THE CITY IS OUR WRITING: Our Work Needs Fast and Slow

By Mary Rakow

As writers we learn to juggle opposites in our work: extravagance and minimalism, large and small, story and plot. And we have to juggle fast and slow. Our work needs both because, to be art, it has to bear witness to the complexity of human life. And to its beauty.

Most of us reading this blog are very well acquainted with fast. Fast is important. It’s intrinsic to our nature because we want move our heavy, earthly bodies through time and space elegantly, effortlessly, swiftly. The poet Milosz says it best:  “We want our poems to move the way thought does.” 

But it seems sometimes like fast is everything. It’s the default. A stand-up comic I like has a bit about how impatient we are now. It’s not enough that Amazon delivers the item we just ordered, today. Or even in two hours.  We want it delivered yesterday, before we even ordered it.  He’s cynical and hilarious. 

Because we know fast so well, I’m going to focus on slow. Having her kind permission, I will tell a brief story:

This client submits work every two weeks. In our last phone session her opening pages were strong, as always. Then she continued and read a scene in which an elderly character moves very slowly back and forth across a small kitchen to prepare a plate of cookies for the protagonist, a child. The scene was hypnotic. The most beautiful thing was the speed. The main character always seeking safety. It was the tenderness with which the author rendered the slow movement that makes it so beautiful. This captivating, mesmerizing experience of safety. It is just exquisitely gorgeous. And stays with me still.

To write such a scene we, as creators, also have to slow down. We have to stop. 

I now live at a very busy intersection in San Francisco. Honking, retaliatory honking, screeching, it’s all part of the picture.

But one the bus, it’s slow. 

I’m taking the #1 bus. It’s semi-crowded. A woman enters guiding an elderly man, perhaps her father. He has a cane, is frail and exceedingly nervous. His eyes jump back and forth, even after they find seats together. His face, full of worry. But then after she settles her belongings on the floor between her feet, she reaches over and lays her hand on top of his. In that exact instant his eyes close and his body softens and he drops into what looks like very deep peace. The power of her touch is astonishingly beautiful. If I had not been slow, if I had been checking my phone, I would have missed it. Instead it was a great gift to me, bringing me right back to all the things I believe in most deeply.

As writers we need to notice these things. If we don’t notice, then we don’t write of them. If we don’t write of them, they disappear. 

An art history professor at Harvard offered a class titled, “The Power of Patience: Teaching Students the Value of Deceleration and Immersive Attention” in which students had to sit for 3 full hours in front of a single painting at an art museum and record how their reactions changed over time. Turns out, it was a popular class.

I think this is a good exercise for writers too. I think we need to re-learn how to mono-task. How to sit.  How to concentrate. How to be mindful. We have to be able to do it when we want to.

During Christmas this past year I was struck by two sentences in the sermon for Epiphany, which celebrates the visit of the “Three Kings” or “Three Wise Men.” Hearing the story many times in my life I didn’t expect to hear anything new.  “What did they do?” the priest asked, then answered, “They stopped.” I’ve thought about that since January. It’s so radical and simple.

A plant moves slowly, directing its leaves to the sun but, as far as we know, it is not conscious of its movement. But we have consciousness and self-consciousness. Part of the reason we’re at the top of the food chain, I venture. And we raise ourselves even higher when we make objects of meaning, like stories, short and long, fast and slow. This is our privilege as homo sapiens. This is our privilege at this point in our evolution. So we should prize our consciousness, and safeguard it, and refrain from those things that claim to be   important but really aren’t.  We need to get out of constant react-mode and to slow down to write well.  And we need, in the work itself, a deliberate use of fast and slow.

My first apartment in San Francisco was in the financial district. It was also a block from a fire department. The sound of sirens was frequent and I liked the whole intense vibe of the location. But then I started thinking about what a siren means.  That it isn’t just part of an intensity and speed that I found energizing. It means someone is in distress and others are rushing to help. So I decided whenever I heard a siren to stop whatever I was doing and take three deep breaths. One for the person in distress, one for those coming to aid, and one for the families of both, that something good and unexpected might come in the intersecting of their lives.

I’ve been doing this now for about 12 years. I almost always like doing it.  But sometimes I resist, too fastened to my own activity at the moment. That’s rare and a disturbing indicator for me. When we slow down, even for a nanosecond, it brings us back to our center.

Built into this and most cities are public places to slow down. Parks, churches. A medieval labyrinth next to a hospital. To walk it like a Buddhist monk raking a pattern into gravel. We can find these locations and visit them as part of our writing practice. 

Writing Exercises

1.

Describe a character, an animal or something in the landscape that is changing very, very slowly. See how much you can write about that single aspect. Play with it and write all the associations that come to mind, no matter how seemingly random.

2.

Write a scene between one person speaking very quickly and the other very slowly. Maybe it’s a first coffee date? What feelings come up in each character? What action comes as a result?

3.
Think of a little ritual that you can do in this month that will bring you back to your center, to your deepest self from which your best writing will come. Play with it. See what happens.

Thank you for your Comments!  Maybe share where you find fast and slow in your reading this month! 

If you’re attending SFWC July 21-24 you can find me doing the Free 8-Minute Edit (that’s fast) as well as the One-to One (slow) Paid Manuscript Consults. 

My calendar will likely fill up after the Conference, so if you need an editor, maybe reach out now at:  www.maryrakow.com.

Meanwhile, have a great month of good writing!!

Mary

© Mary Rakow, 2022

A freelance editor living in the Bay Area, Mary Rakow, Ph.D. works with clients who are both local and global. She is both rigorous and encouraging, insightful and kind.

A theologian with graduate degrees from Harvard Divinity School and Boston College, Rakow’s debut novel, THE MEMORY ROOM was shortlisted for the Stanford University International Saroyan Prize in Literature, a PEN USA/West Finalist in Fiction and was listed among the Best Books of the West by The Los Angeles Times.

Mary writes with deep feeling and a questioning faith. Her second novel, THIS IS WHY I CAME earned excellent reviews in The Boston Globe, The Atlantic, Harvard Divinity Bulletin, Commonweal, Christian Century, O Magazine, Ploughshares. It appeared on reading lists for courses at both Princeton and Yale.

Interested in the visual arts, Rakow received two Lannan residencies and two residencies at Whale & Star, in the studio of visual artist Enrique Martinez Celaya, where she was commissioned to write the first book-length treatment of the artist’s work, MARTINEZ CELAYA, WORKING METHODS.

Mary is a beloved editor and writing coach.  She enjoys working with writers who are just starting out and those with publications and writing accolades.

For inquiries: maryrakow.com

See also:

thisiswhybook.com

https://www.instagram.com/prayers_for_our_time/

https://www.facebook.com/Psalter

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