Re-examining the Writing Life: Seeking the Spirit

It's been awhile since I wrote a Weekly Good. It's been a busy time, full of plans and deadlines and wonder. In the middle of it all, I've been spinning.

I'm rethinking some things seriously right now.

I notice that writing has changed for me these last few months. While before, it was a sanctuary, now it doesn't always feel like that.

I notice too, that the act of writing as a spiritual practice has also changed.

Questions I'm asking myself right now:

-Part of sharing one's work with the world is also to share oneself with the world. But at the moment, I wonder at what cost does this sharing come?

-How can I write about things that move me, and move others, but not lose myself?

-How can I keep my life simple, with a focus on what inspires and feeds me?

-Where is the service inside being known? Is there any? If there isn't, then how does one balance it?

-What elements are vital for my writing to be what it always has been: a sanctuary?

-What is the spiritual practice in writing for others? In writing for oneself? Are these related or entirely different?

The Weekly Good is short and simple this week. I am asking myself many questions about meaning and significance, about accolades and service, about simplicity and seeking.

AGA

Safety Lessons Among Women: Women's Travel Fest Musings

Hanging out with lots of empowered, wonderful women all weekend, including Felicity Aston, who crossed the Antarctic solo! Interviewing her in just a few weeks and can't wait! 
 

Last weekend, I was guest speaker at the Women's Travel Fest in San Francisco, which was a whirlwind experience of talking travel and the issues and joys of traveling as a woman. The panel I spoke on was the Safety for Women panel, and it was an honor to be included alongside such traveling women luminaries as Mary Beth Bond and Beth Whitman, as well as travel physician Dr. Natasha Bhuyan, and WTF organizer Kelly Lewis.

After the panel, I got a lot of questions from women about traveling solo and travel in general. While I normally don't write how-to posts, I felt one was in order as there were so many good questions and important conversations exchanged that afternoon.

Here we go!

Are you ever afraid when you travel solo?

Yes. I am often afraid. But I think what is more important than overcoming fear or wishing for it's absence is to be comfortable with it being alongside you. Fear keeps us alert and aware, and these two things are very important when you are on your own in a new place. There's nothing wrong with being afraid--as long as it doesn't keep you from exploring and discovering.

Are you afraid of getting raped when you travel?

Yes. I am afraid of getting raped anywhere, traveling or not. I've been raped, right here in the USA, and I've written about it here. But that didn't happen when I was traveling--it happened when I was at home in my apartment. This was a long time ago--more than 15 years ago. I didn't travel at that time and I didn't know much about self defense or ways to protect myself.

Things have changed.

Prevention is the best way to not be raped. But sometimes situations happen, and when they do, you must try to remain in control at all times, keep a level head, and be self aware.

The best way to handle those moments when you realize you are at risk is to be wise and think carefully about the situation. You must be able to turn it around and look at it differently. How you can leave? How you can talk to him in way that dissuades him? What self defense moves can you use? Who is nearby that can help you?

Part of traveling as a woman is to deal with this fear of rape--but this part of a woman's experience, period, no matter where she is in the world: at home, at work, at the store. We women deal with this risk every minute of our lives, and travel is no different.

So work on protecting yourself at home, and you will be well prepared for what to be alert to abroad.

What is the one thing you suggest to be safe while traveling for women?

I think confidence is important--if you are confident in your decision making skills, you will not rely on others. Thinking back on when I have been at risk when I traveled, almost every single time it happened when I doubted myself and relied a man to make a decision for me. It's important to inform yourself about where you are going and be responsible for your own decisions, even if you are tired or confused.

What are some of the untruths you hear from women about their safety abroad?

"I'm safe because I'm older, and no one will bother me."

This is what I hear the most. Some women think after forty, they are not going to be at risk. Not true. Not even true after sixty!

"I'm safe because I'm in a European city."

There are the same issues facing women everywhere they go. You have to be smart wherever you decide to travel.

"I'm safe because I'm on a tour."

While tours and group travel can be much more structured with less opportunity, they can also null you into believing that you don't have to pay attention to your surroundings, and this is when things happen.

"I'm safe because I have short hair and/or dress more masculine."

Hey, lots of women have dressed in men's clothing or pretended to be men on their travels--and still had issues! Dervla Murphy is a great example of a woman who rode her bicycle to Coorg and thought she'd have no trouble due to her short hair and men's clothing--she was wrong. The good news is she protected herself and the assailant ran away.

How do you deal with men when you travel?

I treat them like brothers. I remember that every man I meet is six women: his mother, his sister, his wife, his daughter, his aunt, and his cousin. Each one of these women is a possibility of a more intimate picture of the culture or place, and I ideally I want to meet them. The man is simply the bridge.

Oftentimes, I am initially  interacting mostly with men when I travel, as in many countries I travel to, women are not common on the street or in shops. So I do talk to men a great deal, but I always am seeking to know more about the women in their lives. Usually a man will understand if I ask questions about his family and so on that I desire to meet them, or at the very least, that I am not available sexually to him.

One of the big issues that I deal with is that sometimes men ask me out or for a drink when I travel. I always decline these invitations, not because I don't want to go, but because these are not the kinds of experiences I'm seeking. I want an intimate view of a place, and hope to be invited to an event such a wedding, a dinner with family, or other occasion. These kinds of events are where the good stories are--not battling a man groping me.

What do you suggest for clothing?

I was asked this more than any other question after the panel--it was big concern.

Well, you can find lots of great resources online about packing lists, so I won't go into detail. But my basic advice is that you must dress much more conservatively than you would at home, depending on your destination. If you are going to a country like India or Pakistan or Oman, you should dress in loose clothing that doesn't cling. Another suggestion I have--which I practice every time I go to country that has a specific costume of dress for women--is to go to the tailor right away and have a few outfits made in the local style. Sometimes I head right to the local market (mall) and tailor from the airport.

One thing to understand about Western clothing is that even what we consider conservative is not conservative everywhere else. It's not so much about being covered, as it is not showing the curves of the body. So while hiking pants might seem conservative at home, in India they are hugging your behind and long loose shirt worn over them would be wise.

This not to say that it is a woman's responsibility when something happens to her while traveling due to her dress--it is more that while you do have the ability to travel, that doesn't come with the added bonus changing cultures or societies that you visit. It's important to leave your own cultural ideas at home, and be open to what your sisters are doing abroad.

Do you think women should travel alone?

Yes. It's deeply enriching experience to travel alone. I've been alone for most of my travels and never once have I wished I was with someone else--even when something difficult happened, like illness or danger. There is a spontaneity and serendipity that comes with traveling alone, where I am the one in charge of the next moment.

I have also been on trips where I was very isolated, and I would say, high-risk for a possible negative interaction with men. But the risk was outweighed by the stunning minute by minute revelations I had as I was on the journey. I actually seek out these kinds of experiences which are very solitary in nature now, as they are so fulfilling.

I prefer villages and places that are remote, but these places can sometimes be more safe, because everyone knows of your arrival before you even show up. In an urban environment, where people are accustomed to tourists, men may have incorrect ideas about women who travel solo and may interact with you with expectations.

If you aren't ready to travel by yourself, a group is good idea. Just don't stay with them the whole time, and give yourself permission to wander off and do your own thing now and again. That can be an adventure, too.

What is different about traveling as a woman compared to a man?

Well, this depends on the woman, as much as the man. In general, I would say that women and men have access to almost all the same kinds of experiences, but that some of the experiences that are typically things that are uncommon for women to do may require extra precautions.

Women are able to do anything a man can do, for example, ski across the Antarctic like Felicity Aston just did solo. She was the third person to do it, but she was the first woman! And many more women are having adventures like these worldwide. Women are everywhere, doing everything.

That being said, women have access to distinctly different experiences than men, because we have access to the world of women. We have invitations to wedding preparations, births, rooftops, kitchens, gardens, and more---events men will never get invited to, with views they will never see. One of my highlight experiences of my life was walking up a mountain with female nomads; another was joining an all-woman religious pilgrimage; and a third was attending a childbirth. There are women everywhere, and we, as sisters, get to connect with them wherever we are.

It is an advantage--not a disadvantage-- to travel as a woman, because we have access to so much.

 

What are your safety tips for traveling as woman?

Take a self defense class. Take a martial arts class too.

Recognize your weaknesses and insecurities before you travel and strive to overcome them.

Practice getting lost and finding your way without asking for help.

Exercise so you are faster if you must walk or run from a situation.

Bring birth control, a morning after pill, and self care items.

Safety list would include: large scarf for hair, sunglasses, doorstop, locks, toothpaste to fill peepholes, and a travel clothesline for dissuading nighttime prowlers from entering your room

Pack half of what you want to take. No exceptions.

Purchase conservative clothing that is not low cut or body hugging. If you are traveling solo, attention from men is desirable only if you want it, so unless you are headed to a tourist spot or  resort, dress with practicality and common sense.

Tell people your itinerary before you go, and have check in points along your trip.

Research your destination like crazy--the trip starts now! For example: If you are going to Jordan, your trip actually starts months before you go. You are in Jordan, live it, breathe it, know it.

Most importantly: ignore everyone who tells you can't do it.

For more detailed list of safety tips from the conference and general travel tips, Marybeth Bond did a great write up here.

For a packing list of what to take, Women on the Road features my all my time favorite packing list for anywhere you want to go, here.

Don't be afraid. Go.

It was a pleasure to meet you all! Hope this answers all the emails and questions you all sent! AGA

Questions I Ask Myself

I haven't written a Weekly Good in awhile. This one is about how the big picture changes when the questions you ask of yourself as a writer change.

