Author: jenzug

I Spy With My Little Eye: Photo Essay by Ruthie Zug

I was gaining a pretty good momentum in the video department until about six months ago when Bryan switched me over from a PC to a Mac. I love my Mac – especially the part about it not randomly shutting down or taking 20 minutes to power up – but you know how it is learning new stuff. Who has the time?

I have been particularly frustrated with the movie making feature on the Mac, which I suspect is way better in theory than Windows Movie Maker… if I could just figure the damn thing out. In WMM, there was a sidebar within each video project that listed the entire process in steps for making a video, including a step that said CLICK HERE TO PUBLISH YOUR VIDEO ON THE WEB.

That’s a paraphrase, but it was something just as obvious.

iMovie has all the cool features I’m familiar with, but when it came to saving it to publish on my blog, it left too much for me to figure out. I don’t want to have to figure something out – I just want it to be obvious. I have peanut butter sandwiches that need to be made RIGHT NOW, and I don’t have time to read the ‘help’ documentation.

So this is largely why it’s been since January that I made my last video. Not that I haven’t wanted to, or that I haven’t compiled hours of footage in a To Be Published folder – but it seems whenever I sit down to troubleshoot iMovie I usually end up throwing something or screaming at my husband all the way down the stairs, which is precisely the kind of behavior I’m trying to avoid.

So here is a short video to get me started and to satisfy my need to create one without drama. I was mildly successful. The beginning and end titling is too small and moves too quickly to be able to read it, but I couldn’t figure out how to edit those clips – whenever I made changes, an entire new clip was added instead of just changing the one I thought I was editing. And there didn’t seem to be a way to stretch out the length of the titling so you actually have time to read it.

I finally gave up fiddling with it, and just decided to publish it in its imperfect, Shitty First Draft state.

For the record, the opening title reads ‘Take Another Picture, Photos by Ruthie,’ and the end title references the music: ‘Music by Bishop Allen, www.bishopallen.com.’ You should really buy this album. It’s brand new, and I love it. The song I used is called Click, Click, Click, Click off The Broken String album.

This particular video is a project I’ve been wanting to do for awhile, because I love looking at the things I see every day through Ruthie’s eyes. She loves the camera, and I love encouraging her use of it. She has a respect for it, and treats it gently and always tightens the strap around her wrist. Many grown-ups worry and fret when they see her handling such a sophisticated piece of equipment, but it’s actually one of the few things I can fully trust her with.

And I need a little more of that between us.

And I Shall Smite Thy Comcast, Sayeth the Lord.

Several weeks ago Bryan suggested we cancel our cable because he felt he watched too much tv, and he wanted to have time for more creative projects. My response was similar to that of a kodiak bear who stands on her hind legs with front paws waving in the air, shaking her head and roaring with great intimidation.

My verbal response was something like, Why should the rest of us pay for your lack of discipline???

Yeah. Ouch.

But for weeks I really thought my position was justified – and you may think so, too – because I DON’T watch a lot of tv. But when I do, my shows are mostly on cable. And the shows my kids like are on cable. Not to mention what will happen to my house if I am cut off from HGTV.

For the next several weeks, every time Bryan tried to bring this up I was all, Talk to the hand, baby.

Until he got me all dressed up for our anniversary this last weekend and took me to a fancy restaurant for dinner. This time he broached the subject in public, for his own safety.

So here we are amidst cloth napkins, and multiple forks, and a bottle of wine…. whisper fighting. If you’re married to a man, you know what I’m talking about. Men get embarrassed about fighting in public, but you, sista, have some things to say. So you do your best stage whispering to get your point across without causing him to abandon ship.

After a few minutes of getting no where with him, I resort to The Pout, and slump my pretty little dress into my seat.

Then Bryan says, ‘Let me put it to you this way: I want you to know what my next four creative goals are. And I want to know yours. And I want us to fight for space for each other to be able to accomplish those goals. And what makes me sad, is that I’m not sure you even know what my next four goals are.’

And with that, I was like putty in his hands.

