Tag: writing

Holiday

Carols for the Saturday of Awkwardness – Sing Along!

Jana Greene4 Comments
Santa says, “I’m still at the beach! Don’t rush me!”

I ought to be excited about this day.
Thanksgiving is over, but there are still plenty of leftovers. And the ominous Black Friday is finished, giving way to the Saturday of Awkwardness.

For me, every year, The Saturday of Awkwardness opens up the first weekend after Thanksgiving. There are still dishes from the feast in the sink, soaking and re-soaking – but nobody is really in the mood do finish scrubbing off the residue, much less start decorate for Christmas yet. Awkward Saturday is a 24-hour period in which nobody really knows what to do with themselves, and as a result – a sort of funk can settle over us. Our bellies are still too round to carry in boxes of ornaments from the garage; we light the short wicks on the leftover pumpkin-scented candles and hope they burn down in time for the Frazer fir candles to come out. We aren’t ready for real Christmas music quite yet. We are in full-fledged holiday-flux.

Speaking personally, The Saturday of Awkwardness can even be a little depressing. I am still tired from being on my feet preparing and cooking twelve meal items, but antsy about the upcoming holidays, which are looming ever closer like a bumbling turkey float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving parade on a windy morning.

How will we afford Christmas this year, without my income? Writing about my experiences may be fulfilling in some very important ways, but Santa’s workshop does not accept blog posts as payment…not even on Pay Pal! I thought that by now I would have a paying job; it has been seven months since my last employment. Seven months since I broke my ankle that resulted in the surgery that kept me down for more time.

Write, God had said. Clearer than I’d ever heard His voice. And down for the proverbial count, I did. Now, we are approaching the commemoration of the blessed birth of His Son, and I’ve written enough to fill a horn-a-plenty, but have not even generated enough income to fill a mouse’s Christmas stocking. This does not seem to be a problem to God, although I’ve tried making Him understand that the numbers just don’t work.

And then there is the whole family angle.  How will the drama play out this year? Family and Drama go together like the pilgrims and Indians who’s coming together we replicated just a couple of days ago for Thanksgiving: two very different Peoples exchanging niceties and delicious food.  But just underneath the request to pass the maize pie, someone is plotting the scalping of another before the day’s end.

The Saturday of Awkwardness makes me tired; because I know that the holidays are coming like a tsunami and I do not have the energy to dodge it. So, as I poke around the house as slow as a sloth that has participated in a competitive eating event (and won): without purpose to clean, cook, wrap, and shop or decorate the thought occurs to me: The awkward Saturday may the perfect time for resting, and maybe a little songwriting.

During the holidays, we love our festive Christmas music, and Thanksgiving has it’s oven tunes about going to Grandmother’s house (and figgy pudding…you know the one).  So I decided to write a couple of little carols the about Awkward Saturday time. They go a little like this:

(to the tune of O’Tannenbaum)

Oh Saturday

Oh Saturday

Thanksgiving dishes in sink still lay.

Oh Saturday,

Oh Saturday,

Black Friday stole my joy away.

The reds and greens of Christmastime,

Shant’ prematurely hang in mine.

Oh Saturday

Oh Saturday

Make me a turkey sandwich.

 Or….

Joy to the world,

For crying out loud,

We just had Thanksgiving meal!

For Black Friday, You’re a fan of all

The sales, like a crazed animal,

Shopping til’ you dropped

And now your cash flow’s stopped.

And it’s still just November

Awkward Saturday.

God bless us…one and all!

Spiritual

The Flu or Something Like It

Jana Greene4 Comments

By: Jana Greene

It wasn’t the flu.

It couldn’t have been, because my husband had gotten a flu shot and he got  sick before me. The flu shot, heralded as viral kryptonite, was supposed to prevent just such an incidence as this….this plague upon the Greene Residence.

Of course there are two schools of thought on the flu shot.

Team Flu Shot, which consists of people wearing lab coats and the government (completely trustworthy, right?) insists that you MUST have the flu shot. If you don’t, you are a biological renegade, careless with your own health but worse, a phlem-ridden public nuisance volunteering to spread disease.

Team Never Been Sicker is comprised of people who have had the shot and soon thereafter became gravely ill. These folks complete every sentence pertaining to the shot with, “No, really….I’ve never been sicker!” People in this category will also tell you (with a far-away look in the eye, remembering the horror) that they will  never get another shot.. Because if you have every symptom of the legit flu, it is The Flu to you whether or not you’ve been immunized against it.

So, maybe it wasn’t the flu that my husband and I had, but it was a relative, at least. If it approached a talent agency about becoming a Flu Impersonator, it would get hired on the spot and paid top-dollar. It was a dead-ringer.

My Beloved and I lay next to each other for a week – two people madly in love with one another in bed – barely touching and saying things like, “please don’t touch me, even my hair hurts” through stuffed, red noses.

Hours became days. Bedside tables became crowded with wadded up tissues and cups sticky with Thera-flu residue. The days became a solid week, and then ten days of Imposter Flu…misery. And then, a tiny ray of hope in the form of a lapse in the constant headache.