One of the curviest roads in world, from my Morocco journey. Entering the writing life is a lot like driving this road: it can either be scary or thrilling.
 

Change, lots of it.

Things have been changing very quickly in my life and I'm not really sure where to start. Or if I even should explain anything at all. I've been thinking about questions. Questions I asked myself a year ago and new questions I'm asking myself now.

Twelve months ago, I was so excited to get something published and it was fun to play with where I wanted to publish things or even different genres--fiction one day, a travel story the next day. I wasn't thinking about the big picture. I didn't even know what the big picture was. People told me what they thought it would be for me, but it felt very far away and foreign. Different landscape and language.

Now, I think about the big picture all the time. And I've come to see that the right questions are very important in defining what that picture is and how big it can become.

Back at the start of all of this, when I wrote a plan of what I wanted, I felt somewhat ridiculous, as though I was writing things for someone else's life, not mine. Things that seemed preposterous. All those goals were accompanied by questions, which looking back seem obvious to answer, but at the time, they were new.

---

Should I publish in that journal?

The difficulty of deciding whether to write for free and when. This was answered very quickly with the piece I published in The Nervous Breakdown, which was fiction and kind of an experiment in breaking out of travel to see if I could do it. It was easy to do and putting it on a site that had good literary connections--despite not paying--was practical and logical.

Is that anthology something I should pursue?

The decisions of looking at the quality of work of others that will accompany my own, and having to determine if that meets the standard of what is expected of me. I was asked to be several anthologies that were not travel anthologies but memoir, and I turned them down, because I felt it was not the direction I wanted to take my work. I think being asked is very nice, but to say no is even nicer, because it is saying yes to yourself and your larger goals.

Is it ok to tell that editor what I think?

Saying what I think and measuring it carefully--talking about controversial ideas and approaches. Having self doubt and wondering if I'm even the person to have that conversation. Realizing that if I'm in the position to think the thoughts and articulate answers, then I am the right person. Albeit, measured.

That advice I asked that person for wasn't very useful. Should I ask them for advice again?

When you are new at something, you look to the established people in whatever genre you are writing for advice. At first, when I started sharing my work, I saw myself in the world of travel blogging. But I quickly realized that was not a good fit for what I do. I went through a lot of advice at that juncture, trying to decide where I fit and some of that advice was very limited. In particular, I realized that I wasn't a travel blogger, I was a literary writer who writes travel things. I had to learn to seek out advice that worked with that. Now I focus on literary writers, adventure/travel writers, and essayists for advice, as well as editors. I don't pay attention to advice outside of those folks, because it doesn't apply and it's focused on things I'm not. Works for others, isn't going to work for me. [Note: travel writer doesn't mean travel blogger. These are two very different approaches to writing about places and peoples, and using travel blogging principles to write literary travel pieces actually hurts the work--and vice versa. These two schools are in same universe, but not on the same planet. This was a steep learning curve for me and is an important daily consideration in how to tell a "travel" story, who my audience is, the longevity factor of a piece.]

Should I bare my soul about that story?

The difficulty of writing memoir and deciding where to share it. Recently I wrote a blog post for a friend, and realized that it would be the last time I would write something so personal that would not end up on my own site or in a book. Even writing it, I was aware I had to set some of the story aside, for later. Personal stories have value, not just personal value, but dollar value. So now I've decided to save them for books and larger narratives.

Is social media helpful?

Obviously, I've decided that it is. It is powerful, if you use it well. People make a lot of mistakes, the main one being they only keep people in their circle who are just like them. That is a tremendous error. It just means the same fifty people are sharing what you write, over and over again. That says nothing about the quality of what you are producing. Get a poet to read a travel story, and then you know you've written well.

Who should I network with?

One thing I learned right away is that some people are important to know, and others are not. Just because other people think someone has influence means very little unless they actually do. And even if they do, that influence might be relatively small--it might be that they are at the top of the heap, but when you look around, that heap is a very small heap. The big picture forced me to have to predict where the influence of others might land and if it that influence was worth maintaining. Oftentimes, it was not. I learned to do my own homework about which editors, publications, and writers to network with. One thing that I came to embrace fully was that I write for the whole world, and I'm interested in connecting more in that world. This means not staying specifically with an American audience, but shifting simultaneously to  Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and India. Of course I am American, and I will always write for American publications and readers, but I still remember the day and Indian editor called me and asked me to write for him. This was the first step to crossing over into an international network.

What is "real" writing? Can writing be bad? Is everyone a writer? What should I write?

I asked myself this a lot the first year. I saw a great deal of writing which was badly written and I felt terrible that I thought it wasn't good. It was hard to think that. I'd always had the idea that anyone could write: what I learned is that yes, anyone can write, but not everyone can write well. Sometimes in certain genres, certain writers are celebrated as being really wonderful and yet they are mediocre, more about marketing themselves than creating quality.  On the other hand, I read many writers who wrote stunning pieces that were simply articles. So I learned that real writing is not about the topic or the style of the writer, it's only about: do they write well or not--and do they write about A, B, C is a new way? Discovering this was a tremendous relief after entering the writing world publically very quickly and realizing I was going to have to write many different kinds of things. Anything one writes can be fabulous, but only if the writer makes it so.

How should I deal with criticism?

I'm actually writing a post on this for next week and I hope you check back for it. But the basics are: the better you get and the more published you are, the more readers you will have. And for every hundred who love you, ten will hate you. And then there is that layer of readers who don't hate you but are bothered by your success and like to send you little notes correcting your grammar, set up almost-hate mail campaigns on social media, and so forth. It's all relatively petty and at the end of the day, you have to ignore such pleas for attention, even if it grates on your nerves. It's not part of the big picture, but how I deal with it is. This has caused me to ask questions: why do people feel insecure? Why do they compare? What is the benefit that they get from such interactions? I realized it's important to understand the why, not just try to ignore it.

---

I figured out the answers to those questions organically, as the year passed. And now I look at that list of goals I wrote down when I started and am not surprised that I met every single goal. Not because I'm particularly driven, it is just what happened. Maybe too, the big picture wasn't that big a year ago, so the goals were easier.

Instead what excites me is writing out the next set of goals, which surpass anything I have ever thought of. This time I am including things which I could not imagine doing, just for the hell of it, to see if I will really do them. This time I'm forcing myself to move outside of my own expectations and the expectations of others: limitless. Why not?

---

There are different questions this time around:

What is an explorer?

How do the voices of women fit into the larger literary travel narrative?

How far can I push myself?

How will travel publishing change in the next five years? How is what I'm doing helping that?

What defines adventure?

How can I tell the stories of others differently?

What is my network going to look like? How can I tie this into being a citizen of the world?

How are my concerns about women's rights and the environment going to play into my work?

What books will I write and who should I choose as influencers for those books?

How does physicality play into the narrative of a journey?

How many books do I want to write and what locations will I choose for those settings?

How much memoir will I share within those books?

Which editors do I want to work with and what kinds of conversations and connections do I need to make so that I can collaborate with them? (or) How can I maintain the editor relationships I have now, and how can I take them farther?

Now that I have my agent, what kinds of discussions do I need to have with her? How will she influence my publishing decisions and even my schedule?

Those are my meandering thoughts tonight. I'm on a thrill ride, and it's not going to end anytime soon. Just saying that and acknowledging it makes it easier to ask the hard questions and seek the deep answers. It's interesting to see how the questions I'm asking have gained depth because I have gained confidence. This time around, I am more interested in creating new ways to think, new ways of doing things, breaking the rules and the comfort zone. It's going to be a fantastic year.

AGA

Someday I will Be Fearless

This is a photograph of mine from Tikal, Guatemala: surely the most fearless vulture I have ever seen, and I often think of this bird and wish I could trade places with it.~ AGA
 

The first story I ever told myself was a story called How to Be Afraid.

I did not think of writing it down at first as I was very young, and could scarcely write my letters. Later, writing was dangerous, and once found it could be torn, eaten. And of course, there would be punishments. Instead, it was an oral tradition I started with myself, a long list I committed to memory, a guidebook to help me navigate through a world of adults.

I was about six years old when the story began to take shape. At that point, I had the awareness that grownups said different things than what they did, and that they created stories about who they were.

It was a dangerous time, an unsafe time. I never knew what would happen, and I did not yet know how to read people and trust my instincts. I did not understand why bigger people frightened me; I only knew that at night I would pray fervently that they would not come into my room. I lined up protections around me. Charms. Dolls. Rosaries. I crossed my arms over my chest and lay still, pretending not to breathe.

They came anyway.

They seemed to like the fear they inspired in me, and I did notice that. I recall looking at the ceiling and taking myself to new places and planets, a time traveler. I remember that I went to Australia and walked in the desert; to India, where I saw painted elephants; to France, where I lived on a barge that was covered with pots of geraniums. But I never let on that I was somewhere else. I was careful to keep my expression fearful, for I knew otherwise they would hurt me more. Yet I was always worried I would be found out, for I came back from those trips smelling like crushed geranium leaves and with sand between my toes....

~

This short memoir is based on a larger one that is buried deep in all of the stories I write. The full short story, Someday I Will be Fearless, was just published on The Honeyed Quill, last week. Read it here.

The Weekly Good: Words Are The Best Lovers

Last March I ended things with my long time boyfriend. He was from Argentina, and had seduced me with Mercedes Sosa songs and the way his piano hands moved although he did not play; how he peeled an apple, in one swift ribbon; and the poems he recited in Spanish so quickly I did not know what they meant but I did not care.

