Today I’m Surfing

I intended to get this blog out early. For over three years it went out 10am every Tues. with me not knowing what I’d say ’til I sat down that morning. Now, so much floods my mind, I collect lists, notes, and excerpts. Half what I write gets cut. Every 10 days feels right.

I seem to be talking more about writing in this writing life lately. And yet, it’s still about the journey and lifehacks – curiosity, observing with awareness, shifting the narrative, inspiration to keep going, editing our mindset so we thrive. Navigating life in the real world so we create. And tho I’ve always said artists and writers are powerful, I’m feeling the floor demands more, whatever we do. Because we’re creative beings with choices. And these times call for creativity.

Last week I saved this by author Richard Bausch. Someone Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler praises with “no writer has a finer insight into the delicate nuances of the human heart.” 

“The order and harmony of the waves, here on the coast, rolling in with their strangely, widely-spaced iambic rhythm–and I think of something I read long ago, by Robert Graves I believe, called “The anvil and the oar.” About the rhythms of language and poetry as being influenced by the songs in the world’s clamor. Makes me realize again that much of what we do in the act of writing is visceral, made through the deep urgings and agitations of our nerves, of being-in-the earth’s gravitational pull, heart and lungs pulsing and beating with the same rhythms of the sea. That, again, the intelligence we keep seeking to find is in the nerve-endings, and that the SOUND of it in fact can determine the sense of it. And so it’s good to SAY the thing, read it all aloud and listen to it, for it’s quite probable that the real gift starts with your ear for how it should SOUND.”

My first thought on reading it was oh, gosh, I love this. YesYesYes. I feel the lyric and rhythm when I write. I hear it. It affects the words I choose. And only by reading aloud do the missing beats show up.

And what touched me most were his words about how the intelligence we seek is in the nerve-endings. Nerve endings! That the rhythms of language and poetry are influenced by the songs in the world’s clamor. Not snippets and sound bites, but whole Songs! And this, the Sound of what we’re seeking can determine the sense of it. Think about that one. He’s a writer talking about writing. And more. . .the rhythms in life. 

My rhythm started out rough today. I woke raw, vulnerable, cranky. Even knowing how lucky I am to be Me, I was irritated by the energy & time it took to maintain a temp below 84° in this flat-roofed house with no attic or shade. I was impatient watering the flowers in the pots across my portal. The ones I diligently dead-head so to nurture the new blooms, and that draw my eyes from the expansive, ugly, crinkling buffalo grass of a front yard.

I pulled a new window fan from the box & installed it. I felt pleased with the cool air flowing in and how quiet it is, unlike the jet engine of a fan loaned me that’s in another room. Then, something weird. . .when I turned the knob to Off, it kept going. Steady as if it’s on. Confused, I watched. I listened for the windchimes, thinking perhaps a breeze blew the blades. No breeze. I pulled the plug from the wall. It kept going, steady as if on, for minutes. In the opposite direction I’d prefer. Grumbling to the garage for the box, my mind fretted over what wouldn’t get done as I drove across town to return & reorder the thing. I decided to give it another go. Normal. I’ll see what happens tomorrow. For now, I have a day’s reprieve

It came to me how fragile my mood was that I was so easily distracted and pulled from the funk when that cool air blew thru the window. And how easily I let myself slip back into the funk. That somehow those fan blades moving on their own without current or breeze, going in the opposite direction I prefer, were a metaphor.

I thought about the day before when I glanced out to something wonderful & magical in my backyard. A raven high on a wire under my big tree, looking West. And two ravens sitting, snuggling into the mulch. Something I’ve never seen. And THREE magpies! My first ever sighting of the big black & white birds in town being the day before, when a pair flew across the street in front of my house. I was entranced, and felt honored.

Ted Andrews writes in his book Animal Speak, that magpies are about unseen realms. Angels talking thru fan blades moving on their own? And that in some traditions, seeing three magpies signifies a successful journey. I’ll take it.

Then I listened to this. At 11:24 in the video, the tears flowed.

This blog will always be about a writer’s life. I write. That’s my thing. My life in the real world is linked to my creative life, and visa versa. And this blog will always be for people who don’t write. Because it’s about how we stay on our feet, shift our mindset so we create and live the life we want, whatever it looks like. It’s about how we surf thru the waters, the ups and downs. Hear the rhythms. We are meant to be empowered creative beings. Today I’m surfing. What about you?

Another small journey. Getting to wise.
A writer’s life.

Photo: Jeremy Bishop

*
Like what you read? Sign up for updates in your inbox.