The Write Stuff

Blog soundtrack:



As you all know, I like to write.
Yeah, well, duh. :-)

Today, I had lunch with my good friend, Jeff.
Oh, look!
Here he is wearing the catbus shirt I gave him.



This catbus is from the movie, “My Neighbor Totoro”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Neighbor_Totoro
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catbus

Anyway, Jeff and I used to “work” together ‘til we both got laid off.
When at work, Jeff gave me constant support (because I was totally new to the telecomm biz), and then after a bit, we both discovered that we liked to write.
We’d go on walks and talk about our writing aspirations.
Jeff has ALWAYS been one of the biggest supporters of my writing.

At lunch today, Jeff presented me with a notebook.
This might not seem like a big deal to most, but if you’re a REAL writer (or songwriter) you have tons of notebooks or scraps of paper with tons of ideas written all over them.
I always carry a notebook in my purse and a bag o' pens.
I am just constantly writing down conversations, thoughts, ideas, and such.
Also, I'm a total office supply-lovin gal here.
Plus, in a boredom pinch, paper and pen always keeps Iz amused. :-)

Here are all my notebooks:



Jeff gave me a beautiful Moleskine notebook.



Actually, it’s not ONE notebook but two notebooks in one.
DoublemintMoleskine. :-)



Did you know that the Moleskine is the “legendary notebook” of Hemingway, Picasso, and Chatwin?
Well, did you?
http://www.moleskine.com/

On the book, it said, “The history of the Moleskine is inside.”
And here it is:

Moleskine® is the heir of the legendary notebook used for the past two centuries by great artists and thinkers, including Vincent Van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, and Bruce Chatwin. This trusty, pocket-sized travel companion held their sketches, notes stories, and ideas before they became famous images or beloved books.

The little black notebook, with its typical rounded corners, elastic closure, and expandable inner pocket, was originally a nameless object. It was produced by a small French bookbinder that supplied Parisian stationery shops frequented by the international literary and artistic avant-garde for more than a century. In the mid-1980s, however, it no longer became available.

In his book The Songlines, Bruce Chatwin tells us the whole story of his favorite notebook, which he nicknamed "Moleskine." In 1986, the original manufacturer--a family operating in Tours--closed down forever: "Le vrai moleskine n'est plus" are the lapidary words he puts into the mouth of the owner of the stationery shop in Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie--also a legendary spot where Chatwin stocked up on the notebooks. The English writer-traveler bought up all the "Moleskines" that he could find, but they were not enough.

In 1998, a small Milanese publisher brought the legendary notebook back to life under the name "Moleskine," thus restoring a solid tradition, renewing notebookism, and sensing that mobile technologies needed to be accompanied by essential self-standing analog tools.

As the reverent keeper of an extraordinary tradition, the legendary notebook once again began traveling the globe. Capturing reality on the move, preserving details, impressing the unique aspects of experience upon paper: Moleskine is a reservoir of ideas and feelings, a battery that stores discoveries and perceptions without depletion. With its various page styles, it accompanies the creative professions and has become an international symbol of contemporary nomadism. With this physical object, the art of taking notes has found new realms on the web and its communities.

Today, Moleskine is culture, travel, memory, imagination, and personal identity, both analog and digital. It is a brand identifying a family of notebooks, journals, planners, and guidebooks, with different functions, complying with a free mindstyle, both basic and emotional, and connected with the digital world through a huge network of websites, blogs, groups, virtual archives in the Internet.

The adventure of Moleskine continues to widen, and its still-blank pages will tell the rest.

After giving it to me, Jeff said, “They’re pink!”
I wanted to say, “Jeez, Jeff, you’ve known me almost four years. I SO hate pink.”
Yeah, not. :-)

He said that he was going to include Hello Kitty stickers with them, but he knew that I could handle that.
It’s VERY good to have friends who know you so well.

Thus, I “pimped” my Moleskines, Jeff!