Still, despite the fact it was over with him almost a year ago, I don't write about it.

But the last few months have been so crystal clear in purpose, so unrelentingly focused on words, that I have myself questioning the idea of repeating that kind of love, the one with the Argentinian, and why he was in my life at all. The idea of a partner. Or even, the idea of a husband.

I have noticed a pattern with men in my life. Now some might say this is because of who I am or who I have chosen, but I think how we meet another is much simpler, like of a series of random events that cause a collision or a field of safflower to bloom early.

But back to the pattern. The truth is, I'm extremely capable, strong, and passionate. And I'm all these things on my own, without anyone to focus my attentions on. Men who have shown up in my life are strange creatures who seem to like this enthusiasm, energy and giftedness for resilience. At the same time, they have all seemed to need nurturing and a great deal of attention, even if on the outside they appeared to be someone different--perhaps they looked capable and strong, too--but that hasn't meant that they were.

I have never minded the giving of those things: the nurturing, the attention. I have equally loved the whole nesting experience with another.

Until last March.

It occurred to me, last March, that if I wasn't so busy nurturing and giving and cooking and listening and being attentive, I'd have more time to write.

This thought came as shock, electric. It was a revolutionary thought, secret. I kept it on the inside but I was sure he could see it on my face, as I looked at him and considered what it would be like if I loved him but he was absent. Could I not love him just as much, whether he was there or not? What would the kitchen feel like, to move around in, without walking around him? Maybe that space would feel hot or cool, or maybe I would feel nothing.

He moved from the kitchen and I went and stood where he had been standing. The air in that spot was the same temperature as the air around it. I allowed myself to touch the counter he has been touching: the crumbs were the same crumbs. And under my feet, the linoleum was rippled and scarred, as it was all around me.

He was eating at the dining table and I looked at him, and he reminded me of other men I had known and cooked for and done dishes for and packed lunches for and reminded and texted and hugged and kissed. They had all eaten the way he ate, with the salt and pepper shakers on the table, the napkin already forgotten and drifting to the ground, the hands expert at cutting steak, which I had never mastered. In fact, watching him, I realized the only time in my life I ate meat at all was when I was with a partner, as they all seemed to consume large pieces of animals often and it was difficult to cook two dinners.

I realized that I did not want to cook two dinners anymore. Nor did I wish to pick up that paper napkin on the floor, or slice through a brown and red thigh of a cow.

I sat at the table and watched him chew, the knife in his hand part of a set I'd brought back for him from France, each knife decorated with a bee on the handle, with blades made just for beef. He had beautiful hands: slight, fluttering like birds. He cut a bit of meat and then slid it on his fork, carefully, slowly, balancing.

"It's over," I said, matching the cadence of my words with his fork in measured time, as it went up into his mouth and out again. I said more words, but I have forgotten what they were now.

He kept cutting and eating. He stared at the roses he had bought me, which were not even in a vase yet, but leaning in the water pitcher, haphazard, already wilting from the kitchen heat.

His face said he did not take me seriously.

"When will you have this writing thing out of your system? " He leaned forward, his hand waving his knife in little swooping circles as he spoke. For emphasis.

And just like that, snap! It was broken.

"Never." I looked at him evenly, knowing that tonight I would not clear his plate, nor wash the dishes, nor pack his lunch in the morning. I would leave that napkin on the floor for days until he picked it up himself. I would throw out those French knives decorated with bees, because I don't eat meat. I would not have roses on my dining table. I would have a bowl of fruits: pomegranates, kiwis, and nectarines: all the exotic fruits he had eaten before I could get to them. I would write every single day, from now on, from the moment I got home from work until I feel asleep. I would dream in words, uninterrupted.

At some point, much later, he left. I nodded a goodbye. The tears had already passed. I was at my desk, writing. Which is where I have been ever since.

Words are the best lovers.

“Take up one thing. Make that thing your life. Dream of it. Think of it. Live it. Let the brain, the body, the muscles, the tissues, every part of your body be given over to that thing. And just leave every other thing alone. This is the way to fulfillment and the way great spiritual giants are produced.”

— Swami Vivekananda

Yes, please leave a comment. Nice comments always encouraged. AGA

The Weekly Good/Retreat: Turns Out, I Am a Nun Afterall

I was on a retreat last week.

Medieval nun writing/Creative Commons
 

It was strange, that I had looked so forward to going--for weeks and weeks--but once the deadline came around and I had to leave my life and go somewhere away from it, things happened to prevent from me leaving.

Some of these things were pleasant, such as jobs given at the last minute by an editor, but other things were of my own doing.

When I finally dragged myself to the car with my suitcase and pile of notebooks for writing, it was a day late, and I'd missed the first session of writing time.

Truthfully, I wasn't sorry: I think part of me realized I needed space, not group activities.

I spent the almost four hour drive while stuck in traffic thinking about all the things I needed to accomplish while at the retreat: my list was pages long.

Once I arrived, I was taken to my tiny, closet shaped room with its twin bed and spare furnishings, all I wanted was to get under the covers and eat chocolate bars and day dream. I wanted unplanned time, desperately.

I was also reminded of the retreats I'd been on when I was younger, when I was searching for spiritual satisfaction: how many convents and monasteries I had visited! How many little rooms I had sat in just like that one, waiting and wishing for some grand epiphany that did not arrive. I liked the unstructured times during those spiritual retreats, too: just thinking--or not--for hours.

And that is precisely what I did, most of the time, on the retreat last weekend. Sometimes I wrote and conversed and planned, but most of the time I did absolutely nothing.

Curiously, on the first night, I wandered down to the basement of the retreat center, where there were all kinds of art supplies and lots of women fluttering and chatting and collaging and papermaking. I sat at a big collage making table, assembling a collage I had no intention of keeping: I just cut out the shapes and glued them on to be doing something. I listened to everyone talking about their special projects they were making and wondered at my lack of sentimentality: ever since I decided to simplify my life, I'd been less attracted to art-making.

The collage making went on until it was very late at night and the basement rooms were freezing cold; yet, I stayed on because there was a woman there who I was exchanging life stories with. When I told her about my life long desire to be a nun, and how it had taken me all over the world and into darkness when I decided I could not be one after all, she said the most curious thing:

"But you have become a nun, of sorts." As she said this, I was both surprised and also instantly pleased. How strange it was that someone I just met knew this about me, when I did not know it about myself.

She elaborated, telling me about how my focus on writing and words to exclusion of some other things made me a bit nun-like. Or perhaps very nun-like. And what she said rang true.

We talked about a lot of things that night. I told her how no one told me about how my life would change when I decided to write more than a year ago--and not just write, but be devoted to it. No one sat me down and said, you will need to choose some things over others. In fact, it all happened so quickly, almost as if I fell down accidentally. There has been no time to consider what I lost or what I gained; indeed, I have scarcely thought about any of it at all. but sometimes I have fleetingly glanced at something I miss, because putting writing first has been such a huge commitment that I said goodbye often. Sometimes it has been a goodbye to a love affair that had no room for writing in it; other times to just-blooming friendships, which I did not have time for; and material possessions and sentimentality also have gone away too.

At the end of the four days, I felt several things: a bit fat from all the chocolate bars and the hearty food, well rested and of clear mind, and ready to deal with 2015. But most of all, I felt very comfortable with the decisions I've been making lately, to choose to be succinctly focused on words and stories. I left, feeling settled and at home with myself.

The weekly good: turns out, I'm a nun after all..of sorts. I like that. I like it a great deal. This is how my 2015 begins: unfettered, clear, purposeful, and at peace with my spiritual path of words.

[The Weekly Good is a journal-style blog entry about whatever I'm finding to be a lesson or a very good thing in my life. Sometimes I have to look for it, and others, it's easily to find. AGA]

The Weekly Good/ Tim Cahill

The Weekly Good today is a person. Tim Cahill. He wrote a book which changed my life.

Some years ago, when I began a lengthy journey around the world, I found myself in the Panama jungle, living in a tiny community of Ngabe people. I can't say precisely why I ended up there, except that someone who lived there had asked me to visit. But I can say why the visit turned into a very long stay: it was because of a book.

It wasn't just any book, it was Tim Cahill's book, Jaguars Ripped My Flesh. It was the first travel book I ever read. Before discovering his book, I hadn't even known about travel literature as a genre of writing.

I didn't bring it with me to that remote mountaintop village--it was given to me by the Ngabe people who lived there. There was a small library, full of damp and molding books donated by Christian missionaries and volunteer workers, and resting among them was Cahill's book, left behind by a Peace Corp worker.

The people in the village loved his book. They could not read it, since they did not know English, but they revered the jaguar and held a special place for any person who survived a jaguar attack. They presented his book to me as though it was a holy thing.

And it was.

I spent many afternoons outside the village tuberculosis clinic, reading it to a small crowd of patients and their children, who asked questions about what he was doing in each part of the book. It wasn't me explaining and retelling his stories--it was him. He was a real person, alive, sitting with us on a tree stump, hands moving as he told his tales.

~

I was afraid in the jungle. I had never been so outside of what was familiar: everything I knew and had learned was wrong among the Ngabe. I was not an expert at anything. I had nothing to offer. I was exhausted by trying to adapt, and I often wanted to leave those first few weeks.

But Cahill's book changed that. I saw a person doing things he was afraid to do. I saw him embracing challenges. And I realized I could choose that, too. I could be fearless, or at least walk along side the fear.

