SOCIALIZING THE HEATHEN

Socializing the Heathen

In my Writing Your Memoirs group

I’ve been reading the 6,000 wd. chapter

Socializing the Heathen to the class. 

Last night, I remembered two old photos

that fit in here.

 That’s the way I like to

create a blog post.

Here’s the poem, constructed from

the book Chapter of the same name.

~ ~ ~

Socializing the Heathen

If there’s such a thing

as part tomboy, part romantic, 

then that’s what I’m turning out to be.

Every Christmas I can’t wait

to go next door to Lester’s house,

because he gets everything I want.

Pound-a-peg, which I practically wear out. 

Tinker Toys, Lincoln Logs, an Erector Set.

(Little Lester & Me c. 1946)

The Christmas Lester gets his B-B gun, 

I just about die to shoot it!

I never wanted anything so much in my life

except for a pair of cowboy boots

and a Flex-i-Racer,

neither of which I ever got.

Lester’s Daddy nails up a target

on the garage door

so I start being really nice 

to little Lester, so he’ll let me

load and shoot his B. B gun.

I even let him win at Chinese Checkers

and try hard not to be so bossy!

Like making him Sheriff once in a while, 

instead of always my Deputy.

Meanwhile, I continue to get presents

like a squinty-eyed Bi-Lo baby

wearing a long embroidered gown. 

Whatever can you do with a baby?

You can’t even pretend a baby can talk.

“Goo-Goo!” That’s all babies can say.

Not, “Stick ‘em up!!” 

stay tuned . . .

Entertaining Myself . . .

Entertaining Myself . . .

I often illustrate my journal writings

with drawings.

What I love is when I read the entries

a year later,

especially if I'm feeling low.

I just have to laugh

and it cheers me up!

I played tennis when I was in High School.

I've kept up with Wimbledon

 every year since.

It makes me so happy.

This is a photo of Pat Hicks and me,
(first two l.)

doubles winners in Atlanta High School Tournament.

So, now I'm back to the journal drawings . . .

"What I LOVE about being me,

 is never knowing

what I'll be doing next,

 like washing windows!"

This was a happy day!

I took photos of my sketch book

and made a slide show with my

Lonely Late Night Improv composition

behind it.

Yes, that's a happy YouTube video.

http://www.youtube.com/janamedrova#p/u/3/rV48pFQ7hhI

I love dressing my "cartoon" me in hats!

 One day I learned that my camera

took close-ups

and went around taking all kinds of

Fall garden photos
 and put another
musical composition
 behind it, too.
http://www.youtube.com/janamedrova#p/u/2/pRbSF44034I

I think I must celebrate

 making a new YouTube video

by dressing myself up!

Who else cares?

I love to sketch the things I love

like Jungle Growth potting mixture

made in Statham, GA.

And I NEVER have on a great hat

on a bad day, like this one

in which my back was killing me!

Lifting too many planters.

Yes, as an Only Child I had to learn how

to Entertain myself

stay tuned . . .

~ ~ 

IF I WERE A BIRD . . .

If I were a bird

 I’d be a mockingbird.

They perch atop the tallest tree

and sing their little heart out.

Not their own song,

but every other birds’ song.

This year, some mockingbirds built a nest

right above my chair on the deck. 

I felt so honored that they’d chosen

(photo from last Fall)

the overhead Kousa dogwood limb,

like they trust me. 

I could see the Mother bird feeding

her little birds, but they never cheeped,

so no predators would attack.

Soon they all left.

Still, it seemed like a good omen to me.

And that’s when my New Song started . . .

I had an incident of turmoil

and I had to get it out of my system

 It made me remember 

In my first creative writing class at 37,

I tried to write like Flannery O’Connor,

I was haunted by her style

by her short stories.

A Good Man Is Hard To Find

in particular, a line in which The Misfit said,

“I wisht I could’ve been there.”

This is the first verse.

I Wish I Could’ve Been There

Joseph built a table

Mary baked some bread,

I wish I could’ve been there

To hear what Jesus said.

I heard Leonard Cohen on PBS, recently

and I’d never heard him before,

And there it was . . .a style,

a way to put it all together.

So, I started composing the music

on the piano keyboard,

finding the right rhythm, the right tempo,

putting all those elements together.

It’s hard work, 

like those mockingbirds,

flying back and forth, back and forth

with stick after stick after stick.

I am building my song

with my note

 after note

  after note.

I am the mockingbird,

putting in an Allelulia or two,

like Leonard Cohen.

----

Allelulia . . . Allelulia.

I love it so much I’ve practiced up

so I can play the chords

on the Baby Martin guitar

I bought myself for Christmas.

Allelulia . . . Allelulia.

stay tuned . . .

----

Snippets of Creative Writing

Snippets of Creative Writing

I’m getting behind on posting our

snippets of creative writing.

It’s because I’m so tired from editing

my first i-movie from the poem

After An April Rain,

The photo of the napping Buddha is in the movie

I hope it’ll soon be up in the Video Bar (above)

It has sound effects!!

Water, thunder, rain, crickets and birds!

Also, I’m impassioned, right now,

I mean--

stirred up emotionally,

 in turmoil

with sad feelings & consternation.

It’s all being resolved, thank goodness,

by putting it in a new song:

I Wish I Could’ve Been There.

Turning to my Keyboard

is better than

booze, sex, Jesus, or rock & roll!

The music has a swingy banjo rhythm

like Cat Stevens’ music.

(more about it later when it’s finally recorded)

So, now, I’ve already forgotten what reading

our words came from last week,

but I did write them down!

offering, satisfaction, attached, listen, magenta, floor

She wrote:

the offering was simple

a magenta flower

cupped in small hands

eyes locked on the

linoleum floor

I touched her wrist

and she trembled

in her worn cotton

“Listen, your Daddy’s singing”

she tilted her head

as she watched 

the blossoms

float from her fingers.

~~~

I wrote:

She lay on the floor listening

to their hushed voices outside --

her sister Margie and Jake

coming home from the Prom.

Jake’s murmur of fear and satisfaction,

and a startled, “Oh!”

Was he offering her an engagement ring?

Would he take her away -- this sister

to whom she was so attached?

~ ~ ~

And this week she read from 

Maya Angelou’s Inaugural Poem,

On The Pulse Of Morning:

We’d both watched the Inauguration

that morning-- from different states, 

-- different states indeed, in 1992 --

She’d gone out and bought a copy.

I’d read it the next Fourth of July in church.

driving, personal, bliss, courtly, verge, out

I wrote:

He left such a personal message

on my garbled answering machine.

Personal, yet courtly, it seemed--

something about

the bliss he’d felt

when we were driving out

to the lake . . . and how

he was on the verge of something . . .

~ ~ ~

She wrote:

bliss sat very still

on the verge, the edge,

the precipice

of going home

a personal choice

no driving need

but, in or out?

she did not know.

~ ~ ~

A hosta blossom from the garden

 to end with,

like a yummy dessert!

stay tuned . . .

~ ~ ~