Residency on San Juan Island’s Whiteley Center Day 3

(Sorry for the delay in posting – we were out of power, then out of internet until just now…sigh…joys of being on an island?)

Day 3

Today I woke with 101 temperature, decided to sleep in. Sipped herbal tea with honey until I had enough energy to go out into the sunshine to visit a local garden, currently filled with beautiful dahlias. We took home a huge bunch of pink dahlias for about $10. Went about Friday Harbor’s shops and grocery store to pick up supplies (cute pens! and groceries) and came home to rest some more. Then went back up to Lime Kiln Point, only to arrive just as a bunch of orcas had started to appear – along with a couple of tour buses – and they were even more active than last time, this time jumping and flipping and twirling, five of six times in a row. (We caught none of this on camera, I’m afraid, so I’m substituting this photo from a San Juan Tourism web site. Seriously, though, how fun!) We came home and rested again; I read, tried to check e-mail – internet spotty all today. Then off to American Camp Beach in the evening to see some rabbits and foxes in action. We had a very close encounter with this red fox, who was not at all afraid of us, even holding eye contact with his huge golden eyes for a few seconds. Fox encounters! And hundreds and hundreds of scampering bunnies. It turned dark on the beach as we left, just a sliver of moon in the sky. Now home to write, drink some hot soup and cranberry juice with fizzy water (my personal health-strengthening elixir) and maybe read a bit.

Day three and I finally feel like we’ve relaxed and hit our stride a bit. Maybe being sick I pushed myself a little less, and that always helps. That’s the thing about shorter trips – just as soon as you adjust to your new surroundings, you’re home again! Today felt unrushed, with time to read and write during the day, and the sunshine a pleasant bonus, since the weather report had been touting rain all day and there were threatening clouds in the distance. Weekend of all rain ahead, they’re saying!

At 10 PM the power went out in Friday Harbor, since I didn’t pack candles or a flashlight, and I had just put a load of our sheets and towels in the dryer, I was out of luck! How fun is it to be on a cane in the pitch blackness with no light source? Not fun at all! Not so great for reading and writing, either. Here’s hoping the power comes back on before morning – all part of the adventure, I suppose! (The facility caretaker came by with a flashlight after I called, so I at least had that!)

Day 2 – San Juan Island, Whiteley Center Residency Dispatch

We took a more low-key approach to today’s sight seeing, visiting the Pelindaba lavender farm (I got some lavender essential oil and a little too much sun) and American Camp’s beaches, where we saw hundreds of bunnies and a few foxes strewn out on meadowland, near a wide expanse of blue ocean protected by a dense fence of white driftwood.

This evening we decided to seal-watch rather than whale watch as the sun went down , down the dock where the UW center does its marine biology research, and watched four seals follow each other around, poking their heads and splashing around while we vainly tried to get a picture to do them justice. We were also being harassed by a kingfisher who kept chittering and flittering over our heads, a very busy kingfisher, we thought, until we noticed there were a pair of them! The deer are also thick on the grounds of the Whiteley Center, mostly around the parking lot, one of them even scaring Glenn off the path to our cabin late at night! Gotcha, says the deer!

On the health end, my ankle is not healing quickly so I was in a lot of pain today trying to make my way around all the bountiful nature. and I either picked up a bug on the way here or got ahold of something that disagreed with me, and spent part of Day 2 very sick and shaking, then sipping electrolytes. Unpleasant even when you’re at home, but I hope I will be able to shake off whatever had me today and get back to the business of writing, appreciating wildlife, etc. I am always nervous about travel because my immune system sucks and I tend to get sick whenever I travel, especially if I go on a ferry/airplane kind of mass human transport. It keeps me from doing as much as I want. As you may have read in previous postings, I was nervous about trying to do a residency at all. As much as I want to be normal, healthy girl, I am often walking with a cane, disappointed by not being able to eat much or at all when I travel due to a combo of food allergies and stomach problems, prone to waking up in the night struggling to breathe because my asthma has acted up. I have ambitions to do more with my life, to expand my possibilities rather than let my multiple health problems shut me into smaller and smaller circles. That is why I am here. I hope my body will come to agree with my heart and mind that this is a place to be well, to enjoy, to celebrate beauty.

