Windbreak House

"Summer Solstice Recipe: Truth in Writing"

The Summer Solstice (June 20-23) was Litha to the ancient Celts, marking the longest day of the year, the triumph of light even as the year began to decline into darkness. To grow, we must accept even the passing of the sun; we must understand that love cannot triumph over death. We must realize that the light of truth shines more brightly against the darkness of lies. No matter how hard we try to tell the truth, unbelievers will always exist, people who refuse to accept the best possible evidence.

Recently, a former student of mine persuaded his book club to read my Going Over East: Reflections of a Woman Rancher, my second published nonfiction book, which originally appeared in 1987. Fulcrum, Inc., reprinted the original edition in 2001, with an epilogue in which I brought the story up to that date.

My former student took American Literature from me when I was in my mid-twenties, studying for my MA 40 years ago; he still lives in Missouri. I have not seen him since he left that class, and we have corresponded only briefly. We’ve learned we have much in common from our rural backgrounds-- though he claims to understand Sartre and I certainly do not, despite typing my first husband’s turgid, tepid, and tedious Ph.D. thesis on Sartre’s ethics.

Going Over East was published when I was 44. By then, with my second husband, I was well settled into a ranching life I loved. Within a few years after the book was published, my husband and my father died, and my responsibilities changed.

My former student likes the book, calling my passage on chopping ice (so that cattle may drink) “sheer genius,” and says it caused him to remember the feel of the axe in his hands, the skittering bounce when it glanced off the ice.

But this story is about his reading group.

“They hated it . . .” said my former student. “They disliked, and were even hostile to, your book. They were reticent about telling me at first because, after all, I was the one who nominated it. But finally they did. THEY DIDN’T BELIEVE IT IS TRUE. They believe life couldn’t be that hard and still be endured. They thought you made most of it up, just to make it appear you had a hard time as a child, and those things couldn’t really have happened because a person wouldn’t ever choose to actually go back to something like that.”

He adds, “So be aware, Linda, you are a lone voice crying in the wilderness of South Dakota . . . People don’t want biography in the form of gritty autobiography. They want literary pornography instead; something they can’t smell.”

At first I was stunned and angry-- but thoughtless anger is precisely what’s wrong with a lot of the discussions occurring in America today. I prefer that people who disagree do so with civility, with reason.

When I wrote that book, in the 1980s, I had no thought that it might be unbelievable to any thinking person. Most of my neighbors did the same jobs the same way, and many of them suffered considerably more. My grandmother, to name just one of the pioneering women I’ve known, regularly killed rattlesnakes and skunks with her garden hoe, but some of the great-grandmothers in this neighborhood would have considered my life a vacation. These tough people usually had neither the time nor the inclination to write about their lives, so mine is a pale imitation of what they endured.

By 2002, things had changed in ranching, and also in the world of writing. In my introduction to Between Grass and Sky, I reported that, “Even Annie Dillard, one of my own role models since Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, admits she never had a cat; she borrowed someone else’s experience to create an effective passage. I found her tale less moving if the cat didn’t leave bloody pawprints on her chest.” I love her writing, but have never trusted her reporting since then-- but that was only the beginning.

“I’ve always thought the distinction between truth and lies was clear,” I wrote in Between Grass and Sky, “but during the past few years, I’ve collected examples of differing views on the issue of how much truth a reader can expect in a book labeled ‘nonfiction.’ While writers’ renditions of truth vary widely, most readers feel betrayed to discover that an event did not happen as written.”

I explained at some length that I had changed a couple of names in the book, since the real people had not given me permission to write about them, and combined two men into one character.

Literary hoaxes have always been with us, of course. Wikipedia’s entry on “literary hoaxes” consumes 91 pages. But recent history has brought us some spectacular examples. This is in part because publishers do not-- cannot-- investigate a writer to determine if he or she is telling the truth. Contracts protect the publisher from fraud charges, but not from people willing to lie in signing such a contract.

One of the best-known recent scams is the “Navahoax” perpetrated by Timothy Patrick Barrus, a writer of sadomasochistic erotica who wrote three fake memoirs pretending to be Nasdiij, a Navajo. Indians are popular hoax material, in part because readers know so little about the reality of Indian life, and because publishers fail to ask advice from real Indians; remember Grey Owl and Forrest Carter’s The Education of Little Tree.

Some folks even say lying and calling it nonfiction is acceptable; there’s a category of writing labeled the “fiction memoir.” And for a truly bizarre story, read about JT LeRoy. After an hour looking to Google for information on literary hoaxes, I’m horrified, and wonder if truth itself is out of date.

As George Orwell said, “During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.”

