Books offer a Rehearsal for Life

April 29, 2008 By Leave a Comment

At the Festival of Faith & Writing, children’s book author (twice awarded the Newbery Medal) Katherine Paterson sat with her son David to discuss the process of transforming the story of Bridge to Terabithia from book to film. (EW interviewed David for a story about the process with some of the same information.)

David was co-writer and producer for the film. He said that it was a challenge to bring the story to film, because, “People have brought their own lives to it; everyone has his or her own idea of what Terabithia looks like. Everybody has created his or her Terabithia.”

Katherine said, “I hardly describe Terabithia at all…in the book, it just gets a few brush strokes.”

David said, “Everyone, when they read a book, they are their own filmmaker.”

Their rapport was charming. She patted him on the knee now and then, and he would reach over and rest his hand on her shoulder. He teased her for calling him by his brother’s name, and she just laughed. The whole hour was just sweet, sweet, sweet. Well, and I learned a little bit about Hollywood, and how David was firm about how the film should stay faithful to the book.

I won’t spoil it for you if I mention that somebody dies in the book, will I? Did I? Did I just spoil the book and movie? I’m so sorry, if I did. At least I didn’t tell you who.

Well, somebody dies in the book. It’s absolutely critical to the plot.

So when David was first in conversations with Disney to see if they were interested in making the adaptation of Terabithia, they said that they were, but they wanted to change a few things. The fact that the character dies was a big bummer…instead of dying, could the person just break an arm? Could the character fall into a coma and almost die?

Uh, no. The character has to die.

Well, they weren’t interested in that. Finally he was able to get someone to listen and understand that the story was the star–the story was everything–and they agreed to stick with the story and make a faithful adaptation.

And the character dies.

But a problem with that was the trailer. The footage created to promote the film looked like a fantastical adventure–no mention of death–and they got phone calls and e-mails from irate parents who went to the film not knowing what they were in for. One dad was so upset that he took his kids to the movies, and then he was stuck actually having to talk about death with his children. He was livid. And both Katherine and David were thinking, “Hm, maybe it’s about time he had a conversation about death with his children. Maybe more parents need to talk with their kids about these difficult topics.”

Uh, yeah. I agree. I mean, if I didn’t know that a character would die, I might have been frustrated as well. I like to be prepared. So maybe it’s good that I told you, too, so you’ll be prepared if you rent it, to talk about death with your kids. But these conversations are important. Hard, but important. If literature and film can help us talk about hard issues with our families, that can be good.

Katherine said it well. “Children’s books give kids a rehearsal for what life will be.”

She restated it two more times. “Books can give you a rehearsal for the hard things in life. When we lose someone to death, those books can come back to us years later and be a comfort to us.”

She told a story about a letter she received from a man who explained that someone dear to him passed away, and he happened to revisit Bridge to Terabithia because he remembered it from childhood. Reading the book as a child, he sensed its power and it stuck with him. Reading it as an adult who recently lost a loved one, it was a source of comfort to him. “If he hadn’t had it when he was ten,” she said, “he wouldn’t have had it when he was 21.”

Again, “Don’t censor hard books because they’re hard; because hard books help to prepare you for the hard things in life.”

She said, “If a book has any power, it has the power to offend. It also has the power, maybe, to mean something to people’s lives.”

She told about the trouble with discussion questions and study guides created for her books over the years. Some are good, some…not so much. To illustrate, she told the well-known story about a little boy in Sunday school whose teacher asks, “I’m thinking of an animal. It’s brown and fuzzy and climbs trees.”

The class falls silent.

“It’s got a fluffy tail,” the teacher continued. 

Nothing.

“It collects nuts and stores them for the winter!”

Finally, a little boy speaks up and says, “Sure sounds like a squirrel to me, but I know the answer must be ‘Jesus.’”

She used that to make the point that questions need to be real questions. “We need to be careful not to ask questions for which we already know the answer. We need to ask genuine questions.”

She urged us, “Ask the question you have about a book. If we ask a question and don’t know the answer, some really exciting dialogue can open up.”

Filed Under: books, children, creativity, family, lifelong learning, parenting, reading, self-discovery, writer, writers, writing Tagged With: , , ,

Monday FunDay–Do Something Creative Yet Again

April 28, 2008 By 2 Comments

Monday FunDay

Last week’s Monday FunDay was hard to sift through.

This time, let me try to make it clear and simple.

On Mondays, I host Monday FunDay, a carnival dedicated to swapping simple, amusing–maybe even silly–everyday ways you enjoy good, clean fun. I do this so that we don’t all wallow in that “rainy days and Mondays” quagmire. I do it to encourage creativity and laughter.

To participate in Monday FunDay, simply post a story, idea, or explanation at your blog of how you and/or your family have livened up Mondays (or any day).

Then link up via Mr. Linky below (if you don’t have a blog, simply explain your idea in the comments) and we’ll collect all the ideas in one place.

Again, please: ideas must be squeaky-clean, family-friendly fun.

Last week, I encouraged everyone to “Do something creative every day.”

Did you?

Did you write a poem or a letter or a blog?

Did you sketch, paint, or grab some clay and mold a sculpture?

Did you tap at the piano or strum a guitar?

Did you sing a song?

Dance?

Did you plan a garden or arrange some cut flowers in a vase for a centerpiece?

Did you cook a colorful meal or try a new recipe?

Did you pour pancakes in the shape of your child’s initials?

What did you do that was creative? What did you do that was fun?

Instructions for the WordPress Mr. Linky (which is different than the ones you’ll see on WFMW and other Typepad or Blogspot blogs):

1. Write your post. Type up your Monday FunDay edition and post it at your blog.

2. Come back to this post and click on Mr. Linky. A window will pop up.

3. Type in your name (or blog name) and if you like, you can include a short “teaser” for your idea in parenthesis. Something like this:

Ann K (do something creative)

3. Paste in your url. Below the spot for your name, there’s another for the url of your own post. Copy the url for your own Monday FunDay and paste it in (including the http:// part of it).

4. Press Enter. That’s it! It should be saved by Mr. Linky.

5. Link back. Please link back to my blog here. It’s nice for people to find their way to home base and see all the fun.

To see what others have posted, click on Mr. Linky and pay a visit to the fun bloggers who have joined in!

It’s fun to have fun, but you have to know how!

[Check out previous Monday FunDays]

Filed Under: creativity, family, home, self-discovery, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , ,

Kathleen Norris, Acedia, and the Commonplace Book

April 26, 2008 By 15 Comments

Updated: People are landing on this post when searching for “acedia” and “Kathleen Norris.” To learn more about these terms, read this post and then click on THIS LINK to listen to an interview with Norris. She defines “acedia” and expands on the topic.

Because my brain won’t spit out words on demand while working on a Very Important Writing Project, I decided to take a mental break and hang out here a few minutes, where I can split infinitives and let my participles dangle without anyone caring much.

Pray for brilliant offline thoughts, please. My mind is not cooperating.

You want to know more about the Festival of Faith and Writing?

No?

Okay, who’s sick of it? A show of hands?

Hm…some would like to move on to cute shoes, while others of you want to pretend you sat in on Kathleen Norris’s session entitled, “Acedia…Again.”

Or, you did, until you read that title.

Wait, friends! I’ve decided to move ahead with my spotty notes from the Kathleen Norris session, and there’s some good stuff in here (in my opinion). So just stick with me for a few more lines and then you can decide whether or not to click away.

