September 30th, 2008

On Futurity

At reception at the end of a doctor visit.

Me: Oops, I forgot to ask Dr. C. when I have to come back. Do you have it in the file?

A: Yes, it’ll be in a year.

Me: A year! Well, I guess I’ll call–

A: We can book it now–how’s September 20?

Me: September 20, 2009? I could be on the moon by then!

A: The moon?

Me: Well, you know, not actually the moon, but anywhere, really…

A: Is early morning ok? 9 am?

Me: I don’t *know*!

A: (looks at me intently)

Me: 9 am, September 20, 2009 is fine.

A: That’s a Tuesday.

Me: Sure it is.

A: Do you need a reminder card?

Me: I will lose that card in a year.

A: Here is your card.

***

Come *on* now–does anyone really know for sure that we’re going to be having a September 20 in 2009? Who has evidence that we’re not going to get to September 14 and then start counting backwards again?

Is an inability to conceptualize the future evidence of my fundamental inmaturity?

The dancers need a dancefloor / the swingers gotta swing
RR

September 28th, 2008

What Writers Do on Vacation

If Blogger can only cope with one picture at a time, that’s the way we’re gonna do it! Here’s Stephanie and I at the University of Manitoba Rare Books Archive.

Gonna dance til the dancefloor falls apart
RR

September 27th, 2008

Still Thrilled

And then this morning, *Once* got reviewed in the Globe and Mail by Jim Bartley. I remain slightly heart-poundy/hysterical about reviews (this is only number 3 for *Once*) but I think this one is pretty good.

I think I’d like to go downtown/and take it easy
RR

Everyone Should Go to Winnipeg

Hello, blog–I’ve missed you!

Wednesday morning, I went off to Winnipeg to the Thin Air International Writers Festival. It was my first away-game as a writer, my first flight this year, and only the third time I’ve stayed in hotel since I stopped vacationing with my parents in high school. It was *amazing!*

In one awe-striking 20-hour day, I flew out to Winnipeg; checked into the hotel; met the amazing staff and volunteers of the festival (they work *hard* in the west); ate Korean food, saw the Red River; lay on a bench in the sunshine; gave a Book Chat with Pasha Malla, moderated by the amazing Charlene Diehl; hopped up and down in a parking lot; saw a dear friend I hadn’t seen in a decade (hi, Stephanie!); gave Mainstage reading with an incredible cast of characters and *without* collapsing from nerves; stayed up late talking about books; and ate a *lot* of Manitoba cheese. It’s very good.

There’s a video from the afternoon bookchat on the Thin Air blog, of me reading from my story, Route 99 if you are curious. I had actually never seen myself on video before, and as it turns out that I can’t really stand it. I saw about 10 seconds, enough to tell that it’s really me and Charlene in the frame. I think it’s fine. You can’t see Pasha in the frame, but trust me he was there, being charming and low-key and insightful. Have you read The Withdrawal Method? Maybe you should read it, if you are into wise and generous (and often very funny) short stories about men, women and children searching for human conncections.Though if you are female and prone to reading in public, maybe you should take the bright blue dust jacket off, as I got an awful lot of looks.

There’s good stuff about the fest and it’s many personalities throughout their Hot Air blog, and it’s still on-going, as the fest doesn’t end until tomorrow. The festival is huge, and lovely. The talent contained in 10 days is immense.

Then on Thursday, after an interview with a local arts mag, I gave up on being a serious professional writer (as if) and just went off with Stephanie to enjoy Winnipeg. The weather was stunning, and S. is a force of sunshine herself, so of course it was fab, but I am actually impressed to no end about that lovely friendly city. The University of Manitoba, the Legislative Buildings, a pipe band, a Royal Canadian Mounted Police change-of-command ceremony, the biggest cockroach I’ve ever seen, a petting zoo, a store that sells exclusively handmade items with cats on them imported from Japan, and of course, an extremely muddy and hilarious corn maze, for which we were so inappropriately dressed that it was simply safer to take off shoes and stockings and go barefoot. See below:

I was overjoyed to be in Winnipeg, participating in a real literary event with so many amazing folks, and overjoyed not to have screwed anything up. I really liked the town, the people I met, and the squish of mud between my toes. I think I may have been slightly over-stimulated by the whole 3-day whirlwind–when at long last I got to mighty Manitoba mainstay, a Perkins Restaurant (it lived up to expectations–great omelette), the waiter commented that he loved coming to our table because we were always so thrilled to see him.