I burst into tears – the silent ones in which my facial expression does not change so as to not be obvious that I am crying, except that I open my eyes until they are unnaturally large to keep the water from flowing. But the waiter can obviously tell I am crying, because when he approaches the table he kind of hangs out behind Bryan’s chair for a minute until I nod and wave him in.

In a marriage it is so tempting to fight for what is right and fair, and make a check list of how many poopy diapers we have each changed. I forget that in becoming One, his goals become mine, and I should have the same fervor about those things as I do for my own writing. I forget what he sacrifices so I can hire a babysitter once a week and sip wine while I type this essay.

And sadly, I forget that he has been my number one fan and the driving force behind my writing discipline – when I get writer’s block and want to go shopping, he reminds me that the mark of a true writer is one who writes, regardless of what she feels like doing.

It was a moment in which another finger was pried loose from my tightly clenched heart, and I felt the anger dissipate into willing submission.

River Days are here again

parade princessThis morning I was awakened at 6:30am by the quivering voice of a fully clothed four year old: “Mama, I thought we was going to the parade….” She was hard to convince, but we did manage to get her into bed with us, and I spent the next hour and a half with her knees in my back.

Ruthie’s preschool ‘marched’ in the River Days parade this morning, so Bryan walked with her as she and her friends rode their bikes. She was very proud to represent, and Thomas did all the appropriate screaming and charging the crowd when he saw his sister.

candy!Thomas and I hung with the curb crowd, ooo-ing and aahhh-ing at all the activity, and he wasn’t even phased by the Seafair Pirates’ loud canon. He was more interested in eating candy, because apparantly throwing candy into the gutter was a prerequisite for participation. By the time he’d had three suckers and a piece of bubble gum, he was starting to walk a little drunkly – like this Seafair pirate.

As far as parades go, this one was lacking in rumpus marching bands, and a little excessive in political campaign caravans. But drill teams and dance companies were fun to watch, and there was even a unicycle group. And did I mention the candy?

And though I could not attend Blogher, my weekend was not lacking in schwag… I have PARADE SCHWAG:

Parade schwag

More photos here.

BlogHer Blues

I’m not going to Blogher this year. At first I wasn’t phased by this reality, since it really wasn’t practical for me financially or logistically anyway. I was willing to accept that.

But then the BlogHer chatter on the internet started pulling at my Poor Me strings this week. I have kept in touch this year with many women I met at BlogHer 2006, and meeting up with them again would be dangerously fun in a Not Sleeping for Three Days kind of way. I’m trying to get past that left-out feeling, because I know I am not being excluded in spirit. I just won’t be present in body.

But ya’ll better get on the IM and give me a shout out once in awhile!

As further torture I checked out the sessions today, and these are the ones that looked interesting to me:

Digital Exhibitionists or Chroniclers of their Time: Will Naked Bloggers Make History?

The Art of Storytelling

Technical Tools to Build Traffic (because I still don’t understand Feedburner) or The Art of Writing Reviews

The State of the Momospehere (though I’m tired of hearing about it)

Book to Blog and Back Again

On a whim, I just now checked Travelocity for flight information, just in case I could convince Bryan that it would be a good idea for me to take a red-eye to Chicago tonight. But that won’t be happening for less than $900.

Foiled. Oh well.

On the bright side, tomorrow is my sixth wedding anniversary, which is definitely cause for celebration and reason to not take a red-eye to Chicago tonight. I just might get laid.

Things to Remember

I have discovered that when Bryan is gone I act like I have no reason to get out of bed in the morning. I mope, I drag my feet, and we either spend four days in our pajamas or we leave the house at 9 and don’t return until 9 – both of which make me cranky.

Today I took the kids to a play date with actual grown-ups involved, and we have friends coming over for dinner tonight. Suddenly, I am light on my feet and flitting about the house, happily singing as I clean like I’ve never cleaned before.

Yes, today I have something to look forward to, and I’m not too overwhelmed by an over scheduled day to enjoy it. Not to mention I am cooking an actual meal for these people instead of tossing a few crumbs at my children and feeding myself energy bars.

