Yesterday was a different sort of day for me, creatively.
I woke up early and almost immediately took a photo of my dog and kitten, in the dark. I love how the light from the kitchen just barely illuminates them. Every day they have a moment of loving reunion which I managed to capture here.
There were workmen in my house all day, so I was sort of trapped her as the Project Manager. I find that hilarious, me: a construction project manager! And today, I have a very pleasant new floor in my kitchen and in my daughter’s bathroom – which is now devoid of a toilet because we found it was cracked. We’ll be getting a new one installed this weekend.
Instead of showcasing the Yellow Wallpaper project (because my workspace turned into a staging area filled to the brim with tools and machinery and my refrigerator and stove) I will share a love letter I wrote to words AND some photos from the On the Fly poetry show I performed in last night.
Word-Love Lives
One of my famous “I am a writer” stories is this: I was writing even before I could write.
When I was a preschooler I would dictate letters to my mother. You know, letters to Granny, to my Aunts and Uncles in California, Santa Claus. The various stories I cooked up. Mom would dutifully write them down for me and then I would painstakingly copy the words with those thick crayons the youngest kids use in preschool and kindergarten.
I remember sticking my tongue out of the right side of my mouth, head bent, over a page of construction paper. The smell of the crayon and the looping words made me kid-drunk. My slow pace probably drove my mother crazy but even then I was in writing heaven.
Some things never change.
Today there are workmen in my house. Three testosterone overflowing men asking me for the occasional three prong adapter or where the bathroom they can use is. They are banging and sawing and ripping and tearing and I am sitting here, writing. Imagining how wonderful my kitchen floor will look when they are done.
While they have been working, I have been writing. And writing. And writing some more and occasionally writing a text message or answering a telephone call or commenting on a blog post. I occasionally check on my pets who are sequestered in my son’s room. Alice looks like a princess, sitting on a Super Mario quilt. She looks Kitten-Drunk.
Beth, who is a scaredy cat dog, is taking this in a good stride. As long as she can’t see the strange men and as long as I keep cheerfully visiting, we’re good.
I remember in 5th grade, I wrote my first research paper. It was for Mr. Caruso’s Social Studies class at Glen Ridge Middle School. Through some very passionate research and subsequent writing, I managed to write a 35 page paper (Wide ruled notebook paper, mind you) complete with footnotes and 36 resources. I was wild for research papers, even this first time.
Ofcourse back then research papers included using card catalogs.
Opening a card catalog was for me like sniffing a line of cocaine. Not that I would know what THAT is like, darling children of mine.
I digress. Opening the card catalog and thumbing through all those book possibilities was enough to send shivers coursing not only up and down my spine, but frolicking through my veins. Books. Information. Knowledge. Wisdom and the ultimate: me, writing it all down. Drawing my own conclusions. Finding out new stuff and lacing it all up in ways no one ever had before!
How could I not fall wildly in love with writing research papers!
Sitting at a keyboard to research and to look up books doesn’t have the sensuality of the Card Catalogue. It doesn’t have the grit of wandering down darkish, overstuffed library rows rarely visited. It doesn’t have the “just watch me take over technology” feeling of putting microfilm or microfiche into a reader.
I don’t know what happened to Mr. Caruso, but this ritual of teaching fifth graders to write research papers is one of his practices for which I am the most grateful.
I wasn’t so happy to hear his booming voice say, “That’s 3 Strikes for this class, 3P. I will see YOU here after school”. Our necks would bend and we would look around the room, sheepishly. Just what every eleven year old wants to hear: from 3:15 until 3:45 there we would sit. Silently. The only thing to do was stare around the brown walls of Mr. Caruso’s Social Studies classroom.
My hands itched to take out a pen and write my observations like in Harriet, the Spy.
Love affairs, it seems, don’t come in the forms we most often expect.
There are no Fabios in this writing love, there are no muscled, bare chested men letting me gently touch their six packs in this reckless, tormented, I’ve got to get this onto paper passion.
There have been sunrises.
There has been a failed journalism class and somehow a B- on a research paper on Annie Sullivan during my Junior Year at Dana Hills.
There have been sunsets.
There have been notebooks and index cards and keyboards. Laptops, desktops, manual and electric typewriters.
There have been walks on the beach.
There have been visits to art museums and cemeteries and there have been many hours spent in coffee shops and bars.
There have been Open Mics and Shopping Malls. There have been lonely bus rides, airport terminals, hospitals and doctor’s offices.
There has been Walden Pond. San Francisco. Bakersfield. Glen Ridge, New Jersey and the prairies of South Dakota.
Most of all, in the years since I copied with crayon there have been words. My words. My thoughts. My observations. My relentless sharing of “This is what I think, feel, know and hope. Please join me. Love my words, love me, love your own words, love yourself.”
Word-love lives.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It is because of my word-love I participate in Poetry Shows, Slams, Art Shows ~ I like to be wherever poetry is appreciated and share my words.
Last night we were supposed to be in a specific venue but the people who run that venue didn’t ever show up. You had a lot of frustrated poets standing in the cold, waiting to be inside to share their words.
We relocated to Starbucks Downtown who was kind enough to let us sequester a corner of their space to use. I even had a loud poem I shared and they didn’t complain. We officially love Starbucks! (For today, anyway.)
Feature Poet, Terry Lucas, drove down from Mill Valley in the Bay Area to perform. What a personable poet! We hit it off right away as I attempted to keep everyone comfortable as we shivered outside and people tried to get the venue owner on the phone, on text, something….. and all is well that ends well, to be very…. Cliché.
Kevin and I do a Dueling Poets Schtick ~
On the Fly Feature Poet - Terry Lucas
Our On the Fly "Fly Girl ~ Hostess" - LisaAnn LoBasso
Thank you for reading… and look for more Yellow Wallpaper Art tomorrow!
Follow me on Twitter: @JulieJordanScot
Did you enjoyed this essay? Receive emails directly to your inbox for Free from Julie Jordan Scott via the Daily Passion Activator. One inspirational essay and poem (almost) every week day. Subscribe here now -
© 2011
Julie Jordan Scott
Recent Comments