I’m just thrilled about everything in the universe right now, really. Except of course that I owe just about everyone in the universe an email/phone call (sorry, guys, I’m gonna get it together shortly). Oh, and that Blogger seems to have dug in its heels about uploading pictures from my Mac. I have tonnes, but you’ll have to make do with the one for now–maybe someone will lend me a PC so I can work this out at some point!

I just want you to come figure me out
RR

September 22nd, 2008

Writers Reading

If Rose-coloured is of any practical use, it might be to writers who are or soon will be dealing with stuff like the stuff I’m dealing with. If I can help one writer somewhere not go insane trying to proofread his or her manuscript, my work is probably done. And so, to further that project, I’d like to offer my thoughts on the latest thing I’m trying not to go insane about, which is public readings.

I’m hardly an expert–I counted this morning in the shower and I’ve done a grand total of seven readings. If you’ve been to any of them, you know that I am not the world’s best reader, but if you’ve to *several* of them, you know I’m getting better. In addition to those seven incidents, I count as education my considerable time as *audience* for readings, as well as all the time I spend standing on a chair (it helps!) practicing. So maybe, single-didget experience not withstanding, I have a little advice to offer.

To start with, I know the sources of good advice–try Michael Carbert’s Why Are Literary Readings So Excrutiatingly Bad?” Don’t let the grouchy title fool you, this is a fair and warm article by someone who *likes* literary readings enough to want them to be better than they often are. In addition to a good deal of useful advice for the organizers of readings, for the writers themselves, Carbert recommends, “…a basic awareness of pacing, breathing, and emphasis can only heighten a reading’s effectiveness. Writers uncertain of such things would benefit from rehearsal and listening carefully to a recording of themselves.”

To which I would add three things:

1) Plan. I rehearse, but I’m a nervous novice; I understand that more confident and experienced readers can give a polished performance without reading it over standing on a chair half a dozen times. However, I’ve seen very good readers absently flipping pages on the podium, muttering, “Hmm, I’m not sure what would be best… Maybe just a little bit more from chapter three…” No one wants readings that end anticlimatically because they are cut off before the end of the passage, or because the passage was chosen at random and doesn’t have a suitable end, or readings that drone on endlessly because the reader hasn’t chosen an end point and doesn’t keep track of the time. All of these are sort of sad for the listener, who was really hoping to hear not just a random sample of the text, but an actual aesthetic experience there in their chairs, listening.

More good advice from other people: I once met the poet Alayna Munce shortly before a reading, and I asked her how she chose what to read. She explained that her book, When I Was Young and In My Prime is a somewhat complicated poetic novel, and that reading from it required carefully choosing and putting together a number of passages to create an accessible performance. When she got up on stage, I saw her book was feathered with post-its that she flipped among, but her performance that day was simply lovely, polished and simple and even funny. When I read the book soon after (I think practically the entire audience bought the book), though it was still beautifully simple and occasionally beautifully funny, I realized just how much careful jumping around in the text she had done to pick out a strand of narrative and follow it through for twenty minutes. She made the effort so the audience wouldn’t have to suffer confusion, and for us, it was totally worth it.

2. Perform. God help us all, I do have some theatrical training, though only barely enough to know that words are not only the medium but the message. Reading aloud gives dimension to the work that is not available on the page–the energy and emotion of the voice–while subtracting another–that of the silent space of imagination of the reader. To take away the reader’s own pacing and internal version of the text, the performer really ought to offer something just as good–the characters differentiated in tone, the pace modulated, etc. At their best, actors inhabit their characters, become them, which is a bit much to ask of the untrained writer, but still–I did make up those characters and narrators, so I *am* as close to inhabiting them as anyone could be. It’s worth a shot.