As a writer or a songwriter, you keep notebooks and have bits and scraps of papers that you have jotted ideas down on, or you keep things from the newspaper, a magazine, or from your own life that you think will help you write something good. A few months ago, I looked through a drawer that contained a lot of my bits and scraps, and here’s what I found.

I found some ideas for a book I was going to write called “Zippy the Wonder Cat”.
It was going to be about diversity.
Zippy is a polydactyl, and the other cats don’t like him.

I wrote only the first page, and then I had a few ideas jotted down on subsequent pages.
Here’s the first page:

From the trees and alleys and houses of Snidely Street,
Come the felines to the garden of Miss Lucinda Peet.
There do meet the members of the Whiskerville Cat Club,
Where their meeting comes to order under a blooming lilac shrub.

I found my “cat rap”.
Note to TomB: Don’t barf just yet! :-)

Friskies, 9-Lives, and big fat rats,I'm gonna tell you 'bout some neato cats.
Big ones, tall ones, black and gray,
Tough if you don't like 'em, cuz they are here to stay!
Now they all hang out down on the streets,
Talkin' 'bout their crazy cat-like feats.
Rappin' 'bout mousies and playin' with their yarn,
Dancin' to their favorite music from Chaka Khan.

Friskies, 9-Lives, and big fat rats,
I'm gonna tell you 'bout some neato cats.
Fat ones, cutes ones, give them some applause,
Tough if you don't like 'em, cuz they'll bust your paws!

These funky cats are jammin' in the street,
Fluffy's on sax, Scooter's got the beat.
Jerry's really bangin' away at the piano,
And, Jacob's just havin' fun singin' "Meow!"
Friskies, 9-Lives, and big fat rats,
I'm gonna tell you 'bout some neato cats.
Cool ones, Polish ones, they surely got it all,
Tough if you don't like 'em, cuz you're a furball!

Along comes an emu, a big mean emu,
Jerry and his friends run for his BMW.
Start the car and burn some rubber,
Those cats surely know how to run for cover.

Friskies, 9-Lives, and big fat rats,
I'm gonna tell you 'bout some neato cats.
Computer whizzes, movie stars, CEOs,
Tough if you don't like 'em, cuz they got lots of dough!

Cruisin' down the highway, purrin' along,
Look who's broken down in his Saab.
Stop to help a furball, 1-2-3,
Now he's motorin' along with us three.

Friskies, 9-Lives, chicken livers,
Well, I told ya the cats really deliver.
They are funky, they don't whine,
And they drink Beck's beer when de are feline fine.

Friskies, 9-Lives, and tunafish,
Now I've come to the end of the list.
Catholic ones, Jewish ones, they even eat lox,
Best to like 'em or get dumped in their litterbox!

Apparently, I even entered a yogurt jingle writing contest once upon a time…

Dannon Light, I love to bite.
Peach and Lemon,
a taste of heaven!
Only 100 calories in each serving,
guaranteed to keep my figure curving!

Then there was this gem.
Err, again, TomB, don’t barf, k? :-)

Every Cat Tells a Story

I got my first kitty at seven,
My sister, brother, and I were in heaven,
Little did I know of the quirk that began,
To never say “No” to a cat again.

Over the years, much to my parent’s fears,
We always kept a cat or two, frequently termed by Mom “a zoo”,
Patches, Little Red, Jerry, and Bullseye,
Attendees now of that big scratching post in the sky.

Growing older and loving the feline,
I acquired things which I’m proud are mine.
Mugs, jewelry, books, sunglasses, a stuffed cat to pose,
Even a silly rubber cat nose!

My parents warned “Don’t bring home more strays!”,
I wished for the day to have my own way,
Big cats, small cats, oh, what fun,
Bring another cat home, and it’s eviction!

