Memoirous

2019, okay, wow As much as I felt like I was standing still, I kept going. I got a first draft done and a pretty good revision of another. I’ve been sending stuff out. Getting rejected and getting acceptances. I got prospects for next year, and the critique group is getting back together. Even though I felt washed up, I had 12 pieces accepted and wrote 4 new stories. This year I posted 130 blogs. I made new friends and lost a few. A couple friends died this year—I miss them. I started this year the same weight I ended it. Boot camp is working, nevertheless, I can keep up. On a good day. This year I read a lot of books! There’s still a pile beside my bed, but let’s not talk about those. I wrote a poem that a friend said was brilliant. This made me glow inside. I plan to submit it in 2020. My daughter got married—and it was beautiful. Friends and relatives came from far and wide to celebrate. We made merry. I rode my bike to Kingdom Come, actually to t...

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Nearly 40 years ago I went to visit my sister who was spending her Christmas break at Ghost Ranch, a Presbyterian conference center outside of Taos, New Mexico. She had spent time working there as part of the college staff the summer before. Soon after arriving we grabbed snowshoes off some pegs and trudged back into Box Canyon where our voices echoed off the icy walls. During the long twilight, we slowly made our way back to the house following a trail of twinkling lights, like sparkling crystals in the haloed atmosphere. After a quick cup of hot chocolate we bounded into the back of a pickup truck and set out over gravel and blacktop roads. I had no idea where. It was Christmas Eve. We arrived in pitch darkness at a monastery lit by candlelight. The small chapel was packed. I can still recall the smell of wet wool coats and candlewax. The monks began to chant Noël in Latin. A drowsiness descended upon me. Suddenly I was awakened when the mass was over and both Benedic...

O Holy Night is a well-known Christmas carol composed by Adolphe Adam in 1847 to the French poem "Minuit, chrétiens" (Midnight, Christians). I remember it as the finale to the Christmas Eve program at the Presbyterian church we attended in Kettering. It can be a long night until the next morning to hold off on opening presents. At least the car ride and time at church filled those tense, anxious hours. O Holy Night seems to be the perfect vehicle for a soloist, and, indeed, the woman who sang it annually was a trained professional, the daughter of one of the congregants, who came down from New York City. I remember one snowy Christmas in particular when there was speculation whether she would make it in time. Yet, always, in the end she rose up from the robed choir to take her place at the podium. The lights in the church were dimmed, lit mainly by the Advent candles, all of them now burning. The coughing and fidgeting ceased—in expectation. Or perhaps, we were all t...

Via Facebook—I know the thing we love to hate and is stealing our elections—at the Uptown Historical Group, I discovered the wonderful little photo postcards of CR Childs. These have been featured at the site several times and this weekend decided to check them out. Places to click were plentiful through Pinterest and eBay—aka examples of his work available to purchase. The subject matter seeming to be the Midwest circa 1900 – 1910. Outside of that I was having difficulty finding a bio. It seems as though Lake County and the Chicago Historical Societies have CR Childs’ postcards in their archives. Childs started his own printing company that produced these penny postcards. Regional photographer Charles R. Childs (1875 – 1960) was born in Elmwood, Illinois and worked for the Joliet Daily News before moving to Chicago to start his own commercial photography business about 1900. By 1906, Childs was specializing in real-photo postcard views of Chicago's neighborhoods and suburb...

Little Old Lady (comedy) or Laugh out Loud or LOL just put out a 50-word flash of mine titled Her Time about reinventing yourself--it's time--your time! https://littleoldladycomedy.com/2019/12/17/her-time/

Children’s Book Title Suddenly Relevant   There has been an uptick of interest in southeast Ohio because of Heisman Trophy winner Joe Burrow’s viral speech. In his acceptance speech he mentioned his hometown and the poverty affecting that part of Ohio, where, as he mentioned, students often go to bed hungry. Cloud of Witnesses recently released by Golden Alley Press is a middle-grade novel about an Athens, Ohio eighth grader struggling to find his place in school, his family, and the world outside his small-town. Author Jane Hertenstein has given talks and compiled a bibliography of books written about children growing up in rural areas of America. “There are very few resources that reflect these children and their particular struggles.” She gave a seminar at the Illinois Reading Council for teachers and librarians. She cited Dave Eggers’ new novel The Lifters as a book using a rural setting. Appalachia and what is termed “fly-over country” has suddenly captured our ...

Bright Invisible From Kyle White of Kyle White Ink a fellow flasher and November 5 birther brother: Hi Jane, I read this in one-sitting in the Northwoods today. I enjoyed the Chicago start, the history, your vivid poetry, and your tributes in-the-style-of. Felt like I was on the island. Resonated with your "imposter" moments, too! Thanks for sharing it! It's lovely. Bright Invisible: Word Sketches from Great Spruce Head Island a PDF chapbook, This chapbook will appeal to readers of the New York School—particularly fans of James Schuyler and John Ashbery. Great Spruce Head Island has been a source of inspiration for generations of artists and writers. I was invited to GSHI to spend a week walking where Frank O’Hara, Ashbery, and Schuyler walked. Through essays, journal entries, persona letters where I channel James Schuyler, I attempt to experience the island through their eyes. CLICK on image to request *FREE PDF The “imposter moments” refer t...

