“I want you to do this with me for one month. One month. Write 10 observations a week and by the end of four weeks, you will have an answer. Because when someone writes about the rustic gutter and the water pouring through it onto the muddy grass, the real pours into the room. And it’s thrilling. We’re all enlivened by it. We don’t have to find more than the rustic gutter and the muddy grass and the pouring cold water.”
— Marie Howe, Boston University’s 2016 Theopoetics Conference (via mothersofmyheart)
I ask my students every week to write 10 observations of the actual world. It’s very hard for them.
Ms. Tippett:
Really?
Ms. Howe:
They really find it hard.
Ms. Tippett:
What do you mean? What is the assignment? 10 observations of their actual world?
Ms. Howe:
Just tell me what you saw this morning like in two lines. I saw a water glass on a brown tablecloth, and the light came through it in three places. No metaphor. And to resist metaphor is very difficult because you have to actually endure the thing itself, which hurts us for some reason.
Ms. Tippett:
It does.
Ms. Howe:
It hurts us.
Ms. Tippett:
You naming something.
Ms. Howe:
We want to say, “It was like this; it was like that.” We want to look away. And to be with a glass of water or to be with anything — and then they say, “Well, there’s nothing important enough.” And that’s whole thing. It’s the point.
Ms. Howe:
It’s the this, right?
Ms. Howe:
Right, the this, whatever. And then they say, “Oh, I saw a lot of people who really want” — and, “No, no, no. No abstractions, no interpretations.” But then this amazing thing happens, Krista. The fourth week or so, they come in and clinkety, clank, clank, clank, onto the table pours all this stuff. And it so thrilling. I mean, it is thrilling. Everybody can feel it. Everyone is just like, “Wow.” The slice of apple, and then that gleam of the knife, and the sound of the trashcan closing, and the maple tree outside, and the blue jay. I mean, it almost comes clanking into the room. And it’s just amazing.
Ms. Tippett:
In some basic level, what they’ve done is just engage with their senses.
Ms. Howe:
Yeah, and have been present out of their minds and just noticing what’s around them, which is — we don’t do. And again, not to compare it to anything. They’re not allowed. And that’s very hard for them. And then on the fifth or sixth week, I say, “OK, use metaphors.” And they don’t want to. They don’t know how. They’re like, “Why would I? Why would I compare that to anything when it’s itself?” Exactly. Good question.
So then you think, why the necessity of a metaphor? Why do you have to use a metaphor now? Not just to do it to avoid it, but to do it to make it more there. And it’s very interesting.
The words and silences we live by. The rituals that sustain us. The poetry of ordinary time.
2. 'I didn't account for the rotation of the planet and how that affects the constalations while my characters stargazed at different times of year, I have failed as a writer, and this entire thing is trash'
I love telling the story about winning a sumo wrestling contest in college. It was even less plausible than it sounds. Every time I mention it people give me this look like they’re trying to determine if there used to be a lot more of me and then I got really sick. It was just for the martial arts class I was in, so only about forty people, but all but maybe five of us were tall cis dudes. The goal was to make the other person be the first to step outside the ring. I was scrappy enough but I knew I stood no chance.
I thought it would be funny to do a Bugs Bunny thing so at the beginning of my first turn I puffed out my chest and gave my opponent a tough look and acted like I was ready to rumble. He ran at me and at the last moment I just… turned to the side. And he kept going, right out of the ring.
Of course everyone thought it was very funny that this actually worked, we laughed, and I prepared to get walloped in the next round.
But then it worked again.
And again.
I thought for sure everyone who lost to me was doing it for the bit, but then I realized that some of them were genuinely angry and arguing with the instructor, insisting that what I was doing was cheating. Maybe it was, but he didn’t seem to care, so I kept doing it. And I kept winning.
I don’t remember how many guys I vanquished through my repetitive strategy of “smash the dodge button” but I made very little physical contact with any of them and only had to actually wrestle the last guy. I only managed to best him by like snaking around his torso like a python while we grappled until his foot slipped and he stumbled out of the ring. And then I won. And everyone fucking hated me because there was absolutely no reason that should have worked more than once.
Found a 28~ yr old crab model mislabeled as 'Coal Cooking Stove' - don't tell me you wouldn't have done the exact same thing if you had found yourself in my shoes.
hyperfixation please stay with me long enough to complete the project. hyperfixation do not fade. hyperfixation finish what you started for the love of god
If you ever tagged me to do one of those tag game thingies and I never did it:
1) Thank you, seriously. Those are fun and being included shows that my followers care enough to want to learn more about me.
2) Very sorry about that, it’s extremely likely that I said to myself “Cool! But I’m busy at the moment, I’ll have to do this later today or tomorrow” before proceeding to just straight-up forget, now it’s too far back in my notifications and/or your blog to find again.
baratheonpilled
romaincrisis
ellievsbear
snowghoul
