Sid Fleishman passed from this life on St. Patrick’s Day, March 17th. I had breakfast with him today. We’ve breakfasted together many times before. Sometimes he was the Whipping Boy or the Abracadabra Kid. Always, he’s a good friend, welcoming and honest and approachable. Our first breakfast together was in January 2009.

The morning after a writing conference is always tough—like the morning after a wild party. I wake with a head stuffed with impressions, ideas, information, and a vague feeling that I may not have used my time as wisely as I could. While conference hangover may not come with a headache and dehydration, it always takes a few days to recover. The morning after the SCBWI-Florida winter conference in Miami 2 January’s ago, my writing bud Marty and I were sitting in the hotel restaurant, debriefing and nursing our post conference headaches, when Sid Fleishman walked in. Cheryl Zach had accompanied him to the conference, but for whatever reason, she wasn’t there now. He, Sid Fleishman, was alone, looking around, and, so it seemed to us,  looking a little lost.

Maybe because Marty and I were staring at him like expectant pups, Mr. Fleishman smiled. His smile was warm and welcoming, like one you’d give old chums. A few minutes later we were sharing his table. Mr. Fleishman –I’d never be so cheeky as to call him “Sid”, although that is what he asked to be called. Considering the high esteem with which we regarded him, “Sir” seemed more fitting—Sir Sid with his twinkling eyes and open, curious, interested countenance wanted to know all about Marty and me: where we lived, what we wrote, how we came to be writers….

The three of us shared Southeast Asian connections: Marty had lived in Indonesia, as I do now, and Sir Sid, had spent time in Singapore, Jakarta and other spots in Southeast Asia.  We talked about our families, our lives, our children. He shared a story about his son, Paul, and how, after a lifetime of no apparent interest in writing, one day, out of the blue Paul handed his father a story and asked if he wanted to read it and how he (Sid by now), had taken it, expecting it to be a usual teen story, and was totally blown away. Having grown up surrounding by writers, hearing writers talk writing, story, dialogue, seemingly by osmosis, Paul absorbed all he needed to write fabulous stories. As he went on to share how Paul was always pushing himself, trying new things, pushing his talents the admiration and love in Sid Fleishman’s words was more than fatherly—it was writer for writer.

As it inevitably does when writers get together, the conversation turned to books and writing. To issues Sid was having with a story he was working on. (There is something so comforting about learning “real” authors have trouble writing, too.) This led to my writing, specifically to a novel draft I’d buried after a confusing critique. No telling how many conferences Sid Fleishman attended during his lifetime of writing, publishing, and award-winning, how many eager writers, like me, he had met (including the several hundred at this weekend’s event) and how many writer’s stories he’d heard, he still encouraged me to tell mine. He listened intently, showing genuine interest in me and my story and its problems. He asked questions, gave suggestions, and sent me on my way eager to dig my story out of the drawer, dust it off and get back to it.

At the end of our breakfast, which stretched to lunch, Marty and I shared goodbye hugs with Sid Fleishman, our chum. And we felt like chums, new-old friends. And now, we say a final goodbye to our chum, Sid Fleishman. How fortunate we were to share this journey with him.

Sid Fleishman, 1920-2010.

We’ll meet for breakfast again, soon.

I’m delighted to be back home in Jakarta. It was an eventful, joy filled holiday season. I relished the time with family and friends. I am ready for some this-is-my-space-my-time-is-my-own-and-I-can-do-whatever-I-want time. (And, frankly, I was sick of every thread in the five+ mix-and-match outfits I had been lugging around for the past month and was perilously close to jettisoning the whole mess and buying new when the truth is more winter clothes are definitely not what I needed to cart back to my muggy close-to-the-equator, fabric eating/molding/decimating cupboards.)

And I am eager to be where I have the time and space to write more than blog postings. Although I am puffed up proud to report that I, Kelly Bennett, kept my 2009 New Year’s resolution to begin a blog and to post at least one blog posting each week. My official posting count as of Dec. 31, 2009: 65 notes: 8 announcements: 4 drafts; some photos (not enough, but I’ll fix that in 2010). I not only met my goal, I surpassed it. Yeah!!!!!

