One thing leads to another...

Sedona's winter sunsets are glorious.

As autumn blew into winter, and winter is now shifting—ever so skittishly—toward spring, I’ve been thinking a lot about transitions. Something about a season’s changing always leaves me feeling a bit unsatisfied, usually because I haven’t traveled, hiked, written, or lived as much as I’d hoped to during that particular time period. It feels like loose ends or unfinished business.

Similarly, transitions are important in writing, getting smoothly from one sentence or paragraph or chapter to the next. When I don’t take the time to add missing transitions as I’m polishing a piece, it feels unfinished and choppy. Transitioning from one idea to the next may be as simple as adding a single word to show relationship: “Now.” “Next.” “Then.” A complex idea might require a phrase or sentence to summarize before the writing continues.

But sometimes that transition or lead-in may be as subtle as echoing structure, sound, or rhythm. Techniques like alliteration (repeating a sound) are usually associated with children’s stories, poetry, and songwriting, but they can be effective in prose if they aren’t overdone. And deliberately amusing when they are: One of my favorite books, Nancy E. Shaw’s delightful Sheep Take a Hike, makes me smile every time I think about it. The language of the story pulls the reader along as much as the tale itself does. 

Language is a rich medium that offers endless possibilities beyond mere communication. Adding transitions, especially in casual writing like an email message or a blog post, may seem like a detail that’s unnecessarily time-consuming. Or maybe even a little condescending, like scattering breadcrumbs along a trail where the destination is clearly in sight. But transitions make the journey easier and sometimes even fun.

Now, if only winter would take the hint….

Living with deadlines

Aspens in autumn, Flagstaff, Arizona

Getting projects done on time is definitely a big part of a writer’s life. Someone once suggested to me that I should start referring to my deadlines as “lifelines.” His reasoning was that even thinking the word “dead” was bound to create negativity and stress. I saw his point. Furthermore, saying “I'm working late because I have a lifeline” would better reflect that writing is my livelihood, something that supports me.

But the new terminology never stuck, and years later, I’m still saying and thinking “deadline,” even though other options abound. Due date? (Working on a book is a bit like a pregnancy and delivery, especially the labor aspect.) Completion date? (Blah.) Target date? (Nope—creates a sense of anxiety that I might miss the target.) I’d like to call it a “freedom date,” but that may lure my focus away from the project at hand to the fun that beckons beyond it. 

Try as I might to create balance—put more life into a deadline—things still tend to come to a standstill when my focus narrows to one project, one date. Less urgent projects (and blogging) get shoved to the side. Personal trips are cancelled. Creativity leaks away from other areas like cooking and gardening. Life dies a little bit.

The idea that a word or label creates its own reality might be considered New Age, but it isn’t new. For centuries, humans have uttered mantras and prayers. Across different cultures and religions, creation and completion is linked to sound or word or logos—om, amen, shalom, salaam. We shout “Abracadabra” to create magic, or write “I will [fill in the blank]” a hundred times when we (or our schoolteachers) desire change. Words hold power. 

Hemingway said that he once revised a passage 39 times in order to “get the words right.” I haven’t yet found the right word or phrase to replace “deadline.” But I’d like to think that I continue to add more awareness to the term. Death, after all, is just another transformation. It’s as essential to life as winter is to the cycle of seasons, an in-gathering of energy before a fresh burst of creation. Without a deadline, I’d probably keep tinkering away on the same old project instead of beginning something new.

Deadlines. Can’t live with them. Can’t live without them.

The Journey to Keet Seel

Keet Seel Canyon, Navajo National Monument

Not long ago, I read a travel story about Keet Seel, an Ancestral Puebloan site within Navajo National Monument, located about 20 miles south of Kayenta, Arizona. The author’s take on this very special place is that it was an arduous, unpleasant trip and, though the ruin was impressive, it wasn’t worth the effort of getting there. I was astonished.

The facts of the article were absolutely correct. Yes, it is a difficult hike. It’s 8.5 miles (one way) in summer, when it’s hot as blazes and when, after July, afternoon thundershowers can turn a hike from just plain hot to hot, humid, scary, wet, and chilly. (Personal experience speaking here.) The author mentioned such miseries as flies, livestock, sand, lack of water, and a steep exit from the canyon. He neglected to mention the quicksand. (Also personal experience.)

