When the Words Won't Come

I’ve been very proud of myself and my posting skills lately.  This marks my seventh post in 2014, my second consecutive month of posting, and even my third post in one week.  While I did get up to 7 in 2012…I really had to squeeze that seventh one in under the wire.  I’ve said before that I like to talk, and those who know me would most likely scoff and say “It’s like she thinks she gets paid a penny a word.”  So it must seem strange to most people that I don’t post more, either here, Facebook, or on Twitter (Though since the last one only gives me 140 characters, I feel a little more justified with limited Twitterpation).

There are many reasons behind it, I suppose.  The first is that I really do feel guilty on occasion that I sit here typing away on my blog (or staring mindlessly at social media for hours on end) when I really should be finishing novel number two.  However, I’ll back down on the guilt for a moment, because I finally got a couple of people to read through number one and give me some pointers…and just finished the rewrite last week.  I’m also feeling rather accomplished at finishing a promising children’s book.  Now I just need to find an illustrator.  Technically, I have one, but she seems to be busy working a full time job and spending her free time with the man she loves.  Really, the selfishness of some people ;)

However, my main reasoning behind my erratic posting falls under the category of “Does this really need to be out there for everyone to see?”  While I’m more than happy to post silly personality quizzes on Facebook--as well as the occasional heart-felt and/or funny story stolen from another person/webpage--I prefer to keep my personal business personal.  One of my mom’s favorite sayings goes a little like this: “You don’t air your dirty laundry in public.”  That’s an axiom I live by, because while I won’t necessarily go sobbing in a corner if I lose a FB friend over a comment I’ve made, it doesn’t mean I wish to throw out every spare thought and opinion that comes my way.  I believe that everything we say and do—once it’s out in the universe—can’t be taken back.  This is especially true for writers putting pen to paper (or these days, pixels on a screen).  As much as I love to bask in my own awesomeness, even I must admit that not every thought that worms its way to the surface is a gem.  And, just because it’s my opinion doesn’t mean it’s correct—or even valid.  Therefore, I try to choose my words with care and deliberation when I’m online.  (This rarely happens in real life, wherein I suffer from an almost fatal case of foot-in-mouth disease).  That doesn’t mean I haven’t posted things I regret, just that I try to mitigate those occurrences as much as possible.

With this in mind, there is the small matter of coming up with good ideas.  (All former teachers, please try to keep your good opinion of me—if ever you had one—when reading the next part).  When I was in school, I would spend most of the class period with my mind so far away from the topic at hand, that it’s surprising I didn’t actually lose my mind.  (Especially when I'm wont to lose most everything else I let out of my sight).  Instead, I would pick up on one part (or sometimes a few parts) of what the teacher was discussing and play the ‘what if’ game.  Then I would turn that 'what if' into a story and just start writing from the beginning.  Though I’ve been told that most people map out a full outline before starting, this always seemed to work best for me.  Now however, I’m no longer in school and I don’t have what roughly constitutes 3 hours each day to mess around with writing.  Instead, I take my quiet moments where I can to hash out thoughts, and write things down wherever I find a spare moment.  Nowadays, the thinking usually happens while mowing my parents’ lawn.  While I’m on the mower, I have 3 hours in which I must be silent…or at least be willing to look like a complete nutcase when I’m creating a dialogue between two characters.  And, yes, that does sometimes happen.

This doesn’t mean I spend all my time thinking about story lines, character development, or even blog ideas.  Sometimes I take those 3 hours to just let ideas vaguely pass in and out of my mind without too much effort put into remembering them or following them to any conclusion—logical or otherwise.  On occasion, those passive thoughts will turn into something I use later.  More often they’re just something that keeps my mind occupied while I mow, so I don’t fall asleep with the blades engaged.  So please understand that while I am indeed a procrastinating novelist...it is not for want of ideas or attention.  Rather it is an effort toward using (what I hope are) the good ideas, and (trying) to avoid the negative attention.

This One's for Dad

Moths thread through the spotlights, overseeing a ballet of flying shot and shattered clay. Five men stand ready at their stations, patiently waiting for their turn at the brilliant target.
"Pull!" one shouts, finally secure in the feel of the stock against his shoulder and his sight on the bead.
The slightest touch of his finger sends forth a violent explosion of plastic and metal. The shot hurdles forward at terrible speed to find the clay disc flying through the air. It shatters into hundreds of pieces, giving the shooter a thrill of success.

This is the most basic expression of the Second Amendment.
This is the right to bear arms.
This is trap shooting.

When people hear about the NRA or people protesting stricter gun laws, they imagine ignorant, toothless, rednecks who enjoy the company of their siblings a bit too much. This is a pedantic caricature of the people who enjoy this sport. I'll admit, a few of these men may be behind in their dental upkeep, but they are kind, responsible, funny, Godly men (usually).

