Barnstorming on an Invisible Segway

Hope isn't the same thing as wishes.

You can wish for whatever you want, and there are a million stories about why you shouldn't--stories of wishing for things done to be undone, for the dead to be with us again, for all the things that are beyond our reach to be here, now. And some of those stories are frankly asshole stories--some of those stories are about not getting above yourself. Stretch, friends. Climb. Get the heck above yourselves, and then get above that. Do it all you want. Do it more. But some of those stories are saying: don't batter your heart against the impossible when you could be spending that energy looking for a climbing route. And...finding that line between can be hard.

That hard line is some of my job, as a science fiction and fantasy writer: what's hopeful, what's unrooted, a soap bubble dream. If we tell each other that we can dream of a better world, but the only better worlds we can dream of require humans to not react like humans--require the past not to have happened--require invented interventions we can't summon--we're telling people that nothing will ever be better. So we need to do a little better than that, even when the worlds we've dreamed up are three doors over and can't happen--we need not to people them exclusively with shapes of hope that can't.

It's also some of my job this year as a family member. Trying to figure out shapes of hope that can join up with the reality that we have: the conditions, the diagnoses, the treatment plans. Because "I wish all this would go away" is not hope, it's not support, it's not caring. I can say it to myself anyway, and sometimes I need to; the emotions aren't wrong. But saying it to the family members who are most struggling is of limited use compared to doing the work of helping, of making things a tiny bit better in some direction for their actual lives. Of getting them fed with something special, of getting some candles lit for them if I can, one day and then another day if I can, literally or metaphorically.

This is not a writing post. This is the one about the bread. Because good morning. It's Santa Lucia Day. And when we're making the lussekatter, when we're lighting the wreath, those actions ground us. They keep us here in the real. The real smell of the yeast and the saffron, the feel of the dough stretching in our hands. It reminds us that sometimes the hopes we build for each other need to be built on something solid--and sometimes those are the very things we wanted to look away from in the present. But we have to reach out and feed and warm each other now, as we are, not as we wanted to be, and we have to recognize that we're going to have to do this some more in a minute. It's not going to be a quick job. I fed my neighbor, and my neighbor was still hungry: yes, that's the job, friends, it's more than one day's worth. I lit my neighbor's path, and my neighbor still stumbled. I still stumbled--well, yes. Because we've got a lot of light yet to shed before we have anything like a clear path here. We have to remember that we are in the darkest of days, and if we're lucky we get the most perfect saffron we've ever worked with--oh, you would not believe how perfect, it crumbled at the first touch of the pestle and scented the entire house--but no matter what size batch we bake, we're going to be done with them while it's still getting darker. And we're going to have to turn our hand to the next task that feeds and warms us through the darkness, and the next. But we know that, we know that's the work, and we're ready. We've got this. And some mornings, the work is delicious.

Happy Santa Lucia Day.

2022: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=3654

2021: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=3366

2020: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=2953

2019: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=2654

2018: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=2376

2017: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=1995

2016: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=1566

2015: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=1141

2014: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=659

2013: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=260

2012: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/840172.html

2011: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/796053.html

2010: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/749157.html

2009: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/686911.html

2008: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/594595.html

2007: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/2007/12/12/ and https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/502729.html

2006: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/380798.html — the post that started it all! Lots more about the process and my own personal lussekatt philosophy here!

The light isn't back yet.

What do you mean these are the rituals we have. We're doing the right things. We're baking the bread, we're singing the songs, we're lighting the candles, what do you mean the light isn't back yet. Why don't we have better rituals. Why don't we have something that will fix this dark.

And the answer is: because it is December, pals. It is December, and that is not what these rituals are for. We don't knead saffron into enriched dough and light fires and hold our loved ones close because it will change astronomy. That is literally not what we're doing here. These are the right things to be doing not because they will alter the fundamental nature of science but because they're what we've got while the inexorable nature of the universe keeps working. This warmth, this goodness, this humanity is what we've got that we can control--because the timing of the Solstice is out of our control.

Yes, I'm totally talking about the Solstice, why do you ask? That is definitely what I'm talking about here.

And at the beginning of the day--no, not the end of the day, Santa Lucia is a beginning of the day holiday--at the beginning of the day, it is better to knead the dough that rose really well but for some reason is still a really tough knead. It is better to clear the epic plough ridge from the end of the walk. It is better to mask up in public places. It is better to keep doing the best we can, even knowing that the best we can is not an immediate fix, because immediate fixes are not the only thing we have, comfort and joy and mitigation are also worth having for themselves. And lussekatter. Lussekatter are definitely worth having for themselves.