Someone with a lot more training the theatre than I, who uses it to brilliant effect, is Claudia Dey. Her novel, Stunt, would probably sound captivating if read by Emily the Bell Telephone autodrone, but it was Dey’s spellbinding inhabitation of her characters when she reads that made me want the book in the first place. The jacket copy doesn’t intrigue at all compared to the intensely focussed, emotional performances she gives at readings. *Stunt* has a first-person narrator, which I consider the easiest voice to use on-stage–dialogue being the toughest, but Dey’s skill is superlative in any voice. (PS: I finished the book yesterday, and it truly is one of the best things I’ve read this year. And I heard it all in my head in the author’s voice.)

3. Enjoy. I do get *so* wrought up before readings, all seven of them, that people ask if I’d prefer not to do them, but I love readings! No, really! All self-consciousness aside, I do like my own work, and the opportunity to personally deliver to an audience is a great privilege. You also discover a lot from witnessing reactions to your work first-hand–the silence of people listening raptly is completely different from the silence of people fighting to stay awake, is completely different from the silence of people furrowing their brows in confusion. I swear to you, it’s true. I *like* doing readings, and I hope through all the nervousness, it shows. I would never want people who have taken time out of their lives to listen to me to feel they’ve made a bad choice, or that I don’t appreciate it.

The worst reading I’ve heard recently was a fellow who clearly hated reading. He had a clump of crumpled unbound pages he shuffled repeatedly, he read in a monotone and never looked up. He was obviously unhappy to be there (it was a voluntary situation, so this unhappiness is somewhat mysterious) and his dismay seemed directed at the audience whose gaze he would not meet. And he went over the time limit! Frankly, the text seemed like something I wouldn’t have liked under any circumstances, but the author’s acting out the enormous favour of reading it to us didn’t help matters.

We all have enough unavoidable problems in the ungoing narratives of our own lives. To get to sit back and be told a story is such a nice respite–a pleasure to receive, and though stressful, to give also. I’m giving two readings in Winnipeg on Wednesday, so until then you can find me at home, standing on a chair.

They’ve signed me up for surfing but they can’t get be in the choir
RR

September 18th, 2008

Rose-coloured Reviews Cresson Ballet Flats

Shoes are a class issue, and they have been ever since the days of Chinese foot-binding; what you do to your feet is a product not only of what you can afford to put on them but what you are going to *do* with your feet. The above article mentions that, “… by the time of the late Qing Dynasty, foot binding had become popular among people of all social classes except among the poorest – who needed to be able-bodied to work the fields.”

Only those who can afford to work less, choose to work seated, or not to work at all, can attend to fashions that render them less than able-bodied. When I worked on my feet, I wore athletic shoes or, when those were forbidden, Docs, which look from a distance like dress shoes. Almost everybody did, and had to–when you move all day every day, everything on your body is in service of that.

When I got an office job, I quickly bought a pair of pretty vinyl-covered cardboard shoes for $15. It didn’t matter the quality, because they looked cute and they spent their days resting quietly under my desk. The luxury of cheap shoes, I call it. Those shoes, ballet flats, turned out to be pretty good despite the cardboard, and I wore them for ages. My current ballet flats are more expensive, better quality and slightly more interesting looking–they are called the Cresson from Naturalizer, home of vaguely sensibly, vaguely stylish shoes. Teacher shoes, I think of them, as teachers have to look professional but do spend their days pacing in front of a chalkboard on a cement floor.

I like cute shoes, but the voice of Uncle Alex from Eight Cousins is always in my head when I evaluate wardrobe: “‘Suppose a mad dog or a runaway horse was after you, could you get out of the way without upsetting…?'” For, office job or not, I do have to walk the city sidewalks in snow and sleet and goose shit (when I moved to Toronto, I really didn’t expect that the geese would overrun the city); I have to climb onto bushes and occasionally over traffic medians in pedestrian-unfriendly parking lots; I have to deal with not horses but certainly dogs and violent stroller-pushers and cracked cement: I don’t have a car.

