Happy new year, writers!
Do you find it easy to begin again? Or is it hard, once you pause, to gear up for the next chapter, the next book, the next season, the new year?
After taking the month of November off to write poems, and then much of December off because…December, I am back at work on my novel Pimmit Run, determined to get this final draft launched into the world by year’s end.
Though I am usually a quick-start type, and easily pivot from project to project, I’ve found it difficult to get back into the world of this book, until now, sitting as I am surrounded by other writers for my New Year’s Retreat here in Little Blue. But before I was sitting here finally making progress, I wrote a prayer to the Muse at Manna Soup Kitchen, where I run a weekly writing group (we are going to start a street ‘zine called Manna’zine. Keep your eyes out for it.) Here’s the prayer to the Muse, after Major Jackson and Brian Doyle in equal parts:
Let me run at breakneck speed towards this work that You have commissioned. Let my doubts crumple and burn in the conflagration of my passion. Or if I can’t muster passion, which is Your domain, since passion is a gift from You, then build the fire within me, word by word, sentence by sentence. Blow the fire into me, Muse, You divine bellows, You. I have walked too many miles in the rain and wind and scorching sun and even snow to turn back now. Let me thread the needle of Right Effort, being neither careless lest I fail to honor my beloved characters, nor perfectionistic lest I helicopter-parent them to death.
Let me wear a plastic tiara and rainbow socks. Let me darn the holes in my rainbow socks, the ones at the heel where my steady feet marched lo these many years. Yea, may I darn these worn-away spots lovingly, never believing the garment any weaker for the mending but instead stronger, more dear for its clumsy but earnest repairs.
Let me bring forth these finished works as I did my own beloved babes, seared in the trance-pain of childbirth, and let my heart break open, leaving only the residue of a tender gaze into the new eyes, new face.
I know this next round will test me, will hurt some, and I know I cannot ask anyone to walk this lonesome valley for me or even really with me. I gotta walk it alone in my darned-up rainbow socks and my plastic tiara.
But I won’t really be alone, will I? You will be there, whispering gently when I make my proclamations of doom and doubt.
Are you sure? You will ask kindly in that silent still voice. Have you tried? Because what would you do if you knew you couldn’t possibly fail?
Ways You Can Begin Again!
Note: I have more than a little vested interest in the below suggestions:
Join my Morning Seeding & Tending group! If you become a paid subscriber to this newsletter at a mere $8 a month, you get one month of Seeding & Tending free! Or subscribe via Ko-Fi to become a regular member, or try it for a month via my website. We are a jolly yet non-naggy accountability group of dedicated writers who show up, set intentions in the chat, listen to a prompt (or not) and then get the writing quotient for the day done. “Done” being, at times, better than “brilliant and immortal.”
2. There are still a few spots left in my weekly groups. I have a spot in my Tuesday evening group, which is poets and novelists, currently, though any kind of writer is welcome. I have a spot in my Thursday Fiction Group, though this too is open to writers in any genre. Groups are all accessible on Zoom as well as in person thanks to my excellent Meeting Owl camera with mic. See image below.
Reading List for 2024 So Far
I had the great honor of reading Kristen Holt-Browning’s forthcoming novel Ordinary Devotion, about a twelve-year-old girl who is in service to a 14th Century anchoress. Keep your eyes out for this beautiful and fascinating novel, due out this fall, when I’ll give a full review and direct your attention to where you can buy it.
I just finished The Road from Coorain, by Jill Ker Conway. This memoir is not new—published 1997—about the first woman president of Smith College. Dr. Conway was Katryna’s neighbor, so there’s no excuse for me to have waited this long. I love this book. Read it for her prose, read it for the physical descriptions of Australia, and read it for a panoramic view of the 20th century. Her story also made me think about the moment when I, as a woman, first understood that there were ways in which the world would assess me based solely on my gender, and that, given the unspoken (and sometimes spoken) rules of the patriarchy, I would have to fight in order to realize my dreams.
These books are on my shelf to read this winter: Covenant of Water, The Whalebone Theatre, and I plan on acquiring Jesmyn Ward’s new book, because I love everything she writes; ditto the new James McBride. I have never read Kate DiCamillo, but a friend has nudged me to look in that direction. Tom and I are planning a trip to England and Wales this summer, so I am especially interested in books that take place in southwestern England and Wales (we just watched the 2011 movie Hunky Dory, about a young actor-turned-drama teacher (Minnie Driver) who attempts to stage a musical version of Shakespeare’s The Tempest with a soundtrack taken from the 1970s. It’s worth watching for the music alone.
Please tell me what you’re reading and what you love!
Publishing News:
My essay “Jack the Giant Killer” will be in this spring issue of the LA Review, and two of the poems I wrote during November’s challenge have been chosen by Synkroniciti for their March issue. I’ll post again when they are published.
Our own Cheryl Rezendez has an exhibit, The Dance of Dementia, between February 1 and March 2 at Gallery A3 in Amherst MA. The show is about the difficult and painful eight-year journey Cheryl Rezendes made as caregiver for her husband Alan, who bravely struggled with Parkinson’s Disease and Parkinson’s Disease dementia which came about from exposure to Agent Orange when he was drafted to fight in Vietnam. It is also about her role as caregiver for her mother who struggled with both Vascular Dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease, overlapping with Alan’s illness for the first five of those eight years. She will be giving a talk on February 15, and you can register on the Gallerya website to attend on Zoom.
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Nerissa, thank you so much for the kind shoutout about my upcoming novel! I'm reading North Woods by Daniel Mason and it's absolutely wonderful. I think you would really like it--it is about a yellow house in Western Massachusetts (!) and its many and varied inhabitants over the centuries.
😊