I'm Changing the Name of "In Search of the American Dream"

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Saying Goodbye to the Old Blog Name

by Norma Hopcraft

My mother once introduced herself at a little talk she gave as a person who had lived the American Dream. My father and she made it happen together.

My father started his career right out of high school, lower than the secretaries, he told me, adding columns of numbers in the insurance business. After years of struggle and setbacks, he rose through the ranks. He retired from a corner office at the top of a skyscraper in New York City's Financial District, with a view of the East River, where in summer he sailed his 36-foot sailboat.

My mother's role in all this was to be a helpmeet. She started out as a motherless child, raised by a great aunt and uncle in the Depression, collecting eggs from the chickens in the backyard. She worked as a secretary for a few years and was forced to quit when she got pregnant, which is how all companies operated in the 1950s--not that long ago. She took care of the kids, cooked, cleaned, and ironed Dad's shirts for 20 years, even in the height of summer, making the shirts crisper than a professional laundry, until Mom and Dad could afford to pay someone to do it. They never ate out for the first 20 years of their married life because it wasn't in the budget.

But Dad rose, and his dreams of being in charge of lots of people, saying to them, "It's time to jump," and the people saying "How high?" came true. He loved it, he told me. And he had his boat.

If all this sounds like high success on my parents' part, I'm only telling you the surface. You'll have to read my memoir, coming out in about a year, to know the truth.

But right now we're talking about the American Dream.

So along comes me, who decided 30 years ago to be a writer and to risk investing tons of time and energy in it to make my fortune. My American Dream was to write such great stuff that people would tell their friends about it, and sales would soar. I would retire early from my corporate career (such as it was -- marketing writers are not very high on the food chain) to write full time in the capitals of Europe, since I'd be able to afford lots of travel.

I still believed in it 12 years ago, when I started this blog as I traveled around the U.S. -- on a shoestring budget, taking the bus and staying in hostels, sleeping 12 or 24 people to a room. And I couldn't even afford that. I put it on a credit card and spent the next 8 years paying it off.

I wrote some great books, in my opinion, and got some great reviews, but the books didn't catch fire the way I hoped.

Now I'm restarting my blog after a one-year hiatus, and I had to take a long, hard look at the name. I'm wondering if I still believe in the American Dream. My American Dream died a painful death over the last five years as I faced the reality that my books had not outperformed the other 33 million books on Amazon.  I resolved -- to be honest, I resigned myself -- that I would write just for excellence, just for the glory of God (as did my favorite composer, J.S. Bach), just to make my own small contribution to the culture of the world. I expunged fame and fortune from my hopes and dreams. 

But is that really what I want?

I've always believed in having a BHAG, a Big Hairy Audacious Goal, as one of the writers on corporate excellence puts it. My BHAG was to give readers something fun, funny, interesting, thought-provoking to read. And I wanted my work to lead to a full-time writing life. My dream didn't come true the way I envisioned it. I didn't get to retire at 55, but I'll retire eventually, in my late 60s, to write fulltime. So in a way my dream of retiring to write fulltime is coming true, just not the way I'd hoped.

I'm glad to report I have 3 books out there and 3 books nearing completion. I think they're fun, funny, interesting, and might provoke some thought. 

But I had wanted that financial piece.

For years I drew lots of energy from my American Dream of making money, energy that's vital to a long, protracted apprenticeship in writing. To be honest, I don't get that same surge of energy from dreaming solely about excellence. But would dreaming once again of fame and fortune make a dupe out of me? Dreaming of it gives energy, but it's not a good reason to write, according to writers who have written acclaimed books. Maybe it could still happen, though I'll be too old to do much more with it than pass it on to the younger generation -- and it might not be good for them.

The important thing is to serve people, to serve my readers, to serve my Higher Power (whom I call Emmanuel), with excellence in every undertaking.

What are your thoughts? Is the American Dream still alive? Do only a very few, exceptionally educated, talented and lucky people get to make theirs come true anymore? To do what my father did these days, you'd have to have an MBA from Harvard. But why are immigrants still coming to our country believing in the American Dream more vividly than any native-born American?

