L.L. Barkat’s provacative post, “Liturgy”, prompts this response.  She wrote about a book that detailed the joy of formal liturgical practices, like using a traditional book of prayer.  How wonderful, that author relayed, to pray a Common Prayer in concert with the fathers of the faith and believers all around the world.  L.L. struggled with this idea and shared how her personal liturgical rites are more relaxed and include Earl Gray tea, mornings on her porch, and observing the pageantry of nature.

I was reminded of the disdain that I once held for the highly liturgical among us.   “How can there by any vibrance in prayers read from a book?”  I had thought.  Amanda’s wedding changed my mind.  It was held at Grace Church (Episcopal) , one of those astonishingly beautiful Gothic edifices. (”The revival of Gothic architecture in America and England, particularly for churches, was a conscious effort to restore solemnity, awe, and even some “distance” (the notion of God’s transcendence) to worship,” reads the church website.) Before the ceremony the best man and I were led to a side room where the priest had us add our signatures to a huge, ancient, volume, as witnesses of the union he was about to officiate.  I was awed and humbled by this tradition.  In signing my name I felt connected to the thousands of witnesses and spouses who had gone before me in signing that great volume.  I felt an awareness of the enormity of the church’s history, and my small, small place in that history.  During the wedding ceremony, the priest read inspired prayers of beauty and gravity over Amanda and Colin.  I wept, realizing for the first time that even such prayers as these, found in a book written by mere men, are sent from heaven.

Then, thinking about L.L.’s liturgical informality, I recalled the most informal liturgical experience in which I have participated.  I was on a women’s retreat.  We were working at coming to terms with the wretchedness in our pasts.  The retreat leader gave us colored clay and asked us to use the clay to create an image depicting the impact our pasts had had on our lives.  I took my beautiful red, my bright yellow, my true blue clay, and all the rest, and smushed each one with black colored clay until there were no distinct colors.  Each color of clay had been turned into a black-marbled mash.  I then took these individual mashed colors and rolled them into solitary balls, which I stacked into a kind of pyramid.  A sombre and gloomy tomb my completed project turned out to be.

I looked at my project and asked of God, “What about my red?  Look at what’s become of my red.  I so like yellow.  I want my yellow back, Father.  And can You also give me back my blue?  Is it possible for You to un-smush these colors and make them bright and true again?”

The next challenge the leader gave us was to deconstruct our ugly clay representations and, using the same clay, to create an image of what our lives could look like, despite our pasts, because of Christ.   I looked at my clay tomb and saw ruined clay.  What could I possibly do with this?   Well.  I began the assignment and witnessed moment by moment the un-ruination of the clay.  The streaked, yellowish clay turned into an image of the sun, which went into the top corner.  The reddish clay was rolled out into a skinny line and used to spell my name in cursive.  My red name found it’s way to the center of the page.  There was a purple-ish hue, which was converted into an exclamation point at the end of my spelled-out name: Alease!  The greenishness became grass beneath Alease!, and the blueishness turned into birds above Alease!.  When the project was done, the black-marbled tomb had been utterly and completely transformed into an ode to life with Alease! at its center.  My clay had gone from a dark, gloomy, balled, enclosure, to a picture of airy, colorful, growth and flight. 

My fingers and heart had described to God, in clay, what it felt like to have had my colors marred and adulterated.  God used these same fingers and heart, and this same clay, to answer my prayer to be true blue again.  His answer, that He can use bright yellow, or streaked yellow, or even black-marbled-mashed-up yellow, and create with it the unmistakable image of the Son/sun, brings me joy even now.  

Yes, traditional liturgy is wonderful.  Yes, extemporaneous liturgy is glorious.  Personally, though, I’d love to pray more with clay.

Yes, it is officially still spring.  Green everywhere is lush and deep, not just-emerging, though.  Flowers are in full bloom.  The temperature has risen until the sweaters of spring are mostly unnecessary.  Though it feels like summer, and all the signs point to summer’s imminence, we are yet in the lagging, lingering, last days of the spring season.

