Yesterday I heard peeping as I slogged through the muddy gloop of the chicken yard with buckets of feed and water. A chick's hatched! Our first! A fuzzy yellow peeper with a black stripe running from its head down its back, boldly came out from under mama's white feathers. She's been so determined to set that she hasn't cleaned herself, and she's speckled with black mud. Greedily the hen pecked at the chick starter I put out for the first of her brood.
This morning I tried to catch a glimpse of the newest arrival to the coops, but she's got the chick tucked away under her feathers - wings spread, tail fanned, guarding the clutch of about 6 intact eggs.
Earlier we'd wondered about the manliness of the Rhode Island Red rooster, but he's vindicated. It's saved his life.
I've ordered 150 chicks, including 10 guinea hens, from Ridgway Hatcheries in LaRue, intended as layers for next winter and meat for the freezer. The guineas will keep down ticks, bugs and snakes.
The chickens come as an apt symbol for the creativity we're feeling at chez Rosi. Since my husband quit the day job to go full-time in the winery, we feel creative and energized.
Who knew there is a cost to working in a corporation? We have more meals at home, more home fun with the family, and more time talking over ideas for the business. I suspect we will be healthier too.
This week he's working with our friend Jay to build the bride's changing room, and to transfer the wine into oak barrels for aging. The winery has its first wedding in April, and the place will be spiffed up and bride ready.
Tuesday, March 08, 2011
Friday, September 24, 2010
Lee and Coco Dancing
I'm enjoying Mercoledi Creativo at Via Vecchia winery - aka, Creative Wednesday. Never know how many people will show up, sometimes more, sometimes a handful, even so I enjoy being in a time and space that's dedicated to artists.
There's something about sharing the energy with other artists who are not in my discipline that makes me appreciate what it means to make art your life.
Last Wednesday I hung out with my friend Sue, who's a visual artist, and watched Anna Sullivan practice climbing silks hung from a central beam, and talked with Jason the photographer about an upcoming article, and read poetry to Coco.
And, of course, there's Paolo's most excellent wine, which he sells half price on Wednesday. Paolo rolls in at 1am on those nights, totally stoked by seeing one of his dreams come true - to be able to support artists and performers with his space.
Here's a poem inspired by Lee and Coco practicing a phrase Lee choreographed for Independents Day.
Lee and Coco Dancing
I.
We take this bright drop of silver
and wish, work, grow
roll our hips around
swirl our throats around
our painted voice
our dancing song.
II.
Long throat
straight chin
iron torso
small breasts, tight to the body.
All of her belongs to her.
There's something about sharing the energy with other artists who are not in my discipline that makes me appreciate what it means to make art your life.
Last Wednesday I hung out with my friend Sue, who's a visual artist, and watched Anna Sullivan practice climbing silks hung from a central beam, and talked with Jason the photographer about an upcoming article, and read poetry to Coco.
And, of course, there's Paolo's most excellent wine, which he sells half price on Wednesday. Paolo rolls in at 1am on those nights, totally stoked by seeing one of his dreams come true - to be able to support artists and performers with his space.
Here's a poem inspired by Lee and Coco practicing a phrase Lee choreographed for Independents Day.
Lee and Coco Dancing
I.
We take this bright drop of silver
and wish, work, grow
roll our hips around
swirl our throats around
our painted voice
our dancing song.
II.
Long throat
straight chin
iron torso
small breasts, tight to the body.
All of her belongs to her.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
The Colors of All Souls
Why is autumn the season of orange and black? The translucent brilliance of fall leaves? or the orange flesh of pumpkins? The ripe yellow squash and red gourds?
The colors of Halloween, of All Souls, represent two distinct concepts, and both have to do with creativity.
In the Earth cycle, autumn isn't recognized as creative. Instead, it's a time of fruition and shedding, of making provision for the cold months ahead. But the colors orange and black, and the symbol of the pumpkin, point to a different concept at work.
Orange contains the red energy of the earth, the blood of physical beings. Yellow is the light of the sun, the solar power to make us grow. When red and yellow mingle to conceive orange, they give birth to a creative glow.
In the pumpkins we see the shape of the womb. It's grown in the sun for months, fattening. In the center, seeds grow large, full of potential, protein, and nutrients. The center of the pumpkin, like the center of the womb, is black and warm, the home for nascent life.
"Hallowed" means sacred, as in "Hallowed be Thy name." The black of Hallowe'en - All Hallows Eve - isn't about evil, or death. It's about untapped potential, teeming with life. It's about formless energy.
Black is life waiting to become. This space of potential is a sacred space.
For people who are afraid of negative energy or see black as a negative color in an energetic sense, challenge yourself to a re-frame; these are places not touched by love. Touch these places with Love, and you will see the potential that had been sleeping in "negative" energy transform, and blossom into brilliant, positive fruit.
What about the Hallowe'en of ghosts? Ancient tradition has it that Hallowe'en, All Souls, is a thin time, when this world and the next become closer. Life goes on, this tradition says. We're still here; let that comfort you. Death is not the opposite of life. It's the opposite of birth.
All around us our landscape prepares for sleep, a sleep rich with life and potential ready to shoot up in the spring. In that richness we have dreams: ephemeral, non-physical, intangible, the shadow-selves of the forms we are about to create.
Which is why, after the riot of summer's fruition, we need autumn's shedding. As the trees shed, so do we. Our emotions intensify. Little crises force resolutions. You choose to stay or leave, to keep or to give away. We clean, we get rid of, we change over our bedding, our lightbulbs, our clothes. We cleanse.
All this sweeping, emptying, and choosing clears paths for the dreaming to take place. New goals, visions, friends, and foods arrive over winter along the pathways we swept clear, perhaps unconsciously, in autumn.
Creativity at work inside us, whether we realize it, or not.
Celebrate the colors of this season. The creative, joyful orange, and the teeming potential of night-sky black, strewn with stars and a bright moon, to light your winter's path.
The colors of Halloween, of All Souls, represent two distinct concepts, and both have to do with creativity.
In the Earth cycle, autumn isn't recognized as creative. Instead, it's a time of fruition and shedding, of making provision for the cold months ahead. But the colors orange and black, and the symbol of the pumpkin, point to a different concept at work.
Orange contains the red energy of the earth, the blood of physical beings. Yellow is the light of the sun, the solar power to make us grow. When red and yellow mingle to conceive orange, they give birth to a creative glow.
In the pumpkins we see the shape of the womb. It's grown in the sun for months, fattening. In the center, seeds grow large, full of potential, protein, and nutrients. The center of the pumpkin, like the center of the womb, is black and warm, the home for nascent life.
"Hallowed" means sacred, as in "Hallowed be Thy name." The black of Hallowe'en - All Hallows Eve - isn't about evil, or death. It's about untapped potential, teeming with life. It's about formless energy.
Black is life waiting to become. This space of potential is a sacred space.
For people who are afraid of negative energy or see black as a negative color in an energetic sense, challenge yourself to a re-frame; these are places not touched by love. Touch these places with Love, and you will see the potential that had been sleeping in "negative" energy transform, and blossom into brilliant, positive fruit.
What about the Hallowe'en of ghosts? Ancient tradition has it that Hallowe'en, All Souls, is a thin time, when this world and the next become closer. Life goes on, this tradition says. We're still here; let that comfort you. Death is not the opposite of life. It's the opposite of birth.