365 Affirmations for the Writer We all need affirmation. Remember that line in the film/book, The Wife by Meg Wolitzer—“everyone needs approval” That film could actually be titled The Writer. Anyways, here is a year’s worth of encouragement, approval, affirmations to keep the writer going. Plus there’s bonus material of warm-up exercises and ideas to get the writer motor purring. Download or order a copy today—from Amazon or wherever you get books these days. Writing is a journey. Every time we sit down to begin a piece or write the first chapter or the first line we are venturing into uncharted territory. 365 Affirmations for the Writer is about listening to those who have gone before us and letting them guide us with their insight, their own trials. By reading what others have said, we can survey the path before us, count the cost, and plunge ahead. From an Amazon review: If you are a writer in need of a little inspiration, this book is for you. The quotes are gr...

We all need affirmation. Remember that line in the film/book, The Wife by Meg Wolitzer—“everyone needs approval” That film could actually be titled The Writer. Anyways, here is a year’s worth of encouragement, approval, affirmations to keep the writer going. Plus there’s bonus material of warm-up exercises and ideas to get the writer motor purring. Download or order a copy today—from Amazon or wherever you get books these days. Writing is a journey. Every time we sit down to begin a piece or write the first chapter or the first line we are venturing into uncharted territory. 365 Affirmations for the Writer is about listening to those who have gone before us and letting them guide us with their insight, their own trials. By reading what others have said, we can survey the path before us, count the cost, and plunge ahead. From an Amazon review: If you are a writer in need of a little inspiration, this book is for you. The quotes are great, but I especially liked the bonus m...

TWO 50-word flashes to a online journal named Little Old Lady comedy she has a section called Brainfarts--sounds like my kind of place so far I'm on a roll--just when last week I was feeling washed up. Time for some Affirmation.

I wrote a short piece last week. 529 words—from a brain challenge/philosophical exercise about the nature of things that become obsolete. Lately it seems that everyday objects are becoming hard to find. We all know that mass manufacturing is the most efficient way to produce/grow something. It’s why chickens were bred to have heavy breasts that weigh them down and forced to live in chicken concentration camps. It’s way easier. But what about those items that defy mass production, that regardless of how cost effective they are to produce just don’t sell that fast. Like birthday candles. How many times in your life have you been forced to buy birthday candles—at the most once a year? As opposed to buying milk or some other commodity. Nor does one want to buy birthday candles in bulk—and so on I put forth in the piece. Anyway, it was nice to take an idea from start to finish in one sitting—as opposed to the huge project I’d just taken on and been living with for over 3 months....

Mike Posner seems like a real good kid (age 31). Like everyone he’s had his ups and downs. An up might be his song I Took a Pill in Ibiza, downloaded over a billion times, a down might be: Father dying of brain cancer Friends and musical acquaintances dying Broken relationships In his video “Moving On” he confesses that he’s been feeling a little off. So, Mike Posner did a brave thing: in the middle of a promising music career filled with concert dates and album deadlines, he stepped away. And, not only that, he decided to walk across America. I am old enough to remember the articles in National Geographic by Peter Jenkins walking across America in the 1970s. Peter had graduated college and found himself at a crossroads. His marriage was on the rocks, the world seemed like it was on fire, the Vietnam war and hippie movement were winding down, and he needed a cause, something to go for. Jenkins documented his journey with text and photos. A camera was supplied by ...

I remember the first time I read/heard a prose poem and was suddenly enveloped with a sense of oh, okay, this is a thing. At Calvin College’s Festival of Faith & Writing I sat in an auditorium and heard Stephen Dunn in discussion with Scott Cairns about “At The Smithville Methodist Church.” I imagined this poem as a piece of prose. I saw how easily it told the story of a moment. Immediately I thought two things: 1) why can’t I do this? And 2) would this be okay? The answer to both is of course. We are “allowed” to try anything. I was also at this point deep into Robert Bly and the form called ghazal—and how it meanders and leads us back, round and round to a certain place. I imagined a prose poem much like a ghazal—that unwittingly tricks us into a small epiphany, by mostly juxtapositioning 2 seemingly unrelated ideas, the contrast showing them up more clearly and recasting them in a different light, possibly a third way. I love these moments. That crack us ...

Whew reader(s) it has been a hectic last few months, and this blog has suffered. I’m used to posting at least 2 – 3 times a week and lately it’s been sometimes once a week, 4 times a month. I’ve been hard at work on a new manuscript that will likely go nowhere. This is how it goes for unsigned, unfamous writers. A struggling artist. Yet, I feel a bit of satisfaction. To have finished. It is about bicycling. Many reader(s) and friends have “suggested” I write about cycling since it is a passion of mine. But, there is a lot of distance between an idea and the actualization of it. I needed a jumping off place, a framing device. On my Adirondacks/Vermont Green Mountain Loop I was able to visualize what it was I wanted to do. --Of course, there is a lot of distance still between that moment and getting words on paper/digital file. I hadn’t yet realized the scope. Every line or paragraph I found myself gping deeper, filling in backstory and giving historical content to what...

my new ebook chapbook is FREE this is a hybrid incorporating persona letters, poetry, memoir travelogue, musings Bright Invisible: Word Sketches from Great Spruce Head Island a PDF chapbook, This chapbook will appeal to readers of the New York School—particularly fans of James Schuyler and John Ashbery. Great Spruce Head Island has been a source of inspiration for generations of artists and writers. I was invited to GSHI to spend a week walking where Frank O’Hara, Ashbery, and Schuyler walked. Through essays, journal entries, persona letters where I channel James Schuyler, I attempt to experience the island through their eyes. CLICK on image to request *FREE PDF=see side bar at upper right to CLICK