Of course, when I write about events in my life, I risk being deceived by a faulty memory, but it is always my intention to tell the truth. If I distrust my memory, I signal that fact to the reader by saying “I think . . .” or “I imagine . . .” or “I seem to remember . . .” and other warnings that I understand the faulty and self-serving nature of memory.

My primary self-appointed job is writing for the purpose of helping people to appreciate the treasure this nation has in the grasslands of the Great Plains, and the ranchers who have preserved it for us, full of clean air, uncorrupted soil, pure water.

If I lie about anything, a reader might not believe what I say about the grasslands is true.

When a writer makes up dialogue or changes events, that’s fiction, or lying. And every time one of those liars hits the best-seller list, readers ask me, “So, did this really happen or did you make it up?” I resent that.

If I make anything up, I’ll call it fiction. If I am trying to tell the truth, I call it nonfiction.

I sympathize with and greatly pity the readers of the book group. Maybe they’ve watched a lot of “reality” TV. I have no TV connection, but my newspaper informs me about lying politicians, business leaders who won’t take responsibility for what their companies do, and ministers who deplore homosexuality but hire male prostitutes. No wonder belief has been eroded. The members of the book group are so used to a daily diet of lies they may no longer recognize truth. No wonder our society is in turmoil.

I have no idea why they disbelieved a narrative that tells about the experiences I lived through on the ranch. I doubt that many of them have lived a rural life, or have experience with the work a ranch requires. Most of the events in the book aren’t even particularly dramatic; details of ranch work in this area that could be easily verified.

I can’t convince the book club. Instead, I’ve decided to refuse to believe in them.

I’d rather believe in readers who may disagree with me, but would try to discover if I am a liar before announcing that I am. I had encouraged their reading; they might have responded to me with questions. In recent years, ranching has been the subject of many written and televised features, so research on the reality of what I wrote wouldn’t have been difficult.

Meanwhile, my former student writes that he won’t quit the book club. I’m glad. How can one change an organization, or encourage it to broaden its viewpoints, if one quits at every disagreement? In an email, he says he trusts that I can write about this incident without embarrassing him: the equivalent of a handshake agreement between us.

Here in South Dakota, million-dollar deals can still be sealed by a handshake. I don’t suppose the book club will believe that either, but I’m glad my former student is the kind of man who does.



And so we celebrate the Summer Solstice. Without lies, truth would not shine so brightly. Yet no matter how hard we try to tell the truth, we may make mistakes. All we can do is try to be honest.

Here (below) is my recipe for achieving truth in your writing, the handout I provide for writers of autobiographical material. Every one of these suggestions evolved from my examination of my own writing, and the truth I am trying to achieve in my work.


Linda M. Hasselstrom
June, 2010
Windbreak House
Hermosa, South Dakota


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AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL WRITING
Linda M. Hasselstrom


My definition of autobiographical writing:

A STORY about certain CHARACTERS in a certain TIME and PLACE
(just like a novel or short story)
BUT: a novel or story is FICTION and a memoir should be NONFICTION.

It should not be necessary to say this.


Therefore the usual suggestions for writing apply:

-- Write what you know, which includes what you do for a living, as well as the other things you know how to do: hobbies, some folks call them, but include household tasks, things you have learned about dealing with children or cantankerous elders.

-- Write from who you are, which can include your body, mind, hobbies; anything can be material.

Finally, a serious and astute reader has pointed out to me that the best autobiography, or memoir, happens when the self is not so much the subject as the point of departure. The writer is more interested in drawing attention to what his mind has seen and explored, rather than to simply telling about the wonderful uniqueness of the self. And one test of a good memoir is that the author sees the humor in the self-- is able to be self-deprecating, to invite others to laugh at the author’s foibles, and to give others credit where it is due.


In deciding HOW MUCH TRUTH should be in my writing, I ask myself these questions:

1. Is it true? Memory can be faulty & anyone’s mind may unconsciously edit to enhance your role

2. Am I writing self-consciously, self-importantly-- that is, only for the purpose of demonstrating my brilliance or another of my fine qualities? If you think as you write, "The entire free world is going to read this and the people I’m writing about might be angry,” you may leave out important points. Everything you write should have some purpose, some aim, though it may not be immediately apparent.

3. Is the story I’m telling too intimate, too private to tell in public? Ask yourself, "Who are my readers and what do we have in common?” Is it relevant to reveal your political beliefs, your religious beliefs or sexual preferences?

4. Will what I write help anyone? Can you choose to violate your own privacy for a good purpose? Can omission of details give a false impression?

5. Is this story mine to tell? Will what I write hurt anyone? Will that person hurt me? Have I written about illegal activities? If you tell someone else’s story, will the truth hurt them or their descendants?

