One Alone

For as much as I live in the world, I live alone.

I’ve always been a loner. It’s a personality trait that fits a writer or perhaps a painter or composer. Being alone, playing alone, working alone can be very threatening for some people, but not for me. I suppose that is because most of my life goes on in my head.

Oh, I participate in the populated world, and enjoy being with other people, but not for long, and not all the time. Even as a child I enjoyed playing alone, discovering the world as I went, learning from experience. I also paid attention to others, and learned from their mistakes and successes, but by observation more than participation.

Being alone for a portion of every day is as much me as the work I have chosen for myself. Of course there were many years in which I had to work with others, wanted to work with others, but still I preferred working on my own.

Being a filmmaker is a collaborative profession. Writing is the most solitary part of the process, when research and imagination blend into a script, a blueprint if you will, for constructing a visual story. For many years I wrote and produced films. In a few wonderful instances I  wrote, produced, directed, shot and edited and even voiced entire productions. They may not have been the most viewed of the many films I worked on, but they were for me the most satisfying.

Devoting myself to writing for print/electronic publication, as I have for the last 20 or so years, has brought me the most pleasure, the greatest reward (intellectual, emotional, not financial), and is what still drives me to create stories and essays. Even when I think I have cleaned out the store, so to speak, I discover that there is still more to write, and to write about. Being a solo act has spilled over into many other parts of my life.

I live, as regular readers know, in a remote part of the world, near but not in a village of a few people, in a very under-populated part of the world. There are mountains that ripple the county, and that must be crossed for food, entertainment, even visiting with friends or family. That, or do it myself, fix it myself, build it myself. I don’t mind it. In fact I find depending on myself for most things gives me a kind of strength and endurance and acceptance of life that is difficult for many more “modern” people to understand. That sometimes includes family. But I am fulfilled by doing for myself. And a long time ago I found the one person with whom I can be alone and not alone.

Over many years we have built a life and a way of living that encourages and demands a high level of do-it-yourself skills. Some would say that we are at risk, living so remotely, so away from the world. We don’t see it that way. What we do see is that we are perhaps better prepared to get through every day, regardless of what the day may have to offer. We depend on ourselves and each other.

We are not alone, and yet we are.

Looking Ahead

We had a wedding in the family last week. Friends and relatives gathered from near and far to join in celebrating with the happy couple. We shared food, drink and affection with the bride and groom and with each other. We also shared music, but for those of us not yet totally deaf, it made the celebration just a bit uncomfortable. Uncomfortable but, given the occasion, bearable.

One of the side benefits of the gathering was a chance to meet members of the groom’s family, see members of the bride’s family, and meet friends of both. The bride, one of our granddaughters, had invited two of her Peace Corps friends, to be in the wedding party, as well as her closest friend from high school. We knew her, but not the others.

At dinner for the wedding party the night before, we sat with the attendants around us. Young, healthy, perfect skin, perfect hair, perfect teeth . . . and perfect goals in their lives. From distant places, all had arrived at a point in life where they were finalizing the course of at least the next few years. What impressed me about all of them (and their accompanying partners) was that all, (bride and groom included), were setting themselves to accomplish things that will make a better world for others. All of them have chosen to continue their education now, and at the same time, undertake jobs that have already made a difference in the lives of others. It was a very reassuring weekend, talking with them, and with other friends of theirs and with other family members who all seemed to be genuinely concerned and focused on trying in some way to fix what is broken, discover what needs to be done, and then instead of complaining about the way the world is, getting right into the deep water of what might be called “draining the swamp.”

I guess that when parents and grandparents look at the up-and-coming generation we sometimes feel despair or even helplessness. Spend a weekend with young people like these. It is reassuring, generating smiles rather than frowns.

We have seen the future, and the good news is: there will be one.

COLLABORATION

When I was young and single, and before I decided that I was going to remain that way (single – youth would turn to maturity regardless), I gave some thought and consideration to what I would consider essential in the person with whom I would spend the rest of my life. Foremost among them was that the person should be kindred in interests and skills; a person who had a visceral need to live a life that demanded creativity, with the skills to achieve it.