I'm still in search of my dream, refining and revising it as I go. 

What's your opinion on all this? What do you think of the American Dream? 

Please comment below!

 

I Got a Fragment of My American Dream--but still working on it

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I live in Rochester, NY, now. Yes, I'm a snob about cities. I commuted to New York City for 25 years, then I lived in Paris for a year, Barcelona for 3 months, Brooklyn for four years. 

Rochester does not have the cache of any of those cities. 

But it can be an amazing place. 

It hosts the world's longest running international film festival, and it's the only film festival that provides feedback and critique to each filmmaker.

It houses the world's largest collection of American classic films. That's because Kodak is based here, and most of the American classics were filmed in Kodak film.

It hosts a long-running international jazz festival.

And it has an interesting art museum. 

It recently hosted an exhibit of Egyptian sculptures that had been chipped away at -- mutilated.

The exhibit was full of fragments of statues. I find fragments more interesting than whole things.

These sculptures were attacked thousands of years ago because the ancient Egyptians believed that statues of kings had inherent power, that they actually embodied the spirit and authority of each king. When they wanted to malign a king's reign and legacy, they chipped off the royal symbols on a statue -- the upright cobra on the headdress, the stripes on the headdress, the royal beard. They chipped off the eyes or nose so the spirit of the king couldn't see or breathe.

Fragments of statues are like my life. I started out whole (I think--don't children start out undamaged? a tabula rasa, a blank slate?) and then life happened. Plans and desires and longings went unfulfilled. I ended up with just a fragment of what I thought I wanted. And what I wanted was very much shaped and inspired by being an American, being brought up in times when it seemed like the sky was no limit.

I wanted lots of money from my writing, lots of travel, a big house to float through.

What I got was different. It's a fragment of my big, big American dream.

So now I'm sorting among my fragments, among the things that remain. Thank God I have my health, I have a growing sense of God's love for me, I have a family here in Rochester to spend happy time with, I have my driving desire to write--to connect with people, to give people something worthy and nourishing to think about. 

What are your fragments? What remains of your hopes and dreams?

What's driving you these days? Want to make some art? Leave something behind?

Perhaps take some inspiration from these ancient fragments:

Here's another post of mine that involve fragments:

Bits of sculptures and architectural details in Providence, RI

Isn't the face above beautiful? Let's make something beautiful today. Comment below!

Light and Space for Your American Dream

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By Norma Hopcraft

Writers are artists of words, images, ideas, moods.

Painters are artists of images and feeling.

Musicians are artists of notes and feeling.

Architects are artists of light and space and feeling.

The best architects, like the other artists, help us to feel affirmed in our humanity.

I’m crazy about historic commercial architecture, which you’ll find plenty of in Providence, RI (pics below). I like it because these buildings were built to be, and still are, places where people sit in light and space, which architects skillfully divided, and work to make their dreams come true.

Providence itself is a city of light, space, and air. It's rich in historic commercial architecture and water views. It’s on huge Narragansett Bay, and the Providence and Woonasquatucket rivers flow through it. There’s always a breeze.

A sculpture along the Providence River

A fragment of the sculpture

Let me digress quickly to Rochester, NY, where I live now in an apartment full of light, air, and nicely proportioned space. It’s in a 100-year-old building, so I dub it historic. 

There’s always a breeze in this city, too, so near a humungous lake—Ontario. So when I open my south- and east-facing windows, a breeze barrels through, so much so that my little living space feels fresh, like standing on the deck of a boat. I like that. I grew up on a small sailboat, so the breeze ignites memories. As much as weather permits, my windows are open. It's mid-October and they're still open, even in Rochester.

This is where I’m now pursuing my writerly American dreams, after a difficult four years in Brooklyn. You would think, “New York City: a creative person’s paradise,” but in the immense city, with teeming millions of strangers full of near-maniacal energy, I got very disconnected, very lonely, no matter how many friends I called.