All around us our landscape prepares for sleep, a sleep rich with life and potential ready to shoot up in the spring. In that richness we have dreams: ephemeral, non-physical, intangible, the shadow-selves of the forms we are about to create.
Which is why, after the riot of summer's fruition, we need autumn's shedding. As the trees shed, so do we. Our emotions intensify. Little crises force resolutions. You choose to stay or leave, to keep or to give away. We clean, we get rid of, we change over our bedding, our lightbulbs, our clothes. We cleanse.
All this sweeping, emptying, and choosing clears paths for the dreaming to take place. New goals, visions, friends, and foods arrive over winter along the pathways we swept clear, perhaps unconsciously, in autumn.
Creativity at work inside us, whether we realize it, or not.
Celebrate the colors of this season. The creative, joyful orange, and the teeming potential of night-sky black, strewn with stars and a bright moon, to light your winter's path.
Wednesday, September 08, 2010
The Panegyric
Last night I had one of those 4am moments. You might be able to recognize it: waking up, staring at the red digital numbers displayed on our ceiling by a Batman-esque alarm clock, wondering if I had made a difference in the world, wondering if I would ever again move into writing professionally, writing for my living as I did when I lived in England.
Four in the a.m. is a kind of witching hour. I'm confused, in a fugue state, particles of my dreams swirling, dressed up like reality.
I thought of those people who'd decided to leave the planet early because they couldn't take the pain they'd carried: Kurt Cobain, Marilyn Monroe. For some reason, my mind chose two people who could have been as much pushed into Beyond, as gone open-armed to it. They stood in front of me, so much good in their lives, but also that gnawing pain.
This morning I remembered this passage from Robert Louis Stevenson: "We must all be ready somehow to toil, to suffer, to die. And yours is not the less noble because no drum beats before you when you go out into your daily battlefields, and no crowds shout about your coming when you return from your daily victory or defeat."
Uncomfortable words for us modern-day, post-The Secret, positive thinkers. Toil, suffer, die. Yuck! I like the words: ease, choose a higher path, and cross over.
But I also really love the word sacrifice. It means "to make holy." Every time we choose that path of integration over the path of escape, it's toil. Turning the other cheek when someone spits on you is not an easy path. Transforming stinky energy instead of attaching to it is not an easy path. Going back into the past and healing old wounds instead of blaming the actors in the play is not an easy path. That is my definition of TOIL.
Washing those wounds to make them holy - that's pretty much suffering. Feeling that pain all over again while I heal it, that's not ease or fun. But the strength, the integration, the sheer ecstatic bliss when the work is done - that's ease. That's the higher path.
Yesterday when I came across the word 'panegyric' on my GRE review, I looked it up. I had the sense it was an elegy of some kind, but no idea it defined the times when we receive public praise. How many mothers out there put in a day of wiping bottoms and cleaning up dishes and wish for their panegyric? How many dads go to a job they don't enjoy and come home wishing for their panegyric? These are blunt examples, but we all have times when we wish for that moment that someone will eulogize our hard work.
We have our panegyrics: an acknowledgment at a wedding, or a graduation. A hug. They come at unexpected moments. Take photographs. Indulge in those memories.
We have many more days of going out into daily battlefields, when profound ambivalence, silence, or ignorance, keeps those around us from noticing the daily victories and defeats. That's when we have to create our own panegyric, and give it to ourselves.
I'm working with two practices at the moment. The first is out-loud gratitude. I say "thank you" to the Divine whenever I receive a blessing. Any blessing, no matter how tiny.
The second is to ask the Divine to align me with my purpose as a soul on this planet, and to align me with Divine Will, and show me a day that's in alignment with that Higher vision.
Talk about ease - every day I do this second step, I have a day of complete ease. Everything gets done, within the amount of energy that I possess, on time, and unhurried.
These two practices have become energy-generators for me. In a sense, they perform the function of daily panegyrics. They don't keep me from seeing my fears displayed at 4am, they don't stop me from having challenges, but through these practices I feel rooted and centered and peaceful.
Four in the a.m. is a kind of witching hour. I'm confused, in a fugue state, particles of my dreams swirling, dressed up like reality.
I thought of those people who'd decided to leave the planet early because they couldn't take the pain they'd carried: Kurt Cobain, Marilyn Monroe. For some reason, my mind chose two people who could have been as much pushed into Beyond, as gone open-armed to it. They stood in front of me, so much good in their lives, but also that gnawing pain.
This morning I remembered this passage from Robert Louis Stevenson: "We must all be ready somehow to toil, to suffer, to die. And yours is not the less noble because no drum beats before you when you go out into your daily battlefields, and no crowds shout about your coming when you return from your daily victory or defeat."
Uncomfortable words for us modern-day, post-The Secret, positive thinkers. Toil, suffer, die. Yuck! I like the words: ease, choose a higher path, and cross over.
But I also really love the word sacrifice. It means "to make holy." Every time we choose that path of integration over the path of escape, it's toil. Turning the other cheek when someone spits on you is not an easy path. Transforming stinky energy instead of attaching to it is not an easy path. Going back into the past and healing old wounds instead of blaming the actors in the play is not an easy path. That is my definition of TOIL.
Washing those wounds to make them holy - that's pretty much suffering. Feeling that pain all over again while I heal it, that's not ease or fun. But the strength, the integration, the sheer ecstatic bliss when the work is done - that's ease. That's the higher path.
Yesterday when I came across the word 'panegyric' on my GRE review, I looked it up. I had the sense it was an elegy of some kind, but no idea it defined the times when we receive public praise. How many mothers out there put in a day of wiping bottoms and cleaning up dishes and wish for their panegyric? How many dads go to a job they don't enjoy and come home wishing for their panegyric? These are blunt examples, but we all have times when we wish for that moment that someone will eulogize our hard work.
We have our panegyrics: an acknowledgment at a wedding, or a graduation. A hug. They come at unexpected moments. Take photographs. Indulge in those memories.
We have many more days of going out into daily battlefields, when profound ambivalence, silence, or ignorance, keeps those around us from noticing the daily victories and defeats. That's when we have to create our own panegyric, and give it to ourselves.
I'm working with two practices at the moment. The first is out-loud gratitude. I say "thank you" to the Divine whenever I receive a blessing. Any blessing, no matter how tiny.
The second is to ask the Divine to align me with my purpose as a soul on this planet, and to align me with Divine Will, and show me a day that's in alignment with that Higher vision.
Talk about ease - every day I do this second step, I have a day of complete ease. Everything gets done, within the amount of energy that I possess, on time, and unhurried.
These two practices have become energy-generators for me. In a sense, they perform the function of daily panegyrics. They don't keep me from seeing my fears displayed at 4am, they don't stop me from having challenges, but through these practices I feel rooted and centered and peaceful.
Tuesday, September 07, 2010
Princess Di
Thirteen years ago, my daughter was born in England on the day of the biggest funeral the world had seen since they laid John F Kennedy to rest.
Every television featured only one show: mourning for Princess Diana.
As the funeral cortege processed, so did my labor. The midwives disappeared frequently from our room to watch the Princes walking to the cathedral behind their mother.
My daughter came into the world, a beautiful light for our lives, while that meteoric life that Princess Diana had led, went out.
Scouring the shops, trying to find a bouquet for his wife, my husband could find only a few wilted chrysanthemums, the only bunch of posies left.
