I will never forget the New Year's Eve I met George for the first time. I had recently left my husband of five years. I was 23 years old. I was broke as I could be, but I wasn't going to let that stop me from going to college. I had lived near this college town, Carbondale, Illinois, for the past five years and I was tired of just sitting by envying all those kids who got to go while I was stuck in my hum-drum boring life. I had read in the local paper that, thanks to the Democratic party, anyone who wanted to go to college now could. I took them at their word. So far they had done well by me. I had enough loans and grants to get started. There had been a problem figuring out where I was going to live and how, but then I saw an ad for someone to be a personal attendant to a paralyzed woman in return for room and board. I had never taken care of more than a turtle and it died, but I was game if she was.
So I moved into her apartment out on Lincoln Avenue where mostly grad students and alumni lived. It was kind of quiet and I liked that. The only wild one was old Janet, the quadriplegic woman I was caring for. Turned out she was a nymphomaniac which I hadn't been aware paralyzed people could be. Oh yes. One night she had invited over a man, also in a wheel chair, with cerebral palsy, and she wanted me to stick his penis in for him. I had to refuse. I tell you that nowadays after having lived quite a few more life experiences and losing most of my prim and proper mind sets, I would do it. But then I was shocked and repulsed, I'm embarrassed to say.
Anyhow I wasn't looking forward to anything out of the ordinary happening on New Year's Eve. Same old same old, but then old Janet up and surprised me. She had gotten one of her lucky wrong numbers, kept the guy on the phone, and convinced him to come over and have sex with her. I don't know how she did it, but 99% of the time she was successful. I guess it was the advantage of living in a college town full of horny young men.
So this meant, she told me in no uncertain terms, I had to get out, but I wasn't to go too far in case he turned out to be a creep or she needed me for some other reason. This meant, in other words, I was to spend my New Year's Eve sitting in the most depressing, dreary "lounge" of a TV room tacked on to the front of our apartment building. Most people wouldn't be caught dead being seen there any day, and I would be there on New Year's Eve. What the hell. So far most of my life had been spent not really giving two shits what people thought about me. I had grown up the poor and ill-dressed daughter of raging alcoholics who embarrassed me daily, and then as I grew, I became an outrageous "freak the people out" hippie myself, so I was really beyond caring very much.
I got my special celebratory bottle of Cold Duck that I had paid less than five dollars for, and a book and headed on down there. I hoped nobody would be sitting in there watching the damn TV. Watching Lawrence Welk or some damn thing--now that would be depressing.
But the coast was clear. I set out my cigarettes and filled up my water glass with the Cold Duck. Could be worse. I could be back in Sand Ridge, pop. 50, sitting with my ex-husband watching the geese run down the street, which was about the only action in that one-horse town. I'd no doubt be drinking suds from a quart bottle, and he, abstaining as usual, would be launched into his routine about "whatever happened to the sweet flower I married". It was enough to make me puke. I was so sick of him running his mouth on the same old subjects. I tell you nothing could get so bad in my new college life to equal the misery of my old married life. I had gotten married at 18. That shit ought to be illegal. Everybody and his uncle tried to warn me against it, but I knew better. I was so damn smart.
I filled my glass again and got out my book. This kind of thinking was going nowhere but down. The book was a novel by Kurt Vonnegut for English class. It killed me how they were giving me college credits for reading books I would be taking out of the library and reading on my own anyhow. What a scam--giving me loans and grants to do it too. What a wonderful world.
So I sat and read for a couple of hours. Once I got up and stood outside of Janet's door. I didn't hear anything suspicious so I guessed she was alright. Just before midnight a man walked into my solitary confinement. He turned around a few times, as though he wasn't sure where he was or why he was there.
"Hello," he finally said.
"Hello, to you," I said in a friendly voice. He didn't look like he was out picking up women that night. In fact, he was carrying a briefcase. He was also wearing a wrinkled, old black trenchcoat that Columbo would be proud to wear.
"Are you waiting for someone?" he managed. I guess he was trying to figure out why I was sitting in there by myself on New Year's Eve at midnight.
"No, well, I'm sort of waiting for my roommate to be finished with her personal business so I can get back into our apartment."
"Oh, is that right?" He had a nice country drawl to his speech that drew out his words and sentences and made it seem as if you were saying the most interesting things he had ever heard.
"You know I live here too. Right across the hall from you, in fact."
"Is that a fact," I replied. "Want some of this warm duck?"
"No, no I don't believe I do. Would you like to go out and get a real drink--it being New Year's Eve and all?"
I thought about for about two seconds but made it look like two minutes. He had such beautiful blue sparkly eyes. I imagined angels had eyes like his. And when he talked to you, he looked full at you as though he could see into your soul.
"I'd have to ask my roommate if she'll be alright without me first," I told him.
"Why don't you just go do that," he directed.
When I got into the apartment I saw that a little party had formed without me being invited. Oh, well, I was the newbie. What did I expect? Maureen, her last personal attendant was there and she had brought some mutual friends. Janet was pretty well smashed, but she assured me that Maureen would look out for her.
I went in the bathroom and tried to do something about my plain-Jane weekday looks. It was kind of hopeless without attracting unnecessary attention. What was I going to do at this late hour? Put on a sparkly dress?
I put on some lipstick and some blush and went back to the lobby. Surprisingly, he was still waiting for me. "What's your name, anyhow?," I asked him.
"George, George Mack."
"I'm Jeanine Casper. Nice to meet you."
We went and got into his very cute little orange and black, convertible Kharmin Ghia. I was such an old hippie hick it might as well have been a Jaguar for my excitement. It was then that I got wind of his pheromones. Now I had been a hippie chick hanging out with the unwashed often enough to recognize pheromones from a good, long distance, usually to my great revulsion, but these were angelic pheromones. If I guessed right he was an all-natural kind of guy and knew his natural scent was a giant turn-on and so didn't use after shave or even deodorant. And why should he? He smelled of a manly scent that reminded me of sex and heaven. I wanted to just sit and smell him forever.
I was nervous with him. He'd told me that he had been at work that night. He worked at the state hospital with alcoholics. He was a psychologist. He had just gotten his Ph.D. from S.I.U. a couple of years ago. He had been working that night with his alcoholic social club that he'd set up. I was touched with how much he genuinely seemed to care about his clients.
I felt very unworldly and unsophisticated with this man with a doctorate. I noticed I was trying to clean up my language and to speak English the way I know you're supposed to. I even minded my manners and let him do things like open the car door for me and pull out a chair at the restaurant. When he ordered a rob roy, I said I'd have one too, although I had no idea what it was. I really didn't care for hard alcohol and liked beer and wine better.
But I sipped my rob roy and found myself telling him the story of my life. He knew all the right questions to ask. He acted so interested. You would think that I had about the most interesting life story he had ever heard. I chalked it up to his being a psychologist. I guessed they were just really interested in people.
Our hands brushed briefly one time when he was lighting my cigarette. I felt a spark. This man who looked like an angel with his long natural ringlets of golden brown curls could be dangerous for a nobody like me i told myself. For him it was New Year's Eve and he had missed all the regular dating and parties because of having to work. Tomorrow he would get back to his real life and forget all about the nobody across the hall. I told myself I was alright with that.
We had two drinks apiece, barely enough to get me started and I wasn't even counting the Cold Duck, but suddenly I didn't want to look like a lush. We drove back the long way. When we got to the building, he invited me to come over for a nightcap.
I was kind of surprised at the starkness of his apartment. It made me feel sorry for him. He admitted he had recently been divorced, and that his wife had taken pretty much everything. He actually used cement bricks and pieces of lumber for bookcases just like the college kids. He had a couple of director's chairs for furniture and a couch that pulled out to a bed. The rest of the place was kind of empty. He apologized for it, but it endeared him to me. I realized then I couldn't have dealt with a swanky bachelor apartment. I liked good old honest humble living.
He put on some Bob Dylan. Then later he took it off, got out his guitar and played "Lay Lady Lay" for me. It was about the most romantic moment I had had since I couldn't remember when. Then he surprised me by putting some soul into "Give Me That Old Time Religion." I liked it that he liked that old standard so much.
Then it was time to call it a night. He made some moves that I ignored. Finally I just came out and sort of told him that I hadn't been with anybody but my husband in five years, and I wasn't likely to start hopping into beds with men I barely knew now. He accepted this. In fact, he gave me a smile that seemed approving, and I went home to dream about him all night.
This is the authentic voice of an old woman who hopes she has learned some things to share. It is about transformation. It is becoming our true selves. It is finally about returning to Oneness. It is also about writing and recovery.
