Thankful Thursday: Shirley & other wonders

Shirley Plummer - photo by Chris GraamansShirley says she needs to do more.

"I should write every day. I should write in forms. I should challenge myself," she says, with a head shake and a sigh.

We're admiring her book. Her debut. At 85, Shirley Plummer is now a published poet. 

I'm so happy for Shirley my face hurts from smiling. And happy for the power of writing, for the magical, mysterious way creative expression can lift and change.

While she had long dabbled in words, it was only five years ago that she began to take writing seriously. She read and studied and attended a weekly writing group. She forged friendships with writers and exchanged ideas. Her days and journals swirled with words.

A few years ago she fell ill, and then fell down. What followed: surgery, rehab, slow unsteady steps to something that looked like normal. Not so much recovery as readjustment. Her mind, she says, isn't as sharp. Loose change rattling. Cloudy.

When she says, "I can see the end," she's not talking about today. But she's got a lot to do, she says, and ideas to explore.

But first, she has reading events to celebrate the publication of her debut poetry collection, The Task of Falling Rain.

Are you in Oregon? For the love of Shirley and poetry and creative expression, please attend her book release parties:

• Saturday, February 20 at 2pm, Waldport Community Center in Waldport, Oregon

• Saturday, March 5 at 2pm, Yachats Commons in Yachats, Oregon

If you're not nearby, give a nod and a note of thanks to the force of creativity which saves, changes, lifts and connects.

It's Thankful Thursday. Is there anything better than gratitude (which is really just another form of love)? What are you thankful for today?

 

Can't get you out of my head

 

we spread a blanket      spread
ourselves               almost pulseless

in pacific deception


- from A Duet of Novices by Gail Waldstein
from The Hauntings

 

I've got word envy. Or poem envy. Or something like a revved-up appreciation for another's work.

Does this happen to you? You read a line, a passage, a chapter, and you are moved, but it comes with a twinge of wish. As in, I wish I'd written that.

These twinges, this envy, at first feels petty but is really instruction in disguise. This yearning awakens, and then asks why? And the why leads and encourages us to find our own version, our own voice, our own way. 

What's leading you?


Thankful Thursday: Yes


Say yes.

Yes opens the door.

Lately, I've enjoyed a sequence of yes. Like shopping for a car, once you notice the Subura, you see Suburas everywhere (or you just live in Oregon).

My friend Vicki sends out a weekly poem (she researches and writes backstory on each poet. It's a great free service produced by a real poetry appreciator). A few months ago she asked me to serve as guest curator. I shared a few of my favorite poems, including God Says Yes to Me by Kaylin Haught, and concluded with one of my own, Turn Up the Quiet.

One of her readers noted that yes made a frequent appearance. I hadn't noticed, and thus, began a fun exchange:

In response to yes, Careful Reader sent me a no poem by Vsevolod Nekrasov:

no no
no and no

no and no and no and no
and no and no and no and no
and no
and I     no

I responded with another yes poem, an excerpt from On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong:

Say amen. Say amend.
Say yes. Say yes
anyway.

When Careful Reader said she was having trouble finding no poems, I felt heartened. Yes had triumphed.

Still, I kept on the search, digging up more yes poems (though at this point, vindicated, I kept them to myself). I found this poem by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer:

Divining

Not just on the wall—
the writing's on the sky,
the river, the bridge, your hands.
Wouldn't you love to believe
all those blue and red lines
make a map, and if only
you could read those lines,
you might know where to go
from here? Yes, we're lost
and wrinkled and surely doomed,
but god, in this moment
between concerns, isn't it beautiful,
the place where we wander,
this hour when gold gathers
just before the plum of night?


Wanting to know more, I discovered Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer approaches writing and life with yes. I liked her style, and I reached out to learn more. Rosemerry is now featured on the blog series I host, 3 Good Books, sharing her top picks on the theme of, you guessed it, Yes.
 
Don't you love the power of poetry, how it nudges us to pause and consider, how it moves us toward yes? 

 
It's Thankful Thursday, a weekly pause to express appreciation for people, places, things, and more. What are you thankful for today?


Fill me up, it said

. . . And turned, therefore,
 to the expected silence of a page,

where I might simultaneous assert
and hide, be my own disappointment,
which saved me for a while.
But soon the page whispered

I'd mistaken its vastness for a refuge
its whiteness for a hospital
for the pathetic. Fill me up, it said
give me sorrow because I must have joy,

all the travails of love because
distances are where the safe reside.
Bring to me, it said, continuous proof
you've been alive.