Now, I’m near family, making new friends, and working on my memoir (unfortunately, I have a memoir-worthy life). I’m also fiddling with a novel set in – no, not Rochester, but Brooklyn. It's about a theater set designer, a person flourishing in NYC, though struggling with directors and actors and costume designers in the theater world. 

Recently I had an artistic breakthrough in my writing in Rochester that I’d like to offer you, because it will probably help you. To do so, I’ll tell a story of failure—mine.

For most of my writing career, I’ve sent pieces to literary magazine editors that I revised, rehashed, and refined to within an inch of the piece’s life. After 25 years of rejection slips (Stephen King and his spike filled with rejections have nothing on me), I stopped submitting work to create time to self-publish three novels. They’ve gotten good reviews but they haven’t broken through. A crushing of my American Dream of financial success from my books.

Recently I saw a segment on the PBS Newshour about black women trying to break through in the country music world. White female singers have long complained that they get much less airtime than white male musicians. Can you imagine how much harder it is for a black woman, especially in a Southern-rooted genre?

The reporter interviewed several black female artists. One of them said a life-changing thing for me. Brittney Spencer happens to be breaking through quite well, and she said: 

“I no longer ask if it’s good enough, I ask if it’s me enough.”

So I’m no longer asking is this novel/memoir/poem/blog post “good enough”, but is it “me” enough? Have I infused it with the wry humor that I love to read myself? Does this piece express the emotional truth I experienced in that situation? 

It gives me light and space to let a piece breathe. A beautiful breeze off Lake Ontario that was born in the Canadian wilderness can now pour through the windows. Maybe it will mean acceptance from those meanies, the literary editors.

I don’t know what wry humor would look like in architecture, but I do know whimsy, and you’ll find it amongst the pics of Providence below.

If and when you begin travelling again, consider Providence as a destination for creative inspiration. The historic commercial architecture will lift your spirits.

Plus Providence is a foodie town, with Johnson & Wales culinary school and tons of restaurants and cafes. Rhode Island ocean beaches are only ½-hour away in Newport, and you can tour the mansions of incredibly wealth Americans, if you’re into that sort of thing (i.e., seeing how other people’s American Dream came fabulously true.) You must guarantee me that you won’t compare and despair, an activity that derails me often.  

On top of all those goodies in Providence, you can take a boat ride—in a gondola, no less! 

Providence light and space, in the form of architecture, gondolas, and bridges, are shown to you below. How about you? Does Brittney Spencer’s words help you in art or life? Comment below!

I find it interesting that a fragment of something can be more interesting than the whole.

A former power plant partially turned into condos.

Dinosaur teeth?

This sculpture is near the Rhode Island School of Design.  The designer may have graduated from there.

More river views toward downtown.

The river was busy with boat traffic.

The gondolier wasn't singing but giving a spoken guided tour.

This is the architecture I love -- detailed, gracious, interesting.

One project was halted after the historic facade was saved (on the opposite side) and the wall propped up. Then the mural painters got to work.

Another angle.

More historic commercial architecture that brings distinction to the downtown.

Look at the details around the windows -- each floor is different!

A mural. Just cuz.

Looking up in an indoor shopping arcade.

Light and space in the arcade.

The interior of a fancy restaurant. I felt like I was in Paris!

The details in this facade -- can anybody design and build something like this any more?

The entrance is catty-corner under the arches.

a very big, life-like mural.

Whimsy in the downtown.

Beautiful wood carving as well as brickwork.

Another gorgeous facade.

I'm loving the windows.

Here's an example of terrific stonework.

A two-master, with raked masts, after getting through the drawbridge.

Raked masts are tilted toward the stern just slightly.  How about you? Been to Providence? Do you enjoy historic commercial architecture? Relishing light and space these days? Comment below!

Escape to Walden Pond

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In Search of My New American Writing Dream

By Norma Hopcraft

In a pre-COVID escape from New York City, a tough place to live because of the non-stop noise, crowding, lines of people for every service, subways, dirt, asphalt, concrete, steel, exhaust fumes, millions upon millions of strangers rushing past me, I took Amtrak from NYC to Providence, RI in 2019 to visit my brother. We planned a trip to Walden Pond.