His book became my constant companion. I memorized long passages from it. I could hear his voice speaking the words, telling me to pushing myself harder. Stop fighting. Be more open. Learn.

And so I stayed. I stayed in that jungle for many months, until I forgot who I had I had been when I arrived.

~

About a year ago, I met Cahill in person. His voice was exactly like I had imagined it would be. Since that time, he has been a constant mentor, guide and friend. But really, he became that mentor in the jungle. His book changed my life. His stories changed my path. Because of his words I started a journey that I haven't stopped: living a life without fear. And he continues to inspire me to write well and deeply, to overcome, to refine my voice.

I am so blessed and so extraordinarily happy with life tonight.

AGA

The Weekly Good/Authenticity

The weekly good today is authenticity, especially as it applies to the travel writing genre, although I think what I'm about to say could apply to anything, really.

The word "authenticity" is thrown about wildly these days. Everyone talks about being more authentic: we can buy books on it, watch television talk shows devoted to it, pay for weekend seminars to find it. We can travel to the other side of the world to explore it, as some locales are sold to us under the guise of being a hidden secret envelope of authentic experiences, a culture and society with practices far different than our own which have the key to ending our selfish stagnation. If we are truly devoted to it, we can seek out a belief system, giving us the basic precepts which will lead us to it, guaranteed, if we follow the rules and act with discretion. Or we can go the another route, and reject everything known and come up with our own set of reasonings and rules which lead down the road to authenticity.

 I'm sure some of these things work, in great measure or small. But I think authenticity begins and ends with what is inside of us, what our desires are and how that fits with our purpose.

I speak as someone with experience. I've done some of those things I listed off above. I've always strived to be authentic, not because of any particular inner drive, but because my early life showed me that there was a significant difference in the ways and outcomes of how one choses to experience the world. Authenticity itself, as a way of living, seems like it will take a lifetime, as for me it's part of the larger process of self actualization. It is only in writing, in words, in stories, that I have met authenticity head on with some success. In trying to learn how to be authentic I have given up a great deal, but what I have gained is a real voice, solid, comfortable. That voice is something that I get to keep, but I also have to continue working for it. It is a constant stretch of my mind and a letting go of what is easy, popular, or convenient.

Writing, and travel writing in particular, is well acquainted with writers and bloggers which dazzle the reader and audience with claims of authenticity. On one hand, I don't want to add to that, which is one reason why I've never written this kind of thing on my website before. On the other hand, we are in a state of chaos as a genre: the genre itself is in need of an overhaul, as the things that bind us together, the love of place and cultures, is being torn apart by a lack of authenticity.

What I notice happens when people reach a moment's respite from the pressures of selling oneself and products (including places) and they stand momentarily on that plateau of authenticity... is that sometimes they promptly fall off. Money is the grand divider, generally speaking. As is fame, importance, accolades. People moved by these things remind me of puffer fish, puffing up over nothing, the temporary taking center stage when it is the journey itself that is our master. An example of the temporary taking our attention away from being authentic is when people pay more attention to marketing than to words. A perfect example of the creative death of the writer within.

Now, marketers might argue with me about this, but then that is to be expected: that is their job to convince me that I cannot get followers or readers based on talent and hard work, but must jump through artificial hoops. Now, that's not saying some of those hoops aren't useful--they are. But the center of the stage is for the stars: the words themselves.

I've been writing and participating fully in the genre of travel writing for about a year, and what I see are two very distinct camps. The first camp is made up of editors; fine literary travel writers in the traditional sense; wonderful writers from other genres who are entering the travel writing scene and changing it for the better; and some incredibly talented heady and far reaching websites and blogs that cover travel and place in a quality way, sometimes mixing promotional/service pieces with words well crafted.

And then there is the second camp. The second camp is not discussed often, as whenever it is, bruising occurs, for it is a bit like a soft ripe fruit from an overwatered tree that rapidly grows fruits that look delicious but are lacking in flavor, fragile and mushy.

The second camp has tiers with in it, but basically, these are writers who are blogging and writing various kinds of travel writing, which is not authentic and not well thought out. Sadly, (unbelievably!) many people enter the world of travel writing to make money as their first priority, and writing and love of place through an authentic voice is never considered to be a possibility that could work in tandem with their platform. So it comes off like paid marketing, rather than writing. But it doesn't have to...

 It's time for these two worlds to not be in separate camps, but collide.

We are at moment in history that has never happened before: people no longer need to read travel writers to discover a place. In the past, people relied on travel writers to show them the world, and while it's true that there are still "undiscovered" places, most places and peoples that want to be found have been. And while this state of affairs has been in progress for some time, at this precise moment, right now, people are looking for something new.

It's not just as simple as that, that people are looking for something new. People have lost hope, and are depressed, lonely, isolated, oftentimes working jobs or living lives which don't fulfill them. And one thing we know, from being travel writers, is that we understand that, because we too, were unfulfilled until we got off the couch ourselves.  And it's not just our personal lives that need good travel stories to take us places: our world, in many ways, is falling apart. It is in a state of environmental emergency paired with the disappearance of entire peoples, languages, animals, plants, and histories. In this rapidly changing landscape, the travel writer has a new role, the one of activism. A travel writer can be an activist for truth, telling what they see,  sharing it wisely, and showing--not telling--what is happening in the places they visit. This can be done in any context, whether writing a personal essay or writing about a tour; whether writing for a literary anthology or writing for a cruise line. This is truly the birthing-time of the ethical travel writer.

What people need travel writers to do, is to be authentic. People need talented wordsmiths, who craft gorgeous stories about places, and who put themselves inside the story. People need authenticity, truthfulness, and connection to the writers they read.

Activism might seem like a  strong word, but if all travel writers worked hard to craft beautiful stories, essays, and features about places and the people they find there, imagine what it would do the genre. It would lift it to its proper place, a place of illumination and education, a place of soul searching and identity. Travel writers have the potential to do something no other writers can: they can go places no one is going, and they can write in such a way that they bring people there alongside them. They can show the world as they see it, not from some lofty place, but moving about it intimately.

This call to authenticity could be applied to anyone writing for the public, whether they are writing about childcare and being a mother, or politics and gender, or exploration and environment. Each genre crosses over into the next, and each genre has a special way of looking at the world at large that can be expanded to include more of what is real.

It is, however, the travel genre that needs immediate attention tonight. A call to action.  I hope you consider these suggestions as they are given: subtle for some, wild and expansive for others, but hopefully enriching either way.

Some Ideas For Writing Travel Authentically:

1.) Don't write what you don't love.

If you are writing stuff that is not good, admit it, and stop doing it. If you don't have the time to write something well, write less, and write better.

2.)  Words are gifts.

If your response to that is that content is the paycheck, then think about this: why does content have to exclude being in love with the writing you create? Shouldn't you be crafting the most amazing informational piece of your life? Words are gifts.

3.) Write more. Brand less.

When I see someone talking more about brand than writing, the first thing I do read is their work, and I can always tell that it would be to their advantage to write more and brand less. If your website talks about brand more than writing--and frankly if it is more than a mere mention--you aren't writing. You're selling. Who are you selling yourself to? Your readers? Other bloggers? Possible editors? Well, if you're any good, you won't have to even mention it. Just produce good writing on your topic or place every single time. Talking about how great you are just says, "I'm not that great." Writing well says you are extraordinary.

4.) Disclose.

If you write for paid trips and promote places in exchange for writing about them, provide full disclosure. Personally, I've stopped reading any travel blogs that don't disclose at least the basics. I don't like being sold something; I want to read about the inner journey or at the very least, the truth. This may not be possible all of time, for example, on paid pieces. But on your website, it is entirely possible.(This is supposedly a controversial topic, but I'm not sure why it would be. Seems both practical and logical to me.)

5.) Work on the core. Writing well. 

Things like SEO and so forth are important, but what is more important is that you write well. Work on your writing every single day. Crossing over into other genres helps a lot, because it gets you in touch with your voice and makes your narrative stronger. Personally I pay no attention to SEO or followers. I have them, but that's not why I get writing jobs. I'd also add this bit of advice: take anything a marketing person says with a great deal of salt. It's their business to sell their ideas to you, use discernment. Don't lose your authentic voice to gain readers, you'll be unhappy if you do. Maybe not right away, but eventually you'll be leading a life guided not by who you are, but who you purport to be. If you're really set on getting your site marketed, then consider this: get a writing teacher or mentor to balance that out--preferably someone who writes incredibly well in the literary tradition. You have to work on the core, too, not just the Emperor's clothes.

6.) Create writing that lets readers linger.

Just because writing in a particular fashion or format is popular, doesn't mean you need to do it too. Most of the time, things are popular because they are easy, not because they are worthwhile. Let's use the example of lists, as I'm using one as a tool here rather than the centerpiece. If you use these kinds of tools on their own, it is not writing. It is a tool. Figure out how to connect popular ways of doing things with a richer narrative that shows your talents. Believe that people want worthwhile content and craft your work so that you raise the bar not just for yourself, but your readers. They will come to see your writing as a destination, a respite where they can take hold, rather than a five minute escape.

7.) Experiment.

There is no golden rule that says you have to stay in your category, and yes! you really can be authentic  and write beautifully on any platform. Try writing for a literary travel anthology. Try writing for a content marketing firm. Try writing for a cruise line. Try writing for a travel website. Try travel poetry. Try travel sketching alongside essays. Try a magazine about a topic you've never written about, like sailing or history. Try all these platforms on, and pay attention to the quality you contribute, as well as the quality of the writing alongside you. You may find yourself a trailblazer of sorts. Travel writers, to be authentic, need to be renaissance writers, able to dabble and sometimes delve deeply into everything.