6. Have I told this story ONLY out of nostalgia? Only for its sentimental value, a dramatic effect on the reader? Have I made a human friend into a dead saint? Am I looking for sympathy?

7. Am I giving advice? Do I slap the reader in the face with the “moral” of the story? Readers prefer to find the story’s purpose themselves, not to be told what to do or think. Show the reader, don’t tell her; present evidence, not judgment.

8. Does everything I have written advance the story, the purpose, the theme? Have I included anything, as Annie Dillard says, “just for the lousy reason that it actually happened”? Have I included any incident just for its dramatic value when I know it does not advance the story?


How do you avoid the inherent dangers of autobiographical writing?

-- Keep reading autobiographical writing with a critical eye, analyzing other writers’ methods. When they write something you like, study how they do it.

-- Keep writing steadily, building experience in good taste and judgment about what should be revealed.

-- Ask honest readers to tell you, preferably before publication, if they believe you have told too much.

-- After publication, pay attention to reader response and apply what you learn to future autobiographical writing. Writing well starts with collecting material and testing it, which is hard because the real test is the response. The more you read your writing to audiences, or publish work, the more responses you get, and the better you can judge.


Deciding what to include/leave out:

Remember the Elements of Fiction: character, conflict, plot, theme; you are telling stories that happen to involve you.


When writing about yourself, watch out for:

-- self importance, self-consciousness
-- nostalgia, sentimentality
-- giving advice, presenting JUDGMENT rather than EVIDENCE


Memoir: n. 1. An account of the personal experiences of an author. 2. An autobiography. 3. A biography or biographical sketch.
American Heritage Dictionary. 4th edition.


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"May Eve and Vinegar: Bringing Order to Your Writing Life"

When I was five years old, soon after we moved to Rapid City from Texas, my mother helped me weave May baskets of paper strips, and fill them with candy and flowers-- possibly dandelions; we were quite poor. Holding my hand, she walked me to the homes of several friends where we hung the baskets on the doorknob, rang the bell, and jogged away.

I didn’t know then that I was following an ancient custom; I suspect even fewer people know today. Several websites show how to create May baskets, but few mention the Celtic and pagan origins of this custom.

April 30, May Eve, called Beltane by the ancient Celts, was one of the two most important festivals of the year. Citizens began celebrating at dawn, observing the opening of spring’s doorway into light and summer. Nature renews itself at this season, flowering into the dance of life. Beltane (under various spellings) was celebrated in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man, while similar festivals were held in Wales, England, Brittany and Cornwall. In ancient Ireland, the main Beltane fire was kindled on the central hill of Uisneach, 'the navel of Ireland', one of the ritual centers of the country, located in what is now County Westmeath. The ritual called for lighting this community fire, and from it rekindling each hearth fire in every household in the village. What a wonderful, unifying custom.

Until the early 20th century, Irish people also observed the Beltane custom of hanging May boughs on the doors and windows of houses, a practice brought to America as May baskets.

The sense of this ritual, I think, is with us as we observe another ancient custom: spring cleaning. To celebrate, I usually organize my writing files, and renew my recipes for making cleaners for my house that don’t use damaging and nasty-smelling chemicals.

I usually begin writing something new in the morning, then break to figure out what to fix for lunch. While I’m cooking, I can think over what I’ve written. I may recite lines from a poem, smoothing the rough spots, while kneading bread or stirring a stew. The two kinds of pleasurable labor seem to me intimately connected. Spring inspires new writing, and makes me think of granola, so this is an essay at making a case for the way creating granola may help polish phrases.

In spring we often realize how much weight we’ve gained, and resolve to eat more healthy food. Granola is a good beginning. Moreover, granola, filled with seeds and fruit and often eaten with milk and honey, seems the perfect food to celebrate the rebirth of spring and writing energy.

Then, too, I received more reader response to my bread recipe than from anything else we’ve put on this web site. The recipe brought more positive comments than I’ve gotten from many of my books!

[To see the bread recipe and essay, click here.]


GRANOLA
7 Cups quick oatmeal (I often include a cup or two of regular oatmeal)
1 Cup bran
1 Cup wheat germ
1/2 Cup powdered milk
1/2 to 1 Cup sunflower seeds
1/2 to 1 Cup sesame seeds (toasted)
1 Cup chopped walnuts (or substitute double the almonds)
1 Cup chopped almonds
1 Cup flake coconut
1 Cup honey (try substituting some molasses for the honey)
1 Cup vegetable (not olive!) oil

See below for more ingredients added after baking.