I distinctly remember three things about that day: out the window of the delivery room, the sky appeared to be fuchsia to me, although when I focused, it turned back to turquoise. As soon as my daughter was lifted up, she opened her eyes so wide, as if to take in all the world, and the first person she saw was her father. And that night the clouds formed themselves into giant heads, as if people had come to look down on the precious events of the day, and look in at the new lives in the hospital too. It thundered, and rained, and cleared up, and the giant heads in the sky drifted over it all.
We don't get a Princess Diana very often in this world. Some people will internally say to that "Thank God." Before she died she took flack from every pundit with a soapbox; the day after she died they recanted, or had to keep their opinions to themselves.
Only during the flood of national mourning could we all see that Diana had become what she had wanted to be - the Queen of Hearts. As cheesy as that title was, as close a reference as it was to 'tarts', she opened up the heart of a nation known for its curmudgeons.
Every television featured only one show: mourning for Princess Diana.
As the funeral cortege processed, so did my labor. The midwives disappeared frequently from our room to watch the Princes walking to the cathedral behind their mother.
My daughter came into the world, a beautiful light for our lives, while that meteoric life that Princess Diana had led, went out.
Scouring the shops, trying to find a bouquet for his wife, my husband could find only a few wilted chrysanthemums, the only bunch of posies left.
I distinctly remember three things about that day: out the window of the delivery room, the sky appeared to be fuchsia to me, although when I focused, it turned back to turquoise. As soon as my daughter was lifted up, she opened her eyes so wide, as if to take in all the world, and the first person she saw was her father. And that night the clouds formed themselves into giant heads, as if people had come to look down on the precious events of the day, and look in at the new lives in the hospital too. It thundered, and rained, and cleared up, and the giant heads in the sky drifted over it all.
We don't get a Princess Diana very often in this world. Some people will internally say to that "Thank God." Before she died she took flack from every pundit with a soapbox; the day after she died they recanted, or had to keep their opinions to themselves.
Only during the flood of national mourning could we all see that Diana had become what she had wanted to be - the Queen of Hearts. As cheesy as that title was, as close a reference as it was to 'tarts', she opened up the heart of a nation known for its curmudgeons.
Monday, March 01, 2010
Empower yourself!
Self-healing is a fundamental right that we have as human beings. Costs and bureaucracy surrounding the medical profession, plus the constant barrage of advertisements for drugs, contribute to our forgetfulness of that fact. When you learn to connect to the free, unlimited inflow of Divine healing, you empower yourself, and reclaim your right to heal.
Wednesday, September 02, 2009
Big Chicken Day
I thought this was a writing blog! Hah! I want to write about chickens.
MONDAY the guinea hens screeched at the boy-gang of marauding young roosters, who invaded the vegetable patch for my ripening tomatoes. The guineas have no sense of volume. Everything is at high volume - they sound like a high-pitched pitbull barking. Then the old rooster, a Rhode Island Red with a huge black-feathered tail, joins in crowing to protect his tiny harem of five overworked girls. Overworked, because one rooster is more comfortable servicing ten chickens, and mine have developed sore spots which means they need to wear chicken bras - a saddle made of canvas to protect their backs from his spurs. It's all at full volume and I'm wondering what the neighbors think.
The turkey is spectating from his strawbale hutch near the vegetable patch. He's a bronze-breasted, and his head turns red when he's upset or hungry. He must be enjoying the shenanigans, because his head is its natural shade of gray. He has a soft too-whit, too-whit as his call, not a gobble, and he's huge. He's too big for his legs - an unfortunate genetic modification that I didn't understand when I ordered the poults. He's so fat, he looks like one of those 300lb men at the zoo, who use a zimmer frame to hold up their stomachs. At least they try - and so does Christmas, waddling to his feed tray, scooping up huge beakfulls of grain.
We wait until dark and put on our gloves and jackets, even though the night is still warm. I tuck a flashlight in my pocket. We are robbers with chicken crates. We go to the main coop, push the crate in front of us, and close the door behind us. I shine the light on the sleeping chickens, my husband picks up the first one and puts it in the crate. I count. We put ten to a crate, load it onto the trailer, and bring in the next crate. By the last ten chickens, we realize we don't have enough crate space. Ten chickens go into a cardboard box while we rustle up cat carriers and dog cages from the basement. At the end of the night we have 78 chickens, 3 guinea fowl, and one turkey loaded into the garage, waiting for dawn.
TUESDAY my back hurts. I beg my husband to come to the slaughterhouse with me, but he needs his vacation days for the grape crush this year for his winery. My son has new muscles from a year on swim team, and he gets drafted for the job. We leave at 7.30am for Kings Poultry near Troy, Ohio (USDOT inspected, chickens chilled to 40 degrees and sent out on ice) for our 10am appointment. I try not to think about how much I love the chickens, how funny Christmas is, how the guineas protected him with their screeching. I try not to think about how I will have to buy my eggs now from the grocery store, or about the massive freezer in my basement. Most of all, I try not to think about leaving my chickens on the slaughterhouse loading bay, because even though the people there are terribly nice, it means one thing only for my birds.
I wonder how my son is going to take it. He loves Christmas, and used to spend time crouched near his coop just sitting with him. But we gamely unload all the heavy crates, line up our tubbies and coolers, and get our return time: 2pm. I keep saying to myself - this is the food chain. This is the food chain. But I also think - I'm going to become a vegetarian one day, when everyone in the house can eat beans without us stinking each other out. Then I'll be able to keep chickens just for the eggs and for the pleasure of it.
We arrive home at 6pm after problems strapping the empty crates to the trailer. We are exhausted, but still the chilled carcasses have to be unloaded directly from the ice into the freezer. One by one my husband hands me all the birds, and we fill it up. I identify several of them - here are the older girls, the layers, and their rooster, here is the Americauna, they were a bit runty. And here's Christmas - 40lbs of him with the three darker guinea fowls. I think of all the people lined up at our holiday table, waiting with forks.
This is the reality of eating meat. You take a living thing, you cut off its head and scoop out its guts, and then you bake it at 350. This is the reality of the most disposable meat in our culture - the chicken.
WEDNESDAY I can't wake up properly without the rooster's crow. I really miss him. We only got rid of the layers because we want to go on vacation this year, a proper family vacation, and can't leave livestock at home.
It's too quiet around here. I look over at Christmas's coop, and he's not there. He's in the freezer. I wonder what we will have for dinner. It's too early to eat chicken.
MONDAY the guinea hens screeched at the boy-gang of marauding young roosters, who invaded the vegetable patch for my ripening tomatoes. The guineas have no sense of volume. Everything is at high volume - they sound like a high-pitched pitbull barking. Then the old rooster, a Rhode Island Red with a huge black-feathered tail, joins in crowing to protect his tiny harem of five overworked girls. Overworked, because one rooster is more comfortable servicing ten chickens, and mine have developed sore spots which means they need to wear chicken bras - a saddle made of canvas to protect their backs from his spurs. It's all at full volume and I'm wondering what the neighbors think.
The turkey is spectating from his strawbale hutch near the vegetable patch. He's a bronze-breasted, and his head turns red when he's upset or hungry. He must be enjoying the shenanigans, because his head is its natural shade of gray. He has a soft too-whit, too-whit as his call, not a gobble, and he's huge. He's too big for his legs - an unfortunate genetic modification that I didn't understand when I ordered the poults. He's so fat, he looks like one of those 300lb men at the zoo, who use a zimmer frame to hold up their stomachs. At least they try - and so does Christmas, waddling to his feed tray, scooping up huge beakfulls of grain.
