THE MUSE IS A CHARACTER I'M WRITING

THE MUSE IS A CHARACTER I'M WRITING

Shamefully or understandably, one of my writing projects is a novel that is not on hold but that I've revisited after months away. I don't have writer's block. It's that Life demands too much survival from me and too much time including long commutes, in this long moment, to focus. The author Erica Jong said, and was quoted saying, that the time to write cannot be replaced. I know!

The novel is set in the realizable past but is a historical novel. The research for it, which I also enjoy, frankly takes far more time than the writing. That's because I know that a knowledgeable reader will crash into any inaccuracies and not be able to go with the reading flow and the reader who just wants to suspend all belief is someone I don't want to mislead. 

It's my aim to enter that time and place and know it as well as my characters.

I'm not complaining. Researching is not just about finding the right information to read. My research has included photographing historical photos on walls in various locations as well as walking certain neighborhoods to photograph buildings. I have a list of buildings I want to go into just to see the lobbies; some of the places in my novel are long gone or have been repurposed or are up for refurbishing. I often listen to music from the era I've placed characters in, because they listen to that music. I've paged through books about the history of the era and photographed just what I'm focused upon and eventually print that out. Clothing and haircuts and perfume are included in my work.

Recently, when I revisited my novel, I started by reading what I've already written. Time away is an excellent way to discover that what you wrote months or years earlier still stands, that it's valid, that it's good or even great. I continued to write a chapter that furthers the story the other day. I'd printed out what I wrote previously and I knew what I wanted this chapter to accomplish as the story moves forward. 

It seems to me that my main character, the one my readers will get to know the best, is my muse. This character is continuing to tell me her story so I can write it. 

C 2025 Christine Trzyna  All Rights Reserved

THEMATIC

For some time there's been a thematic underlying this blog which suspect that only one or two people (other than me) in this world is perceptive of.  

The thematic ties into my postings about the art of Andy Warhol (whose studio was called The Factory), my postings about products ("they didn't pay me to say this") and what I perceive as people seeing themselves as defined (and self promoted) by what they buy/own/like.  People reducing themselves to lists as well as advertisements and informational blurbs, in particular to prove they have value beyond their basic humanity (which some of them attempt to deny to others), often defined as having money for Brands ("We only eat Gelsons") - class - superiority through acquisition. People (including authors) turning into BRANDS so now you can sue someone for hurting your Brand/ income potential re defamation of BRAND (object) rather than a human being.  People promoting and marketing themselves for career, for friendship, for love.... but also for survival. (So if you're an author who also writes poetry, or you want to write fiction and non fiction, or more than one genre you may have to have several names of the pen.)  Not wishing to offend anyone with your version of truth - or opinion - we are in an era of self censorship and stifling in order to be liked - or employed.

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In some stories, a character's fashion purchases stand in as character development since these purchases define their sensibilities.

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When I post my (current) "likes" does my reader know me?  (Maybe, slightly.  I recently surprised myself with a "sea change" about something I'd been dedicated to for about 10 months.)

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Though I've taken down or not re-posted dozens of song/music videos that I was in the mood for or hearing in my head at the time I posted them, my personal music inventory is vast but also telling since I'm Old School and not at all into or informed on the hip hop and rap artists. Does that peg me?

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I once had a friend who was uniquely beautiful (and privileged) who was always used the term "Boyfriend" to mean "Date" as in "I have a new Boyfriend" after a couple Dates. She wasn't es[especially promiscuous but she wanted people to think so, that they had a chance with her. She attracted so many men who she enjoyed toying with; even the ones she didn't want. I caught on eventually that she also didn't want to loose any of her entourage to other women and these men let her waste their time. Her phone rang constantly (pre cell) with them just checking in, just telling each other what they were doing with their day, in search of Fame.  Interviews, auditions, practice sessions, and in the evenings the clubs to nurse a beer while showing support for each other. She was years ahead of most of us when it came to thinking of herself as a Brand and Self Promotion and Marketing which actually hid her true self, an unknowable self perhaps, unknowable as a means of self protection. It took me a while to realize I had been "conned by her charisma" and to get over the shock of realization that I'd made a major life decision based on her bullshitting me.

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It's NOT "all good."


C 2019  Christine Trzyna  All Rights Reserved

MUSES WITH WORSE PROBLEMS THAN MINE - TALKING TO STRANGERS

Talking to strangers seems natural to me and it's helped me when I need to interview someone or take a poll. I'm not a snob about it. I talk to people from all walks of life. I wasn't always at ease like this but I think it started when I was in sales and I grew in confidence also when I went back to college and loved classroom discussions. Walking my dog, I've been part of many conversations that start on the basis of dogs and expand out.

In recent weeks I've had a number of encounters that left me feeling personally "What Problems Do I Have?'

First there was the lady I met in a thrift store I'm not really into thrift stores like some people are I rarely go to them but I like to find art supplies in them. There was a woman looking through clothes and holding dresses up to her body. She asked me what I thought of a dress and we got to talking. Soon the conversation went like this.

"Do you notice that I'm pregnant?  Five months.  And I'm 38 years old."

"Yes  you are!" I said, noticing her prominent belly.

"I had a bad day yesterday.  I went to the hospital.  They heard no heart beat.  My baby's dead."

The woman threw her arms around me hugged me and began to weep, huge tears running down her face.

I hugged her back and asked God to protect her.

I wondered where the father was.

She needed to be held and to cry.

"They weren't nice about it.  They didn't know I lost another baby just six months ago.  They told me to go home and wait to miscarry.  But I think I felt something this morning - a flutter.

Maybe the test was wrong."