To get ready for this trip, I read Walden, an American classic by Henry David Thoreau. I read about the fish, the loon, the war between ant colonies, the lake, while standing on the Q train, swaying as it pounded through the tunnels from my apartment in Brooklyn to my job in Manhattan. 

The contrast between his simple, quiet, solitary life in the woods and mine, hurtling at high speed in a noisy steel tube, crushed between strangers, could not have been more stark.

Walden is fantastic nature writing. And philosophy. It challenges Americans today to consume less and live more simply.

Thoreau was a bit of an oddball, it seems--which you might expect of someone who chose to live in the woods and eat mostly beans he farmed himself.  He did go into nearby Concord nearly daily, apparently, so he did do plenty of socializing.

But it was a little off beat. Here are the things he valued most when socializing: "I sat at a table where were rich food and wine in abundance, and obsequious attendance, but sincerity and truth were not; and I went away hungry from the inhospitable board. ...I called on the king, but he made me wait in his hall, and conducted like a man incapacitated for hospitality. There was a man in my neighborhood who lived in a hollow tree. His manners were truly regal. I should have done better had I called on him."

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Thoreau lived on Walden Pond in a house he built himself, approximately 8 feet x 10 feet.  When I stepped into the replica (his actual cabin no longer exists), there was only space for a narrow cot, a fireplace, and a small table. I think he had two chairs, because he did get visitors.

Walden is so worthwhile, and full of quirky observations like this one, in which he opines that the grand houses his neighbors lived in in Concord were similar to a forest creature's home, in that "It's basically a porch leading to a burrow."

Cool, huh?

He had more cool writing.

About spring:

"The grass flames up on the hillsides like a spring fire...as if the earth sent forth an inward heat to greet the returning sun; not yellow but green is the color of its flame."

About truth:

"Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth."

About being fully alive:

"Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star."

Other famous quotes:

“I find it wholesome to be alone the greater part of the time."

“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be."

“Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations.”

I find these last three particularly encouraging because I do end up alone so much that I have to suspect that I engineer my life that way, just as Thoreau did. So I'm in good company.

And I built castles in the air -- the castle of a comfortable amount in my retirement account thanks to the success of my books. Well, at least I have three books out in the world.  I also have a memoir, a book of essays, and a new novel (set in Brooklyn, where I lived for four years) all well on their way to completion. I was ambitious, and worked hard, and did not make 100% of my dream come true. But six books written (Lord willing)? Not bad for a castle in the air.

My dream of comfortable retirement thanks to my writing had to die (yes, it was keen grieving for months over that one), but my new dream still has to do with writing. Like the quote from Thoreau above, I want my writing to reveal the truth. Beautifully.

The third quote means a lot to me because I've adored books and reading from the moment the little black squiggles on a page resolved themselves in my mind as, "See Sally run," and my imagination saw Sally running--wow! What a moment! I decided then I wanted to be a writer and return the gift I'd just been given, to create great pictures and stories in readers' minds. So I'm glad to see a kindred spirit in Thoreau, with his vast respect for books as treasures.

Walden is now a state park, and people swim in the lake and sit on manmade beaches.

The path leading to the site of Thoreau's cabin (which no longer exists, but there are stone markers).

These are the markers on the site of his cabin, where he wrote the greater part of his world classic, "On Walden Pond." He lived in it for two years, two months and two days. This photo was taken by J. WALTER GREEN / AP

Walden is a popular spot. Thoreau used to have it all to himself, except for an occasional hunter, fisherman, or visitor to his cabin.

The water of the lake all comes from underground springs, so the water is very clear. There is no stream feeding the pond or exiting it.

A replica of his house, and a statue of Thoreau.

Me, asking a deep question about consumption, non-conformity, and the meaning of life.

Me outside the replica of Thoreau's cabin, so you can see the scale of it.

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The Atlantic Magazine's article about him says, "Mr. Thoreau dedicated his genius with such entire love to the fields, hills, and waters of his native town, that he made them known and interesting to all reading Americans, and to people over the sea."