We wait until dark and put on our gloves and jackets, even though the night is still warm. I tuck a flashlight in my pocket. We are robbers with chicken crates. We go to the main coop, push the crate in front of us, and close the door behind us. I shine the light on the sleeping chickens, my husband picks up the first one and puts it in the crate. I count. We put ten to a crate, load it onto the trailer, and bring in the next crate. By the last ten chickens, we realize we don't have enough crate space. Ten chickens go into a cardboard box while we rustle up cat carriers and dog cages from the basement. At the end of the night we have 78 chickens, 3 guinea fowl, and one turkey loaded into the garage, waiting for dawn.
TUESDAY my back hurts. I beg my husband to come to the slaughterhouse with me, but he needs his vacation days for the grape crush this year for his winery. My son has new muscles from a year on swim team, and he gets drafted for the job. We leave at 7.30am for Kings Poultry near Troy, Ohio (USDOT inspected, chickens chilled to 40 degrees and sent out on ice) for our 10am appointment. I try not to think about how much I love the chickens, how funny Christmas is, how the guineas protected him with their screeching. I try not to think about how I will have to buy my eggs now from the grocery store, or about the massive freezer in my basement. Most of all, I try not to think about leaving my chickens on the slaughterhouse loading bay, because even though the people there are terribly nice, it means one thing only for my birds.
I wonder how my son is going to take it. He loves Christmas, and used to spend time crouched near his coop just sitting with him. But we gamely unload all the heavy crates, line up our tubbies and coolers, and get our return time: 2pm. I keep saying to myself - this is the food chain. This is the food chain. But I also think - I'm going to become a vegetarian one day, when everyone in the house can eat beans without us stinking each other out. Then I'll be able to keep chickens just for the eggs and for the pleasure of it.
We arrive home at 6pm after problems strapping the empty crates to the trailer. We are exhausted, but still the chilled carcasses have to be unloaded directly from the ice into the freezer. One by one my husband hands me all the birds, and we fill it up. I identify several of them - here are the older girls, the layers, and their rooster, here is the Americauna, they were a bit runty. And here's Christmas - 40lbs of him with the three darker guinea fowls. I think of all the people lined up at our holiday table, waiting with forks.
This is the reality of eating meat. You take a living thing, you cut off its head and scoop out its guts, and then you bake it at 350. This is the reality of the most disposable meat in our culture - the chicken.
WEDNESDAY I can't wake up properly without the rooster's crow. I really miss him. We only got rid of the layers because we want to go on vacation this year, a proper family vacation, and can't leave livestock at home.
It's too quiet around here. I look over at Christmas's coop, and he's not there. He's in the freezer. I wonder what we will have for dinner. It's too early to eat chicken.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Good-bye Thanksgiving
...he left the gate open, and the coyote seized her opportunity. We found you by the orchard. We are meat eaters too, and this half-chewed reminder proves everyone loves a turkey dinner. Happy coyote, happy coyote pups. Happy vultures, happy crows.
The three remaining guinea hens stick close to Christmas.
LESSON LEARNED
Predators and opportunists live by their own rules. If you don't want to lose something you've carefully nurtured, make sure you maintain your fences and close the GATES.
The three remaining guinea hens stick close to Christmas.
LESSON LEARNED
Predators and opportunists live by their own rules. If you don't want to lose something you've carefully nurtured, make sure you maintain your fences and close the GATES.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Dances with Chickens
(Thank you Reg for the title)
Dances with Chickens
One day I will have an immaculate garden
with a deer fence, six-feet high
made of silvered wood. A sprinkler
system I turn on with the twist of my wrist
and squash that don't lie in a green mattress of grass.
One day I will write full pages of work, my train
of thought uninterrupted by the Simpson's latest mischief
or a request for food.
I might keep our rooster, even though he dances and flies
at me with his spurs,
his 20-hen harem long gone
to the slaughterhouse.
What will he do with those nesting boxes? Who
will he show the worm to, no
favorite to coo?
One day we will lie by a pool together
my husband and I, and wish for the noise of teenage boys
even though the price is a wrinkled pool liner
and a bottom gritty from unwashed feet.
The turkeys come toward my daughter, shaking
the feed bucket. They are so loyal and grateful
and wary.
One day it will be silent here, no bumping into dogs
the kids insisted on, no disgruntled cats
only the obsessive hum of neighborhood mowers.
You all will be gone from the messy garden
and vases I put down
will remain on the counter, unbroken
in a house
as still as a snapshot.
On strong, long wings
my children fly.
Dances with Chickens
One day I will have an immaculate garden
with a deer fence, six-feet high
made of silvered wood. A sprinkler
system I turn on with the twist of my wrist
and squash that don't lie in a green mattress of grass.
One day I will write full pages of work, my train
of thought uninterrupted by the Simpson's latest mischief
or a request for food.
I might keep our rooster, even though he dances and flies
at me with his spurs,
his 20-hen harem long gone
to the slaughterhouse.
What will he do with those nesting boxes? Who
will he show the worm to, no
favorite to coo?
One day we will lie by a pool together
my husband and I, and wish for the noise of teenage boys
even though the price is a wrinkled pool liner
and a bottom gritty from unwashed feet.
The turkeys come toward my daughter, shaking
the feed bucket. They are so loyal and grateful
and wary.
One day it will be silent here, no bumping into dogs
the kids insisted on, no disgruntled cats
only the obsessive hum of neighborhood mowers.
You all will be gone from the messy garden
and vases I put down
will remain on the counter, unbroken
in a house
as still as a snapshot.
On strong, long wings
my children fly.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Brakes
Yesterday I Googled my name. An interesting look in the public mirror - everyone should do it once in a while. What struck me was how differently layered the references were. And then one leaped out at me. A Detective Fiction website that had copies of Motherhunt for sale. This is how they described me:
"An American author who has lived in England most of her adult life. Caused something of a splash with collectors and readers with the publication of her first novel."
My first thought was - "I wish someone would have told me at the time that I'd made a splash." I began to write the novel when I was 29, a time when my emotions were governed by anxiety and confusion. I had a new baby far from home, and no clue as to how to be a Mom and a writer and earn a living at the same time. Two books, two babies, and two miscarriages in the space of four years - that was intense.
There came a time after I'd written Butterfly Eyes when I made a choice. I remember it clearly, sitting on the bottom step of my home in Bedfordshire with my baby daughter in my arms. I so wanted to get upstairs and write. I yearned to write. I yearned to publish, to go on book tours, to attend writing soirees - to lead a full life as a writer. To give myself completely to my craft. But who would raise my babies? A nanny could not give her what I wanted to give her; I had specific values and qualities that I wanted to instill in my children, and only I could do that job.
My frustration at not being able to write was so overpoweringly fierce, I wanted to abandon my job as a mother, to walk away. And that's when I made a key decision.
I'd learned that my books had a shelf-life and a life-cycle. My childrens' life-cycles would be longer than the books'. The books had to come second. That, I knew, would have consequences. I wouldn't be able to write as fully as I needed to write in order to fulfill my potential in my profession. I would have to focus on other, more mundane, things.
