Z is for Zee Leetle Grey Cells: Use Them - No One Else Is

"You should employ zee leetle grey cells."

~ Agatha Christie, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

Z

ee leetle grey cells, as Hercule Poirot called them.  In such sort supply these days.

Every time I indulge my social media addictions, I see some new insanity lying in a pool of their own vomit on the front page.

It makes me want to z-cream and then catch a few Zzzzs.

Because sometimes sleep is the only cure for all the crazy in the world.

Z is for Zany Zingers

Two words: Donald. Sterling. 

Oh, I’m sorry.  Did I blink at some creepy ass concrete angel and get sent back to the Jim Crow 1950s?? 

I don’t know what’s worse.  Him saying the incoherent and offensive things he said, or the Commentator Trolls who use what he said to defend the First Amendment.

Both raise my blood pressure.

Zee End of the Road

But hey.  I don’t want to end on a craZy note.

Especially since tomorrow is May 1^st and the start of National Mental Health Awareness Month and my own personal Mental Health blogathon.

Everyone, including Mr. Sterling, has walked a journey that we only see a part of.  Knowing what that journey has consisted of would help us understand a little of the why.  But it never excuses the what.

Image credit: Good ol' Google

Because in the end, we are free to say whatever we want, to whomever we want, and whenever we want.

But we should also be prepared to bear the consequences of those verbal choices.

Z’est pas?

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Did you make it through the entire challenge?  Are your fingers red with the blood of countless hours spent at the keyboard?  Congratulations!!  You did it!!!

Y is for Yoga or I Need a Nap!

A garden to walk in and immensity to dream in--what more could he ask? 

A few flowers at his feet and above him the stars.

~ Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

O

ne step away from glory and bragging rights, and I’m ready to just drop dead on my keyboard. 

So of course one of my work projects picks this specific time to implode and cause massive amounts of stress for both me and the team I support. 

Peachy.

If I ever needed the calming influence of meditation, it would be now.

Y is for Yoga

Recently, I read a study about the efficacy of naps and how taking one in the afternoon can boost your productivity at work.  I so need to print that out and give it to my super.

Although, napping at work has potential PR nightmare written all over it, so that’s a no go.

But meditation, well, that might be doable.  And I happen to have a yoga mat.  It generally only gets used when I see my acupressureist, but hey, it does get used.

On days like today, I’m reminded that it needs to be used more often.

Meditation without a Mat

A drink for the birds and the bees.
Image credit: M. D'Eigh

On Sunday, I watched my friend’s eight year old son and he was keen on going outside to work in the garden with me.  Not one to turn down energetic and delightfully snarky help, I handed him a shovel and let him dig his way to China ~ where China means compost.

It was the kind of beautiful day where everything is sharper ~ with a sky so blue it could send a weeping angel back in time.

As we dug in the dirt, threw out weeds, and said hello to various arachnids, butterflies, and creepy crawlies, J-boy leaned on his shovel and said, 

“Gardening is peaceful.”

And I thought, who needs a yoga mat when you have a carpet of lush, green grass?  Or a bed of soft, rich soil?  And the warmth of the sun on your back, and a gentle breeze to balance the temperature.

This peaceful contemplative feeling is a little more difficult to obtain when one is sitting at a desk, surrounded not by green growing things, but stressed out individuals and blah beige walls.

But perhaps then, meditation is two-fold: the being in your peaceful place (i.e. my garden) and then going to that place in your imagination when you can’t be there physically.

I wonder if they make living yoga mats with soft, Zoysia grass?

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Do you meditate?  Practice  yoga?  How do you de-stress at work?

X if for X-Ray: Your Words Pierce My Very Soul

Words can be like X-rays if you use them properly -- they’ll go through anything.

You read and you’re pierced.

~ Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

W

ords are dangerous. 

That’s why the First Amendment is, well, first.  The freedom to speak one’s mind is actually a guarantee of all freedoms. 

Because when you strip away that right, it keeps your enemy from stirring up support for the opposing side.

Words are powerful.  They have the power to reach the isolated, to inflame the broken-hearted, to comfort the wounded.

Words also have the power to hurt, to wound, to tear down. Especially words spoken to us in anger, frustration or stress.  And if those words are spoken to us in our formative years, they are likely to remain with you forever.