Well, she spent most of the time defining that word, “acedia,” that has fallen out of usage. She’s trying to resurrect it, because she thinks it captures our current culture’s general boredom, apathy, or ennui. None of those words expresses the attitude and mood quite right, so she’s returning to acedia.

She wrote in the description:

Few people today have encountered the word acedia, which literally means not-caring, or being unable to care that you don’t care. In some ways, though, acedia defines today’s culture, expressing itself as willful indifference, restless boredom, or even frantic busyness. Norris discusses both acedia and its opposite–the zeal that draws on faith, hope, and love.

She said that when the seven deadly sins were determined and defined, the term “acedia,” which had been used widely among monks who struggled with it, was absorbed into the concept of sloth. It was lost. It has a meaning, however, that is specific and in her opinion, useful.

“I tend to believe words are in usage because we need them,” she said. And she thinks we need the word “acedia” again. When she proposed the idea of a book about acedia, somebody–maybe a monk, maybe an editor–told her, “Well, you’ve got an open field, since not much has been done with it since the sixth century.”

She said she faced an “attack of thoughts spiraling me downward” and made a “powerful connection with my past. When you’re a writer,” she said, “there’s no turning back from such a connection.”

“Acedia works like a spiritual morphine. It leaves you not caring; unable to commit to relationships; unable to stay in one place; and so frantically busy, you don’t have the energy to care….there’s so much coming at you, you can’t care any more. It renders us impervious to care.”

Does that sound like our culture today?

By the way, she passed along what she thought was the best description of midlife she’d ever heard (I can’t remember the source):

“Midlife is a metamorphosis in reverse, where you start out as a butterfly and gradually turn into a caterpillar.”

(laughter)

She talks and writes openly of her avoidance of all things math-related. In a room full of writers, I’m sure there were plenty of sympathetic ears. When she said, “I don’t have much faith in linear process,” she was rewarded with a burst of hearty laughter. I have no idea what came before or after that. No context. Only that isolated statement.

She talked about how our culture gives us the art we need and maybe the art we want.

Maybe we want Britney, for example, because we don’t want to deal with the complicated pain and horror of that pesky ground combat in Iraq. “Denial,” she said, “is entrenched in our culture. We don’t want to be awakened from our sleep of acedia.”

Maybe we want to not care; in fact, we might even want to not care that we don’t care.

“Why bother?” we wonder.

She borrowed a phrase from Wordsworth, that we’re in a state of almost “savage torpor.”

Life bores us. And she quoted someone…Baudelaire, I think, saying, “Oh, how tired I am of the need to live 24 hours a day.”

She was speaking to a lot of writers in that room. She talked about the “tyranny of the blank page.” Later she called it the “democracy of the white page–every writer has to return there.”

I would add that bloggers can replace that with “blank screen.” The screen stares. The template taunts. Do we have anything to say? Each writer returns there and asks the same thing…unless, of course, she is plagued by acedia.

“What do writers need?” she asked rhetorically. “Not to stop.”

“We need ‘possibility,’” she said, then quoting Kierkegaard so quickly that I couldn’t get it down. So I jotted a few key words in order to Google it later, which I did, landing on this page of Kierkegaard quotes:

“If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of the potential, for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible. Pleasure disappoints, possibility never. And what wine is so sparkling, what so fragrant, what so intoxicating, as possibility!“

She claims that prayer and the reciting of psalms battle acedia.

Finally, she mentioned in passing a “Commonplace Book.”

Do you keep a Commonplace Book?

I think my blog has become something of an online, virtual Commonplace Book; in fact, I think many blogs are, given the description provided at Wikipedia. It says:

They were a way to compile knowledge, usually by writing information into books. They were essentially scrapbooks filled with items of every kind: medical recipes, quotes, letters, poems, tables of weights and measures, proverbs, prayers, legal formulas. Commonplaces were used by readers, writers, students, and humanists as an aid for remembering useful concepts or facts they had learned. Each commonplace book was unique to its creator’s particular interests.

This very post, in fact, is an act of “commonplacing,” as I record Norris’s quotations and reflect on them personally:

What is “Commonplacing” and what is a Commonplace Book? Commonplacing is the act of selecting important phrases, lines, and/or passages from texts and writing them down; the commonplace book is the notebook in which a reader has collected quotations from works s/he has read. Commonplace books can also include comments and notes from the reader; they are frequently indexed so that the reader can classify important themes and locate quotations related to particular topics or authors.

The commonplace book was always at hand as a conversational prompt…today, perhaps, it can serve as fodder for blog posts, articles, books, or good old-fashioned conversations.

Although I don’t want to add another notebook to my life, juggling it along with my Day-Timer and journal, I’m tempted to begin one for that purpose–to collect sayings and quotations that I can use as a conversational (or blog-versational) prompt. And then the blog itself serves as a more developed, refined version of the notebook.

That’s all I’ve got for Kathleen Norris.

Look for signs of acedia.

And tell me about what you use as a kind of Commonplace Book.

Is it your blog?

Do you weave quotes and facts into your journal or diary?

Do you jot down quotes on pieces of paper or 3X5 cards and toss them in a box?

Filed Under: blog, Blogger, blogging, books, creativity, lifelong learning, mind, reading, self-discovery, writer, writers Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Yann Martel on Life of Pi, Interpretation, Stillness, and Art

April 25, 2008 By 17 Comments

A couple of years ago, urged by a friend, I read Life of Pi, by Yann Martel.

It left me fascinated, and a little confused. I guess I’m not so good with obscure stuff. So I was quite interested that the Festival of Faith & Writing brought him to speak. Would he explain the book for the slow-of-brain?

The evening began with an amusing glitch. Martel was introduced by a woman who spoke slow…..ly………and………distinct……..ly.

With lots………of paus…….es.

I thought, “Whoa, this is going to be the longest introduction ever.”

She began:

“You may know…….Yann…..Martel…….from his second book…….The Life……of Pi.  In 2003……..The Life….of Pi….won the Man Booker….prize…..”

At this point, a fidgety Martel popped up from his chair and whispered in her ear. She turned toward him, but the mic picked up her voice whispering, “There’s no ‘the’?!”

He shook his head ‘No’ and sat back down.

She began again, “You may know….Yann…..Martel….”

He popped up and whispered again. She shook her head, as a huge, embarrassed smile spread across her face. She was, after all, a member of the Calvin College English Department. She would understand the importance of misplaced article adjectives and book titles.

She took a deep breath and began a third time. “You may know…..Yann….Martel…..from his third….book………..LIFE……of Pi. In 2003…LIFE of Pi….”

And so it went….just as slow and distinctly, but with a little humble humor thrown in to help us make it through. 

Yann Martel told a little about his childhood in Canada to help us understand where he’s from, and then hopped, skipped, and jumped up to the events preceding his decision to research and write Life of Pi.

Here are the tidbits I scribbled out:

“The creating of art is a lifelong endeavor, and I consider myself merely an apprentice.”

This statement reassures me as I wake up feeling poor and needy and immature at the craft of writing. I feel ever so slightly more comfortable scratching away at words and phrases, knowing it’s a lifelong endeavor. I shall learn and grow–and hopefully improve–with each attempt.

“Reading increases your experience of life–it give you more lives.”