This won’t be a long stay in Jakarta as I return to the states Feb. 1st. I’m presenting at the IRA regional conference in Oklahoma City and spending a few days after in Tulsa with friends (Lexi is meeting me there.) The Bright Sky folks are supposed to be setting up promotional events for my picture book Dance Y’all Dance in the Houston area from the 10-18th, but I haven’t heard a word— so no clue what is happening with that. I’m not going to sweat it; what will be will be. My mom isn’t feeling well, so if worse comes to it, I’ll use that time to go to Reno and visit her. The hardest part about this being a published author biz is this constant pressing feeling that I am supposed to be promoting/visiting schools/organizing all the time–while I enjoy sharing my books, the organizing takes so much time and energy, and even more of both is spent coping with the worry that I am not doing “my part.” Now here is where I lapse into my version of the “in my day we had to walk 7 miles to school” bit: Back in the 80s and early 90s, when I was first published, aside from autographing at stores on occasion, authors were not expected or encouraged to do promotional stuff–because childrens’ book publishers primarily sold to school and library markets–sales reps did the work. The author’s “job” was to write more books. What luxury compared to this market or perish publishing world of today….Enough already.

2011 Resolution:

Be grateful I am physically able to write. Be grateful I am mentally capable of stringing letters into sensical order. Be grateful I have the time and support I need to write. Be grateful others want to read what I write. Be grateful that on some certain days, when the mood is right, the muse is willing, and the stars are just so, I write magic.

Henry David Thoreau wrote: “A man has not everything to do, but something…”

I get so caught up in getting through my to-do lists that sometimes, like today,  I get mad when I catch myself doing nothing. But doing nothing is something.

Years ago, at an SCBWI Conference in Los Angeles, E.L. Konigsburg discussed creativity and how we need negative space—white space, blank space—in our minds, in our lives, in order to allow new ideas to emerge. The only author to win the Newbery Medal and a Newbery Honor in the same year (1968), with her 2^nd and 1^st books respectively: From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler and Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth, and then 27 years later win a second Newbery Medal (The View from Saturday, 1997) Elaine Konigsburg is my hero. She is who I want to be when I grow up: a brilliant, accessible, prolific writer. All this being said, you would think that I would take her advice to heart and embrace the white space, allow myself to make nothing that something—sometimes, anyway.

Occasionally, when I consciously try, I give myself that nothing space…really I do. But often, like today—right now—instead of giving my mind time to empty, and the extra time needed for my imagination to kick up to high gear, and even more time to see where it leads me, I take over and get busy doing something—say writing a blog entry.

Earlier, when I was supposed to be doing nothing, I stumbled upon this passage by Brenda Ueland. I believe Julie Larios shared it at a Vermont College residency:

Long, Happy Dawdling

The imagination needs moodling–long, inefficient, happy idling, dawdling and puttering. These people who are always briskly doing something and as busy as waltzing mice, they have little, sharp, staccato ideas, such as: “I see where I can make an annual cut of $3.47 in my meat budget.” But they have no slow, big ideas. And the fewer consoling, noble, shining, free, jovial, magnanimous ideas that come, the more nervously and desperately they rush and run from office to office and up and down stairs, thinking by action at last to make life have some warmth and meaning.

And so, on this the 31st day of the old year, at the dawning of a new year, 2010, with the hope of allowing for plenty of “moodling” I make this bold and italicized resolution:

The next time I catch myself daydreaming or look back after an afternoon spent…how? and I feel those raging Puritan Ethics Monitors shaking their scabby heads over the wasteful way I spent my day I’m going to set them straight: “Nothing is something! It is what we are supposed to do. ..Elaine said so! ”

I opened with Thoreau, so it feels fitting to close with his blessing. And now, as soon as I post this, I’m going to get busy doing nothing, promise!

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.”

Happy Moodling!