Some moments you can roll over on your own, and some moments you just don't want to...
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Welcome Autumn
"...as leaves // preserve the tree by learning / to relinquish it." --Linda Gregorson, "Elegant"
It is the first official day of autumn. Sunlight glows through the chill. My neighbor boys scamper around our house in jackets and loud voices. Buses heave with the onslaught of school, responsibility, and the distant idea of holiday. Sharpened #2 pencils all around. Levi wears long sleeves and footies. He stares at his feet and grabs his bib. He rolls over and passes me a shocked expression, particularly when I shriek in delight. Levi is my little leaf--strange that we are preserved by our posterity, and yet in a few generations my posterity may only have a vague memory of me. Will I still be "preserved"?
Autumn is my favorite season. I wish I could live in a perpetual autumn. It even smells like poetry.
In October, I am allowed all the ice cream I want to celebrate the sweet reality of autumn. Last night we made anniversary cookies (so named since my parents served them at their wedding reception and Mom makes them every August 22. I've decided to glom onto the tradition since I made hundreds and hundreds of them for our casual gathering. A bit late to mark our two years, but why not start now?). Wes frosted the wafers as I bathed Levi. The little bug gazed contentedly at us. He doesn't notice the mold. He doesn't care about the crammed space. Windows surprise him. Despite my inclination to be continually unsatisfied, I looked at my two men and thought, "Can it really be any better than this?" Perhaps autumn will tell.
For the last month or so I've been thinking about Jonah. I used to think he was silly for trying to run away from God and his calling. Starting to believe his instinct is understandable. He knew he could not escape, but he knew he could choose his own path, and perhaps he wanted to see how long he could delay what he knew was right. Procrastination? Righteous resistance? Mere pride and short sightedness? I don't like arguing with God; it's much worse than being digested alive. There are days I wish I could dwell in the belly of a whale, when I say please please swallow me. But I don't think I need to trace the intestinal tract of a sea monster or be spewed upon the land I deserted to be grateful for each breath, grateful that guidance comes my way.
Welcome Autumn. I'll sing the psalms with you.
It is the first official day of autumn. Sunlight glows through the chill. My neighbor boys scamper around our house in jackets and loud voices. Buses heave with the onslaught of school, responsibility, and the distant idea of holiday. Sharpened #2 pencils all around. Levi wears long sleeves and footies. He stares at his feet and grabs his bib. He rolls over and passes me a shocked expression, particularly when I shriek in delight. Levi is my little leaf--strange that we are preserved by our posterity, and yet in a few generations my posterity may only have a vague memory of me. Will I still be "preserved"?
Autumn is my favorite season. I wish I could live in a perpetual autumn. It even smells like poetry.
In October, I am allowed all the ice cream I want to celebrate the sweet reality of autumn. Last night we made anniversary cookies (so named since my parents served them at their wedding reception and Mom makes them every August 22. I've decided to glom onto the tradition since I made hundreds and hundreds of them for our casual gathering. A bit late to mark our two years, but why not start now?). Wes frosted the wafers as I bathed Levi. The little bug gazed contentedly at us. He doesn't notice the mold. He doesn't care about the crammed space. Windows surprise him. Despite my inclination to be continually unsatisfied, I looked at my two men and thought, "Can it really be any better than this?" Perhaps autumn will tell.
For the last month or so I've been thinking about Jonah. I used to think he was silly for trying to run away from God and his calling. Starting to believe his instinct is understandable. He knew he could not escape, but he knew he could choose his own path, and perhaps he wanted to see how long he could delay what he knew was right. Procrastination? Righteous resistance? Mere pride and short sightedness? I don't like arguing with God; it's much worse than being digested alive. There are days I wish I could dwell in the belly of a whale, when I say please please swallow me. But I don't think I need to trace the intestinal tract of a sea monster or be spewed upon the land I deserted to be grateful for each breath, grateful that guidance comes my way.
Welcome Autumn. I'll sing the psalms with you.
I love Joni Tevis
"What I Want
To know what it means to live a biblical life, uncloistered every day. This is my book of new ritual, of learning to live a prophetic life in conjunction with another....My practice is observation. How do relationships illuminate?" --Joni Tevis, "A Field Guide to Iridescence and Memory"
Two and a half weeks ago while searching for books linked to Ander Monson's Neck Deep and Other Predicaments I discovered Joni Tevis. Sadly, I'd never heard of her before. Joyfully, I found her! And now I share the glory with you.
The Wet Collection was published in 2007. This is the first essay collection that the subcategory of "lyric" doesn't annoy me. She doesn't write meaningless, annoying sentences! Her writing is not obscure or needlessly "experimental" (please excuse the scorn, I've been frustrated, I'm sure they are nice people). Tevis writes crisply. Her images border between song and dream. Her lucid thought process on the page invites you to ruminate with her. She writes honestly.