— from Turning to the Page
by Stephen Dunn

To view full poem, go here.


 

When we read . . .

I ask questions: What are you reading? Why? What is it about this topic that resonates with you? How does it influence your own work?

I liked the responses so much, I made a place to share those answers, influences and ideas: 3 Good Books.

Because when we read, creativity stirs. And when we create, our lives expand.

Expand yourself. Get to know great writers and artists. Now Showing at 3 Good Books: Ebony Stewart, a performance poet and sexual health instructor (that's her in the video). She's funny, tender, smart and sharp, and she's got some great book suggestions.


Thankful Thursday: Midwinter Blues

Gratitude, smatitude.

It's the bleak midwinter. Creative folks are dying left and right (see: David Bowie, C.D. Wright, Alan Rickman) and my thankfulness is a dry, dry cup. As in empty. 

The sky is grey, the days damp. My body heavy, my mind slogged. Oh goodlord, enough already. Hello Zoloft, my dear friend.

But, yes, of course, we must turn to gratitude. When we feel it the least is when we need it the most. Because attention attracts gratitude and gratitude expands joy, it's time to slice through the ugly and get to the good.

This week, what gets me through:

Parenthood
I refer, of course, to Parenthood, the television show (and not —shudder — my own children, and the fact that I don't have children, and chose not to have children, and that I had the opportunity and support to make that decision is another thing to be thankful for. But I digress). I'm late to the party on this ensemble show that is really a dressed-up, contemporary soap opera. But gosh, it's been fun. Not completely mindless, it's been the ideal binge-watch on these dark, long nights.

Kettle Corn
I'm cutting back on sweets (so goes my resolution not to resolve). I'm not cutting sugar entirely, that would be crazy (see also: impossible, wonderful) but I'm backing off. And if you don't eat the entire bag in one sitting (while watching Parenthood), it's a nice treat.

Creative Self-Help
Uggh. I have an adore-abhor relationship with self-improvement books. Like an ant to a picnic, I'm drawn in with vigor and focus. Yes, I will be a better person! Yes, I will be more creative, more happy, more efficient, more slim, more young, more old, more self-accepting . . . Well, you can see what happens. So much more is, well, less. And exhausting. (And so, we return, with gratitude and guilt, to Parenthood and kettle corn. Oh, how the hamster wheel turns).

Long-story-short, I'm reading Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert (am I the only one who hasn't read Eat, Pray, Love?). It's a self-help book, which is to say it feels sort of insightful, sort of soothing, and sort of annoying. Still, there are some nuggets that speak to me, like this:

The older I get, the less impressed I become with originality. These days, I’m far more moved by authenticity. Attempts at originality can often feel forced and precious, but authenticity has quiet resonance that never fails to stir me.

Yes, that's where I am too. In mid-January, on chilly days and long nights, I'm scratching for gratitude and finding more than I imagined. My cup fills, if slowly.

And you? What are you thankful for today?

* p.s. I'm also thankful for digression, asides, parentheticals — and your patience.

 

Aspiration wears me down

Blank page. Clean windows. New shoes. I like a fresh start.

But, sheesh, I can't take the pressure of a new year.

I can't see another photo of a fit woman with luminous skin and super-toned bod. No more lists advising me how to be a better boss, rising star, team player. And please, no more images of dreamy couples on dreamy beach vacations.

Aspiration wears me down.

I already know I'm not going to write every day, exercise more, or eat less. I won't give up sugar or dairy or carbs. I might drink less. I'll try to love more. But, really, I can't guarantee much.

I've read the same endless stream of self-improvement suggestions you have: Have a clear goal. Write affirmations. Positive self-talk. Visualize your ideal self. Self care.

I get it, but oh, it takes so much effort to be my "best self." While I don't want to let myself go, I'd sure like to relax.   

So, this year I turn again to Lisa Romeo's I Did It practice. Rather than look forward with resolution and proclamation, I'll quietly look back and assess what I did achieve: personally, professionally, emotionally, physically. I'll recall (to myself) the accomplishments and may even feel buoyed. And that may be just the nudge I need to believe I'm able, willing, and often revved with possibility.

How about you? In this new year, where's your head and heart?