We are starting to crawl out from under it, this monster bug.  A few days ago, I logged onto this blog and realized that I have not written since October!  What? How can that be? But there it was – bigger than Dallas – the calendar on the right-hand side of this page that chronicles blog entries with November empty.  Time flies when you are incapacitated.

So, I’m sending apologies to the blogosphere for missing out on the entire month of November (so far) and looking forward to doing some writing in earnest to make up the difference. God snuck in some inspiration for new articles in between bouts of fever and nausea, and I’m looking forward to digging in to His Word and His work, and venturing out into the world again.  Mister and Mrs. Never Been Sicker were down for a count, but not out of the game!

The plague is lifted, may the words soon follow!

Inspirational

Grace Train Sounding Louder – thoughts on writing the tough chapters

Jana Greene10 Comments

By: Jana Greene

“But how can people call for help if they don’t know who to trust? And how can they know who to trust if they haven’t heard of the One who can be trusted? And how can they hear if nobody tells them? And how is anyone going to tell them, unless someone is sent to do it? That’s why Scripture exclaims,  A sight to take your breath away!  Grand processions of people  telling all the good things of God!  But not everybody is ready for this, ready to see and hear and act. Isaiah asked what we all ask at one time or another: “Does anyone care, God? Is anyone listening and believing a word of it?” The point is: Before you trust, you have to listen. But unless Christ’s Word is preached, there’s nothing to listen to.” – Romans 10:14-17 (The Message)

When I first read this scripture,  I thought about a locomotive. The image came to my mind of a train making stops in all kinds of places and picking up wayward people of all walks of life before continuing down the track.  I don’t know why.  Writers are a peculiar bunch when it comes to thinking (and everything else).

Another  line of thought  kept me active in my alcoholism for many years:  Nobody knows how I feel.  As long as I fed that train on the black coals of Terminal Uniqueness, the faster it gained speed for the inevitable train wreck.  Since no one else has had the exact  same life experiences that I have, I felt justified in drinking – and so I drank more and felt sorrier for myself and entered a tunnel of dark denial, and well….enough of the locomotive metaphors.  The result was disaster that I might not have survived.

I might not have.  But I did, because God is real and because surrender is an option.

The book I’m working on writing is about the ways that I’m not unique, which is most ways.  It is about life happening to a person who lost control; about that loss of control being the best thing that ever happened to her because it set the trajectory for letting go and letting God do His work.  There are elements of comedy, because so much in life is absurd, and musings about getting older, raising kids, and the like. Also along the storyline, there are many dark tunnels,  experiences that may speak to others who have lost control, these are the the parts that are difficult to write. Painful to write.  I would rather not include some experiences in the book  because they are embarrassing and shameful.

But they are the very same things that made me feel as though nobody knew how I felt when I first tried to get sober. They are universal, really – just as much as getting older and raising kids. Everyone hurts.  I think it’s important that others know they are not alone, not “too bad” for God to love, not a train wreck waiting to happen. Unless there is a Grand Procession of Christ-followers willing to be honest, who will help? God has given me a beautiful, awful, honorable burden to write about my recovery so that maybe someone with similar uniqueness will know that God can be trusted.

Or as Isaiah said in scripture, “Does anyone care? Is anyone listening and believing a word of it?”

I care. I believe.

As I relinquish the engine to God and ride in the boxcar, barefoot and vulnerable with my legs dangling over the passing tracks – watching the world and enjoying the view, and grabbing ahold of other wayward sinners on the way, pulling them up to ride along side me. There are bumps in the track and the car rattles at times, and we are not certain where it is headed.  But it’s okay because we are confident that the Engineer knows what He’s doing.

It is a sight to take your breath away.  And breathe life into your soul.

Poetry

Your Words and the Strength to Bleed Them – a poem

Jana Greene4 Comments

“CUTTY SARK” painting by Paul M. Kruemcke (my beloved grandfather “Papa”)

circa 1966

By:  Jana Greene

“And I’m bleeding, and I’m bleeding, and I’m bleeding
Right before the Lord
All the words are gonna bleed from me
And I will think no more” –  The White Stripes, Seven Nation Army

Words

like the ocean when you are standing at the end of the world

right about to fall off the edge.

Just when you think you’ve run out of sea

the world becomes round and look! 

Endless more!

More to say.

More to think.

More to write.

Units of communication,

Words,

transfused into us by our Creator.

On the waters of written language

The world takes passage in order to think.

Thought-provoking words inspire

ignite and set into motion

Kingdoms, governments and laws.

I write in order to unthink.

Unable (unwilling)  to tourniquet the thoughts

with substance or busy-ness or logic,

the flow commences with a single prayer,

“Lord, give me the words.

And lend me Your strength to bleed them.”

Words, woven together

one pitifully weak and thin thread at a time.

One narrow thread of thought,

 meaningless by itself,

white with a memory of bliss until it bleeds from the loom pink,

and then red with heartache.

Keep weaving until the thread changes to the blues of struggle

and the yellows of rejoicing,

and a million shades in between.

My history

thread by thread

word by word

becomes a sail.