I love this. Reading carries me away from my suburban cul-de-sac, off to other lands, and into the minds and hearts of other people. I enter their struggle, their conflict, and develop greater insight into the human condition, and compassion for people in other places and situations–people who are making different choices than I and are dealing with the consequences of those decisions. In reading, as in life, I seek to understand why people are who they are and do what they do.

He talked about his background as a Canadian growing up in an extremely secular culture, and how he shifted from being an atheist to being more open to the idea of faith in general. He said he started thinking about faith:  What is it? How do we experience it? What does it mean?

He said that when he was in India, he started thinking of the idea that would become Life of Pi.  To research it, he chose to explore three major religions.

And then, he proceeded to share his take on Life of Pi. “This is just one person’s reading of the book,” he said. “You may have a different understanding and conclusion. So. Here’s one person’s interpretation.”

It will take too long to type out and would ruin the story for you if you haven’t read it. So I’ll leave you hanging. But I feel satisfied to know at least one way of understanding Life of Pi. Whew!

I will, however, share another snippet–something to ponder and decide if you want to agree or argue his point. After he walked us through the storyline and his explanation, he said, “Life is an interpretation…you don’t have a choice of what will happen to you, but you do have freedom of interpreting it. And it makes all the difference in the world.”

During the Q&A time, someone asked about his blog, and he told about “What Is Stephen Harper Reading?” Stephen Harper is Prime Minister of Canada.

In 2007 Martel joined a group of artists who testified before Canada’s Parliament to try to increase funding for the arts (He explains it in detail here). As he was waiting to go in, he said he was thinking about stillness:

I was sitting in the Visitors’ Gallery of the House of Commons, I and forty-nine other artists from across Canada, fifty in all, and I got to thinking about stillness. To read a book, one must be still. To watch a concert, a play, a movie, to look at a painting, one must be still. Religion, too, makes use of stillness, notably with prayer and meditation.

Keep those thoughts of his in mind.

The fifty artists went in and presented the reasons that funding for the arts is essential for Canada as a country, but the leaders seemed disinterested. He said that Stephen Harper, the Prime Minister, tends to run Canada more like a business than a country, and sat unmoved throughout the short plea for support of the arts.

Martel could have responded in a lot of ways to the apparent disinterest. He decided to be positive, proactive, and clever. 

I pulled from the site the following explanation: 

The Prime Minister did not speak during our brief tribute, certainly not. I don’t think he even looked up. The snarling business of Question Period having just ended, he was shuffling papers. I tried to bring him close to me with my eyes.

Who is this man? What makes him tick? No doubt he is busy. No doubt he is deluded by that busyness. No doubt being Prime Minister fills his entire consideration and froths his sense of busied importance to the very brim. And no doubt he sounds and governs like one who cares little for the arts.

But he must have moments of stillness. And so this is what I propose to do: not to educate—that would be arrogant, less than that—to make suggestions to his stillness.

For as long as Stephen Harper is Prime Minister of Canada, I vow to send him every two weeks, mailed on a Monday, a book that has been known to expand stillness. That book will be inscribed and will be accompanied by a letter I will have written. I will faithfully report on every new book, every inscription, every letter, and any response I might get from the Prime Minister, on this website

I just love that. I love the care with which he is selecting great literature and writing a brief explanation of how it might enrich the Prime Minister’s life.

Martel said he has a few self-imposed rules for the book selection process. He chooses relatively short books, trying to respect the PM’s time (and, perhaps, his attention span). And I think with the exception of Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince), the books are all in English. I can’t remember why, because I think the PM is fluent in French.

Here is an excerpt from the first letter Martel sent accompanying the first book, which was Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Ilych.

I know you’re very busy, Mr. Harper. We’re all busy. Meditating monks in their cells are busy. That’s adult life, filled to the ceiling with things that need doing. (It seems only children and the elderly aren’t plagued by lack of time—and notice how they enjoy their books, how their lives fill their eyes.) But every person has a space next to where they sleep, whether a patch of pavement or a fine bedside table. In that space, at night, a book can glow. And in those moments of docile wakefulness, when we begin to let go of the day, then is the perfect time to pick up a book and be someone else, somewhere else, for a few minutes, a few pages, before we fall asleep. And there are other possibilities, too. Sherwood Anderson, the American writer best known for his collection of stories Winesburg, Ohio, wrote his first stories while commuting by train to work. Stephen King apparently never goes to his beloved baseball games without a book that he reads during breaks. So it’s a question of choice.

And I suggest you choose, just for a few minutes every day, to read The Death of Ivan Ilych.

I liked that Martel reminded the PM, as well as his Festival audience on that night he spoke, that reading can be done in short segments of time. Most of us sleep next to a nightstand of some sort. We can leave a book there and “in that space, at night, a book can glow,” as we read from it for five minutes at the end of a day. Even busy people can manage to read. He was, of course, preaching to the choir that night at Calvin College; but to Stephen Harper, he was being understanding and practical.

It’s also fun to scan the titles Martel has chosen along with a brief synopsis of each book. Martel includes his own personal opinion about why the book is great, and along the way, gently reminds the PM why literature matters–why art matters–and why stillness matters in the taking in of art.

 

Filed Under: blog, Blogger, blogging, books, change, creativity, lifelong learning, mind, reading, self-discovery, simplicity, slowing, writer, writers, writing Tagged With: , , , , ,

The Possibility of Possibility

April 24, 2008 By Leave a Comment

I marvel at the details several people have retained from their time at the Festival of Faith & Writing. They managed to capture every sight, sound, gesture, outfit, tone of voice, and numerous precise quotations in their notebooks and journals. Or perhaps they simply have a better memory. Some people are like that. I remember reading The Seven Storey Mountain and thinking, “How in the world does he remember the color of the wallpaper in a room he was in at age seven?” Same with Sting’s memoir. He drudged up all kinds of sensory detail from his childhood. Do they make it up, take good notes, or have a photographic memory?

Well, I don’t like making things up unless it’s truly fiction…apparently I take terrible notes….and I don’t have a photographic memory.

So my recollections at this point are sketchy at best.

If you want more details–if you want to feel as if you were there–visit the following blogs:

L.L. Barkat’s ”Seedlings in Stone” (at the bottom of this post, she lists the previous few that highlight earlier days at the festival, as well…and there’s an extremely flattering description of me that I shall cherish for all my days…that is, if I remember to write it down). 

Llama Mama was there, too. She reflects on the experience here, here, and here.

Starting with this post, Julana at “Life in the Slow Lane” will walk you through in remarkable detail the Festival experience including several sessions that I missed. I would have had to record the sessions to say so much about them. I need to get me some memory pills to boost my retention. I’ll make salmon for dinner tonight…more Omega-3s. Anyway, here’s what she recalled about Mary Gordon’s plenary address. Then she went to hear Luci Shaw, whom I missed, except now I feel like I was there. Then it was Mary Karr whom, again, I missed but feel that I lived vicariously through Julana’s memoir. And then, her experience of “The Reckoning,” a film presentation.

Claudia Mair Burney, who is busy with her own fiction projects, wrote one post–one very poignant post–about Franz Wright.

I may dig for others who are reflecting on their days at the Festival. But I thought I would amuse you with the sketchiest of sketchy notes that I scribbled out.

Honestly, I seem to have gleaned only sentence fragments with little to no context.