THE NIGHT I MET THE LOVE OF MY LIFE
I will never forget the New Year's Eve I met George for the first time. I had recently left my husband of five years. I was 23 years old. I was broke as I could be, but I wasn't going to let that stop me from going to college. I had lived near this college town, Carbondale, Illinois, for the past five years and I was tired of just sitting by envying all those kids who got to go while I was stuck in my hum-drum boring life. I had read in the local paper that, thanks to the Democratic party, anyone who wanted to go to college now could. I took them at their word. So far they had done well by me. I had enough loans and grants to get started. There had been a problem figuring out where I was going to live and how, but then I saw an ad for someone to be a personal attendant to a paralyzed woman in return for room and board. I had never taken care of more than a turtle and it died, but I was game if she was.
So I moved into her apartment out on Lincoln Avenue where mostly grad students and alumni lived. It was kind of quiet and I liked that. The only wild one was old Janet, the quadriplegic woman I was caring for. Turned out she was a nymphomaniac which I hadn't been aware paralyzed people could be. Oh yes. One night she had invited over a man, also in a wheel chair, with cerebral palsy, and she wanted me to stick his penis in for him. I had to refuse. I tell you that nowadays after having lived quite a few more life experiences and losing most of my prim and proper mind sets, I would do it. But then I was shocked and repulsed, I'm embarrassed to say.
Anyhow I wasn't looking forward to anything out of the ordinary happening on New Year's Eve. Same old same old, but then old Janet up and surprised me. She had gotten one of her lucky wrong numbers, kept the guy on the phone, and convinced him to come over and have sex with her. I don't know how she did it, but 99% of the time she was successful. I guess it was the advantage of living in a college town full of horny young men.
So this meant, she told me in no uncertain terms, I had to get out, but I wasn't to go too far in case he turned out to be a creep or she needed me for some other reason. This meant, in other words, I was to spend my New Year's Eve sitting in the most depressing, dreary "lounge" of a TV room tacked on to the front of our apartment building. Most people wouldn't be caught dead being seen there any day, and I would be there on New Year's Eve. What the hell. So far most of my life had been spent not really giving two shits what people thought about me. I had grown up the poor and ill-dressed daughter of raging alcoholics who embarrassed me daily, and then as I grew, I became an outrageous "freak the people out" hippie myself, so I was really beyond caring very much.
I got my special celebratory bottle of Cold Duck that I had paid less than five dollars for, and a book and headed on down there. I hoped nobody would be sitting in there watching the damn TV. Watching Lawrence Welk or some damn thing--now that would be depressing.
But the coast was clear. I set out my cigarettes and filled up my water glass with the Cold Duck. Could be worse. I could be back in Sand Ridge, pop. 50, sitting with my ex-husband watching the geese run down the street, which was about the only action in that one-horse town. I'd no doubt be drinking suds from a quart bottle, and he, abstaining as usual, would be launched into his routine about "whatever happened to the sweet flower I married". It was enough to make me puke. I was so sick of him running his mouth on the same old subjects. I tell you nothing could get so bad in my new college life to equal the misery of my old married life. I had gotten married at 18. That shit ought to be illegal. Everybody and his uncle tried to warn me against it, but I knew better. I was so damn smart.
I filled my glass again and got out my book. This kind of thinking was going nowhere but down. The book was a novel by Kurt Vonnegut for English class. It killed me how they were giving me college credits for reading books I would be taking out of the library and reading on my own anyhow. What a scam--giving me loans and grants to do it too. What a wonderful world.
So I sat and read for a couple of hours. Once I got up and stood outside of Janet's door. I didn't hear anything suspicious so I guessed she was alright. Just before midnight a man walked into my solitary confinement. He turned around a few times, as though he wasn't sure where he was or why he was there.
"Hello," he finally said.
"Hello, to you," I said in a friendly voice. He didn't look like he was out picking up women that night. In fact, he was carrying a briefcase. He was also wearing a wrinkled, old black trenchcoat that Columbo would be proud to wear.
"Are you waiting for someone?" he managed. I guess he was trying to figure out why I was sitting in there by myself on New Year's Eve at midnight.
"No, well, I'm sort of waiting for my roommate to be finished with her personal business so I can get back into our apartment."
"Oh, is that right?" He had a nice country drawl to his speech that drew out his words and sentences and made it seem as if you were saying the most interesting things he had ever heard.
"You know I live here too. Right across the hall from you, in fact."
"Is that a fact," I replied. "Want some of this warm duck?"
"No, no I don't believe I do. Would you like to go out and get a real drink--it being New Year's Eve and all?"
I thought about for about two seconds but made it look like two minutes. He had such beautiful blue sparkly eyes. I imagined angels had eyes like his. And when he talked to you, he looked full at you as though he could see into your soul.
"I'd have to ask my roommate if she'll be alright without me first," I told him.
"Why don't you just go do that," he directed.
When I got into the apartment I saw that a little party had formed without me being invited. Oh, well, I was the newbie. What did I expect? Maureen, her last personal attendant was there and she had brought some mutual friends. Janet was pretty well smashed, but she assured me that Maureen would look out for her.
I went in the bathroom and tried to do something about my plain-Jane weekday looks. It was kind of hopeless without attracting unnecessary attention. What was I going to do at this late hour? Put on a sparkly dress?
I put on some lipstick and some blush and went back to the lobby. Surprisingly, he was still waiting for me. "What's your name, anyhow?," I asked him.
"George, George Mack."
"I'm Jeanine Casper. Nice to meet you."
We went and got into his very cute little orange and black, convertible Kharmin Ghia. I was such an old hippie hick it might as well have been a Jaguar for my excitement. It was then that I got wind of his pheromones. Now I had been a hippie chick hanging out with the unwashed often enough to recognize pheromones from a good, long distance, usually to my great revulsion, but these were angelic pheromones. If I guessed right he was an all-natural kind of guy and knew his natural scent was a giant turn-on and so didn't use after shave or even deodorant. And why should he? He smelled of a manly scent that reminded me of sex and heaven. I wanted to just sit and smell him forever.
I was nervous with him. He'd told me that he had been at work that night. He worked at the state hospital with alcoholics. He was a psychologist. He had just gotten his Ph.D. from S.I.U. a couple of years ago. He had been working that night with his alcoholic social club that he'd set up. I was touched with how much he genuinely seemed to care about his clients.
I felt very unworldly and unsophisticated with this man with a doctorate. I noticed I was trying to clean up my language and to speak English the way I know you're supposed to. I even minded my manners and let him do things like open the car door for me and pull out a chair at the restaurant. When he ordered a rob roy, I said I'd have one too, although I had no idea what it was. I really didn't care for hard alcohol and liked beer and wine better.
But I sipped my rob roy and found myself telling him the story of my life. He knew all the right questions to ask. He acted so interested. You would think that I had about the most interesting life story he had ever heard. I chalked it up to his being a psychologist. I guessed they were just really interested in people.
Our hands brushed briefly one time when he was lighting my cigarette. I felt a spark. This man who looked like an angel with his long natural ringlets of golden brown curls could be dangerous for a nobody like me i told myself. For him it was New Year's Eve and he had missed all the regular dating and parties because of having to work. Tomorrow he would get back to his real life and forget all about the nobody across the hall. I told myself I was alright with that.
We had two drinks apiece, barely enough to get me started and I wasn't even counting the Cold Duck, but suddenly I didn't want to look like a lush. We drove back the long way. When we got to the building, he invited me to come over for a nightcap.
I was kind of surprised at the starkness of his apartment. It made me feel sorry for him. He admitted he had recently been divorced, and that his wife had taken pretty much everything. He actually used cement bricks and pieces of lumber for bookcases just like the college kids. He had a couple of director's chairs for furniture and a couch that pulled out to a bed. The rest of the place was kind of empty. He apologized for it, but it endeared him to me. I realized then I couldn't have dealt with a swanky bachelor apartment. I liked good old honest humble living.
He put on some Bob Dylan. Then later he took it off, got out his guitar and played "Lay Lady Lay" for me. It was about the most romantic moment I had had since I couldn't remember when. Then he surprised me by putting some soul into "Give Me That Old Time Religion." I liked it that he liked that old standard so much.
Then it was time to call it a night. He made some moves that I ignored. Finally I just came out and sort of told him that I hadn't been with anybody but my husband in five years, and I wasn't likely to start hopping into beds with men I barely knew now. He accepted this. In fact, he gave me a smile that seemed approving, and I went home to dream about him all night.
I wrote this poem yesterday. It reminded me of why I love being a mother.