But the reward for the hike to Keet Seel was being able to enter one of the most magical places I have ever visited. This Ancestral Puebloan village, occupied 700 years ago, is tucked into a sheltering alcove, and it looks as though its residents simply picked up walked away. Part of the magic is that Keet Seel can only be visited in the presence of a ranger, and only by five or fewer people at a time. The spacious coolness of the alcove is impressive. The quiet is awesome. These qualities would be lost in a crowd of people. And who knows what else might be lost at this historic site (or along the route) if hundreds of people tramped through daily.

The author’s chief complaint was that Keet Seel is open to hikers only in summer months, and he directed his displeasure toward the Navajo Nation, which administers the monument in partnership with the National Park Service. Personally, I’m thankful that the strenuous nature of this journey keeps the experience rare and special, and grateful that local tribal members have chosen to limit access this way. Keet Seel is not an appropriate “sacrifice site,” a term coined by an archaeologist in reference to cultural sites that are opened and promoted to the general public in order to educate or entertain. Though Mesa Verde’s Cliff Palace is magnificent, it has lost an ineffable something because of the crowds who visit there. The long hike to Keet Seel, on the other hand, is an opportunity to let go and prepare to be transformed. We need both types of places.

At least, that’s my perspective. And as I re-read that article about Keet Seel, I realized how much travelers’ (and writers’) perspectives can differ. One person’s paradise can be another’s ho-hum. A big part of this is the expectations and experiences we carry with us like baggage when we travel. And I think that as a culture, we’ve gotten used to things that are easy and comfortable. When I write travel stories, I think it’s important to report things accurately—the difficulty of a hike, the expense of a popular destination. But I also believe it’s important to look at things with an unjaded eye, to make room for magic. There can be a fine line between being discerning and being dismissive.

Now that summer is here, Keet Seel is open once again to day hikers and backpackers. (Advance permits are required.) If you don’t like flies, or heat, or challenging hikes, you can "settle" for easy canyon-rim trails with great views. But if you’re ready to let modern life fall away as you walk through Navajo land, and then enter an ancient village with fresh eyes, put Keet Seel on your bucket list. 

A writer's bookshelf

Centuries ago, book ownership indicated that a person was of high status. If that were true today, I’d be at least minor royalty. (The Countess of Coconino County, perhaps?)

Over the years, I’ve given away boxes and boxes of books. Even so, I still have so many books that it's chore to move them. Ounce for ounce, I’d say my biggest haul is reference books. Yes, the web has many resources for writers, but sometimes (when I’m hiking, for example, or dashing across the room to identify a bird singing outside) going online isn’t convenient. Plus, I have what could be described as an ambivalent relationship with my computer. Or maybe, after reading books and writing books for most of my life, I simply enjoy picking up a book and flipping through the pages, even if it’s just to look something up.

For a book author, the reference bible is the latest edition of the venerable Chicago Manual of Style, now in its sixteenth edition. For magazine articles, it’s the Associated Press Stylebook. I own both, as well as a glossary of words and expressions. I’ve noticed that my glossary use is related to the number of years I’ve been out of school—maybe needing help remembering the difference between “affect” and “effect” is one of the early effects of aging … which eventually affects us all (just practicing, sorry!).

A good dictionary isn’t as essential as it once was, thanks to all the great resources online, but I’m happy with my Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. Other books I use include a brief etymology guide for sleuthing the origins of words. (I’d prefer the 20-volume Oxford English Dictionary, but that would fill a shelf all by itself.) Roget’s Thesaurus is helpful when I’m at a loss for words or, more likely, when I find myself repeating the same ones too often. I occasionally need to refer to my French and Spanish dictionaries. And I’m still schlepping around my Harbrace College Handbook, a handy grammar/composition guide I’ve had since, well, college. Yikes.

The internet has opened up vast doorways for research … often to my dismay, when I go online to find a quick answer and realize I’ve spent a half-hour or more following a tempting trail of breadcrumbs. A site I especially like is howjsay.com for pronunciations of words. Even after all these years, those little symbols are difficult for me, especially the ones used by Wikipedia.

I also have shelves and boxes of maps, atlases, and project-specific information such as field guides. I find regionally published books especially useful, such as the field guides produced by Grand Canyon Association and Western National Parks Association. For cookbook projects, I use Joan Whitman and Dolores Simon’s invaluable Recipes Into Type.

I realize that my life would be more Zen-like if I could rely entirely on the internet. But these are old friends, moving with me and helping me write dozens of articles and books. When I first starting freelancing, buying reference books represented an investment in myself. Seeing them on the shelves or opening one and breathing in the scent of ink and paper evokes a multitude of past experiences and projects, and holds the promise of more.