8.) Move outside of the travel genre.

Maybe your work gets followed by people writing exactly what you write, but that is no huge coup. What would be more impressive if you got writers outside of your genre to read your travel writing and like it. If you can do that, you're writing well. If you can do that and still meet your obligations as a travel writer, you've achieved authenticity. Now repeat that, over and over, forever.

9.) Push out, not in.  

Follow and read travel websites which push your limits about what travel writing is. Move out of your comfort zone and your network of people who write about the same things you do. For example, if you write family travel, try reading the websites of Artic explorers for awhile. Or if you write literary travel, try on luxury travel blogs for awhile. (I'm always fascinated by what I learn about what I like, love, or need to improve about my own work when I leave my comfort zone.)

10.) No is a beautiful word!

Say no to promoting things you don't like, or that don't fit your platform. My own choice is to keep my website and travels promotion free, but if the time comes that I decide to incorporate that, it will be because it fits with I'm trying to create. If you have any doubt, say no. No is a beautiful word!

This is our moment, as travel writers. We hold a lot of power and influence in creating ways for people to see the world, but only if we are authentic. Authenticity attracts because it is needed. Give yourself the gift of making authentic choices in your writing this year and in your life.

The weekly good is authenticity. It's time.

AGA

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The Weekly Good/ Goodbye

“If you are brave enough to say goodbye, life will reward you with a huge hello.”

— Paulo Coelho

The weekly good today is saying goodbye.

Christmas Eve is always a charged time for me. It is, as some say, complicated.

I decided to end my relationship with my family some years ago, and it really took quite awhile for me to get used to the lack of familial structure during holidays. Christmas Eve, in particular, was especially painful. What does one do, when there is there is no obligatory dinner to attend, no stockings to hang, no mandatory gifts to buy, no photos to take?

In past years, I filled this void easily: I volunteered at homeless shelters, packed up boxes for the food bank, baked dozens of tins of Christmas cookies, attended a lengthy Latin mass.

But this year, I'm doing something different. I have embraced some of those same traditions, but with an added twist. I've come to see that Christmas is not gifts, nor trees, nor religious services, nor being with anyone in particular.

It is, instead, an opportunity for reflection and self examination, as well intensely examining the people we choose to have in our lives. I'm using this Christmas Eve to think about connection and saying goodbye in a positive healthy way to experiences and people that don't shine. Sometimes relationships shine for a little while and then when you stop polishing them, they get dull again. It is a process of discernment to determine which connections to polish and which ones are not worth the effort.

What relationships have I chosen for this life, and are they of value? How are these relationships creating peace? Not world peace, but the peace of the self.

I know what you are thinking: a relationship that creates peace? It doesn't sound like the connections we are used to making. But peace is not possible between two people when there is a great deal of space between them. Not physical space, but the space of understanding. You can't force understanding: people are in their own worlds, and either they come into it by some immeasurable kismet, or not at all. Sometimes it feels like we are walking around blind, blessed with deep friendships and familial connection only when we accidentally bump into each other.

Oftentimes, I have felt pressured to keep people in my life that did not earn their place in it. Family, for example. One's family can be even terribly kind and warm and loving--but if they deny your truth, then suddenly that kindness, that warmth, that love, it looks different. At least it does to me.

And even friends: sometimes I have kept people near out of habit, as I have known them for years. Other times, I have allowed people in that perhaps I should not have, based on what I thought I saw, or perhaps hoped I did. But life changes. And it is okay that it does. It would be strange if it didn't.

Each time I question a relationship in my life, I have to question myself, too. There is the question of what did I contribute or not, to create something that did not function. Always there is a lesson.

But these goodbyes have to be made, to make room for renewal. This is the time to make decisions which will carry over into the new year. It's not a sad thing, letting people go. I allow myself to miss them, to linger a bit. As Paulo Coelho says, it takes a huge effort to free yourself from memory. There is remembering, and then there is reflecting in what was, but no longer is, without waiting. Just moving through it.

I've come to love goodbye.

Goodbye means something new. Goodbye is a good thing. It doesn't mean you don't wish someone well. It only means you are choosing for them not to be an influencer in your present.

If you are one of those people who is like me on Christmas, wondering how to define a holiday for yourself, when all the people you're supposed to be with aren't present because they don't fit with who you are: celebrate it. You are allowed to write to write your own life story, and you are allowed to choose all the characters in it. It's a positive place to be standing tonight, a night whose story is about what is new and coming forth.

The peace of the self is as important as world peace. In fact, I don't think world peace is possible if we are not at peace with ourselves.

Wishing you a blessed Christmas.

AGA

The Weekly Good/ Two Suitcases

“The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.”

— Hans Hoffman

Image: Creative Commons
 

The daily good today is not one thing, but two: two suitcases.

I bought two suitcases today: they are black and big and have a hard shell, and they sit in middle of my bedroom, waiting.

I'm not going anywhere yet. I bought them to fill. I bought them to limit myself, limit my possessions.

I've been working on simplicity for some time: I have gotten rid most of my clothes and books and sentimental objects. But I knew I needed to have more self discipline, especially where I live. In the United States, we are bombarded with information that does its best to convince us that we need more. More of everything. Despite my hard earned self discipline, I often tempted by things of beauty, color, and form..as well as books, paper, and little things.

I felt having the suitcases and limiting what I owned to what could fit inside them would be an exercise that was both poignantly practical and deeply spiritual. I suppose , too, the idea of the suitcases is symbolic. Letting go and filling are recurrent themes in my life.

As I stood in the shop staring at all the varieties to choose from, I felt a little overwhelmed. There were so many kinds: I'd thought it would be a simple decision. But it turned out that choosing the suitcases to store your life in is actually quite difficult. There are the distractions of texture, of color, feel. But the biggest distract is the finality of such a choice.

I choose two, and bought them, and took them home. I lugged them up the stairs and stood looking at them, kind of astonished that the space they took up would represent my material existence on this planet. I will admit that I cried a little, for it is a letting go of the highest order to attend to such a task.

On the other hand, there is a methodical joy that comes with choosing carefully. I don't think there is anything quite like it. It's always interesting when I come to this choice (for I have simplified to this extent a few times in my life) that people try to reassure me, telling me I can store things with a friend, for example. But we are not here long enough to really need to store things with anyone. We have the ability to be freed of things, and it is good for us to choose total freedom.

It is good for me, anyway.

The last time I made this choice I was preparing for journey around the world. Oh, the agony of giving my things that I had loved away! It was swift and cutting, and my attachments were many. I did actually store a few boxes with a friend, and when I returned some years later, I was kind of appalled at the material objects I had thought had value, because they had none to me after my journey. I learned from that. I learned that sentiment is not terribly useful, as things don't represent memory: stories do.

I've been cutting loose more than material things these days. I'm cutting loose people, ideas, fears. Some days it feels like I am a snake, constantly shedding one skin for another new one, over and over and over. This can be both exhausting and rejuvenating. But I know that these peeled layers are not useful and do not fit with who I am, and even if I want them to belong, they don't. Life is short and unknown, and I've found that is important to understand timing. There is not time to make wishful mistakes, there is only time to choose as wisely as I can. Sometimes this hurts, but it then again, it feels good at the same time. Letting go is an act of being in the moment and being present, rather than reacting to the past, which is what attachment is based on.

During this life of mine, I feel quite directed and purposeful. My inner life, inner world, is quite complicated. I have lengthy dialogues and conversations with myself and my past selves which need attending; I have writing set out for the coming year, and very little time to think about other things. This is why simplicity works for me: it gives me a clearing, a space in my head to make room for writing.

This Christmas week I have a few days off, and I've decided not to write during that time, but instead to fill those two suitcases and get rid of the things I don't need. It is a physical act, but it is also a mental one too. It is creating a clearing and a space that is in alignment with my goal for 2015: to make words and the act of writing holy.

Holy. Meaning sacred, consecrated, divine.

There is not enough space in these suitcases or in my world for things or thoughts or people which distract from that purpose, which is a new way of looking at writing: it is not solely a craft, it is a calling. I think choosing the word holy puts everything in a different light, and I find, already, that I am beginning to see the temporal quality of what is around me.

And now, I'm going to go pack for the rest of my life. I am looking forward to choosing what I love, what I need, and the ease of choice after the suitcases are full.

AGA

The Weekly Good/ Faith

The weekly good today is faith.

Writing is an act of faith: the idea that one will write something and it will make sense to another human being is kind of preposterous, let alone the idea that it will become their story, too. That it moves, swiftly gliding through the muck that rises between us as people, the muddiness of the workings of individual experience, and somehow manages to appeal to the collective hive mind.

Then, too, living is an act of faith: simply getting up the morning, putting clothes for a job one hopes to keep or lose, sitting at the kitchen table munching toast and making plans... means one believes that it will all happen, that one will be here in one hour, as well as that afternoon and the next day. Paying bills, dreaming of vacations, filling up the gas tank, cleaning the house for guests that will arrive on the weekend, breaking up with lovers because there is something better, finding your true self, speaking your truth. It all means you must believe in something more than your small self, as on your own, you are little more than a collection of atoms loosely strung together, like Christmas tinsel, glinting, reflecting.

Reflecting what?

When I was a small child, I recall having a balcony once, off of my bedroom. I was not supposed to go out on it, but I did, often, during that short time we lived there. I would wait until everyone was quiet and sleeping, and then I'd slide the glass door slowly so it would not make a sound.  I would step out on the balcony and look up a the sky.

