WARMING UP

There's been so much written about blogs these days. Just yesterday I stretched across the couch and read the New York Times Book Review section and instead of a tagline, one reviewer was simply identified as "Her Name" and the line, "She maintains the xxx blog." Gee, times have changed.

Lately, I've been consciously trying to reduce my time here online. I jump on to check emails and navigate only to the sites that I need to go to for information, purchases, etc. A recent discussion with a friend about how and why W.E.B. DuBois was so prolific made me realize that apart for him being male and therefore without the many constraints that are inherent in woman's life (especially woman who is also mother) he absolutely limited his distractions. I recall hearing once that he only returned telephone calls at the end of the day and did not engage in any conversations before his writing work began and ended. I think too, now, of Alice Walker who, in the documentary, I'll Make Me A World, said that she had to sell her house, get divorced, and move all the way to Mendocino in order to write The Color Purple. Her charachters just weren't going to budge in New York City. I wonder why.

All of this to say that I, too, have seen a stall recently in my creative output; a stall I believe is the direct result of too much stimulation. This once scene I've been working on has been so very difficult to get down that I've been close to tears. But I believe it is because I've needed to get quiet.

And let's face it, that is no easy task in this life -- children or no children. One cannot even turn on the television without being assaulted with advertisements, news (which is not even news), canned laughter, and sex, sex, sex. No point turning on the Smooth Jazz station, lest one wants to listen to a half hour's worth of obnoxious local car salesmen and contest announcements (contests that no-one ever wins). One cannot even turn to one's home in the evening hour for silence without the telephone ringing and some unidentified person on the other end asking for participation in a survey that will "only take five minutes." All the more reason that I have dedicated myself to meditation (shamatha meditation to be exact), to steadily increasing my sitting time, to yoga (the art of stillness), and to simple reading.

And the other thing is although I don't post often I do have intense moments of thought, thoughts that I don't think I necessarily want to offer for public consumption. Because isn't that what it is? Consumption? Do people not seek to absolutely consume you? I think of people who are much more famous than I ever care to be, whose lives are just absolutely open court for dirt-bag photographers and ditch-diggers, just looking for that one thing that someone said ten years ago to wave up in the air and use against them. This American life.

So what I have been doing is writing and thinking and preparing for the birth of a new poem, tentatively titled, A Womanifesto. It started out as a Manifesto, but of course as I think things through, as I think of what I want for all women (particularly the girl in my home who will one day be woman) I think of how important it is to convey this message with hips attached at the sides. I submitted two batches of poems today, sent them out into the world with two kisses goodbye and traveling mercies. Two weeks ago I hauled home two arm loads of books on "black life in the 1940's" to help me through this aforementioned scene (and chapter).

I have also been studying the landscape around my home. Last year I lost my neighbors, a husband and wife six months apart, and felt so un-done that I didn't plant a thing. This year I am determined to get my garden where I want it to be. To that end, I bought three absolutely gorgeous clematis' (two fuschia and one deep purple) and am going to order some hydrangeas from Spring Hill (they do very well in the sun, which I have have a whole lot of around my home). I am also going to do a long line of tiger lilies all the way across the back, which will do wonders for me I'm sure as I wash dishes and am going to give my absolute best effort toward a true herb garden.

So that's the skinny for now. I'll have something else to say in a day or so, as time permits: the joy of having a son.

Namaste,

ANGEL

"I write the way women have babies. You don't know it's going to be like that. If you did, there's no way you would go through with it."
TONI MORRISON, "Rootedness: The Ancestor as Foundation."