Goodnight Stars
When you wake up you don't know
Which days are diamonds and which are stones
One diamond day I just came home from working
And my son was still up, and I got to read him "Goodnight Moon"
He was about two years old at the time and ablaze with life and wonder
The book got me thinking, "Good night stars."
I scooped him up in his p.j.'s and ran him out to the backyard.
It was a perfectly clear, brilliant night for stars.
This was early in the summer and it was warm.
I held him tight against my chest and pointed to the sky,
"Stars" I showed him with my heart full of love.
He grinned from one ear to the other, "Stars" he repeated.
Then he laughed from the pure joy of it--in absolute awe.
He totally got it and let those stars shine into his world, his life.
He laughed some more at the pure ecstasy of the experience.
I could only grin at how eager he was to let in more life, more beauty, more love.
I wanted right that minute to take him across the country and show him an ocean.
Or wait up all night and watch his face as he thrilled to his first sunrise.
Where was a bird's nest full of baby birds he had never before seen?
Why couldn't it be winter and I could take him to see the frozen waves of Lake Michigan?
The Grand Canyon would just have to wait, along with telescopic views of planets.
Goodnight world everywhere full of countless wonders for a rich mother to give.
Goodnight stars.
HAVING A BLAST AT FANSTORY.COM
Hey, kids, want to have some writing fun? I have spent four days now having a blast and I want to tell you about it. I haven't had this much fun since roller skating round and round with the big Hammond organ playing, and my favorite boy of the hour holding my hand. I have been hanging out all day every day at one of Writer's Digest "101 Best Websites 2008 for Writers" and it's called FanStory.com.
What can you do there? What can't you? You can submit a story, essay, script, novel chapter or poem and have it instantly reviewed by other writers. They will rate it on a six-star rating system plus review it in a few sentences or more. If there are any SPAG (spelling, punctuation, and grammar errors, an acronym I learned there pretty quickly), they will fill you in on these. Everyone is a writer and everyone is a reviewer. There are lots of prizes for writers and even prizes for best reviewers.
I submitted a poem on day two that won "recognized status". The next day it won "all time best status". I will include the poem after the post so you can see for yourself if they are honoring just any old thing or not.
They have monthly prizes and yearly prizes. Everyone works to keep up their numerical ranking on a one to six score.
There are a bunch of contests, most with $100 prizes. Some are free to enter and some cost "member dollars" which you earn by reviewing the writing of others. And, dig this, if you want to you can even make up your own contest and run it complete with prize money. And, yes, you can enter you're own contest, but no, you don't get to be the judge. The voting peers are the judge and you might win the prize pool of money collected for entries.
It is so exciting! I am wasting whole days over there writing and reviewing. Round and round I go reading my reviews, replying to the the feedback, reading the replies to my reviews and sometimes replying to that. Then I have to check my e-mail box there to see what's come up. I have become a fan of several people and they might have posted something new. And today I learned one of my short stories has received special recognition. Wheeee!
I may not be earning any freelance money, but the kind of writing I'm doing is personal and from the heart--just what I wanted to do before I started resorting to counting keywords or some damn thing that I don't consider real writing. And I'm in a writers' group communicating and sharing with real people who do what I love.
You sort of have the feeling that you're at the rink and everyone knows everyone. They all stop by to welcome you when you're new. The people there are anxious to see what new tricks and steps you've brought to display and to show you some of their steps--their new tricks and some of their old standards. So it's one big happy family show and tell at the ol' roller rink and it's as exciting as hell.
Oh, yeah, all the writing is not brilliant and ready for prime time. Don't ruin it for yourself by bringing your pretensions. A whole lot of it is poetry. Poetry is the majority in fact. Short stories and novel chapters are next. But you'd be surprised. Not all of the poetry is as bad as you might suspect, and some of it is very, very good. Some of the short stories and novel chapters will also delight and surprise you.
Some of the writing is written by published authors who show off their ISBN numbers and book covers. Other stuff is written by writers dreaming of getting published for the first time and even some high school kids are in there trying. It's all happening at the writing/roller skate rink where anything can and does happen.
The writers are all ages and all backgrounds. Some are retired professional people, some are working people, some are students. There are farmers, C.P.A.'s, English professors, and waitresses. It is an unbelievable mix of strange bedfellows united by the common bond of a love for writing.
Here's the poem I submitted that got all the attention despite the fact that I gather quite a few were not used to free verse and some rated it highly while calling it "more of a story than a poem":
Bunny Boy
My son, the semi-grown man-child, memorizes rap music and says fuck too much.
He wanted something to love, never having had a girlfriend and his Dad died.
Now he has a tiny, baby, long-eared, softer than baby hair, white and brown rabbit
That follows him wherever he goes.
It eats bright green, crunchy lettuce from his hand.
He makes little cardboard houses for it to crawl in and out of.
I was there the first time the little bunny let him pet her with two extended fingers.
His touch was barely there, almost above her, as though he were petting her aura.
His smile was so gentle and loving as he petted her, the door to his heart was left
wide open.
Anyone could have walked right in. I sure did.
WILD CHILD
Not the Coolest KidIt was hard to be a seventh grader in Catholic School and be as wild as you want to be, but I gave it my best shot. My peak achievement, I suppose, was coming razor-thin close to getting expelled. That happened because the nuns took the class downtown (Chicago) to watch a boring old war movie ("The Longest Day"--and it really was).
Anyhow about fifteen minutes into the movie, my friend, Joan Ryan, and I sneaked out of the theater to go pick up sailors we'd seen when we were going into the show. We had a much, much better day than our goodie-goodie classmates I can tell you. Too bad though we were embarrassed in front of the sailors on account of being in our queer old uniforms. What can a girl do? Light up another cigarette so you have some semblance of looking cool, that's what. We lost track of time, not that we were wearing watches or knew when the damn movie was getting out anyhow.
By the time we sashayed our little plaid butts around the corner and down the street back to the theater, the entire seventh grade and all its nuns were boarded on two buses waiting for us. "Way to go, Joan" I tell her. She's cool, putting out a fag like nothing is going on. Well, all the talk was about expulsion for the rest of the week. I enjoyed the week at home watching daytime television while Mom and Dad were at work. They weren't as upset as you might think since they were both alcoholics and didn't pay a lot of attention to the everyday family problems. As long as they had a bottle at the end of the day, everything in their world was just peachy.
Joan's mother was a big muckety-muck with the PTA. She was always running up to the school to help out the nuns. It was the least she could do I figured. She had nine kids in the damn school. Anyhow, Joan heard from her Mom that the nuns were cooling down now. The talk was drifting from expulsion to separating the two of us. That wasn't such great news since there were only two seventh grade classrooms: the bright class that we were in and the remedial class still reading aloud like molasses moving down the side of the jar. I had a feeling that I would get the worst of it with Joan's Mom being an Altar and Rosary Lady and every other damn thing up at that church and school.
My parents had never put in an appearance. I would be easy to sacrifice, and I could count on no parents running up to the school to complain that it was totally unfair. Hell, it was totally unfair. I made better grades than Joan. But the next six months found me living in some of the slowest time outside of the state penitentiary. I swear it took one year for those kids to read a paragraph, and I was trapped in my seat with nothing to do but stare at the page.
I'd already been caught reading James Bond books underneath my Scholastic Reader. Seventh grade was turning out to be the biggest yawn imaginable. I almost lost interest in being a rebel. One afternoon I had to set my bus pass on fire just to prove to myself that I still had the stuff. I think my protest was vaguely about how I didn't want to have to carry a little card to ride the bus or some such crap that makes no sense to me now. So as if things weren't bad enough, now I had to walk back and forth to school every day in the heat and in the cold. But lunch time was good. Our class had the same lunch time as the smart kids so I got to see some of my old friends, flirt with some boys and hang out with Joan.
I was supposed to stay right there and hang out on the playground after eating, but Joan lived nearby and one day she talked me into sneaking over to her house. It was an experience. All her nine brothers and sisters were there. It was like something out of an insane asylum movie: Snake Pit II: The Suburbs.
That was the day I was shattered to learn that the whole damn family was ten times wilder than I could ever dream of being. The funny thing was all the weird stuff that went on happened while the non-working mother was home. I looked at Joan's Mom closely and realized I was only seeing her shell. The real woman was far, far away. I guess having nine kids will do that to a person.
Anyhow, we get in the house and her brother Jimmy heads straight for the phone.
"Check this out," Joan says, lighting up a cigarette right there in front of her mother. In fact she had taken one of her mother's fags from her pack
"He's calling the convent," she tells me while blowing smoke out of her nose. "He does it every day.