“Hallelujah!”, I screamed when I bought my house so nice,
Now I need some cats to scare away those mice!
Bobo the Aloof from a cat show came,
Fritz the Oblivious, from Buddy Dog with his white mane,
Rover’s from Connecticut, warning, she’s bitten,
And Casper, the kitten, for a total of 16 mittens.

After a tough day of living, some find space
At a gym, at a bar, or some other place.
It’s tough to find some comfort and a place to hang your hat,
I go home and have a cat.

My lap is never empty with a cat for every mood,
I can go home and be happy, or they let me brood.
A catless home, how bizarre,
I believe “Home is where the cats are.”

Tonight, at my doorstep, if I should encounter a stray,
I would have to say, “Come in, stay and play!”
Because I know my cat quirk will never mend,
Allowing me never to say “No” to the cat, my beloved friend.

I have bits of overheard conversations that I jotted down:

"So, I was sitting in the bar in my pajamas drinking a Brandy...."

"She's pregnant..................by him?"

"But, if you say it like that then you're kind of admitting that you were wrong."

I have titles for stories never written:

Picking up the Lipsticks of my Life
Much Love, Anne
My Eyes are Greeen and Other Things I Never Really Noticed about Myself
Lost Lake Drive
The Birthday Stories**
**One year, I was going to write a story for every friend for his/her birthday.

I have quotes:

"iams mens praetrepidans avet vagari." ~Catullus

...now the mind impatiently desires to wander.

"To be nobody but myself -- in a world which is doing its best to make you everybody else." ~e.e. cummings

"Of all the people who love me, none of them is you." ~err, um, me

"You learn. You grow, and you know." ~err, ah, me, again, I think

I have random thoughts/overheard converations written down on one scrap of paper like these gems:

"Tommy, you're the typical Italian male."
"I'm afraid of the kids; they don't like me! As soon as she leaves, they freak out on me!"
Dogs -- "My Tommy"
"Stick with the goldfish. You really don't want to bring anything home that has to be fed.
Al Pacino. Olympia Dukakis.

I guess this might have been a movie idea since I did some casting at the
end. :-)

Ah, this one is my favorite:

Voodoo doll -- impotence; rejection; fleas; back pain; slugs; flat tire; lose job; win in Vegas; ectasy; lose keys; start smoking; stop smoking; gain weight; lose weight; find gold; bounced check; kittens; IRS refund; stock split; win bingo; zits.

What that was ever supposed to mean, well, your guess is as good as mine! It sounds like it could be a Coen brothers movie, no?! :-)

AND, this must have been one for the “Keep Things That You Think Will Be Good for Stories” category.
I broke up with someone. I wrote him a letter.
He came by my house when I wasn’t there; he had a key.
He proceeded to write a 6 page “Let’s reconsider this break up” note on post-its and left it at my house, which I kept.
The funny thing was, and probably why I kept it, that after 6 pages of post-it note seriousness, page 7 said, “P.S. Rover ate + Kim called.”

I guess the most important thing is to keep writing, even if most of the ideas never make it beyond the scrap of paper that they are written on. I think that's why I'm trying to write here every day. I need to keep writing, and it keeps me going.

After my Dad died, I found his notebook.
See, it’s says “Writer’s Notebook” in the corner. :-)
It's his writing notebook from when he was an undergrad at Northeastern.
He started NU, left to serve in Korea, then came back and finished, and got his degree in English.



And here are its words.



Its stories are “The Third Time”, “Too Little”, “The Little Boy”, “The Wake”, “Mrs. Robak”, and the “The Worker and the Corner”.

Anyway, I love my notebooks, Jeff.
They are wonderful.
And, I will see you next Friday for lunch again when we will sit in the grass under the trees and talk about life, writing, and anything else that happens to come our way.

P.S. I rode 25 miles on the rail trail today.
Update to Cycling Fashion Snobbery: This is so not a cool look either.
White socks pulled up to almost your knees totally cancel out the fact that you have cycling shoes on, okay? :-)