This spring a new vision of myself sprang forth.  I made the momentous decision to leave my church.  Though some may make the decision to change churches with the ease that they decide to switch branches of the public library, or to visit a different WalMart, for me deciding to leave my church was like deciding on undergoing a surgical transplant.  For me it meant time and planning, cutting away, attaching anew, and accompanying pain.  So I determined that if God was leading me out, let Him lead.  And so He did.

Sometime early in the year, before I went to my writer’s conference in California, Raquel, a friend and colleague who attends my old church, BT, asked if I would participate in organizing a legal symposium ministry at BT.  I told her sure, I’d love to help.  A meeting was scheduled for the new ministry.

In March, at the writer’s conference, I wore a name tag that listed my hometown in New York.   Despite the fact that New York is a huge state and that you could fly for hours to get from one point in New York to another, I was consistently approached by non-New Yorkers who inquired, “Do you live near Brooklyn Tabernacle?” or “How far is your town from Pastor Jim Cymbala’s church?”, or “Have you ever visited the Brooklyn Tabernacle that’s in New York?”  One pastor, the editor of a national denominational magazine, and a denominational leader told me, “Pastor Cymbala’s ministry has really changed our church.  We revamped our prayer life.  His book was so influential that we gave copies out at Christmas to leaders of other churches in our community.”

After almost a week of having strangers from all over the country telling me how much they love BT, my old church, I started to think, BT is a pretty good church, huh Lord?  I pondered, during my drives through the mountains of Silicon Valley, if I’m going to be waiting to hear from God as to where my next church will be, why not wait to hear from God at BT?  Why not stop my downward spiritual spiral and stabilize my soul spiritually at BT for a while?  Maybe going back is the best alternative for me for now?  What do you think Lord?

In the days following my return from California, my openness to returning to BT bloomed into resolve. 

A few weeks after my return from California I was scheduled to go to BT on Sunday morning for a meeting about the legal symposium ministry I’d agreed to help with.  The ministry team was to meet with Pastor Cymbala after service to discuss our plans.  That Sunday in Brooklyn was to me a fleece.  I prayed that the Lord would soak that one Sunday with the dew of Heaven, if going back was what I should do.

The service was exactly what I remembered and loved finding in worship at BT, the presence and power of the Holy Spirit.  Besides which I was embraced and welcomed by familiar faces.  This is my family, I was reminded.   Big Willie, the keeper of most everything in the House, asked, as I waved past him with a smile, “Are you visiting or are you back?”  I had no answer.  I moved on to meet with Pastor Cymbala to discuss the new ministry.  He had no questions about my participation on the team, even though I was no longer (officially) one of his sheep.

After the meeting I fellowshipped with friends.  We talked about my church and my sense that it was time for me to move on.  I shared, “I think of coming back here…but I don’t really want to.  It feels like going backwards.”  My friends, wise women, spoke to me words like: 

“What you really want is to be where God wants you to be”; and

“Perhaps you are like Naomi, you went out, now you are coming back and God has a particular blessing waiting for you here”; and

“Maybe God is bringing you back because your assignment is finished there and He has another assignment for you”; and

“Missionaries routinely come back to their home church for periods of refreshment and respite before returning to the mission field.”

They spoke easily.  They spoke as one, without contradiction.  A few minutes of fellowship provided me with more insight about my church situation than I’d had in the previous six months.  Maybe I really would go back to BT. 

But, my anxious heart questioned, if I go back, Lord, what would I do at the church?  Would you want me to sit and not serve?  Would you want me to clean the church, start serving at the bottom and wait to see if I’m allowed back into leadership?  Even if one wants to, how is it that one goes back?

Coincidentally, I returned to BT three days later for Raquel’s graduation from a 10-week Bible discovery group.  She’d invited me to her graduation several weeks earlier.  I knew the program she was graduating from.  I used to be a leader/facilitator of this program.  At the graduation, friends, facilitators, and my former participants (one now a facilitator!) showered me with love.  The speaker, Keith Friday, encouraged us that God is a Good Father.  He used examples from his own experience as a father to parallel God’s love for us.  It took me a while, but by Keith’s third example of God’s particularized love for, and interest in, His children, my ears were opened and I Heard.  God, I acknowledged silently, you really are taking a particular interest in my church situation, aren’t you?  After the ceremony ended, I went to talk to my former leader, the head of the ministry.  Carmen kissed me and asked, “You’re coming back?”