I like this thing they call Balance. It makes me not cranky.

Stupid

Ruthie’s latest word craze is ‘stupid.’ I think it started when Bryan and I became fed up with our Comcast DVR randomly shutting down for the 42nd time, and one of us mumbled, ‘Stupid Comcast.’ Ever since then, Ruthie’s mantra has been Stupid This and Stupid That.

For awhile I tried the tactic of semi ignoring it, not wanting to whip her into an excited fervor by any strong disapproval. That didn’t work well, as EVERYTHING became stupid. So I tried redirecting it into inanimate objects, like STUPID COMCAST, or stupid bike. Stupid People were off limits. But still, everything was obsessively stupid, not to mention the occassional Stupid Thomas slipped in there.

The pinnacle of this craze came last week on our vacation when we had a stupid day in which, once again, everything was stupid. Ruthie came to ask permission to do something, I said she could do it later because right now it was dinner time. She screamed at me and ran away. She ran all the way across a large field and up a hill, and from that hill she screamed, ‘YOU’RE SO STUPID!’ at me.

The next morning I spent some time cleaning and reorganizing the kitchen area of our campsite. I threw away cups, tossed dirty dishes into a tub, and moved unnecessary items from the table. Then I came across a folded up piece of paper. I unfolded it to see if it was something I could throw away, and as my eyes landed on the one single word written on the paper, it was as if the gods were sending me a message that I had just not been understanding, and now they were making it as plain as the nose on my face:

stupid

Resisting

They say depression is anger turned inward, which likely explains the funk I’ve been in. I thought I was coming out of it a few weeks ago, but in retrospect I see it is more circumstantial – as in, if things go the way I want them to I’m happy, and if they don’t, I’m depressed. I have not been very successful in just going with the flow, but rather I’ve had very strong expectations of how I want my day to go and my children to behave, and things aren’t really working out the way I had hoped.

Because, as you know, shit happens that I can’t do anything about.

My heart feels tightly clenched, rebellious, closed. I haven’t been able to write. Little things anger me, and nice people irritate me. Suggestions and helpfulness infuriate me. And in all things that don’t go my way, I am the victim.

Whew. It feels good to get that out – to name it.

I saw my therapist yesterday for the first time in months. I love him. He is soft and compassionate, but still tells me things that are difficult to hear. He counsels with the perfect balance of Biblical truth and therapeutic mumbo jumbo. He doesn’t just tell me to sin less and love Jesus more, but digs in to the very complicated labyrinth of lies I have believed about myself and about God. He understands the context of habitual sin.

I described all the ways in which I felt frustrated as a parent of Ruthie. I recounted scenarios in which I had done all the right things, but was still screamed at. I cried, wondering why God had given a woman like me a daughter like Ruthie. As each story progressed my therapist whistled and shook his head, chuckled, and said things like, “Wow, you’ve got a strong one.” But when I cried about Why, he gently reminded me that God was using my relationship with Ruthie to transform my heart of anger.

More crying. More release. More submission.

I bawled all the way home yesterday. I probably should have pulled over. Never do I nor my therapist imply that Ruthie’s behavior justifies my sinful actions, but the floodgates of my emotions were opened at the reminder that she is… exceptional. It actually reminds me that this is the way she is, and I need to stop wishing she was different. Working with her would be a lot easier than working against her.

I have also resolved that I have done just about all the behavioral modification that one person can do, and at this point it is all about my submitting to the transforming work of the Holy Spirit – which means dying to myself.

I hate this concept of dying to myself because I think my own needs and wants are really really really important. I just want everyone around me to know exactly what their script says so I don’t have to actually direct. It seems so ridiculous that I live like this, but it’s true: nobody in my house is more important than me.

And it’s starting to feel really icky.

[Here is where I usually insert a snappy wrap-up about lessons learned and moving forward and all that. But since I am feeling unresolved, perhaps my writing should reflect that, too.]