Happy Santa Lucia Day. Keep trying.

2020: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=2953

2019: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=2654

2018: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=2376

2017: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=1995

2016: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=1566

2015: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=1141

2014: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=659

2013: https://marissalingen.com/blog/?p=260

2012: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/840172.html

2011: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/796053.html

2010: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/749157.html

2009: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/686911.html

2008: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/594595.html

2007: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/2007/12/12/ and https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/502729.html

2006: https://mrissa.dreamwidth.org/380798.html — the post that started it all! Lots more about the process and my own personal lussekatt philosophy here!

I think I am not the only one who feels a wave of relief in these pandemic times every morning that I wake up without a fever, without a cough, without anything to signify that I am getting sick. I read recently that loss of sense of smell is one of the early signs, and so I had two reasons to be happy that I woke up and smelled saffron and yeast from the next story down.

Last night I stirred up the lussekatter to rise while I was sleeping.

I've never made lussekatter in spring before, never made them when the thaw was so thoroughly thawed that the snow pile in the circle was half-dirt. I've made them for something other than Santa Lucia Day before, specifically for Tim's birthday, but he was out of the country for his birthday this year and hadn't had anything I'd baked for him. When I asked if he wanted pumpkin bread as a social distancing treat (I still might do that next week...or later this week depending on how fast we eat the lussekatter...), he paused and said, "Actually...."

So here we are, kneading the dough, singing some different songs, trying to bring back a different kind of light. It's not Lucia Day, friends, but sometimes we need another candle anyway. Sometimes we need to put our backs into a little more care for each other and a little more hope for goodness in the world. Support the health care workers and the food workers and infrastructure workers who are keeping us all as safe as they can manage, be kind to each other, and bring back whatever light you can in whatever way you know how. It's not Santa Lucia Day, but we'll do the work apart-together anyway.

I’ve been doing this for ten years now.

Not making the lussekatter; that’s a tradition of longer standing. But writing about the making of the lussekatter every year. About doing the work of the dark of the year, singing the light back into the world while you make the saffron-rich bread. About Santa Lucia Day, how it comes before Solstice so there is more dark to come, and what that means to me. It’s the same every year. It’s different every year. Holidays are like that.

This year in particular I am so glad to have a ritual to fall back on, work that yields to patience and experience and knowledge. The long rise changed my life. This year I made a half-batch, carefully measuring the beaten egg into my tiniest measuring cup, pouring half of it into the dough and half down the drain. (I know. It would have been fine with a whole egg. But I want it the way it’s supposed to taste, not a slightly richer version.) And between the smaller mass of dough and the knowledge gained from years past, it was an easy knead, turning pliable almost as soon as I picked it up.

In addition to Christmas songs, I find myself singing other songs every year, whatever pops into my head. “Lovers in a Dangerous Time” and “This Year” and whatever else feels appropriate. This year I discovered that what I was singing was Paul Simon’s “The Boy in the Bubble,” with a line I never really thought of before: “These are the days of miracle and wonder, and don’t cry, baby, don’t cry.” The days of miracle and wonder, we find out, are not the same as the days of ease and laughter. The days of miracle and wonder make us weep, and not just for joy. Not even mostly for joy.

Sometimes miracle and wonder come upon us all unawares. But sometimes we have to work for them. We have to work our asses off for them, and cry and despair and feel that we’ve come to the end of the line. And some of us have–I don’t want to pretend that it’s inevitable that we always win out, that we always come through the dark times. Sometimes it is just all too damn much. And the people around us, the people we turn to for help, may have reached their point of “all too damn much” in ways and for reasons that we don’t know or don’t understand.

And it’s so easy to feel distant from everyone we love, to see the distances and not the ways in which we’re close. It’s so easy to feel like we’re struggling alone instead of together. But it’s not true. Or it doesn’t have to be.

And still we try to carve out something beautiful, something fragrant and fine. Something we can give, something that connects us. Something miraculous and wonderful. Even in a year where the dark days have taken turns we never imagined. Especially in that kind of year. I’m struggling to remember which rabbi it was, what the exact wording was, who said that the work of the world is neither ours to complete nor ours to abandon. Not my tradition–but one of my truths. One of my great truths.

It’s time to sing the songs and bake the bread. It’s time to find our way kicking and screaming into miracle and wonder. And it’s time to do the work in the dark time to bring the light back into the world in the days ahead.

Happy Santa Lucia Day.