***

I was hot and tired.  I had my dog with me on the bus in her wheeled carrier that's like a suitcase. The air was polluted by the fires. I was having trouble breathing. I'd taken her into an air-conditioned office with me for the day. I was so allergy sick I was dull. I wasn't looking forward to sticking to the mattress all night. We need a HEALTHY and HAPPY living environment, I was thinking.  We needed that Yesterday!

The driver said, "You've got to have FAITH in God."

I said, "I can only try to have faith."

She said, "No you must TRUST God,  You must BELIEVE.  You must KNOW that he's going to come through for you."

I simply cannot make myself think or feel this way.  I need proof.  My ideas about God are that there is this Intelligence to the Universe but I don't think He cares so much about me, even if i do things His way. So I didn't lie to her. But I didn't want to put her much stronger spirituality through any tests.

Then she said, "I've got a situation. There's just me and my two kids. My husband disappeared months ago. He flew into Atlanta. He went to Tennessee. The last anyone saw him. He was there.  Me and the kids - we have dreams of him.  I KNOW he is alive.  I KNOW he is out there."

I don't know that he's not.

I've seen too many TV shows.

"Have you done everything?

"Yes, on TV, everything!"

A few days later I waited for this particular bus driver to go past, even though I wasn't getting on.

I handed her a note that said, "David Paulidis Missing 411."  "Look this guy up on the Internet - on YouTube - Don't Freak! - Big Foot I almost whispered. He's an ex cop and maybe he can make sure for you that they did everything right in the investigation."

She took the note.

And I have not seen her driving that bus since.

***
She got told about the huge number of photocopies she was making and that her copies seemed to be jamming the printer. She was a lady with obviously dyed hair and clothes 10 (or more) years too young for her. She meant to be nice. She offered to bring her own paper. The place closed and so we headed out the door at the same time. She was in there looking for work. Verbally she gave me her resume. She had done a lot of physical labor - painting.  I tried to relate with a story about how I once hung wallpaper - three clients before I quit.  I didn't know anyone hiring. I respected that she'd once contracted with a huge apartment building. She told me she used a toothbrush on the light switches.

"You need a ride home?" she asked.

"Well I only have a half hour walk and it is a beautiful day. I was going to stop and get my dog some food at the market."

"Get in I'll drive you there."

So I did get into the car she was living in. Not obviously. She drove me first to check in with her friend living in his van. In the five minutes to the market, she told me tomorrow was going to be an even better day.

Her boyfriend was coming out of prison.

***
All three of these people are muses, each in their own way, and not on purpose.  But don't judge me on how or why.

C 2018 - 2025  Christine Trzyna

MUSES ON THE GROUND IN SANTA CRUZ

MUSES ON THE GROUND IN SANTA CRUZ

One day I just got up in the fogpit and drove to the smogpit.
One world and another linked by fast highway.
Sometimes your other world is across the street and doesn't require drastic measures like mileage or time zones, but what did I know?
Walk in closets and toilets in parks were called "alternative housing."
I had to get out of there.

From somewhere high up, the clouds, or maybe the sea cliff, I left an imprint first.
I dragged my heart through the ocean waves before I left, dangling it in a bag made of net, that also held semi precious stones, letting the salt water do its work.

I left muses on the ground in Santa Cruz.
Some made me do what I wanted.
Some made me do what I didn't.
Some just left me terribly confused.

And I heard this song coming in from somewhere, in my head, Bob Dylan's Girl From North Country, so I went out and bought the album it was on so I could hear it again and wonder
who I left behind, who loved me. That and Alanis Morrisette's Ironic.

There were muses on the shelves of the libraries.
There were muses in binders left in coffee houses.
There was a muse who came up to me and pronounced my surname properly.

I had to hide my signature.
I went from handwriting to penmanship.


C 2018-2015  Christine Trzyna 
All Rights Including Internet and International Rights Reserved

GIRL FROM NORTH COUNTRY - EDDIE VEDDER

MUSES SOMETIMES PROVE TO BE FALSE

First read about this notion from a short story called THE MOON IN IT'S FLIGHT by Erica Jong.

How many times have you been influenced to do something energized by getting to know someone, or having a "thing" for someone (you don't really know them at all)?

Spurned by fantasy, I have:

Done a painting. (Which has been lost, I don't know where.  I thought I had it as a rolled up canvas but have not seen it in years.)

Moved to a bigger apartment. (Where I had a party and he flirted with another woman in my kitchen!)

Avoided my favorite TA at UCSC.  (Long explanation not forthcoming.)

Cried my eyes out for a whole day - at work yet. (I claimed allergies.)

C 2017-2025 Christine Trzyna

THINKING OF MUSE MARK

Mark didn't mean to but he taught me young that I would never ever have a jealous, manipulative, or controlling partner.


One of the most willful people I've ever met, he is predictably a huge success.  He has all the things I don't though some of the things he willfully wanted I never did.


One of the relationships of my life that I suspect has past life connections, there has always been something occult about it.

THE CHARMING SOCIOPATH MUSE WHO LEFT ME IN A DARK PLACE

My cousin, a minister, has quite recently, after more than half a life with no connection, turned out to be the one person I could talk to about one of the deep shocks of my lifetime, the charming sociopath muse of my early adulthood, who left me in a dark place.

Wicked, is what he called my Charming Sociopath, and for the first time in years I found there was someone I could talk to about the existence of Evil.

The Charming Sociopath had a support network of deceivers, people behind the scenes who must have known his insincerity, or at least suspected it, but were not protective of me. Many of them went to Church.

And so I proceeded to a dark place where loyalty, faithfulness, and devotion, idealism and belief were challenged.

My cousin says, "He was grooming you for more shocks."