In Toronto, car vs. no car is not quite as much of a class issue as it would be in Regina, but it really does make you buy shoes in a different way. I’ve not watched that tv show everyone says makes you want to buy $400 shoes you can’t walk in, Sex in the City, but I suspect those women operate in a slightly different tax bracket from me. I guess it could be an issue of equilibrium as much as money, since I have friends who will stroll quite casually in 3-inch heels over those medians and snowbanks. But for every one of those, there’s one digging in her spike heals, and refusing to walk one more step unless it’s into a taxi.

I hate taxis and like to move under my own power, so I like the Cressons. The online add brags about having a “stylish low vamp” (vamp being the leather bit that goes over your toes) but it is actually high enough to give the shoe good purchase on the foot–when there’s the pivot-point of shoe-coverage is too low, the whole thing can flip-flop right off (hence the eponymous shower/beach shoe) when you try to move at speed. The zig-zag strap (a sportified allusion to toe-shoes, I think) also gives the shoe greater staying power, while also looking cute–over short distances, I think I can run nearly as fast in the Cressons as in sneakers. Good for snarky bus drivers, short pedestrian signals, vengful drivers and wild dogs.

The online ad also describes these as having a “1-inch heel” but I totally don’t think they do. The rubber sole is built up slightly at the back, but it’s also built up *around* the back, making a firm support perfect for stomping angrily down the sidewalk (I never do that) or climbing a dirt hill (also an unknown circumstance in my life).

There isn’t major arch support inside, just a little rise on the instep, which is enough for me but might not be for others. But the insole is nicely padded and, bonus, bright red, as is the inside of the leather upper, and there is a tiny bit of red stitching on the outside of the back. I dig that little hint of cool.

I bought these about 6 months ago. I paid $70, and consider them very well worth it, as they are fare and passage to so many places.

Pete almost lost his job until the union stepped in
RR

Rumours of Asia

I have always had a pair of brass sculptures of Thai dancers. These are young women with high pointed headdresses and sinuously flailing arms. The arms are brassed in mid-motion pushing through the air–on each body, one hand high, one low. When you arrange them with the lowered hands touching, as I always do, they form a wave with their arms. Their faces are impassive, more impassive even than you’d imagine for being formed from metal. Their arrangement is also impassive to me, though you could put them together another way or even just have each on it’s own. But why would you, when you could the wave.

I have no idea how I ended up with these; their presence in my life predates memory. Almost certainly, they were given to me, as I was not shopping for objets d’art, or anything, in nursery school. Of course, a heavy pointed metal objet seems a spectacularly inappropriate gift for a nursery scholar, but it never occured to me to play with them in a way that could result in me or anyone getting hurt. I have always just kept them on shelves or tables, in the hands-touching arrangement. Until:

B (picking one up): This is an unusually weapon-like hat, isn’t it?

Me: Put it down.

B: You could kill some with this, probably. (gesturing Macbeth-like at me) Stab stab.

Me: Put it down put it down.

B: Fine (puts it down the wrong way, so that the wave is flawed)

Me: It goes on the other side of the first one.

B: (moving it) And do you want me to flick the lights on and off 25 times?

Me: With their hands touching!!!

B: That’s a complicated way of saying yes.

Me: ARGH!

B: (nudges them so that they are again perfectly arranged) You’re gonna miss me.

B. is in fact my brother, whose presence in my life also predates memory, and whom I will indeed miss when, tomorrow, he moves to Tokyo. For someone who likes things consistently arranged, it’s hard when a loved one flies off to the antipodes. But there is a bright side to this, of course (in addition to B. having a wonderful year abroad): watch this space in Spring 2009, when Rose-coloured reviews the Tokyo transit system. I can’t wait, can you?

I can barely stop
RR

September 17th, 2008

Taking It to the Streets

Two days post-launch, I’m starting to breathe normally again, and to focus on coherent thoughts other than, “Ack!” and “Hooray!” But there are future tailspins coming up, and I’ll mention them here in case you happen to be in the neighbourhood of said spins, and feel like coming out to comfort me.

September 24, 2pm–An Afternoon Book Chat with Pasha Malla at the Thin Air Winnipeg literary festival.