Mix all dry ingredients well. Pour oil into 2-cup measure. Warm honey until it flows and stir it into the oil (they mix well when warm, and the honey doesn’t stick to the cup). Pour honey and oil over dry mixture. Stir well.

Spread on two large cookie sheets. Bake 300 degrees, watching and stirring several times so it gets golden but doesn't burn on the bottom. I use a spatula to pull the mix in from the edges, then turn it in the center so it doesn’t spill over the edges.

Baking takes 30-40 minutes at my altitude of 3500 feet, with my propane oven, but watch and time your own baking; it’s easy to burn this mixture. Midway through the baking, I usually switch the cookie sheet on the bottom rack to the top, stirring at the same time. I’ve burned a lot of granola by thinking I would rely on a timer to tell me when it was done; you need to keep looking.

Add after baking (so the fruit doesn’t get too hard):
3/4 to 1 Cup raisins, cranberries, chopped prunes, or a mixture of dried fruit.
You may wish add 1/2 to 1 Cup flax seed; cooking destroys some of its beneficial qualities, so add after baking.

Cool and store the granola in airtight container. I freeze half of this recipe, and it feeds me breakfast for at least a month.

I usually eat it in a bowl with yogurt in the morning, but I’ve also kept containers by my desk to nibble as a healthy snack all day long.

GRANOLA BARS
Bring 1/2 Cup white corn syrup (or honey) to a boil.

Mix in 2/3 Cup peanut butter. (Or carob? Or other flavoring?)

Stir in 3 Cups of the baked granola mixture.

Spread in 9x9 greased pan and let sit 1 hour before cutting. Store in airtight container.

For years, I’ve made variations of this granola for breakfast, eating it with yogurt and fresh fruit. Experiment with flavors you like; you might use molasses instead of honey, for example, or omit the honey from the mixing and add sweetener when you are ready to eat. Or add cinnamon, nutmeg, or other spices.


More Thoughts about Cooking and Writing

Cooking demands planning: do I have everything I need to make this recipe? If not, do I have something that might be substituted successfully? How will what I want to add taste with the other ingredients?

Similarly, as you prepare to write an essay, you must ask yourself questions about your plan. Decide if you can logically defend the personal opinion you want to express. Do you need to quote the opinions of others? Do you need to provide facts to support an argument? As you revise, try to consider what it would be like to read the essay if you disagreed with its premise; what would convince you?

Even better: submit a draft of the essay to someone who really disagrees with you, and listen to what that person has to say-- just as you might offer a taste of a new recipe, asking for comments on how the ingredients blend together.

An essay is often an argument for a particular point of view. Therefore, it often stands or falls on its ability to draw the reader into the discussion. A flat statement that the writer’s view is correct isn’t usually convincing. Often, an anecdote from the writer’s own experience can provide a little entertainment while making a serious point; a personal note may draw a reader into the essay in a way that a simple recitation of facts cannot.

For example, I’ve tried to recall, as I worked on this note, how long I’ve been making this granola recipe, and where I first saw it. I have a recipe for pumpkin bread that was handed to a friend on a street corner in St. Louis during the Sixties, by a smiling woman who said the only requirement of the recipe was that it always be “given away with love.” I’ve given away dozens of the loaves since those days, always with a copy of the recipe, and love.

I suspect I first copied the granola recipe from a healthy cookbook during the Sixties, both for its health benefits and its practicality. Nowadays, the stores are full of fancy commercial granolas that weren’t available then-- but none of them are as good, or as free of preservatives and sugars, as this one. And, just as I’ve done with some of the yellowed drafts I keep in battered file folders, I’ve been tinkering with it, revising it here and there, since those days. Go ahead: create your own version.

Just as it’s possible to fall in love with the cleverness of a particular line, or an image, so it’s possible to overdo some ingredients. How much honey is too much? How many adjectives are just right?

Both cooking and writing provide much of their joy from having done them: eating the meal, seeing the poem in print. But in both cases, if we get in too much of a hurry to enjoy that final step, we may fail at one of the steps in the process that must precede it. Take your time making the granola; take your time working through the essay.

One more aspect of cooking that makes it appropriate for discussion related to writing is the closeness brought by “breaking bread together.” Just as sitting down to a meal was often a symbolic part of signing peace treaties between warring nations or individuals, so eating together can allow conversation to reach different levels between people. Many of the best discussions of writing at Windbreak House Retreats have occurred during meals. For good reason the retreat kitchen has several aprons (made by a long-time correspondent of mine); many of our writers have made relaxed cooking and eating an essential part of their retreats. I’ll never truly forget the closeness and the memorable discussion that lasted several days when two of us, snowed in during a retreat, created and consumed a 40-Garlic-Clove Chicken. But that’s another story.

