The Joy of Writing
“Passion” is a good word for what writing entails. I think of teenage ‘first love’--so filled with angst and joy, so desperately important. Writing is like that for me. But more, writing teaches me about myself. I have learned how serious I am, how intense. I’ve been accused of having a mind like a steel trap, but I confess, my memory only holds those things I find useful. I use memories of picnics and campgrounds, of walks through the redwoods, of summer in Kentucky when my feet kicked up puffs of dust on the powdery dirt road. My mother bent over a campfire just as Ah-mah does. I record chance bits of conversation, items in newspapers and magazines, moments on television. When I delve into my imagination for what Atlantis might have been like, I recognize Aletha, the Keeper of Language, and wonder if she lives in my memory or my imagination. Sometimes writing is like slogging through 10 foot snow drifts or digging ditches. This is especially true when things don’t seem to be going well...or easily. I measure the success of my pages by how well they flow, and when they are not flowing, I feel more desperate than the teenage girl who has not heard from her new boyfriend for five minutes. I have an artist friend who told me long ago that she inevitably reaches a stage in her painting when she wants to throw the canvas in the trash. Born of frustration, the feeling comes right before the breakthrough. I cling to that concept when I reach the point where nothing is working, much less flowing. First chapters are especially difficult. How does one grab the reader’s attention, especially nowadays--and keep it? "Ah-Mah" had numerous first chapters before I could settle on the one that felt right. I’m currently writing the sequel, and I feel certain I’ve written at least six first chapters. I hope the one I have now is it, but I won’t be certain until the story is finished. "Ah-Mah" took me into a world different from anything I had written before. Egypt of 5,000 years ago would have been ancient to the Romans and Greeks. Pharaohs did not yet rule. In fact, villages were recent and still independent of each other except for some trading. The place I chose for my village did exist historically, and was called Nubt. The idea that refugees from mythical Atlantis and earlier Mu might have migrated to Egypt after the fall of their respective continents is not new. Historians have argued for centuries over where the continent of Atlantis might have been. In my mind, and in Ah-mah’s story, Atlantis is in the Atlantic, Mu, the Pacific. To me, Atlantis has always represented the Father principle in the human being, Mu, the Mother principle. I could easily imagine a dry, dusty land, after all I spent a number of childhood years in far south Texas. And I could imagine how someone might think of how to do something, to invent a treatment. Ah-mah is curious, and she is a healer. It seemed only natural to have her notice how people walked, how they stepped harder on one foot than the other, or stood unequally. As she so often said, when describing her foot treatments to others, “I started with a bowl of water and a rag.” Frankly, I’ve often thought of the washing of feet in the Bible, and how that must have affected those who received such care. Politics has recently come to the Land of the River, Ah-mah’s home. An ambitious fellow named Rahotep has established himself as ruler of Nubt, and Ah-mah does not trust him. She, and all the women before her, have governed the Land of the River, planting alongside the people, treating their wounds, helping with births and deaths. To her mind, Rahotep is not needed. But fate, or Life, or whatever one chooses to call it, has plans for our Ah-mah. Her foot treatments become known throughout Egypt, and tales of them are carried to a far away land, one that has great cedars. Soon, Ah-mah finds herself on a boat headed away from the Land of the River toward Byblos, present day Lebanon, and a king who thinks her foot treatments will help his wives to bear him sons. From birth, Ah-mah has conversed with a voice only she can hear, a voice named Aletha. On the voyage to Byblos, Ah-mah dreams of Aletha, and sees her being thrown into the sea by a gigantic wave. Dolphins come to rescue Aletha, taking her to an island of small brown people. The eldest, Kalalawalapo, does what she can to heal the tall, pale-skinned woman, but she cannot relieve the woman’s wish to die. One day, something happens that changes Aletha forever. "For many days Aletha rose, walked the beach, ate, and slept. At last a day came when she did not return to the shelter, but sat beneath a date palm looking out to sea. Kalalawalapo sat with her. Another space of days passed. Kalalawalapo