Belong Somewhere

"If you could move anywhere, where would you want to move to?"

In our family, asking hypothetical questions is a favorite pastime.

"Well, I liked Pennsylvania, and New York," I said half-heartedly.

It wasn't a lie, it was just a truth that didn't mean anything.  Since childhood, the idea of moving has been a nightmare, or, at best, a bad idea.  Now I think I've finally figured it out.  I belong in the Pacific Northwest - "belong" in exactly the possessive sense of the word.

I am a first-gen PNW girl.  And that can mean a lot of things, which is why I feel isolated, when I'm not.  The PNW is a diverse patchwork-place.  It may be known for rain, coffee, and liberal politics, but once you live here, you see a huge array of subcultures, substereotypes, and interesting trends nobody talks about, since they're understood.

Loneliness thrives here.  Loneliness on both societal and individual levels.  If we have one thing in common - be it an affection for a deadly volcano over our heads, or a mystical fascination with the paradise that is California - we cling to this commonality.  The feeling of belonging somewhere else brings people together, too; as they see it, they are rooted here for a season or two of their lives, but if they stay any longer it is quite by accident, or habit.  They move about tentatively, ergo they form ties with everyone and no one.  Loneliness almost unites the lonely, almost.

Oddly enough, I don't get that feeling of belonging elsewhere.  For that and other reasons, I certainly don't fit in here; I belong to many "groups," but of each label I am always an atypical version.  The main point, though, is that there is nowhere I could fit in better.  It is enough to belong somewhere, never mind elsewhere.  I intend to stay here indefinitely, pull our moody weather over my head, and be glad that Conrad understands.

‘It seems to me I am trying to tell you a dream—making a vain attempt, because no relation of a dream can convey the dream–sensation, that commingling of absurdity, surprise, and bewilderment in a tremor of struggling revolt, that notion of being captured by the incredible which is of the very essence of dreams….’

He was silent for a while.

 ‘…No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life–sensation of any given epoch of one’s existence—that which makes its truth, its meaning—its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream—alone….’

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Writing is caring

By CherryX (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Something prompted me to start writing my novel* again.  Actually, a lot of somethings, including some personal experience.  But the tip of the iceberg was reading the first chapters in Notes on Life and Letters by one of my favorite authors (Joseph Conrad).  Interwoven in his discourse are two interrelated, simple points for writers:

1. Don't be pretentious.  Stay on the same level as your characters and avoid reigning over them.
2. Care about your characters.

This made me realize I am very good at liking my characters and very bad at caring about them.  Because writing is caring, and I had stopped writing.  One asks, "Why should I care?  Why should anybody care?"  That is where humility - intellectual humility, as Conrad puts it - comes in.  Be humble, and write for the sake of writing.  Don't be too lofty to immerse yourselves in your characters' world.

Putting it in a different perspective - let's say I don't care about my book that much.  But don't I care about my characters very much?  For me - who am drawn to character-driven books - this is the deciding point.  I love my characters.  Therefore, I will write their stories.

*Quasi-steampunk/alternative universe, with hints of dystopian/futuristic.  My sister has also been asking for the next installment of my Dracula retelling, so I'm going to be returning to that project, too. 

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Weekend Quote: Courage

{hosted by Lemon Tree at Half-Filled Attic}

As before, when grappling with other forces of nature, he could find in himself all sorts of courage except the courage to run away.

- Joseph Conrad, Within the Tides

I was a bit turned off by the depressing, first short story in Within the Tides--that is to say, after finishing it, I haven't yet got any further along in the book.  However, I love the above quote, spoken by the protagonist.  It reminds me of a quote from another author of sea stories:

“I will have no man in my boat," said Starbuck, "who is not afraid of a whale." By this, he seemed to mean, not only that the most reliable and useful courage was that which arises from the fair estimation of the encountered peril, but that an utterly fearless man is a far more dangerous comrade than a coward.

- Herman Melville, Moby-Dick

And how striking Starbuck's quote is!  How unlike Captain Ahab, who is confident he is afraid of nothing, least of all a whale.  Isn't he afraid, though?  Is Ahab, in fact, too cowardly to "run away" from Moby-Dick?

Third literary connection: what about Sherlock Holmes (book or TV)?  Did it take courage, or cowardice, to "run away" after Reichenbach? 

Personally, I think there are times when the smartest thing to do is to distance yourself from a bad situation, one you have no ability to change.  It takes courage to give it up, but more importantly, it takes courage to accept the sting to your pride.  It's not always possible (unfortunately) to be a hero.

