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It is 10:04 in Reno a Tuesday,
my hair is still wet and my nose is
still wet and my throat is dry,
and I'm here to soak up the
pools of knowledge and to stir
up the stagnant books with
missing pages and missing ideas
I haven't written yet but there is
time, I tell myself, and tremble
at the speed, the
momentum,
the inertia of it all because
it is 10:08 in Reno a Tuesday
and even the clock is
advancing.

Without Time for a Room of One's Own

Back when “A Room of One's Own” was first delivered to a rare and privileged group of university girls, Virginia Woolf’s advice – that a woman wishing to write fiction should earn 500 pounds a year and have her own writing room – was attainable, but certainly not common. Today, it is unusual to find an aspiring female writer without these necessities. Today, on the contrary, if a woman possesses talent, ambition and other outstanding qualities, poverty is not the trap that will keep her from writing; it is rather the trap of achievement. The pressure put on a modern woman to maximize her independence and opportunity impedes her ability to reach the mental state required to write great fiction – what Woolf describes as the “Incandescent Mind.”

Particularly if she is vibrant and talented, a modern woman comes under extraordinary pressure to become a Superwoman – a woman who works outside the home, nurtures her family, keeps the house, participates in civic life, taxies the children, volunteers, exercises, and who – at a moment’s notice – counsels her husband through his stress and challenges. The exact list of activities is variation on a theme. The Superwoman is not my work of fiction; statistics cited in Guidance & Counseling Journal show 50% of American women work outside the home, and most of them still shoulder 75-80% of housekeeping duties. The Superwoman simmers constantly, and I fear will continue until she reduces to a thick paste and all her talents have evaporated.

That the Superwoman cannot write great fiction is not because she is too busy, but because her creative channel is clogged with responsibility, stress and guilt. If it were a matter of scheduling, the Superwoman could arrange for the children to carpool to school, so she could eek in a half-an-hour of writing before she has to leave for work. It is ludicrous to imagine that, in a breath in the morning’s routine, she could achieve the calm and unimpeded state of a writer, the elusive Incandescent Mind.

The Incandescent Mind is not merely bright or even luminous. It leaves “no obstacle in it, no foreign matter unconsumed." When the writer shuts the door to her study, she must leave her daily life outside. Wailing children, ringing phones, demanding bosses, and brooding husbands – all distractions must wait, and the heat of her creativity should burn up any guilt that might follow her to her desk. Once she is settled in that room, the author’s passion for life is entirely for the life of her characters, and only their troubles are worth her attention. In critical terms, we can link the Incandescent Mind to Keats’s concept of “Negative Capability,” which can be described as the poet’s ability not to be. The author must be void of her own being, allowing the world of her fiction exist instead. A talent in this state is capable of staggering genius. Not wanting to mince words, both Woolf and Keats are describing the genius of Shakespeare.

The Superwoman will not be our next Shakespeare. She is convinced she has no room or right to ignore her obligations. By nature, the Superwoman is willing to make sacrifices, but she cannot ask the same from her husband or children. The children need her affection, her guidance, and if she doesn’t drive them to piano lessons then isn’t she denying them the chance to be creative? Nor can she withhold herself from her husband, who genuinely needs and loves her. Besides, for all his obliviousness, he really does encourage her to succeed. Giving up her career or her education is not an option either. Modern Society now affords women many, many opportunities to utilize their independence; and it will not suffer the insult of women choosing to pass up those opportunities. The withered hands of our oppressed foremothers pried open those doors of opportunity, and how ungrateful and ignorant is the girl who would rather not walk through them. No, she cannot give up her career because it would be a tragedy if a woman with her potential were “just a housewife.”

So what does she do? I do not know the answer; Superwoman is a title I myself wear with pride and exhaustion. It would take a prodigious effort for a Superwoman to overcome her own nature. She would have to believe that writing validates her more than the reliance of others. She would have to give up her career, replace it with her career as a writer, and if anyone accuses her of being “just a housewife,” she would smile at her undone laundry and dirty floors and reply, “Oh, not a housewife, but a writer.” Above all, she would have to trust that her completed masterpiece gives her children, her husband and the thousands who read it the strength and courage to strive for greatness in their own lives. These thoughts would carry her through her daily life and ease her guilt, so that when she sits down to write, she has the freedom to be completely lost to her fiction.

Back when Woolf first delivered “A Room of One's Own,” she introduced her audience to “Judith”, Shakespeare’s imaginary sister. She was a girl with talent and ambition that lived and died in poverty and obscurity, denied the opportunity to earn an income or develop her skills. Woolf challenged that the spirit of Judith still lived, and that when the circumstances were right, she would be born again into a world where her opportunity matched her potential. It seems to me that that time should be now, but where is our Judith Shakespeare? She lives - I don’t doubt it for a second - but she is very busy and very tired. She plays so many roles for so many people that she no longer has a voice of her own.