That doesn't mean they can't be a bit rude and crude at times, but their ribbing is good-natured and evenly dispersed. Laughter is as common as gunshot, though the men try not to break each other's concentration during the actual shooting.  My dad recently broke his ankle, and the comments are equal parts giving him a hard time about it, and offering any and all assistance he needs between now and harvest.  These men take the “I’ll give you the shirt off my back” mentality almost literally.

It's interesting watching the various shooting styles these men possess. Most keep it simple and just follow the target. Others end their turn with a flourish that makes me worry for the time their shot gets a little delayed. My favorite is the guy who kicks his back foot up and lunges forward a little, as though it is him, not the explosion of gun powder and sparks, that propels the shot forward.

The men also have several different reactions to their failures. The triumphs are almost all celebrated with a small smile and return of concentration. Most of the men react to defeats with only a tightening of the lips and a grim shake of the head.  Some mutter a few curses under their breath and grip their gun a little harder on the next round.  And I know of one who, in his younger days, would react to a streak of missed birds by breaking open the gun to violently eject the spent shell, snap it back together, and then bounce the stock of the gun as hard as he could on the concrete.  All this while spewing forth a stream of vitriol that could make some of the truckers blush and thank the good Lord their earmuffs kept them from hearing most of what was said.  Even this man (who may or may not definitely be my father) never got angry at anyone else, only worked to better himself with every opportunity.

My dad started bringing my sister and I to the Gun Club when we each reached the age of six or seven.  Some of you may gasp in horror at the thought of bringing such young children to be audience to a sport that is literally all about guns.  However, you people can take a deep breath and relax.  I won't say my sister or I (especially I) were particularly mature for children our age, but that doesn't mean we didn't have a healthy respect for the potentially deadly qualities of what our father was doing.  Dad carefully pointed out what we could and could not touch while at the Gun Club. There was “ could not” in most of those conversations.  There was also a clear line where we couldn't cross whether the men were shooting or not.  While I won't credit my sister and I with an overabundance of maturity, we were intelligent enough to know when Dad meant business, because our normally quiet father would achieve some impressive volume if we disobeyed.  Not to mention it takes a severe lack of survival instinct to cross over into the shooting area while trap is being shot.

Those times at the Gun Club were some of my favorite memories growing up.  I never lacked for stray uncles, and there were even a few women on occasion.  Some of the other men in the club brought their own children, and my sister and I were able to entertain, and in turn be entertained, by others.  In fact, I would say that mitigated most of the danger in my childhood.  Though vast amounts of time spent with my sister could sometimes be life threatening for me even without projectile weapons at the ready.  Obviously it was never my fault when we fought, but that's a story for another day. (Don't listen to any comments that say otherwise, by the way--that includes you, mom).  The Gun Club was the first place I experienced a crush on an older boy.  He was a whole two years older than me, which basically made him too far out of my reach, but perfect for my sister.  Which may explain some of that sibling rivalry ;)  Mostly though, trips to the Gun Club were times I got to spend with my dad.  It was also some of the few times my sister and I got along for longer periods of time.

I stopped going to the Gun Club when I was around twelve, because even with this abundance of 'uncles’--or even a first crush--there wasn't enough to keep me occupied while dad shot anymore.  It has only been in the last couple of months that I've started intermittently going back with my dad.  I shot a couple of times around the time I was 12 and decided not to go back, but I straight up sucked and that may have been part of the reason I stopped.  I haven't really gotten any better, but fifteen years later, I'm more willing to approach my lack of skill with some pragmatism.  The only way to get better is to try, though that is certainly the more frustrating approach :P

I won’t go into my views on gun laws either pro or con.  Mostly because I’m not phishing for trolls, but also because I admittedly don’t keep up on politics much at all.  If Jon Stewart covers it, I’ll give it a listen, but unless it’s a topic about which I’m truly interested and willing to do the research in other news sources to find out every side of the issue, I don’t keep up on politics.  Though if you do happen to go to a gun club with a Liberal outlook on life, be prepared to get offended on occasion, no matter how much news and politics you follow ;)

Regardless of the politics, visiting the Gun Club is still fun and fascinating to watch.  There truly is poetry and skill in this sport, and anything that gives my dad this level of enjoyment is always a great idea in my opinion.  (Though when the guys try to talk to me about their gauge, shot weight, or any other technical aspects, I start talking about Doctor Who so we’re all equally confused.)

Budapest: A Teaching and Learning Experience

For those of you who keep up with this procrastinating novelist, you’ll know that I recently traveled to Budapest, Hungary a few weeks ago.  For those of you who know me, you won’t be surprised it took me this long to write about it.  It was a wonderful experience, full of beautiful sights, warm and wonderful people, and some amazing students.  I’ve included pictures of the parliament building, the Szechenyi Baths, the Chain Bridge at night, and a group photo of my class (in that order on the page).  

