PASS THE PASSPORT(S)

 

For some, 'tis travel time. The other day I discovered yet another ranking list, one I would never have thought of.

 

It’s the ranking of passports. See here, and also here.

 

These rankings have to do with how many countries do not require a visa from the passport holder. The more, the “better” the passport, as in allowing its holder greater travel freedom.

 

Only about a third of Americans have a valid passport at any time, and the feeling of belonging to a good or “best” country has little to do with how many other nations approve of ours. But a good passport is no trifle.

 

I say this, because I know two people who are in the process they hope will eventually give them a US passport, and loving what the country stands for is less than half their impetus to undergo this lengthy and expensive course.

 

Their number one reason is to have a passport that makes travelling easier.

 

From birth I held (or was entitled to hold) two passports. One is ranked 4th in passports, the other 17^th. (Some differences depending on which ranking, but the disparity is the same.) My love for both countries is real. But, trust me, in the days I travelled more the passport ranking did make a difference.  

 

We take so much for granted. Being part of a strong country is yet another thing to appreciate when it comes to life’s fortunes, which in my case I hadn’t had to struggle for.

 

Americans are fortunate in many ways. This is just one more to be grateful for.

COMMON TRAPS FOR ASPIRING* WRITERS

 

*First, do away with the word “aspiring.”

If you are writing you are already a writer, not an aspiring writer. The aspirants are the folks who say they will write someday when the stars align just right, as in when the moon is in the seventh skies and Jupiter aligns with Mars.

(Dates me, doesn’t it. The words for The Age of Aquarius from the musical Hair.)

 

When beginning a writer’s journey, the biggest trap is losing oneself to the notion that this is about the market, not self-discovery.

 

Conversely, the second biggest trap is to lose direction believing it’s about oneself only, and not the market.

 

Holding both truths at once, seemingly contradictory, is how to not fall into writerly traps.

 

Writing begins and forever remains a journey of self-discovery. But it must recognize fueling stations that take account of the market. It is about communicating these discoveries, and the market is the vehicle.

 

I instinctively understood the first but took a few years to acknowledge the second. Now I know I write for myself first, and to communicate to others a close second.

Hardest Scenes to Write?

 

It’s different for every writer.

 

Some writers struggle with dialogue. It’s easy for me, because I hear the characters talk, and I often have to tell them it’s time to be quiet.

 

I’ve had writing friends who said it’s the scenes that are the most wrenching for their characters. For some reason, these flow for me. Maybe because I feel the internal urge to plow through and get the characters out and away from the pickle barrels I threw them into.

 

For me, it’s the quiet descriptive passages I have the hardest time putting into words. Almost every editor I have worked with has suggested I add more to expand and enrich these quiet moments of physical observations.

 

I’ve had dialogue cuts suggested and whole scenes eliminated. But I have yet to have feedback that said “cut description.”

 

Could it be because I began with picture book writing, where description should be left to the art? Maybe, but no matter. I know this is where my storytelling needs help.

 

And this is the point. It’s important to know one’s Achilles heel.

PHONE PROGRESSION and PERSONAL EVOLUTION

 

The Israel I was born into had few personal/private phones. At that time, only physicians and government officials had a phone at home.

 

I was four when we got a line at our apartment, and we had to share it with a neighbor family. That meant any time the neighbors used the phone, ours would be dead. My father complained that their daughter was a teenager, and that meant (you guessed it) she was on the phone for hours. But who would this teenager be talking to when few families had phones?

 

Being the first two families in the building with phones also meant a line of neighbors at our door in the evenings asking to use our phone and each paying us the cost of a local call. It was a fixed equivalent of ten cents. In those days, one would never turn down a neighbor’s wish to talk on the phone to one of their relatives who were also lucky to have a phone. This meant we perennially had neighbors in our living room waiting for their turn. It was just fine.

 

About a year or two later, more lines popped up and we even got the neighbors with the teenage daughter off our shared line. The country was growing, and now most people had landlines into their homes.

Then came the modular phones, which meant a phone in every room. You’d think this provided privacy, but it didn’t because it was a single line and the dreaded click of a parent listening to my conversations (by then I was approaching the teen years) meant it was in fact less private.

 

Then came answering machines, and we didn’t run to answer the phone anymore because the machine would get it. Eventually the first mobile phones appeared, then the many lines to a single residence, and, you guessed it--- the smart phones. So smart, that they not only track us but listen to us.

 

By then I was living in the USA and our family was among the last to switch to smartphones. We were forced to when Verizon shut down the 3G network. I witnessed others who got a head start on these brilliant gizmos, carrying these little buggers from room to room, even sitting to dinner with their phone next to their plates.

This is exactly what I didn’t want to do or become. Me, a slave to my phone? No thanks.

 

We’re all caught up for the moment with phone conveniences. But I have learned a thing or two in the few years where others surfed smartly, and I stayed basic. I learned what I didn’t want and find that I now use my genius phone the way we used our first landline way back when. Ninety-five percent of the time it’s in a fixed place. It’s never “on me,” and definitely never ever at the dinner table. My phone is turned off every night. I disabled almost all notifications.  

 

Because I want to own a phone that doesn’t own me. I remember the days when life was richer because we were not awash in the phony (pun intended) notion that without a phone life’s bells cease ringing.