Patched when torn

woven with those glorious words

for which God gives us with generous abundance.

Which God reminds us to use carefully.

To choose carefully.

To bleed wisely and weave gloriously.

Under the wind of His grace…

To sail upon.

Inspirational · Spiritual

Big Fish in a Little Pond

Jana Greene6 Comments

By:  Jana Greene / thebeggarsbakery.net

You might be a big fish
In a little pond Doesn’t mean you’ve won
‘Cause along may come
A bigger one –  Coldplay, Lost

Fill in the blank:  When I finally achieve ______________, I will be_____________.

Accomplishment…it is a slippery little sucker.  Once you catch it, it tends to wriggle free.  I think I know what success is, but the definition keeps changing. But I’m learning not to compare myself to others.  If God doesn’t compare us to one another, why do I?

My “fill-in-the-blanks” have changed many times:

When I finally achieve career success, I will  fit in.

In the business world, while others were striving to reach the next rung on the ladder, I was just trying to keep from tripping over myself on the ground.  The message at the office is: the work world is how you measure your success – and a large portion of society  confirms that it must be true.  But there is very little requirement in corporate America for creativity.  While others were making money and enjoying the fruits of their labor, I felt like my fruits were dying on the vine. I was such a square peg forced into a round hole even my successes weren’t really mine.  They were the achievements of a round-shaped square peg, whittled down to conformity in order to fit.

When I finally achieve my ideal weight, I will be happy with myself.

This is a biggie (no pun intended) with most women I know.  At different stages of my life, I have been heavy and I have been thin.  Here in the middle (and middle-aged) is not where consider my body ideal, but I have to be honest with myself.  In the skinny years, I found a myriad of other ways to be unhappy with my body.  Fitting into size six jeans was nice, but all the while I was thinking, “Another gray hair!” while hating this feature or another.  Those goals I set for myself that seem so important often fail to satisfy.

When I finally achieve organization, I will be a better writer.

Somewhere in the recesses of my brain, I’ve decided that I will one day become an organized person.  I will sit at my desk, which will have all of my resources handy (dictionary, thesaurus, extra printer paper, highlighters) and utilize Microsoft Outlook’s calendar and scheduling features.  My desk would not appear to be the workplace of a mad scientist who decided to take up writing Haiku…..half-drunk cups of coffee, sharpies missing lids, a random cat wandering across the keyboard.  But as it is, my desk is never clean and orderly.  It is covered in yellow post-it notes that proclaim messages like “Next Tuesday” and “Why snails have strong faith” or “7”…things that I am sure will later jog a writing idea but usually don’t, because I’ve forgotten why I wrote them down in the first place.  I’m not even sure my computer has Outlook.

So, I keep asking God, what can I achieve for you?  What can I accomplish as Your child? 

After all, he knows me best.  He knows that I am no businesswoman.  He knows that I carry a little fluff around, that I am messy and disorganized.  He is ok with these and a million other personality and character attributes belonging only to me, and the defects?  He is helping me work through those.

He always finds me, even under the striving to please others – even in my most vain and selfish pursuits.  I sense my Creator saying often to my spirit, “Little fish….how did you get in there?  No wonder you are miserable – you are in the wrong pond!”

He created me.  He should know!  The definition of the true measure of success in Christ is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.

When I achieve surrender to God I will be successful.  Accomplished. And most likely, covered in yellow sticky notes.

Inspirational

I’m ALL in! A Reintroduction to the Beggar’s Bakery

Jana Greene2 Comments

Hello, and pleased to meet you – or meet you again!  Today I’m re-posting the first piece from The Beggar’s Bakery as a reintroduction.  God bless you, and thanks for your readership!

By:  Jana Greene

Welcome to my little piece of Real(ity)Estate on the web! It took a long time for me to create one; I could not imagine anyone would read it.  (I hope it turns out that I’m wrong, but if not – I get LOTS of writing practice!)

I also hope that you might take something away from it each day.  I am going to try my level best to keep it real (probably too real at times).

So what you should you know about me?

There are the usual stats and facts:

I am happily married to Bob Greene, whom I don’t write about in the public forum often at the risk of sounding like I’m bragging.  He really is – cliché not withstanding – my best friend, and I’m so glad to be doing this crazy life with him. We have been married over five years and have blended a family that contains three teenaged daughters; two mine, one his. (Yes, they all live with us, and yes….He IS practically  a Saint!)  The blending is harder and sweeter and more challenging  and more rewarding than I could have imagined.

I gave birth to two daughters, now 16 and 19, and I  mother my lovely stepdaughter (nearly 20) when she lets me.  They are my heart walking around outside of my body, if my own heart chose to drive me absolutely crazy (which it has on occasion). I love them fiercely and will try to respect their respective privacies here, although you can expect a good many pieces about my frustrations as I learn to let them go. If they get bored enough, they might read this one day, in which case I have TONS of chores for them to do.

I’ve worked at insurance and real estate agencies, mortgage companies, law offices, and as a day-care teacher. As a single mother I worked several at a time – including a hardware store paint-slinger and as a part-time hotel maid.  All were character building.  But I’ve been a writer – legit or not – since I could hold a crayon.