September 24, 8pm–Matches and Misses readings, also at Thin Air, this time with writers David Bergen, Nicole Markotić, Daria Salamon, Pasha Malla and Gerald Hill.

October 15, 8pm–The launch of the sure-to-be-wonderful Pivot Reading Series at the Press Club in Toronto. Fellow readers are Paul Vermeersch, Leigh Nash, and Alex Boyd. I’m really excited for this because the Pivot Series is sort of goddaughter to the wonderful IV Lounge Reading Series, which Paul and then Alex ran for a total of ten years. Carey Toane will be doing it now, and I’m v. v. pleased to be on the ground for lift-off (there is something wrong with that metaphor), with all the old and new guard.

October 21, time tba–A group reading at Bryan Prince Bookseller in Hamilton. Extra awesome because it is as close as I’m likely to get to a hometown reading. My hometown does not possess a bookstore, and Bryan Prince was always where I shopped for books as a kid, so it’s pretty exciting to go back there and see, perhaps, my own book on the shelf.

October 22, 8:30pm–THE WRITING LIFE #3 discussion with Pasha Malla and Ivan E. Coyote, hosted by Neil Wilson Ottawa International Writers Festival

So we’re either headed into some good times, or this blog will cease entirely to be about reading and writing, and be given over to talk of my hair and places I’ve fallen down. Oh, suspense!

Never knew it would end til it did
RR

September 16th, 2008

Sailing off the edge of the ocean

Certain events so wig me out–graduations, new jobs, moves, any sort of big change–they I start to see them as the end of all that came before. The fact that I am typing in my blog, wearing my cardigan and knee socks, eating my pear, on the day *after* my book launch, seems a bit impossible. It as if I thought I was going over the edge of the horizon, and should no longer be visible to the human eye.

And yet, here we are, and though I am very very very tired, it does seem nice here on the other side. I do not think that one can write up an event like the *Once* launch without seeming a little like a hopping up and down ten-year-old, but that *is* a bit of my personality, plus I do know there were a few people who wanted to be there last night and couldn’t be. So, for you, the blow-by-blow:

I wore my bright yellow swirly dress, which I’ve had for years and love very much. I had bought a new dress for the occasion, but suddenly I realized that I don’t *know* that dress, and wasn’t sure I’d feel myself, feel comfortable all evening in it. Also, the yellow one is the same colour as the Pantone of the cover text (look right). In other news, my hair was actually flawless for an hour, but that was at 7:30 in the morning, and it was a stressful and windy day, so no one who saw me at the launch would’ve known about the perfection.

After all the wind and stress, I was vibrating six inches above the ground by about 4:30, so I gave up on reality and went bikini shopping with J. When she found exactly what she wanted for $4, even though it is definitely not high season for these things, we felt it was an excellent omen for the evening ahead.

J. drove me downtown and I left her with her dinner companions and went off to look for The Walrus, which according to subscribers contains a review of *Once*, which I would very much like to obtain a copy of. I walked quite far, but no love, so I walked back to the The Gladstone Hotel to meet my mentor Leon Rooke, editor John Metcalf, publisher Dan Wells and kind benefactors Steven Temple and his wife Jennifer.

I have no idea what was said at dinner. I think it was nice. I think I was fairly appalling company.

My family came (the other Rosenblums do not have a web presence–they are much more self-effacing than I) and I introduced them to everyone. Eventually, we went upstairs to the gallery reading space, which is very very pretty (I’m so sorry, I had my camera in my bag the entire night and didn’t once take it out. In fact, I lost track of the bag for more than two hours, and am pleased to still have a camera, as well as my wallet.) At first, it was pretty quiet in the room, though with the family, the six of us from dinner, and stalwart friend Scott, we still could’ve had a nice little intimate event.

A few more cool people trickled in. A few more–and they brought me gorgeous flowers. Then a lot of people came. I signed a bunch of books and then the amazing This Is Not A Reading Series team, headed by Chris Reed and Marc Glassman, shepherded everybody into their places, those being off in a wing beside the main presentation space (not an actual stage–hooray–nothing for me to fall off or trip over!). Chris introduced Dan, who gave a warm speech on the history of the Metcalf-Rooke Award (er, that would be the thing I won!) Dan introduced Steven, who talked about the state of bookselling and publishing in general. It was a smart speech, quite funny, a little scary, but I *am* looking forward to being unjustly ignored by history! The key is the worthy few who will protest the injustice. Also, I’ll be dead by then.