As Cicero once said, “A room without books is like a body without a soul.” I read that in a book somewhere.

Write What You Notice

Blame it on spring, but lately I’ve been on a kick about the ways in which writers—and everyone else—interact with the world. “Write what you know” is a common instruction for aspiring authors. Like most clichés, it holds a kernel of wisdom. But but don’t write only about what you know; write about what you notice.

Here in the West, it’s easy to get caught up in the larger aspects of being outdoors: the clear air and spectacular views, the aerobic challenge of mountain hiking, the attention-getting rocky terrain. Everything seems bigger and bolder. But here—like elsewhere—the real magic is in the microcosm.

Desert four o'clock, mirabilis multiflora

Nature reminds us daily to pause and look closer. We are surrounded by stories. A penstemon that was brown and dry a few weeks ago explodes with green leaves and a stem that appears to reach inches taller overnight. Heavy buds burst into bloom and bees follow, until the air vibrates with color and sound.

Look closer still: A nipped stalk might be the work of a javelina. Most Sedona visitors and quite a few locals have never seen a collared peccary, yet on nearly any trail you can spot its hoofprints, similar to deer tracks but smaller and closer together. Look for scrapes where a herd has searched for roots, or find scattered prickly pear parts, remnants of last night’s meal.

Look again at that prickly pear, and you might see a jumble of twigs, home to a woodrat (a.k.a. packrat) who cleverly arranges spiny cactus parts to discourage visitors. The nest, likely occupied for generations, may contain shiny treasures fallen from hikers’ pockets, or even pollens preserved since prehistoric times—a treasure for archaeologists. In so many ways, the world around us is interconnected, layered with stories.

“It is not a matter of miracles,” says Buddhist teacher and author Lewis Richmond, “but a matter of noticing.”

Opening your eyes, using all your senses, perceiving intimately—this is what separates tourists from travelers, whether you’re on the road to Grand Canyon or traveling the road of life. Write about what you notice, and your words are authentic, even inspiring. The everyday sparkles with the numinous, the deeper layers that call to our sense of beauty and connect us to the miraculous.

The Secret of the Senses

Cliffrose near Walnut Canyon National Monument

When I’ve spoken to other writers about making their work more sensual, a few have jumped to conclusions, thinking I’m suggesting they change their manuscript from a memoir or mystery into a romance novel. What I mean is this: Whether you’re writing a romance novel or a travel story, involve the five senses in your work.

I learned this simple technique at the very first writing workshop I attended, about 25 years ago. At the time, I’d published poetry and corporate materials, and I'd finished a romantic suspense manuscript that had just been politely turned down by Harlequin. The workshop leader, Richard Jewell, was published across a multitude of genres and markets, and his advice was universal and easy to implement. To date, it remains the most valuable workshop I’ve ever taken.

Some of us respond well to inspiration, some to nagging. I respond to practicalities and tools, and Jewell matter-of-factly shared several over the course of a couple evenings. Incorporating his suggestions, I revised my manuscript and sent it to the next publisher on my list. It sold.

Are you ready for the secret?

Ground your words in the reality of taste, touch, sound, smell, and sight, and they will come alive. Incorporating the senses in your writing is a bit like cooking, however. If you add too many seasonings, or too much of one spice, the dish will be unpalatable. Instead, sprinkle in the senses in proportion to how we use them.

Because most of us are visually oriented, sight—describing how things look—will be the dominant flavor. Very likely, you’ve incorporated the visual sense intuitively, without having to think about it. You may have even overdone it—too much description and not enough dialogue, for example. The danger of engaging so much with the virtual world is that we rely more and more on the sense of sight. Without including the other four senses, our writing can become as flat as our screens. 

Though sounds may be harder to spot in your writing (just as we often don’t notice the sounds around us once we’ve become habituated to them), we rely heavily on our sense of hearing. Does your fictional heroine respond to a footstep in the dark? Does your travel story include the sound of the wind or the pulsing beat from a nightclub? Include a sound on each page of your story.

The sense of touch--the itch of wool against skin, the slick coolness of a glass of ice tea--should pop up every couple pages. Smell and taste are more challenging to incorporate, especially if you’re writing nonfiction, but a dash of these every few pages will add immediacy to your work: the bitterness of stale coffee, the heady vanilla-like scent of a blooming cliffrose.