I am imperfect all the way.  As a writer,  I use the forbidden “three dots”…too often and cannot bear to part with the text-forbidden smiley faces 🙂 and sometimes use run-on sentences because I think they convey stream-of-consciousness better and yes, I know all of these are against the Strunk and White’s “The Elements of Style” guidelines.  I have written for a small  local paper,and although I couldn’t make a living at it, it was the best job I ever had.  Also, I have a terrible “wordi-ness” problem, but I’m working on it.  Sort-of.  I write for the selfish reason that it helps me productively process the pain and pleasure in life when I pour words onto a page.  And for the selfless reason that I cannot help anyone else find the “Bread of Life” if I don’t show them where I found it.

Because, all of these things I tell you about me, are true, but none define me.  I am a Christian and a beggar.  That is my most accurate self-description.

Over eleven years ago, I came to the end of myself and all of my delusions of put-together-ness, which is to say – I got sober.  If you know me even casually, you know I am an alcoholic. I haven’t had a drink in that long, but I am still – forever – in recovery, something that keeps me humble and coming back for more of what got me clean in the first place.  Every single day. I keep it “out there” because there is somebody, somewhere who is hiding bottles and drinking that “two” beers just to stop the shaking and who is so, so, ashamed. I know shame.  Or maybe he/she is addicted to drugs, or porn, or the approval of others –  it’s all the same to your soul – or cannot seem to find a reason to wake up in the morning.  I can’t tell you how to fix it, but I can tell you who can.  I can tell you that I 100% expected to die during that hard time, and sometimes would have considered it a relief. I still have bad days (that “One Day at a Time” thing…) but I have the clarity to enjoy the GOOD ones, of which there are many.  Faith and humor are key.  Oh, and boundaries, on occasion.

One Day at a time, by the Grace of God. Even if I might have bad days, or whine a little.  You know, just to keep it real!

One beggar showing another beggar where she found food. When I couldn’t love myself enough to lift myself up, I crawled back to Jesus, and He  said “You look hungry… come to the table!”  Redemption is the best feast ever.

All posts are copyrighted.   Feel free to share a link to this blog and let me know who you are sharing it with, please 🙂

Inspirational

From Outside of the Circle: My 50th Blog Post

Jana Greene6 Comments

By:  Jana Greene

Observations from Outside of the Circle

A Writer Looks at 50 First Blog Posts

My dear friend, Liz, and I were at the beach, watching her six-year-old son play.  He had found a long stick of driftwood and was using it to draw a tight circle around himself in the sand.  When he was done, he sat down in the center, knees drawn up to his chest.

“It keeps the monsters out,” he said, matter-of-factly.  With the imagination of a child, he enjoyed the safety of his circle.  Pleased with himself, pleased with the illusion that he was safe…that although he could get out, nobody else could get in.  It reminded me of writing.

I don’t think I’ve ever written every day for fifty days in a row before.  Even though it’s my passion, I’m too wonky and inconsistent to employ the self-discipline.  But today, as I write the 50th blog post for The Beggar’s Bakery, I am keenly aware that I have so much to learn about the craft.

Learning be true to my own story. God didn’t give me a love for writing so that I can be someone else’s mouthpiece.  I’m working on the bad habit of second-guessing myself all of the time.

Learning to be as honest as I can.  This is difficult, because when I write in my most honest voice, I will potentially offend/shock/elate/disappoint/inflame/inspire/make nauseous any number of friends and strangers.

 Learning to treat heavy subject matter with gentle care.   Addiction, rejection, the difficult aspects of parenting and marriage, self-condemnation and the theology of grace.  And that could be the combined topic for any given Tuesday.  “Keeping it real” may help someone in a similar situation know that they are not alone.  At the very least, it helps keep me humble, sober and realistic.

Learning to appreciate the writing community.   I have gotten to know other writers who, much like sponsors in recovery, love to encourage new bloggers.   They are amazingly, selflessly supportive.

Learning to let others IN.  Anyone who has battled addictions knows that you protect your secret with your life, until it becomes your entire life to protect it.  By it’s very nature, alcoholism demands keeping others out.  It just makes sense to me, then, that recovery means letting others in. 

At some point during the past 50 days, I realized that I don’t want to live in a tight little circle anymore; writing to be pleased with myself, pleased with the illusion that I am safe…. that although I can get out, nobody else can  get in.   That self-drawn circle is cramped and predictable, and the edges are the same in every direction.   Writing is stepping out of self-preservation in order to let others in.  It is running full on- to the sand, inviting others to join me, even though the tide keeps rearranging the landscape.

Constantly rearranging it.

And what about the monsters that the circle was supposed to keep out?

Honestly, none of my monsters has ever respected my boundaries anyway.

Recovery · Spiritual

First Do No Harm

Jana Greene6 Comments

By:  Jana Greene

I’d written the post I’d set out to write for the blog, but hesitated to hit “publish”.