 

Thankful Thursday: When shared with you

It's a big Thankful Thursday — the last of the year. Thank you for spending Thankful Thursdays with me, for keeping me accountable, appreciative, and grateful for things big and small.

Attention attracts gratitude, and gratitude expands joy, and my gratitude grows when shared with you.

Thank you.

 

Bell Song of Thanks

for patience and prayers
    for holding tight
    and letting go

for mothers     
    who cry in the dark
    and pray for light

for fathers
    reticent as rocks
    solid as time
    
for brothers
    that call

for sisters
    that don’t
    
for the near miss
    the second place
    the small dent

for speaking up
    and stilling down

for lungs to run
    legs to stand
    a heart to believe

for sickness
    and balm
    fortitude and grit

for newborns
    cradled in hopeful hands

for goodbyes
    that shook
    left us sobbing and stranded

for faith
    and song
    and the reminding chime

for giving up
    and starting over

despite of,
    because of,
    almost always
    for

love.

 

- Drew Myron


On Hidden Lives


Memoir often gets a bum

           wrap as a self-involved 

           genre, but the irony is that 

           when it's done well, a memoir 

           is an exploration of one person's

           life that illuminates the lives

           of many."


             —  Sonja Livingston


Sonja Livingston is master of detail. She peers beneath the surface and extracts the emotional terrain of people and place. She is author of Ghostbread, an award-winning memoir about growing up in poverty (it's one of my favorite books), and her newest work, Ladies Night at the Dreamland, is a collection of essays.

At 3 Good Books — a blog series I host — Livingston shares her favorite books on the theme of Hidden Lives.

Join us, here.


Merry music, softly

Had enough of the jingle-jangle of Christmas?

Me too. I cozy to a quiet Christmas, with books, blankets, and calm.
For sanity and serenity, I'm listening to tranquil tunes: 


Aimee Mann: One More Drifter in the Snow
Ever since she penned and performed the soundtrack to my favorite movie, Magnolia, Aimee Mann has reigned as my very own queen of substance & cool. With this collection, she turns classic tunes into a hushed and intimate holiday with a dreamy vibe.

 


Chris Botti: December
Okay, okay, the title says seasonal, but here's my confession: I play these tunes all year through. Botti's low-key trumpet is warm and soothing, and keeps me snuggled and serene.

 


Sarah MacLachlan: Wintersong
Gauzy and ethereal, Sarah McLachlan delivers. This collection is signature Sarah: pretty, pensive and beautifully moody.

 


Tracy Chapman: O Holy Night
While she doesn't have her own collection of holiday tunes, Tracy Chapman's O Holy Night is the standout of A Very Special Christmas 3 compilation.

 

As usual at this time of year, I'm in a mix of harried, moody and melancholy, and almost any version of Silent Night leaves me in near-tears. But, really, isn't that the spirit of the season — to be touched, to be moved?

Your turn: What's playing, and are you moved? 

 

These music selections are available on iTunes and Amazon.


Finding meaning, making art

Let Me, a found poem by J.I Kleinberg  

"Every journey is about finding," says Judy Kleinberg, an artist-writer who has created over 1,000 found poems.

"Browsing through magazines for images, I noticed 'accidental' phrases that were created through the happenstance of page layout," she says. "My process is all about finding that unintentional syntax and combining small word chunks into poems."

Join us at 3 Good Books, where Kleinberg offers reading suggestions on the theme of finding.

 

Pigeons, pork chops, maybe

In the Pacific Northwest, where I live, all about me is floods, landslides, and endless wet. For days that wear like weeks, we've been saturated in rain and gray. And gray is more than weather.

Against Gray

Mold. Mice. A tough porkchop.
The angry ocean.

Old carpet.
Seagulls, pigeons, worms.
Trash can. Concrete.

Seattle. Portland. Dusk.
The pull of sadness.
Worn cedar siding. Wind.

Mullett, tuna, catfish, dead fish.
The words maybe    almost.

Black and white photos dimmed with time.
Late night television of my youth.

Oatmeal. Gravel. Cigarette smoke. Dust.

Old man eyebrows, wiry and wandering.
Women who’ve given up.
Oyster shells. Fog.

The flu. A murky x-ray.
Loneliness is a shadow.

Mornings without my glasses.
Bullets, battleships, steel.
Mushrooms. Sweat stains. Dirty socks.

