Tag: telling stories (Page 2 of 2)
i’m not a mall person. oh, i’ve spent my fair share of time in malls, mind you, but now i just prefer galleries and arts and craft fairs and etsy. there was a time when malls stimulated me, now they just overwhelm me.
but today we were in the car all day, so we check into the hotel, drop our bags, then stretch our legs by walking straight over to the mall to grab a bite of supper.
i’d forgotten how much i enjoy watching people and looking at the store windows. every shopper represents a bundle of stories. every worker bee: stories. every mannequin: stories. stories, stories, stories. everywhere i look: stories . . .
i look at the girl in the carrot-colored high-heeled boots and the teensy, little ole’ bitty tighty-tight-tight shorts and say, “sugar, tell me you didn’t dress yourself. ahem, i mean, tell me about your outfit.”
to the perky young blonde woman sitting at the table next to me i say, “honey bunny, i just love your pocketbook. do you carry it every day or just for special occasions? was it a gift you bought for yourself?” and i close with “where’d you get it and does it come in blue?”
to the young man with the baggy sweatshirt and the crayola hair and matching crocs while restaging the window display, i watch a while then beg him (because i don’t have all night) “what’s the story you’re telling here? what path led you to this as a career?”
to the woman sweeping the floor and wiping down tables, the woman whose face is a story in and of itself, i pat the chair beside me. “come, sit,” i beckon. “tell me your story. tell me three if you can spare them.”
i find a few perfect gifts for special people, and as i pay and chat with the delightful young woman who works there, a man comes in and barely comes to a stop before saying, “excuse me. can you show me where the roof leaked?” to him i said, “well, well, well. i see SOMEbody failed kindergarten. do you see me standing here?” and when he nods yes, i say, “well, in case you didn’t notice, i am a customer. a customer currently in the process of giving this young woman money to pay for my purchases. money that she will later use to pay her rent and from which you will pay the roofer. now you need to learn to wait your turn, but tell me: why are you in such a galdern hurry?”
okay, truthfully: i say these things . . . but only on the inside.
one day, though. one day i’m gonna’ do some mall walking with a side of mall talking. i’m gonna’ invite and encourage people to tell me their stories ’cause i know they’ve got ’em. and i know i want to hear them. i really, really do.
oh, except . . . remember the maintenance man? well, unless he’s learned a thing or four about manners by the next time we run into each other, i can pretty much guarantee you that in his case, i’m gonna’ talk more than i listen. his mother would want me to.
friday night, mother decided she wanted to come home 4 days early. she said it was so i could spend time with my husband – and i’m sure that’s part of it – but i also think she was ready to come home.
there’s a whole lot more i want to say about that and about our time together, but i’m a little distracted cause, well, see, here’s the thing: after three years of tire-kicking, i officially signed up for nanowrimo this year.
which starts in less than 4 hours.
i’m actively researching a non-fiction book, but since that could wind up taking 3 years or more on the research alone, i decided nano would be a fine opportunity to bring that story idea out – the one that’s been lurking around in my imagination for 8 years or more – the fiction piece.
yes, 8-year-old fiction.
but with nano’s clock ticking loudly, i am visited by the ultimate writer’s block: i can’t even remember the idea.
i’m breathing deeply and revisiting the notes i’ve scribbled out over the years (i thought there was more!)
sometimes accomplishment moves me into a new place, so i made a to do list. i still need to:
clear my desk
file all those papers
decide on a writing sweater
flesh out a writing writual
decide which candle
make out menus for the next 4 weeks
and grocery lists
finish christmas shopping
pluck my eyebrows
clear out and reorganize the pantry
change the answering machine message to say “not now dearie”
well shoot, as you can see, i’m suffering from a bad case of writer’s procrastination and paralysis.
so to hell with the notes and to hell with the list. i’m off get my daughter to don her costume again and canvas the neighborhood. i’m telling her to go as far as necessary, to stay out as late as needed, that i don’t want to see her back here until she has a bag FULL of chocolate.
in and out,
up and down,
over and over.
she wove her strands of life together,
patching hole after hole.
eventually she saw it was more than the threads that gave her strength,
it was in the very act of weaving itself
that she became strong.
~ terri st. cloud ~
~~~
tired of multi-tasking and compartmentalizing,
weary of my worth being defined by how busy i am
and how full my calendar is,
knowing that i learn best when my body,
my entire self is involved,
i sign up for jude hill’s cloth to cloth class,
determined to weave the life i want.
i start with a colorful, hand-painted marbelized fabric.
a fabric that while beautiful, is busy and indecipherable.
i weave in calm, muted, solid colors
providing spaces to exhale and explore,
places with room to just nap and ponder and be.
it’s mounted on a sturdy, textured base.
the frayed, unfinished edges remain unhidden from public consumption now.
the stitches that hold it all together
are not straight or even,
or dainty or fine.
every night between 10 and 11
a cat appears on our deck.
a totally, no-hair-excluded black cat.
a cat that is the same size
the same color
has the same eyes
as our indoor cat, godfree.
our indoor black cat
is not amused
and our dog snaps effortlessly
and loudly
into her role as protector.