Book Review: Winter Wheat

winter_wheat.gifI finished Winter Wheat by Mildred Walker last week for my book club. The story takes place over a year and a half during the early forties when Pearl Harbor was attacked. Ellen is a young woman with an American father and a Russian mother who met when her mother nursed her father through an injury in the first world war. They live on a dry land wheat ranch in Montana, which means they use no irrigation, relying instead on the weather for a successful crop.

The story opens in the summer after the wheat has been harvested and stored, and Ellen’s father is listening to the various market prices on the radio to determine when he should sell. A good price for his wheat will mean Ellen can go to college in the fall, and he is determined to make this happen. Ellen is full of optimism and excited anticipation. And then word comes that she will, indeed, attend college in the fall.

I haven’t written any reviews for fiction books before, so I’m not sure how much of the story to tell here, and I certainly don’t want to give away any spoilers. I suppose I could give my opinion: I liked the book. It is a slow moving story, which one gal in our book club pointed out was probably intentional as a reflection of the slow moving simplicity of ranch life in the forties. She felt it was a more suitable read for the winter, while cozied up next to a fire.

There was much description of life on the ranch – the plowing, the sowing, the waiting, the sweating, and the toil. Ellen used the hard labor to work out her anger, and grief, and confusion over things that pressed her. I appreciated this aspect of her story – the sweating out of frustration, the release of tension after a hard day’s work. I envied the simplicity of ranch life – the work she persevered through was difficult, but when it was done, she rested.

We talked about this in our book group – the nature of our lives today as being so busy and filled with noise. I feel as if the work I do will never be done, that there will always something undone. But on a wheat ranch you harvest, you plant, and then your work is done and you wait for the wheat to grow. When you are out in the field, you are working hard. Then you eat dinner, get a good night’s sleep, and do it all again the next day.

As I read, the simplicity of this way of life appealed to me.

Another focus of the book is Ellen’s observation of her parents’ relationship. Their marriage is complicated already because of her mother being a foreigner, but it is made even more complicated in Ellen’s eyes as she learns more information about how they came to be together. It is particularly interesting to see how she vacillates back and forth between the two, at times identifying with her father’s frustrations, and at times her mother’s. It opened my eyes to the pitfalls of children attempting to make sense of complicated and much more mature relationships, and gave me compassion toward Ruthie for all the times she looked worried as Bryan and I exchanged sharp words.

It is also an interesting commentary on the culture of love and marriage in the forties. I kept getting frustrated with Ellen as she clung to the idea of a relationship that seemed shallow, wondering why she didn’t just let go and move on to someone else. But in the context of the early forties, it was not customary to give your love away so easily. Today, we women shave off pieces of our heart to many different men over the course of our lives. We love, we lose, and we move on to new loves. But during the forties, this kind of behavior was reserves for ‘loose’ women – respectable women were courted and married, and the process was all very practical. This, too, has it’s downfalls, but the point I’m making is that Ellen represents the quintessential forties woman who panics a little at the thought of having no man in her future.

If you’re in the mood for a story that takes it’s time, I recommend Winter Wheat. It may be slower than the average Steven King thriller, but it is sweet and simple and something to be savored.

What I Did This Summer

I just returned from five days and four nights of camping in the rain. It was a little overwhelming, but we just couldn’t stay away as it was the week of our favorite music festival on an island north of Seattle. For five days everything felt damp, even if it wasn’t actually wet – my pillow, my book, my skin, my shoes, my children… EVERYthing.

This afternoon as I unpacked my bag to do laundry I experienced post traumatic stress from the musty smell, and ended up washing everything even if I never wore it. All trace of damp memories needed to be eradicated.

During the one non-raining afternoon I was stung on the ankle by a wasp, and through this experience I discovered who my true friends are (or aren’t) as they laughed at my screaming and leg shaking. They sat mocking me from the craft tent, claiming they thought I was scared of a slug. Granted, these Orcas Island varieties of slugs are no less than five inches long and an inch thick, but they are not that scary.

For the record, I think I was stung by this. I remember thinking – in the delirium of my experience – that I had never seen a black wasp before, and that this was the biggest f*#@ing wasp I had ever seen in my life. My ankle is now inflamed, red, and itchy, and I’m trying to not scratch the skin raw.