I think she's changed my life. Really.
A door opened as I read her work. (A cyclone, actually--but how does it open and yet not blur--?) Essays are the literature of thought. Revised, artful thought. Since I live in LaLa Land 70% of the time, many of my thoughts linger there. The Wet Collection allows the imagination to spin new yarns--the hypotheses and conjectures are included as essays because (duh! moment here) they are part of how she thinks. Hurray! Bring on LaLa Land and its provinces.
I don't think I've felt this liberated about my writing since I came to college four and a half years ago. Hallelujah. Praise the angel Joni.
Read her book--refreshing and rejuvenating, and not just for those in a writing slump.
To know what it means to live a biblical life, uncloistered every day. This is my book of new ritual, of learning to live a prophetic life in conjunction with another....My practice is observation. How do relationships illuminate?" --Joni Tevis, "A Field Guide to Iridescence and Memory"
Two and a half weeks ago while searching for books linked to Ander Monson's Neck Deep and Other Predicaments I discovered Joni Tevis. Sadly, I'd never heard of her before. Joyfully, I found her! And now I share the glory with you.
The Wet Collection was published in 2007. This is the first essay collection that the subcategory of "lyric" doesn't annoy me. She doesn't write meaningless, annoying sentences! Her writing is not obscure or needlessly "experimental" (please excuse the scorn, I've been frustrated, I'm sure they are nice people). Tevis writes crisply. Her images border between song and dream. Her lucid thought process on the page invites you to ruminate with her. She writes honestly.
I think she's changed my life. Really.
A door opened as I read her work. (A cyclone, actually--but how does it open and yet not blur--?) Essays are the literature of thought. Revised, artful thought. Since I live in LaLa Land 70% of the time, many of my thoughts linger there. The Wet Collection allows the imagination to spin new yarns--the hypotheses and conjectures are included as essays because (duh! moment here) they are part of how she thinks. Hurray! Bring on LaLa Land and its provinces.
I don't think I've felt this liberated about my writing since I came to college four and a half years ago. Hallelujah. Praise the angel Joni.
Read her book--refreshing and rejuvenating, and not just for those in a writing slump.
Spotlighting My Students
In class last night my students decided that they want our blog to go public. They want the world to comment on their work. Check it out: www.ruminationresearchwriting.blogspot.com
Friday, September 11, 2009
Cheerful Duties
"There is no duty we so much underrate as the duty of being happy." --Robert Luis Stevenson, "An Apology for Idlers"
Like pretty much everything in my life, I've made a goal of happiness. (Yes, there have been years when "smile" opened and closed the to-do list). Rays of sunshine add warmth and light even when they are fleeting. Walking to campus in the winter during my first year at BYU I thought I would freeze to death. I slept in my down filled coat. Occasionally, though, the sun glinted on the snow and I would dash out to meet it suddenly filled with hope. I never felt completely deserted with faith in the sun.
We are supposed to be the light of the world. Yesterday I was a dark cloud with too much rain. Levi didn't know what to do with me. Today I've been cloudy with a chance of rain. Regardless of the temperature or season, I'd like to be sunny.
Stevenson reflects on how happiness and pleasure multiply. When you see a happy person, your happiness increases. Thus, he argues, we all have a duty to be happy and increase the joy in the world. Is that possible? I like to think that it is.
Most of my spiritual moments manifest themselves through streams of happiness. If it is our duty to be happy, is it God's as well?
Is part of being the savory salt spreading a feeling of well-being and possibility? Can hope thrive through darkness if it knows there is a light somewhere?
Perhaps I am not capable of being the sun (frankly, no--only the Son can do that) but I'd like to be a lamp or candle. On a generator. One that doesn't melt or flicker out when you most need it. Even when I'm frazzled and unorganized and frustrated, I'd like to grant a little flame existence.
If we "are the light of the world" don't we all have to reflect each other?
Like pretty much everything in my life, I've made a goal of happiness. (Yes, there have been years when "smile" opened and closed the to-do list). Rays of sunshine add warmth and light even when they are fleeting. Walking to campus in the winter during my first year at BYU I thought I would freeze to death. I slept in my down filled coat. Occasionally, though, the sun glinted on the snow and I would dash out to meet it suddenly filled with hope. I never felt completely deserted with faith in the sun.
We are supposed to be the light of the world. Yesterday I was a dark cloud with too much rain. Levi didn't know what to do with me. Today I've been cloudy with a chance of rain. Regardless of the temperature or season, I'd like to be sunny.