Writing time, henceforth, became tucked here and there. It got stuffed in the cracks. I felt confused, my identity as a writer stripped away, piece by piece, until it no longer mattered. What ascended instead was something I didn't value when I viewed myself as purely a writer - the healing work. Ten years of self-healing, then helping others to heal. Like a glass shattered against a marble floor, I picked myself up piece by piece and healed myself back together. Instead of a glass, there is now cut crystal, sparkling with rainbows.
Through it all I've written personally, kept stacks of diaries, this blog on and off, written and published short stories, written another novel, a non-fiction book proposal, had a radio show. And for the last six months, since beginning to teach for Healing in America, I've been on a writing fast, and it's uncomfortable in some ways, and feels exactly right in others. As a person, my largest inner cogs have been turning, re-gearing, to put my personality in a completely different place.
Last week, my son left for a month with his grandparents, and I cried at the airport. University will be coming around so fast. The crack in the cliff-face, that tunnel upwards into a meadow of writing, where I can once again explore the potential I chose against with the baby in my arms - that's within view.
What's really cool? All the healing work I've done for myself and others over the intervening years has put me in a very peaceful, centered, and connected place. Writing now comes from a new well. A very deep, and full aquifer. I see people in a completely different way. I react to stress with peaceful resources. I deal with conflict with strength and clarity. That's the crystal. That's ten years of healing and becoming non-attached to the label of 'writer'.
It's a completely different space.
And the writing that flows from there will be ...
"An American author who has lived in England most of her adult life. Caused something of a splash with collectors and readers with the publication of her first novel."
My first thought was - "I wish someone would have told me at the time that I'd made a splash." I began to write the novel when I was 29, a time when my emotions were governed by anxiety and confusion. I had a new baby far from home, and no clue as to how to be a Mom and a writer and earn a living at the same time. Two books, two babies, and two miscarriages in the space of four years - that was intense.
There came a time after I'd written Butterfly Eyes when I made a choice. I remember it clearly, sitting on the bottom step of my home in Bedfordshire with my baby daughter in my arms. I so wanted to get upstairs and write. I yearned to write. I yearned to publish, to go on book tours, to attend writing soirees - to lead a full life as a writer. To give myself completely to my craft. But who would raise my babies? A nanny could not give her what I wanted to give her; I had specific values and qualities that I wanted to instill in my children, and only I could do that job.
My frustration at not being able to write was so overpoweringly fierce, I wanted to abandon my job as a mother, to walk away. And that's when I made a key decision.
I'd learned that my books had a shelf-life and a life-cycle. My childrens' life-cycles would be longer than the books'. The books had to come second. That, I knew, would have consequences. I wouldn't be able to write as fully as I needed to write in order to fulfill my potential in my profession. I would have to focus on other, more mundane, things.
Writing time, henceforth, became tucked here and there. It got stuffed in the cracks. I felt confused, my identity as a writer stripped away, piece by piece, until it no longer mattered. What ascended instead was something I didn't value when I viewed myself as purely a writer - the healing work. Ten years of self-healing, then helping others to heal. Like a glass shattered against a marble floor, I picked myself up piece by piece and healed myself back together. Instead of a glass, there is now cut crystal, sparkling with rainbows.
Through it all I've written personally, kept stacks of diaries, this blog on and off, written and published short stories, written another novel, a non-fiction book proposal, had a radio show. And for the last six months, since beginning to teach for Healing in America, I've been on a writing fast, and it's uncomfortable in some ways, and feels exactly right in others. As a person, my largest inner cogs have been turning, re-gearing, to put my personality in a completely different place.
Last week, my son left for a month with his grandparents, and I cried at the airport. University will be coming around so fast. The crack in the cliff-face, that tunnel upwards into a meadow of writing, where I can once again explore the potential I chose against with the baby in my arms - that's within view.
What's really cool? All the healing work I've done for myself and others over the intervening years has put me in a very peaceful, centered, and connected place. Writing now comes from a new well. A very deep, and full aquifer. I see people in a completely different way. I react to stress with peaceful resources. I deal with conflict with strength and clarity. That's the crystal. That's ten years of healing and becoming non-attached to the label of 'writer'.
It's a completely different space.
And the writing that flows from there will be ...
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
An Apache saying
I've been following the series "We Shall Remain" on PBS. Last week they featured Geronimo, and one of his grandsons made this statement: "As Apaches, everything we do is sacred."
I bet there were some viewers who thought: "what makes you so special?"
A fascinating book for me at the moment is Lynne McTaggart's The Intention Experiment. The book shows clearly, through the thousands of scientific experiments cited, how intention can have a profound effect on our world.
Through quantum entanglement we are always interacting with other parts of our universe than the one we are aware of at the present time. Not only have studies shown that people have a direct effect on their environment with the thoughts they focus on, they can also alter their brains which become measurably thicker in areas which receive intense focus.
If everything we think has an impact, then everything we do has a definite effect. We are working with the whole, if only in small ways, at every moment of our existence.
In native culture, you make a prayer before you do anything. In today's parlance, you set an intention. An intention is a specific request, which is then released to a higher energy which orders it to the highest possible outcome.
The Apaches and native peoples remember it; others will have to re-discover it. Everything we do is sacred.
I bet there were some viewers who thought: "what makes you so special?"
A fascinating book for me at the moment is Lynne McTaggart's The Intention Experiment. The book shows clearly, through the thousands of scientific experiments cited, how intention can have a profound effect on our world.
Through quantum entanglement we are always interacting with other parts of our universe than the one we are aware of at the present time. Not only have studies shown that people have a direct effect on their environment with the thoughts they focus on, they can also alter their brains which become measurably thicker in areas which receive intense focus.
If everything we think has an impact, then everything we do has a definite effect. We are working with the whole, if only in small ways, at every moment of our existence.
In native culture, you make a prayer before you do anything. In today's parlance, you set an intention. An intention is a specific request, which is then released to a higher energy which orders it to the highest possible outcome.
The Apaches and native peoples remember it; others will have to re-discover it. Everything we do is sacred.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Live richly
Live richly
in the center of life
tumult of growing things
chaos of fractals
unfolding to light
iris
of God's living stream.
Live richly your fears
salting the sauce
give yourself freely
to mistakes
let love flow
from the center of your smile
and your feet
absorb the rain.
in the center of life
tumult of growing things
chaos of fractals
unfolding to light
iris
of God's living stream.
Live richly your fears
salting the sauce
give yourself freely
to mistakes
let love flow
from the center of your smile
and your feet
absorb the rain.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Another chicken story
I just took 10 chickens up to a USDO processor in Bradford, Ohio and
got the excellent price of processing at 1.75 per chicken, processed,
weighed and inspected and refrigerated to 40 degrees. I now have
chickens that I can sell legally from my freezer at home. I plan to
raise and sell 150 chickens this summer - a mix of finishers at 8
weeks and 3-4 month meat-layer crosses. I will process at the Bradford
facility in batches of 50 chickens, and take pre-orders from friends
and my neighbors. I expect to have all my chickens sold before I load
them up in the trailer and take them to the processor.
I loved the processor - on an Amish, family-run facility which is open
to the public. The people there obviously have a love of their
community, and the matriarch happily answered my questions for 20
minutes as a newbie chicken farmer.