From Mary Gordon’s session that officially opened the festival (her words with quotation marks; my simple responses without):

“A person of faith lives in the possibility of possibility.” I wrote it down to think about. Kathleen Norris repeated the same idea in her session later.

Gordon also said that she feels that one of the most compelling passages in Scripture is the plea, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!”

Also, she said that “some things are only understood when pondered…We must look and think, and look and think, and look and think.”

How many people take time to look and think, and continue to look and think, and then look and think yet again?

That’s a lot of looking.

And thinking.

I want to look more, and think more, and Lord willing, truly comprehend.

That’s all. Gordon spoke for, oh, maybe 40 minutes, and that’s all I managed to write down.

Phyllis Tickle and Kathleen Norris both presented ideas that took some time to develop. Tickle talked about “Writing as Catechesis.” I think she was surprised when, after speaking, she asked, “You’ve all been catechized, haven’t you?”

Silence.

“What? How many of you have been catechized?”

Hardly a hand went up.

I wasn’t formally catechized, and I wondered how I would have responded to it, if I had been. She talked about how it was “in” her from her youth.

She used an extended analogy of how we as writers each morning pray–at least we’d better pray–and then go through the closet into a type of Narnia, entering something like an Eastern market with lots of colorful stalls where we’ll do our shopping for the day. We take a big basket and visit the various sellers making our selections–a metaphor here, and a strong verb there, and maybe something to boost our plotline over at the far stall. And then we squeeze back through the closet–through the knothole, she called it–with our full basket, hoping that we will be able to put it all together to prepare a palatable meal. Those of us who write as Christians are constantly in the process of saying, This stuff that I’ve brought back, does it fit with Truth? If it does, I must use it, for I worship a God who is Truth. If not, I must leave it out.

I like that idea of heading out each morning having prayed and asked the Lord to guide me into all Truth and then “shop” for the words and metaphors I need.

She said much more, but I didn’t capture it. Sorry. She’s so engaging and lively, I just got caught up in the discussion and stopped writing.

In another session, Scott Cairns and Kathleen Norris sat down to have a conversation. Here are snippets:

Norris: “When I found the monastery and started having personal retreats, I remember saying to one of the brothers, ‘Where have you been all my life?’ And the Benedictines can honestly say, ‘We’ve been here 1500 years…where have you been?”

Funny monk.

She described her experience of stumbling into the monastery as the opposite of blind luck. “I think of it as ‘blind grace,’” she said.

“In a world that changes so fast, there is stability in the morning and evening prayers,” she said. “It’s reassuring to know that they (the monks) did it yesterday, they’re doing it today, and they’ll do it again tomorrow.”

She also said, “The world is so narcissistic, but living and praying in community, the monastics know that it’s not about them.”

Norris, when responding to a question about the “theology of space,” said that Manhatten taught her about humanity. “There, I realized that if God loves all these people, I guess I have to, too.”

Dakota taught her about Creation, raw and bold.

She’s learning about caregiving for her mom in Honolulu.

And in the monastery, she says that the guest room offers a silence that “sinks into your bones. In that silence, you can really begin to see what to do next with your life…in that silence, possibilities open up…the scattered person becomes able to be quiet and be whole.”

She said that a documentary film about Trappist monks called “Into Great Silence” does a great job giving the viewer an idea of what life in a monastery is like.

I had to laugh at myself. When she said the title of the film, this is what I heard:

“Integrate Silence.”

It made enough sense that my mind didn’t question it. I just wrote it down. Then, because the girl to my left kept looking at my page, I glanced at hers and saw what she had written: “Into Great Silence.”

Oh.

Embarrassed, I scribbled out “Integrate Silence” and wrote the correct title in the middle of the page and drew a rectangle around it.

I wish I remember the question that preceded this answer from Scott Cairns:

“Be a praying people. Developing a rule of prayer, a habit of prayer, will protect you from all manner of delusion. If not, we’re doomed to error.”

And then Norris said, “I’m least faithful when I’m anxious or fearful.” It was tied in with the discussion on prayer, so I would assume that prayer is key for her to trust in the Lord and thus be more faithful to Him.

Cairns told a story about traveling to Mount Athos with his Greek Orthodox priest. A man came rushing up to them and asked the priest, “Do you know Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior?”

The priest paused. “No,” he said. ”I like to share Him!”

Those are snippets, and only snippets, that I preserved on the pages of a cheap, red, spiral notebook.

I’ll continue tapping out a few others in my next post…that is, if I’m not boring you.

If you prefer that I move on from literary snippets to other blog-worthy topics, I can show you a lovely photo essay I put together that will be my first ever (and probably only) cute shoe post. Oh, yes; I kid you not. I acquired a pair of tan-and-navy slipper-style spring shoes not long ago. You can judge the shoes’ cuteness, as they embark on a spring tour of our front yard.

Oh, how I love to skip around in the possibility of possibility!

From looking and thinking (and looking and thinking) to cute shoes, blogging offers up a blank template every morning, allowing us to dwell daily in the possibility of possibility.

Filed Under: blog, Blogger, blogging, books, creativity, lifelong learning, mind, reading, writer, writers, writing Tagged With: , , , , , ,

You. Are. Blessed.

April 22, 2008 By Leave a Comment

During the festival, I spent time with several single people. I was walking with one of them to a lecture and mentioned that I was blogging. He said that some friends of his were bloggers, as well. I asked if they had a particular topic that they focused on, or if they just wrote about life.

He said that one of them was married, and she and her husband were trying to have a baby. Her blog, he said, chronicled that difficult journey. Then he turned to me. “You have kids?”

“Yes, I have four.”

“Four kids?”

I nodded and mumbled an affirmative sound. “Mmhm. Four.”

We continued walking, and after a pause, he said. “You’re blessed, you know.”

I nodded.

After a few more steps, slowing our pace, he said, “You’re really blessed, you know that?”

I nodded again. “Sure. I know that.”

My response, evidently, wasn’t convincing. Perhaps I didn’t sound like I believed it strongly enough in that moment. He actually stopped, stood in front of me, and looked straight into my eyes. “Listen to me, Ann…you’ve got to realize…You. Are. Blessed. You are! You’re blessed!”

This time, I felt almost a power of blessing surge from one believer to another. Maybe sometimes we need someone to shake us up a bit, to help us realize all that we have, all the good in our lives, the things we might be taking for granted. “I am!” I responded with renewed energy. “I’m blessed!”

He seemed satisfied. This time, he was the one who merely nodded. “Good,” he said. ”Good. Well, it was great seeing you. Have a great time tonight!”

I was still feeling the depth of his message. I waved as he left to meet up with his friends, and I headed over to sit with someone else. As I passed through the doors of the auditorium, I was still smiling.

I. Am. Blessed.

The way I read the moment, he was referring in particular to my children in light of his friend who was struggling to conceive. But he didn’t say that, specifically; that’s where I went with it.

I have four children, and I was urged to grasp at that very moment the divine blessing that they are. I thought of each one of my four, one after another–not that I hadn’t been thinking of them throughout the festival, but this time I thought of each with a swelling gratitude. And The Belgian Wonder. I assume that my friend, being single, meant him, too. And I thought of all the things The Belgian Wonder was doing back home so that I could be at this event. His support. Faithfulness. Love.

Then I thought, you know, there are so many things. I’m blessed in so many ways. I could make the list, the One Thousand Gifts and more.