She surprised me by touching on this subject so immediately, so directly.  I answered, “Actually, I think I am…” 

She responded, “You’ll facilitate the fall semester starting in September.”

This surprised (and delighted) me.  I laughingly questioned, “But I only, just one second ago, told you that I think I’m coming back.  How can you give me an assignment already?” 

Carmen then told me, “I’ve prayed that the Lord would send you back.  Now you’re back, you’ve got work to do.”

Word that I was coming back buzzed around the room like a bee.  Rhayna, once junior, now soon-to-be-married senior facilitator, took me aside and confided, “I’m so glad you’re coming back.  I’ve been praying for God to send someone.  The seasoned leaders are going off.  While it’s great to train new people, we need experienced facilitators.  This is perfect.  You can step in and help Carmen without there being any adjustment period.” 

At which my heart whispered, Father, I’m really coming back, huh?

The final factor was my own pastor.  Would he be in sync with this transplant that I believed God was effectuating in my life?    Would he release me?  Lord, I thought, if he resists or opposes this move, then I don’t see how I can possibly go.  I met with Pastor Banarsee a couple of weeks after speaking with Carmen.  We discussed what I believed God was doing.  He shared his experience of being called to move from one church to another.  As he spoke, his words echoed words that I’d heard from the Lord about my leaving, though he did not know this.  Then my pastor, with grace and wisdom and prayer, released me to return to BT.  As I was leaving he handed me a folder that had been on his desk. 

“I prepared this for you before we talked,” he said.  “I had a feeling that we would be discussing your departure.”

The folder contained information about transitioning into a new ministry.

And so, with a bittersweetness like the ending of springtime, I’m going back to BT at the beginning of July.

So last night, as I was leaving Manhattan around 8pm, it happened.  I was heading south on Third Avenue, one block before Delancy Street and my left turn towards the Williamsburg Bridge, when traffic backed up in my lane.  The lane to my left was clear, though.  I decided to get over. 

There was a motor scooter traveling directly behind me that decided to get over at exactly the same time as me. 

Then the guy banged my driver’s side rear window with his with his fist.  I heard the sound of metal contacting glass.  Hard.  I thought my window was going to shatter.  My physical boundaries felt breached, or at least threatened.  I said, “Do not touch my vehicle!”

Before I could finish the thought I was heading down the clear lane, stopping my truck beside the scooter to my right, and lowering my front passenger-side window.

Scooter-man looked over at me.

I said, “You have an anger management problem!”

Smiling an I-hope-you’re-not-some-crazy-person-because-I-really-didn’t-mean-anything-by-all-that-yelling-business smile, he said, “What?”

I repeated, with my index finger wagging as I leaned across my front passenger seat, “You have an anger management problem and need to get some help!”

He said, still smiling that smile, “I don’t have an anger management problem.  I have a problem with women drivers who don’t know how to drive.”

During this exchange, I wavered between wanting to cease immediately and drive on, and also wanting to engage him.  All kinds of impressions and thoughts ran through my mind.  What stunningly straight white teeth he has; whoever worked on his teeth did a great job.

“Well I have a problem with people who don’t obey traffic rules and then become enraged.”

“I didn’t obey the traffic rules?” he asked incredulously, “You didn’t obey the traffic rules either!”

How come the woman on the back of his bike isn’t saying anything? She knows I’m right about him.  Maybe she’s a girlfriend and is on good behavior. Is he wearing a wedding ring?  Nope.

“Yeah, well, you need to learn to manage your anger.”

“I don’t have an anger management problem.  Women buy these big SUVs and use them as bumpers because they don’t know how to drive.  That’s the problem.”

I sneered back at him, looking him in the eye, “You’re single aren’t you?”