And blessed may you be this spring.


Linda M. Hasselstrom
March, 2010
Windbreak House
Hermosa, SD


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A Winter Message from Linda
"The Sacrament of Bread"


Every year, usually about December 20, I wish I’d written a Christmas poem as some organized writers do. This year, having failed again, I decided that sending greetings through my website would be compatible with my constant theme of sustainable, responsible behavior, saving both energy and cash.

Furthermore, after a couple of hours tapping at the keyboard, I realized that I may already have said most of what I want to say since I’ve been repeating my concern for the prairie in my writing for 30 years. That’s fine: some things need to be repeated often before they are accepted.

So I’m not going to waste energy debating causes and culprits of climate change. I’ll keep working to reduce my impact on the world from which I draw both physical and spiritual nourishment. And I’ll try to do unto others as I would be done to.

I’ve been re-reading some of the books that taught me a good deal, including Wendell Berry.


To live we must daily break the body and shed the blood of creation. When we do this knowingly, lovingly, skillfully and reverently it is a sacrament. When we do it ignorantly, greedily, clumsily and destructively it is a desecration.
-- Wendell Berry, The Gift of Good Land


Among other sacraments I’ve rediscovered during this year-and-a-half on the ranch is that of baking bread, kneading it a long, slow ten minutes for that perfect texture and crunch. Here’s my current favorite recipe:


Rosemary (or Dill) Bread

1 package active dry yeast

1 cup warm water (about 110 degrees F.)

2 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary or dried rosemary, crumbled
or 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill or 1 tablespoon crumbled dried dill weed

1/2 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon regular salt

1 cup whole wheat flour

About 2 cups all-purpose flour (I use unbleached)

Olive oil

1 large egg, lightly beaten

1/2 teaspoon coarse salt

1. Sprinkle yeast over warm water in a large bowl; let stand until foamy (about 5 minutes). Add rosemary, sugar, regular salt, whole wheat flour, and about 3/4 cup of the all-purpose flour. Beat with a heavy spoon or an electric mixer until dough pulls away from sides of bowl in stretchy strands.

2. Beat in about 3/4 cup more all-purpose flour

To knead by hand: turn dough out onto a lightly floured board and knead until smooth and springy–about 10 minutes, adding more all-purpose flour if needed to prevent sticking. Place in a greased bowl; turn over to grease top.

To knead with a dough hook, beat on medium speed until dough is springy and pulls cleanly from sides of bowl (5 to 7 minutes), adding more all-purpose flour 1 tablespoon at a time as needed if dough is sticky.

3. Cover with plastic wrap or a damp dish towel and let rise in a warm place until doubled (about 1 hour).

4. Punch dough down and knead briefly on a lightly floured board to release air. Shape into a ball, gently pulling top surface under until the top is smooth.

5. Place on a greased baking sheet; brush lightly with oil. Cover lightly and let rise in a warm place until doubled, about 45 minutes.

6. Brush loaf with egg. With a razor blade or very sharp knife, make a small X-shaped cut on top of loaf. Sprinkle with coarse salt. Bake in a 375-degree oven until loaf is browned and sounds hollow when tapped on bottom (about 45 minutes). Transfer to a rack and let cool.

One of the things I love about bread is that it’s forgiving (shall I point out the metaphor?) If you find, when you cut open a loaf, that it isn’t done in the center, return it to the pan or put it on an oven rack and bake 10-15 minutes longer.

Bread is ideal for writers because it also takes well to revision. Find a recipe you like and experiment with it; I haven’t tried other herbs in this yet, but in summer, I surely will. Moisture introduced during baking–a pan of water on the lower rack of the oven–produces a crisp crust. Or spray the loaves several times during baking, using a plant mister. An egg white mixed with 1 tablespoon water or milk and painted on the loaf makes the crust shiny and does not brown as much as a crust glazed with a whole egg or egg yolk. Milk or evaporated milk give a brown color to the crust, the latter a little darker. Sprinkle the unbaked loaf with poppy, sesame or sunflower seeds after glazing, so the seeds will stick. Making two or three 1/2-inch-deep slashes across the top of a loaf allows moisture to escape.

Update: Kathleen Norris suggested in a note to me just after Christmas that this bread would be good with dried tomatoes. I chopped several from a jar of sun dried in olive oil and added those to the recipe; delicious! The tomato enhances the rosemary.

So for this winter holiday season, I wish you this:

May you discover the joys of making bread with your own hands,
may your bread always forgive you, and
may you be nourished by its body and its spirit.


Linda M. Hasselstrom
December, 2009
Windbreak House
Hermosa, SD


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