Today’s Inspiration:
Nothing much.
Today’s joy:
Meeting with our creativity group, but also taking a break from it for a while to come back, hopefully more refreshed, energized.
A past joy:
Sitting in the computer lab at school, writing plays. I wrote the one-act for my Intro to Theatre final, in 90 minutes. It was about 60 pages before I had to cut it down.
Today’s inspiration:
Today’s joy:
O’s and Mets completed wins within minutes of each other.
A past joy:
Taking pictures yesterday. I wasn’t all over the place, but in a lot of places, some good places. And it was great to be out, but not running errands, which is what I’ve been mostly doing when I’ve been out. It was good to be out and be creative again.
Today’s inspiration:
Our creativity group met tonight, instead of last night.
Today’s joy:
See above. Plus, working on an update blog post to an older blog post.
A past joy:
Making collages at church. Long story.
Today’s Inspiration:
Another good Saturday morning, informal meeting with the creativity circle.
Today’s joy:
Finished another scene in this play.
A past joy:
Finishing other plays. Typing “The End” is very satisfying. I should begin writing the last scenes first.
Today’s Inspiration:
During our creative circle, someone asked about what our expectations were in our creativity, our creative work. Whether we believed we lived in a world where we could be successful in our creative pursuits. I thought about it and realized I needed to come back to this question as well as many others.
Today’s joy:
Watching this evening’s O’s and Mets games online.
A past joy:
Listening to or watching baseball during a long road trip.
Today’s inspiration:
Today’s joy:
First time in a long time that I started a poem from a list. First time in a long time that I’ve started a poem at all.
A past joy:
Playing Uno all night on the porch.
In our creativity circle this morning, we talked about hiding. One of the members of the group talked about their background, how they were raised, their social circle, and how that contributed to them hiding. And they’ve been struggling with putting their work out there out of fear of being rejected by those people in their family and friend circle.
It really goes back to the question that Dr. Thema asks in that tweet.
It can be difficult. It can be messy. People get used to you being a certain kind of way with them and they don’t want to see you any other kind of way. And if you’re doing something new, something that’s out of the millieu in which you’ve existed with those people, they may not like it. They’re not ready to experience you in that way. Sometimes we go the opposite way and hide ourselves to avoid having to be that person in front of those people, which can cause unhappiness with you, since you know you’re not being yourself.
It’s an issue I’ve struggled mightily with. Even recently
So, it goes back to that question.
Today’s inspiration:
R&B and Soul music. Specifically, 80’s and 90’s R&B and Soul. The stuff I grew up listening to. I’ve been keeping a running list of essential 80’s and 90’s R&B and Soul love songs and writing from that list. I need to get back to my play-in-progress, but it was enjoyable spend all night listening to some of the music I love and writing.
Today’s joy:
I started writing as soon as I woke up this morning and spent as much time as I could, writing. No resistance, no writer’s block, nothing. That felt good. Plus, it feels like spring is close. By this time next week, it’ll be lighter longer, ushering in my favorite time of year.
A Past joy:
The chicken parm at Trattoria E Pizzeria Da Enrico in Columbia, Maryland, is still probably the best chicken parm I’ve ever had. When I was dating somebody out that way years ago and we’d order food, that was by far my favorite. I might roll out there and get carryout one of these days.
I wrote last night and this morning about some resistance I had to being vulnerable in my writing. And yet, by the time afternoon rolled around and I’d been inspired some, I was able to get down what I needed to get down. I’m on the fence about how much, if any of that stuff, I’m going to share here. I may later in the week after I’ve had some time to reread and edit some of it.
The poet Tiana Clark writing in the March/April 2021 issue of Poets and Writers about her process, and sometimes lack thereof, of writing during the pandemic, remarked about editors soliciting “Black pain from Black writers” in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd. At that time, she wasn’t sure she had much to add to the conversation, she wrote. After all, the killing of George Floyd was just the latest such killing in recent years and any Black writer suffering from fatigue from discussing the latest death of an African American at the hands of law enforcement, was understandable. One has to wonder how many times and in how many different ways you can frame this conversation.
Her response ended up being a turn in the opposite direction. She embraced “black joy and pleasure.”
After I read the essay, I had to ask myself and wonder where I had joy and pleasure in my own life. Especially during the pandemic. One place where, until recently, I had come up short was my writing. Participating in the online production of North Avenue was indeed a happy experience and yet, after that was done, I looked around and didn’t see that much joy. For one reason or another. I’d been in a play that ended just as the pandemic was starting. The first time in a long time that I’d been on stage. And when the world retreated and reorganized, I didn’t do the same as far as that goes.
The last couple of years, I’ve been involved with prayer circles where folks gather once weekly to talk about life and then pray for each other for a time. Last year, I’d considered the possibility of merging that practice of weekly prayer with creativity. I wanted to use it as a space not just for people to come together and “hold the high watch,” but to also be partners in support and accountability. We’d support each other in our creative pursuits and make sure that we were all holding to our own and each other’s word. I told my spiritual community what I was interested in doing and they were enthusiastic supporters. I wasn’t ready right when I had the idea, but it was definitely something I wanted to do in the future.
This year, the idea came back up and I told the group that I was ready.
Then I read the essay.
And thought about it.
And what I decided I wanted was not just a spiritual and creative practice, but one specifically centered around joy. I told the others who would be participating that this was the intention — not just to talk solely about what was going on in our lives and to ask for prayer around the parts we wanted to improve, but for us to consider where the joy is in our lives. Or can be. Where we’re inspired. And how we can be inspired in our work.
The others agreed to make these practices part of our journeys for this gathering. We’ve agreed to do the inner work and the outer work of making whatever it is that we claim we want to make, and to share it, daily.
I think it’s a necessary process. It’s good to keep focus. With all the death around, the fear and anger. Conspiracy theories. Half truths. Hard-to-swallow truths. Scarcity. It’s easy to become distracted and derailed from the creative process at this time, so it’s good to get focus back on practice and on those things that are life affirming and not just on all of the conditions of the world. It comes across as privilege at first, but it’s not. It’s paramount. And the conditions will still be there, ready to be picked up, chewed on, etc. later. It’s less about divorcing ourselves from the world as it is about giving ourselves a place where we can find and be our best selves –especially our creative selves– in the world, as the world is ongoing. As Tiana says, “blood and bruises from history or current events will always be present in my poems.”
Tiana also said that this year, she’s “trying to curate more joy into my life.”
I am, too.