2006: http://mrissa.livejournal.com/380857.html

2007: http://mrissa.livejournal.com/502825.html and http://mrissa.livejournal.com/503100.html

2008: http://mrissa.livejournal.com/596214.html

2009: http://mrissa.livejournal.com/688906.html

2010: http://mrissa.livejournal.com/751599.html

2011: http://mrissa.livejournal.com/798532.html

2012: http://mrissa.livejournal.com/842565.html

2013: http://www.marissalingen.com/blog/?p=260

2014: http://www.marissalingen.com/blog/?p=659

2015: http://www.marissalingen.com/blog/?p=1141

Last year for Christmas I wrote my mom a story that included all these elements. This year I decided to put it on my website for free to share with all of you. Here it is: How to Wrap a Roc’s Egg. It was inspired by a pair of earrings made by Elise Matthesen, by the work of the great taxonomist and general all-around eccentric Carl Linnaeus, and of course tea. Happy Solstice, merry Christmas, and on through all the rest of the holidays ahead. Enjoy.

The thing about coming back tired from vacation into the making of holiday cheer is that there are all sorts of things that are almost but not quite slipping my mind. Entirely possible that there are all sorts of things that are completely slipping my mind, too, but I can’t remember what they are just now. I was so tired this morning that I had to stick my head back under the shower once I’d gotten out, because I couldn’t remember whether I had rinsed my hair or not, and it seemed like probably I should make sure.

Of course, I was trying to remember something like five different plot points on two stories that had come up while I was in the shower, so you can see where something like “did you perform the basic functions for which you were there” might have fallen off the bottom of the list.

Which reminds me–and thank heavens something does, because see above–that I’ve been talking on Twitter to Matthew Bennardo about working on multiple projects at once. He was feeling alone because most of the people he was asking claimed to work on only one story at once. And no, that is not me, really not, really no. I have dozens of stories in different stages of completion. I would worry about this if I didn’t write so dang many stories of different types and lengths anyway, but clearly I’m finishing stuff. Clearly I’m selling stuff. So what we call this is process, not problem.

Before I left for Montreal, Kameron Hurley had a blog post (somewhere…oh, look, here it is) called “Why I Finish All My Shit.” And I read it, and I thought, “huh, no, glad it works for you, but no.” Because yes, you have to finish stuff to learn how to finish stuff–both in the sense of completion and in the sense of making endings work. Absolutely. But there is a very strong sunk cost element here. If I get 200 or 2000 or 20000 words into a story and realize that it is just not working, forcing myself to finish its non-working self rather than writing some better story is what we call a colossal waste of time. And unless something is under contract, if one story is working and another is stalled out, for me there’s no particular reason to sit and stare at the stalled out story when I can be productive on the story that’s working.

(I’ve talked in the past about working out of sequence on longer projects–longer short stories as well as novels–and this is part of why. It works on a chapter-by-chapter basis for me, too. Why should I stare at Chapter 3 going, “Guhhhhh worrrrrrds,” when I could be humming merrily away writing Chapter 16? Yes, Chapter 3 will eventually get written, and for some people it really does have to happen chronologically. I am not one of those people.)

Look, here’s the thing. I have a chronic illness. I have chronic vertigo, and it stinks, and the meds that (sort of) work for it also stink. But one of the things it does is make me aware of limited opportunities. Of giving myself the best chance to succeed, to get things done, to even enjoy myself along the way. For some writers, sitting down and writing one story, start to finish, chronologically, and only writing another one when the first is revised and sent out, is the way to do that. That’s great for them. But it’s not my process, and it may not be your process, and that’s okay too.

If there’s one writing rule I would like to see enshrined for beginning writers everywhere, always, it’s this:

It’s okay if you don’t do it like anyone else, as long as you do it well.

I am home from Montreal and digging out from under the mountain of things that will pile up when you take a vacation. It was lovely, it was grand, and now it is lovely and grand to be home. And oh, so much stuff. So much stuff. Presents to wrap, more presents to buy and wrap. Stories to revise, more stories to write. The laundry is starting to feel a bit under control, although I know that this is an illusion, as the laundry hamper is almost full again. There are several things that want cooking, and more that want backing, and…well, most of you know what day it is, Saturday.

While I’m doing all this stuff, the magic of publishing brings you things I worked on much earlier. I have a new story up on BCS today, A House of Gold and Steel. Go, read, enjoy.

My godson Rob was diagnosed with celiac this spring, and while we haven’t made all the changes we would if it was someone in my household, there has been a lot more paying attention to what has wheat and barley and the like, what doesn’t, what does but can be made to work without it. Also, we have been saying for years that my goddaughter Lillian is almost old enough (and definitely enthusiastic enough about baking) to be included in Cookie Day. This year, the two things combined: we had Lillian spend the night and then spend all day having Gluten-Free Cookie Day.