began to doubt she would ever again hear words from this woman. Almost she spoke first. In the dream, Ah-mah could feel the great emptiness in Aletha. She could sense Kalalawalapo’s impatience growing as well. When the bird screamed high in the sky, halting Aletha’s steps, Kalala-walapo was watching. She sent her gaze up into the same part of the sky where Aletha looked, but could not find the source of the scream. When Aletha ran to the shelter, Kalalawalapo, and many of the other islanders followed, eager to see what would make this tall woman run. Quickly she fashioned a crude pad from palm leaves and strips of what was left of the shift she wore when the dolphins brought her to the island. In haste, she tied the contraption to her left shoulder and ran back to the beach to stand motionless. A gasp was heard from all except Aletha as the large, reddish brown bird with the terrible beak dropped to her shoulder. Collectively, their eyes widened in awe as they watched the bird dig his claws into her barely protected shoulder, and saw the blood trickle down her sunburned skin. Kalalawalapo stopped them with hand raised when they would have followed Aletha into the palms. The woman knew this bird. They should be alone. “Hawk,” Ah-mah’s dream self whispered. “Hawk,” said Kalalawalapo, startling those who could hear with that strange sounding word. The woman stayed beneath the palms, Hawk with her. To Kalalawalapo,watching from afar, it seemed the woman spoke aloud, gesturing emotion-ally, sometimes sitting, sometimes pacing, the bird perched on an overhead limb. At last she lay down full length and seemed to sleep. In the late afternoon, the woman stood, and Hawk resumed his perch on her left shoulder. Together they came from beneath the palms, Aletha striding like a goddess. With the waves lapping her toes, she stood looking out to sea, alone with Hawk, except for the many eyes who watched. Suddenly, Hawk leaped from her shoulder into the air, spreading his wings and flapping them, lifting himself up into the nether reaches of the blue, blue sky. Raising her arms as though to follow him, Aletha spoke, in words all the small, brown people could hear, though only one understood. “I am Aletha of Mu. I salute you, Hawk.” Hawk screamed.” From “Ah-Mah”(© Webeus House 2005) The dream affects Ah-mah deeply. She has difficulty separating it from the reality of sailing to a foreign land. No longer simply the voice only she can hear, Aletha has become a real person living in another time and place, surviving tragedy, finding a way to live again. Little does Ah-mah know that she will soon be faced with terrible loss. She too will have to find a way to live again. Over the years, I’ve developed devices to help me through the times when the writing does not flow. I take a walks to get unstuck. Nature seems to calm me, to set me in a different mode. I’ve also begun to identify and understand my process. One of the more interesting aspects is that I write all the time, even though I don’t always put words on the computer screen. I’m always thinking, ‘noodling,’ as my dad used to say. My writing process can require incubation. Those are the worst times for me, and the reason I have a closet full of jigsaw puzzles. Puzzles require my full attention, and bring me to a comment made by another friend. She said, “What we really need is a series of ‘Get Out of Your Way’ seminars!” I use puzzles to get out of my way, to let my subconscious figure it out. And when I do, I am always amazed at the new direction that eventually comes. Writing helps me grow as a human being. It not only helps me learn about myself, it also heals me. I have worked on feet for more than twenty years, but Ah-mah taught me a new way of looking at the people I treat. For example, I use her ritual prayer often--Where there is desire, where there is need, where there is consent. The people who come to me must want to come, must need to come, must consent to come. Ah-mah taught me one more very important thing--no matter if one is looking at people living 5,000 years ago or this very day, there are some things that do not change. We are born, we die, we have children, we have problems that we solve or don’t solve, all things that are part of each and every civilization on earth. I call them universal themes. And for me, they are keys to human behavior--especially my own. Known for years as an authority on Fostoria crystal, Emily Seate now pursues her first passion, that of writing novels. "Ah-Mah" is Book One of the HeartMind Chronicles. Book Two, The White Crown is due to be released in 2007 and concerns Ah-mah's grandson, the true Scorpion King. http://www.webeushouse.com/ |
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