Living with your inner critic

You know that voice inside you? The one that says, "This is no good. You're never going to get it right. You may as well give up." Mine is strong and mean and persistent. It beats me up, and it also uses logic ("Does the world really NEED another book? You know who needs you? Your kids!"). And it doesn't just bug me while I write. As I've been training for this marathon, it's started in while I'm running. "You're never going to make it. You may as well stop. You're probably about to injure yourself. C'mon, slow down."

I hate it. I used to try to ignore it, or to get rid of it. But lately I've stopped.

I went for a run in LA with the amazing Sara Lewis Holmes, and we got to talking about the voice, both in running and in writing. Here's what we realized: it never goes away. You can win 15 National Book Awards and a Pulitzer, you can run 95 ultramarathons, you can be the most accomplished anything in the world. But the voice will still be there. Every time it gets hard, it will be there, feeding on your insecurity and trying to convince you to quit.

And then Sara said the wisest thing. She said maybe you have to learn to live with it, to say, "Oh, hello. I recognize you," and then to go on.

Earlier this week, I went running with Tink. She rides her bike alongside me and it's usually great. But this run, she was cranky. She started whining at the farthest away point and she screamed and kvetched at me for two miles. She was making me CRAZY. But the more I talked calmly back and kept running, the more ridiculous she got ("I am going to DIIIIIIIE!"). I could laugh at her. And of course, we made it. Now, when I am running and the voice starts in, I just pretend it's Tink kvetching. And I go on.

I am about to start a new book, and I know soon thereafter the voice will start. But I'm not going to ignore it. I'm going to say, "Oh, hello. I recognize you." Because I am less nice than Sara, I will probably add "You stupid voice."

And then I will go back to writing.

Why my children have no hope of being normal...

Part 357: the omen

...because I promised Tink we could do "Harry Potter camp," just she and I, this week. Today is Potions. I printed up a simple baking soda and water recipe in a fancy font and labeled it "Revealo Totalum." I told Tink we were going to learn a simple potion that you paint on a plain piece of paper to reveal secret messages, or the future.

Then last night, I snuck downstairs, took the "plain piece of paper" and, in vinegar, wrote "THE DARK LORD RISES! BEWARE! BE NICE TO YOUR MOTHER!"

Heh heh heh.

This week, we are obsessed with...

(books you should read)

1. Once Upon a Time, The End (Asleep in 60 Seconds)
by Geoffrey Kloske, illus. Barry Blitt

For any parent whose kid ever insisted on "One more story!" ten million times until you were left exhausted and skipping entire pages and telling stories like, "Once upon a time a kid wouldn't stop asking for stories and his mother went INSANE. The end."

Includes such classics as The Two Little Pigs and (my favorite) The Princess and the Pea ("Is there a pea in your bed? No? Then what's your excuse? Go to sleep."). Hilarity.




2. Iggie's House, by Judy Blume

Winnie's best friend Iggie moved away, leaving Winnie miserable. When the Garber family moved in with three kids, Winnie was thrilled. But the Garbers were the first black family in the neighborhood and not everyone was as thrilled as Winnie to have them there.

From the publisher: Winnie, a welcoming committee of one, set out to make a good impression and be a good neighbor. That's why the trouble started. Glenn and Herbie and Tina didn't want a "good neighbor." They wanted a friend.

This book was first published in the 70s and re-released in 2002 with this new cover (which Tink & I both I hate, though we can't articulate why; I think it's because the kids look so happy, which they are definitely not in the book). It feels a little dated (I had to explain to Tink what "Negro" meant). But what is both amazing about Judy Blume (and terribly depressing about the world) is how not dated it is. The awkward way Winnie and the Garbers learn to make friends with each other as individuals and not representatives of their respective races, Winnie's ignorance, and the thinly-veiled excuses Winnie's neighbors give for not wanting the Garbers around could easily have been written this year.

3. Cool dates. As in, today is 8.9.10. We will definitely be having a dance party tonight at 6:07. Who's in?

Who can help me find these things?

Attention Jacqui's Room reader(s):

I need your help finding something: July.

Like the whole month. I lost mine, apparently, because it's almost over and I can't remember what I did with it.

I mean, from the looks of this blog, you'd think I hadn't posted in two week, when in fact, I have been posting brilliant and hilarious items TWICE DAILY.*

I looked in my bag of marbles and it turns out most of them are lost too.

It's a household wide problem. Yesterday, I listened to Tink and Destructo have an extended argument entitled "Uno: are we or are we not playing with a full deck?"

In other news, I heard an all too familiar thumping and scratching sound in my attic this weekend.** Is it possible a new generation of flightless pigeons is out to get me?! Did they not read this blog last spring? Or do I now, in addition to everything else, literally have bats in my belfry? I will keep you updated.

* In my head.
** No joke. All three of these things actually happened this week. This is my life.
*** Photo from 826michigan's Liberty Street Robot Supply and Repair Store website. You can buy loose screws there, if you don't have enough already.

Our weekend, by the numbers

Number of laps of the outside of our house done by Thor in his imitation of Iniesta's celebration of Spain's winning World Cup goal: 1

Number of shirts removed as part of said imitation: 1

Number of laps of our house done by my children in imitation of their father: 2

Number of clothing items removed during laps: all of them

Number of laps done naked: 3

Number of laps done wearing each other's clothing: 1

Number of laps done wearing underwear on their heads and screaming with giggles while their father chases them, trying to corral them into the bath: 1

Number of neighborhood block parties we are likely to be invited to this summer: sigh.

Sssurprisssse!

Today's Thursday News of the Absurd Inspirational Moment proves we should all watch more nature TV shows.

From Yahoo!News:

Mass. school janitor finds 3-foot python in locker

Apparently, a janitor cleaning up at the end of the school year opened a locker and a giant snake popped out, prank can of peanuts style. Except it was a real python. When it tried to attack him, he "grabbed it behind the head as he had seen on nature TV shows."

I think this is the last scene of the book, the one that rolls with the credits in the film. It's the last loose end to tie up: "But what happened to the python?!"

So you tell me, what is the rest of the story?

Obsession

You know you are obsessed with your book when...

... while pondering your book during morning "make the lunches and run around collecting stuff" time, you forget to eat breakfast.

... while pondering your book during a write-in with a friend at the library, the solution to your plot problem hits you and, before you know what you are doing, you holler "I got it!" and leap from your chair.

... while pondering your book during a run, you become so absorbed that you forget to watch your step and fly to the pavement in the middle of the street, battering your shoulder and scraping your knees and palms. Yet all you can think as you continue the run (with blood dripping down your leg) is "She could totally wipe-out like that in Chapter 8."

... even in the face of all this, you still find yourself happily pondering your book during dinner...and bedtime...and during the second half of the Brazil-Chile World Cup game...