Before Darkness Settles

Fall is definitely here with her earthy smells of damp leaves, wet soil, and depending upon where I am - routes walked or roads traveled, the increasingly crisp morning winds may be redolent of pine or of ocean scents mimicked by Lake Michigan. 

I love fall in a melancholy sort of way. It's an ambivalence really, one full of nostalgia for those autumns of my childhood. Becoming aware of fall's earthiness also is to become keenly aware of other scents now absent. Like youth, they're grounded in another  life.

Maybe somewhere in America - in her suburbs and rural communities, in urban residential neighborhoods, leaves are still raked into huge piles. In those places, maybe children continue to jump into those piles, and parents continue to nag their children to help with the raking? It's a task not unlike tormented Sisyphus's. Poor pathetic Sisyphus who continuously pushed a boulder upward, and that boulder continuously rolled back upon him.

But is there anywhere in America where piles of leaves are still being burned, still filling nostrils with a smoke- laden dampness? Oddly, it wasn't entirely an unpleasant scent.  I don't really know except that today, staring at leaf patterns on my walkway, then lifting my head to absorb ambient fall aromas, I realized that scent of burning leaves most likely is gone forever.

Today, I'm reminded to enjoy the few remaining days before taking my dogs outside will require pulling on boots, hats, parkas, gloves and more; to enjoy the few remaining days before darkness settles on my neighborhood at 5:00 p.m. and Thanksgiving is on the horizon while spring seems years away!

GOOD NEWS! I've become an Amazon Reviewer.

Approaching the commercial arena:

I'm always on the lookout for wonderfully written books and articles about food and travel, another heavy-on-food genre as well as books about writing, research methods and the usual heart wrenching narrative.  But let's keep in mind one critical fact - we can't eat scenery and really do tend to remember those wonderful meals enjoyed away from home. Consequently, I'm usually a bit hyper critical of food writing but this collection definitely makes the grade and hit the spot for me.

You can read my Reviews at Amazon.com

Research Time and Place: Salmon River

I've always been intrigued by research - the process, the investigative challenges, and of course the results. Any writing that contains even the slightest reference to a time and place -whether fiction or non-fiction demands validation of facts.

When the writer describes a scene, presents dialogue or refers to an event, the past about which he or she is writing is really occurring the "NOW..." for the characters - individuals who created the public records. Historians may live in the present while looking back into the past but writers have an under-appreciated yet just as important of a responsibility: to place the reader into the context of by-gone events and eras. In doing so, the writer brings characters forward into the present for the reader.

Accuracy allows readers to experience the kinds of emotions with which the characters are dealing - their hopes, conflicts, pain, and resolution but presented accurately so readers will internalize those feelings as though actually living in the time period being written about.

One of my favorite books - one that brilliantly deals with numerous difficulties and concepts of historical research is The Art and Craft of Writing Historical Fiction by James Alexander Thom.  That noted, clearly the same strategies and rules are followed by writers of nonfiction, too!

Thom details methods for:

     *Finding and using historical archives

     *Conducting real-life field research

     *Reconstructing a milieu about which you're writing- people, voices, cultural contexts & physical environments

     *Achieving verisimilitude - the appearance of the true, in speech, action, and setting

I strive, in my writing, to focus upon verifying all information I've gathered that might end up in my stories or essays. To me, it's clear that if I plan to weave historical fact with a compelling plot then accurate descriptions comprise the foundation of my stories' believability.

Several days ago, I was drafting an essay about the first two or three times I ever visited Idaho. Those trips included drives across the Galena Summit and down through the Stanley Basin. Last week I took the same drive. It was twenty years later and when I arrived at an historical scenic overlook, a turnout really on Rt. 75, the road market indicated we were at an elevation of about 8000 ft. The highest peak in the area is 11153!

I was describing rivers. I was checking a map and listing names of those I could see from the overlook. But I was most intrigued by the names of several rivers noted in large italicized fonts on my topographical maps. there is the Big Lost River; another lists the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness. My reference sources claimed that it is the largest wilderness area in the contiguous United States.

I stopped to take photos. When I read the sign post at the overlook, the graphics and text imbued a drama feel to the sign post when considered within its historical context.