Category Archives: Events

Whew! (Storytelling Performance)

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I did it!

Tonight I told my first major story set in about two years (Glimmers in the Darkness from this page). I recorded it too, so now I’ll actually be able to hear what it is I sound like.

This has to be good, no matter what I sound like, because I have to hear what’s wrong in order to change it, right?

I was pleased with how well I did. I’m always amazed/relieved I how well I can do once the “crunch” is on.

~ ~ ~

So now I’m about 50% psyc’ed, confidence built-up, to pursue this project further, and 50% ready to drop it like the hard work it is and do different work for a while.

Two different people tonight said variants on both, “I could never do that– I’m too shy,” and “That’s a *lot* of memorizing!” (It was roughly a half-hour set.)

I understand both statements, but have found that the stories themselves are the answer to both challenges.

When I find the “right” story something in it– a line, an image, a posture, grabs my imagination, and I want to spend more time with it.

Spending more time with the story provides the familiarity to share it (actual memorization and recitation is not even a recommended method of storytelling, usually), and the story itself is the thing that puts and keeps you in front of your audience.

Because if you have a good story you know instinctively that it *has* to be shared.

Even children understand this. Nothing has happened unless Mom or Dad has seen or knows about it too.

“Look at this Mama!” my girls say over and over again.

It’s not enough to experience it alone. Someone— best if it’s someone important— has to share it.

It’s saying that something important to me is also important to someone else, and this affirms that I fit into something larger than myself.

That a story that moved me equally affects someone else– this shows me something we have in common.

And while I often talk about Storytelling in the grand terms of cross-cultural unity, and the variety of things it teaches (because I’m trying to justify what other people may marginalize), I also just love the stories.

I love them because I need stories. And, frankly, if no one ever listened, I’d still need them.

So even when I step back for a season, this telling thing doesn’t just go away. And I find that reassuring, somehow.

Book Work

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Here are some pictures of this week’s work. (If you want to see pictures of actual people, those are here)

jan-books-1.jpg jan-books-2.jpg jan-books-3.jpg

That last case with the empty shelf is from the shuffling the girls and I did. I haven’t had an empty space on my own shelves for a long time. If hadn’t already decided not to buy more this year, that might be way too tempting to look at every morning.

Resolution Time

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(Bottom revised and a clarifying comment from me.)

Based on these numbers, I estimate that I handled over 500 beautiful books yesterday.

I stripped my shelves in high optimism– Yes! We’re *past* the book-pulling stage. Really we are. — and ordered everything according to a new system. (I have been craving this for months.)

Currently I have more unread books in my house than I think I can read in a year. The amount of money I spent on books in the last 13 months is so high I’m not telling you how much.

They were all good books, most of them used (and, so, serendipitously collected), and I bought them as fast as I found them. Which is faster than I can read them, and the whole reason I bought them was to read them.

So now I have determined (God help me) to take a year off of buying. This in order to focus on what God has already provided for me in this fruitful year. My New Year Resolution/Experiment grew out of this.

I want to see if I can go a whole year without buying anything for me. (Yes, I still plan to eat.) Instead, my fun/ freedom/refreshment stuff must all come out of what I already own.

This includes those purchases that I can blame on other catigories (e.g., children’s books, business) that I know are because I am thinking of them at the moment– not because they are true needs of now.

~ ~ ~

Books is just the easiest example of this goal. I also mean it to apply to projects.

I am too easily attracted to new things, and while eating up the learning curve feeds one of my appetites, that passion also pulls my heart and mind away from digging deeper into what I’ve already decided has value.

Under this plan I won’t be taking any new classes this year, and won’t be visiting any craft or book stores (unless it does somehow prove to be a true need? Then we’ll have to work out a different system of checks and balances).

~ ~ ~

There are two big elements of this 2008 project:

  1. Learning creativity and contentment
  2. Re-training myself to simply not look

These two elements working together have reflexively made me more home-focused (I’ve noticed a mind-shift in just the last 24-hours– check with me again in a week), because I am making myself aware of and planning with what’s here and how to use it.

And if I don’t feed my imagination with all the things I can want (#2), it makes #1 easier.

It also frees up my imagination to focus on much more worthy topics. Like how I’m going to show my children that home is a fun place to be. That leaving doesn’t have to automatically = more-fun.

My Experience Providing Foster Care
(part 1)

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As promised, here is the first part of my story.

Like most things in my life that have stuck, this all began with little that I would call “effort” on my part.

My sibs and I were all teenagers (my older sister was in college already, I believe) when my parents decided to become foster parents.

I don’t remember them telling us kids before the process was almost complete (my mom assures me she did, and that we were all in agreement), so there wasn’t much time between becoming aware, and the arrival of our first fosters.

That would be foster*s* plural.

There was a set of three sisters, and my parents agreed to take all three so they wouldn’t be split up. It was a short-term placement (the caseworker promised), and we all agreed that we could do anything for a weekend.

They left not a whole lot longer after they should have, but their caseworker soon called again, asking if we could do a longer (months-long) short-term.