He left a huge contribution to the world in his writing. When he died, the famous philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson said of him: "The country knows not yet, or in the least part, how great a son it has lost." How about you? Have you read Walden? Want to go there? Want to simplify? Comment below!

American Dream: A Special Place You Return To

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Fire Island Restores My Soul

By Norma Hopcraft

"Yoga weekends--I'll never manage another one." Alison, the manager of my hiking club's cabin on Fire Island, dusted her hands together.

"Why's that?" I asked.

I pause the story there to tell you a little about Fire Island. With this pandemic affecting our lives drastically for a year now, many of us have a pent-up desire to get out of the house and see new places -- or return to old favorites. 

For me, that's Fire Island. It's basically a 30-mile-long sandbar that runs parallel to the southern coast of Long Island, New York. The Atlantic breakers arrive there unblocked for thousands of miles and pound the sand with a roar that delights my ears.

Water horses, with manes flying behind them in the wind, course onto the beach at Fire Island.

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It can be a pricey place to visit, but my hiking club has a cabin there, an inexpensive way to stay.

The fun thing about my hiking club cabin is that you never know who you're going to meet. One summer, on one of my four trips to Fire Island that season, I attended a yoga weekend at the cabin. I chatted with the manager, Alison. Managers work hard over the weekend, feeding everyone and keeping the place organized. But they do get to stay on Fire Island for free.

Alison dusted the corn meal clinging to her hands. She was working on dinner.

"Yoga weekends--I'll never manage another one."

"Why's that?"

"This woman came in the kitchen this morning while I was making fruit salad for the cabin for breakfast. I had just finished slicing a banana and folding it into all the other fruit. She saw me throw the peel away and said, "Oh! I can't mix fruit with banana. It's not good for my system."

"So I picked all the banana slices out and put whole bananas on a plate, to be served next to the fruit salad."

"Yes?"

"And I saw the woman put fruit salad in a bowl. She grabbed a banana. A little while later her fruit bowl was empty and she was eating a banana! Sheesh! She's a little bananas to make me do all that extra work."

Even if some people stay at the cabin who are a little bananas, I still love it and go there as often as I can.

I've been returning to the cabin for 10 or 12 years, but it was closed all last year. I missed it terribly. It's a place that feeds my soul with wildness, with natural beauty, with huge expanses of sky, sand, and sea. It feeds my eyes after being among the brick, concrete, asphalt, and razor wire of Manhattan and Brooklyn.

I go there to rest from the brutal noise of the city. I go to journal about my writing, to hone my craft. I go to rejuvenate and get in touch with my inner creative springs again.

Won't you please tell me a favorite place that you'd like to return to? And why? Comment below!

I know that some people aren't crazy about the beach and sand. But to me, wet sand clinging to my feet is just part of being in a panoramic seascape: sun, surf, sand. The glitter of sun on the water, the ability to see the entire expanse of sky -- I love it! To be in the vast expanse of beach and sky has been essential to me all my life. I hope you enjoy these scenes from Fire Island!

You get to Fire Island by ferry. 

My friend Jane loves Fire Island too. This is called un Sunken Forest because it's located between the tops of two sand dunes.

A view of the Great South Bay, and beyond it the southern edge of Long Island, from the Sunken Forest.

This is the ocean side of Fire Island, at twilight. I love to walk a mile to the next town and its restaurants, with my feet caressed by the surf.

A sunset, looking over the Great South Bay.

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The Fire Island Lighthouse, seen from the ferry.

Houses on the bay side of Fire Island.

I always sit on the top level of the ferry. Except in rain.

On another trip, a different day, the sky and water appeared different.

This was a silvery, coppery, bronze day.

Another day and another mood for the Fire Island Lighthouse.

My author pic was taken on Fire Island. By my friend Jane!

There's an ice cream shop in Ocean Beach. This man is feeding his dog ice cream with his spoon! My sister Chris captured that photo and also these pictures of surfers on the day after a big storm:

I took this one, on a quieter day. How about you? What favorite, spiritually renewing place do you return to? Comment below!