I hear Jimmy on the phone, "Yeah, hello, is this the convent? I want to know what you wear under those fucking habits and I want to know now." He's laughing a little but we were laughing more. "Do you wear special nun underwear? I want to know if it's black and sexy, or if it comes down to your knees and has crucifixes on it." He has made his voice so deep it's funny in itself. Joan's Mom comes into the room.
"Hurry up, Jimmy. I need to make a call." That's all she has to say, and she leaves.
He finally hangs up, the nuns were staying on the line for some reason, and Joan's sister, Molly, picks up the phone and orders a pineapple pizza. I hate pineapple pizza so I stop paying much attention until I hear her tell the pizza place to deliver it to the Sisters of St. Joseph and she gives the convent's address. These kids don't play, I think. I get up to go use the bathroom, but I have to come right out again.
. "Joan, there's a loaf of unwrapped white bread soaking in the toilet," I scream.
"Oh, that Johnny. He's going to get it this time. Hey, Molly, where's Johnny? I'm not putting my hands in the toilet."
Then she turns to me, "Just pee on it, Mare.. It's just bread." She sounds kind of bored like this happens all the time. I watch her sneak and grab her Ma's purse and sure enough she grabs a ten-spot out of her wallet. Her Mom never glances over from where she's sitting smoking in the kitchen.
"Let's say we go out after school, huh, kid," she says to me with a wink. Joan's sister, Maggie, the polite one, comes over to me.
"Did you have any lunch?" she asks sweetly. "We've got some okay cereal you can have." I realize I am hungry.
"That would be great, Maggie," I say.
We go join her Mom at the kitchen table. Maggie hands me a box of Cocoa Puffs. Someone has written really bad swear words all over the box about how rank the cereal is. "Fuck this shit" it reads where it should say "Cocoa Puffs". Joan's Mom doesn't seem to notice as we pass the box in front of her nose. I can't help but laugh.
Just then the Dad comes home for lunch. I smell booze on his breath. I guess he starts even earlier in the day than my parents. He is full of wide smiles on his bright red face. He greets each one of us broadly, patting me on the head and calling me Joanne, the name of one of the other kids. It must be hard when you have so many kids. We eat our cereal while he drinks a beer. Maggie reaches over and gulps down half of it.
Then it is time to leave the nut house, surrender my unofficial title as the wildest girl in the seventh grade, and head back to school to spend another couple of years at my desk that afternoon. Boy, I had a dull home life--even with my parents parking in the front lawn most nights.
Call for Manuscripts (from Absolute Write) And My Manuscript In Response
Editor looking for manuscripts from people in their upper-fifties through their sixties who have something to say about their life experience. Consider any of the following jumping off points (or none of them) to write a cohesive, emotionally engaging essay or short story. (Maximum 1,500 words). If writing in story form, the events and people must be real.
True stories about your youth, heart-warming reminisces, pathos, flower power, Haight-Ashbury, Viet Nam, Woodstock, The Beatles, etc. Dynamic individuals who changed your life, were your role models, who showed you something you had never considered, who changed the course of your life. What wisdom, what insights, what knowledge have you gained?
What changes in perspective about business, religion, marriage, family, people in other countries, and the planet earth have you experienced? What have you accomplished that you, in your youth, never knew you would? What process/es brought that into being?
What paranormal experiences have you had? If you had the opportunity to say something to someone who is no longer here, what would that be? What do you hold to be unshakably true that you didn?t know 40-45 years ago? How are you different from, or how are you the same as, you were 40-45 years ago? What things that you used to disagree with your parents about do you now agree, or what things that you used to agree with them do you now disagree?
What is the most beautiful thing you?ve ever seen? What is the most beautiful piece of music you?ve ever heard? What was your favorite television show when you were ten to fifteen years old? What?s your favorite television show now? What is the greatest movie ever produced? What?s the best novel ever written? What?s the best nonfiction book you?ve ever read?
Tell about the picture you had of your life as a child and how it has actually unfolded. What is lovely about that?
Please do answer or address the following question:
If you could say or express one thing that you believe, truly believe, in your deepest heart of hearts, would change the world for the better, what would that be? Be honest and tell your truth!
Payment, at present, is shared revenue of profits, specifics to be determined by number of participants, and other minor details.
Send via email, either in body or as attachment (Mac or RTF/TEXT) to:
susie@alighthere.com. Put SUBMISSION: ?What I?ve Learned?
in subject line. Failing to do so may cause your manuscript to be lost as spam.
I thank you beforehand for your heart-felt work,
Susie Wolfington, Assistant Editor
ALightHere.com Books
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Here's my manuscript:
My honest, deeply held, belief about what will change the world for the better is not a pipe dream. It is happening now among people of my generation as well as other age groups. Consciousness is being raised (without drugs this time). People are realizing that we are all One. People are becoming multi-sensory-- limited to the five senses. We are far less left-brained and much more intuitive. We know on a profound level that mother earth is emitting her death throes and that it is up to us to do something and soon before global warming and violence put an end to us all. This miracle will be brought about by a generation of people that have transformed themselves from fear-driven, ego-run automatons to human beings in touch with their souls who believe love is the solution to every problem. As one neighbor forgives another at home and across the world, just as a butterfly's motions in one pole are felt in another, healing will come to the world. Harmony will reign when love rules all. There are signs of it happening now everywhere if you look.
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I am 59 years-old and consider myself an old hippie. I am self-employed as a freelance writer and an online bookseller. I don't really make enough money to support myself without my disability check. My work is the result of following Joseph Campbell's advice to "follow your bliss". I love books and I love to write. I haven't sold out and I'm proud of it. I don't have to get up every morning, hate my life and put on nylons. I try to only write articles that I can be proud of. I sell books I don't have to be ashamed of. I attempt to practice the same integrity in my businesses that I practice in my relationships with friends and family.
I have worked to remain true to many of the idealistic beliefs I had when I was young and in the movement. I have turned my back on materialism. I own next to nothing. I think I may be one of the last Americans standing without a cell phone. I do not have a car. I buy things when I must at thrift stores. I can't remember when I last bought something new. I have no money in the bank--no savings or stocks for a rainy day or for my retirement. I trust God to take care of me and the lilies of the field as He has all these years. I eat simply, healthily and avoid meat. I don't drink or take drugs except for prescription drugs I must take.
I went to my first rock and roll concert when I was 15. I had to go by myself because no one at my high school that I knew wanted to see the "dirty and disgusting" Rolling Stones. It was their first American tour. I sat so close to the stage I could see Mick Jagger sweat. I didn't miss a Stones concert after that until after my kids were born and I was in my 40's. I even caught them in Europe once.
I married my childhood sweetheart when we were both 18 and we left Illinois after the wedding and headed to Haight-Ashbury to live. I remember driving across the country with nothing to eat but a jar of homemade pickles his aunt had given us. We had all our wedding gifts packed into a little Ford Falcon and no real money or job prospects. We weren't worried. We figured everyone took care of everyone else and the universe took care of those that got looked over.
When we got to San Francisco, we immediately met a young man from Illinois. He told us he wasn't doing anything that day except planning to jump from the bridge and kill himself so he would show us around. After the tour we went back to his place and, sure enough, he had written a suicide note on the mirror.
The next time we moved it was to Northern Minnesota in the Superior National Forest where we built a lean-to and planned to "get back to the land", a popular movement at the time. We were city kids with no camping experience and we floundered a lot. We spent three months in those woods in 1969, and missed Woodstock because we didn't know anything about it. Boy, were we mad.
I never knew I would graduate from college. I didn't start until I was 23, after I divorced my husband. There was a time I had to work three part-time jobs while in school, and I always worked at least one, but I was able to put myself through college. College was the most fun I never imagined growing up. My counselor kept bugging me to choose a major, but I wanted to learn it all. Unlike the kids who went straight to college from high school, I was thrilled every single day to be there. Finally I realized that as an English major I would be getting college credit for reading books that I would have been home reading anyhow. What a scam I thought. Those sun-drenched days reading Shakespeare beneath shade trees with the smell of pot smoke all around me from other students--those were golden days.
I specialized in creative writing. I didn't want to teach. I learned that I loved to write short stories and poetry. I wrote some of both about my hippie days with my by now-ex husband and our adventures. The professor said they were some of the best of that kind of stuff he'd read. I only knew then what I know now: when I write there is no time. One minute it's ten o'clock in the morning and when I look up it's six a.m.
I have learned quite a few things in my life, thank God, that I didn't know or appreciate 40 years ago. "To thine own self be true" is a maxim seriously worth living by. Forty years ago I wanted to be a non-comformist, a flower child, then a hippie, so I wore my hair long and straight, wore paisley and fringe, and said "Holy Shit" a lot. I lived in fear some fellow hippie might not think I was cool enough. I was pretentious as hell. I had to be up on the latest music and pop cultural icons or I was nobody. I thought I was so damn free and I didn't know how to be spontaneous. I couldn't be silly because I was too hip. I thought like others, talked like others--probably even walked like other people. All the posturing robbed me of my youth.