His eyes widened.  He looked non-plussed.  He said nothing.

I raised my window and drove off. 

Then I laughed.  I felt the thrill of Zinger victory.

Ever since 9/11 my soul has been encased in a Titanic-sinking-sized iceberg of fear.  It’s been seven years, just about.  Apparently, the ice is finally melting–and at a rapid rate.  So, while normally I might acknowledge that women, particularly nice, Christian, women, don’t do this kind of thing (sneering, indeed!), instead I am savoring what it was like to not be afraid, and careful, and nervous, and unable to say words that I know should be said to address grievances that I know need addressing.  Maybe freedom is another opposite of fear.

This fear of mine was birthed through events that transpired in Manhattan.  How apropos that events transpiring in Manhattan should herald the fear’s demise.

(Lazy day musing)

Books that, to my mind, beg for comparison:

Girl Meets God and Stone Crossings

(Lessons learned by two women on their journeys of faith)

Paradise and The Great Gatsby

(Unsuitable (poor) boys fall for well-to-do girls, part from girls, become insanely wealthy, try to win girls-who have fallen in love with eminently suitable men-back)

Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Sophie’s Choice

(Adrift NYC apartment dwelling heroines of “foreign” origin, with liberal sexual mores, transform themselves into fashionable New Yorkers courtesy of the men in their lives, both are secretly admired by a male neighbor who is not in the same league, both books are narrated by said neighbors who drop homosexual cues in the narrative)

The Known World and The Confessions of Nat Turner (A Novel)

(Madness begetting madness among slaves and others in the antebellum South; both won Pulitzers)

Howard’s End and The House of Mirth

(Elite classes of England and America in the early Twentieth Century and what becomes of women of such classes whose characters and ideals do not quite fit the prevailing mode).

OK, since you insist, I’ll rate them.  Stone Crossings preferred far and away; liked Paradise more than Gatsby I’m not ashamed to say; don’t bother with either Tiffany’s or Sophie’s, the movies were better; the writing in Known World was more excellent than that in Nat Turner, though both were good overall; House of Mirth outpaces Howard’s End by miles and miles and miles.

What book overlap occurs to you?

Recently I posted about time I spent away in California that was transforming for me.  Experiencing, in a completely unstructured way, the mountains, the sea, the warmth of the sun, the chill of the wind; as well as visiting a new church and seeing faces representing the world’s diversity of people groups, was satisfying and rejuvenating for me.  This rejuvenation came at a time when single, professionally-and-spiritually-burnt-out me, needed rejuvenation.  It was a successful retreat.

My friend Bonnie is a Harvard educated stay-at-home mom.  She relocated to Virginia so that her husband could pursue graduate studies at Regent University.  Bonnie mothers three young children, and spends her days creating a beautiful and peaceful home for her family, while trying to stretch a limited budget.  For her, spending time alone, much less time alone in California, is as likely as her walking through her closet to Narnia.  But when I last spoke to Bonnie, she told me that though time and privacy are in short supply, she often has moments that feel like retreat with God.  These moments surprisingly occur for her in the shower.  Something about the ritual of bathing giving her mental freedom, and the steady warmth of the water soothing her senses, I think.  Bonnie finds Godly insight, direction, and peace, even when not explicitly sought, in these few moments that she is alone and, literally, naked before the Lord.  This is a successful retreat.

It seems, then that it is God who draws to retreat.  We go on our way willing to seek, but not necessarily knowing how we will find, where we will find, or what we will find.  On our journey, though, unerringly, the Seeker of our souls finds us, and we find that we have had a successful retreat.

A special note to readers: This post is part of the HighCallingBlogs.com Group Writing Project “retreat, retreat, retreat,” sponsored by Laity Lodge. As part of their sponsorship, Laity Lodge is offering a 25% discount to all readers of High Calling Blogs, or of this blog, for three retreats. (Just ask for the “HighCallingBlogs.com discount.”)

Also, I’m hoping that since I have chosen to, participate in the writing project myself, that I may  win a FREE retreat!  I’ll let you know if I do.

