After Elizabeth Gilbert’s Cleveland appearance this winter as part of the Cuyahoga County Library Writer’s Center Stage series, I had pages of notes demanding full-on essay treatment.
That was November.
In the little notebook I carry in my purse, there are four scrawled pages crammed between cabinet measurements for our kitchen renovation and notes from an early morning school levy campaign meeting. No essay. No grand reflections. A few stolen moments documented from a folding chair.
A few weeks ago, I read an article by Nadia Bolz-Weber, ‘The Spiritual Practice of Saying No.’ The title invites an immediate shift in how we view our commitments, boundaries and pleasing impulses. Do we say yes because we are afraid to say no? Afraid of disappointing the asking party? Afraid of not doing our part?
When Gloria Steinem walked onto the Severance Hall stage in Cleveland Tuesday night, I screamed like the fan girl that I am.
Puttering is my dominant activity of late. Not in the curious, playful way your dad used to putter in the garage on Saturdays. I putter with purpose. That purpose is avoidance.
When I updated my Facebook profile with ‘work’ [aw, that’s cute, love], it was absolutely no accident that I identified myself as Writer/Procrastinator.
Confession? I am incapable of chit chat. It starts all ‘la la la, how’s school going’, then, *sploosh*, we’ve stepped off the shallow shoreline right over the continental shelf.
Kindergarten crafts-chat turns toward the conspiracy of public school privatization or poverty and the achievement gap. Because, you know, if poor kids had access to craft supplies at home, and mom wasn’t working two jobs, she could have been able to help him cut out Valentines for the class party. And we really need to organize—hey…?