I. Am. Blessed.

And then I thought how each one of us needs someone to take hold of our arm, look us in the eye, and get through to us, deep into our hearts.

You. Are. Blessed.

You are.

You’re blessed.

When he said that to me, his urgent message was full of love, almost pastoral in tone. As he moved on, I felt as if I’d received a blessing.

Can we minister to each other that way? Can we bless each other? Can I get through to you, as he did to me, and pass it on?

I don’t know. I don’t know how a few words tapped onto a screen could somehow carry that insistence or travel deep into your heart and soul, but I want you to know that you’re blessed.

Do you know that?

You’ve got to realize–you are!

You. Are. Blessed.

Filed Under: blog, Blogger, blogging, children, family, motherhood, parenting, self-discovery, Uncategorized, worship, writer, writers, writing Tagged With: ,

(First, a long introduction, then…) Monday FunDay–Do Something Creative

April 21, 2008 By Leave a Comment

No one was around when my friend dropped me off at home yesterday after the long drive from Grand Rapids. My family was at a soccer match. The house was empty.

I dropped my suitcase not far from the back door.

Got a drink of water.

Climbed up the stairs to my bedroom.

Flipped back the covers (The Belgian Wonder had made the bed, people–am I not blessed?) and flopped onto the bed.

I slept.

When I awoke an hour later, I wondered, Was the Festival of Faith & Writing just a dream? 

As I threw a load of laundry in the washer and scrubbed the bathroom sinks, I thought about the people I met.

Except for my actual acquaintances and friends–Brent Bill, L., and Jim Poole, for example–I doubt if the people in the photos that I posted yesterday will remember me personally. They were simply gracious enough to pose for a snapshot with an admiring fan. Elizabeth Berg probably didn’t even realize I was leaning next to her. She was appropriately focused on the person whose book she was signing. She may have been trying to ignore me!

The festival high is fading even more this morning, as I was jolted into reentry by a clogged toilet. Nothing as raw and humbling as a clogged toilet to yank a person back to real life. Plunging will ground you.

Real life. Where macaroni-and-cheese is dished up, pans are rinsed, and outside, pops of yellow dot the spring-greening yard–I came home to spot the first dandelions of the season.

Here, in real life, is where The Boy leaped out of the car, rushed to me, threw out his arms and squeezed me, leaning firmly against my legs for a full minute-and-a-half.

Real life is where stories of soccer matches won…and lost…are told and retold. It’s where birthday parties are planned. Where little boys sing bedtime songs with their mothers, and say, “It’s good to be with you again.”

I’m home.

And it feels like this is all I have left from three days of literary bliss:

This stack represents the tiniest fraction of authors who were there. These are only the books that I own or happen to have checked out of the library before I left.

Working my way from the bottom of this stack up, I have to assume that Francine Rivers has flown home to California to keep working on whatever book she’s on. Kathleen Norris, whom I couldn’t bring myself to do anything silly around, has likely returned to South Dakota or maybe to New York, to work out the final details on the galleys of her forthcoming book or speak somewhere. Elizabeth Berg is on a mind-boggling book tour, with almost nonstop appearances across the nation. Deb Rienstra, a Calvin professor, may be teaching writing students this morning with renewed enthusiasm for pouring vision into them of writing as art. Phyllis Tickle, according to her website, is at this very moment–even as I type–speaking at The Associated Press Annual Meeting, giving the Keynote Address during their luncheon in Dallas, Texas. Claudia, though she wasn’t a speaker at the Festival (but I had her book to place on the stack) is probably working on the novel she described to us when we were sitting in the comfy chairs. L.L. Barkat (also not a speaker, but I have her book) appears to be back home, processing her experiences and posting them on her blog. And finally, Cindy Crosby, I would assume, is back home being contemplative, finishing up a book she mentioned she was working on.

And I’m plunging the toilet.

On Mondays, I host Monday FunDay, a carnival dedicated to swapping simple, amusing–maybe even silly–everyday ways you enjoy good, clean fun. I do this so that we don’t all wallow in that “rainy days and Mondays” quagmire.

To participate in Monday FunDay, just post a story, idea, or explanation at your blog of how you and/or your family has livened up Mondays (or any day).

Monday FunDay

Then link up via Mr. Linky below (if you don’t have a blog, simply explain your idea in the comments) and we’ll collect all the ideas in one place. Again, please remember: ideas must be squeaky-clean, family-friendly fun.

First, here’s Ann’s Family-Friendly, Post-Festival Monday Fun idea this week:

Do Something Creative Every Day

 Shauna Niequist, the perky young author I met on the first day, read an essay from her book Cold Tangerines. In it, she said, “Do something creative every day.”

Sometimes it’s good to have someone say this to us. We can say it to ourselves, “I am going to wake up and do something creative today.” But sometimes it’s more effective to hear it from an outside source. It seems more urgent, more important and valuable. When someone else insists, “Do something creative every day,” the investment of time and energy seems worth it. We can take the risk. We can act on it. We can make a list of things we love to do–dance, sing, paint, write–and go do it.

A while ago, I posted about digging up and dusting off long-lost creative interests. Perhaps that post, “How the Cuckoo Found Its Voice,” will inspire you to pull out some old cross-stitch kit or tap out a little tune on the dusty piano keys.

Or perhaps some words from Shauna will inspire you. I found this lengthy passage typed out on someone else’s blog (thanks, Ashley, whoever you are, for sharing this excerpt):

Art slips past our brains straight into our bellies. It weaves itself into our thoughts and feelings and the open spaces in our souls, and it allows us to live more and say more and feel more. Great art says the things we wished someone would say out loud, the things we wish we could say out loud.

It matters, art does, so deeply. It’s one of the noblest things, because it can make us better, and one of the scariest things, because it comes from such a deep place inside of us. There’s nothing scarier than that moment when you sing the song for the very first time, for your roommate or your wife, or when you let someone see the painting, and there are a few very long silent moments when they haven’t yet said what they think of it, and in those few moments, time stops and you quit painting, you quit singing forever, in your head, because it’s so fearful and vulnerable, and then someone says, essentially, thank you and keep going, and your breath releases, and you take back everything you said in your head about never painting again, about never singing again, and at least for that moment, you feel like you did what you came to do, in a cosmic, very big sense.

I know that life is busy and hard, and that there’s crushing pressure to just settle down and get a real job and khaki pants and a haircut. But don’t. Please don’t. Please keep believing that life can be better, brighter, broader, because of the art that you make. Please keep demonstrating the courage that it takes to swim upstream in a world that prefers putting away for retirement to putting pen to paper, that chooses practicality over poetry, that values you more for going to the gym than going to the deepest places in your soul. Please keep making art for people like me, people who need the magic and imagination and honesty of great art to make the day-to-day world a little more bearable.

And if, for whatever reason, you’ve stopped — stopped believing in your voice, stopped fighting to find the time — start today. Do that. Do something creative every day, even if you work in a cubicle, even if you have a newborn, even if someone told you a long time ago that you’re not an artist, or you can’t sing, or you have nothing to say. Those people are bad people, and liars, and we hope they develop adult-onset acne really bad. Everyone has something to say. Everyone. Because everyone, every person was made by God, in the image of God. If he is a creator, and in fact he is, then we are creators, and no one, not a bad seventh grade English teacher or a harsh critic or jealous competitor, can take that away from you.

