I lived my middle-aged years as a nomad, going from country to country and often returning to China. The breadth and depth of my experiences moved me to keep journals to capture the details. Occasionally, I put together parts of my experiences on paper so that my parents and friends could get at least an inkling of my adventures and the people I met.
I was told many times, “You should write a book.” The idea did not appeal to me because finding a willing publisher seemed such a long shot. Vanity presses were available, but that cost a substantial amount of money plus brought up the nagging question of how many books to print and what to do with them. Writing a book didn’t make it onto my “to do” list.
Writers in the Leisure World Writers’ Club began to talk about publishing their books through the new concept of self-publishing. Much older than I, and often physically handicapped, these authors became models to me of achieving the elusive goal of publishing a book. No need to send out endless query letters to tired editors. No need to tailor my writing to the demands of any editor. No need to decide whether to invest all the time and energy into writing a book on the slim chance of finding a publisher. But - and it was a big BUT for me, I was barely computer literate. However, I added writing a book to my “to do” list.
A few years passed, and writing a book remained on my “to do” list, but always on the bottom. I took a one-day workshop on self-publishing that offered details on alternative methods of self-publishing. It was interesting, but all required more computer literacy than I had. It also required having a computer at home.
In 2004, I had to take a health course to keep my teaching credential current. The teacher assigned us the task of creating a project that would enhance our individual health and well-being. Part of my personal project was to do some research on the different forms of self-publishing while investigating what may be possible for me. I dug out my notes from the self-publishing workshop and read them more carefully. I found a print on demand publisher called iUniverse that looked reasonable.
I had borrowed an old computer from friends, but the screen was small and hard to read. If I was going to really write my book, I’d have to invest in an LCD screen and new computer. That would be a considerable financial investment. Was I willing to buy it? Writing the book moved higher up on my “to do” list.
Figuring I needed to join the new century, I breathed deeply and bought a nice computer. I unearthed the box that contained all the journals I had kept during my years of wandering the world. Reading through the journals, I started to mark parts of the journals that would be good to put into a book. I discovered a carton my mother had saved for me. It contained, in careful chronological order, all the letters I had sent to my parents while I had traveled. On top of the letters was an advertisement for a vanity press publisher. That carton held my mother’s firm conviction that I would some day write a book with those letters. I hired someone for an afternoon to teach me Microsoft Word and how to set up a manuscript. And I started to write. I had always composed my writing in longhand first. Could I make the jump to writing directly on the computer? I tried it, and found I could. I decided to take the summer to really begin to put together the book. That summer, writing the book moved to the top of my “to do” list.
My writing the book progressed along with the warm days of summer. I began to sense a shift in my attitude toward writing the book. Not only was it dominating my “to do” list, but writing the book was taking over my whole life. Rather like an insistent playmate, the keyboard summoned me any time of day or night. Whether I was in a theatre watching a ballet, reading the newspaper, or even in the shower, I could hear the silent yet strident call to return to the keyboard.
The Muse became my very demanding master. When the Muse dictated to me, I obeyed by scribbling words, phrases, ideas on scraps of paper that appeared everywhere around my home. I even pulled off the road into a parking lot to write down something that wouldn’t stop niggling at my mind. Just the “right word,” or the best turn of a phrase became my first thought upon awakening, and the last thought that kept me from sleeping. I was both exhilarated and exhausted.
The feeling was like a movie I once saw in which one of the actors making a movie couldn’t separate his real life from that of the characters in the movie. In similar fashion, my past and present blurred until daily chores and activities became burdensome, annoying distractions from writing. The present dimmed, my past took over, and the future went blank. Finishing the book became more and more important to me. My life couldn’t move forward without going backward first. Nothing but finishing the book was on my “to do” list.
The book came together rather quickly because it was more a matter of organizing what was in my journals and letters. I made the decision to write it as a journal and not use the wisdom of hindsight. And there was the delicate balance of talking about personal friends whom I’d met along my journeys. Although I changed the names, I knew they would recognize who they were and, while being true to the way it was, I didn’t want to offend anyone. Knowing that what was published would quite literally be set in stone, I also wanted to be truthful but not hurtful to the countries and cultures I was describing. After all, I needed to be able to get visas to return to China again. Most importantly, a book must communicate, and I constantly questioned what I wrote from the perspective of the reader who may indeed never have traveled or lived in distant lands.
In June of 2006, when I first opened a carton containing Memoirs of a Middle-aged Hummingbird as a published book I could hold in my hands, I cried. It was the most beautiful book I had ever held. Long ago on a dusty bookshelf in a forgotten corner of a library in Israel, I had found and read a book by a woman who traveled to Bali. The way she talked about Bali piqued my interest and brought me there. Without her book, I would never have discovered Bali, the closest I ever came to Paradise. That mostly unknown, but very memorable book to me often served to remind me of how grateful I was that she had bothered to write and publish her book.
I wrote the book for the people I know who have said, “I wish I could have traveled like you,” as well as for those who said, “I love to read about your travels because you do things I’d never do.” And I wrote it for myself. It captures as best I can what, in many instances, can never be seen again, as well as the intangible value of the best years of my life. Perhaps, some day, in some way, my dusty book in a corner of a bookshelf will inspire someone. My “to do” list has long since filled up with other things, but there’s a difference now. I will die, but my book is forever.