Here is what we made.

First, in our pajamas, we made fully glutenated waffles for breakfast. Because Lillian hasn’t been diagnosed with celiac, and sometimes having the gluteny things you like when you’re not sharing them with your big brother is a good plan.

Then we got ready for the day and finished putting out the Christmas decorations (usually wayyyy too early, but I’m going to be in Montreal, so I needed to get it done if it was ever going to happen) and waited for my folks and my grandma. And then the reinforcements got here and we really got going.

We made: chocolate fudge with hazelnuts; double-layer chocolate/peanut butter fudge; caramels; strawberry shortbread with gluten-free flour*; chocolate-dipped apricots; chocolate mixed nut clusters; amaretti (tinted lavender–Lillian’s choice), some sandwiched with frosting and some with raspberry jam; Nutella cookies; and chocolate chip peanut butter cookies. We didn’t get to the blueberry meringues, so I’ll do those tomorrow before we really get going on the gluten-y cookies, and there was a teeeeeensy mishap when we were boiling the apple cider down for apple cider caramels, so that got scratched for the day.

And in the process, we taught Lillian about when you whip a lot of air into egg whites to make them fluffy, how to use a pastry blender to do exactly the opposite, how to use a pastry bag to pipe dough out, how to make frosting from scratch, and many other topics in the worlds of baking, chemistry, finance, and more.

All in all, a lovely day. More of it coming tomorrow.

*This was our only use of a gluten-free flour product. All the other cookies and treats were recipes that are just naturally made without flour. I know that some of the wheat substitute flours can taste pretty good for people who need them, especially with a strong flavoring like strawberry covering up the fact that they don’t taste quite the same, and they’re a good resource to have. But when I’m not working around another dietary restriction like nuts, dairy, or eggs, I prefer to make recipes that were gluten-free to begin with, rather than adjusting things to become gluten-free. Several of the above were also dairy-free, though, so ask if you’re interested.

Today is Sunday, and my birthday is Saturday. I have already read two books (one paper, one ebook) that were early birthday presents, because I am spoiled and because apparently the concept of delayed gratification is not a strong suit at the moment. Anyway, in making a dinner reservation for this evening, I got asked, is it anybody’s birthday? and usually I lie and tell them no, because I don’t want to make the waitstaff feel obliged to sing as well as their real jobs, and I worry that they will give me a nasty piece of white cake instead of letting me decide whether I want good dessert or no dessert. But this time I chirped, “Yes, it’s mine!” Because this year, honestly, with all the horrible and disappointing news the world has brought us in the last week, I kind of feel the need for all the birthday assistance I can get.

This post is a list of things you can think about getting for yourself–or just drooling over if you don’t have the spare cash–as presents for yourself for my birthday. Sadly, I can’t get them for all of you. I am not that much of a wealthy hobbit, to be able to buy all of you these lovely things as presents for my birthday. But I will at least show you the shinies that I would get you, if I could have a proper hobbit party and give you all the proper hobbit presents that I would like to give you. (Please note that this is the opposite of the usual wishlist: I am not asking you to get this stuff for ME but for YOURSELVES. Not that I wouldn’t like it also, but some of it–like the Kickstarter stuff–I already have, and mostly: the point is you, not me.)

1. Nerd coloring books. Specifically, Dinosaurs With Jobs. Mostly I would get this for my old college friend Scott, but the rest of you might want it too.

2. Chad Jerzak Raku ceramics. Saw these at the St. Kate Art Festival. Very cool.

3. Fresh Mud Pottery. Also at the St. Kate Art Festival. So many things in the gallery, be sure you look at the slide show.

4. Elise’s Current Shinies. Ooh. Shiny. So many shinies, so few body parts to hang them from.

5. Tim always has lovely things. Here are two of his newer ones (that first link was from the Pop Art Minneapolis series, the second the newest Reader photo).

6. Richard Shindell and Lucy Kaplansky are doing a Kickstarter. For those of us who have been yearning for another Cry Cry Cry album, even two-thirds as good will almost certainly be good enough. (Did you miss out on Cry Cry Cry? Here they are singing Northern Cross. The third member is Dar Williams. Oh, fine, here’s another: By Way of Sorrow.)

7. Julie Dillon, who has done the gorgeous art for my Tor.com stories, is also doing a Kickstarter. Many ways to support her art; go look.

Any other loveliness you want to share with each other? There’s a whole week before it’s my birthday, and the comments section lies before you.