It was a pretty raw piece about addiction and motherhood; two things I have experience with that often end up awkward bedfellows in my writing.  Addiction and motherhood don’t belong in a single story, but long ago they had an affair, and the resulting lovechild was a story about my grieving choices I had made but reveling in the grace of Christ.

Still staring at the glow of the laptop screen.  Perhaps I shouldn’t put this ‘out there’, I thought, finger hovering over the enter button.

Some Christians will be offended.  They will judge me twice; once for being the person I was, and again for admitting to being that person.  They might think I am playing fast and loose with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, a poor representation of a Christian.  I would never want to do that.

And – far more importantly – what about those who don’t know Jesus yet?

Still, I can’t shake the urgency to write about these things, to ‘put them out there’.  So I pray….

”God, first let me do no harm.”  A spiritual Hippocratic Oath of sorts –“ let me do no harm to Your name”.

Be the beggar, I feel Him saying.  Stop trying to “bake”…..

Sometimes, writing, I feel like a rebel deserter of my formerl self;  a New Creation counting on Christ to do the jousting because I am rusty from old war injuries.  A grateful and humble flawed veteran…not measuring up to what the world thinks a Christian should always be, but gratefully not of this world.

Old war stories sometimes need to be told, and telling half-truths distorts history.

I press the Enter button to Publish.  And revel in the grace of Christ.

 

Inspirational · Spiritual

How to Write a Life in Twenty (not so) Easy Steps – For my Daughters

Jana Greene10 Comments
 
By: Jana Michelle Greene

You are a writer when you take your first breath in life, perhaps even before that. Preceding the ability to have cognitive thought, you start to etch the words of your life into being. Just by living, you write a story, an imprint on the world.

It is read by every person you come in contact with, and devoured by those you hold most dear. People are funny about books. Those who love them usually love them much.

Some are not readers. But all are writers. As you write the book of your life, remember these things, my daughters:

Don’t allow yourself to be typecast.
Fancy yourself an Overachiever? A Diva? A Loser? Never wear a label, it limits your dimensions. Chances are you will be an Overachiever, an Underachiever, a Type-A Personality and Types B through Z at differing times in your story. Expect Character complexity. You will at times be more complicated those who read your life can comprehend, and certainly more complicated than you yourself can understand. In your lifetime, you will stoop to shameful behaviors in spite of yourself, and overcome unimaginable odds by the same measure. In your travels, never allow yourself to become what other characters ascribe you to be. And you will transform from birth to dying breath.

Add colorful characters.
Use Best Friends sparingly in your story, and delve into their character with lots of detail. They are integral to getting through the sticky scenarios, and absolutely indispensable in chapters of great joy. Acquaintances will make cameos in your life, and give you reasons you show up in theirs.

The Great Love of your Life? The truest loves are part and parcel of your own soul, Main Character substance. Villains and liars? They have a place in the story, too. Even absolute fairy tales prescribe their presence, and you will have them with you, always. Acknowledge them; they are teaching you what not to become. But don’t give the storyline over to them.

And if your story needs a heroine?
Be the heroine.

But try to keep it about everyone else
Make the Acknowledgements at least as long as your longest chapter in the story, and give plenty of credit throughout to those who have lent the richness and depth to your life.

It’s ok to have fragmented sentences and grammatical errors.
Life is incredibly messy. There is no Great Spellchecker in the sky; nobody is counting your mistakes.

Short chapters are ok, too.
Some scenes will end before you know you’ve written the first paragraph. When a chapter has taught its lesson, it’s ok to walk away from a setting.

Every story has a beginning, middle and an end. Make them all count.
Just as your story begins with a date of birth, it has a finite number of pages until the Acknowledgments. Like any page-turner worth its weight of paper, you will never know exactly what’s around the corner. Never knowing the end of the story ahead of time keeps you motivated to write your best ending.

Bright, fancy covers don’t really matter.
The slick sleeves that invite others to read your manuscript always, inevitably fade and fall apart. The old adage “Don’t judge a book by its cover” has a postscript: “Give people more than a cover to judge you by.”

Allow for deeper meaning in the seemingly insignificant things.
A poem about the rain is sometimes really about despondency and angst.
And sometimes, it’s just about rain.

Keep the Table of Contents Flexible
Things change, sometimes a lot. Majors in college, boyfriends, financial situations; they can all evolve. Don’t let the shifting throw off your truth, or the telling of it. Write the Table of Contents of your life mostly in pencil, with only the most important core subjects penned. God, family, integrity and your truest passions – these should be inked.

Lighten up the Plot
Have fun, and enjoy the tale as you go. Much of the story is extraordinarily silly; laugh as much as you can. Laughter lightens any load and exhilarates those who read your story along with you.

Use the right punctuation when necessary.
Use lots of exclamation points! Everywhere you look, there are things to be excited about, and little manifestations of pure joy! Exclaim those things; they are worthy of literary device! And equally important, versing yourself in good punctuation means that you know when you put a period. After bad relationships. Unhealthy behaviors. Mistreatment. Selfishness. Utilize the “three dots” only when necessary…but don’t be afraid of “To Be Continued”…

Make your life a symphony of genres.
There is equity in throwing in a little Comedy when the Drama gets too intense, and a little Romance when the Tragedy is overwhelming. And daily, there will be Mystery.