Today I know who I am and I really don't give too much of a good hot damn what other people think about my somewhat strange ways, whereas when I thought I was being so outrageous as a kid I sometimes was bothered by "straight" people's reactions to me.
I re-married when I was 36. I managed to find another aging hippie. He was, of course, like I was at the time a bit crispy. We met in A.A. He died about eight years ago from a cancer that started in his eye. I have wondered if it was the result of the time he dropped acid and stared at the sun all day.
Now that would be something I finally agree with my mother about today, and my father if he were living. I wouldn't want my two kids, ages 19 and 22, doing all the drugs I did. I am thrilled that they only smoke pot. They both deny ever getting close enough to cocaine to have ever seen it. I have told them the truth about my drug experiences in the hopes that they might listen, learn and save themselves some suffering. I think I took LSD over 250 times. I would not want my kids taking it once and that sort of surprises me but it's the truth.
Other things i have learned in the past 40 years are that I don't want a life that is ego-driven. I need to meditate to hear the still small voice within. I can follow inner guidance and act lovingly or I can fall asleep to my soul and end up being self-will run riot and make a mess of my life if I choose. I have learned that romantic love is a trivial pursuit compared to practicing compassion. I am open to the idea of a spiritual partner but not a love interest of the romantic variety. I am too old for such nonsense and wasted far too much time on it in my salad days. I have learned more about respecting my body, and I regret a lot of the abuse I put it through back then. Neil Young is still one of my rock and roll idols, but I spent one Christmas utterly moved by "The Messiah" and wanted to hear it over and over.
I would like to read the finished compilation of these manuscripts.
FINDING YOUR TRUE LIFE'S WORK: "DOORS WILL OPEN WHERE YOU DIDN'T KNOW THEY WERE GOING TO BE"
"If you follow your bliss," Joseph Campbell* said, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there a while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. When you can see that, you begin to meet people who are in your field of bliss, and they open doors to you. I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be."
Oprah Winfrey also is a big believer in people establishing new careers by following their bliss and she is a perfect example of the theory herself. People who love what they do, do it well, and are well rewarded for doing it. Life is far too short to stay stuck in a dead-end job collecting a pay check and being unhappy.
We were all given talents. Many of us lost our belief in our gifts because they weren't encouraged when we were children. We may have lost them by feeling inferior and unworthy as a result of thoughtless criticism from teachers or even parents.
We are not supposed to hide our light under a basket. We need to free ourselves-to return to our childhood exuberance and become the very one we truly are. George Eliot wrote, "It is never too late to be what you might have been."
It really is never too late. We have only to get in touch with our spiritual side. But then as the philosopher Teilhard de Chardin wrote, "We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience." It is only that we let our human side, our ego, our lesser self, get in the way of the spiritual self we are created to be. That being is not motivated by fear and resentment but by love.
How do we get in touch with our higher self? Many religious people are not spiritual. Also, many spiritual people are not religious. If you can formulate a concept of a power greater than yourself that you are comfortable with, that is a great start. If you already have one, so much the better.
Begin tuning into the spiritual simply by being still and quiet. We cannot hear the small voice within each of us that directs and guides when we are noisy and all over the place jumping from one activity to the next. Slow down.
Then begin to meditate. Any meditation method will do. Just still the body and mind so the spirit can come through. Focus on the breaths. Take in deep breaths and watch each go in and out. If you think a thought don't be discouraged, just watch it float over you like a cloud and say "Thought." You will notice an improvement in your well-being and in your life almost immediately once you start a discipline of regular meditation.
Pray. Even if you aren't sure who, if anyone, is out there, act as if. Talk to this entity, perhaps beginning by saying, "Hey, I don't even know if you're there, but if you are will you show me the way home."
Begin to notice the increased coincidences in your life. Coincidences, they say, are just miracles God doesn't sign his or her name to. Things will begin to change in your life. Something, call it the universe, is trying to get your attention and miraculous events are taking place more often the more you notice them and wonder what message you are supposed to take from them.
Then all things become possible. If our lives are based on love rather than fear, we can no longer show up just to collect a paycheck because we think that's what we're supposed to do in life according to the way we were brought up. A new career direction may begin to reveal itself to you. A life transformation might start with quitting a much-hated job.
You can help this process by using your non-physical guides. Who are they? Some believe they are old souls we knew in past lives. Others believe they are the departed souls of friends and family members from this life. But we all have people watching lovingly over us just waiting for a word or sign from you to begin to help directing you. You can ask them questions as you would ask a friend. Ask, "What is my motivation for continuing to stay in the same old dead-end job and what can I do about it?" Then pay attention. Keep an open mind. Say to them, "Help me, please, I lack courage, strength and direction. Guide me. Show me the way." Doors will open that you didn't know were there.
Spiritual awakening has to mean a new direction in your career or a new career because being spiritual means that you cannot conduct business as usual unless you conducted your nine to five life authentically and honestly. You will want to act from a higher ground of love which means honesty, integrity, responsibility and compassion direct our actions. You will not want to work with the notion of "What's in it for me?" anymore and this will change everything.
You can develop your innate psychic abilities to further direct you. Practice re-learning what you were taught to forget as a child. Guess who's on the phone or at the door before you pick it up or open it. Predict what mail you'll be getting that day. Work on empathy. When talking with a friend try to feel what he feels Then state the feelings to him and ask if you are correct. There is nothing weird or odd about psychic abilities. They are gifts that everyone has but let wither from disbelief and not using them.
The more loving and compassionate you become, the more you will be on the path to following your bliss. Far from serving as a permission to anything you will desires goes, instead of selfish pursuits you find that you want to serve. You want to contribute to your community and to the world because your heart is full. This is how we are going to change and save this poor planet-by transforming ourselves one by one. We are evolving as human beings. Can you feel it in the air? More people are choosing freedom to be who they are and do what they really want to do. It always ends in bliss and love.
Following your bliss will put you in touch with the dreams of your real self. Remember that soul? You will find yourself doing things called work that feel more like play. Like Joseph Campbell experienced, invisible hands will reach out and take yours and show you the way to your new life's work.
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*Joseph Campbell--American mythologist, writer and lecturer, best known for his work in comparative mythology.
MAID'S DAY OFF
Housework is anathema to me. I am literally and metaphysically allergic to it. The only slightly larger waste of time I can even think of offhand might be building sand castles on the beach as the tide is coming in. To me it is pointless, petty and doing it is only a harbinger of what I imagine hell must be like.
So, of course, I live in chaos and a bit of filth. Yet I try to keep up some sort of pretense of domesticated life when people come over, an event I attempt to thwart at all costs but which sometimes conspires beyond my best lack of welcoming.
For example, one lovely Saturday afternoon my lover dropped by. He should have known better by that point in our relationship than to do the "drop-in" but he was playing dumb, I suspect, to get a gander at how his little mystery woman lived behind the door she always kept carefully closed. Not only had he broken all the rules by doing dropping in unannounced, but, horror of horrors, he had brought his two young adolescent sons whom I barely knew having only met them once briefly. What a way to make a good impression!
I listened to them calling for me on the other side of the door, and looked around my destroyed living room which led to the mutilated bathroom and then to my slaughtered bedroom. My Gawd, what was I to do?. It was too late to pretend I wasn't home. They had heard me talking on the phone, unsuspecting guests, when they came up the stairs. What a fool I had been. Now I was stuck. I needed to be resourceful or I was about to be thoroughly humiliated.
A gleaning of an idea came to me. I messed up my hair and pulled my blouse out from the waist of my pants. I picked up a nearby floorful of items and threw them across the room. Then I was ready to face the music which was definitely in the genre of punk.
"Oh hello Jim. Hello boys. How are you all?" Their six eyes were wide as platters as they frankly took a good look at the unravelings of my mind and the physical form of the ennui of my domestic spirit.
The younger boy muttered "Holy S**t" under his breath but I heard him clearly and took it as my cue to go into my unrehearsed act.
"Isn't this something, boys? Can you believe this? I came home last night and this is what I found. I don't even know what all is missing yet. I'm afraid to find out. What kind of animals could tear up a place like this? What were they looking for I wonder? I just can't believe it!"
Their slack jaws drew shut and their eyes focused on me with something that looked like pity. It was working. Hot damn! It was working.
"Someone broke in here last night?" asked the slower of the boys. "Did you call the police?"