X is for X-ray: Words Pierce the Soul

That’s why it’s so important to respect words and to choose what we read and what we say, wisely.  Because they can even engender feelings in us that are not our own.  Or at least, they are not on the surface.

Now that's a book boyfriend!
Image Credit: Unknown, Google Search

Case in point, I just finished reading a book where the female protagonist goes through a vomit-inducing tornado of emotions.  I felt her agony, her moral qualms, the pain of her choices. 

My visceral reaction was a result of one part my NF personality, one part character identification, and one part the author’s talent with words.  Her weaving of the story and the emotions of the characters was masterful.

Don’t think it happens to you?

Think of the last news article or controversial Facebook status you read.  How did those innocuous little bunches of letters make you feel?  Upset?  Happy?  Pissed off?  Did you passionately deny, support, defend the ideas?

Or just shrug and read the next headline?

So remember the next time you read something:  what does the x-ray of those words you have said or heard reveal about your heart?

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Okay, maybe this post is a stretch for the Letter X.  “But you gotta admit, that’s sexier.”*

W is for Writing Challenges: Ready for Another Round!

Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not;

and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.

~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

I

must be a masochist. 

Only three more days to go in the A to Z Challenge and I’m prepping for another blogging challenge in May.

What can I say?  As much as I witch and moan, these challenges are a great training program for writers.  If you didn’t have a daily writing habit before, you do now.  The key is continuing the practice after the challenge has ended.

W is for Writing Challenges

Every writer is different.  Every blog is different. 

Maybe blogging every day isn’t your bag. 

Maybe you are a disciplined writing machine and don’t need to do another challenge.

But as for me and my Muse, we will blog challenge as long as we can.  It hones our writing muscles and forces us to write every day.

So I tooled around the ‘net looking for another blogging challenge.  30-Day, 26-Day, Once-a-Week ~ I didn’t care.  I just wanted community support, and enough structure to push me.

And I couldn’t find any.  At least not with the subject I was looking for.

Writing for a Cause 

Image credit: Bill Watterson

May is National Mental Health Month.  And mental illness is something I am very passionate about, but it seems I haven’t been as vocal about it.  I bought into the social stigma that still surrounds it.  No one is ashamed when they’re diagnosed with cancer or a heart condition.

Even HIV has managed to overcome its social pariah status.

But somehow, being diagnosed with bi-polar disorder, or depression, or schizophrenia is shameful. 

Don’t get me wrong.  I know we are more open and accepting of helping people who suffer from mental and emotional illness today than at any other time in history since the dawn of Freud's couch.  

But so much more needs to be done.

Working Together

One way to help raise awareness is to do a blog challenge with mental health as the theme.  So for the month of May, I’m going to blog five days a week ~ that’s 22 days ~ about Mental Health.

Now, I don’t mind doing this by myself.  But the more people who do this, the more awareness we can raise.  And the more support we have as writers. 

If you’d like to join me, please email me mdeigh (at) gmail (dot) com with your blog name/address and your email address.

Let’s hone our writing skills and shine a light in the darkness of mental illness at the same time.  You never know whose life you may touch.

Or save.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Are you doing another blog challenge after this one?

V is for Villanelle: Breaking Writer's Block with Poetry

Only the very weak-minded refuse to be influenced by literature and poetry.

~ Cassandra Clare

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

A

s it is still April, it is still National Poetry Month.  I highlighted one poet, Margaret Atwood, at the beginning of the month.

As we near the end of the challenge, let’s take a look at a form of poetry.

V is for Villanelle

The Villanelle is an interesting structure for poetry.

Poets.org describes it thus: 

The highly structured villanelle is a nineteen-line poem with two repeating rhymes and two refrains. The form is made up of five tercets followed by a quatrain. The first and third lines of the opening tercet are repeated alternately in the last lines of the succeeding stanzas; then in the final stanza, the refrain serves as the poem's two concluding lines.
 Using capitals for the refrains and lowercase letters for the rhymes, the form could be expressed as: A1 b A2 / a b A1 / a b A2 / a b A1 / a b A2 / a b A1 A2. 

Want to learn more?  Visit Poets.

