Life of Wry

I tend to be a fan of the early morning baseball games.  You can see why, right?

I can capture the moment with my Blackberry, but not with a resolution that does it justice.  So use your imagination, and while you’re at it, add a grande cafe au lait and coffee cake to this scene (smells good, huh?), and a whole bunch of parents (and grandparents) I’ve come to enjoy immensely.

Getting up at 5:30’s not so bad, huh?

[Note: For the record, I started today’s post with this title, “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” and continued in the body with “..but don’t take me to heaven,” and proceeded to write a scathingly sarcastic couple of paragraphs about today’s rapture silliness.. because doesn’t my photo of the sunrise just sort of say heaven to you?… and it was fun and satisfying (if over the top), but… then I decided to honor my own moratorium on the subject, opting to give it not one bit of attention more, because holy shit this has just been insane.  And deleted it.  Feel better now.]

… well after the reminder to shut off cell phones (thanks for not calling me.. that would have been embarrassing).

1. Kid’s at a dance (last one of the year).

2. We had dinner at Bistro 33 (mmm..french onion soup..pinot grigio).

3. And ate candy from Newsbeat (Good ‘n Plenty, Dots and Neccos).

4. And saw a hilarious movie (really), though we were late, so had to sit way up front.

Awesome.

One of the nicest nonprofit organizations you’ll ever meet. Quietly and effectively serving the community since before there was even a world wide web.

What are they about?  This stuff:

That is all.

….in the shooting of this picture.

A roasting pecan is absolutely one of the world’s most heavenly smells.  And I was all set to say a thing or two about that, but I got distracted by that glaring, passively constructed opening sentence.

I’m told that the passive voice is a lazy and cheap devise used by weak writers who rely on trite statements to bail them out, instead of using clear, conventionally constructed sentences and effective transitions.

Ouch.

So, I decided, instead, to do a little grammar research.

I mean, this is primarily a writing blog (as it says over there in the right margin).  My objective is to become a sharper writer…so, I am going to have to pay a little bit more attention to these things.

This is what I found out (gleaned from various geeky grammar sites):

• In an active sentence, the subject is doing the action:  “I heard it through the grapevine.”  In a passive sentence, the target of the action moves into the subject position: “It was heard by me through the grapevine.”

• Passive construction isn’t incorrect as much as it is wordy, vague, and/or awkward.  It’s simply not the best way to phrase a thought.  If you want tight, clear writing, it’s best to use the active voice.

• The passive voice does have its place.  For example, it can be used intentionally to obscure meaning.  Reagan famously said, “Mistakes were made,” when addressing questions about the Iran-Contra scandal.  He did not want his administration to be implicated, so purposely left out the obvious subject of the sentence (who made the mistake?).

The passive voice can also be useful if the object is more important than the subject, like in my introductory sentence.  The active form of that sentence might read: “I did not harm any pecans when I shot this picture,” which is more straightforward but does not focus the reader’s attention on the fate of the pecans and is not the play on words I was going for (the No animals were harmed in the making of this film trope, which is a passive statement meant to appropriately focus the reader on the object rather than the subject).

So… is that all clear?

One other thing I found interesting, especially for fans of Elements of Style:

In their section on the passive voice, Strunk and White apparently mis-identify as passive 3 out of 4 of their examples.   Most grammarians agree that the first example is expressed in passive voice, but at least some grammarians believe that the last three are, in fact, expressed correctly in the active voice:

• “At dawn the crowing of a rooster could be heard”

• “There were a great number of dead leaves lying on the ground”

• “It was not long before she was very sorry that she had said what she had”

• “The reason that he left college was that his health became impaired”

So, I guess use of the active versus passive voice is not always totally clear, even to grammar experts.

That is something to work on.

In the meantime, no harm done.

Thought I’d do a little stream of consciousness, because I want to offload a few thoughts but don’t have the time to organize them into a coherent essay.  And because I just want to de-formalize a bit, relax and open up and not work so hard.  I have a strong suspicion that if I stay too long with any of these thoughts, I’m going to over think and over write, and either beat them senseless, or give up on them altogether because they will have lost their luster.  And see? Already I’m bored.

That’s the trouble with writing, you know?   I want to write, I do, but it’s a huge struggle to just open the gate and let it flow.  I end up working too hard and in the process it grows rigid.  And then I conclude that some thoughts that were great in your head, are just better left there.  And that’s stupid, especially if you’re trying to develop skills as a writer.

So… not stopping.  Keeping going…

But, changing the subject.  Here’s the picture I took for today:

Walked past this little parking lot scene on the way home from lunch with Jim this afternoon.  Is it about perseverance?  Optimism?  Endurance?  If you bother to really look, there is always beauty to be found?

It’s the photo-of-the-day and, you know, it can say whatever you want.  Go for it. Let it speak to you.

Anyway.

Walking home, I was telling Jim that I’m working on a list of new years resolutions for next year.  I’m a new years resolutions kind of person (we know this), but I’m not usually coming up with them this… early.  But it has been a reflective few weeks, you know?  Maybe it’s because of the crappy weather.. a springless spring kind of messes with you.  It’s May for god’s sake.  It is pouring as I write this; it’s rained all spring.  Enough already.  (The weather’s been so grey and cold and un-May-like, I’m starting to use words like crappy.. not usually one of my words, in fact it’s one of the few words my mom outlawed in our house, as she thought it was particularly crude..a wee bit ironic, given her vocab these days, which can be very un-ladylike).  Very uncharacteristic, but the weather is really starting to affect me.  Going inward.