"Oh, yeah, sure I did, but they were long gone. The police didn't do much because I am not even sure if they stole anything yet. I mean my computer is still here, and my TV and my stereo."
Jim decided to step in and be my hero. "Well, you are coming to stay at our house tonight. You can't stay here in this mess. Who knows if they'll come back?"
Uh ho. I realized I had gone too far. I wasn't ready to leave my happy home where I could roll in my own mess like a pig wallows in mud. I mean I'm quite comfortable in my squalor. I sure didn't want to leave.
"Oh, I'll be fine. They're not coming back. For what? They already know there's nothing here to steal. They've had their fun trashing the place."
The older boy spoke up, "Well, they sure did trash the place. I never saw anything like this before."
"I know," I replied. "Ain't it a shame."
I hate housework.
WRITING SLAVES OR "ARTICLERS"
Two want-ads for freelance writers I have recently seen that strike me as a new low for real writers. Today's, on Elance boards, was for an "articler" who, of course, would write articles. The other was for someone who could produce articles at 50 cents each. I tell you it's no wonder I'm on Prozac. If I wasn't already I'd be starting out on it now.
All I really want to write for are "Field Reports" which, unfortunately, is having major construction problems and not operating at this time, and "Skirt" Magazine. Both of these publish only personal essays for pay. The question I keep asking myself is do I still have the heart and soul to write personal essays after punching out 500 words here and 600 there on everything from the dieting drug Alli to dining out while dieting?
To be continued.
WRITING SLAVES OR "ARTICLERS" Part 2
I just found another new market (new to me) for authors not articlers: Orato.com. It, too, is strictly first person stories. They call them news stories, and, do, in fact, prefer stories that have to do with sizzling news taking place right where you the writer were. But they will also publish stories about love breakups and working at Burger King. You can either pitch your story to the editors or self-publish it. You get paid outright, plus there is something called "tips" for the writer at the end of your story where cash tips can be left. Read the guidelines here. I joined up because it seems to be an informative, edgy and fun website for writers and readers.
CHRISTMAS GIFT OF LOVE
I deleted the picture of Santa with one hand holding a gun to his head and the other a bottle of scotch. Beneath that picture was a bunch of bipolar rants about my lack of Christmas spirit. I decided it was a disgrace to add to someone else's depression this time of year. I am trying to go more upbeat. I will put in a side article that is a sort of generic sounding piece about coping with holiday insomnia, anxiety and stress with honey. Harmless fluff that might help someone, and certainly better than looking at the food critic piece that's been there for some time while I was in my holiday funk. I am grateful for any reader who came back after I left up "My Thanksgiving" for a month. I didn't need to follow it with suicidal Santa.
Okay, so right now my fake Christmas tree is parked on its side where it fell off its pedestal. It's wearing its second attempt at lights. It needs another go at it. It looks like Jackson Pollack sprinkled them on this time. Before that it looked like a little person without a stool or ladder put them on.
I have no reason to mope. I can forget cleaning up this stall and focus on writing. Hooray! My daughter just told me I am welcome to hold my annual Christmas Eve dinner at her house. My high school best friend, who found me through Facebook after all these years, can just meet me in a restaurant. Things are definitely looking up. I am going out today to bid on jobs at Elance in earnest because it's okay if I win some. I'll have the time to write.
I need E-book experience. I feel ready to write E-books and I did download a free how-to-write-an-E-book that is very helpful. Find out how to download this free excellent E-book that comes with a download for "How to Write a Press Release" E-book download here.
Almost half the ads I see now at Elance are for writing E-books but they all want to know what books you're written previously. Not so easy to get those clips right away. It's just the kind of big project I need to shake this Christmas funk.
My heart goes out to anyone with a Christmas funk. My advice: Let it all be. Pretend you're hospitalized this year and can't do anything but write from your bed. Let it all go. The cleaning, shopping, and the making yourself crazy. Your family knows you love them, and you can show it in other, simpler ways. Life is all too short to lose your stress and sanity because of one day out of the year. Keep the real meaning and just have love in your heart whatever you have to do to keep it glowing. Love,
Maryellen
MY THANKSGIVING
"You know some mothers drink. It could be worse," I told my petulant 22-year-old daughter as she was driving me home, at her instigation, from what has to be called a lackluster performance at my brother's for Thanksgiving dinner.
"I wish you did drink. At least you'd be awake. You'd be participating. It would be better" was her response.
I don't mean to be a miserable old sot that embarrasses her children on social occasions. I do try not to dribble down my front as my heavy chin hangs down the front of my blouse. And I know I do that stir-crazy move. You know the one--the nodding person suddenly realizes she's asleep, shakes and stirs herself completely, sits a bit more upright, and goes right off into another nod.
I am a miserable old mother. My vice? I write. I write all night long night after night, and then when holidays happen, and I must go out during the day among the living, I get caught in the glare of everyday reality. I am a writing junkie who just can't say "when".
Okay I can try and say "when". But I know I'll do it again. I'm an addict. I'd rather write than sleep or even eat for that matter.
Anyone who's been there can tell you it's useless to attempt questions to ease back into the conversation. They know you've been sitting there nodding off and they don't feel like helping. They just laugh at the ridiculousness of your question.
"Why were the children baking their underwear?"
"Go back to sleep, Mom." Laughter.
"I'm sorry," I say now.
"No you're not. You'll just do it again. You'll say you won't but you will."
She knows me too well this daughter of mine. And I know her. And then it hits me why she's really pissed. She had a big job interview Tuesday. She tried to call and tell me about it and I didn't pick up. I hate the phone. I let the machine take the calls. If i don't hear my kids' voices, I don't bother going over to the phone. She called and didn't speak just so she could be the victim. The brat. I had thought the interview was Wednesday and when I did end up calling her a day late I caught some hell about not being there for her the day before.
I've looked and the closest self-help group I can find online (of course, ) is Internet addicts. But that doesn't quite cover it. If I didn't have my Mac I suppose I'd be shaking out my wrist at three in the morning as I turned the pages of my spiral notebook, writing as furiously as I could.
Do I have to go live in Las Vegas to be among my fellow time travelers of the night? I think all the noise and action would interfere with my concentration. If nothing else, the heat would keep me from writing.
Oh, let me tell you though, my family and friends all have one answer to my problem and it's the same for all of them: Go to bed earlier and keep regular hours.
Don't make me laugh. The writing genie only comes out to play at night. Who can concentrate with the neighbors listening to their televisions as though the sets were in another house adjacent to theirs? All the mundane stuff, the everyday trivial bits take up the daylight hours and leave the best time for writing.
FENG SHUI YOUR OFFICE SPACE
Here's one from my archives. Something to do over Thanksgiving to get those writer juices flowing more freely.How do you feel when you enter your office at work or at home? Do you feel the way your body feels when it is uplifted with high energy from high negative ions in the forest after a good rain? Do you feel that sense of peace and well-being you get from walking on the beach at dawn? Or do you feel more like you have just entered solitary confinement in a falling down, filthy jail? Somewhere in between perhaps? Help is available.
Feng shui, the Asian art and science that unites energy, time, space, people and the environment can help you increase your work productivity and feel much better while you're working. It requires a few simple changes in your working environment.
Feng shui has been around for over 3,000 years in China. It consists of a complex body of knowledge that determines how to balance the energies in a space. It is based on Taoist vision and an understanding of nature and the idea that everything in it is alive.
Perhaps you would be surprised to learn that Donald Trump, Tiger Woods, Oprah Winfrey, Steven Spielberg and some of the largest companies in the world including Coca-Cola, Sony, Shell, Procter & Gamble and Citibank use feng shui.
For our purposes here--to come to your immediate rescue--we're not going to get too technical or have you use the Feng Shui compass and the Ba-Gua, a chart you make which outlines the entire space you are in. Plenty of further information is available on the Internet if you wish to delve deeper.
Chi is the term for the universal energy that permeates everything around us from the inside of our bodies, the inside of buildings and on to the outside. The primary goal of feng shui is to direct the Chi inside the space you work in so that it nourishes a good flow of Chi inside your body. Then you can approach your tasks feeling energized, inspired and in tune with nature.
Here are some feng shui basics that will not only get you started but will provide almost immediate results.
The first step is very important. Clear out the clutter. Get rid of everything that doesn't belong in your office, that is ugly and unnecessary. Initially it requires some effort to light the load but keep in mind as you take things out of your environment that don't need to be there, you are lowering your stress level. Clutter can rise to the ceiling on a bookshelf. It always has an oppressive, overpowering feeling. You are freeing the Chi, or life source energy, to flow smoothly around you and keep that energy moving.
