Kristin Bair O'Keeffe: Writer. Mom. Teacher. Traveler.

WRITERHEAD: My New Blog & Web Site

As of today, April 1, 2011, my blog and web site are up and running! Ready for visitors!

Visit: www.kristinbairokeeffe.com OR www.writerhead.com

See you there!

New Website and Blog Are A'Coming!

Hey y'all. I know, I know...it looks like I'm neglecting this blog once again. And I suppose I am, but now it's for a terrific reason. I'm putting together a brand-spanking-new website and blog!

I am so excited about this. I want to reveal it all to you today...but can't. Still a secret.

So hold tight and keep checking in. Sometime in the next few weeks I'll be directing you to a new blog.

Whoo-hoo!

Writers: Make Your Sentences Sing (la la la la!)

You know, I've been teaching writing for the past 16 years, and one of the many things I've learned in that time is how hard it is to help writing students "get" how much rewriting goes into writing (almost) every single sentence in order to make a story or essay sing (without sounding at all like it's TRYING to sing). [FIRST DRAFT]

******

You know, in the 16 years that I've been teaching writing, I've discovered that one of toughest things to teach writing students is how friggin' hard it is to write a good sentence and how much rewriting has to happen before every sentence sings. [SECOND DRAFT...much stronger, yah? I'd do yet another draft...and another, but I have to dig out my car. This one you'll have to live with...even though it hurts to walk away from it now.]

******

Most students hand me a first draft or a second draft, believing it to be their last.

"Uh, no," I tell them again and again. "Not yet."

I won't tell you what they say in response. :)

Over the past week, I had my own "rewrite exercise" to do. I had to write a single letter (a persuasive letter, mind you) about me, and OMG it was excruciating. I rewrote every sentence in that 1.5 page letter at least 1,482 times. I trimmed every extra "and" or "but." I broke up sentences that wanted to run on and on and on (and on). But truly, when all was said and done, I knew exactly why I write and teach writing...because I love when sentences sing.

Just saying, my writer friends. Spend the time on your sentences.

La la la!

10 Back-To-Work Strategies for the Repatriated Writer

If you're a regular here at "My Far-Flung Life," you know that I haven't been getting much work done since late last summer when my family got news that we would be moving back to the U.S. from China (after nearly 5 years in Shanghai). At that point, my writing/work life pretty much came to a screeching/hollering/ba-ba-ba-banging halt.

Since then, instead of hunkering down at my desk every day, I've been "transitioning"--me, my daughter, my husband, our stuff, our life, our grocery store purchases, our snow boot supply, our...(you get the picture).

But today--January 3, 2011--my almost-three-year-old started preschool and I once again have a handful of sacred, silent hours to work.

Aaaahhhh! Sweet writing/working time.

And in the same breath...uuuuuuuggghhhhhhhh! Holy *#(!, I have way too much work to catch up on, like:

• four-month-old emails that I never answered (sorry, sorry, sorry if you're one of these!)
• an outdated website to update (cringe)
• two online courses to design, write, and publicize
• a novel to polish & send out
• writing students to connect with
• on and on it goes...

But honestly, after such a long hiatus, I've got no rhythm. I'm sitting here at my desk staring at the shadows the sun is making on the wall and getting absolutely nothing done. All of which got me thinking about what boosts my productivity and gets me working. Surprise, surprise, I got a list:

1. Make a to-do list.
2. Ignore the 20 or so boxes of stuff from China stacked up around you...the ones you really need to unpack but are NOT going to unpack right now. (Remember, you are working.)
3. Read whatever you're writing out loud. (I just read that out loud. The more I read out loud, the deeper I go into my work. It works, I promise.)
4. Sit cross-legged on your chair. (A must! I cannot work with my feet on the floor.)
5. Focus. Choose one of the gazillion projects on your plate and stay with it. (Forget multi-tasking right now...you're not up for it.)
6. DO NOT LOG ONTO TWITTER!!!!! (Did you hear me? DO NOT LOG ONTO TWITTER!)
7. When you get the urge to call your daughter's preschool to check on her, first look at the clock. If no more than seven minutes have passed since the last time you called to check on her, DO NOT CALL. If an hour or more has passed, go ahead...make the call. Then get your arse back to work.
8. Read something you wrote that works...that you feel good about. (Make sure it's short.) Get inspired. You are pretty darn good at this, you know.
9. Hang a "You love writing!" sign on the wall over your computer. Because you do.
10. And finally, when your husband sends a "Stuff" email listing all the things "we" (meaning "you") need to do, ignore it and get back to work. (Also, resist the urge to strangle said husband when he gets home from work tonight...he's kinda cute and nice to have around...despite his missteps.)

______

Stop Photo Credit: Michal Marcol / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Go Photo Credit: Scott Chan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 

2011: My Three Non-Resolutionary Words

Today (the delightful 1.1.11) I'm giving a nod to Chris Brogan and Susan Murphy (a.k.a. SuzeMuse) for sharing the New Year's non-resolution these-are-not-goals 3-word strategy. I love the idea of setting forth three words that don't represent specific goals, but that express the energy and direction of all I want to accomplish in 2011.

