Comments on: Mine Shafts and Dead Canaries

By: Winston

Winston — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 14:18:05 +0000

Ruth, how wonderful about your novel sale!
Being thrust out on such a public limb must bring forth some deliciously delirious spikes of anxiety.
For your next novel how about a thriller entitled, oh, I don’t know, maybe, The Dead Canary Society.

Possible synopsis:
Various anxious people of the over-50 ilk become acquainted and decide to join forces and meet within a safe environment to shamelessly worry together. In the guise of a book club, they meet weekly, rotating the meetings among one another’s homes. All goes well for a while. The Society even ventures into the public arena, penning occasional letters of angst to the editor of the newspaper, bringing the World of Worry to new depths. Enter one Ruth Wainwright who seems so ripe for entry into The Dead Canary Society. A born leader albeit a proficient nail-biter, Ruth manipulates the others into holding Society meetings in a downtown coffee house, professing industrial strength caffeine magnifies anxiety. Then bit by bit, in tiny Tinker Bell style, she begins to infuse the group with rays of, dare I say it, optimism. Too late it is revealed by one suspicious investigative member that Ruth Wainwright is the Supreme Pollyanna Incognito. Many lives are ruined along the way and The Dead Canary Society collapses under the weight of insouciant Hope.

Nope? Oh, well…

By: Winston

Winston — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:23:56 +0000

Alexandra, I don’t believe anxiety really diminishes with age. I believe, from personal experience, that with age a great shift occurs from the Truly Life-threatening Traumatic Experience format to the more mundane, realistic personal format. Where once I worried about The Bomb or tropical storms forming five thousand miles away, I now worry endlessly about misplacing my cellphone or if I really did turn off the flame beneath the kettle before going into town. These days those types of worries are enough to placate my anxiety.

By: Alexandra

Alexandra — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 19:53:58 +0000

I haven’t had a chance to read the NY Times magazine yet but I will. My second child is one of the anxious ones, no matter what the situation.
I loved reading the notice at the top about your novel. How proud you must be!
And, I agree about anxiety diminishing with age, one of the great aspects of getting older!

By: Kerry Dexter

Kerry Dexter — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 18:05:04 +0000

I’ve learned it works much better for me to expect the best. as you say, sometimes the canary makes it. that’d be me.

By: ruthpennebaker

ruthpennebaker — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:12:16 +0000

I’m inclined to think anxiety diminishes with age, which is good news. I’m not nearly as anxious as I was when I was younger. But some of us still excel at imagining the worst.

By: Jennifer Margulis

Jennifer Margulis — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 13:13:46 +0000

It’s so fantastic that you SOLD your novel but it sounds hard to live with all that anxiety. I think a lot of us have that to some extent or another. I don’t know if this is relevant but I just started reading this amazing book by Cheri Huber (do you know her work?) that addresses this issue. She’s very smart and insightful. The book is called How To Get From Where You Are to Where You Want to Be and after just a few pages I already started to feel less anxiety and more positive awareness (then I lost it on an airplane, leading to a bout of self-flagellation, oy vay)…

By: Vera Marie Badertscher

Vera Marie Badertscher — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 06:27:07 +0000

Isn’t it another form of pessimism? I’m so glad to be a pessimist, because I’m never disappointed.
Just read your “perfect day” post–what a contrast. That post was totally heart warming. This one made me, well, anxious.
But then I noticed your notice at the top about your book. How beautiful those lines of print look, don’t they!
Best wishes. Hope nothing falls on your head today. It could, you know. (But it probably won’t).

By: Meredith Resnick - The Writer's [Inner] Journey

Meredith Resnick - The Writer's [Inner] Journey — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 22:47:47 +0000

I wonder sometimes about normal anxiety and when it becomes toxic and obsessive. Such a fascinating topic.

By: Sheryl

Sheryl — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 21:19:54 +0000

Oh, how I can so relate! Me: born anxious, always a worrier. Me still: anxious and worried. A siren? Definitely someone I know, most likely a close relation. A phone call after 9:30PM? Uh oh. Something’s wrong. Funny thing is, it’s always the things our minds don’t think about that end up happening and NEVER the things we spend endless hours sweating over. Go figure…

By: Roxanne @ Champion of My Heart

Roxanne @ Champion of My Heart — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 19:16:14 +0000

I just read that NYT piece yesterday. Next week, I’ll be blogging about it’s relationship to the dog behavior modification work I’ve been doing with my fearful dog, who I kid you not, takes both an antidepressant and an anti-anxiety medicine twice each day.

Most writers I know are anxious in some form or another. That includes me.

BUT, the upside of being this way? I’m a ROCK in an emergency because I’m quite accomplished at functioning despite anxiety. Other people flip out because they are not used to working while amped up, but me? I seem and act like my “normal” self.