How are you feeling NOW about your laughter? Yeah, YOU know who you are.

The rainy weather changed the vibe of the week for me. Usually we spend hours listening to music while the kids run around, but this year (our fifth) I felt more introverted and isolated, choosing instead to hide under a tarp most of the time and read a book or visit with a friend. Bryan kept asking me if I was having fun, and I didn’t know how to answer. I felt like I was supposed to be having fun, because we have always had fun at this festival, and Bryan is on this stupid kick about having a positive attitude. But camping is a lot of work, and camping in the rain is a hell of a lot of work, and sometimes it just doesn’t seem like a vacation to me.

In reality, I know I had fun. There was too much laughter and revelry at 2am to claim I did not have fun. But I think I was mourning that it felt different than all the other years. I like tradition, and this trip is a yearly tradition. There are certain things that I expect from this vacation every year, and when those things didn’t happen they way they always have I think it threw me off a little.

Anyway… yes, Bryan, I had fun. It was just different fun, and I’m okay with that.

I apologize that I did not warn you dear readers that I would be absent from this space, but I make it a point to never tell the Internet when my house will be dark and unoccupied and filled with all sorts of valuables for the taking.

We will now return to our regular, albeit spotty blogging routine.

Writer’s Workshop: Compelling Non Fiction

I was invited by my friend Julie to attend a writer’s workshop tonight on Bainbridge Island (put on by Field’s End), where I enjoyed a taste of small town quaintness. We packed into a little room in the library – where suspendered old men shuffled noisily about the room as they refilled their coffee cups – to hear Jim Whiting speak on writing compelling non-fiction. Jim mostly covered the topic of Lead-Ins – those ways we grab the readers’ attention and keep them reading. He also covered elements of editing, such as transitions, rhythm, layout, and sentence structure.

What I came away with in the discussion that followed the hour long lecture, is that historical, factual, or biographical accounts need not be dry and boring. Even though we are not writing something that is invented, we are still telling a story, and we have an obligation to be good storytellers.

I think about this often in my writing, especially as it pertains to moving out of the blogosphere and into the print market. Blogs tend to have cult followings. I know my faithful readers (well, the COMMENTERS, anyway), and I know why they keep coming back. But when I think about venturing into the wild blue yonder of book publishing, I shrink in self-consciousness, wondering why on earth anyone would care what I had to say.

But then I attend a workshop like this one, and I am reminded that there are bad ways to tell a story, there are good ways to tell a story, and there are great ways to tell a story. If I am a great writer, and tell a great story, others will be drawn into my narrative. The things I struggle with and write about are universal – anger, depression, parenting, friendships, marriage, etc. If my storytelling is compelling, and relevant, and filled with perspective, it will not be boring.

The idea of perspective is what I had always missed in my writing when I was younger. I was a Just The Facts girl – struggling to put events into chronological order and worrying about time lines. You all are lucky I am not writing an autobiography that begins, I was born in 1971 to parents who blah blah blah.

Or perhaps you would not continue coming back to This Pile if that’s how I wrote.

I think sometimes the facts aren’t always the important thing when telling a story. I’m not suggesting we lie about what actually happened, as in the case of James Frey’s A Million Little Pieces, (which came up in tonight’s discussion). Only that in telling a story of historical or factual significance, we are adding our own perspective, our own observations, our own interpretation of experiences. A good writer can write about making cookies with her mother and eloquently describe the fact of baking cookies, but a great writer can use the element of baking cookies with her mother to draw the reader in to a complex mother/child relationship.

(I made that cookie making thing up all by myself – was that great writing?)

As an example, one of the ladies in the room spoke about her sister having a completely different perspective on their childhood that she did, and she wondered what the truth would be if they each wrote her own account of growing up. And to me the answer is… EXACTLY, because each would write from her own perspective and her own experience.

It was a very enjoyable evening – bookended by relaxing ferry rides, and made complete by a pinkish sunset and the smell of the salty Sound. It was also a great boost to a lull in my writing motivation, so THANKS JULIE! I look forward to more lectures in the series.