According to feng shui doctrine, the position of your desk dictates your power. It should be as far away from the door as possible. You should have an unobstructed view of the door from where you sit. If this is not possible, use a feng shui cure such as setting up a mirror to enable you to see it.
Don't face a wall while you work. If you can't reposition yourself, hang up a picture that provides an eye level scene of something like a long winding road or river.
Define your personal space. A small mat or area rug at the entrance to your work space will inhibit people from walking in unannounced. Hang a bell to alert you to visitors if you can.
Do not let things pile up on the floor. This keeps you stuck in the past, making it hard to finish projects or meet deadlines. Sort through your papers once a month and discard what is unnecessary.
Use symbols of future goals just above your eye level. If you wish a promotion, put a tall plant on top of a bookcase or file cabinet. To reach a sales goal, write your target number in red marker on a green piece of paper and post it over the door.
Integrate organic materials into your work space such as wicker baskets, wooden paper trays, crystal paperweights, and potted plants. These will encourage people to let down their guard with you because representations of nature are reassuring in a business environment.
Keep your dreams. If your job bears no resemblance to the work you dream of doing, incorporate water into your office. Try an indoor fountain or a picture of a moving body of water. Aquariums are wonderful and relaxing. Water keeps you tuned into your desires and encourages you to take steps toward your real career goals.
Don't let items pile up on your desk. Clear your desk at the end of each day. It will be so much nicer to come in the next morning to your clean desk free of clutter.
Have good quality air and light in your office. Keep the office windows open often or use an air-purifier. Use as much natural light as possible. Think about using full-spectrum lights.
Color is very important in feng shui and each color offers different subtle characteristics that affect the mood and tone of your office. If you can't paint, set out objects like rugs or pillows with the color. Live with the colors you love. Light colors invigorate, and dark colors can make you feel oppressed. Use lively, energetic colors like orange or yellow to accent and uplift the energy. This will help not only your productivity, but also your morale and creativity.
Idea Catcher Notebook for Magazine Article Ideas
Okay, knowing your niche market. getting paid for freelance magazine article work, all that's left to grow is to keep those article ideas green and growing. Certainly the clippings files of interesting ideas are growing fatter and staying organized. What's left to do?
What's next is to start your ever-present notebook idea catcher, or if there already is one, to expand on how its used and keep it going. They don't get carried around day-in and night-out for only the most profound thoughts and headiest quotes. Those kind of journals end up under the bed covered in dust. They are for musings, intriguing comments and questions heard or stumbled upon, reactions to news, relationship updates, reading responses and questions; descriptions and solutions to problems--you could even draw mini mind-maps.
There is so much to write about that will jar loose so much more. Perhaps you're on a bus or a train and it's going to be a moderately long ride. Get out your notebook and write about what your life's mission is. Take the position of a soul searcher, a seeker after truth and justice, an adventurer or a wanderer and write what you think, feel and observe from one of those identities. Go to a movie and if it affects you, write a mini-review. Record dreams and fantasies. What do they suggest about your waking life?
Put yourself into the life of an intriguing stranger you noticed. What is their life like? What do they do? What do they dream about? What do they believe? Do they love? Get into it.
Get into objects. Arrange them into still lifes and try to understand them from an artistic perspective. What do you do to them and why? Which do you prefer? Write about the experience. What did you learn?
Describe your pets. Write characterizations about them. You didn't know them as well as you do now when you named them. Do they suit their names? What would you name them now, if not. What one word would you use to describe your pet? What do you think your pet thinks about, if you think your pet thinks?
List major changes in your past life, present life, those coming up and those you would like to make in your future life.
Remember as you write to be as specific as you can. Use plenty of sensory words that also can jar the memory and bring forth ideas. Create the sights, sounds, smells and textures for the reader even if the reader is only going to be you.
At times go back over earlier entries and rewrite something that grabs you or fashion it into something else--perhaps an article?
Take yourself on field trips just for the sake of your idea catcher: a walk in the woods, a trip to the park, a walk along the beach, a trip downtown--all enjoyed in detailed description in your notebook.
Sit at a coffee shop and collect bits of overheard conversation. Some people make entire blogs out of these bits and some imagination. The part of the conversation you're not privy to is as engaging as what you do hear.
Soon these snippets will grow and flower and become living, breathing articles. Each notation is like a dandelion after the flower has faded and only the skeleton is left. Blow on this feathers and watch what they can become.
Some All Too Common Mistakes Made By Novice Freelance Magazine Writers
1. First big mistake: sending in a totally wrong query letter. Now this query may be wrong because you didn't bother to read the freelance guidelines which clearly state that article submission is preferable to sending a query. Or it may be wrong because you never bothered getting a sample copy of the magazine and, therefore, have no idea what the demographics are--who they write for, what the tone is, what the features usually address--nothing--and this shows through loud and clear in your query. Maybe if you had read the guidelines, you'd know that they only deal with writers' agents and you could have saved yourself some time and trouble. Too bad you're too cheap to buy or subscribe to "Writers' Market"?
Or perhaps the query is so terribly wrong because you didn't bother to even run the spell check no less proofread it for mistakes of capitalization, punctuation, grammar, etc. and you've just told an editor you're not really a writer just a mad typer. Finally, it could have been so far, far from being the right query letter because a good query convinces an editor that an article would be right for his magazine, meaning that it is sizzling, attention-grabbing and well-written. And you practically skipped over the expected paragraph about why you are particularly well-suited to write this article for this magazine. Having a B.S. in Biology doesn't convince an editor you are qualified to write about home decor, nor does college membership in that sorority you mentioned.
2. The article you submitted had no lead, for starters. It not only didn't grab the reader, it was so mundane and run-of-the-mill it made him want to just set down the article down and walk away.
3. The flat writing continued throughout the article like last week's 7-Up. There was no inspiration, no real shred of interest shown by the writer. There were too many cliche's and adverbs and not enough facts to make the generalizations ring true.
4. Again, how does a writer submit an article in today's cyber world without at least running the spell check on it? And why not just get a red marker and write "amateur" across the top of the thing if you insist on giving "it's' an apostrophe for possession not "it is"? And what about misspelling simple words like "decor" and "scheme". And if it had been proofread by anyone, perhaps someone would have noticed the use of the word "marvelous" in every other sentence. That is called gushing and it really doesn't have a place in most objective magazine review writing.
5. You submitted a seasonal article for a seasonal issue the magazine already put to bed three months ago. Publishing time is not like real time. In publishing time, Christmas has come and gone and so has Valentine's Day.
6. Your article is 1,500 words long. Had you read the guidelines you would have known that the maximum length they accept is 600 words.
7. Having shared some ego-deflating truths about the query and article, one can't help but wonder if it were actually wise and expedient to call the editor three times to inquire about its status?
8. It's a mistake to grieve early or even middle or late rejections. They are as much a part of writing as buying another ink cartridge for the printer or researching freelance help wanted ads. Paper your walls with them like some of the great writers did.
Don't give up--just vow to do better next time. Spend more time on getting to know the market and the magazine. Do your homework. Research your demographics. Outline your articles. And, please, ask at least three friends to proofread and edit it for you.
Meet ED2010: A Website Every Freelance Magazine Writer Should Know
It may the best magazine writing site going. It has lots of what you need and want. And it's not written in a slick, hard to take business style but a down-to-earth conversational one.
ED2010 writes on its "About" section that it is:
...a community of young magazine editors and magazine-editor wannabes
who want to learn more about the industry so we can fulfill our dreams of
landing top editing and writing positions in the magazine industry...
They go on to say that it was born in New York City, but now they have chapters in cities across the U.S., Canada, and in the U.K. They also have college campus chapters. It costs nothing to join.
They only ask that you read their blogs, comment on their message boards, and look over the WhisperJobs.
Oh, and they sponsor happy hours in your town and towns across the country. Great networking, huh?
There is a lot of talk in the freelance press and Internet websites now about what rates freelancers charge, and what rates they should charge. Deborah Ng of Freelance Gigs did an anonymous survey recently, and the results weren't pretty. They were especially ugly now that there seems to be an increasing number of job postings that want to pay one dollar per article.
ED2010 has real magazine industries anonymously post some of their positions, geographic locations. job perks and salaries. You can get a solid idea of what actual people at your level are making as they begin their careers, and an idea of what to hope to make later on.
ED2010 provides an indispensable glossary to the jargon of magazine writing and publishing. Here's one acronym you don't want to find on your draft from your editor: "MEGO" = "my eyes glaze over". There are many more, including what all the position titles mean from market editor to copy editor.
There are resources galore. "Extensive" barely covers all the job boards, freelancing sites, newspaper sites, magazine sites, writing, media and professional resources.