I voted in a general election for the first time when I was 18.  I still remember how excited I was.  Reagan was running against Mondale (or was it Dukakis?).  Born again Christian and high school debater that I was, guided by my understanding of the issues as well as my conscience, I voted for Reagan.  My father drove us to the polls and, after making sure he was listed as a registered voter, he walked out—a protest non-vote.  Since 1988 and that first election, I’ve continued to be guided by my understanding of the issues as well as my conscience.  I have voted for Republicans and I have voted for Independents, but I have never voted for a Democrat in a national general election.  Mostly, I have never caught the vision cast by the Democratic nominees.

Until now. 

Ingrained in my memory is the image that I saw on television a couple of months ago of a Hispanic working-class man at a rally who was calling out in a loud voice, “Si puedemos!”  I later learned that “Yes we can!” is a campaign slogan.  I hear in my mind the voice of one of the Kennedy progeny saying how she’s often told by people that her father and uncles were inspirational in those people’s lives, and how for the first time she is, herself, experiencing what it means to be inspired by a candidate.  I’m turning a page in my life and acknowledging that there are issues other than abortion and gay marriage that matter to me, and it’s reasonable to expect a candidate to address more than these two issues. 

A couple of years ago I (inadvertently) went out-of-network to see a doctor for one measly stress test, and it cost me almost $2,000.  Affordable healthcare would be nice.  In the Summer 2008 issue of the World Vision magazine that I receive, President Rich Stearns writes, “Just once I would like to hear the candidates discuss the importance of addressing one of the greatest terrors facing our world today:  poverty that enslaves one-third of the world’s population and results in nearly 10 million children under age 5 dying needlessly each year….In 2007 the US spent five times more on the war in Iraq—one country—than we provided on foreign aid for the rest of the world.”  Yes, less myopic foreign policy would be nice.

Mrs. Loving, of “the Loving case” fame if you went to law school, died this past week.  In 1967 (practically yesterday!) the Supreme Court effectively did away with the anti-miscegenation laws of 17 states.  Specifically the Court decreed that it was unconstitutional for the State of Virginia to prosecute Mr. and Mrs. Loving for living together as man and wife, he being White and she being Black.  [The Virginia judge in his lower court ruling declared that God made people black, white, yellow and red, and put them all on different continents clearly intending that they not mix together.  Funny.  Now.]  The loving Lovings, who had escaped incarceration in Virginia only by agreeing to leave the Commonwealth, were allowed to move back to their rural community.  Their marriage was recognized and validated by the State.  Mr. Loving lived with his wife in quiet enjoyment for less than ten years before passing away.  Mrs. Loving never remarried.  Because of the Lovings any of us, who live anywhere, can marry anyone that we choose.  I think about the Lovings, and 1967 (practically yesterday), and ask myself, how can I vote for a candidate whose voting record on Civil Rights issues is consistently awful?  Who I’m sure would have voted in favor of an anti-miscegenation law.  Why should I vote for such a candidate, anyway, when I’m not at all inspired by anything that he has to say, or even with the way that he says what he says; when I’m not catching his vision?  When he’s so 2004?

I cannot vote with the visionless.  I hear the voice of a leader.  I hear the voice of inspiration.  I hear a different voice than the ones I’ve been hearing for the past twenty years.  And I’m liking the sound of this voice.

What will I do, I wonder, if a vote for vision is not offered in November?  If the choice is between Same Old Thing A and Same Horrible Thing B.   I can see where a protest non-vote might be tempting.

It is Spring.  Which means changes are taking place all around me.  I noticed for the first time ever that cherry blossoms bloom all along the main street of my town.  How is it that I’ve never noticed them before?  Daily I see that branches are greener, grass is taller, daylight lasts longer; I notice that people are a bit more relaxed, their tones more agreeable, their smiles more ready, and their pace more languid.  This is Spring.  This Spring I am alive to change.  Transformation, renovation, reformation, even revolution, might better convey what is taking place, or budding, in my life right now.  At the forefront of this seasonal shift is a change of churches.  This change feels like a life reformation.  And so it is. 