We took on 20 chickens this summer as an experiment on our 5 acres in
Powell, and I get to eat the first one tomorrow. We've been enjoying
eggs since October, and the whole experience of being on the meat end
of the food chain. It's been a pleasure from start to finish, since we
bought the chicks at Ridgeway hatcheries in April. Ridgeway supplied
me with a list of slaughtering operations in Ohio. I chose the one in
Bradford because it is USDO, and they also have a telephone. Some of
the other facilities I had to write to, and wait for a date back!
got the excellent price of processing at 1.75 per chicken, processed,
weighed and inspected and refrigerated to 40 degrees. I now have
chickens that I can sell legally from my freezer at home. I plan to
raise and sell 150 chickens this summer - a mix of finishers at 8
weeks and 3-4 month meat-layer crosses. I will process at the Bradford
facility in batches of 50 chickens, and take pre-orders from friends
and my neighbors. I expect to have all my chickens sold before I load
them up in the trailer and take them to the processor.
I loved the processor - on an Amish, family-run facility which is open
to the public. The people there obviously have a love of their
community, and the matriarch happily answered my questions for 20
minutes as a newbie chicken farmer.
We took on 20 chickens this summer as an experiment on our 5 acres in
Powell, and I get to eat the first one tomorrow. We've been enjoying
eggs since October, and the whole experience of being on the meat end
of the food chain. It's been a pleasure from start to finish, since we
bought the chicks at Ridgeway hatcheries in April. Ridgeway supplied
me with a list of slaughtering operations in Ohio. I chose the one in
Bradford because it is USDO, and they also have a telephone. Some of
the other facilities I had to write to, and wait for a date back!
Thursday, October 30, 2008
How a surrogate 'Dad' taught me to run, and lifted us all in the inner city.
I went to Middle School and part of High School in Seattle's south side, bussed into the inner city. In eighth grade I ran cross country, pounding the pavements and parks of south Seattle as our legs ate up the miles in fall conditioning. In ninth grade I ran track, and received the great gift of a coach I will never forget.
Rocky Adams stood about six-foot-two, with a big belly and grizzled silver and black hair. In his sixties, he’d been through segregation in Alabama where he’d been made to use ‘colored only’ washrooms. He’d run track in the Olympics on the same team as Jesse Owens, and talked about Jesse like he was just around the corner, or a phone call away.
Rocky Adams stood about six-foot-two, with a big belly and grizzled silver and black hair. In his sixties, he’d been through segregation in Alabama where he’d been made to use ‘colored only’ washrooms. He’d run track in the Olympics on the same team as Jesse Owens, and talked about Jesse like he was just around the corner, or a phone call away.
I don’t think there was a single girl on our team who had a father living at home, including me. Somehow, they’d divorced or died or drifted away. So Rocky became OUR father, the father of every girl on that team.
I remember how we’d drift out onto that red cinder track after school, and gather in a little cluster around Rocky. Every girl gave him a hug. It wasn’t like Rocky asked for hugs. We just went up to him and put our arms around his big belly and we hugged him for all the father we could get.
Some girls would hang on him, and he’d have to peel them off and before sending us all around the track. “I have a headache Rocky,” we’d complain, buying time, or “I’ve got pains,” and he’d get stern: "Your head hurts, your belly hurts, next thing your hair is goin’ to hurt! When I was guardin' them women in Korea, suddenly they’d go off in them bushes, and come back with a baby half an hour later! And you tell me you can’t get round that track?!”
Rocky worked at a sports store, and he never let a girl or boy go without the spiked shoes we needed to run our races. He made it clear, if you didn’t have the money for a bag, or Bengay, or a new set of spikes, he’d get them for you.
Years later I wondered how much of his own money he’d spent on those shoes. At the time I thought they were magical, free, but now I understand he must have sacrificed for us, like a good father would. He lectured us tactfully on athletic wear, that a good bra would improve our performance – go buy one. He drew the line at supplying those.
With his stories of Jesse Owens, with his chiding, he encouraged the girls to stay in school and the boys to give their best. Don’t get pregnant, he told the girls, but he didn’t shame or shun when one girl did and had to leave the team.
As a fatherless girl, I counted on my hugs from Rocky. He gave me unconditional love and support for all the years I ran track with him, at school and during club in the summers when I’d take the bus across town to practice, even though I never came in first, not once. I am grateful to have lived in a window of time when he could hug us like a father, and we could respond like daughters.
When I look at Barak Obama, I hear in my mind some of Rocky’s stories about growing up in the south, and I definitely hear how proud he would be, just like he was so proud of Jesse Owens. Rocky’s stories of Jesse lifted up those inner city girls and boys, gave them a shot at a new horizon.
What if people who are weakened by despair and limited options suddenly find strength through Obama’s leadership? Won’t it be a wonderful thing for our nation if everyone became stronger? That everyone feels they have a chance? What if the despair of the inner cities is suddenly lifted by hope, and the talent and beauty and life there has reinforcement for creating positive patterns?
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
IWWG Conference
Got up at 3.30 am with my friend Reg to get a plane for 5, to be on a subway at 8 to be at the conference by 10am, to find there's no tea or coffee at IWWG. We listened, famished, to the opening speakers, then ducked out to Maloney's bar and I had an "Irish" breakfast. Sorry Maloney's, and the homesick Irish chap who served us, but it was really the Full English - 2 eggs, 2 bangers, 2 rashers, tomato, black & white puddings, tea, toast, orange juice. Everything except the baked beans, porridge and fried bread. An obnoxious man at the bar kept on talking loudly about OJ Simpson decapitating his wife "DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS? HE DID IT WITH A KNIFE" until the barman asked him to "stop talking about what you're talking about."
Reg and I rehearsed our pitches for the 6th time each, and headed back to the hall to listen to the agents' panel.
The night before, my daughter did our nails, made sure we had adequate makeup, went through our wardrobe picks, sorted, discarded and added, checked our jewelry and made sure we'd look our best. With stunning prescience, she made us write down on cards what qualities we were looking for in an agent, and then told Reg: don't expect the person who's right for you will necessarily be a woman.
IWWG put on a lovely panel of agents. Because the group has a focus on spirituality, they'd picked several agents who seemed to be a good fit for me. We stood in two-hour lines at tables to meet our top picks, but it was worth it. I felt very at ease with the woman who asked me to submit my work. In my exhausted, befuddled state I still managed to give the book's synopsis and my platform, thanks to the morning's practice with Reg - who stood in line to see the only man there.
We bought a copy of "Next to Mexico" from the author Jen Nails, a book I'd actually picked up in Barnes and Noble the week before, thinking it would be a good choice for my daughter.
We also bought a book from Natalie Reid, who does 'soul readings' and helps people work with their soul's voice through her book The Spiritual Alchemist: Working with the Voice of the Soul. Natalie holds workshops at the IWWG annual conference at Strathmore. I'd love to go in June, but that's a busy time for my chicken, bee and garden operation, and I plan on pasturing 100 chickens this year - a substantial increase from 20.
What I loved about the panel of writers who spoke to us in the morning, was their diverse means of publishing. This used to make me feel very scared: "if there are so many more books being published, who will ever buy mine?" I wondered. But I see it differently now.
The publishing industry has opened up in such a huge way that everyone has access to some level of publication. Instead of a dozen carefully tended, clipped and sheltered rosebushes, there are fields of wildflowers blooming across the earth - in blogs, e-books, self-publishing or traditional publishing houses.
It gives authors access to publication according to their skill level and their desire to be published. So a person who just wants to get an idea out there could blog; develop the idea into an e-book and sell it; get it bound with artword and promote it as a self-published work; or try to really take it to a highly-developed, highly-polished level and submit it to an agent or a publishing house.