It was big, and I was small.

I would listen, and I would talk, long winded monologues, secrets, private mumblings in code. Perhaps there was someone listening to me, too. How badly I wanted that!

At some point, perhaps eight or nine, I decided someone/something was listening. It seemed impossible to me that the things of beauty that I could see, existed accidentally without some magical string of lights to bind then together. It also seemed impossible that no one was listening because things were getting better in my child-life, and I felt it must because those fervent speeches I made on that balcony that year had been heard.

It was also more than that though: a settledness in myself. It was as though a glass jar of pebbles that been shaken so hard that it shattered, but instead of the feeling of absence that comes with such violence, it was peaceful. There was a strange order in the glass and pebbles mixed together and spread out, everything in its place. It felt as though all the elements had separated and then reformed in the pleasing pattern.

Later on, much later, I would often return to that feeling of being spread out, perhaps even walking on the glass shards but never being cut. I was always above, appreciative of the design below. Sometimes the patterns of the design didn't show up readily and it was only after an set of actions put into motion that I saw the purpose of what seemed random at first being an unfolding.

Once, I was Guatemala, in an outdoor market, buying vegetables and plastic flim-flam things I don't recall. The market lane was very crowded, packed with people doing their weekly shopping. It was a bright sort of loudness, and there were several kinds of music and chickens in cages and fish in big turquoise buckets.

Then the crowd parted wide, like arms opening, and a person came walking slowly down the center of the lane, feet barefoot on the ground that was littered with candy wrappers and vegetable trimmings. It got very quiet and the music was still playing, but like in slow motion, far away, like multiple music boxes when you stop turning the handle. The sound that stood out above all others was the difference of the crunch of the person's feet on bits of plastic and then the slick slipperiness on torn cabbage leaves and mango peelings.

The person looked different than anyone I'd ever seen. Their face and body looked run over, with tracks of violet and blue, red patches like birthmarks and grey brownish bits here and there. They walked slowly with their head high, and people looked away, or covered their children's' faces.

There came the moment when they were no longer far away, but quite close to me. I stood by the fish stall, surrounded by the sea, the smell of fish and salt and lime. I saw the person in a different way now, their features all out of place, like bubbles or bumps, rather than a nose, mouth and ears. I felt them moving deliberately towards me it. I stood very still, counting their steps, their gait measured despite one leg dragging a little behind. It was scarcely noticeable, because they were walking with such regal purpose, on a straight line to where I stood. But the dragging had a rhythm: one, long two, shuffle, repeat.

Our eyes met, and I realized that they had not been in an accident. They were a leper. I had never seen one before, although I'd read descriptions  once or twice. Strangely, once I realized this I was not sure if I should look away or not, I did not know what would be best. Yet they kept moving towards me, staring at me, and it felt like there was no one else there but myself and them. I could hear the rustle of people stepping back, and I could see a blur of blues and greens and reds,  hands and faces, but just barely, for I was pulled in entirely by the leper's gaze. I did not discern male or female; I only recall their eyes and our connection.

My market bags were full, and I held one in each hand, the plastic handles bowing and the material pulling against beets, carrots, tomatoes, spices, dried beans, tinned fish. I felt myself moving forward, being pushed, something in the small of my back, sharp. Not uncomfortable, but distinct, concentrated, forceful. I moved without walking and found myself in front of the leper, face to face.

I set my bags down. The leper picked them up and kept moving, not pausing, until they were gone, and the crowd blended again together.

It was so extraordinary, it felt like God was there.

I'm remembering this incident today, as I have felt lately that there are no ordinary happenings, and that the things cast in front of us or that we leave behind are connected to us having been heard at some point. I am leaving many things behind me right now, and as I turn away from them, I feel that same familiar pressure in the small of my back, and find myself moving without walking again.

The weekly good today is faith. Everything is placed where it is for a reason, and even if we cannot see the pattern in this moment, it is there. Things that are out of place don't touch us, we are far above them, looking down below. And when we are the ground, a force is with us, guiding, protecting, showing.

When you stop and think about it, there's nothing ordinary about one's life.

 

AGA

The Weekly Good/ Trust

“I get by with a little help from my friends.”

— John Lennon

Photo credit: ©amygigialexander 2104/ Graffiti on wall on the inner city of Fez, Morocco  
 

The good today is trust.

Being a grown up is difficult. Even at forty six, I cannot quite get over how different it is than when I was eight years old. Eight does not seem that long ago, eight feels touchable, close. Eight is the age I had a friend called "K" and she and I used to lie on the grass after it rained, and stare hard at the sky, looking for UFO's, which we had read came after a storm. Or we would imagine we did not have the lives we did, which were strained and a bit rough at times: we never spoke of these things, but we knew. We would listen to Cat Stevens on her brother's tape deck and pretend to live the lives of others: Amy Carter, Princess Lea, the daughter from The Planet of the Apes. Our conversations were possibilities. I could say anything to her, and she could say anything to me. Two sides of the same.

She was the most wonderful friend, and yet I cannot recall her name.

But when I think about friendship and what defines it, I think of her. She was always present, a listener, a jokester, an advice-giver. She knew things I did not, and somehow my world at eight was easier with her living inside of it.

Real friendships like the one with "K" were harder to come by as life moved forward. Young adulthood was strange and uneven, and I lacked the focus to maintain friendships for very long. People came, and they went, and it did not seem to make a big difference either way, life seemed long and effortless. Then middle age came rather abruptly with marriage, divorce, religious revelation and cancer in quick succession, and the main friend I had made in my life died rather sadly and at her own hand. Before she died, just days before, we met for lunch at our favorite spot.

"I have something to tell you.' she said. "You are real."

I did not feel real when she died two days later. I did not feel real when the phone rang and I held it as they told me and I knew when her name was said, one word, "Grace', that she was gone. Somehow I just knew. I did not feel real when I discovered, alongside most other people in her life, that she lived a double life, caught up in a series of untruths so enormous they swallowed her up, and she left.  I did not know she was not real, and this cast me into a pit of doubt about not only who she was, but who I was.

For some years after that, I didn't pursue friendships, for I felt responsible for her death. If only I had known. If only I had paid attention more to the details. But eventually I realized that what someone wants to be unknown and hidden will remain that way until they are ready to show it. I realized her death was not my fault. I realized I could try to find a new friend.

Then I realized it was not that I blamed myself, but that I did not trust people anymore. Grace had been my best friend, but at the same time, she was someone I did not know. I was very cautious around people, and achingly slow to invite them in.

It took a long time. Years. There were failures, quite a few: people who I did not have enough in common with, or who lived far away, or were awful to travel with. There were successes, many, slowly budding interactions. It was slow and lonely for years.. Maybe too, I wasn't ready for the kinds of friendships that would be laid out for me. Perhaps I was preparing.

Recently, I was in need of guidance that only a group of good friends can give.. Not the kind that is brief or uneasy, but that instantly opens windows and lets the fresh air in. When this need arises, that is how you can tell who is a friend and who is real. The litmus test of friendship is always crisis, and crisis is the great sifter of people in a general way as well. Integrity to the left, noncommittal to the right.

These kinds of good, solid, friendships are hard to find. Yet I finally have them, and not just one, but many. Some of them are people I have only met this year, and others are people who I have known for a long time. Some I met online (yes, sometimes that works) and some I met in the jungle or washing laundry in buckets on a rooftop of an orphanage in India.

It took me a long time to make these kinds of friends, for I remembered Grace. How she wasn't real, but in-between places, caught. Only one way out. I was afraid that it would happen again, and so my demands for what makes a close friend were and remain high. So high very few have  reached the bar.

And these people, they are my fire circle. They surround me, protect me, warm me, keep me, and love me. Yet they are spread around the globe, so far apart. I visualize sometimes that we will all be in the same room together. How noisy that room will be!

I am not an easy person to be friends with. I am intensely focused on my writing, have lofty standards and values, and expect the best from the people around me. I stay up too late at night worrying and wondering and need a friend to open the door of my cage every once in awhile. I don't lose my temper easily but I lose my way and get distracted by violence and difficulty in the world, and I often need a friend to brighten things a little. I get hurt and am triggered easily because of my childhood, and so must occasionally ask friends to nurture as a mother rather than a sister, father rather than a brother. I am on my own, family free by necessity, and my friends have taken their place. It is a hefty balance.

Why do my friends do so much for me? I am not sure. I am just grateful that I have arrived at place and moment where friendship is easy, and my circle is wide and full of powerful, gracious people with lives overflowing. I can't believe they let me inside those lives sometimes.

I want to thank them, especially after they have helped me recently to listen and not lose my focus with my writing, which is easy for me to do. Without them I would not have these pages of my book written that sit on my desk, or those essays finally done. Without them I would have no future plans, for they don't let me rest in dreamland, they make me speak my words aloud so they are alive and bouncing. Without them, my life would not be raw, in the moment, right now, real.

It is good to be surrounded by the sweet love of friends. I hope the circle keeps growing.

AGA

The Weekly Good/ Writing is Real

“Writing is a socially acceptable form of getting naked in public.”

— Paulo Coelho

Photo credit: amygigialexander/Art by Yves Saint Laurent, "Love" collection, Morocco
 

The weekly good is that writing is a place to be real, even when the rest of the world isn't.

It's strange to me that sometimes I go through my whole day, tied, bound, fettered to situations and people that I cannot escape. What is stranger is that I have no place that is as warm and welcoming to my grief, pain, indecision, truth..than my writing.