Dylan Thomas was a master of the villanelle, as evidenced by his poem below (one of my favorites):

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

by Dylan Thomas

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Variety is the spice of a Writer’s Life

Poetry is a great way to wake up the Muse if she’s gone to sleep at the typewriter.  It forces you to really think about words, how they sound, how they fit and flow and dance. 

Poetry, especially in this form, makes you concentrate on structure and sound and emotional impact.  If you’re stuck in your writing, try composing a villanelle.

Muses eat that stuff up.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Have you ever written a poem in villanelle form?  Share it with us!

U is for Unforeseen vs. Unprepared

The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing, in so far as it stands ready against the accidental and the unforeseen, and is not apt to fall.

~ Marcus Aurelius

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

N

o matter how carefully you plan your trip, there is always a bend in the road.

Sometimes it seems like things happen out of the blue just to throw you off balance.

This is top most in my mind today because of a situation at work.  Our program was supposed to get something scheduled.  We were assured by the two individuals in charge of this particular project that the event was already scheduled.

Then at a meeting today, it was announced that we weren’t going to get the schedule we needed.  For a project with an already strained budget, this put us all over the edge.

U is for Unforeseen vs. Unprepared

My co-worker and I looked at each in stressed disbelief.  How could this have happened?  For weeks we were told, “Everything is fine. We’ve taken care of it, no need to worry; we've been in constant contact with our counterparts at X.”  

Now, you’re telling us that we've been blindsided?

Sometimes we plan and plan, and despite our best efforts, things fall apart.  We can’t foresee everything event, or envision every possible spanner that could be thrown into said works.

Although some personality types are really good at that.

But encountering an unforeseen event or circumstance is very different from going in completely unprepared.  The first is understandable and forgivable.  The second ~ not so much.

U is for Use it

As in, use both your brain and your team. Again, not everything can be accounted for.  But when working on a project, be it for a multi-million dollar contract, a cross-country trip, or the great American novel, you should have a plan. 

You don’t like structure.  I understand.  I’m not a huge fan myself ~ interrupts my Muse’s energy flow, man.

But I’m not saying you have to develop OCD and insert a steel rod in your glutes.  Unless your idea is to travel cross country in search of your place in the grand cosmos ~ in which case the point is to see what comes your way ~ a minimal amount of prep goes a long way towards keeping you on track to the successful completion of your project.

Even on that cross country search for meaning, you probably want to do some basic prep: at least one change of clothes; car maintenance, gas money, food.  It could mean the difference between reaching your destination safely and becoming some cop’s newest unsolved murder.

Or the loss of a contract, your boss's, and your team’s respect.

Or the death of a dream.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

How do you deal with an unforeseen hitch in your plans?

T is for Tenacity: How Hungry Are You?

I hated every minute of training, but I said, 'Don't quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion'.

~ Muhammad Ali

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

T

ime. There never seems to be enough of it.

Yet we still twenty-four hours in a day.  The same amount that Leonardo da Vinci had to work with.

As did Vincent Van Gogh.

John William Waterhouse.

Sylvia Plath.

Edith Wharton.

Albert Einstein.

T.S. Eliot.

J.R.R. Tolkien.

But perhaps they had something I do not.

T is for Tenacity

They had a grasp on at least three things that I struggle with, but all three can be summed up in one word:

Tenacity.

(A better word might be passion but that’s not a T word and today is brought to us by the letter T.)

Tenacity means that no matter what, you follow your dream.  You stick it out.  You endure the highs, the lows, and the very boring in-betweens.

It means that you manage your time wisely (the second ingredient) and that your daily tasks and goals match up to your dream. 

New growth on a burnt tree after
Australian brush fire.
Image Credit: Marc Anderson

Tenacity is honing your craft, becoming even better at it, even when you’re tired from your day job.  A writer once said, “I hate writing.  I love having written.”  That sentiment applies to any dream we may have. 

We may hate the training, the clean-up, the grunge work that goes into realizing any dream.  We love the dream already fulfilled.

T is for Term: The Long and Short of It

Too often, we focus on the short-term benefits of an action or in-action.  We forget to look at the big picture and the long term effects ~ be they good or bad.  

We have to know where the end point is, what we’re working towards, in order to make better, wiser choices about our dreams.

As an E/INFP, I tend the opposite direction: I see the big picture and intuit how to get there, but sometimes miss the little details that could make the path a smoother one.  I see the end and say, “I want be there!” or “I want to do that!”  and…never get off the ground. 