So to all the secret writers, late-night painters, would-be singers, lapsed and scared artists of every stripe, dig out your paintbrush, or your flute, or your dancing shoes. Pull out your camera or your computer or your pottery wheel. Today, tonight, after the kids are in bed or when your homework is done, or instead of one more video game or magazine, create something, anything.

Pick up a needle and thread, and stitch together something particular and honest and beautiful, because we need it. I need it.

Thank you, and keep going.

Do something creative today. Not only might it be fun, but your efforts make the world, as Shauna says, a little “better, brighter, broader.”

Do something creative today, this Monday, and all week.

Every day. 

 

Instructions for the WordPress Mr. Linky (which is different than the ones you’ll see on WFMW and other Typepad or Blogspot blogs):

1. Write your post. Type up your Monday FunDay edition and post it at your blog.

2. Come back to this post and click on Mr. Linky. A window will pop up.

3. Type in your name (or blog name) and if you like, you can include a short “teaser” for your idea in parenthesis. Something like this:

Ann K (do something creative)

3. Paste in your url. Below the spot for your name, there’s another for the url of your own post. Copy the url for your own Monday FunDay and paste it in (including the http:// part of it).

4. Press Enter. That’s it! It should be saved by Mr. Linky.

5. Link back. Please link back to my blog here. It’s nice for people to find their way to home base and see all the fun.

To see what others have posted, click on Mr. Linky and pay a visit to the fun bloggers who have joined in!

It’s fun to have fun, but you have to know how!

[Check out previous Monday FunDays]

Filed Under: books, change, creativity, family, home, lifelong learning, motherhood, parenting, reading, self-discovery, taking risks, writer, writers, writing Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Connections and Conclusions

April 19, 2008 By 19 Comments

As I stepped into the room where Phyllis Tickle was speaking, our eyes met and, in her words later, “I jumped! Did you see me jump?”

She remembered. She remembered the transatlantic flight we shared in 2005, and the descent that led to my child’s airsickness. She remembered The Belgian Wonder and I mopping up vomit as the plane landed. She remembered handing me a paper towel, and how, when I turned around to thank the kind stranger, I realized it was her and exclaimed, “You’re Phyllis Tickle!” She remembered saying, “Why, yes, I am! You look familiar…how do I know you?” I explained that I met her at a writing event, and I reminded her of something stupid I said, and she remembered that, too.

And she remembered how I introduced The Belgian Wonder to her, and how he thoughtfully didn’t extend his vomit-y hand to shake hers. She remembered how I totally abandoned him to the cleanup to continue talking with Phyllis and find out why she was on the same flight from Belgium. I was so focused on my kids for the six- or seven-hour flight that I never bothered to turn around. She was one row behind me the entire time.

And so after her talk yesterday, we had a big laugh reconnecting and remembering.

And, of course, cheesy-me, I asked someone to take our photo:

That whole airsickness incident reminds me to take a tip from the world of advertising and marketing: if you want someone to remember you, even bad press is good press. So do something memorable, or don’t feel bad if something memorable happens.

When I was sitting through Phyllis’s presentation, I scribbled a quote that stood out–and it wasn’t even the point of her talk: Some writers “are learning to say very well…nothing.” About the only application that kind of writing might work for is ad copy, she said, or on the Web.

I thought about blogging. I hope to learn to say things very well. But I hope to use any skill I may acquire to say something meaningful, not “nothing.” It’s a good warning; a reminder to merge craft and content, or, to have content with craftsmanship, or something like that. She didn’t say all that–that’s me chewing on her one thought.

The title of her talk was “Writing as Catechesis.” It’s too hard to explain briefly, so I’ll just type out her description from the information packet and let you ponder it:

“Writers of all stripes have claimed to write for discovery, yet religious writers, according to Tickle, write to discover what they believe as well as what they think, making writing the ultimate catechesis.”

After her message, as I waited to go up and get my photo taken, I glanced to my left. Two chairs down from me sat Christian authors Lisa Samson and Claudia Mair Burney!

I recognized them from their blogs. I’d clicked over there from this blog or that blog. Who knows how we arrive at places on this crazy World Wide Web, eh? Anyway, I recognized their faces and names, and decided once again to be a bold attendee. I stuck out my hand and said, “Hi there! I recognize you both from online…would you mind if I took your picture and put it on my blog?”

“Of course not!”

As I introduced myself to Claudia, I mentioned someone that I was pretty sure she knew, Don Pape, and I mentioned that I was working on a book for David C Cook, where Don is Trade Book Publisher, and she said, “Don’s my buddy! And I just came out with a book with David C Cook!” She held it out. It’s called Zora & Nicky: A Novel in Black and White. Then, she handed it to me. “Here,” she said. “I want you to have this.”

“What? No! No, I can buy a copy.”

“No, I want you to have it. Here.” She put it in my hands.

“But…well…Thank you. Thank you so much.”

So congratulations, Claudia, on the book’s release. And thank you again. I can’t wait to read it!

And then I got to talk with Lisa Samson, and she’s a bright, lively, fun author who has written a lot of Christian fiction and just came out with a book called Embrace Me.

Congratulations, Lisa, for the book’s release!

After chatting for a moment or two about publishing, they introduced me to someone else. It turns out that she’s the Executive Director of the Christy Awards, Donna Kehoe. I said hello, chatted about nothing too memorable, nor did anything memorable happen–no kids around to produce vomit–and I think it was Donna who offered to take a picture of Claudia and Lisa that had me in it, too.

Then I excused myself to go get that snapshot with Phyllis.

Later that afternoon I was passing through the little campus hangout, making a beeline for a booth where I planned to unpack my bag and write, and there sat Claudia in a comfy chair, eating some yogurt.

“Ann!” she called out. “Pull up a chair and join us!”

“Oh, no, no, I don’t want to intrude on your gathering. You should feel free to sit here and talk shop.”

“You aren’t intruding–I’m inviting you. And we aren’t going to be talking shop, or if we do, you can hear it, too. Sit down. Pull up that chair.”

So, unsure what the others would think, I set down my bag and pulled up a chair. Then Lisa Samson came over along with Donna Kehoe, and then another author named Cindy Crosby came over. They introduced her to the group as well. They’re all so warm, welcoming, and gracious. The world felt all rosy and soft-focus as I listened to them tell funny stories and explain the plots for their next book projects. 

The funny little “small world” thing about Cindy Crosby is that she grew up in the next town over from where I grew up, and her dad owned the Christian bookstore just around the corner from where my mom worked. I used to walk there with just a little bit of change jingling in my pocket. I’d look at all the book titles and study the pamphlets. Every once in a while, I’d buy a little pamphlet, because that would be all I could afford with my change. But one time, I saved up enough to buy my first Bible with my own money. My parents would have bought it for me, but I wanted it to be all my own, and somehow purchasing it must have been key to that in my mind. Cindy’s dad tried to talk me into an NIV or NASB, but I had it in my head that I needed a KJV. I think I was about 12 years old. So I made my final selection: a King James bound with inexpensive burgundy leather. Her dad did succeed in talking me into getting my name stamped on it in gold. I think he understood how personal it was, and convinced me that my name in gold would solidify the deal.

Later, with birthday money from my aunt, and because I was having a little trouble understanding the King James, I bought my second Bible from him–a copy of The Living Bible with a kind of puffy green hardcover binding.