Don’t be discouraged when the plot seems to drag.
It will seem to veer right as you try to steer the story left. Keep on keeping on. Keep writing.

Dedicate your “book”.
God is your Publisher and your Editor, the Ultimate Author and Finisher. Don’t try to do His job, yours is enough labor. Take His suggestions and read what He writes in the margins. Review His critiques of your work often, taking care to pay attention to the subtle cues as well as the highlighted ones; it will make the next chapter flow much better. He will make sure your “book” gets into the right “hands”, and He gives out no rejection letters. (It’s always good to be close to your Editor!)

Handle Writer’s Block with dignity.
All Great Writers suffer this crisis. Don’t mistake stagnancy with your identity. It is equally true that many of the greats turn to the numbing agents of drugs and alcohol and all manner of poison, all of which takes you back to some other point in the story when you faced the same dilemma. How many times do you want to repeat the same scene in which you suffer? Weakness breeds bad storylines; small bouts with strength (consult with The Editor) help you over that mountain. There are no small victories.

In all great works of literature, there is a Turning Point.
In your story, there will be lots of them, turning points. Never underestimate the power of a fork in the road. This is the moment in time where the decision of one tiny paragraph, sometimes one word. It can be one turn of a page, impacting each page thereafter and ultimately, and the end of the story.

Set out to make your story epic.
Don’t settle for ordinary, “See Spot Run” is easy but empty. Make sure every page is full, even if with mistakes. Love the people whom you love very hard (and with every cell in your being), you will get loved back hard. Mediocre is not an option, yours is a tome that will touch a life, and another and another.

Almost nothing you’ll ever do will affect only you.
No one life is a single-print.

And last, Love yourself just like the Great Classic you are.
Tattered pages, yellowed edges, typos and all.
Whatever goes into the final print, it’s all Character Development.

It’s your story – utterly familiar, irreplaceable.
Only you can write it.

Inspirational

Write, Wrong or Indifferent (Part 2)

Jana GreeneLeave a comment

Write, Wrong or Indifferent

Joining a Writer’s Guild

Part 2

The night of the first guild meeting finally arrived.  Because it was December, it had already become pitch-black by the 7 o’ clock scheduled start.  I was haggard from work, and had been in a fair amount of back pain all day.  On especially trying days, I cannot wait to come home from work and pull off my shoes and put on comfy clothes, usually PJs.  This was definitely one of those days.  I chose a decent pair of sweats to wear to the meeting, and when I passed my husband as I walked out the door, grumbled:  “I hate clothes.”

“I love you,” he said anyway.

How I adore that man.

The guild meeting was held in a church classroom, and the parking lot was only dimly lit.  I realized how dimly lit when I accidentally ran over an orange traffic cone, and then another.  The last cone was still dragging under the Jeep when I screeched into (what I assumed was) a parking space.  When I look up, there is the silhouette of a woman standing in the doorway to the classroom.  I can tell by her body language that she is trying to look casual, as if she is unsure whether to laugh, offer help, or call the cops.  I am five minutes late now, and I hate being late for anything.  Maybe I should just go home.

When I step out of the car, it immediately begins to rain.  I am cold, nervous, embarrassed and now wet.  The six copies of my article are wet too, I notice, around the edges.  I slog up to the door, and the woman I had seen in the doorway was gone.   But I do see Melissa!

She is standing at a “welcome “area.  Melissa is a kindred spirit.  She claims to feel awkward, too, on a regular basis, but it is hard to imagine her insecurity.  She is deeply and powerfully beautiful and disarmingly candid – which made me love her right away when we met several years ago.

I couldn’t wait to hug her.

She explained how the guild meeting works, and gave me some pamphlets and other materials.

“I’ll sign you in,” she says.  “What is your genre?”

I had no idea.  This article would not fit neatly in any one “box”.  If I were to “shop” the piece out, what magazine might buy it?  Again, no idea.  Although it was essentially about parenting, it would certainly not be a fit for parenting magazines (which, really, only cover the predictable parenting topics like potty training or making popsicle-stick art.  Show me an article in a magazine for parents entitled, “You Want to Pierce WHAT?” and I will buy a subscription on the spot).

There are spiritual aspects to the piece as well, but I doubted a Christian magazine would touch it, what with its subject matter (tattoos) and generally snarky overtones.  And, it was neither comedy nor horror, though to be honest, there were elements of both.  I tried to quell the anxiety that I am in the wrong place at the wrong time, with a genre-less essay.  This was not a good start.

“Don’t worry about it,” Melissa soothed.  “It’s ok.  Just find a seat.”

In a room right off the hallway, the other ladies sat in school chairs in a small auditorium.  It was, actually, the Band room for the Christian school housed at the facility.  There were less than a dozen women scattered unevenly throughout about forty chairs and while I was wondering what significance – if any – choosing where to sit might have with perceived writing skill, they stopped chatting amongst themselves to say hello.  I responded, took a random seat, and resumed thinking about the universality of Band rooms all over America, with their distinctive scent of woodwind oil and their porous ceilings, and …yes?