I’ve never asked, but it seems to me that “short-term” means anything with even a theoretical end-date. Ish. If the kid(s) hang around longer than expected and everybody stays cool with that, they become long-term.

So with 2 1/2-days of experience, we became a family of 8.

I was 17.

My parents sold our old Bronco (I never realized till then how attached I was to it) and bought a Suburban. Rooms were rearranged, and I began sharing with a 6-year-old. I also got my advanced degree in child care.

You see, I had got my undergraduate in the previous four years of Calvins and Margrets (who were also *great* kids that I enjoyed, and am thankful I was in their lives), and now I was apprenticed to two experienced professionals.

These kids were good. I’d done dozens of bedtimes, but the older two, especially, knew how to drag it out. I’ll probably never know if the questions were genuine or calculated, but either way I couldn’t resist their clambering for my wisdom.

Continue reading »

Praise God from Whom all Blessings Flow!

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Happy New Year!

And I just *had* to share my delight.

In October I attended a writer’s workshop where I recieved back my novel’s first-chapter that had be reviewed and commented on by one of the editors present. For almost three months now I’ve thought my folder from there– holding both the marked-up manuscript and my skip-the-slush-pile cards– had been thrown away.

But I found it this morning.

I’ve been re-organizing my bookshelves (what do you do for a thrill?) and found it buried on a bottom shelf.

All I could say was, “Bless God! Bless God! Bless God!”

I brought out the cards and plopped them in front of Jay. Natasha asked what they were and I said Jay would tell her. He read them, only half paying attention, and two beats later the light went on and he was excited too. (“I’m so happy for you!”)

He had wondered if he was the one who had thrown it away during a house blitz.

Will NaNo continue this year?

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I’m getting the ‘I’m sick of this and want to move on‘s already. I got these last year too, maybe a couple days further in. I produced over 1500 words today, and a two-page outline with a much tighter story than last year, and all I can think is how un-human I feel. How my house needs work and my children need prayer (this after a lovely morning together, so I’m thinking it could all be the tireds).

Maybe I should stop reading Stein (Ooo! Sorry Kaye! I do like it!), because it automatically starts my inner editor, and that’s just killing my desire to put words down– it seems more focussed on untangling and adding meaning to the structure than actually writing the story.

Last year I kept going because Jay said it was important. And because I had between 5 and 12 people I’d been talking it up with since October began. Now I don’t know. Part of me just wants to quit before I’m really started. Maybe it’ll come down again to whether this is important to Jay. I don’t know now if it’s important enough to me.

This may all change after a good night’s sleep. Jay asked me today as he got out of the car, “Are you sure you’ll be okay? You didn’t get much sleep.” I laughed and said, “Well, it’s moot now, you’ve already decided to go to work.”

So we had a lovely morning visiting animals all around town. Of course, it did nothing to diminish my desire for my own… But the children enjoyed it, and I enjoyed watching their delight, and seeing that even Elisha (18-months) is learning gentleness– he was adorable with the kitties, and seems to have a baby-version of the cat sign now (stroking his cheek instead of drawing out the whiskers).

Crashing now– hoping I don’t get the chance to put up half my day’s word-count before 4 a.m. this time…

New Things to Think About

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I was at a 6-hour seminar from 2 to 4 today.

There was a *lot* of material covered and not covered, and I’ll definitely be getting the book from the library to fill in the gaps. Some new new ideas were planted that I’m going to mulch for a while.

~ ~ ~

He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven
W.B. Yeats

Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Half an Eventful Saturday

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Had another lovely Third Saturday with the ladies of our church.

This month’s theme was a Garden Party and Basil. We were all dressed up– hats too– and one of the older women led a small devotional based around the gardening and growing metaphors in the bible.

Alternating with her was our master-gardener/hostess, talking about the physicality and uses of the basil she’d collected (at least six different types).

These were passed around and I marveled at how they were each so unique (Yes, I know “So unique” is redundant, but like “Learning by osmosis,” incorrect has become better understood than the correct. *sigh*)

We each planted some basil to take home, than came back inside for salad (garnished with our choice of the basils) and two different basil pizzas. (Desert was melon chunks, and, in keeping with the theme, someone had put a branch of basil on the mound of fruit in the serving dish. That collected several laughs.)

The morning was good time of conversation and encouragement (Somebody actually called me “perfect” today. Poor dear. I think she was a little over-eager to soothe some assumed hurt. But it was nice to hear anyway ;-) )

I was away until nearly 1p.m., and came home wondering how much Jay would have been able to do with the kids.

Coming in to a peaceful living room and catching his eye before the children noticed I was home, I must have been too eager to shut the front door, because I didn’t realize my finger was still there.

Jay saw what happened and was by me in a moment, looking at the mangled skin. I have never been a screamer, so he asked me (while lifting my hand above my head), “Childbirth being ten, where is this on the scale?”

He was mostly serious, and I wanted to laugh, but I was too busy slowing my breathing and trying to look at the damage (skin torn, mostly, and bruising). “I’m feeling light-headed,” I said, feeling a bit surprised.

“Yeah,” said Jay, swallowing and trying to keep my hand out of both our sights. “Me too.”