I matured spiritually at a large, multi-ethnic, urban church, a mega-church really.  An imperfect, but fine, fine church.  A few years ago I sensed the Lord saying to me that it was time to go from this haven.  Eventually I was drawn back to the church where I first met the Lord.  I felt impressed to return to this small, suburban congregation of peoples from different countries around the world, though all of the same race.  There was a new pastor, there was a new vision, there was a new vitality to the people it seemed.  I followed the Lord’s prompting, and I do believe it was the Lord, relinquished my leadership responsibilities at the mega-church, and moved on. 

It has been a few years since I came to my suburban church.  Of course there were adjustments.  There are differences.  One key difference being that there is a lower level of spiritual maturity among these saints, which I anticipated.  What I did not anticipate was that, in the years that I dwelled among them, I would experience a steady spiritual decline.  Steady.  Decline.  The issue has become, on the one hand, that this church has taught me in ways, grown me in ways, and changed me in ways that could never have occurred at the mega-church; it has been profitable to be here, kind of.  On the other hand, how far back is one expected to slide before it’s acceptable to cry out for a rope and reeling in?

Truly, I have known for quite some time that change was necessary and inevitable.  In the heart of winter, between Christmas and New Year’s Day, I sought the Lord in earnest and He promised Spring.  But winter went on for weeks and weeks more.  I went to California in March planning, after the Writer’s Conference, to spend extended periods of time in the presence of the Lord praying and crying out for direction.  But I didn’t.  Nonetheless, looking back on my time spent in the doing of nothing in particular–on long meandering drives (now to the city, now to the beach); in ebbing and flowing conversations with Jesus; drenching my senses in the incomparable California sunshine; finding spontaneous answers to the daily question, “What am I going to eat for dinner tonight?”–I realize that my time away was transforming.  Winter ended while I was there.  I returned to New York in the spirit of tranquility and expectation.  I returned owning the experience of sunshine, belonging, purposefulness and weightlessness.  The parts of my life that had been merely ill-fitting before my trip, upon my return could no longer contain me.  My soul had expanded, my spirit had enlarged.  The Spring that commenced for me in California insisted and clamored that winter at home, in New York, desist.

And so, the winter released its hold on my life.  It is Spring, at last.  There are cherry blossoms blooming on my main street that I never noticed before.  I am leaving my church.  The, “How do I…?” and the, “Where do I..?”  I have left for the Lord to answer…

About the English Majors.  I continue to suffer from relapses of envy.  Not as to matters of style, but definitely as to matters of form.  Yes.  Syntax, grammar, sentence structure, these do not come easily to me.  Reading my workbooks, I realize that I am rather familiar this subject, these rules.  Observing the rules in my writing, though, is where my challenge begins.  The English majors make proper usage seem natural, as natural as speech itself.  I must be lesser-than, language impaired, to have to concentrate so to get it right.  Right?  But just as my heart began to waver, Maya Angelou helped me:  “Some critics will write ‘Maya Angelou is a natural writer’ - which is right after being a natural heart surgeon.”  I’m not the only one concentrating hard to get it right, it seems.

Surfing the blogosphere, I came across a very interesting post about the increased level of c-sections that are being performed in America and the risks posed thereby.  It caused me to realize that almost every woman that I know who has given birth in the last 5-10 years has done so via c-section.  That’s downright curious.

I had dinner on Saturday evening at the Outback.  Our waiter had the ear-tingling Southern drawl of the actor who was in The Wedding Planner with Jennifer Lopez.  He said, “I’mon go ahead and get yall some honey butter to go with that…”  Plus he kept touching my arm as he spoke.  I’m sure it was all affected.  Nevertheless, my sister and I left a big tip.  J

Three quick good things:

