Author: Maria Johnson

Writer’s Block Party at The Daily Post

When was the last time you experienced writer’s block? What do you think brought it about — and how did you dig your way out of it?

Ha. Ha. It ain’t no party, this writer’s block thing. I don’t suppose whining about it is productive, either, but there’s something to be said for sharing the angst with other writers. Thus the party, right?

I’ll bring the whine.

This round of blockage is courtesy of too many things on my plate, both emotional and long lists of tasks. My father’s recent illness and death, a huge and on-going de-cluttering project (how in the world have we accumulated so much stuff?), demands at the office. It weighs down the creative soul. Or maybe I’m just afraid of what might come out of the pen, so I put it down.

The solution is to write anyway. At least that’s what my writer-friends tell me.

Write. Even if it’s crap. It’s still writing, and then maybe something good will come of it. I’m hopeful, anyway.

I’m still blocked. I’m still writing. And I’m still hopeful.

another edition of 3 favorite things

1. that first delicious stretch in the morning

2. the smell taste of just-brewed coffee

3. the rhythmic swish and scratch of the pen on the page in an eruption of inspiration

a little question about faith

“Would you share with me your personal definition of faith?”

I came across that question on Facebook this afternoon, and it has driven me to distraction all afternoon as I pondered what I could respond.

It is such an amazingly personal question, but the query is posed with an acknowledgement of that — even suggesting that the answer could be sent via message. That’s part of the reason why I feel compelled to answer here although I could very well hide from the public discourse.

While it’s a deeply personal request to share the definition, it’s a profoundly public experience to live it.

For me, faith is a commitment. It’s a response to the gift of God. It’s a promise kept. It’s the thing that keeps me in the pew when I don’t want to be. What sends me to confession in spite of myself. What gives me hope when despair would be easier. What gives me joy in the highs…and the lows.

To live the faith means to assume the risk of living it publicly. Scary in today’s world, isn’t it?

I looked up what the Catechism has to say about faith, and found this:

166 Faith is a personal act – the free response of the human person to the initiative of God who reveals himself. But faith is not an isolated act. No one can believe alone, just as no one can live alone. You have not given yourself faith as you have not given yourself life. The believer has received faith from others and should hand it on to others. Our love for Jesus and for our neighbor impels us to speak to others about our faith. Each believer is thus a link in the great chain of believers. I cannot believe without being carried by the faith of others, and by my faith I help support others in the faith.

That’s why I wrote it here. To share my thoughts, and ask you the same.

“Would you share with me your personal definition of faith?”

a toast, for some inspiration

flannery

One of my friends, Sarah, recommended that today I drink a very special beer that she brews occasionally, the Flannery Pecan Pie, to commemorate the anniversary of Flannery O’Connor‘s death. The beer is named after O’Connor, who lived relatively close to me (by relative I mean in the same state).

So I did.

I’m a fan of the beer, and a fan of O’Connor, though perhaps not for the reasons you might think. I mean, for the beer, yes, because it’s tasty, but O’Connor — I appreciate her stories, but I don’t love them.

I’ve taught her stories for years, decades, actually, but I’ve never really enjoyed it. Not like I’ve enjoyed teaching other things. It seems that “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” is in every anthology I’ve ever used, and so it goes that I assign it.

And then the fun begins. By fun I mean anxiety. Some of the language and situations makes my students uncomfortable, which in turn makes me uncomfortable. Am I a victim of political correctness? Not in this instance. I just know my audience, and I choose my topics seriously. I’ll teach it a term, just to see and test the waters, and usually, I’m left feeling like I pushed some buttons for no good reason.

O’Connor gives me insight into this phenomenon

All my stories are about the action of grace on a character who is not very willing to support it, but most people think of these stories as hard, hopeless and brutal.

This is why I’m a fan of hers, and why it makes it difficult to teach. Too often, I encounter students whose lives are hard, hopeless, and brutal. To bring fiction into the picture seems to add salt to their wounds. After all, we are all fighting our own demons.

Her observation on the situation rings so terribly true today:

At its best our age is an age of searchers and discoverers, and at its worst, an age that has domesticated despair and learned to live with it happily.

featherMy task, to expose these things, discuss them, deconstruct them, and try to wrench hope out of them…usually ends in…not what I hoped for. I strive to take the despair and channel it into something else, something positive. It’s hit or miss.

But it’s time to teach it again. We live in perilous times. I don’t spare my students anything by not helping them face the indignity of the assaults against us, whether it’s from language intended to demean, or some of the terrifying assaults against our faith.