I do try to talk to people, but as a good friend of mine says to me often, "People are messy."

Words are never messy. They are loyal and steadfast. Yes, sometimes they are lazy and do not line up the way I want them to, but they always work hard trying. Words are good places for complex feelings and loneliness, private joys and gladness.

People, not so much. There is trust, but only to a select few, the ones who understand and who see the layers. Not everyone has that skill, to see layers.

Sometimes I try to share my real self with people, long since gone. I talk to Auden and Austen, Tolsoy and Wright. They are all very good listeners, silent. Other times I try to talk to real people, living. It does not always go so well.

And that is what draws me into storytelling and keeps me there. It is real in a story, and I can be real inside of it.

Sometimes I suffer from terrible headaches, because I forget this truism. Then it occurs to me to put my feelings into a story, and suddenly, I can handle being in the world. Naked.

AGA
 

The Weekly Good/ Rest

“Each night, when I go to sleep, I die. And the next morning, I am reborn.”

— Mahatma Gandhi

The daily good today is rest.

Some people might think that it is odd that I would write about rest, because I try to do a lot different things and am a busy person. But rest means different things for different people: for some of us, it means rest from light and noise and being awake; for others it could be being alone and listening to only oneself; and for a few people I know, rest is not quiet, but active motion without introspection.

For me, rest can be many different things: time with (or away from) words, time with sleep-after a good night's rest, I am reborn, as Gandhi says. But I also feel the same exact way after finishing a good piece of writing. Not writing that is "fluff", as one of my dear writerly friends calls it. No. I mean writing that holds you in one place until you are done with it or, most of the time, when it is finished with you. This is the best of kind of rest to me.

Each time I write something weighty and good, it releases me from the heaviness that comes with having carried it around. It's another kind of sleep, the sleep of the writerly mind caught mid-motion, stepping between one story and the next. That is a kind of rest, too.

And after that rest, there is the waking up, which looks and feels like this:
 

Photo credit: ©amygigialexander2014/Stained glass window in small village church in France
 

Writing is a holy act, and its sacrament is the finished story. But the spaces in-between the stories, that is needed too.

AGA

The Weekly Good/ The Activist Writer

“When Rimbaud became a slave trader, he stopped writing poetry. Poetry and slave trading cannot be bedfellows.””

— Chinua Achebe, from his 1994 interview in the Paris Review

Photo credit: ©amygigialexander 2014/ Ngabe girl with dove, Comarca Bugle, Panama
 

The weekly good today is about shining a light in a dark world: the melding of activism and writing into one.

Lately, I've felt loss. So much hate, snarkiness, and cynicism in the world I'm watching. Worst of all, that killer of souls, apathy. I've been searching for hefty examples of leadership, words, and encouragement from the wealth of the literary world over the last few weeks. Part of me has wondered what I, as a writer, can do to make the world better.

Sometimes I think I am making it better: telling stories about places in way that evokes what is beautiful even when it is painful; going places and showing the world, blown wide open; and using my own life and struggles to hopefully inspire others to move beyond where they are and think of themselves as more fluid than stuck.

But that's not enough, and I've been wondering why. The world seems to be going to dark places, and lighting it up takes more and more effort.

And yet, there is this light, isn't there? It's not just an empty wish for things to be brighter: it's a real and lasting light dancing in and out of shadows that we are trying to capture.

Chinua Achebe, in the quote above,  is referring to activism and its relationship to the writer. He's not talking about hope or wishy washy sentiments: he's saying that it's very clear to him that writing and shining the light in the dark places are requirements of being a writer. That it's important to speak aloud, to be seen, to be a strong beacon. That one cannot exist without the other for the literary. Narcissism is writing left on its own, stranded and admiring its reflection, but paired with some form of activism, the whole world shows up.

And I find this stunningly hopeful.

Writing is important work. It is not lofty, but humble, earthy, on the ground. One must lie on the floor and listen to the rumblings. One must look all directions in one's life. One must go deeper than just filling a page with words. Writing has the power to help other people see things differently, without telling them how, but showing them.

To me, being an activist in my writing life means to continue doing what I'm doing now, but not to get too comfortable, to keep pushing out at the edges, little by little. For others, pairing activism with writing will look different, and could translate into a multitude of things.  There are so many ways a writer could bring it into their work: it could be a moment that is personal and shared; or a gentle leading of the reader a new direction; or creating content with new integrity; or even letting go of smoothness and launching into the uneven territory of anger. This kind of pairing can fit into any kind of writing:  the important thing is that the writer is illuminating something. It doesn't have to be devastating, or detailed, but it has to say:

Here is my voice, let me show you something you missed: here is a glimmer of integrity, here are words I am not paid to say,  here is truth and beauty, here is my humanity, here is an injustice made right by my voice, here I am in the open.

Whether it is a glimpse or the writer is able to maintain being in the open for longer periods, both are examples of activism and writing coming together. And both are necessary, because right now, more than ever, we need writers to take up the torch, and light up the world with words.

AGA
 

The Weekly Good/ Write It All In

“Don’t bend; don’t water down; don’t try to make it logical; don’t edit your own soul according to the fashion. ”

— Franz Kafka

One of my favorite photos I've taken this year was this one, at the gateway to the ocean, on the edge of Tangiers. It's an extraordinary photo, because it shows a moment: a man walking, yet captured, still-life. But it's also so blue, so intense, so total. There is nothing between the viewer and the blue. One feels one is seeing everything. And to me, this is how writing can be: it can show everything, either by telling it, or by my subtly inserting it into the subjects and stories I write. Writing is a place with no space in between--or if there is space, it should be a satisfying one, which is hard to do when you leave things out. My solution has been to mix things up.
 

It was last January that I started this website, and I have to say that from the start I found the idea of a website pretty terrifying--not so much because of what I would write here, but more so what everyone told me NOT to write.

As someone who is a travel writer, I was advised to stick to travel and place. Not to sway too far from the status quo. It was suggested I not talk about difficult subjects: not just by other writers, but pressures also came from the public and even my own relations.

But one thing I knew from the start was that I had spent years suppressing my stories, and because I was told not to tell them, I took on the shame and responsibility for them. I knew that when I created a website, it would have to include the dark things, the hard truths, the realness.

There are people who write well and manage to avoid these things, but to me the best writers are the ones who dive deep. When I read work by someone who is talking story but not moving in and out of the water of their own history, I feel a lack. It is not empty, but it is missing something. I don't really know what to say when I read that work, because it's obvious that they avoiding talking about the very thing which led them to that story in the first place. It makes everything watered down, as Kafka says above, when we are not authentic.

So it's been almost a year here, writing a mix of travel and personal memoir, and I think it's working. I've talked about cancer. I've talked about rape. I've talked about incest. But I've also marched through Paris, joined a wake in Honduras, taught at a Muslim girls' school in Bihar.

Recently I was talking to a travel writer, who had a sort of content-and-destination website, but who also wanted to write about her personal life. It was frustrating for her to find a happy medium, and she'd decided to create two websites, one for each of her selves. I get that on a professional level, but I also get that our histories empower us to write about what attracts us, whether it's travel, entertainment, dogs, or politics. Figuring out a way to bring a little (or a lot) of one's history into one's writing life without dividing it can be very rewarding. Not to mention, it shows that you can move about in the world freely, honestly, and without reservations. It makes you relatable, responsible, and personal.

Today, the good is the importance of mixing it up. If you only write destination pieces, you will end up hungering for richer, more intensive words and stories. And if you only write work about your agonies, frustrations, and self growth you will sometimes wish you could write about your summer vacation which was perfectly wonderful.

Life is interwoven. Writing should be, too.

I'm glad I ignored the advice I was given about what to write and share publically: it has helped me understand my readers and gain a wider audience, not to mention dismiss shaming people entirely from my life. I'm planning more big stories for 2015, and in part this is because I have this website, this home, this creation to share them on. It's a great comfort to have a place where I can mix it all up. A place where I can show the deep intense blue of the Moroccan sea, in words.

Thanks for reading. Gratitude.

AGA
 

The Weekly Good/ 10 Ways to Use Facebook

Today's good is Facebook.

That's right. Facebook. This is the one year anniversary of when I decided to learn how to use Facebook. I honestly had no idea how to use it wisely and well, and up until then had used it only for personal posts or to chat with longtime friends. I will also admit I posted a lot of bunny pictures.

But a year ago, I realized that it was a gateway to a bigger world. I was working long hours at my job (which had nothing to do with writing) and I really had no social life or free time available. I also had decided to commit myself fully to the writing life, and needed to have conversations and connections within the world of writers. The ways I'd used in the past to relay information or widen my circle weren't going to work. I saw social media--particularly Facebook--as something that could change how I used my time, connect me to other writers, and help me find readers.

I paid attention to how some people were using it, and then combined what they did to make a road map for myself . And it has worked brilliantly: I have about 4000 followers now, and I began with less than one hundred. Those aren't just names: those are people whose websites I visit, who I try to have conversations with, and who I am invested in equally. This website has a few thousand subscribers as well, and that is in part, because of Facebook and what I create on my Facebook page. Those numbers might not seem high to some, but remember, that's by hand: I didn't buy those followers (like I've heard some people do!)..I worked for them, one by one. I expect this number to double in 2015, all on it's own.