An artist, I always thought, would be the ideal mate for me; a painter or sculptor or another of the visual arts. Eventually I decided that such a person didn’t really exist, and so I would carry on alone, enjoying what relationships I could, but no longer looking for the one person who would fit that description.

And then we met. And half a century and more has passed, and we are still together, still working on things jointly, still finding new ways to share our life. From painter to photographer was not a giant step, and when I had an opportunity to make a film with a crew of my own, I signed her on as still photographer. Aside from the pictures I needed, one received a major award in an international juried show.

The eye of an artist is quite different from any other, I’m certain. And while I have a pretty keen sense of image and what I want to see (as a film writer I could not have survived without that skill), I don’t “see” the way she does. I don’t, perhaps, have the same inner vision that allows her to create and bring together elements and images into a picture that says much without motion or movement. Today, website design has become a logical progression for visual artists, and is a skill that has now been added to her resume.

And that brings us to our most recent collaboration: developing a new and exciting web page where you can find out more about my books, about writing and about the part of me that is the writer.

With her artist’s eye she has brought together images and words from a general impression of what I want or need.  I have learned to depend on that eye to turn my vision into reality.

The new website is still being finished as I write this, but we hope that in the next few days it will be up and running. You will find it, when it is ready, at www.paulkleinwrites.com.

Visit often. Comments are always welcome.

An Anniversary and a Birthday

John Williams raised his baton, and on the downbeat the music began. It wasn’t some star-studded movie music he was conducting, but music much older, with words we all know. The words are 200 years old, and are as stirring today as they were in 1814.

We were watching the televised July 4th program from the National Mall in Washington DC. At least we recognized the place as the Mall, but really, you couldn’t see the ground, so many citizens had come out to say Happy Birthday to our land.

I imagine that The Star Spangled Banner is one of the first songs we Americans learn as children, probably soon after Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. It is a song we have all sung at ball games and ceremonies and graduations and sometimes, if you’re like me, you even sing it to yourself. Not all of it. Nobody remembers all of it, according to the WW-II movies, anyway. Only spies did that, and that was how you tricked them into revealing themselves. It isn’t because it is so complicated, I suspect, but more because we all want to get on with whatever has brought us together in the first place. Besides, it’s hard to sing. High notes and twisty cadences and things only the music-minded really understand. But we make the effort.

I’ve sung it so many times, in places I can’t even recall, with even worse voices than mine helping make the words ring out. And yes, it has been sung to different music (they call it music, anyway, whoever they are who sing it that way), but to me, regardless of where, regardless of the quality of the music or the voices sharing the moment, this is still “The Song.” It is the song of freedom, the song of longing for peace, the song of aspiration and faith in a future we can’t always see. But we can hear it in the words.

No matter how many times I’ve heard it, how often I’ve stood with my hand over my heart or fingertips touching forehead, it still reaches me, touches me, makes me stand a little straighter, a little taller. That’s real music. Two-hundred years! That’s a long time for song to be in the top ten.

For me, it is always number one!

I Think I Will, I Think I Won’t

A week or so ago I received the first copies of “Unusual Suspects: Four Stories of Suspicion, Suspense and Murder.” The book is already available as a Kindle, and now has a three-dimensional version as well. But the real work is just beginning: moving books from my office to your house, or from Amazon.com to your Kindle or mailbox.  That will be work.

I’m not complaining. I enjoy going out and meeting book people in book stores and libraries and at book fairs and such. I like answering questions about my work, about writing in general, and of course, about the understory in every book I write. But it takes time.

About the time I have a new manuscript ready for publication, I start thinking, “Well, that’s it. I’m finished. I don’t want to go through this again. I’m too old, there are too many things I haven’t done, too much that needs to be taken care of. I’m written out.” Except, of course, I’m not. I see something that triggers an idea, a storyline develops, characters begin to populate the story and pretty soon I’m outlining, fleshing out characters and background and scene settings and so on. That comes from writing films, I guess, but I don’t do that anymore; haven’t for some years. But seeing the story in my mind isn’t something I can expunge from my thinking process.

