A Matter of Words

For what it's worth (get it?) I am embarrassed by the fact that it has been over a year since I posted anything here. Why have a blog if one does not use it as a platform for expressing one's views? Have I not had anything to say in the course of a full year?

Of course I have. And I have said it, in bits and pieces, on social media, during speeches at Toastmasters, in articles or poems I have written, in a manuscript, in writing homework or exercises at the writers' group I enjoy monthly. I had quite a lot to say at my father's funeral. I've been in a few plays, which doesn't really count since what I had to say then was written by others. I have said even more during countless phone conversations. I have emailed. Texted. Written ACTUAL LETTERS AND CARDS -- I know, a dying art, but one I still think is important.

My point is ... we all have something to say. Not just the pundits. Not just the talking heads. Not just the celebrities and politicians. Currently I am teaching high school sophomores for a teacher on maternity leave. Most of them do not like the grammar portion of the curriculum. Why is this important? Because they have a story to tell. Their thoughts and views matter, so the way in which they express themselves both verbally and on paper matters.

Your story matters. Everyone's does. It has been my privilege to help others with their personal stories -- some factual memoirs, others the products of their imaginations -- and tidy things up a bit to the point that they were published. It is always challenging to get inside someone else's head and write (correctly) what he or she wanted to express. More on that in a bit.

One day in the mid-1980s I was standing in my kitchen -- a young mother of four who scarcely had time to eat some days, let alone write --  when my parents walked in with an IBM Selectric typewriter. My mother worked for a CPA firm that was upgrading its equipment; she had bought one of the old ones at a great price. I started crying. I had had, at that point and several years earlier, two or three things printed. I wrote something for the church bulletin. I kept a journal. But this incredible gift spoke volumes: We believe in you.

Some years later, but many, many years ago -- 1988, to be exact -- I attended a writers' conference in Arizona. I'd never been to one. I'd never been away from my family for that long, practically a week! I hesitate to say it was a life-changing experience, because the phrase raises  high expectations, but when I look back at that time, and what it eventually meant, I think the words are accurate. My life did indeed change because of the words of two men, Jamie Buckingham and David Manuel.

As a teenager, I had the privilege of hearing Jamie preach at his church in Melbourne, and when he would visit Fort Pierce, but his is a legacy that reaches many times around the globe -- he helped Corrie ten Boom write her story (Tramp for the Lord) and Kathryn Kuhlman's. He penned many humorous and insightful Christian books such as The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Make You Miserable. At the conference, one of the things that stuck with me was spoken to the entire group: "If I preach a good sermon on Sunday morning, I may impact a few hundred people. If I write a book, I can reach so many more." In his case, he reached millions more.

Jamie wrote 22 books of his own, and another 24 for others, among them Nicky Cruz's Run, Baby, Run was a cult classic of the Jesus Movement; Bill Nelson's Mission; and Jeannie C. Riley's From Harper Valley to the Mountaintop. He wrote other people's stories because they had something to say, but may not have been as gifted with the time, talent, or energy to put the words down on paper in a cohesive form. The world would have been poorer had he not been willing to not only put his own thoughts down, but those of others.

What the men said about ghostwriting, or as-told-to writing struck a chord: Everyone has a story to tell, but not everyone can write it. There aren't enough writers willing to share other people's stories.

I didn't know David Manuel prior to the conference, nor had I read any of his books (most notably The Light and the Glory which he wrote with Peter Marshall). But I was in his "group" at the conference. and I've never forgotten his encouragement.

The deal was this: conference attendees were asked to write a short story based on a few verses of scripture, intentionally narrow. They wanted to see what we would come up with, given very few parameters. Frankly, they didn't expect much, but the exercise would give them an idea of what they had to work with.

Somewhere around the beginning of the conference, they asked us why we were there. When it was my turn to answer, I said something along the lines of, "I love to write, but I'm not sure what I should do with it. Maybe I should write letters to the editor, or words of encouragement to others. Maybe I should try to be published. I'm here to find out." 

At the end of the conference, during one of the small group session, David Manuel remembered what I had said. "You wanted to know what to do, and now you do." He'd been surprised and pleased at my short story because it had taken a narrow verse or two and expanded into a real narrative with characters and layers, intrigue and romance. David Manuel, published author, liked what I had written!

That encouragement gave me the confidence to try harder, write more, take more chances, weather the inevitable rejections. A few years later, I was writing weekly newspaper columns for an editor who was equally as encouraging and instructive. More than once I was called into his office to discuss why something hadn't worked, but he was always constructive rather than dismissive. He was my first editor but also the first person to relate to me as a writer, period. He didn't know me, but he knew writing, he knew newspapers, and he knew how to manage people.

After a few years, other editors coming and going (not all as helpful as that first!), I was no longer writing regularly. Without a deadline, it's easy to let things slide. I started this blog. I wrote a book that did not, I'm afraid, make any bestseller lists (available as an e-book at smashwords.com though!). I wrote and illustrated a children's book (She-Bear in the Beautiful Garden). Guest columns. Started writing for a local group of magazines. Have a poetry blog, in addition to this one. Working on a fiction manuscript, guided by solid input from fellow writers. And now, occasionally editing other writers' books, telling someone else's story the way Jamie and David had encouraged.

Back to my point ... way up there, I know ... we all have something to say. If you write it down, the audience may grow. That's both a positive and a negative, as some politicians have found out -- there's real staying power to words. Negative writing can come back and bite you! But I have wonderful emails that I've kept for ten years, because they meant so much to me, and still do. I have cards and letters. Words matter.

Your words matter. It's a new year, writers (that would be, hopefully, everyone reading this). Write a comment on that report when you hand it back. Post something meaningful on Facebook. Tuck a note inside your child's lunchbox. Send a distant relative a card. Write to that inmate. Rant about something in a letter to the editor or (better still) publicly thank someone for a job well done. Write a poem. Jot down that story of something funny that happened in the service. Pour out your heart in anguish, retelling a time of grief or trauma (it will help, I promise you).

Maybe your writing will not be for a major publisher. Maybe your books won't reach the kind of audience Jamie Buckingham's did, but maybe they will! Your writing can impact someone. It can even, and perhaps especially, impact you in ways you might not imagine: changing you, growing you, softening you, honing your thoughts and ideas and dreams.

My sister sent me a card one time that had printed across the top: (don't forget     TO WRITE). Under it, in her own lovely handwriting, she'd added Please don't forget to write! There was more, but not a lot more. Her brief encouragement now has eight tiny holes from where it has been moved around the corkboard in my office and skewered with multiple pushpins years after it was given. Her words mattered then, and they matter now.

Words matter. Your words matter. So..... don't forget to write!