Sara Said
The Jewish Things and German Place Dream
I know as part of the dream’s setting that I’d bought a place in Germany. It seemed like a condo or apartment in an older building. The building was a mysterious maze of rooms and halls. Most were not well lit. Rain lashed the windows and could sometimes be heard drumming.
The place I’d purchased was filled with things, which were mine, now. I was exploring, mostly in darkness, to see what these were. Spotlights lit the objects when I came across them.
One object was a black box with raised, golden letters in another language. Someone with me, a female who was never seen and whose role wasn’t defined to me, said with excitement, “That’s Jewish.” They went on about the language on the thing. The object looked to me like it could be a complicated metal camera or something that stamped other materials to form or shape objects.
Focusing on my guide’s explanation, I heard her say, “The Nazis took things from the Jews.”
I was trying to understand how they’d come to be in this building, which now reminded me of a Nazi building I’d toured when I’d been stationed in Germany. It had apartments inside where government officials lived, along with offices.
“It belongs to you,” my mysterious female guide said.
I was excited to own something like this but also disturbed, because it had been stolen from others. My guide was going on about being able to make money from it.
I left her to explore more on my own and ended up back in my living quarters, which was part of the same building. I discovered more objects. I also discovered my quarters and new building seemed to be poorly maintained. Down in the lowest level was a ill-kept garage area. I discovered squatters had been using it, accessing the area by raising the garage door. I learned this from seeing one squatter open the garage door, revealing pouring rain, slip out, and close the door. Making a note of that, I continued walking about. Most of the flooring was missing from several levels, and animals were coming in via tunnels in some rooms.
Yet, I was excited by what I found left behind by previous tenants. My guide reappeared. Showing me something, she said, “You can sell this and easily make fifty thousand dollars.”
That pleased me, but I told her, “I’m not selling anything that was stolen from anyone.”
She said, “We don’t know if anything is stolen.” She must have known I was recalling what she said before, because she said, “Many of these things were made before world war two, but we don’t know how they got here. They could have been stolen from the Jews, or the Jews may have lived here and left them behind. They belong to you, now. That’s what was agreed when you bought the building.”
I wasn’t mollified, but I became cautiously optimistic that I could sell some things and make some money. Returning to that first black piece with the golden writing, I stood and admired it, framed in white light and surrounded by darkness.
***
As I edit and revise the Incomplete States series, I’d begun to become optimistic. I thought, maybe instead of self-publishing this series, I can find representation and a publisher.
It’s part of my never surrender approach. My hope became stronger this weekend. My wife and I saw Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin. Listening to UKLG recount how difficult it had been to become published, how nobody got her when she sought publication, but how much she believed in herself, reminded me of my writing efforts and suspended publishing efforts. My writing, as she said about her writing, is not easily categorized. Yet, I thought, too, it’s arrogant to compare myself to her, for I’m in no way her measure as a thinker and a writer.
This dream, I think, reflects my doubts and concerns. Every day, as I edit, I enjoy what I’ve written. It excites me. But doubts haunt me.
It reminds me, writing is a lonely business, especially as a struggling novelist. That, I believe accounts for the dream’s darkness and the building’s dilapidated state, and the never ending rain, putting a damper on my hopes.
Old Paths
Ah, more ME STUFF. Yes, it’s all about me, which sounds like a good movie title, except it seems so similar to the classic, All About Eve.
I’ve been editing the third book, Six (with Seven), in the Incomplete States series. It was the first of the four books that I wrote. I finished it over sixteen months ago.
Reading and editing the book rekindled memories of how I hunted for a writing process that worked for me. I was initially a staunch proponent of outline and research. I took that route because everything that I read said, that’s how you write a novel.
It didn’t work for me. I was restless, frustrated, and bored with the process. I tried modifying it. Reading of Orson Scott Card’s process, I attempted something of the same. I attempted to flow-chart what I would write. I used Post-its, white-boards, butcher paper, and story boards. As none worked, I chucked them all with the decision, I’ll just wing it.
I started writing in notebooks. I’d edit and revise each day’s work, typing it up on my computer, and doing further editing as I went. I later learned many writers use this organic process.
That first resulting novel was a disaster. I still have it, with promises to edit and revise it someday. Meanwhile, it was a tremendous learning experience. First, I’d written a novel. That buoyed my self-confidence, but then, it needed so much work that I sank like a house in a Florida sinkhole.
The next thing that happened is, I shoved that monster aside, and wrote another novel, and then several more. Each time, they needed work, and I was too impatient to fix them. Eventually, slowly, I gathered, ah, editing and revising is part of the writing process. I wrote more, I edited them, and published them. Then I grimaced because I see the errors in the published work.
They needed more work. I needed more patience.
With my panic and self-doubt somewhat subsiding, I began to think more about my writing process, and what that meant. Insights into myself and my process grew.