PS Still wrote a poem today, though it was about being sick on the floor of a hotel room. With puns! So, you know.

A Post from San Juan Island – Whiteley Center Day 1

We arrived today after an uneventful afternoon ferry ride through the scrubby, evergreen-covered San Juan islands, and immediately upon entering the residency center I hopped out of the car to be confronted by a half-grown fawn, who, upon seeing my stumble forward, stepped closer rather than farther away.

San Juan Island is everything about the Northwest or Seattle on steroids – artsy sculptures in front yards, eccentric but friendly women in alpaca sweaters (not fleece, not on this alpaca-farming island, no sir), watery sunshine mixed with grey cloud, thick thickets of blackberry and forests of evergreens, golden and bald eagles, numerous deer, foxes, orca fin views from parks and the occasional otter and seal bark from the water. I happen to think it’s pretty close to perfect. The occasional chill in the wind, the rain dripping periodically through the trees, don’t dampen spirits here (I did have to buy a coat – I’m used to traveling with nothing heavier than a cardigan or raincoat – and cursed myself that I hadn’t thought to bring some warm gloves – the regular September Seattle chill is just a tad chillier here, so far north we’re almost to Canada (and your cell phone thinks you are in Canada!) I’m thankful for the radiant floor heat in the cabins tonight.

After doing a little sightseeing – the alpaca farm, Lime Kiln Points to see some whales (where we had this handsome black fox encounter, where he trotted within steps of us) and many more deer:

I came home to the cabin to remember there was no phone and no television – and proceeded to read Amy Uyematsu’s The Yellow Door. Amy’s a poet I’ve been following for some years, and she deserves more attention than she’s gotten. I wrote a poem. I’m writing this blog post. So far, a productive start to the trip! One of my beliefs is that if we writers could just stay away from the phone, television, and internet for a good portion of our lives, we’d achieve so much more…but maybe that’s just a residency mentality. There’s something interesting that happens when you go somewhere with the intention of reading and writing. You actually do those things!

Transitions – a new review, farewell to a friend, and the importance of taking time out

Well, first of all, thanks to L.A. Lanier for this new review of The Robot Scientist’s Daughter up at The Spark, The Alternating Current’s blog: Seriously, I am grateful for each and every new review that comes in!

Last night was a get-together, a kind of Bon Voyage party, for my good friend Kelly Davio, who is moving, alas, to London. (Here is her exit interview from the Seattle Review of Books: http://seattlereviewofbooks.com/notes/2015/09/09/exit-interview-kelly-davio-is-moving-to-london/) It was nice to hang out, but sad to say goodbye to someone who is so full of good energy and has been such a force in the literary world. It was also probably our last 80-something day, one of those long Indian summer days. I woke up and this morning it was in the sixties and raining.

I am taking time out, after the stress of selling our house, looking for a new house, then walking away from our last house after a bad inspection, after all the crap going on the literary world, to go to a writing residency on San Juan Island. I haven’t done this for some years, and I’m looking forward to having time without TV, phone, or (maybe?) internet. But if I don’t get back to you, that’s why. I’m hoping when we come home we find a house, I’ll come back with some new poems and some more progress on my “PR for Poets” book, maybe a good look at my book of poetry in progress on apocalypses and disasters. I will have time to read books for fun (not just for reviews and blurbs) and maybe do some sketching (I’m an absolutely terrible artist, but I enjoy it.) I’m hoping, since it’s September, we’ll even see some whales! I’ll be on the lookout for porpoises, otters, seals, golden eagles, foxes and rabbits (all of which I’ve seen before on San Juan Island.) If my significant other and I were both free of needing to see doctors and go to work, it’s definitely a place I would buy a house.