Tova's Training Update 2

This week, training is is sucky. I'm frustrated and pouty. Every workout I get slower and weaker, after my workouts I'm sick, and frankly it's humilitating. I completely BLEW UP during the run practice this week. Got about 1.5mi in and detonated - couldn't breathe, couldn't see, certainly couldn't run.

I'm sure everybody's advice is correct: Too fast-too soon, dehydration, not enough carbs, overtraining - aggh! I knew I was going to have to train my body, push past pain and weakness, but I wasn't expecting this to require so much mental training. I'm going to have to completely rewire my head.

And if it only weren't so easy for HER. SHE (who is actually really lovely, smart, and supportive) is just so good! God - I hate it when someone makes it look so easy.

So there you have it. I'm a competative, spoiled brat, who is totally on the glory hunt. I'm sure those of you who know me aren't surprised. Those of you who think you know me need to wise up to the act.

Tova's Training Update 1

Hey there!

My mom and I raced the Moms On The Run 5k on Mother's Day to raise money for breast cancer patients. I got two friends to join the run at the last minute - that's $160 for Northern Nevada breast cancer patients! Go Team!

We all did well and had a great time. My mom got 2nd place for her age group (she had a bum ankle and wasn't even trying). I finished 17th for my age group and only a minute ahead of my mother. If anybody asks, the cape caused some drag and hurt my time. Remember superheros - no capes!

"Capes? Superheroes?" Well, it was also a costumed event. Attached is a picture of me during the costume contest, showing off for the crowd. The lovely Fairy Godmother next to me is my girlfriend Jill; she was dusting everyone with Cure Sparkles (the finish line was covered in fairy droppings - really funny). I lost the contest to a little girl dressed as a Boo-Bee (a bee with the word "Boo" written all over her costume). It was a pretty sweet way to spend Mother's Day. Big thanks to Lisa Andrews for staying up with me 'til 2am finishing the costume (note for the next race: Get a full night's sleep).

This was my very first race, but I'll be racking them up as I train for the Pacific Grove Triathlon in September. I'm entering that event to raise money for the Leukemia/Lymphoma Society, so don't be surprised when I ask you for a donation of support. I plan to keep you in the loop with lots of cool pictures of me suffering and sweating, so stay tuned.

Greetings to all,
Tova "Wonder Woman" Ramos

You Eat What You Are

I had the most flavor bursting, hard working, hunger smothering granola bar today.

It came out of the same box of bars I dip into every day, but this little snack had something to prove. Did they enact some new quality-control standards at the Quaker Oats factory? Did they switch to an organic, grown with love, grain supplier? Could my chewey comrade sense my insatiable hunger? Was the bar infected with a noxious bacteria that caused the raisins and almonds to swell to delicious proportions? Or was it my perception - my point of view at that moment - and my intention to see the the wholesome goodness in everything?

I may never know, but I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Why is being good so hard?

We were sitting next to each other, singing song after song, and it felt good. I don't sing much, but he kept waving me on, and we kept laughing and singing. After one particularly smooth batch of tunes, I piped up, “Hey man, what’s your name?”

He reached is Pabst Blue Ribbon over the guitar and toasted a greeting with me, “Ted, and you’re Tova.”

“Yup,” I nodded. “I’m Tova.”

Out of the corner of my eye I saw his hand move. I thought he was reaching to swat a bug off my jeans, but he swerved and nudged my finger…he nudged my wedding ring.

“And you are totally taken.”

“Totally,” I laughed, for the first time noticing his lips, which could probably do more than just sing.

“Well, next time leave that at home.”

If you were inside my worries,

You'ld think I had never partied in a hotel room before. I don' t know what were all so worked up about. I know that at some motel room get togethers, I have thrashed about Way wilder than I'm planning on getting at DadaMotel. Slight correction - at DadaMotel I'm planning on thrashing about creatively like you all have never seen before. I'll be the Guns-n-Roses of mental motel mischief.

Babble

OOOh
suculata-soculato.
OOOoh
skutsolada dadamump...
bushquash bushquash, borabesabum.
mooshmash mooshmash puterliderahm.

No Title

Will I ever see you again? It's been, G-d, ten years this March. I always thought how funny. I always thought what a great joke. You never saw it coming - they say the left side of your body was pristine. But that's just like you. You never needed to know where we were going. You touched my wrist and looked at me instead. I cried. I've never cried like that again, but I've faked it a couple of times. I miss you so much baby. How can you really be gone? I never read your book. I never read your book. I know how it ends - our lake, our child. I know how it ends, and I'll never be satisfied with another ending. How shallow I've become without you. I don't keep anything; I'll throw it all away eventually. I say I'm not sentimental, that I don't keep dead chi around, but the truth is I can't see the magic in it anymore. And I can't bear the guilt that they didn't mean anything to me. And when this chapter is done, I'll say it was a good read, but I have late fees to pay at the library.

He's nothing like you and that tears at me. But he loves me like only you could have; I'll never be able to leave that hunger.