Oh, yes…..Nice to meet you, too.

A lady had just arrived and taken the seat right next to me.

She was well-dressed (business-casual, you might say) and I noticed that her brown leather purse matched her brown leather shoes perfectly.  A quick look around the room revealed that all of the ladies are lovely.  They are all “put together”, by outward appearance anyway.  No-one else is wearing sweatpants.  No-one else had her hair in a poorly executed (and wet) ponytail.  Suddenly, I was in 8th grade band again, the new kid.  I wondered why I was there.

I was wondering, too, where did the other traffic cone I hit go? When Melissa sat in the other free chair next to me and took my hand to hold.  And the meeting began.

Inspirational

Write, Wrong or Indifferent – Part 1

Jana Greene3 Comments

Write, Wrong or Indifferent

Joining a Writer’s Guild

Part 1

By:  Jana Greene

Joining a local writer’s guild almost kept me from writing.  I say “almost” because I have since come to love it and look forward to the monthly meetings.  It was because of fear – yeah, that old chestnut – that I nearly didn’t participate at all.

From the time I could hold a crayon, I wrote about things.  I can remember forming “J”s first, and from there, looping and dotting kindergarten hieroglyphics to tell my story.  Because even then, I was a historian of sorts, not a fiction writer.  I felt the need to journal everything I experienced and observed, wanting to chronicle my own life story.  My name is Jana, and I am six was my first story.  And later, I wrote about the things that happened to me as a child – some of them traumatic – that I could not speak about aloud. Many times, in middle and high schools, I wrote angst-laden pieces about my social awkwardness, with titles like:  I don’t fit in anywhere .

What a strange little girl I was.  But writing things down helped me deal with things, big and small, that I couldn’t reconcile in my spirit any other way.

At forty-three years of age, I am still a strange bird.  If I am going to tell my story, I’d better start doing it now.  I am becoming annoyingly forgetful, and I don’t want to erroneously tell someone else’s story by mistake.  One of my dearest friends, a woman named Melissa, also finds comfort in the writing, and has her own story to tell.  We are forever vowing to write a book together about overcoming struggles and such, but we can’t seem to lasso one issue onto the page before another is bucking and rearing back, thus our tales never seem to get written.  This is why we joined a writer’s guild, a Christian writer’s guild.

I missed the first monthly meeting , which was kind of an orientation.  I was sick that day.  But the following afternoon, Melissa left a breathless voicemail on my phone about her experience.

“Jana!” She began.  “Guess what?  I know what we are supposed to DO with our lives!  Call me!”

I could not dial her number fast enough.  Our very purpose, made clear!  (Of course I would be absent on the day my life’s purpose was designated!)  Her line rang only twice.  When she picked it up, I could feel her warm energy burning through the line.

“Write,” she said, instead of ‘hello’.  “You and I, we are supposed to write!”  With her sweet, Georgian accent, she launched into a synopsis of her time at the meeting.  There were other women, she said, just like us, who dream to translate a tiny little fraction of what God whispers into our lives onto the page.

But of course!  We needed support!  Support from a group was the missing ingredient; it might even override the fear….the fear that still says that I don’t fit in anywhere.

That evening, I could hardly wait to write a piece for the next month’s meeting.  But what to write?  Whisper to me, Lord.  Please whisper.

                Nothing.  Like the proverbial author who sits down to his typewriter and taps out the word “The”.  And that’s all.

Oh NO!

I strained for ideas, for eloquence.  I longed to write as Helen Steiner Rice, the prolific Christian poet whose very prose rivals those of the Psalms.  I wanted to present something that would glorify God and really showcase my writing style, except that those two things are sometimes mutually inclusive.

Stalling, I logged onto the guild website and paid my dues (literally, with MasterCard).  No turning back now!  Surfing through the site, I noticed that one of the membership perks was a free critique.

Critique.  That sounded a lot like critic, the root word of criticism, which I am not a huge fan of, constructive or otherwise.  Immediately my concern went from channeling Helen Steiner Rice in order to glorify the Almighty, to how I would soothe my own bruised ego when the bruising commenced.  Ashamedly, I was licking my wounds before the whip was anywhere near.

It is those self-serving thoughts that result in articles titled “The”, wherein the main character – me – does nothing.  Writes nothing.  Glorifies no-one.

God, what do you want me to say?

And with that prayer, a pseudo-crisis appeared in my life just in time to become the subject of an actual story.  The issue was that my eldest daughter decided to make good on a lifetime threat to get a tattoo, and I was upset about it (hey, don’t judge me for judging her!) so I wrote about the experience from a mother’s point of view.  As usual, a serious bout of writer’s block was averted by the antics of one of my children (thanks, girls)!  The piece I wrote was raw and real, and more importantly, helped me heal from an event I couldn’t work through my mind and spirit any other way.  It was twice as long as the guild guidelines allowed for, and did not follow proper grammatical rules.  Also, it contained the word “damn”.  It was a rather rough “rough draft”.