So with no more than a few moments of thought behind my three words, here goes:  

TAKE ROOT-- (yeah, two words, I know...but one thought) -- Since receiving news of our recent repatriation from China to the U.S. (way back in late summer 2009), I've disengaged...a lot. I had to; for me, there was no other way to move my family from one side of the world to another AND manage all the emotional, geographical, physical, financial, and career changes that accompanied it. But as my family slowly begins to take root in our new town and our old-new country, I'm feeling the urge to once again reach out and engage...take root myself.

 THRIVE -- "to grow vigorously : flourish : to gain in wealth or possessions : prosper : to progress toward or realize a goal despite or because of circumstances" (pretty self-explanatory, yeah?)

CONSTRUCT -- Just what it implies. I'm a'building this year. Dreaming. Drawing. Seeing. Constructing. Inhabiting. Taking risks. Changing the skyline. Inviting. Sharing what gets built.

And you? Three words?

Tectonic Life Shift...What Comes Next?

It's early morning. My daughter and husband are still sleeping. Our sea shipment arrived from China a few days ago so in the early morning light I can see our happy chair, our giant-beautiful Chinese wedding cabinet, Tully's English/Chinese books (shoe/xiezi, mouth/zuiba), and a photo of the three of us in Shanghai. Despite the sudden presence of these very concrete objects, China feels very far away, as if it were a dream, not a city/country where I spent the last five years of my life. As a writer/human who develops and depends on visceral connections to place, I admit that I have been knocked off my game by this tectonic life shift. I'm doing a lot of thinking/dreaming/wondering/pondering about how to proceed from here...how to incorporate all that I learned/absorbed/witnessed/questioned during my life in China...and how that is going to inform my writing, my teaching, and my life back in the U.S.

That's where I am today. Stay tuned.

THIRSTY: Celebrating the One-Year Anniversary

At this time last year, I was celebrating the publication of my novel THIRSTY. I was still living in China, but was in the U.S. promoting the book...joyfully running from event to event. It's hard to believe an entire year has gone by.

I had big plans for this anniversary (balloons, giveaways, blog posts, etc.), but instead I've spent the month of October repatriating to the United States after almost 5 years in China. There's been little time for anything else.

But in the few moments between plane rides and packing and trying to get our two-year-old settled into a routine, I've been quietly re-celebrating the fact that my novel THIRSTY is out in the world for readers to find.

If you've found it and read it, thanks. If not, check it out here or here.

Now...back to the repatriation thing.

From China to the United States: A Repatriation Ramble

October 13 or so

The (very tired, jetlagged, wornout, but good, healthy, and happy) eagle (a.k.a. me) has landed. As of very, very late Monday night (which was actually very, very early in the morning on Tuesday), I'm back in the U.S.

Sorry it's been so long since my last post. Of course, I'd planned to blog during our 10 days in Ireland, but--ah-hem--it didn't happen. Too much life going on to pause for the written word. (Actually I just typed "written world," which is some type of perhaps-not-Freudian-but-maybe-Freudian slip.)

So I'm here. And the sky outside is that crispy blue that blesses New England on perfect days in the autumn. The leaves are deliciously crimsony-buttery-ochre and although I had to force myself out of bed this morning, I did & was rewarded with a perfect sunrise during my walk/run/walk/run/mostly walk with a little running.

Been thinking about tons of stuff while I haven't been writing:

• Stephen Elliott of The Rumpus...whose daily newslettery notes I've missed and am looking forward to catching up on. If you don't subscribe to his daily missives, you should. And once you do, it may take you a while to connect to them cause he's really honest and raw and open about stuff we humans usually like to hide and only share with people we go to bed with or break bread with or sit next to on a subway during an extra-long ride, but after a while, I'll bet you'll be as addicted to them as me.

• How many people write blogs. This fascinates me. How many people have all this stuff in their heads that they want to share with the world.

• How weird it is that I don't have a return ticket to China. First time in five years. We're back in the U.S. to stay and I have to figure a way to (re)create a writing life...and a life-life...here.

• The five-year cycle in my life. Every five years I change my life drastically--geographically and relationship-wise. Always have. This major move back to my home country with a husband and daughter in tow is no exception. It's huge and significant. We're talking about buying a house, which I've never done, and I've been thinking about how permanent that feels to me and how permanence might scare the beejeebies out of me just a wee bit. Of course, I know permanence is a thing of the imagination and that nothing is ever really permanent, but still...

A Few Days Later

I'm thinking about China a lot. As expected. Today, Andrew, Tully, and I took a mile-long marsh walk in the woods. It was symbolic of everything I missed so much when I was in China. Trees and grass and sky and clean air and quiet and crunch-under-foot and the smear of colors and THAT smell and so on. I hugged trees, said hello to rocks, introduced Tully to various bugs, and waved to the ocean.