The WhisperJobs are from all over the country and include online jobs where you can work from your home. ED even provides human resource email contact info with company email address formats for magazine staff at publishers like Conde' Nast, Hearst, and Time, Inc. There are lists of mailing addresses and phone numbers for quite a few of the heavy hitter magazine publishing companies as well.
The college students' section offers internship listings, message boards, advice, and the opportunity to start an ED chapter at a college as well as attend an ED networking event that isn't a happy hour.
Speaking of networking, they help manage ED book clubs across the country and will help start one in the area of any person who requests one.
But don't think ED is all frivolous, light-hearted fun, games and finding jobs. There are serious blog postings about subjects like whether teen mags are going to be able to sustain their reader base because most teens want to read Cosmo; ad pages everywhere being hit by the recession; will college grads be able to get jobs in this economy next September; and are we soon going to witness the death of print magazines. The interns who write these posts include their complete profiles along with access to their other ED blogs like "Ed's Intern Diaries".
The links alone would be worth the price of admission, if there were one. And there's something called "The 60-Minute Mentor Program" for new college grads seeking advice.
ED2010 is the place to be for anyone who wishes to write or edit magazines
TODAY IT'S ARTICLES ON MAGAZINE WRITING
Today I am using this freelance writing blog to inform and entertain you the reader, I hope, as I publish three articles as writing samples for a position I am applying for at Suite 101.com. I have finished my first three months there, and now I am eligible to apply for a promotion to a feature writer. I just found out that there is an opening in magazine writing. I need to submit five articles on the topic with my request for this job. I wrote three so far today. I am publising them in the blog so they'll look good and be easier to attach with my request. I hope you find them useful.
Okay, let's start with the next post.
Just a funky mood I'm in. It's 6:18 a.m. and I haven't been to bed yet. Been working every freelance want-ad and market write up ad I can find. I want to write something exciting for money. I got two checks this week and it has gone to my head. I'm only happy when I'm writing. But I guess you figured that out by now. I wrote two astrology things--sort of funky soul mates based on sun sign astrology and one what to eat when you have PMS article all for Helium.com Marketplace. I am also working on a few others for them. One about what to eat to prevent cancer and one on Chinese New Year. Yeah, coming up soon the year of the Ox. That's what I am. A quiet, hardworking ox.
The more freelance writers blogs I read the more I learn I am far from being the one of only a handful of writers disgusted with the present marketplace of $1/articles and SEO nightmares and spinning articles to pass plagiarism tests. Lots of us are disgusted. I found some who are simply choosing not having anything to do with any of it which is reassuring. I think of the wonder and total regard I held for writers for most of my idealistic life and I can't imagine it has come to spinning. Would F. Scott have spun a few to keep Zelda in a good secure place and to buy a few more rounds? Can you picture Virginia Woolf counting keywords? I'm certainly not putting myself in their league I'm merely asking is that what has become of writing today?
Meanwhile, I continue sending and receiving e-mails from my best friend all through high school, now a grandmother. We have so much fun. She is still hunting deer every morning at 4 a.m. One more and she can stop for the season because she'll have enough to last the year. She lives in Smackover, AK but she's from the Chicago area. I told her I know what I'll serve her for lunch when she comes to see me over Christmas--something she is probably dying for because she sure can't get it in Smackover: good old Chicago pizza. My poor sister and her family just live in Wisconsin. I was there recently and they told me all about how awful all the pizza up there was. But then one night when we were all starving they went ahead and ordered one. Yeap, it was sure awful. They weren't exaggerating. I think the sauce was plain tomato paste. I can't talk about what was supposed to be the pepperoni or I'll get sick. You wouldn't think making pizza was such a secret, would you?
MONEY IS NOT ROLLING IN, BUT IT IS DRIPPING IN
This week I have received payment for two freelance articles. One was the home remedies piece. The other was an astrology newsletter for December. I hope I get picked to do another of those. It was a lot of fun. I really did research to write it. I know a lot of you probably think astrologers just pull their forecasts out of their asses. No me.
So I will hereby warn you all to look out for the evil full moon on December 12th. Everybody is going to be in their crabbiest holiday stressed-out frenzy and looking for someone to dump it on. Don't be the dumpee. Avoid crowded shopping malls. Do your Christmas shopping before December 10th or after December 14th just to be safe. Try not to let critical, temperamental words fly out of your mouth during this period or they will fly right back in your face with a vengeance.
Good news you ask? Yes, there is a brilliant Jupiter-Venus conjunction on the 1st that is ripe for romance and holiday festivities. Too bad it's a Monday. Make your own fun. Grab someone you like a lot, love, or would like to know better and go look at holiday lights or go cut down a Christmas tree in legally sanctioned woods. Don't waste this beautiful aspect on the mundane. And, BTW, Sagittarius, get ready for one fabulous birthday month. You deserve it because you are just so lovable.
That's all true. I swear. Now I am on to bidding writing an e-book on the meaning of baby names and six articles on diet and health, something I've written about frequently. I am still bidding on the the low side, but bids that allow me to feel good about myself as I do the work.
I tell you there are some ugly things going on in the freelance writing help wanted world if you've looked lately. Have you seen something like this:
"Wanted 100 articles in three days, all spun from one article that I will provide, must pass plagiarism test and all must be original. Publisher can only pay $1.00 per article. SEO knowledge and experience crucial. Keywords will be provided."
Sickening, huh? Who calls this writing? I am thinking of dumping Elance because they let these a-holes sign up as publishers, and I only recently signed up with them. Until very recently I didn't even know what spinning meant or that you could actually purchase a device that would spin an original article into a copy that could be tested for plagiarism and pass. I say it again. I am sickened.
I see these sort of disgusting faux apologies for low rates in help wanted ads posted everywhere. Five dollars an article for a regularly written 500-600 word article is common. What kind of chimps do they think we writers are?
I tell you I delight in the TV/movie writers' strikes when they stop production and make viewers realize that the shows and movies they love so much are created by writers. We need stronger unions for the little guys. We need to let these publishers know that we won't be working for $1-10.00 per article and that they are very rude to even take out an ad suggesting such a thing. I know I didn't go to college for four years, earn ten years of print and Internet writing experience and take extra writing classes on my own to earn a slap in the face rate. What about you?
"WORDS FOR WORD LOVERS"
Yesterday was my 59th birthday. This picture is of me when I was a year or two younger, and not beating the freelance road to "wealth" (purchase of real hair conditioner) quite so hard.
I picked up an interesting book at the local library sale today. Alas, not as interesting as its title, "100 Words Every Word Lover Should Know." (Published 2005, from the editors of the American Heritage Dictionaries.) It flipped open to internecine, a word I've never been sure enough of to actually use. I was looking forward to learning the other 99 words. (I outgrew the Reader's Digest vocab words ago.) So, based on that one word, internecine, I bought the book only to sadly discover that word lovers apparently don't know the following words. Do you know them all too?
alchemy
anachrosism (not kidding you)
cappuccino
chortle
desultory
detritus
hiatus
insouciant
facetious
fecundity
egregious
I need my money back don't I? Now I'm going to see how many I can find that are usable and I don't know them:
didjeridoo--A musical instrument of the Aboriginal people (not too usable)
Wait, I found one: litotes, "A figure of speech consisting of an understatement in which an affirmative is expressed by negating its opposite as in, "I showed him over the establishment, not omitting the pantry, with no little pride, and he commended it highly. (Dickens, "David Copperfield") Good Scrabble word perhaps.
Another, nictitate (nik'titat)
intransitive verb: To wink. Who's pretentious enough to use that one I wonder?
Here's an unusual word I don't know: humuhumunukunukuapuaa. Hint: It's a noun. Of course you want to go out and use it right away but the problem is that this word for word lovers is either of two triggerfishes native to the outer reefs of Hawaii. Damn! And I was almost as happy seeing this word on the page as I was the day I discovered a word with a built in "ha ha": brouhaha.
I expected way more from the editors of popular dictionaries, who, for all practical purposes, should have long lists of less common words for those seeking to enrich their vocabularies. Well, I just found the price of admission: sesquipedalian, adj., and I can honestly say I appreciate this word for "1. given to or characterized by the use of long words. 2. Polysyllabic. I can even imagine using it in places where I don't care if I'm pretentious as long as I impress; e.g. "I don't mean to be sesquipedalian, but have you ever seen a humuhumunukunukuapuaa?"
If any of you have good 75 cent words that not everyone knows, and that can actually be used in conversation or writing, please add them to comments below. The winner of the best word or words can have the useless word book I bought today to give to someone in need, like a child.
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