I removed the naughty word, but left the rest alone.  With no idea what to expect (or who my fellow guilders were), Melissa and I agreed to meet at the front door of the church that hosted the meetings.  Still, I wondered…..what if I don’t fit in?

I drove there with my hands on the wheel at “9’o clock” and “3 o’clock”, just like they teach you in Driver’s Ed.  My hands were shaking that badly.

 

 

Spiritual

“Can You Hear Me Now?” – God

Jana Greene9 Comments

By:  Jana Greene

Do you ever wish God used a megaphone?  I do.

I have a couple of friends who are blessed with the ability to hear from God:  that small, still voice, presenting audibly.   I believe it is a gifting, the way speaking in tongues is a gifting, but not one of mine.  At least not yet.

A few months ago, I felt like the Lord was telling me to quit my stressful job.  (Convenient, right?  That’s why I didn’t listen at first).  I was experiencing health issues and as my doctor said, “something had to ‘give’. “  (As I live in a house with three daughters of the teenage persuasion, it was unlikely to ‘give’ at home.)  And my creativity?  Withering on the vine.  By the end of the day, I was too tired to create anything, even dinner for my family.

“It’s ok,” I felt like my Father in heaven was telling my spirit.  “Its ok to quit your job.”

But it was a good job; a full-time job, with benefits.  Employment is hard to come by these days.  So, I figured I must have misunderstood God.  But the health issues got worse.

I wanted to be obedient, but I also wanted my 401-k and paid time off.  In essense, I wanted assurance of a favorable outcome.  Nevermind that, in thirty years of salvation, God has never given me a guarantee that “Plan B” will pan out.  Even when I am absolutely sure that I am being obedient. But things have always worked out to the good.   I suppose that’s why it is called a Leap of Faith, and not a Baby step of Certainty.

My prayers continued.  Please, God….show me the direction to go.

“Write,” my interpretation of his voice said.  “Quit your job, and write.”

Why would God, who knows all, advise me to do that?  And what if I was hearing Him wrong?  What if, because writing has always been my dream, I am hearing what I want to hear?  The stakes are high here, there is much to lose.

But so, so much to gain.

For weeks, there was confirmation that it was time to quit.  It was time to move on and take a risk.  Still, I kept hoping that the clouds would break open, the sun shine upon me, and the booming voice God – who sounds a lot like Morgan Freeman in this scenario – would tell me what to do.  (He also called me a “good and faithful servant” here, but I digress).

If that actually happened, it would not be a Leap of Faith on my part, I guess.  It would be more a Baby -Step of Certainty.

If I want to hear what God is saying, I have to approach it with openness.   I have to ask that He reveal His will.  It seems so simple, but I forget to ask specifically sometimes, but still wait for an answer.  Just asking is the first step.

I have to read what He has to say in His Word.  I use The Message translation because it is plain to me, and although I enjoyed Geoffrey Chaucer’s “The Canterbury Tales” as much as the next 10th grader in high school, I like to read The Word to read plainly, not in King James English.  My soul digests the message easier when my brain doesn’t have to digest it first.

I’ve learned that other Believers are a resource that God expects us to tap into.  I must ask for prayer, and listen to the advice of those who walk closest with Christ.   (Different from taking a “poll” – which  is what I mistakenly did at first.   The reactions amongst my friends were split about 50/50, with “Wow!  Good for you!” and “Are you CRAZY?” being the predominant reactions.)

My believing friends?   Overwhelmingly supportive.  When I ask them for prayer, there is always the chance that they might even hear audibly the confirmation that I received only from a gentle brush to my spirit.

I am so afraid to misunderstand, which of course, I will at times. It’s part of learning to discern God’s voice.  My struggle is that even when I hear from God – quite unmistakably – I still question it.

JESUS (using megaphone):  Quit your job and write.

ME: Get  a mob at night? Fit the fob just right?  Lob it out of sight?  What, Lord, WHAT?

Jesus:  **FACEPLAM**

Maybe that’s why I don’t hear him audibly.  If He did use a megaphone, I would no doubt complicate his command by over-analyzing.  He really isn’t a drill sergeant anyway.  He is love itself, patient and kind.  SO patient and kind.  And if I mis-heard?  He will still use the experience to bless me and others, and to glorify Him.   He is so awesome that way.

I quit my job, and I’m writing.  I don’t know how long it will be before I need to find a paying job, I trust God will let me know.  As for today, I have peace that passes understanding.  As for today, I am healthier, if not wealthier, and my soul is “listening” for the next move.

That small, still voice that presents by brushing my spirit?  It’s the sweetest sound.

Spiritual

About Jana Greene

Jana Greene19 Comments

Happily married wife, mother to three adult daughters, and JiJi to one granddaughter. Chronic illness and pain survivor – one day at time. Ex-evangelical who loves Jesus more than ever. Alcohol-free 22 years. Unlikely feminist. Animal-lover. Poet. Mid-life is when your mind wakes up. Believer in the Universal Christ. My friends are family. Music is life. I believe in plant medicine. One Love.

(Oh….And I love to write. Always have. Thanks for coming along on this journey.)

Chronic illness and pain survivor – one day at a time. I just love