Leon and John were also then introduced, each with their long lists of accomplishments and kindnesses and books (it was then that I actually started hopping up and down. Not *too* many people could see me in my wing, though!) Then they presented the award, a cheque that I was expecting (and do heartily appreciate) and a trophy that I was not expecting, and also really appreciate. It’s so much nicer to display a pretty engraved glass thing than a cancelled cheque!!

When I got called out of the wing to accept these things, I was then able to look forward into the gallery and see all who were there. So as I was smiling and thanking, I was also boggling at the people sitting on the floor and clumped in the doorway and sitting on the steps in the hall. I totally owe every friend and stranger who came out last night, but among the most deserving of gratitude are those who listened to the whole thing *from the stairs*. Thanks, guys.

Thanks also have to go John and Leon, who spent most of our presentation eloquently batting a ping-pong ball of praise for my work back and forth while I, catlike, watched it fly over my nose (I was sitting in the middle). I think it is human nature to discount praise and honour criticism, but when such esteemed folks as those say such amazing things, well, it at least makes a girl think wonders *might* be possible.

The ball was struck my way a number of times, of course, and I got to talk a bit about waitresses, a bit about sex, magic, work and relationships. All the good stuff. I liked the Q&A, too, especially when Julie Wilson said something nice about my dress (and asked a cool question also).

And then I signed a *lot* of books. It was very very fun, and so amazing to see so many people, although I’m afraid I didn’t really chat as much as I would have liked. By the end, my signature was a scrawl and my head was spinning and the evening was closing in on ten. But there were amazements still to come. I’ll point-form it for you:
–I met for the first time the astoundingly talented artist, Marta Chudolinska, the creator of the linocut art that graces my cover. She is as lovely as I had expected. I hugged her rather hard.
–my parents stayed out until past ten o’clock.
–Very briefly (and disastrously): indoor Frisbee!
–two launch attendees, invited by me but unknown to each other, struck up a conversation and, after a few minutes of talk, discovered that they are cousins. Much embracing ensued.

It was pretty great, though I had made myself fairly ill with anxiety before hand, and the room was quite warm, and after all guests had departed, I wound lying down on a table to talk over the evening with Dan (yeah, I know, I’m working on this). I had meant to go play *outdoor* Frisbee, which would have been much safer, but I was clearly in no condition to do so, plus hadn’t really *talked* to John and Dan in the whole lunatic evening, so we went down to the bar for a while.

It was so great to be sitting still and listening to good talk, and as woozy as I was, I clung to the tabletop with my fingernails like a child that does not want to be sent to bed. I made it until nearly midnight…so I think I got the whole of the day.

There will never be another like it, I’m pretty sure.

Love is noise
RR

September 15th, 2008

Moving Right Along

It is comforting to know, unless I actually spontaneously combust at tonight’s launch (note: highly unlikely; no need to wear anything flame-retardent), the world will continue to be amazing.

Emily Schultz’s lovely multi-city short-story web compendium, Joyland continues to be a joy, showcasing great and strange new stories by authors like Claudia Dey and Lydia Millet. And as of today, there’s also a story up there by yours truly. The piece is called Black-and-White Man and I’m really thrilled that’s being included in such an amazing project.

On Wednesday, I’ll be attending opening night of Atlas Stage’s production of George Walker’s Theatre of the Film Noir, which is exciting not only because I like George Walker and haven’t been to the theatre in a while, but also because the last time I talked to star Magdalena Alexander, her enthusiasm for the project was practically pyrotechnic. If you come to opening night, there’s a party afterwards at the Drake, but the show runs in Canada until Sunday (or, if you’re going to be in Poland, also in October…)

Ok, enough distractions, back to worrying about tonight.

Now that it’s raining more than ever / know that we’ll always be together
RR