(that’s how i know the outdoor cat has arrived.)
i take food out,
and each night the outdoor cat
gets a little teensy bit closer.
but the indoor cat
remains unamused
and vocal with his
displeasure.
they sit
with only a window between them,
one cat feasting
one cat fussing,
the outdoor cat fearful
the indoor cat fierceful,
and i know – i just know –
there’s a metaphor in progress.
they say that catching-up is hard to do . . . no, that’s breaking up that’s hard to do. whatever.
best rush of 09 was brought on by . . . well, honestly, i don’t have rushes any more. not since that one unfortunate night in undergraduate school when i was drunk on life – the closest to feeling joy i can remember. for the record: there were no drugs and no alcohol involved – just a day of good things. like being asked out by an upperclassman who was easy on the eyes. getting an A on my paper. finding $20 in my wallet when i was hoping to find enough change to make $1. it was just me and happiness to the 7th degree.
maybe to the 9th.
so there i was, humming to myself in the room when my roommate got back with her little entourage of toadies pledglings. humming, laughing, saying whatever funny stuff popped into my head (and it was all pretty damn funny, if i do say so myself). “what’s wrong with her?” sniffed the condescending bitch girl from across the hall who’d just pledged a sorority. “oh i don’t know,” sniffed back my condescending bitch in the making sorority wannabe roomie. “just ignore her.”
they ignored me all right, talking about me as though being drunk on life automatically rendered me stone deaf. it took weeks for them to change the subject, and life was so miserable, i vowed to never disturb the flatlines again. it’s just too dangerous. even now, there are far too many people around here who prefer homogenization. to get a rush and show it is to risk being labeled, and the labels used around here have some more kind of everlasting glue on the back, let me tell you.
i don’t know why this college memory bubbled up. maybe it’s time to:
a) find these gals on facebook, ask them to be my fb friends, then drop them like hot potatoes (that’ll really sting ’em.).
b) learn how to have a rush and keep it to my own self. (i guess that’s possible?)
c) don my big girl panties and get over it.
~~~
best packaging has to be anything apple sells. space for only the necessary. the essentials held firmly in place to prevent jarring and breakage . . .
wish they’d create packaging for my life.
~~~
best tea of the year . . . well, since no tea has crossed these lips in the past 16 years, i’m just gonna trek down memory lane and tell you that the best tea i ever had was aunt rene’s sweet tea.
down here, when we go to a restaurant and the waiter asks what we want, we say “sweet tea” to which, more often than not, we get a “huh?” eventually followed by “we only have unsweetened tea.” let’s be real clear about this: the term “sweet tea” is NOT retarded. it is a type of tea. a particularly pleasing, desirable kind of tea. sure it’s been a while, but i can tell you this with absolute certainty: you cannot thump all the crystals to the bottom of some colorful little packet, dump it in a glass of tea, whirl it around a few times, and expect to get anything near the quality of aunt rene’s sweet tea. it’s just not gonna’ happen.
aunt rene’s tea was so good, i once gave her a big ass set of drinking glasses when it wasn’t even a holiday. (something that’s unheard of in my cheap economically-correct family.) you could get about 3/4 of a gallon in those glasses, and we’d down at least 2 refills with every meal. the woman had to make her tea in a stockpot, i tell you, it was that good. before i swore off tea, i was known to make a meal off aunt rene’s sweet tea, though i have to admit that like my children, i preferred to have aunt rene’s sweet tea with a side of her blackeyed peas and some of her crisply fried bacon for dessert.
the secret to aunt rene’s sweet tea? sugar. lots and lots and lots of sugar. added while the tea was still hot so it would dissolve. she’d stir that disappearing sugar, and once she couldn’t see it anymore, she’d up and add some more, reckoning that if you can’t see it you can’t taste it.
i guess now folks would call that wrong or unhealthy or something. i mean, we all know that sugar is on the bad-for-you list.
sure. whatever.
i just quit drinking tea cause it was staining my teeth, and i read somewhere that discolored teeth add about a decade to your real age.
yeah, i’m kidding. there’s no way i can talk about age in the same hemisphere as aunt rene cause the best thing that special woman (she was my great aunt) (and i mean that in more ways than one) ever taught me is to not ever tell ’em your age. “it’s none of their business,” she’d declare, the “damn” implied. “besides, just ’cause you can count it doesn’t mean it counts.” (she lived to be 97.5 years young.) (but who’s counting her years or the number of glasses of sweet tea she imbibed?)
best09
~~~
the stories are mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge.
~~~
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This work by Jeanne Hewell-Chambers is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at http://www.TheBarefootHeart.com.
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