Taking Root

If you were to peruse the pages of my journal (please, don’t), I’d feel so embarrassed about the number of pages devoted to questions about finding time to write. The themes are banal and repetitive:

I don’t have enough time to write.
I wish I had more time to write.
I feel frustrated.
Maybe I should write before work or after work? 500 words per day?
I’m discouraged at how the novel is going.
I should be making more progress.
Someone turned down the novel... again.
I feel insecure.
I wish I had more time to write.
How can I find more time to write?

One could look at the sheer volume of ink I spilled wringing my hands about writing and think, “Hey, dummy! If you had spent that time actually writing instead, your book would have been finished that much faster!” True, true. But writing isn’t a sterile journey, and I needed a place to whine, kvetch, feel sad, give myself a pep talk, and get up again.

I love this quote from former poet laureate Robert Hass:

“It’s hell writing and it’s hell not writing. The only tolerable state is having just written.”

Yet even amid all my grousing and insecurities, a small, steely stubbornness was taking root. I wanted to be a writer. The longer the process to publication dragged on and the more setbacks I experienced, the more the conviction grew that I was already a writer. One might say I experienced a deepening sense of vocation.

I began to wear the “impediments” to art like a badge of honor: starting to write in midlife, working a day job, raising children, caring for aging parents, connecting with friends, and otherwise being a grown-up.

The Psalmist writes,

The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; surely I have a delightful inheritance.

I prayed those words frequently. I wanted to be present to the life I had, not always be wishing for a different one. I was called to be an adult, living in a world full of responsibilities and limitations. And I was also called to write.

I also had the sense that I wasn’t alone.

Over the years, I met so many people committed to making art: writing, painting, dancing, making music, and creating sacred spaces. These folks—we—lived complicated, demanding lives, yet were committed to nurturing that sometimes-nascent, sometimes-flickering flame of creativity.

These artists in everyday life were my tribe.

Last week, I found the craziest thing, something I had completely forgotten about: a proposal I had scrawled out on yellow legal paper on this very topic, with chapter headings and everything.

The Artist in Everyday Life... book?

If something comes of it, you can say you heard it here first!

Life, lately

Now that the UC Berkeley semester is winding down, there’s space in the campus libraries again. I love wandering around the East Asian Library.

The San Francisco Giants have been having a mis-er-able season. But May 10 kicked off a nice winning streak with a victory in the bottom of the the twelveth. Call it a Mother’s Day miracle.

Song for Another Home comes out in the UK in August!

Pre-order now

SONG FOR ANOTHER HOME is available for pre-order via your local bookstore or via Bookshop.org, Amazon, Barnes & Nobles or wherever you buy books. You can also check out the UK version!