I think it’s important for writers, visual artists, and other creative types to take time out from their “regular lives” to deal with their art at least for a week once a decade at least, right? It can be a week, or a month, or six weeks, or a whole summer if you can afford to do that. There are so many residencies that you can apply for (See this list for some ideas: http://thewritelife.com/writing-residencies/#.oxkna1:m4F)

I like this one, on San Juan Island at U.W.’s Whiteley Center, because it affords a kitchen as well as a dining hall (so I can make my own food, because of those pesky food allergies) and it has handicapped-accessible cabins. Plus it has a working field station! And it’s only a few hours away from home, but is remote enough to definitely feel like you’ve gotten away from normal life. So wish me some luck and some quiet down time and some creative spark.

Don’t Give up on Poetry (or the Poetry World) Yet

I am writing this at the end of a few of the most rancorous and scandal-ridden months that I’ve experienced in the poetry world. A few of my friends have told me (though they are great and accomplished poets) that they are thinking of quitting poetry altogether – when the poetry world gets ugly, and when the poetry world gives so little in terms of rewards, it’s understandable to feel this way.

But let me say a few reasons why you shouldn’t give up on poetry – or even the poetry world – yet.

Poetry is a fantastic art form and outlet, regardless of the people involved. There are some poems I can read and re-read endlessly with delight. They’re more satisfying and take less time than a novel, while providing many of the same rewards. When I get hit with a poem idea in the middle of the night, the middle of a movie, or whatever, one of my happiest times is writing that first draft of a new idea for a poem. This kind of happiness remains whether or not the poem gets published, recognized, whether I get paid for it, or whether anyone ever notices anything you or I do. So, the reading of and creation of poetry should be happy-making, regardless of “poetryworld.”
I would say the poetry world is made up of 75 percent excellent people. Friendly, open, willing to help, empathetic, and enthusiastic about promoting the art form that is the least profitable and the most obscure, they are often teachers or professors or editors, wanting to do something to make the world a better place despite their individual burdens. There are probably, max, seven percent of the poetry world that are true sociopaths – needlessly mean, selfish, and uncaring about hurting others. There’s probably another seven percent of narcissists – mostly harmless, but definitely not interested in helping others, only themselves. And there’s one percent of genuine saints of poetry – those who go out of their way to donate their time, energy and money to worth causes, willing to lend a hand, thinking of others above themselves. So, think about this – don’t let 14 percent of all poets hijack the good parts of the poetry world for you. They make the most noise. The make the “news.” Some of them win awards and wreak havoc as much as they can. But they are in fact, not the majority, not by far, at least in my unscientific experience with the poetry world. And make sure if you run into that one percent of poets who are saints, that you say thank you and help promote their work, because they’ll be too busy helping others to do it themselves.
Maintaining hope, a sense of humor, and kindness in the face of negativity is maybe the most important (and hardest) thing you can do in life. I have a hard time doing it most of the time, when I watch the news, when I get a rejection letter, when someone is mean to someone else in front of me for no reason, when a jerk gets the rewards while the talented, kind and unselfish get passed over, I get angry. I want justice, of course. Working towards justice is a good thing, and you can use any anger to propel forward to the things you want to achieve – if you’re outraged by classism, racism, sexism, etc., then take some action towards making the world a better place for the people around you, the poets you love that get no attention. Sometimes the larger world – and the poetry world – can appear to be so overwhelming and chaotic you think you’ll have no impact, so you give up to despair. But I am here to tell you, you are already probably having more of an impact than you think. If you called a friend to cheer them up, or worked vigilantly for free as an editor, or the runner of a reading series, or with underprivileged students, you are making the world a lighter, better place.
Protect your art. Practice it. Let it make you happy. Don’t worry about where it’s going. Your poems could change the world, could light up the heart of a kid 50 years from now, could make someone who is suffering feel that they are not alone. You don’t control where your writing goes, all you control is writing it and sending it out with intention and hope. The bitterness and jealousy and pettiness and cruelty – all those things will only distract you.
Poetry – and the poetry world – will be there waiting for you if you want to take a break.