotta shift it into Drive, I thought. I knew that much. I pushed my foot down onto the gas as hard as I could, determined to control the beast, and shifted.
The stick popped into Reverse and we shot backward a good 10 feet before Donovan’s foot stomped the teacher’s emergency brake. All of us lurched forward as we stopped, my forehead bouncing off the steering wheel. Devin and his friends howled with laughter outside, some of them actually falling and rolling on the lawn. Cool Raymond adjusted his sunglasses and looked out the side window, doubtless imagining himself elsewhere. Mr. Donovan reached over and pushed the stick back into Park, keeping his foot hard on the teacher’s brake.
“I can see,” he said, “that we’re going to have to start at the beginning.”
This story was previously published in Tattoo Highway. Need driving lessons? Go ask your Pop.