• My “English major” envy has passed.  I admire the prosaic language of the English majors, but, for better or worse, that style does not harmonize with my voice.  I don’t tend to go on with fanciful descriptive passages in my writing.  In fact I’ve been known to skim over such passages in my reading, expediting my way to the point.  Henceforth, I’m pleased to celebrate my direct and truthful voice.  God has made some to describe in detail the meadows and the stars, and in so doing to woo men to Him.   God has made others to use less description, and more directive in their writing, and in so doing to hasten men to Him.  Then there are others who are made by God, not to woo or to urge, but to explain and convince, and in so doing to win souls of men for Him.  And on it goes.  There are a variety of plantings growing in the garden of the Lord.  Since I have been made an orange tree, I shall not strive to produce mangoes.
• The path I took to finding an excellent, informative post on blogging:

Mary DeMuth blog rolls Sally Stuart.  Sally Stuart posts on blogging .  A comment for Sally from Kristi Holl leads me to her blog, Writers First Aid, where she recently posted “Successful Blogging Made Easier.”  Which post, in turn, linked to Terry Whalin’s blog.  Kristi Holl writes:

My friend Terry Whalin (agent, editor, writer) was in New York recently, where (among many other things) he was on a prestigious panel discussing successful blogging. See the article here. This is a description of the panel. “If you’re thinking of creating a blog or looking to improve your current template, this is a must-attend session.  Panelists will show how to achieve professional results when it comes to generating buzz, cultivating an audience, and writing the kind of content that gets you noticed by editors.”

Terry was very generous and posted his handout (which includes a free blogging e-book offer). The handout is simply loaded with links to help you make your blog all it can be. I hope you’ll take advantage of it. Thanks, Terry!

• I had a wonderful dinner with friends last night, continuing the month-long celebration of my birthday.  BBQs in the West 70s for dinner, then the Mozart Café nearby for dessert (yummy).  Over rotisseried chicken and a Forest Berry tart we shared about church, work, men, and men some more.  There was laughter, there was candor, there were moments of clarity.  Powerful is simple fellowship, let me tell you.  I’m committed to making time for more of such gatherings throughout the remainder of the year.

Forgive me Father for I have sinned.  It has been 10 days since my last post.

I have been envious lately of English majors; they who have spent extended periods concentrating on language, words, books, and comparative analysis of same.  The English majors are revealed by their more excellent prose, by their bent for literary stylings. 

Having received less instruction in the style and usage of the English language than these, I find that I trail drastically far behind in my ability to artfully (or even correctly) arrange letters, and spaces, and punctuation marks to communicate beautifully and precisely with the written word.  I tell myself that some credit is due me for originality of thought and boldness of utterance.  But truly I know that these matter little.  A writer, above all else, is judged by her writing.  And so, I have been envious of English majors lately.  I have regretted time otherwise spent in my studies.  I have wondered if this is even a feasible hope–to write. 

But hope is.  Feasibility does not come into it.

In hope, last week I purchased nine books, including two grammar and composition workbooks, test prep materials essentially.  I began re-learning all the rules that I might have learned better the first go-round had I realized earlier what it meant to write. 

In hope, I continue to work my way through the classics of literature.  Attempting to see, through lenses fixed in this time and place and affixed to my particular eyes, the timelessness of these works and what makes them so. 

In hope, I write, and keep on writing, believing that writing is craft as well as art, and, thus, can be learned and improved upon.  Surely the great ones, even, in early days, were merely good, were sometimes not good, in their writing.

One of the nine books that I purchased last week was The Faith of a Writer: Life, Craft, Art by Joyce Carol Oates.  I know little of this author, but was encouraged and inspired by her words:

Don’t be discouraged!  Don’t cast sidelong glances, and compare yourself to others among your peers!  (Writing is not a race.  No one really “wins.”  The satisfaction is in the effort, and rarely in the consequent rewards, if there are any.)  And again, write your heart out.  ….

Language is an icy-cool medium, on the page.  Unlike performers and athletes, we get to re-imagine, revise and rewrite completely if we wish.  Before our work is set in print, as in stone, we maintain our power over it.  The first draft may be stumbling and exhausting, but the next draft or drafts will be soaring and exhilarating.  Only have faith:  the first sentence can’t be written until the last sentence has been written.  Only then do you know where you’ve been going, and where you’ve been.

The novel is the affliction for which only the novel is the cure. 

And one final time:  Write your heart out.