Anyway, I took a terrible, terrible self-snapped shot of Cindy and me, but I’m including it because Cindy looks okay. I’m the one who looks terrible, and I’m okay with that:

Apparently, I am so tired, I’ve decided to take a nap on Cindy’s shoulder. 

Or, rather, I need a little coaching in how to take self-snappers.

Anyway, Cindy is author of several books, including By Willoway Brook. She doesn’t have a website, but you can do an Amazon search on her name to pull up her titles.

I lunched with L.L. Barkat, who wrote the newly released Stone Crossings (Congratulations again!), and we had a great conversation about writing and blogging.

“I wish there were some fun way to get a picture of us together that I could post on my blog,” I said, “that would still respect your privacy.”

And then, as we shifted our feet, inspiration hit her.

“I know!”

And that was the only moment during the festival that I regretted wearing my sensible walking shoes. Mine are on the left, and I can see now that they are probably far, far too sensible…scuffed…worn…a disgrace…unsightly and unstylish.

Okay, maybe they aren’t that bad.

Then again, maybe they are.

People, if you ever meet L.L. Barkat, pray that you shined your shoes that morning. This is her new thing. I ran into her later, and she said she got a nice shot of her shoes next to Ed Gilbreath’s.

I said one time that my blog might never be popular, because I’ve never once written about cute shoes.

Now that you’ve actually seen my shoes, I’m certain that I’ve just secured my mama blogosphere death sentence.

Sigh.

Any recommendations on a fairly comfortable pair of stylish black shoes I might shop for when I return home?

Here’s a shot of my new friend L., who wishes to remain unnamed, when we were sitting in an auditorium waiting for Yann Martel to speak. He’s the author of Life of Pi and maintains a blog called “What is Stephen Harper Reading.” He explains the reason for the blog and what he does here.

Then I met two charming festival attendees–Eileen Button and Nadyne Parr–at Elizabeth Berg’s lecture.

We ended up walking together to Elizabeth’s book signing, so I just stood in line with them in order to continue the conversation. I didn’t have a book of Elizabeth’s for her to sign, but I thought it might be fun to get a picture, because I was just thinking of you all so much and wanting to share everything with you. Really.

So there I was at the table, and her sweet husband said, “No flash,” because Elizabeth has an eye condition. So we turned off the flash, and Nadyne snapped this picture that will prove to the world what an intimate friendship I’ve forged with Elizabeth Berg.

You can see for yourself the rich interaction we were enjoying and what a surprising connection we made in such a short time.

Right. Well.

I had two more favorite moments. One was when I ran into a dear friend at the very end of the conference, just before heading to Katherine Paterson’s lecture. I was with Nadyne, and she snapped this picture of my happy reunion with Jim Poole.

In addition to being very tall, my friend Jim is a talented actor, video producer, and writer, but he will be most familiar to you as the voice of Scooter in the VeggieTales productions. That’s the vegetable with the Scottish brogue. We have a sing-along CD with “I Can Be Your Friend” on it, and I always jump in and sing along with Jim, imitating his accent, “Aye, that’s why we’ve got feelin’s that are verrrry (roll the “r”) much the same!”

Too bad I didn’t run into Jim sooner, as he managed to get himself known by several of the “names” at the event–he’s endearing and easy to know, so one of his new BFFs (Scott Cairns, maybe or Jeffrey Overstreet) invited him to the evening reception where all the authors were sipping colas and eating hors d’oeuvres. Before I ran into Jim, I peeked and saw them all mingling. It was a grown-up-writers’ party to which I was not invited…but…apparently Jim could have gotten me in.

Life just didn’t time out quite right, however, and I wasn’t able to nibble triangles of chicken quesadilla next to Kathleen Norris and Scott Cairns. I wouldn’t have known what to say anyway. I would have been tongue tied, and if I managed to think of something to say, I would have said it with tortilla blobs stuck in my teeth.

Memorable.

My other favorite moment happened this afternoon. Ever since I saw the comment from Monica at Paper Bridges (formerly “Books Are My Friends”) that she wished she could sit in on a session with Rob Bell, I had this idea…I wasn’t sure if I should try it. I mean, I knew it would be goofy and borderline junior-highish. I waffled.

Then I just did it.

I walked up to Rob after his session. “Hi, I’m Ann Kroeker,” I said, holding out my hand to shake his. “I really enjoyed your talk just now (he said thanks), but what I wanted to ask is a favor. A friend of mine couldn’t be here, but really wanted to see you most of all. And so I was just wondering if I could get a picture of you with this and put it on my blog.”

He grinned really big, nodded, took the piece of paper, and I snapped this:

 

And this, my friends, is an example not only of how to do something so memorable so that you might be remembered for your silliness, but also of why you want to make friends with a blogger. You never know when she’ll be thinking of you.

Filed Under: blog, Blogger, blogging, books, change, creativity, reading, taking risks, Uncategorized, writer, writers, writing Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Festival Friends

April 19, 2008 By Leave a Comment

I rode up with a friend of mine, but she wasn’t attending the festival. She’s visiting her sister here in Grand Rapids. Another friend of hers was going to be at the festival, but I’d never met the friend of my friend.

What I’m trying to say is that I came alone.

And a mom of four doesn’t go places alone very often.

So as I rode the shuttle bus from the hotel to the college on that first morning, I felt I was forgetting something. I’d pat my backpack to be sure I could feel my cell phone in the front pocket.

Check. 

I’d stick my hand in my front pocket to be sure my room key was in there.

Check.

Camera?

Check.

Campus maps?

Check.

Water bottle? Laptop? Wallet? Check. Check. Check.

Then it occurred to me:

Kids?

uh oh….where are the kids? Oh, that’s right. I’m alone.

Friends?

Nope.

I’m kidless and girlfriendless.

The nice couple riding next to me on the bus struck up a conversation with me, asking if I was here with a group, and I had to say, “No, I’m here alone. I know just three people here on campus. Two people who work here, and their son, a student. That’s it.”

The bus lurched as it made a cumbersome turn to the right onto the campus. Just at that moment, I looked out the front windshield and saw the son, walking along the sidewalk! I waved my arms and tried to catch his eye, but he didn’t see me.

Andrea commented on my last post, saying that L.L. Barkat would be here. I’ve visited her blog and noticed her comments here and there on the blogosphere. I’d read something she wrote and think, ”Ohhhh….she’s so insightful.” But I didn’t know her at all.

Then I got it in my head that it would be fun to meet her in person. Plus, she has just published a book, so that would be fun to celebrate with her! Her first book, entitled Stone Crossings, was just released April 1st. But how could I meet her? There’s no photo of her on her blog, so I had no idea what she looks like.

I stopped by the InterVarsity Press table in the vendors’ area and bought a copy of the book. As I signed my receipt, I asked one of the ladies there, “Have you ever seen this author?”

“Yes.”

“What does she look like?”

They told me her hair color and did their best to add a distinguishing detail or two, so I started looking for someone who fit that description. I tried to read the nametags as I passed women with the correct hair color. It’s hard to do that without looking too weird. I gave up after a while.

