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[Final thoughts from Kim T. Griswell at the 2009 Highlights Foundation Writers Workshop at Chautauqua]
It was a dark and stormy day.
You arrived in a tempest
rain merging lake with sky
trees dodging the wind’s fist
lightning shocking your senses.
The inner mirrored the outer.
Your pulse quickened, gut churning,
emotions whirled like leaves torn green and raw from a trembling branch.
Bewildered and bedraggled—smelling a little too much like wet puppy—
you wobbled toward the Hall of Christ,
puddle-jumping till your knees nearly shattered
but it didn’t matter.
Even when you stepped on concrete
you got soaked to the ankles.
It was a dark and stormy day.
Stranded in the Detroit airport
you waited 2 or 4 or 6 or 8 hours—
you can’t remember exactly how long—
but it felt as if you’d been waiting a lifetime
butt gone numb
sitting on that blue plastic chair in the Detroit airport
(Or was it Chicago, or Denver, or Atlanta?)
By now, you’re not sure where you are.
You’ve had nothing to eat but some wilted lettuce
squashed between two slices of Sunbeam bread
and your Starbucks coffee has long since
gone cold and bitter in its cup.
And now, here you stand
steam rising off your hair
at the bottom of two flights of stairs
all alone
with a suitcase the size of C.S. Lewis’s wardrobe
[Yeah-you know. That wardrobe.]
the one you’d so eagerly packed last night
with every hope and dream you’d ever had about being a writer—a children’s writer—
and as you packed that case
your crisp white shirts felt like the pages of published books—your books.
But it is a dark and stormy day.
And now, here you stand
looking up, up, up those concrete stairs
and you know you’ll never make it to the top.
Your words will never be printed
hungry hands will never turn the pages of your books.
Today is not a sunshine blue-sky day on the easy road to publication.
Today is a dark and stormy day.
And then something happens
up there at the top of the stairs.
The double doors creak open on their rain-warped hinges.
A figure begins to emerge.
First the eyebrows—bushy and forbidding—
then the tip of a curious twitching nose
followed by a nametag the size of a toddler’s bib.
And all you can read through your rain and tear-soaked eyelashes
is a single word—a name—Kent
or maybe the name is Roger or Ben or Bethany or Kathleen or Tyler or Chris or Harold or Jo
but to you that word looks a whole lot like hope.
And you take a deep breath,
clasp the handle of C.S. Lewis’s wardrobe
and start tugging.
You have lugged these hopes and dreams around for a lifetime
and up there is the ark that’ll carry you out of this tempest
and friendly faces welcoming you
and no matter how many steps you have to climb,
you are getting on board.
Fellow writers, your Chautauqua week may not have been all smooth sailing
but each and every one of you has gotten your sea legs.
When you go back to your ordinary world
you may wibble and wobble trying to keep your balance,
but I know you will not fall.
You have proven to us—to yourself—that you have the courage
to be the hero of your own writer’s journey.
And for that—you—all of you—each and every one
deserve a round of applause.
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| Kim is a senior editor for Highlights, Inc. and works with the Highlights Foundation and Boyds Mills Press. She served as the coordinating editor of Highlights for six years and Highlights High Five for a year. Her work in the children’s literature field has spanned the worlds of publishing and teaching, leading her to positions as senior editor of Bookbag magazine, book development manager for The Mailbox Book Company, a university and community college instructor, and a teacher with the Institute of Children’s Literature. She holds master’s degrees in teaching writing and in literature from Humboldt State University. She has taught writing workshops across the country on such topics as Focusing Nonfiction, Mystery Writing, Creating a Sense of Place, Writing for Children’s Magazines, Nature as Muse, and The Hero’s Journey. A prolific writer and committed editor, Kim has published more than two hundred short stories, articles, and columns. Her books include Carnivorous Plants, Nonfiction Reading Practice (Grade 3), and many stories in the four-book series, Short Short Stories for Reading Aloud. In 2008, Kim was awarded a two-month writing residency at the Sitka Center for Arts and Ecology in Oregon. www.kimgriswell.com. |
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