First Fruits
and what else is ripening?
Dear involved reader,
In last week’s newsletter I mentioned that one of my readers spontaneously upgraded to being a paid subscriber, and the next day another friend followed suit! What a generous gift and it was much appreciated.
I’m formulating plans for how I’m going to expand and produce more work for this newsletter, including serialised fiction. I’m in the early stages of inception, which is always the fun part. I reckon it will be an autumn project.
Speaking of autumn… Happy Lughnasadh (or Lúnasa)! The 1st of August is the modern date attributed to this seasonal shift, which in our traditional calendar signalled the first day of autumn. For those of you broiling in August heat with weeks of it ahead of you this might seem like wishful thinking, but there are signs aplenty of the coming downshift in Ireland.
Such as this short video salutation I recorded earlier today.
Lughnasadh is a holiday named in honour of our old Irish god, Lugh, who was typical of solar gods since he was a bit of an arrogant boaster, but he could back up his brags. He had several epitaphs, including lámfada (‘long hand’ or ‘long arm’), which was likely due to his talent at throwing his legendary fiery spear, ‘slaughterer’, for incredible distances and with unerring accuracy. He was also known as Ildánach: ‘skilled in many arts’ as he became an expert at everything he studied. He was as good a scholar as he was a warrior. It’s a rare hero who can easily win battles, compose poems, play a harp, cast spells, forge weapons, and sit down and beat you in a game of fidchell (an Irish board game probably similar to chess).
He became leader of the gods, the Tuatha Dé Danann, as a result of his remarkable mastery. Every member of the Tuatha had at least one impressive gift, but Lugh could beat anyone at anything.
It would be wonderful to state that the Tuatha had the discernment to demand such useful abilities in a leader, but before Lugh they had selected another good looking boaster called Bres, but under his petty stewardship he demoralised the entire people. Lugh was the much needed remedy after a period of degradation. Of course, his ascension to chief resulted in war. This is what happens when solar gods appear on the horizon!
Lughnasadh is associated with the first fruits of the harvest, and as I’ve indicated, there is much ripening happening in the fields at the moment, despite a wet July. On top of these changes we have a supermoon lighting the skies tonight. This is when a full moon hits its closest point to the Earth in its orbit (a mere 357,264km away), and we’ll get two of them this calendar month, with the second one rising on the 31st of August.
Tonight’s big moon is lifting low and early on the horizon, so we might have better luck spotting it at the end of the month. I’m unlikely to see it today based on this photo I took earlier today:
This image, of the clouds mirrored in the Coole Park turlough, is a reminder to me that even grey clouds on a damp day can evoke wonder.
Going for walks in nature and observing the seasonal and celestial changes is part of how I keep myself grounded in the here and now after spending much of my day with my mind fogged with illusion and dreams.
Since I’ve enough nonsense hazing my mind, I’ve dropped away from using most social media over the past couple of months, and despite occasional bouts of FOMO, or tiny panic attacks that I’ll no longer be relevant, I rarely miss it.1
I log in every now and again, post a couple of items, and abscond before a revulsion envelops me. I’m not trying to impress you with my restraint, merely to note that engaging with social media is not vital. Publicity and publishing models are changing rapidly, and it strikes me that the better use of my time during this era of duelling social media platforms is not to bet anxiously on every competitor, but to reflect on the kind of work I want to produce next. The pixel dust will settle after the forthcoming tech gun fight, and the dead bodies will be apparent. I do not want to be one of the flies buzzing over a corpse.
We all go through periods of contraction and expansion. Since the beginning of the year I’ve been in an intense period of study and a reassessment of my goals. This newsletter has been a huge aid during this period. It’s an outlet that encourages me to be productive, connects me to genuine people, and results in quality responses to my work. 2
It simultaneously makes me braver and suggests it’s okay to be more vulnerable in my output. Probably my ‘first fruits’ of this process was starting B.A.D. almost a month ago. I plan to keep evolving and responding. If I’m marvelling at this change in such a short period I hope I will be flabbergasted at the harvest after the one-year mark.
I’ve been pondering recently about how much time is required to shift the tenor of your work. The best method is to write your way there, as I have been doing via these newsletters, but there is little incentive for a jobbing writer to pause long enough to notice that her compass is no longer pointing due north.
