what's behind and underneath

Just finished a late breakfast in bed and took this photo. Not that I usually eat breakfast in bed, mind you, but Jim Williams is cheerily drilling into a wall in my house and I want to be out of the way. (If you follow that link, you can see a photo of my kitchen, front and center, opening his webpage. He does great work.). I need to pack and get on the road to Mississippi. I'm meeting Marianne at The Varsity. Ha!

But no lunch there. Instead, I'm having my ritual oatmeal and thinking about what lies behind and underneath. Underneath those cooked oats are blueberries and raspberries. Underneath the top bedcovers are many other winter bedcovers -- can you see the layers? That's how we do it around here, layers upon layers, and the heat stays way down at night.

And look at all those drawers and doors -- what's behind them, inside them? These are the sorts of questions on my mind as I turn my thoughts toward Mississippi and this weekend.

I wish I could convey the complexity of writing about 1964 Mississippi. So many folks who know about book two of the Sixties Trilogy ask me, "Have you read The Help?" and I haven't. I won't, not while I'm working on a story that also takes place in the sixties in Mississippi. My story is for young readers, and they deserve no less than adults do. They deserve a story with as much clarity and truth -- and heart -- as I can muster.

And therein lies the challenge. Chapter One of Bruce Watson's fine new book Freedom Summer gives a good overall look at what Freedom Summer was. It's good reading for you, if you want to follow me along on the journey to book two's publication. It's good reading anyway.

I was eleven years old in 1964. I spent time in Mississippi that summer with my kinfolks. I had no idea of the revolution going on around us. I only knew that the pool had closed, and so had the roller skating rink, the Cool Dip, the movie theater, the Pine View Restaurant... and no one could explain to me why.

Thirty-five years later I published a picture book I called Freedom Summer, about the summer I was eleven. Now, I'm writing a novel about (as Bruce Watson puts it) "The Savage Season that made Mississippi Burn and made America a Democracy."

There is so much nuance. There are so many layers, just like you see on my winter-made bed. There is so much love, anger, truth, ugliness, beauty, differing opinion, behind every obvious doorway. Just what WAS Freedom Summer?

The stories are not simple. Mindsets are misunderstood. Motivations were not always pure... or evil. And my heroine, Sunny, is plopped right down into the middle of the mess, in Greenwood, the headquarters of SNCC in 1964, where she must make decisions that will change her life and forever alter her history. Will she do it?

 I can't write her story without understanding, from as many valid angles as possible, the many layers of Freedom Summer. So off I go again, to Greenwood. Into the Delta.

More from Mississippi.

what a difference a day makes

24 little hours...  ha. And wowee at the response to where should my new office space be and what should I do with it. Thanks so much. I heard the gamut of responses, too, which was heartening. Not everyone said: "Girl! Schedule an intervention! Do the Right Thing! Hire a professional organizer!" hahahaha. (Actually, this post was very helpful!)

So many of you remarked on my "treasures" that "tell a story." I had never thought about them that way, but you're right. I am conscious that I create "little altars everywhere," and that they comfort me. And I'm not sure I'll be able to create them in the same way, with this bedroom.

 But I have bought some second-hand furniture for the living/dining room, you see. A buffet, a hutch, a chest of drawers for linens (no table yet). And so I am going to give it a try, here in this bedroom with my office, and see what happens.

Christmas is now totally put away. I only need worry about the papers still in boxes, as you can see, but that will entail a frosty afternoon in front of the fire or watching a movie, going through boxes. The room needs painting... any suggestions? I've already started collecting paint chips. I've got my friend Jim Williams coming this morning to look at lighting (that opening photo on his website is my kitchen!)-- I need a pretty ceiling light in that closet, and an outlet for a lamp, maybe. I need my bulletin board hung. I need to get rid of the wall ducks the previous owners left me. hee.

 

 I've read about writers who are building their writing cottages on their property (and my friend Toni Buzzeo just posted a YouTube video about the construction of hers). I think they are lovely, and yet I think they are not for me. I want to be connected to the place where (as E.B. White put it) the household tides run the strongest. I want to be surrounded by stories, little altars that hold the memories, moments, and meanings that have shaped my life and my writing. If I need to get away from home with my writing, there are cafes that suit me -- Zen Tea is one. So I'll chronicle my progress in this new room and we'll see if it sticks.

What's sticking today is a getaway. Already! I'm heading to Mississippi this afternoon with my good friend Marianne Richardson. Marianne teaches 7th graders at the Heritage School in Newnan, and she grew up in Greenwood, where book two of the Sixties Trilogy is set.

It's time for me to return to Greenwood. I know my story now, and I know so much more about Freedom Summer. It's time to do a second research trip to fine-tune what I've discovered since my last trip to the Delta

 The links above will take you to photos of my August trip to Greenwood, and to a great book about Freedom Summer by Bruce Watson. If you read the intro on that page, you'll know more about the revolution I'm writing about in book two. You'll be hearing much more about that revolution as well as my progress -- and process -- with book two.

I've got my dslr camera, my video camera, my notebooks, research and more. I've got a great good friend to accompany me. I've got friends waiting for me in Greenwood. We are off on an adventure, peeling another layer of the complex onion that is Mississippi and the deep south, the layers of Freedom Summer. Come along.

trying to settle in

The ongoing office saga, which started in May. To be fair, I never did completely unpack. I moved everything from my former office, which was the entire living/dining room of this house, to the empty bedroom vacated by my youngest when she moved out in May.

And, even though we shoved the Christmas boxes in here just yesterday (so it would be a mess anyway because there is still so much STUFF everywhere from the holiday), and even though I traveled so much this fall I never fully occupied this room (even though I did write in here, on the green chaise, for one week, to try it out)...

...and even though I can admit to being a wee bit depressed this spring and summer (children moving up and out and away can do that to me), which kept me from tackling the challenges of this new office space (and, truth be told, the whole idea has depressed me some, so I need to figure out what to do and just do it and move on);

AND... even though we love eating and communing with friends and family -- it's important to us -- and I dearly want an indoor dining room (as opposed to the wonderfulness that is Irene but is too cold in winter, too hot in late summer) -- AND -- (you can see our makeshift dining room from last year, put together while the office was the office, here)...

I just don't think I can give up all that space to compress myself into this bedroom.

Do you?

Look at these photos of the living/dining room as the office (click on slideshow), and tell me:

What would you do?

Please.