Writing & Critiquing Since 1979
News & Updates: Bearlodge Writers Blog
We Bearlodge Writers love the craft of writing and share a deep respect for others of like mind.
Meeting in Sundance since 1979, BLW has expanded over the years to include writers from the Black Hills of South Dakota and Wyoming.
Enjoying fellowship, we encourage friends in their writing endeavors, offer suggestions to help improve their works-in-progress, and share information and tips on the business of writing.
Writing, again . . .
by
A. M. Hummel
I've been searching, for months it seems, for something to say, something that will get me back on path. Something wondrously astute, clever and humorous (caring and considerate might also fit nicely), something worthy to have come from the mind of a writer with thousands (and thousands and thousands!) of words published. But I've been steamrollered, squashed flat by the weight of my losses (the deaths have clustered over the past six months, but it was his that numbed me) and truth is I just haven't had much to say. My creativity—as well as my sense of humor and my sense of what might be important enough to share with others—has been on a leave of absence.
It seems every excursion (or have those moments merely been intrusions?) into that part of me once able to write my way through it—whatever "it" was—has ended with more time than I care to admit being spent attempting to suit the proper cards in a favorite computer game. Before, I wasn't guilty of wasting time that way. At least not often. When I powered up and plugged myself into a project, then sat back to survey the words I caused to appear on my monitor's screen, well, they usually made some sense. They had direction . . . intent . . . meaning. If not astute, or clever, or caring and considerate, my words at least had some worth.
I'm told mourning does that to a person. I'm told it's best to let it run its course, to sit back and make only those decisions that must be made, to put anything (and everything!?) major on hold.
"It takes time," those who have experienced the death of a loved one tell me, "a year and sometimes more . . ."
"Depends on the person . . ."
"You'll know when you're ready . . ."
Etc. So many etceteras. . . .
But today, heading into this "next step in my life," I'm hell-bent to get something done . . . to get something written. Something more than the few sorrowful sentences I vaguely remember penning into a journal started (and titled) "For the Purpose of Possibly Saying Something that Might Someday Help Someone Else." Those words are now lost somewhere in piles of government paperwork and sympathy cards.
But there is one poem that niggles at the back of my mind, asking—no, pleading with me to allow it to come forward. I see it curtseying, or perhaps bowing deeply (I'm not sure it has gender), before it softly begins to recite:
Petunias
Snared in grief,
I forgot the beauty of the early spring sun,
found no delight in the delicate snowdrops rising from the old cat's grave.
Instead, I pondered the time it takes to cremate a body
and what I'd do with the remainder of my life.
Snow moved in, covered the deck,
hung heavy on his apple trees,
prompted the ire of those Canada geese resting on our pond.
I remembered he hated mourning and tears,
knew he'd soon expect petunias in the planters.
I've laid a fire in the wood stove
(to keep spring's chill at bay)
and opened that box of old photographs.
We long intended to sort through and identify those scenes and faces.
I find the one I need.
He'd surprised me with petunias for our first flowerbeds.
Their blossoms were the warmest pink,
soft as his kiss,
fragrant as the breath he mischievously whispered against my bare neck.
Petunias:
we'd planted them
the next day.
Together.
From that memory I draw great comfort. Still more comfort comes from the fact I've finally set those words to paper—caused them to march neatly, line by line, across the screen of my monitor. And from the fact there's so much good to remember.
For now, for today, I call to mind words of advice offered by a favorite cousin whose husband died just short weeks after I lost mine. She is strong of faith and determined. Her sense of humor remains intact, as does her strength of will. Always wondrously astute—clever, caring, and considerate—she answered when I asked how she was doing: "I'm okay, ready for whatever comes. I've got my big girl panties on and nobody better mess with me!"
Maybe I'm ready too. I'm not so naive as to think there won't be long days filled with empty spaces—and many more meaningless lines on my monitor. But my will is building, strengthening. I'll write for him, perhaps because of him, and I'll write often. It's what I do, what I am.