Through deadlines, agent pressure, audience expectations, or the need to keep yourself in coffee, it’s hard to stop and figure out what you really want to do other than spin like a whirligig in the prevailing wind. This is the other reason to eliminate excess ‘noise’, as I call it: the endless bad news cycles and malcontented chatter-feeds. There is a constant babble about trends and forecasts, instead of the silence needed for deep consideration.
Even on Substack, you can be overwhelmed by discussions about metrics, how to find subscribers and encourage people to pay for a subscription. There are people who love this hyper-analysing, and it energises them in their passions. But for some, it’s dispiriting. It’s not a case of who is right or who is wrong, but what do you want to achieve?
The urge to ‘meet the market need’ is most evident in an industry like screenwriting, which insists on pitches, treatments, step-outlines, and constant feedback and refinement before you write the script… if you write the script. Everyone is so keen to get it perfect so it will sell. This is an illusionary aim. One producer will pass while another producer will rave about it. But every time a producer passes on the project a rewrite is demanded. As if the problem is with the work rather than it was a mismatch of taste or expectation. This request for fresh edits by the writer can result in a gradual warping of the material. Everything that made the project special is sanded off until is a pale plank that will work for every house… and suddenly everyone wants to use brick.
The message to the writer is that the work is deficient rather than the work has not yet found its champion. It requires iron confidence in the material from everyone involved to sell a project without destroying its soul. Every prospect will offer an assured judgement and most of them will never buy the story. This tornado of opinion shreds good scripts into mediocre scraps.
I’m not suggesting all input is forbidden — erudite insights are welcomed by all except the most insecure — but there is a delicate stage after conception when a writer carries an entire universe in her head before she starts writing. My experience is that the gestation period is never the same, but I like to hold off from writing for as along as possible (notes, doodles, scribbles, etc. don’t count). There is a definite click when you begin, and after that you need momentum, attention and care.
Recently I took a series of online seminars with the poet David Whyte. One of the issues he discussed was the need to wait. In his opinion, writing too early was one of the biggest mistakes a writer could make. It can result in you floundering, but more importantly, it can stunt the full development of the work. He noted you need ‘to let it alone in a radical way.’ Can you be a witness rather than a critic? It’s difficult to hold options in your mind lightly and tenderly in the receptive space of non-judgemental curiosity. It takes more discipline and courage to wait than it does to whip out the measuring tape, hammer and nails.
It reminded me of my recent Substack in which I discussed David Lynch’s approach to writing: sit and wait for the big fish, but it will take patience, faith, and sometimes you’ve got to move about.
Who has the time and bravery to do this? Who has the savings and belief in this tenuous endeavour?
Not every project requires this foolhardy, gallant openness. But there are times when you sense the rare whale under the surface, so very deep, and you must linger in your boat, feeling its wake rock you, spying only parts of its form at any one time.
Eventually, just as you are nodding off or ready to move the boat again, the entire gargantuan, carbuncled creature will surface, and lift your vessel up with it.
Before I end (much later than I envisioned), I’d like to point you toward David Whyte’s Substack, where he is now publishing much of his new essays, poems and photographs as well as his older material. His thoughtful, beautiful work is even worth a paid subscription. I discovered Whyte years ago when I read his sublime book, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words. Whyte is part Irish and part Yorkshire man so he’s a bit like a rebellious mystic poet with a practical streak.
I plan to write about poetry at some point, as it’s a practice that nourishes me especially when I am adrift on the vicissitudes of life.
Here is a link to his entry on ‘Gratitude’ (from the book, Consolations). Follow it and watch the live action short film with Whyte narrating the piece: his voice conveys a calm centre you didn’t know you needed.
I still use Instagram, although I have little faith in it as a platform to enhance engagement with my followers. Per most social media, my content is simply part of the churn the platform keeps spinning to lure in eyeballs for advertisements. I post a picture a day, and look at some enjoyable images.
New readers might want to look at my post ‘Solstice Review’ where I offer an overview of my approach and progress with Substack and how it’s affected my writing.
Thanks for the restack!