I do see writing and publishing as soul development now. This takes out the competitive element with other authors and writers. Instead of "my book - what have you written?" it's "how are you developing your soul?" or "what does your soul want to express?" Also, "what feeds my soul?" and for blocked writers, "how do I get in touch with my soul?" And ultimately, it's always:
"what makes my soul sing?"
Reg and I rehearsed our pitches for the 6th time each, and headed back to the hall to listen to the agents' panel.
The night before, my daughter did our nails, made sure we had adequate makeup, went through our wardrobe picks, sorted, discarded and added, checked our jewelry and made sure we'd look our best. With stunning prescience, she made us write down on cards what qualities we were looking for in an agent, and then told Reg: don't expect the person who's right for you will necessarily be a woman.
IWWG put on a lovely panel of agents. Because the group has a focus on spirituality, they'd picked several agents who seemed to be a good fit for me. We stood in two-hour lines at tables to meet our top picks, but it was worth it. I felt very at ease with the woman who asked me to submit my work. In my exhausted, befuddled state I still managed to give the book's synopsis and my platform, thanks to the morning's practice with Reg - who stood in line to see the only man there.
We bought a copy of "Next to Mexico" from the author Jen Nails, a book I'd actually picked up in Barnes and Noble the week before, thinking it would be a good choice for my daughter.
We also bought a book from Natalie Reid, who does 'soul readings' and helps people work with their soul's voice through her book The Spiritual Alchemist: Working with the Voice of the Soul. Natalie holds workshops at the IWWG annual conference at Strathmore. I'd love to go in June, but that's a busy time for my chicken, bee and garden operation, and I plan on pasturing 100 chickens this year - a substantial increase from 20.
What I loved about the panel of writers who spoke to us in the morning, was their diverse means of publishing. This used to make me feel very scared: "if there are so many more books being published, who will ever buy mine?" I wondered. But I see it differently now.
The publishing industry has opened up in such a huge way that everyone has access to some level of publication. Instead of a dozen carefully tended, clipped and sheltered rosebushes, there are fields of wildflowers blooming across the earth - in blogs, e-books, self-publishing or traditional publishing houses.
It gives authors access to publication according to their skill level and their desire to be published. So a person who just wants to get an idea out there could blog; develop the idea into an e-book and sell it; get it bound with artword and promote it as a self-published work; or try to really take it to a highly-developed, highly-polished level and submit it to an agent or a publishing house.
I do see writing and publishing as soul development now. This takes out the competitive element with other authors and writers. Instead of "my book - what have you written?" it's "how are you developing your soul?" or "what does your soul want to express?" Also, "what feeds my soul?" and for blocked writers, "how do I get in touch with my soul?" And ultimately, it's always:
"what makes my soul sing?"
Thursday, October 16, 2008
New York - new pitch
After working for a year on platform by creating the radio show Conscious Voices for WCRS, I'm back to novels and brushing up a final final version of Novel 3 to sell in New York. The International Women Writer's Guild (IWWG) holds a pitch session this weekend. Sunday there is a meet-the-authors open house, a book fair, and then a meet-the-agents open house. The blurb promises that past events have "yielded wonderful matches between authors and agents."
A friend and I are travelling up together on a 4am flight, (OMG - that's before my rooster is even up) and we plan to practice-pitch to our local IWWG chapter the day before.
Why is it taking so long to get novel 3 out the door? Last year at the Columbus Writer's Conference I had a session with editor Sally Kim, and she encouraged me to get in touch with several agents. But after listening to editors and agents talk about their needs, I felt that I had to back up and construct more of a platform. I dove into creating a radio show for WCRS fm. Twenty-two episodes later felt I'd earned a break, and that it was overdue time to get that novel once again into position for an agent.
A girl can only do so much!
When it's my turn to sit in front of an agent, I'll tell her that Sally did want to see my book, when I'd found someone who could talk to her. (Some editors in the big publishing houses can't talk to writers unless the writer has an agent.)
The trainer at the gym had the nicest thing to say to me when I told her I'd be going to New York. "I wish you luck - you deserve it. You work so hard at it."
Maybe that's why I feel so calm going into this. I've done the hoofwork. The novel's been combed through 13 times. I've had a professional editor comment on the manuscript, and taken her advice to heart in the subsequent redrafts. I've taken time to build the platform and labored over designs for the final website. Is it worth it? Has it been worth it? Yes.
When the conference is over, when my plane touches ground back in Columbus, if I don't find a match at IWWG I'll start contacting agents one by one until I find that right someone. In the meantime, I'll begin novel 4. I'll record a show. I'll be starting on the promotion for the NFSH Healing in America training courses in Ohio in March 2009. And it will all come together eventually, and it will all be good.
A friend and I are travelling up together on a 4am flight, (OMG - that's before my rooster is even up) and we plan to practice-pitch to our local IWWG chapter the day before.
Why is it taking so long to get novel 3 out the door? Last year at the Columbus Writer's Conference I had a session with editor Sally Kim, and she encouraged me to get in touch with several agents. But after listening to editors and agents talk about their needs, I felt that I had to back up and construct more of a platform. I dove into creating a radio show for WCRS fm. Twenty-two episodes later felt I'd earned a break, and that it was overdue time to get that novel once again into position for an agent.
A girl can only do so much!
When it's my turn to sit in front of an agent, I'll tell her that Sally did want to see my book, when I'd found someone who could talk to her. (Some editors in the big publishing houses can't talk to writers unless the writer has an agent.)
The trainer at the gym had the nicest thing to say to me when I told her I'd be going to New York. "I wish you luck - you deserve it. You work so hard at it."
Maybe that's why I feel so calm going into this. I've done the hoofwork. The novel's been combed through 13 times. I've had a professional editor comment on the manuscript, and taken her advice to heart in the subsequent redrafts. I've taken time to build the platform and labored over designs for the final website. Is it worth it? Has it been worth it? Yes.
When the conference is over, when my plane touches ground back in Columbus, if I don't find a match at IWWG I'll start contacting agents one by one until I find that right someone. In the meantime, I'll begin novel 4. I'll record a show. I'll be starting on the promotion for the NFSH Healing in America training courses in Ohio in March 2009. And it will all come together eventually, and it will all be good.
Friday, September 14, 2007
Decision Maker
After a long, hot and glorious summer with the kids and my beautiful neice, swimming and bouncing and camping and eating from the garden - and yes, writing too - I'm at work. Just turned in a 20-minute segment for Bexley radio about the Columbus Writer's Conference. And last night, I was approached at a radio party to host my own weekly hour-long show on my favorite topics: conscious living, holistic health, sustainability, and travel.
What an amazing opportunity! And I've got enough ideas to fill 20 hours of programming!
How different from Wednesday when I'd hit writer's block. I felt so drained, a kind of panicky drained, where I'm afraid I'll never be able to write again. A writer friend called, and she talked about her artist dates, and how they seemed like a complete waste of time, but the day after taking time for her inner artist she worked more easily, smoothly.
She's right, I thought. Without hesitation, I grabbed my favorite black and gold fountain pen, my journal, and headed out to the pool where my son lounged in the hammock with stomach flu. I put on a California Guitar Trio cd, and sucked up the freedom of letting myself just BE.