Hospitality That Diverts Tragedy

I couldn’t resist this article about the gunman who raided a D.C. area party, only to be thwarted by kindness when one of the party-goers extended hospitality to him. An incident that started with a man holding a gun to a 14-year-old girl’s head, ended with hugs and bewilderment for both parties involved:

After the intruder left, the guests walked inside the house, locked the door and stared at one another. They didn’t say a word. Rabdau dialed 911.

The incident almost seems cartoonish and as far fetched as frogs raining from the sky. If a movie were made of this incident, I picture a comedy with Eddie Murphy or Adam Sandler as the robber.

“We were just finishing dinner,” Cristina “Cha Cha” Rowan, 43, blurted out. “Why don’t you have a glass of wine with us?”

The intruder took a sip of their Château Malescot St.-Exupéry and said, “Damn, that’s good wine.”

It makes me wonder what motivated one of the women to offer the gunman some wine. Did she sense hesitation? Did she sense he was more troubled than hardened? Whatever the reason, she in essence extended hospitality to an enemy, and her kindness diffused the situation.

The would-be robber, his hood now down, took another sip and had a bite of Camembert cheese that was on the table.

Then he tucked the gun into the pocket of his nylon sweatpants.

“I think I may have come to the wrong house,” he said, looking around the patio.

“I’m sorry,” he told the group. “Can I get a hug?”

I’m a fighter, and when faced with a grouchy cashier, or a road rage-er, or a stressed out husband I usually respond in kind with harsh words or a snippy attitude. After all, don’t I have a right to be pissy? I’m certainly not the one who started it.

“There was this degree of disbelief and terror at the same time,” Rabdau said. “Then it miraculously just changed. His whole emotional tone turned — like, we’re one big happy family now. I thought: Was it the wine? Was it the cheese?”

Recently my thoughts about forgiveness have collided with my thoughts on hospitality, as I recently found myself at the same party as someone who had hurt me. I practice what a friend calls ‘maintenance forgiveness’ everyday, fighting my demons of bitterness and working to put my trust in God over the situation, but this has largely been a battle I fought in my own mind. Seeing someone I felt betrayed by was a whole new battle.

I don’t know if how I acted at this party was the right thing to do – I was aloof and distant. I honestly didn’t know what to say, given the circumstances, but I probably didn’t make it easy for anything to be said to me. The anger in me believes that showing kindness toward a perceived enemy is caving in to the idea that he or she may have been right in offending me – that it is weakness on my part to say hello and have a welcoming attitude, that ignoring or avoiding is the just thing to do in order to stand up for myself.

In the midst of my mind-wrangling, a friend shared these verses with me from Colossians 3:

12Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. 13Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 14And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

Forgive as the Lord forgave you. We offer kindness to a stranger or an enemy because kindness has been shown to us. This is the heart of hospitality. It’s like what it says in the book of Luke, what good is it if I love only those who love me in return? Anybody can do that. The challenge for me is to show kindness to someone who has not shown it to me.

Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Even as I write this, anger swells in me. I want justice, and I don’t want to be nice until I see it. I want someone to apologize to me without any sort of excuse or reason why things happened they way they did. And sometimes I feel like I could set up camp on my tall cliff of self-righteousness until Christ returns… or until I received an apology. I don’t want to be the first one to extend kindness and humility because, dammit, I was the one who was hurt. I am the one who was wronged. I shouldn’t have to make the first move. I… I… I…

And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. But I also want peace and reconciliation, because being a part of community is too stressful when there is discord. When the Body is torn, so is the soul. When I think too much about how someone else should be treating me, instead of submitting to how I ought to be treating others, the selfishness eats a hole in me, making me feel bitter and depressed.

So as I think about hospitality, and hospitality of the heart, I think also of forgiveness and kindness and humility, and whether I can look into the face of a gunman and offer him a glass of wine. But as Bryan said to me as I processed it all with him, “We may not all be brandishing guns, be we’re all packing heat in the form of unforgiveness, and justice, and the desire to separate the white hats from the black hats.”