Stevenson reflects on how happiness and pleasure multiply. When you see a happy person, your happiness increases. Thus, he argues, we all have a duty to be happy and increase the joy in the world. Is that possible? I like to think that it is.
Most of my spiritual moments manifest themselves through streams of happiness. If it is our duty to be happy, is it God's as well?
Is part of being the savory salt spreading a feeling of well-being and possibility? Can hope thrive through darkness if it knows there is a light somewhere?
Perhaps I am not capable of being the sun (frankly, no--only the Son can do that) but I'd like to be a lamp or candle. On a generator. One that doesn't melt or flicker out when you most need it. Even when I'm frazzled and unorganized and frustrated, I'd like to grant a little flame existence.
If we "are the light of the world" don't we all have to reflect each other?
Three Months
I've been watching the clock all day. Three months ago I lay in a hospital bed, giddy with an epidural, grateful for heartbeats, and that a doctor I liked was still on call. Three months ago Levi was still Charles Lamb. I was large as a barge. We didn't know his laugh. We didn't know his voice. We didn't know who he was--but we knew he moved and lived and we loved him. Three months ago we weren't quite parents. And today we're still figuring it out.
Eight years ago as a freshman in high school I watched the World Trade Center collapse on repeat. I saw planes crash. I saw people scream. I felt the smoke covering our nation; more I felt the hazy confusion of mortality. What tragedies--personal, local, national, global--await my little boy? What memories will scar into his body, will he remember the shirt he wore when some event occurs? What sacrifices will he make.
Three months into our miracle, and more questions present themselves. I watch while he sleeps. Today he laughed so hard in sleep that he woke up. Sometimes he wakes up wailing. What does he dream? Can he remember his past? Or does he simply reflect the future filled with its sorrows and joys?
Friday, September 4, 2009
Inquiry
Alexander Smith writes that all you need to be an essayist is the ability to meditate on "fortune, mutability, and death." In short, ruminate on life here and there.
School started this week: class, teaching, thesis. Switch that--thesis, teaching, class...and life, too. I worry I won't have enough students and my pay or my class will be cut. (Few want to take a class from 5-6:30 p.m. even if it is only twice a week and totally awesome). I worry about doing my thesis well. Sure, I can scribble out crap--but I want a lot more than crap. I've determined, as of spiritual experiences yesterday, to write poetry again and (try to) not care about how terrible it is. The whole writing for joy thing. I believe that anyone can write well if they enjoy it; my goal is to teach my students to enjoy inquiry.
Inquiry is a word I spaced until Wednesday night after teaching. I'd been searching for it all week. The essay is a mode of inquiry. They don't get it. Yet.
But then there's real life. Staring at Levi, changing diapers, asking if his hand really does taste better than pretty much anything (sure sounds like it). Editing with the boy on my lap is a near impossibility. Let's face it--writing must go beyond the first draft. Real life this week also includes taking meals to people, lining up meals for others, talking with Wes, homework, exercise, waking up at 4 a.m. most days then accidentally sleeping in until 6 a.m. on others. Real life speeds up and real life is mutability. I think that is part of fortune and death. And inquiry. Add that.
Sometimes I get tired of thinking nonstop about my state of being. Currently: wife- and motherhood. I wonder if people think Will she ever stop talking? We've heard it all before! But off I go anyway on my great fortune, the never ending mutability, and the inevitability of death. People change more than situations. We say we don't want change--moving, new jobs, new friends, etc.--but the reality of it is that most of the time we change and the situation is the same and you (we/I) ask How is it possible that no one else realizes that everything is different? Oh. Just me.
School started this week: class, teaching, thesis. Switch that--thesis, teaching, class...and life, too. I worry I won't have enough students and my pay or my class will be cut. (Few want to take a class from 5-6:30 p.m. even if it is only twice a week and totally awesome). I worry about doing my thesis well. Sure, I can scribble out crap--but I want a lot more than crap. I've determined, as of spiritual experiences yesterday, to write poetry again and (try to) not care about how terrible it is. The whole writing for joy thing. I believe that anyone can write well if they enjoy it; my goal is to teach my students to enjoy inquiry.
Inquiry is a word I spaced until Wednesday night after teaching. I'd been searching for it all week. The essay is a mode of inquiry. They don't get it. Yet.
But then there's real life. Staring at Levi, changing diapers, asking if his hand really does taste better than pretty much anything (sure sounds like it). Editing with the boy on my lap is a near impossibility. Let's face it--writing must go beyond the first draft. Real life this week also includes taking meals to people, lining up meals for others, talking with Wes, homework, exercise, waking up at 4 a.m. most days then accidentally sleeping in until 6 a.m. on others. Real life speeds up and real life is mutability. I think that is part of fortune and death. And inquiry. Add that.
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