The first events were readings from authors who were new to the festival. I glanced at the names, but didn’t recognize any of them. Shauna Niequist was one of them. I didn’t know anything about her except what was included in her short bio, but those few words caught my eye. I saw that she had been part of Willow Creek, though she’s in Michigan now. In my long-ago past, I spent many years road-tripping to Willow Creek to sit in on conferences and services, so I felt a tiny connection with Shauna–a Willow tie. Plus, her book title was Cold Tangerines and the cover was bold and, of course, orange. Could be fun, I thought.

Hardly anyone was there when I showed up just a few minutes before she was to begin. I sat just behind her. She looked at me, so I smiled and stuck out my hand.

“Hi! I’m Ann.”

“I’m Shauna. Pleased to meet you!”

“Nice to meet you, too–I see that you were involved with Willow Creek. Do you know…” and I listed some names. She knew them all. Two of them quite well. So I felt like I’d made a little connection.

“So you’re in Michigan now?” I asked.

“Yes, my husband is on staff with Mars Hill.”

“Oh, Wow!” I said. ”Well, I’m really looking forward to your reading!”

“Thank you,” she said. Then she went to the podium and opened her book. She read and interrupted herself to include spontaneous, endearing, witty commentary or disclaimers. She’s bright and intelligent, while remaining accessible and casual.

And as she continued to read and I picked up on some details, it slowly occurred to me…hey….wait…a…minute…

She said her son’s name was Henry, and I remember reading somewhere that….Bill Hybels’ grandson’s name….is….Henry…..

Oh, brother. I’m such a dope. This is no ordinary Willow Creeker.

Shauna is Bill Hybels’ daughter.

Thunk. That’s me hitting my forehead with the palm of my hand. Duh. Of course.

So I determined, like every true blogger, to snap a picture of us together so I could tell the story here. As soon as it was over, I got a little carried away. I couldn’t scoot past the people in the row next to me, so I spontaneously stepped up over the chair in front of me. So uncivilized.

But I did have someone snap a picture.

Here I am with Shauna, author of Cold Tangerines and cradle Willow Creeker.

Opening session with Mary Gordon, I’m up in the balcony. I look over and see a face and name I recognized from the Internet. I don’t know him personally, but I was just feeling bold and nutty. “I know you,” said, extended my hand. ”I’ve seen your name, at least, and I recognize your face from online….”

I introduced myself and asked if they would let me snap a photo. They humored me. I almost didn’t include it, though, because my photography was so terrible. But I told them I would. So here it is, over-exposed and out-of-focus.

J. Mark Bertrand and Christopher Fisher. That’s all the interaction I had with those guys. J. Mark Bertrand has a book that either just came out or is about to be released called Rethinking Worldview: Learning to Think, Live, and Speak in This World.

Then I chose to attend, ”Writing for Faithful Readers: Davis Bunn and Francine Rivers in Conversation.” This whole conversation format is nice enough, I guess. It’s personable. We get to know the person a little bit, maybe, but we don’t get a lot of content. I found myself wishing for more structure. These people didn’t prepare for those sessions–they just showed up. So I don’t have much to offer you in terms of quotable quotes.

Later, I was crossing the pedestrian bridge suspended above a four-lane road, not expecting anything in particular, when all of a sudden, Anna, from Hope Road, walked toward me saying, “You’re Ann! Ann Kroeker!” She recognized my face from my blog.

I squealed, I was so happy to see a familiar face. “Oh! You’re Anna! Oh, it’s so amazing to meet you in person!”

After I calmed down a little over meeting her, I asked who she was looking forward to seeing here. 

“I want to see Lisa McKay,” she said, and some others.

I decided to try taking a picture of the two of us, and I was laughing too hard and leaning weird. So I said, “Let’s get someone else to take it for us, shall we? (seeing someone coming my way) Excuse me, could you snap a picture of the two of us?”

It was Lisa McKay! The very person Anna wanted to meet! I didn’t know who she was, but it was especially fun for Anna. I thought the timing was uncanny.

So this picture of Anna and me was snapped by Lisa McKay.

I thanked Lisa and then, as I turned back to Anna to ask her another question, someone came up behind me and said my name.

It was a friend of mine, Quaker author B. Brent Bill. We met through a mutual friend at a writing event near home and have overlapped at several other writer-type gatherings. Brent is a kind and humble man who has written many books and just had yet another released through Paraclete Press called Sacred Compass.

Here’s the photo that Anna snapped of Brent and me.

Anna excused herself, suggesting that we try to meet up again for coffee. But I didn’t get a cell number, and I haven’t seen her since.

Brent and I chatted for a few minutes.

Then I saw someone approaching me who fit the L.L. Barkat description. I looked at the nametag.

Bingo!

She prefers no publically posted photos, and so to be on the safe side, I chose not to describe her in detail. So instead of presenting you with a snapshot of L.L. Barkat, here’s a snapshot that L.L. Barkat took of me in that same spot on that same pedestrian bridge.

That’s where I’ll stop, but there are more stories to come. I met more people and took a few more pictures.

So I came alone, but I’m meeting new people…and making a few new friends.

 

Filed Under: books, creativity, reading, Uncategorized, writer, writers, writing Tagged With: , , ,

Live, from Grand Rapids, it's the Festival of Faith and Writing!

April 16, 2008 By Leave a Comment

Approximately 2,000 writers, readers, editors, publishers, and assorted literary types are converging at Calvin College for the biennial Festival of Faith and Writing.

I’m here for the first time ever, to listen and take notes.

This event pulls together a wide range of authors–novelists, poets, essayists, memoirists–to present various thoughts on writing and faith. And editing. And reading critically. And how not to use sentence fragments…or maybe when it’s okay to use them. Like, maybe, in a casual blog post composed at midnight.

Oh, and there’s a discussion group on effective blogging, but it filled up and closed before I even knew I had to sign up. So I guess I’ll never know how effective I could have been….

The Bloggers Circle [CLOSED]

What are the challenges and pitfalls of good blogging? How much should you disclose about yourself and other people on a blog? How do you respond to critics? To what extent should blogging be descriptive, a kind of reporting, and to what extent should it be reflective and expressive of your own feelings and thoughts?

Anyway, if you’re interested, here’s the list of speakers.

I only knew a few, like Katherine Paterson, Kathleen Norris, Yann Martel, Haven Kimmel, Phyllis Tickle, Elizabeth Berg, Deb Rienstra, Rob Bell, Francine Rivers, and Luci Shaw. Maybe some others, too. You can see from this diverse group that this is not intended to be an exclusively Evangelical event–I think it’s encouraging a broader conversation of faith and writing at a literary level. A lot of these speakers not only have written books and won prizes, they also teach at prestigious universities. I hope I’m inspired and encouraged rather than overwhelmed by these brilliant minds expressing themselves.

Hopefully I can check in here at the blog. I’ll try to snap a few pictures of famous people. I’ve been known to say and do embarrassing things when I meet people I admire. I stepped on someone’s foot just before we were introduced, I’ve said really stupid things, and on one memorable occasion in 2005, I was riding on an airplane back from Belgium one row in front of Phyllis Tickle. The story involves airsickness. You can read about it here if you like. After all, there’s really no better way to spice up a story on the mamablogsophere than to include a little vomit vignette.

Anyway, if anything memorable happens should I happen to bump into Kathleen Norris or Katherine Paterson in the hallway or the ladies room, you’ll be the first to know.

Filed Under: blog, Blogger, blogging, lifelong learning, reading, travel, writer, writers, writing Tagged With: , ,