____

One thing I did manage to do during the past few weeks was read Jonathan Franzen's FREEDOM, and although I was bored and annoyed for the first 100 pages or so, by the halfway mark, I was hooked. And gobsmacked. It's pretty darn good. One of the first comments I started making early on in the book was "It is SO American." And that feeling got stronger and stronger as I read...the characters are SOOOOOO American. Perhaps this stood out so much to me since I'm in the process of repatriating to the United States after almost five years in China (or perhaps other readers were aware of it as much?).

During my time in China, I became acutely aware of what others think of Americans...how we're viewed...the positives and negatives. This is a complicated topic of which I'm barely scratching the surface...so bear with me. One of the things that hit me hard while reading FREEDOM is that in the U.S. we have the privilege of passion. In other words, we get to be passionate about any damn tiny thing we want to be passionate about (like Walter and his token bird) and we're allowed (for the most part) to act like nutcases about it. (more later)

And A Few Days Later Than A Few Days Later

Earlier this week, I got sick. Really sick. Like with a fever and everything. I felt like the stuff buried under the filthiest sludge in the world. I was in a daze and could barely function. I'm surprised and not surprised that this happened in the midst of this repatriation. Physically and emotionally, I'm spent.

____

A week ago (pre-fever), I got ambitious and attempted to do a bit of rewriting on the novel. That surge of creative energy lasted all of 35 seconds, but I tell you what, in that 35 seconds I finally rewrote a sentence that has been bugging me for months. And all it took was one word. One simple word: windy. So even though the surge was shortlived, it was successful. (At this rate, I could finish writing the novel by 2083.)

____

OMG...I love crispy green seedless grapes. F'in awesome. I missed them.

____

Signing off now. This surge is subsiding too.

Expat in China: 10 of My Favorite Blog Posts from 2009

You know what I'm thinking after re-reading my blog posts from the last 4.5 years? Good gracious Mavis...I've been in China for a good long time. I've seen a lot. I've done a lot. I've explored a lot. And now? Some days I feel like I know something about China; other days I'm pretty sure I don't have a clue.

Either way, here are 10 of my favorite posts from 2009. (If you haven't read my favorite posts from 2006, 2007, or 2008, check them out.)

• "Iron Goddess: A Tea Ceremony"

• "How to Launch a Debut Novel (In the U.S.) from Shanghai, China"

• "The New Website for THIRSTY Has Launched" (Over a year later, and I still love this website. Check it out here.)

• "Got a Dirty Pan? SHOUT it out!" (Still shaking my head at this one.)

• "Baby + Book Deal = Joy, Triumph, Exhaustion, Awe, Amazement, Exhaustion" (If you read any of the posts, read this one. It's the whole story.)

• "The Big, BIG Dog: Old China vs New China" (Still shaking my head at this one, too.)

• "How (Not) to Talk to Adoptive Families, Part I" (This isn't one of my "favorite" posts, but it's one my most important posts. If you're interested, I've continued on with this series. You can find the others under the "Adoption" category on the blog.)

• "Publication Day! It's Here! October 1, 2009!" (Another uber-amazing day. The publication of my novel THIRSTY.)

• "Boys Against Girls: Toy Store Triumphs In Gender Petrification" (climbing onto my soapbox...)

• "They Freed the Plum Pudding!" (Thank goodness.)

Expat in China: 10 of My Favorite Blog Posts from 2008

I've only got three days left in Shanghai...the clock is a'ticking. The house is packed up and our things are (almost) on a boat headed for the United States. Life is changing, and as it does, I'm looking back over my time here in China.

Here are 10 of my favorite posts from 2008. (If you haven't read my favorites from 2006 and 2007, click here and here.)

• "Learning to Speak Chinese: The Totally Inappropriate But Hilarious Way I Learn to Say 'My Grampa's Dead'"

• "Dream: Magic and Invisible"

• "New Shoes...from my ayi" (Yep...these are the shoes...there in the picture!)

• "Saving Face in China (a story of my ayi, an orange-zesty dessert, and a trash can on Anfu Rd."

• "Title #1: My Driver Has Lost His Marbles; Title #2: A Breach in Driver Etiquette; Title #3: Yet Another Cultural Sideswipe?"

• "We're Adopting a Baby! Another Grand Adventure" (This was the first time I shared the news of our adoption.)

• "The Coffeecake Chronicles: Day 3: Vietnam, Friday, September 26, Before We Go to the Orphanage" (In the months leading up to our adoption...before we had decided on a name for her, we called Tully "Coffeecake." Thus, there's a whole series on the blog called "The Coffeecake Chronicles." I wrote this particular post on the morning before we went to the orphanage to be with our daughter for the first time. Pretty special day.)

• "Tulliver's Travels: In Wonder and Awe" (This is mushy, gushy, mumma-love post. 2008 was such a great year.)

• "Writing: On Process: Writing?" (After becoming a mom, when does the writing bug bite?)

• "Writing: On Process: BIG, BIG NEWS!" (Did I tell you what a great year 2008 was? I did. Oh, good.)