The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.

~Flannery O’Connor


it was a good day

From The Daily Post: today’s challenge is another Odd Trio prompt — write a post about any topic you want, in whatever form or genre, but make sure it features a slice of cake, a pair of flip-flops, and someone old and wise.

I had every intention of following through with this fun challenge right up until I realized that I had a bunch of errands to run with my knight-in-shining-armor. As life happens, we took off on our adventures.

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Somewhere along the way, we stopped for a beer at the local watering hole and watched antique car auctions because we lead an exciting life. And then, we went for ice cream to reward ourselves for existing, because nothing follows a beer like dairy, right?

Finally, we each dedicated ourselves to a different part of the kitchen. Me, to canning some strawberry preserves. He, to making some delicious bread on which to spread the strawberry preserves. Life is good, isn’t it?

Then I ate a piece of Tiramisu. Yummy! I was so sugar high that I tripped over my own flip flops on the way to the sink, and I realized, Holy cow! I can do the challenge after all. If only I knew someone old and wise.

Thwarted.

So instead, I turn to the wisdom I need:

Your word is a lamp for my feet,

a light for my path.

Psalm 119

Read the whole thing. It’s longish, but really, it’s chock full of wisdom.

What alarm? Apparently I just sleep through them.

If ever I could make a case for getting an old school alarm clock with the obnoxious little hammers striking a loud bell, this is it. So I can have the satisfaction of crushing it and launching it across the room.

I do not know why, on my day off, the alarm is set for an odious six o’clock wake up. Well, I do, actually — so I can get up and write.

Right.

The truth is, I roll over and go back to sleep until the sun wakes me.

Except today. Today, my iPhone alarm, set to some terrible rhythmic tones, went off at the ill-advised time just as it’s supposed to do, and I slept right through it for 15 minutes. Fifteen minutes!

Instead of waking me, it made its way into my dream, which, for reasons I cannot fathom, was taking place in my church, during Mass. So naturally, the phone went off and I scrambled to turn it off. Don’t we all? But it wasn’t my phone, so I indulged a judgy moment of looking around. That was entertaining. I was sitting next to two Mormom missionaries, and behind a very large man with big hair who was annoyed at me. You know, the usual crowd at Mass.

It didn’t end there. The sacristan (this is of special note since we don’t, to my knowledge, have a sacristan in the traditional sense, and certainly not an appointed one like “the sacristan” implies.

Anyway, the sacristan exits the sacristy (what else?) waving a ringing phone that he then silences as a kind of demonstration.

Shortly after, bacon candy falls from heaven. I’m just going to note, this happened, and move back to the phone.

At that point, the ringing iPhone was making me crazy in the dream, so I left, running away from the ringing phone to the safety of my car. As soon as I started the car, the phone rings. Again. Finally, I answer it. It’s my former principal, calling to shoot the breeze.

At this point, I totally lose it in my dream and wake up to a moment of irritation as my senses process that the alarm is going off.

I am displeased. Immensely.

But look, I got up and wrote something!

And now, I’m going back to sleep.

hmmm…food for thought

I had a conversation with a friend at work about finding bliss at the intersection of vocation and avocation. She observed that bliss and bless sound an awful lot alike. So I’ve been thinking about what blesses me in my work  as I ponder pulling the trigger on some things…

Post A Day: Back to Life

Today’s interesting challenge poses the question: what’s the one thing you do to feel human again?

The preface establishes scenarios — a long flight, a grueling week. The suggestion that something has worn us out physically. The answer is rather dull: I take a nice hot shower. It feels good to be clean — to feel the grime washed away. There’s something to be said for the sensual pleasure of hot water flowing over me.

Nevertheless, I’d rather focus on the depth of the question: what makes me feel human? And perhaps of more interest, what could possibly have the effect of zapping my humanity?

I feel least human when I refuse to acknowledge the humanity of others. I can spend my day never making eye contact, never listening with my heart, never getting emotionally invested in the events happening right next to me.

I have become an expert in disassociating myself from the feelings of those around me. The sad part of that is that I lose a piece of my humanity along the way.

I have to allow myself to feel to get it back. I need to love. I need to love, not just those who love me back, but those who are difficult to love, too. The demanding family member. The obnoxious neighbor. The uncooperative colleague.

I need to learn to love like God loves.

And I need to allow myself to cry, whether it’s in grief or gratitude, joy or anger, appreciation or frustration. It’s an amazing catharsis to cry – to express through tears a multitude of emotions.

What could be more human than that?