Barbells. Knife. Wrench.
Clenched jaw.

Dirty dishwater. Sideways rain.

In the distance, you.


- Drew Myron


What I'm Giving: Books!

In a gift giving frenzy?

As I do every year, and much to the chagrin of my nieces and nephews who would prefer a fat wad of cash, I'm giving books.

Books always fit, and rarely offend. Books are best to both give and receive (though cashmere and sea salt caramels are strong contenders, but enough about my wants).

Feel free to borrow my gift list and make it your own*:


MEMOIR (without the annoying me-me-me)


Bettyville
by George Hodgman

A gay man returns home to take care of his strong-willed, elderly mother, and the results are both very funny and very touching. The New York Times says "it works on several levels, as a meditation on belonging, as a story of growing up gay and the psychic cost of silence, as metaphor for recovery."

 

MOTIVATIONAL (without cloying platitudes)


The Best Advice in Six Words
edited by Larry Smith

We've come a long way since the first book of Six Word Memoirs. Book after book, the best-selling series works so well because creating six word snippets is both challenging and fun, and can deliver a delightful mix of  messages amusing, sharp, touching and sad. (Have you written your six-word memoir? You can see mine across this website header: Push words. Pull light. Carry balm.)



SPIRITUAL (without dogma)


Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner & Saint
by Nadia Bolz-Weber

A tatooed, female, recovered alcoholic joins with homeless, gay, and transgendered friends to start a church. This is not fiction, this is faith. The kind of religion that is inclusive and real. Now a New York Times bestseller, Pastrix is described as "a book for every thinking misfit suspicious of institutionalized religion, but who is still seeking transcendence and mystery."

 

YOUNG ADULT (without vampires or zombies)


The Way Back from Broken
by Amber Keyser

At last, a novel that understands teen readers are hungry for complex characters and deep material. In this compelling and poignant novel, a 15-year-old boy grapples with the grief of losing his baby sister. The author "takes the reader inside the pain of loss," notes a book reviewer, "making it personal and ragged in all the best ways, so that each step toward healing builds to a life-affirming and cathartic conclusion."


ILLUSTRATED BOOK (sorta story, sorta comic)


Hyperbole and a Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened
by Allie Brosh

It's been out two years but I'm just now getting to the lovefest for this sharp and amusing illustrated book. "Funny and smart as hell," says Bill Gates (yes, that Bill Gates). NPR, Goodreads, Library Journal, Elizabeth Gilbert and 3,000 Amazon reviewers love this book. And now, you can add my (not at all powerful) name to the list.

 

FICTION (literary, but not overly crafted)


Elegies for the Brokenhearted 
by Christie Hodgen

I like my fiction deep and dark, and Elegies for the Brokenhearted delivers. Melancholic and deftly written, the novel tells the story of one woman's damaged and difficult life through a series as elegies — aching and insightful laments for the dead. Original and absorbing, this is the best book I read in 2015 (though as usual I'm late to the launch; the book was published in 2010).

 

 * I have numerous caveats for my reading pursuits. But don't fret, it's the thought that counts. Unless you give me a cookbook, to which my response will always be, "Can't we go out for dinner?" 

 

 

Thanks Giving: Illness, usefulness, being

One of my best days lately was talking with a woman who cannot speak, listening to a woman who cannot hear, and dinner with a friend who said, “I only cry in front of you.”

___

For most of the past year, I’ve willingly moved toward sickness and death. Life recedes at every turn, among family, friends, and at work. There’s no shortage of pain, this we know.

___

When we visit a friend in the nursing home, my kind and compassionate husband can’t wait to leave.

Is it the smell, I ask? (They all smell, even the good ones. Because, well, incontinence stinks).

Is it the sight? Elderly people aren’t pretty. The beautifully elegant and aging Katherine Hepburn is like a unicorn, a myth. The rest of us sag, spot, wrinkle, shrivel, and smell.  

No, he says, I just don’t know what to say or do.

Without action, he’s restless, wants to fix. I know the feeling, though I’m spared this anxiety because I rarely feel equipped to fix anything.

Still, what seems the most obvious action is also the most difficult: show up, without resolution, avoidance, distraction, or cheer.

___

use·ful
   ˈyo͞osfəl/
   adjective
   1 :  capable of being put to use; especially :  serviceable for an end or purpose <useful tools>
   2 :  of a valuable or productive kind <do something useful with your life>

My every prayer: make me useful.