More likely, though, the reflection is part of post-trip melancholy.  Everything seems so anticlimactic, after having been so far away and so incredibly activated.  Coming home, great as it feels to be back with my family and life, I feel a bit misplaced and out of sync.  My re-entry this time has been particularly disorganized and tedious (to wit, only today did I finish unpacking and putting everything away.. three and a half weeks after getting home: a new personal worst). (Which, I also have to say, made a huge difference.. the clutter that was everywhere is gone.  Desk is back, office floor is clear, table tops are empty of all the clothes.  I even cleaned out the vacuum cleaner closet.  Totally on a roll.)

So… feeling reflective.  And with that reflection..a set of new years resolutions, 6 1/2 months early.

Aaaaaand….. here, I was going to write about them.  But now I’m not going to.  Thinking about them the last few days, I thought they were particularly good–not earth shattering, not even that clever, and certainly not original–but smart and wise and I thought reasonable.  I thought, wow, maybe I’m starting to get it.  Over the years, I’d started to wonder if perhaps I was never going to really grow up, that I’d just have to come back again in someone else’s body and try harder.  But then, a flash of wisdom, and I’ll think maybe it’s all coming together, maybe age, experience, therapy, adversity, perspective, advice, travel, time, conversations with others…  are this perfect storm of factors and influences that are starting to make an impact and maybe I’ll figure it out after all.  I mean, here, for example, are these great resolutions…

But now I can’t really share them. Not to be a tease..  But now they seem silly and obvious and not worth the build up.

So changing subjects.

I ordered a book today called the Buddha Brain… which has nothing at all to do with my recent trip to Nepal.  It comes from a conversation I had last night with someone who’s reading it and recommended it very highly.  She said it’s possible to re-program the neurons in your brain in a way that avoids certain patterns of thought in response to certain situations or circumstances (in my case anger ar0und a set of events).  The objective is to obtain greater equanimity and inner peace by re-routing the paths in your brain that keep you stuck in unproductive, counterproductive, nasty places.  Totally doable, they say. Who wouldn’t want that?

Which brings me back to the resolutions:  one of them had to do with equanimity–finding it, living it.  Less anger, more equanimity.  Because sometimes you have to move on.

Now you know one of them, anyway.

A moment ago, I did a search on how to wrap up stream of consciousness writing. Didn’t find anything specific to that, but came upon a lot of sites and a few quick comments that confirm SofC is at least a legitimate thing:

• SofC is unstructured, unedited writing that reflects your observations or feelings in the moment
  

• SofC is a way to cultivate your emotional and poetic mind, and to improve your writing skills in general

• SofC writing may lack correct punctuation or syntax; it favors a looser, more incomplete writing style

• SofC, also called stream-of-being also known as the mindstream (Buddhism)

Interesting. Although it occurs to me that perhaps it’s best as a private exercise.. not done publicly.  But that’s alright, right?  Not that big a deal.  Except it’s terrifying not to edit.

But here’s the thing, I don’t think I said anything.  You have to wonder if that has value.  I read recently a compelling commentary on writing, about how it’s important to have something to say, and worthless to read if it’s vacant.

On the other hand, a huge part of my strategy this year has been to create a practice of writing, a habit.  Also a comfort with the process.  My thought was that daily writing would remove the barrier, the fear.  It would become a comfortable and natural practice.  I even said that some days the best I may come up with is a simple caption, and that’d be ok, as long as I sought to write at least something, so that it becomes a ritual and a non threatening, easy process.  Which speaks to the value of SofC.  Right?  Just writing.

Dunno.  We’ll see.

Where are all the kids?

They must be in the dugout.

Of course. It’s hailing.

A big red blanket.

Essential on a cold day.

Until it gets wet.

Baseball in a storm.

Not my idea of fun.

Worse when you lose. Meh.

Jim and Francis track an errant foul ball.

This hyper kodak moment gave way to grey, windy skies a short time later.  But we got our two games in before the rains, and it was a GRRRREAT day for baseball:

Crush 8  – Cyclones 4

Crush 8  – Twin Cities 3

..I remember them fondly always, but more fondly than usual this afternoon…  those wonderfully sweet years when mom was nice, and fun, and someone worth dressing like.

That is not me, today. Today, Peter has called me every name in the book, none repeatable in a family blog.

Not taking offense, I know that it’s part of the deal.  And it’s not the first time, but I must say he’s gotten more sophisticated in his name calling.  Ahem.

The blush is off the Mother’s Day rose, it appears.

For the record, I earned my meanest mom in the world designation (the most publishable of all the things he called me) for upholding yesterday’s sanction for forgetting to call us after school to let us know where he was.  Yeah, that one.  Sanction being: he had to come home from school today (yes, on a FRIDAY), instead of playing with his friends. Who are also appalled at my meanness, I hear.

So.. yeah.. I’m pining for the younger version of my son today.  The very sweet one with the high voice who used to think I walked on water and all that.  I understand we’ll meet up again in about 20 years.

It’s 11:45pm, too late to write.  So I’m cheating.  I’m posting a picture taken three weeks ago (to the day, actually) and using it to represent my state of mind this late night hour: blank, barren and dry.

I already made excuses yesterday for my writelessness.  And, happy to report, I dealt with those.  Tonight, I’m just tired.

So I leave you with a three-weeks-old desert scene, shot somewhere outside of Abu Dhabi, an hour before sunset.

Enjoy.