When previously reading wonderful books, I lamented that I’d never be that good, capable, creative, or talented. Now, I think, how do I write and tell stories like that? Instead of bludgeoning me to the point of retreat, those other writers and novels establish goals.
Which brings me back to this novel and series. I started out blindly with a half-baked concept, and then went down different paths until I found a path that worked. Those other paths were still in the novel, and required that I read them and decide, keep them in, or cut them — or revise them.
Done writing, editing, and revising today.
Future Me
I read a recent article about how we see ourselves. The article’s essence was that a study showed that people could readily see how they’d changed, but didn’t think they would change in the future.
That’s an odd conclusion. Looking back on how and why I change, I can appreciate how the world changed, forcing me to change. Mentors, friends, and family members have died. Their influence remains, but it’s faded.
Sometimes, I think of it like dominoes. I’m in a long row that’s been set up to fall over when tapped, part of a pretty design. Matters that tap me over include my changing body. My hearing is damaged and my vision has lost its acuity. My metabolism has slowed, as has my physical energy, and my muscles are weaker. My joints are stiffer, and my athleticism and coordination have diminished. My sleeping patterns have changed. I endured illnesses and injuries which changed my trajectory. I’ve gained weight and developed gluten and dairy reactions. I mostly bloat. Before I bloated, I didn’t understand what people meant when they said, “I feel bloated today.” Now I understand.
Our food chain has changed. What impact that has on me, I probably won’t ever know. I was introduced to new foods, and dishes from other cultures, and I was introduced to better quality food, increasing my awareness of what quality means, and how it influences me.
Technology has advanced, enabling me to hear more music, inviting me in as a witness to more amazing events and moments. I usually have a laptop or tablet nearby to keep me connected to others. I’ve never met many of the people who are in my circle of friendship. Science has advanced, giving me more to think about. Researchers, psychologists and sociologists have gained insights into how our bodies, societies, and civilizations function. Engaging TED Talks and blogs help socialize new information. Big data analytics keep expanding on what we know, or what might be going on.
Our society and government have changed. Events like 9/11 changed us. I make more effort to understand the world than I used to make. After traveling and living outside of the United States, I became more watchful about politics, equality, justice, and our environment. As our politics have changed, and groups like white supremacists and Nazis have grown, I’ve been forced to question what I know. Likewise, revelations of sexual assault, news of murders, and lies by politicians and others sharpen my desire to know the truth and understand.
I’ve read many more books since I was young. I’ve written books. Both activities encouraged thinking, and from the thinking has come change in my views, approaches, appreciation, and understanding.
My brain has changed, apparently from triggers built in at some genetic level. I’ve become more impatient. Lessons learned through betrayal, resentment, success, and failure have fostered changes to my behavior. I work on improving myself more than I used to, when improving myself meant working out or taking classes.
I’ve lost hair on my head. My hairline recedes and my baldness expands. My hair thins and grays. Meanwhile, the rest of me becomes hairier. With my aging and changes, I became more invisible to a larger segment of population.
Or maybe that’s just me and my perceptions. They can change.
I can extrapolate some ways that I’ll probably change. I think I’ll be more withdrawn, speaking less, and enjoying small talk less. I hope to be writing and publishing more, but that’s a hope that I’ve been nurturing for over twenty years. My future diet will probably be more limited, I’ll be less active, and pop culture will seem more alien. I’ve always disliked talking on the telephone, and avoid it when I can. I suspect it’ll be hard to get future me on the phone.
I’ve been fortunate that I’ve escaped being caught in disasters. That luck can change. It feels, sometimes, like the hazardous air from the wildfires of the last few years have changed me. Certainly, that smoke, combined with the blazing heat, increased my depression, depleted my energy, and sapped my will. It certainly changed my summer and expectations.
Then, there are the other people in my life. Their changes, illnesses, success and failure will change me, too. That’s one constant that’s not likely to change.
All these variables will cause changes in me. I don’t know what I’ll be like in the future, but I don’t think that who I am now is who I will be.
Fairies
“What’s this?” I asked myself, speaking only in my mind.
I looked around. Nobody was in sight, but on my desk was an unexpected fresh cup of steaming coffee.
The coffee fairy had been by, I realized.
I’m very fond of fairies. Besides the coffee fairy, the doughnut, cookie, and brownie fairies have visited me.
Fairies do have a dark side. Just this morning some feline fairy left a gift on my shower mat. They also left another gift on the bathroom rug. It had to be a fairy, because my floofs were all bland innocence and whiskers.
Some fairies have never visited me, despite my hopes, like the lottery fairy (“You have to have a ticket!”), but the writing fairy often comes, streaming words through me. The words often make sense, too. Well, sometimes.
Time to write edit like crazy at least one more time, and see what the fairies have for me.
Michael Seidel, writer 