The Trance

Sending invitations out for this blog has created more pressure to write than I might have expected. (And the weekend with its 45-degree weather and mean winds did little to inspire, so I chose not to write.) It nagged at me though, the Not Writing-ness of my weekend. Which is why I got up early this morning to begin an entry before the whole house was awake and wanting.

Today I ask you to look back at my last post referring to Isabel Allende’s deceptively simple do-it-yourself instructions for becoming a writer. And here is what I have to say: Ms. Allende – You forgot to mention moods…of which I have many. Regardless of moods or moodiness, you need to write. And to provide a parallel for this in the realm of motherhood, this is much like the fact that you need to say, prepare a snack for Child Number 1 (and a slightly different snack for Child Number 2, and again different for Child Number 3.) again and again, day-in, day-out because of the incredibly relentless nature of children. (Oh, yes—and the fact that children really do need to eat.)

Ms. Allende did not refer to the discipline it takes to write, rather she spoke briefly about the trance-like state she is lifted into upon entry into that other world of magical composition. But discussion of discipline or not, it was clear that she orders life to her liking by scheduling her first day of writing a new book to fall on the same January day. Leading up to that date she rushes about doing laundry, cleaning house, gathering up her papers and research. Clearing the space, if you will. Making room. (A reference to Virginia Woolf here would be too easy, right?) But this makes sense because writing does engross. Writing does make one criss-cross the world and come circling back again. Mommy’s writing. I can’t look at— Not right now— You’ll have to get your own snack—

For those of you who have the time to do so, you may want to listen to the NHPR radio broadcast of the interview at http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2010-05-05/isabel-allende-island-beneath-sea . The most surprising/unexpected moment of the night was her insistence that we as an audience sit up and pay close attention to the issue of slavery. She spoke about its prevalence across the globe, and how we have slavery “even here in the United States.” She got very loud about this, and leaned directly into her microphone to suggest that any naysayers could Google it, or go directly to: http://www.freetheslaves.net/

The way I see it, and can ultimately relate to the idea of slavery is to view it as a continuum; at one end you find the looser use of the term “slavery” to suggest being a slave to other people’s expectations of you to say, buy a home, shop at The Gap, or make a certain amount of money. At the other end are the stories – not stories at all – of young girls forced into the sex slave industry, children chained to posts in rug-making factories, or whole families indebted, indebted beyond generations as yet unborn.

So do I make the easy connection here? Do I say that my life is so much easier than that imagined child in Pakistan, and therefore the simple indulgence of sitting at a computer on a Monday morning is a gift? Do I ask, dear Reader, for your forgiveness in complaining about moods, and making excuses for my inability to follow-through on a task? The trouble is I’m just not convinced it’s that simple. Each of us is burdened with a unique set of abilities and disabilities. Depending on the setting, an ability can make us appear different, when all we want at that moment is to appear the same as everyone else. A disability can at times splinter off like light hitting a crystal and cast color into the room. But hear me when I say this—each of us carries a burden. Some of us encounter financial troubles, while others face health issues. Whatever the trouble, the burden, the thing that enslaves us, it is our job to seek freedom.