I'm sharing Facebook as my daily good today because recently I noticed how many people don't  understand it, are overwhelmed by it, or misuse it. But it can be a helpmate, not a hindrance. It is something that can create good in your life, but only if you pay attention to the details. If you had told me a year ago that Facebook would work for me, that it would an important aspect of my writing life (for the days of either/or and writers locked in attics scribbling away madly alone on their novels are long since over), and that I would, well, adore it..I wouldn't have believed you.

Below are ten points I used to create the Facebook presence I have now. I say this with a smile and almost laughing out loud, because quite honestly, it amazes me that it has worked and that I truly enjoy it.

Ten Ways To Make Facebook Good:

1. Be a real person to the friends you have right now: even if you only have fifty. Don't try to get more friends or followers. Focus on the ones you have now. If they like what you do, more people will come. Naturally. Thank people often for what they share, don't just skim through and use the "like" button. Do not friend-shop. Friend shopping is going through some else's friend list and trying to friend people of influence. Bad form. Instead, decide to be a person of influence. Let the influencers you see come to you. If you really want to friend someone who is very much outside of your circle, ask for an introduction though messaging a third party you have in common, or try meeting them on Twitter and starting a conversation there first. This starts a conversation on a firmer footing and you will be creating a relationship, not just adding a name.

2. Limit your time on Facebook and schedule the main chunk of your interaction on it each day. Then, if you feel like popping on to have interactions later on, do it if you feel like it. But don't feel obligated. I spend one hour on social media a day, max. Some people use Hootsuite and other feed tools: these are things which feed links you like into your FB feed. I don't use these unless traveling in a place where being online is impossible, because personally, I think such posts lack intimacy and distance me from the reader.

3. Don't sell things. This includes you. There is nothing more annoying than "here's a screen shot of the piece I wrote for ______, I'm the most popular!" Don't push products, that includes bath oil or your aunt's candle company or the workshop you are running. Never market, or give a glimmer of marketing yourself or anyone else. You can talk about your victories and plans in other ways (see below). Instead, use your FB feed to share other people's work in real ways. Become known as a person who shares other people's work and gets it seen. Sharing other people's work--particularly not just your friends' work--shows integrity and thoughtfulness. If you can show that you can move a piece, a cause, or a topic, people will tend to send you their essays and work, and this is a way you can develop deeper connections with other writers and editors. You also get to read work which inspires you, find more causes which move you, and widen your circle with more diverse points of view.

4. Facebook is where you can talk about your victories, but do it in a real way. Putting things in the context of gratitude is better than self promoting. "I'm really grateful to so-and-so for letting me write on her blog this week. She asked me to write about a difficult topic, ________, and I learned a lot from writing this piece." Make your posts about other people, even when you talk about something you did. If you run a workshop, thank people rather than talking about how great you are. Nobody cares about how wonderful you are, and you don't look wonderful in the least when you make the accomplishments of others small.

5. Never, ever share links in someone else's posts in the comments. It's bad form. (Unless they ask for it, or on the rare occasion it seems sensible.)  Especially never your own links, but even the links of other people. For example, I shared a piece from a well known site last week, a beautiful essay. Someone commented with a link by a friend of hers, an essay on the same topic. Now why would I want to keep that comment there? It will prevent people from reading the essay I've chosen. And if it's truly good, that commenter could have sent it to me in a private conversation and let me decide if I wanted to share it. When people comment with links, it takes away from the conversation, it doesn't add to it. This includes linking your own website in comments: for example, let's say I write about going to Paris. Someone might comment, "When I went to Paris, I loved the photography museum and I wrote about it here, on my blog, ____________ (names blog and possibly links)." Tacky. You may think you are getting more readers to your site, and maybe you are, but to most people, you are no longer a writer. You are now a salesperson. Believe it or not, every exchange you have online doesn't require for you to link yourself, your website, or your projects. Comments are a place where you can craft conversations and develop relationships. Not sell yourself. By having an online presence that doesn't rely on promoting your website or work constantly, you will actually gain more readers.

6. Think of your Facebook page as your living room, decorated with the objects you love, and with a coffee table full of beautiful books and plates of snacks for guests. That's right: you play host on your page, and guests arrive around the clock. Just like any good host, you curate the conversation, steer it the direction that works for the group and the theme of your party. You wouldn't decide to have a party at your home and let others host it, would you? If you end up with a guest with bad manners, it's par for the course. But you don't have to invite them back. This is what the block key is for, or you can use the unfollow button and still remain friends but they won't see that you've unfollowed them. Groups are another room in the Facebook house. Sometimes they stop at the front door, like the obviously marketing-your-book-or-brand-or blog groups. In those kinds of groups, you are going to promote yourself and talk about promoting yourself. Not my personal favorite, but can be useful if you blog. My favorite kinds of groups are the ones that are smaller and more intimate....a bit like sitting at the kitchen table with old friends. Here you can be more personal and have a chance of creating lasting friends, supporters, and connections. Make sure with all groups that you (1) turn off group notifications and (2) turn off notifications on any posts you comment on or like, or you'll be inundated with pings. You can also create a group of your own as support--something I've done--and design it to suit your specific needs. I have groups that I discuss certain topics in that I don't post on my wall, and it helps me to have a place to go so that I keep my wall content unified and interesting to who reads it.

7. Decide how public you want to be. If your page is private and personal, that's fine, but if you are a creative, and have stuff to share, you will limit yourself considerably. I took my Facebook page from personal to public: anyone in the world can look at my Facebook page without friending me. This option isn't for everyone, but for someone like me, who gets a lot of email about certain topics I write about, people appreciate that they can have access. The other alternative is to use other social media to share your work, or to start a page that is public for your work and creative identity. The problem with this is that FB keeps most of the posts from pages like that out of the main feed, so not many are going to see what you share. You'll have to use your private FB page to share posts to make it work. All this said, seriously consider friending people you don't know, so that you can share your work more widely. Consider using a pen name, too, as I do: it's helpful and makes me feel more secure in the more public world. The list feature can help you create a mini-platform to share certain topics. For example, if I want to share a link about rape, I'm most likely not going to share it with my whole audience. I will share it with a list of people who I've had conversations with and are engaged with that topic. Or let's take the example of someone who has a private FB page and has started adding writers and editors to it, and can't seem to get past having to share their work with their aunt, sister and co-workers: they could create a list of writers, and just share it with them.

8. Never ask in comments or via chat for editor contacts, or contacts at all. Instead, spend time getting to know the work of the person, and have conversations about that. If they offer information, let it be an exchange between you both, rather than you trolling the Facebook feeds for contacts. And if you do make contacts with editors on FB (which is one of the things I use it for) read all of their work, read their magazine, read their writers, before you ever even have a casual conversation about creating work for them. The same goes for mentors: never ask someone to be your mentor without establishing a relationship first. Think organically.

9. Haters are going to hate. I've got probably a dozen people on my friend list I'd love to remove, but I can't because we have friends in common and it would be awkward. For one reason or another, they suddenly stopped liking my posts or reading my work, and interacting with them is weird. So here's what I do: I ignore them. It's their problem, and frankly success of any kind, makes other people act funny. Jealousy is like grief: it has its stages. Maybe they will work through it, maybe they won't. But if this happens to you and you can't unfriend, simply ignore them. Hopefully you will be able to unfriend at some later date, and frankly if you do well, you'll be lucky to only have a dozen who follow you but aren't your fans.

10. Make your page on Facebook a destination: if someone were to meet you from FB, be the person they would expect to meet from reading your posts. For me, I try to focus on the uplifting inspiring aspects of life and writing, just as I do on my website. People go to my FB page expressly to see what I post, and I enjoy the dialogue and the connection with others. I'm exactly the same in person, I talk about the same things that I feel are relevant. Create a theme for your page that people can expect, and make it personal, real, authentic. It works well to share ideas that are edgy or controversial, because that makes you a real person. It also works well to share pictures of your cat. But what works best is to share what you are passionate about and what lifts people and takes them to new places or points of view. Resharing is nice, as are lovely quotes, but status posts that are personal go farther. Choose 2-6 various kinds of posts per day, and choose wisely.

These aren't universal rules, nor steadfast. They are just what has worked for me.

Facebook is a tremendous power of good. If it's not a power of good in your life, reconsider how you are using it.

My goals for 2015 include falling in love with Twitter!

AGA

The Weekly Good/ Say Yes

Image: Creative Commons.
 

I was so very much looking forward to my alone-time tomorrow: I planned on treating myself to a day of luxury. No mandatory social events, no dishes, no cooking, no idle chatter. Instead, a bubble bath, uninterrupted. A bowl of mashed potatoes, eaten right out of the serving bowl. And most of all, no guilt for not participating in a holiday that forces many people to pretend everything is perfectly fine in their family dynamic, when it's really not.

Then I got a call. An urgent one: would I be willing to cook dinner for 70 battered women, their children, and a bunch of volunteers?

It seems that the cook had the flu, and there was no one to fill such an ample apron.

I said yes.

It's been my year of saying yes to everything. True, it wasn't a writing opportunity, but it was a doing good opportunity, and those deserve a yes, too.

After I said yes, I found out the budget was very small. My mind had to stretch alongside my dollars as I tried to figure out how to create a meal for so many for so little.

When I mentioned this series of not-so-perfect-events to friends, some said told me it was rather nervy for anyone to ask someone else to make a dinner with no budget. Poor planning, they said.

But this is life. We work with what we've got and we fly by the seat of our pants. Or skirts.

I'm doing the same exact thing in my writing life right now: I've got big plans and (perhaps) not enough money to do what I want to do, but this small detail doesn't matter.

It all works out. And thank you to that nice man in Trader Joes who bought me four turkeys.

AGA