When you engage all five of the reader’s senses, you’ve opened a doorway into your world—the one you’ve created on the page (or screen)—and the reader becomes an active participant. 

Try it. I know it sounds simple, but what have you got to lose?

The Writer's Craft: Learning From Failure

I’ve always been more intrigued by questions than answers, and I find the fluteplayer image painted or carved on cliff walls throughout the Americas (but most famously here in the Southwest) particularly evocative. Is the fluteplayer a traveling salesman, a supernatural being, or a specific individual? Does he symbolize fertility, rain, seeds, music, or a particular ceremony? 

Fluteplayer pictograph near Sedona, Arizona

I had a lot of time to contemplate these questions while acting as a volunteer docent at Palatki, near Sedona, leading tours of alcoves containing centuries of rock art. One afternoon, a set of possibilities magically shaped themselves into a children’s tale. Thus far, it is the only time in my writing life that I felt visited by a muse. I decided that destiny was playing its hand, and a couple weeks later I sent off the completed manuscript for Kokopelli’s Gift expecting great things: a major publisher, a fat advance, tons of sales, maybe even tie-in products like notecards or refrigerator magnets or, heck, why not a Kokopelli stuffed toy?

The manuscript limped back, rejected.

As the saying goes, this wasn’t my first rodeo, so I knew that I needed to detach, reprint, package, stamp, and send it to the next publisher on the list. And the next. And the next. And the next.

All tolled, I queried and pitched dozens of publishing companies, coming close only once before the book finally found a home at Kiva Publishing, a small company in California that specializes in Southwest-themed books. Owner/publisher Stephen Hill had a talent for matching up writers and illustrators, and he contracted a gifted artist from New Mexico's Santa Clara Pueblo, Michelle Tsosie Sisneros, to illustrate my story about a mysterious stranger who visited a drought-stricken village.

Though I’d expected fireworks from Kokopelli’s Gift, I received instead a small but steady flame that still burns. My articles and guidebooks have been ephemeral—useful to travelers I’m happy to say, but out-of-date in a month, a year, five years, whisked away by rack-jobbers or replaced by new editions. What pleases me most about Kokopelli’s Gift is that it's beautiful (thank you, Stephen and Michelle), and it endures (thank you, muse).

I might have given up on this story after the first round of rejection letters, but I once knew a novelist who sold a Gothic romance twenty years after writing the manuscript, when Gothic fiction resurged in popularity. The obvious moral is “never give up.” In other words, be committed. But there’s an equally important corollary to this moral: Don’t mistake attachment for commitment.

If you’re attached to your story, you may not make necessary revisions, or you may resist tailoring it to a publisher's needs. If you’re attached to a particular outcome—being published, getting a six-figure advance—a sense of failure is likely after a few tries or a few years, and you’ll probably throw in the towel.

But how can you be committed and detached at the same time? 

For most of us, this is one of life’s greatest questions, and there’s no easy answer. Like an archaeologist searching for the past, you may need to dig deep to uncover the origins of your attachment. My attachments, I’ve found, are often responses to feelings of lack or fear. When you’re able to bring up an attachment and look at it in the hard, bright light of day, you can begin to free yourself. Then, with renewed insight, you can commit to your progress as a writer.

Flowers in the Desert

Poppies and phaecelia  in the Sonoran Desert

Spring brings improbable splashes of color to the rocky deserts of California, Nevada, and Arizona. Something about flowers blooming in an arid landscape calls to the human psyche. Photographers and travelers hoping for an iconic scene dial hotlines or check websites for wildflower reports. (Desert USA is a superb resource.) Gorgeous coffee table books by Larry Ulrich or Jack Dykinga get snapped up along with wildflower field guides. Many of us bring home seed packets, hoping to replicate Mother Nature’s annual surprise party in our own backyards.

What is it about flowers in the desert that speaks to us so? Certainly, they are a metaphor for perseverance. Or for finding beauty in unexpected places—a swath of golden poppies at the base of a rocky peak, a red plume of Indian paintbrush bursting from a split boulder. A flower in the desert also reminds us of the ephemeral nature of beauty and youth: Here today, dried sticks tomorrow.

Speaking from a writer’s standpoint, I think that the vision of a tender plant surrounded by cacti, dirt, and rocks creates a feeling of tension. It’s like starting a story in medias res (in the middle of the action), intriguing the reader with questions: How did this get here? What happens next? There’s a sense of impending doom, for you know this delicate flower won’t survive the harsh desert summer.

Or will it?