After about an hour, I began to see vivid images in my mind, and this poem fell out. This is its fifth draft:
Decision Maker
We are arrows shot
black against turquoise sky
a silver-tipped swish.
We the bow
the burning bicep
white fingers, blood starved,
hot scrape of string to arm
and the vibrating core
of the bow-master.
In my quiver, a thousand decisions,
aim of my eye,
each shot, destiny wrought.
The arc interrupted by an act of will, or not
interrupted at all.
----------------------
The poem reminded me of something I'd read in Khalil Gibran's The Prophet. So I scurried upstairs and found this on page 18:
“You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.”
It's no shame to be trumped by a master, and I have to give the blue ribbon for archery metaphors to Gibran. But it was interesting to see how my language differed from his. We also talk about different subjects - Gibran about the separateness between one generation and the next, between child and parent and how important stability is for how far a child can fly. My poem is about how our decisions govern our life's experiences, and how we can choose to change old patterns through the act of will, or create a positive life by using the principle of trajectory.
In a business and marketing class I'm taking from Freelance Success's Erik Sherman, I've posted this piece of advice on my wall: "through ordered and diligent work, you can take advantage of business that happens by accident." I think that, too, also resonates with the bowmaster and the vibrating core.
I didn't realize I missed blogging this much!
What an amazing opportunity! And I've got enough ideas to fill 20 hours of programming!
How different from Wednesday when I'd hit writer's block. I felt so drained, a kind of panicky drained, where I'm afraid I'll never be able to write again. A writer friend called, and she talked about her artist dates, and how they seemed like a complete waste of time, but the day after taking time for her inner artist she worked more easily, smoothly.
She's right, I thought. Without hesitation, I grabbed my favorite black and gold fountain pen, my journal, and headed out to the pool where my son lounged in the hammock with stomach flu. I put on a California Guitar Trio cd, and sucked up the freedom of letting myself just BE.
After about an hour, I began to see vivid images in my mind, and this poem fell out. This is its fifth draft:
Decision Maker
We are arrows shot
black against turquoise sky
a silver-tipped swish.
We the bow
the burning bicep
white fingers, blood starved,
hot scrape of string to arm
and the vibrating core
of the bow-master.
In my quiver, a thousand decisions,
aim of my eye,
each shot, destiny wrought.
The arc interrupted by an act of will, or not
interrupted at all.
----------------------
The poem reminded me of something I'd read in Khalil Gibran's The Prophet. So I scurried upstairs and found this on page 18:
“You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.”
It's no shame to be trumped by a master, and I have to give the blue ribbon for archery metaphors to Gibran. But it was interesting to see how my language differed from his. We also talk about different subjects - Gibran about the separateness between one generation and the next, between child and parent and how important stability is for how far a child can fly. My poem is about how our decisions govern our life's experiences, and how we can choose to change old patterns through the act of will, or create a positive life by using the principle of trajectory.
In a business and marketing class I'm taking from Freelance Success's Erik Sherman, I've posted this piece of advice on my wall: "through ordered and diligent work, you can take advantage of business that happens by accident." I think that, too, also resonates with the bowmaster and the vibrating core.
I didn't realize I missed blogging this much!
Friday, June 08, 2007
Last day of school blues
Last day of school, and I feel a bit sad because I'm picking up steam in writing work and now the schedule shifts - to what? How will I create time to write? How will I find solace?
But I know, if I look to past summers, I will be able to integrate my life: kids and summer fun with writing. Somehow!
The kids know of my need. One day when my son was trying to think of a punishment for some small trespass I'd committed he said: "I know, you're grounded from writing for three days!"
"OOOOHHHH!" I wailed. "You really know where to hurt me!" And he grinned and we giggled.
I can see it now: they're putting me in a nursing home but checking out the internet connection and finding a lap table so I can still use my computer, diary, pens....
I'm working on two stories at the moment: one non-fiction about Nazi-era provenance art for Bexley Public Radio, the other fiction, a 2,000 word short story I want to enter into the Ohio Writer's competition.
The online competition service CRWROPPS (which you can subscribe to as a feed, see previous posts for details) spits out five to eight competitions per day for me to peruse. And I'm getting picky.
Competitions can be a scam. Think of a good name for your comp, set up a PO Box, advertise and watch the checks come in. That's why the website which keeps an eye on comps, Preditors and Editors, doesn't take as valid any comp which charges a reading fee. (Ditto for agents). However, comps are one way magazines and writers' groups get revenue in to keep them afloat.
My rules have become: if it lists a PO Box as its address, don't enter. Wait for comps from magazines and writer's groups you recognize, then check out their websites. One website CRWROPPS listed had a rolling competition - ie, they gave winners out every few months. But when I clicked through to the site, the poetry was diabolical, and basically pay to play.
But I know, if I look to past summers, I will be able to integrate my life: kids and summer fun with writing. Somehow!
The kids know of my need. One day when my son was trying to think of a punishment for some small trespass I'd committed he said: "I know, you're grounded from writing for three days!"
"OOOOHHHH!" I wailed. "You really know where to hurt me!" And he grinned and we giggled.
I can see it now: they're putting me in a nursing home but checking out the internet connection and finding a lap table so I can still use my computer, diary, pens....
I'm working on two stories at the moment: one non-fiction about Nazi-era provenance art for Bexley Public Radio, the other fiction, a 2,000 word short story I want to enter into the Ohio Writer's competition.
The online competition service CRWROPPS (which you can subscribe to as a feed, see previous posts for details) spits out five to eight competitions per day for me to peruse. And I'm getting picky.
Competitions can be a scam. Think of a good name for your comp, set up a PO Box, advertise and watch the checks come in. That's why the website which keeps an eye on comps, Preditors and Editors, doesn't take as valid any comp which charges a reading fee. (Ditto for agents). However, comps are one way magazines and writers' groups get revenue in to keep them afloat.
My rules have become: if it lists a PO Box as its address, don't enter. Wait for comps from magazines and writer's groups you recognize, then check out their websites. One website CRWROPPS listed had a rolling competition - ie, they gave winners out every few months. But when I clicked through to the site, the poetry was diabolical, and basically pay to play.
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Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Sunday, June 03, 2007
Be the explorer on the edge of your world
It's being so scared, and yet deciding to do that thing you're most afraid of, and getting beyond it and finding out you're not only alright, but better for the experience, and then seeing the next thing you're scared of, and then saying to yourself 'I'm a brave person. I did the last thing that scared me to death. I'm a person of courage and I'm going to do this next thing that scares me to death,' and you do, and it's ok...that's what makes life such an adventure.
You can be Marianne the Librarian and lead a wonderful, adventurous life because you're facing your fears every day...and it will look to other people that you're just an ordinary bod going about ordinary bod things every day, but you won't be.
You'll be an explorer on the edge of your world; you are the bravest person to face the fears that make you the most frightened, and the most courageous to do those things anyway.
For everyone who lives like this, their reward is the most wonderful freedom; their life is the most exciting; their dreams are the most fulfilled.
You can be Marianne the Librarian and lead a wonderful, adventurous life because you're facing your fears every day...and it will look to other people that you're just an ordinary bod going about ordinary bod things every day, but you won't be.
You'll be an explorer on the edge of your world; you are the bravest person to face the fears that make you the most frightened, and the most courageous to do those things anyway.
For everyone who lives like this, their reward is the most wonderful freedom; their life is the most exciting; their dreams are the most fulfilled.
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