The Baths were so wonderful and relaxing, I never wanted to leave!  And my students were so wonderful, I wish I could have spent more time there (those poor kids got a lot of English vocabulary thrown at them in a 5-day span.)  I’m only sad that I didn’t get a picture of my host family, who were both fun and informative ;)  I stayed with a young couple (Nora and Robert) with two small children—one was just over one (Balint), and the other was three (Andris).  Those were two extremely adorable kids!

Traveling is always an interesting experience in which one packs way more activities into a day than one is really prepared for.  By the time I left (super freaking) early on a Saturday morning—seven days after arriving—I thought my legs were going to fall off.  But I didn’t really mind, because I now have a new experience and a new country under my belt.

In regards to this, I want to focus a large part on my experience teaching English.  I had a lovely time several months ago observing one of my favorite former high school teachers as part of a practical section in a teaching class I took spring semester.  Based on that short experience, I knew teaching could be a tough but rewarding job—though it did make me rethink the age-level I would want to teach.  However, teaching (or in my case, observing) a class full of 14 and 15-year-olds the finer aspects of the English language is vastly different from teaching that same age-group English basically from scratch.

The most terrifying part of this event was that I (and really most of us on the mission trip) went into this with absolutely no training and very little indication of what we could expect.  Admittedly, that was also part of the fun.  I think I learned as much in those five days as my students.  I started out with seven girls in my class, and they all had varying levels of English proficiency.  Yet, I never got a clear indication of who could speak at what level…because these were seven extremely quiet girls.  As someone who finds it hard not to talk during every moment of the day, this created a certain level of difficulty for me.  I said daily prayers of thanks for Boti, that guy looking cool in the group photo below, who volunteered as my translator.  (That poor guy got a lot more English thrown at him than he expected, too)  I didn’t find out until the third day that one of the girls in my class had never learned any English, and I was told by the person translating for me that she felt bad that she couldn’t answer me when I asked her a question.  This, in turn, made me feel awful, so I tried to make her understand that all I wanted was her best effort, and I would never be disappointed with a wrong answer so long as she was learning something.  I’m not sure if that got across the language barrier, but I hope it did.  My real break in the ice came on the fourth day when I discovered a Whovian in my classroom.  That was an amazing revelation—not only because Doctor Who is the absolute best, but because that girl went from quiet to non-stop chatter in seconds flat.  I was most impressed when she quoted an entire monologue from Series 5 in English…which is something I sure can’t do, even though I speak the language.  She even ended up translating for many of the other students who were struggling to keep up with my own non-stop chatter.  It just goes to show that Doctor Who is universal, and really can solve pretty much every problem ;)

There were a few aspects of teaching English in a foreign country that I hadn’t anticipated.  The first was that I noticed a subtle break-down of my own English skills.  Even as someone who likes to focus on grammar (though I’m sure those who are better versed could find hundreds of errors in my writing…not to mention my speech), I bent every rule I could think of to make myself understood.  This was also interesting as someone who constantly uses complicated words.  I went from saying things like “verbose” to “lots of words.”  That was an unexpected quandary for me.  I had to repurpose my vocabulary so I wouldn’t confuse the heck out of both my students and the people of the church.  However, the most unexpected problem I found was that, despite the many other foreign countries I’ve traveled to, once I modified my speech to keep everything as simple as possible, I subconsciously expected everyone to whom I spoke to be able to understand what I was saying.  I never thought that I’d be one of those people who expected everyone to know my language no matter to what country I traveled.  And I’m not entirely convinced that was what was happening.  The closest I can get to explaining the situation is to tell you all about Andris.  He was a normal 3-year-old.  He spoke constantly on topics that he found to be of great interest…except he only knew Hungarian, and by the time I had met him I had only learned how to say “yes” and “I don’t understand” in his language.  Needless to say, we did not have long conversations.  But, the reason I bring Andris up is because there was no concept in his young mind that would let him comprehend the fact that I couldn’t understand him.  He figured out something was wrong, but his solution was to constantly ask me “What is this called?” in Hungarian.  Once his mom translated, I would answer by giving him the English word for whatever he pointed at.  When I did so, he would giggle a little, as if to say: “Silly lady, that’s not what that’s called.”  Now, intellectually, I know that not everyone speaks English—nor do I expect them to.  However, with absolutely no Hungarian skills other than the basics, I was at a loss for how to make myself understood except to keep trying simpler words and phrases, much like Andris.  In the end, I had to rely on my severely limited Hungarian, their slightly more advanced English, and lots of hand gestures.  I’m so grateful that the people of the church and school were willing to put up with me butchering their language and kept an open mind when I just tried the same context with different words and lots of non-ASL approved sign language. 

Overall, I loved my time in Budapest—both the tourist bits and the teaching.  I got a lot of new Facebook friends who post things in Hungarian that makes me think, “I really need to start learning this language.”  And, I’ve got hundreds of pictures to share (some of which are sitting on my computer waiting to be posted).  I hope to go back…a wish I hold for all of the countries I’ve visited.