What I’m getting at in a roundabout way is that all types of writing, even nonfiction, can incorporate fiction-writing techniques to pique the reader’s interest or simply to entertain. Though I haven’t written poetry in many years, I still think about rhythm, consonance, alliteration, and other poetic techniques when I write travel pieces. Similarly, I’ve found that the ingredients of a compelling novel—tension, conflict, characterization, sensuality—often work well for nonfiction.

Maybe you’re writing a piece about an upcoming city council meeting, or a blog post about using Facebook for marketing. As you re-read the draft of your article, think of the wildflower in the desert that makes you stop and take a closer look. Have you unconsciously incorporated storytelling techniques in your work? Will readers feel compelled to stop and take another look themselves? Will they ask, "What happens next?" 

The Writer's Craft: Spring Cleaning

George Orwell once said, “Good prose is like a windowpane.” Getting your prose to that state of clarity is, of course, not as simple as it sounds. Maybe that’s why Orwell also said, “Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a bout of some painful illness.”

Though spring is associated with fresh starts, writers need to polish and prune all year long. A few quick tips at making every word count:

Organize. Take a metaphoric step back and look at structure. Rearrange or toss out words, sentences, and even entire paragraphs that don’t support your story. If you’re in love with a section that simply doesn’t fit but you can’t bear to trash it, save it in a “Cuts” folder. Chances are you’ll never miss it and never return to it … but it’s there just in case you want to try it on for a different project.

Lose the deadwood. Can you say the same thing in fewer words? Helper verbs (was, been, have, could, does, etc.) aren’t always helpful. Take a closer look. Maybe you can even trim a letter here and there. (“Toward” is better than “towards.”)

Go for more color. Cut back on nonspecific verbs like “went” and aim for something better suited to character, setting, or story, like “raced” or “dawdled.” Trade in vague constructions like “There are” for something more pointed.

Retrain. Look for overused words or lazy habits. Make a list of your usual suspects and search them out. (Use your word processor’s Find feature if necessary.) Eventually you’ll recognize the offenders as you’re typing and replace them automatically.

Tweak, trim, and repeat until your prose sparkles. Self-editing is a skill that can be acquired through practice or with the help of a style guide. A classic is Strunk and White's The Elements of Style.

Which writer are you?

Everyone’s a writer, or at least it seems that way these days. Blogs, Facebook posts, e-newsletters, self-published books…. I could go on, but for someone like me who’s old enough to remember how thrilling it was to break into print (i.e., ink on actual pages) and who’s still dreaming of writing a hardcover bestseller—well, the new reality can be a bit disconcerting.

I feel a bit like a traveler who suddenly realizes she’s hopelessly lost. But years of traveling have taught me that getting lost sometimes leads to great discoveries. First, I needed to discover—or uncover—what kind of writer I am. Or, in other words, who have I been all these years?

I’m not an artist. Some writers are. Terry Tempest Williams comes to mind. For me, her evocative prose triggers a spectrum of senses and emotions, and the visual images inspired by her writing linger long after reading. To reach out and touch someone … that’s art.

And I’m not a storyteller (but how I wish I were!): the writer who keeps you up past your bedtime so that you can read just one more page. Paragraph. Chapter. (Oh, wait—is that the sun coming up already?) Nora Roberts, John Grisham, Diana Gabaldon, Val McDermid…. I bet you have a list of favorites too.

Me, I’m more of a bricklayer: A blue-collar writer who approaches writing as a skill more than an art, as a job more than a calling. My dad was a union carpenter, and like him, I go to work every day and apply my skills to different projects. He helped build bridges or buildings. I’ve written novels and articles, press releases and brochures, technical manuals and poetry. I’ve worked for publishers, businesses, a film producer, and even other authors. And when writing gigs were thin on the ground, I took second jobs to learn more (proofreading, editing, page layout) or to earn more (retail, teaching yoga, housecleaning).

Many people think of writing as a purely creative pursuit. I agree in one sense: You have to be creative at how you pursue writing if you want to make it a bigger part of your life. If I waited for the muse to strike, most days, I’d just be sitting here. Waiting.

I prefer to think of writing as a craft. Tools, mentors, experience, luck, inspiration, hard work—take these “bricks” and over time you can build something that looks a lot like a career. Travel writer and bricklayer, that’s me. Now that I’ve settled the question of who, it’s a question of how. And why. Did I choose travel writing, or did it choose me?

Since the “hows” are pretty straightforward, I’ll start with those, in between writing about what I like best: traveling.