___

Years ago, I began working with teens in a writing group. Many of the young writers struggled through lives complicated by abuse, neglect, drugs, alcohol, and more. I had no experience in social work or teaching. Even writing was more instinct than education.

Expressing my anxiousness, a good friend offered the best advice: Just show up. Be present.

She was right. The teens have now grown up and on, and I still whisper those five words to myself.

I’m not an expert in health care, psychology, or, really, anything. At the nursing home where I work, I sometimes turn into a strange version of myself. My voice rises in a cheery rush, an effort to fill the uncomfortable space. But I’m trying. Some days I visit with a woman who talks in gibberish. We don’t need words. We sit in the sun. I hold her hand, and she smiles.

I’m trying to be quiet, to sit still, to be.

___

What I’m learning is the span between sickness and death is a long, gray, murky mess. The definitive moments are few. You do this and this and that, in a zigzag, with no direct route. Sickness is cloudy and slow.

Few of us die suddenly, peacefully, easily. It’s not death that unsettles me, but the rocky road to get there.  

___ 

We should write about this, my friend says.

She's in the mire of caregiving, watchful of every change in a disease robbing body and mind. This is not the life she imagined. Together, each in our own way, we’re seeing many ends.

But what would we say? Illness is ugly. Aging stinks. We don’t want to see the unpleasant end. And when we squirm with discomfort, we don’t want to realize that we’re not as magnanimous as we believed.

___

You can brighten a life, I tell a prospective volunteer. But not many people want to visit the darkness of dying, even if a visit would light up the lonely. 

It takes so little to help another. This is a fact both comforting and sad.

___

At the nursing home, or in the hospital, time slows and I’m in a protected envelope in which every moment matters. Most days I feel lucky to be among people who trust me enough to let me see their fear and loneliness. I’m trying to say that every small gesture is worthy of effort. And those gestures are largely unseen, and that seems the most honest and true thing I can do.  

___

But let’s not get dramatic; I’m holding a hand, not curing cancer. I’m admiring a necklace, and noticing new socks. I’m discussing the chicken dinner, and gushing over a fresh manicure. I’m pushing a wheelchair, not because she can’t push herself but because it gives me an excuse to chat and smile, to be of use.

___

I didn't expect to laugh so much. But I'm giggling with Betsy, who is telling me about her absent children and no-good man. And I'm laughing with Sylvia, who is sneaking a smoke. And I'm silly with Ellen as we bumble to secure her jacket that is all zippers and sleeves.

"I'm no good at this," I mutter.

"You're learning," she says, patient as Sunday.

We laugh at our mutual inability. We are giddy about nothing at all, and in nothingness we share an everyday ease.

___ 

Happiness doesn’t come in the way I expected, writes Samantha Harvey, not a massing of good things over time, but a succession of small, strange and unowned moments.

___

Unexpectedly, gratitude gathers. My thankfulness is a messy pile of autumn leaves. In this decay, there is much beauty.

 

 

Thankful Thursday: Crazy Fallen World

These are difficult days for gratitude. The days are short, the skies gray, the heart heavy.

And yet, of course, we must make room in the mire for thankfulness, to keep some safe and tidy spot for our gratitude to grow.

Praise our crazy fallen world, writes Barbara Crooker, it's all we have, and it's never enough.

I often reach for Crooker's reassurance, and learned recently that her gratitude is hard-earned, which makes her beautiful poems even more illuminating. You can learn more about Barbara Crooker on the 3 Good Books blog.

Praise Song

Praise the light of late November,

the thin sunlight that goes deep in the bones.

Praise the crows chattering in the oak trees;

though they are clothed in night, they do not

despair. Praise what little there's left:

the small boats of milkweed pods, husks, hulls,

shells, the architecture of trees. Praise the meadow

of dried weeds: yarrow, goldenrod, chicory,

the remains of summer. Praise the blue sky

that hasn't cracked yet. Praise the sun slipping down

behind the beechnuts, praise the quilt of leaves

that covers the grass: Scarlet Oak, Sweet Gum,

Sugar Maple. Though darkness gathers, praise our crazy

fallen world; it's all we have, and it's never enough.


— Barbara Crooker
  

It's Thankful Thursday. Gratitude. Appreciation. Praise. Please join me in a weekly pause to express appreciation for people, places & things. What are you thankful for today?