Writing, it turns out, is more than a craft for the writer. It is a way of life. Internal, mostly. not something you can do as a team or a group. I write for me, and I hope that the ‘me” for whom I write is essentially like you, the difference being that I have a story to tell, and you want to hear or read it. But regardless of what happens once the story is written, I am compelled to share it, to hear your response, to try to make the next one better so you will keep coming back. If you do, my accountant is happy, but if you don’t, I’m not that unhappy, as long as you remain there. I believe that there is something in the DNA of every writer, especially a fiction writer.

For writers there is no “The End,” as long as there is a “Thee.”

Holding Back the Hand of Man

Here on the mountain the sun is warming us slowly from the cool and breezy night to what promises to be a warm and sunny day. It is part of what holds us here, what each day makes us happy that we are here and not still in the city or the suburbs. Being here has also given us peace and quiet, solitude and a small but loving group of people we’ve come to know and cherish. This place, as stimulated and focused our creativity. Just being here brings joy.

We met here with a few of our friends the other evening, on our deck that sprawls across the south-facing front of the house.   It is a big deck, generous in both length and width, and except for one small area about ten feet wide, runs from one end of the house to the other. All the rooms but two have windows or doors that open onto the deck. At the outer edge we stand six or more feet above the ground, a consequence of living on a mountain.

On the other side of the house, the true front, we are at ground-level. No stairs to climb, and no barriers to getting in or out. We live on a dead-end dirt and gravel road, up a steep gravel driveway that bends back on itself. To reach the front door we have constructed  a wooden walkway bends through a courtyard of shrubs and flowering plants. The  yard is small, about 30 by 50 feet. Then the land rises again on the north and west sides, creating the heavily-treed backdrop that protects us from the winds and winter. In all, house, gardens, decks occupy less space than the suburban lot we lived on when we were just outside the city where my work was. But that is not all of our place. We have a mountain that rises beyond the courtyard, fields of hay and yet another mountain that provides the view from the deck. From any point of the house, what we see is what we hold.

When we first built here, more than 20 years ago, the trees surrounding the house were perhaps 40 or 50 years old. More gracious now, they surround us so closely that we almost feel we are living in a tree house. The view of our fields in the valley below has become more obscured with each year.

We have tried to change very little of the land we call ours. We have worked to encourage good timber growth, we keep about a dozen acres productive in hay, but in general we have tried to make as little impact on the land as possible. We came here because of the land, we stay here because of the land, we know that what ever happens to us, we will always have the land because it is now a part of our hearts and souls. It is the place were we have grown in understanding if not wisdom. Our time here  prepares us for whatever tomorrow holds.

We try to hold back the hand of man. That is our job. This place is literally and figuratively our rock. We stand on it assured that it will not crumble. In truth, the land owns us.

We are caretakers who will pass on, but the land will remain.

My Little Girl

My little girl came into my life at a time when, frankly, I had thought I would always be alone. I had given up finding the young woman I was destined to marry, had expressed to friends that being single seemed the right place for me, and then one day, just like that, there she was. And again, just like that, there was the little girl. A woman now, of whom I am perhaps inordinately proud, and three copies of her as well. All, daughter and grand daughters, make Fathers Day a day with meaning.

What these women have chosen to do with their lives, the people they have shared them with, the goals they have set and reached, are what brings joy to parents, to this parent in particular, because along the way they have and are touching the lives of others in ways that might be considered difficult for some, but seem to be natural to them. I know for each the way has sometimes been hard, harder than it should be, and I wish only that I could have exercised a father’s power to make it easier or better or both. That isn’t something that being a parent or grandparent can really accomplish, of course, and they are strong, stronger than many, because they have found the strength to grow and go and become the people they are. If there is a gift I have given them, it is to seek the strength within.

And what I have received in return! Love, yes. Fun, of course. And learning. Everyday that I learn something new, I count as a day well spent. Being a father has brought me experiences and knowledge I would never have gotten had I followed my plan and remained the bachelor I had envisioned. And the world, my world, would not have been as rich and rewarding had I not had the experience and the opportunity to grow that comes from being Daddy.

Fathers Day is really Father-and-Daughter day in our house.

Thank you, Daughter, for making my day.