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Day 5: A favorite quote

“He was just a word for me. I did not see the man in the name any more than you do. Do you see him? Do you see the story? Do you see anything? It seems to me I am trying to tell you a dream—making a vain attempt, because no relation of a dream can convey the dream–sensation, that commingling of absurdity, surprise, and bewilderment in a tremor of struggling revolt, that notion of being captured by the incredible which is of the very essence of dreams....”

He was silent for a while.

“...No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life–sensation of any given epoch of one’s existence—that which makes its truth, its meaning—its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream—alone....”

I have been procrastinating on posting about Heart of Darkness at my book review blog.  My problem is knowing where to begin!  It's only 111 pages, but it is possibly the deepest fictional book I've ever read.

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Chesterton and Conrad on Facts

© Daniel J Maxwell

In the last few days, I've been perusing two radically different books: G. K. Chesterton's The Club of Queer Trades (a first-rate audiobook) and Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (my beloved publicity copy).  The first is a humorous collection of adventures in Victorian London.  The second is a profound, psychological study set in Africa under British imperialism.  Two books could not be more unlike.  But while I was reviewing some of the more outstanding quotes today, it struck me both books have similar things to say...on the subject of facts.

It's a weird coincidence.  I have a habit of reading multiple books at once, but between books of different genre, there is rarely such a complete, simultaneous overlap of message/meaning.  If it doesn't bore you to tears, read the excerpts below and tell me if I'm just seeing things:

   "Facts," murmured Basil, like one mentioning some strange, far-off animals, "how facts obscure the truth. I may be silly—in fact, I'm off my head—but I never could believe in that man—what's his name, in those capital stories?—Sherlock Holmes. Every detail points to something, certainly; but generally to the wrong thing. Facts point in all directions, it seems to me, like the thousands of twigs on a tree. It's only the life of the tree that has unity and goes up—only the green blood that springs, like a fountain, at the stars."

* * *

    "But, after all," I said, "this is very fanciful—perfectly absurd. Look at the mere facts. You have never seen the man before, you—"

    "Oh, the mere facts," he cried out in a kind of despair. "The mere facts! Do you really admit—are you still so sunk in superstitions, so clinging to dim and prehistoric altars, that you believe in facts? Do you not trust an immediate impression?"

- Chesterton

   For a time I would feel I belonged still to a world of straightforward facts; but the feeling would not last long. Something would turn up to scare it away. Once, I remember, we came upon a man-of-war anchored off the coast. There wasn't even a shed there, and she was shelling the bush. It appears the French had one of their wars going on thereabouts. Her ensign dropped limp like a rag; the muzzles of the long six-inch guns stuck out all over the low hull; the greasy, slimy swell swung her up lazily and let her down, swaying her thin masts. In the empty immensity of earth, sky, and water, there she was, incomprehensible, firing into a continent. Pop, would go one of the six-inch guns; a small flame would dart and vanish, a little white smoke would disappear, a tiny projectile would give a feeble screech -- and nothing happened. Nothing could happen. There was a touch of insanity in the proceeding, a sense of lugubrious drollery in the sight; and it was not dissipated by somebody on board assuring me earnestly there was a camp of natives -- he called them enemies! -- hidden out of sight somewhere.

* * *

I believed it in the same way one of you might believe there are inhabitants in the planet Mars. I knew once a Scotch sailmaker who was certain, dead sure, there were people in Mars. If you asked him for some idea how they looked and behaved, he would get shy and mutter something about 'walking on all-fours.' If you as much as smiled, he would -- though a man of sixty -- offer to fight you. I would not have gone so far as to fight for Kurtz, but I went for him near enough to a lie. You know I hate, detest, and can't bear a lie, not because I am straighter than the rest of us, but simply because it appalls me. There is a taint of death, a flavour of mortality in lies -- which is exactly what I hate and detest in the world -- what I want to forget. It makes me miserable and sick, like biting something rotten would do. Temperament, I suppose. Well, I went near enough to it by letting the young fool there believe anything he liked to imagine as to my influence in Europe. I became in an instant as much of a pretence as the rest of the bewitched pilgrims. This simply because I had a notion it somehow would be of help to that Kurtz whom at the time I did not see -- you understand. He was just a word for me. I did not see the man in the name any more than you do. Do you see him? Do you see the story? Do you see anything?

- Conrad

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