I’m a 747 that has the ability, the strength, and the knowledgeable pilot to get to my destination, but I forgot to put gas in the tank.

There has to be balance.  Virtue is found in the mean, not the extreme.  Keep the end in sight, but also follow the steps carefully to get there.  Otherwise, you’ll get side-tracked and never make it to your destination.

How much do you really want that dream to come true?  How hungry are you?  How passionate are you?

How much are you willing to bleed for your dreams?

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

As a “Perceiver” these structured things really kill me.  But I know they’re sometimes a necessary evil to reaching a goal.  What motivates you?

S is for Sustainable: Happy Earth Day!

Here is your country. Cherish these natural wonders, cherish the natural resources, cherish the history and romance as a sacred heritage, for your children and your children's children. Do not let selfish men or greedy interests skin your country of its beauty, its riches or its romance.

~ Theodore Roosevelt

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

H

appy Earth Day!

I’ve been gardening seriously for a couple of years now, dedicated to being organic and as sustainable as possible.

This means no chemicals, pesticides, no GMO seeds or compost.  Companion planting.  Respecting the seasons and plant cycles.

It’s difficult to be 100% sustainable without livestock to help provide manure, etc.  But I’m on the road.

At least to healing my little bit of earth.

S is for Sustainable

One of my farming heroes and role models is Joel Salatin.  Not only is he committed to sustainable farming and living, but he has an acerbic wit and way with words.  He wrote an article for Mother Earth News back in January that says it better than I could.

Healing the Earth

Happy Earth Day ~ hope you have a chance to get out there and imbibe some with Mother Nature!

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

How did you celebrate Earth Day?

R is for Restless: We Gotta Get Outta This Place!

You live like this, sheltered, in a delicate world, and you believe you are living. Then you read a book… or you take a trip… and you discover that you are not living, that you are hibernating. The symptoms of hibernating are easily detectable: first, restlessness. The second symptom (when hibernating becomes dangerous and might degenerate into death): absence of pleasure. That is all. It appears like an innocuous illness. Monotony, boredom, death.

~ Anaïs Nin

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

M

aybe it’s because Winter was so long this year.

But you like Winter.

I know.  But each season has it’s time, and Winter missed its cue to walk off, stage left.  Spring has been waiting to make her debut.

You were feeling restless even when the snow was deep, and Spring was just a dream. 

Well, maybe it’s just since I’ve moved back home.   You know, they say you can never truly go home again.  And God only knows, my soul has been ripped to shreds at one point or another in the last three years.

You were restless and hurting four years ago.  Before you moved.

R is for Restless

A few years ago, I remember seeing a commercial for restless leg syndrome.  I ave restless brain syndrome.  And restless soul syndrome.  And restless writer’s syndrome.

I’m just…restless. 

But I don’t know what for. 

It’s just a general ennui, an itchy feeling in my heart that translates to my skin ~ until I no longer like it fits me anymore.  I need a new one.

Image credit:  Thanapol Praserdvigai

It’s a longing to be surrounded by breathtaking mountain views, far from the maddening crowds.  To lie in a field of violets and alfalfa.  To burrow in a hammock and watch the humming birds dance.  To just be and not to do.

And for that to be enough.

Because here in the everyday, it is never enough.  Never finished.  Never perfect.  Always something that needs fixing, picking up, moving around.  

I’m tired of living life as an active verb.  I want to live it as a passive verb for awhile.

Running Out of Excuses

And yet, like most people, I put off my R & R.  Time, that precious treasure, is hoarded up for future spending.  And for me, there’s a good reason ~ I’m not my own person.  I work for the Man.  And so I need to save up my vacation time for Kodiak.

(Angels break into song.)

But that doesn’t mean I can’t take an hour here or a day off there.  I work a compressed schedule, so I really have no good reason not to relax.  And every reason to jump off the Tilt-a-Wheel.

It’s exhausting being responsible.  But it’s equally exhausting being restless.  There is nowhere for the energy to go.  It just sits there, humming inside of you, begging for an outlet, any outlet. 

And it’s better if you plan the release. 

Because here, there is no Autobahn.

Because here, there be dragons. 

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Are you restless? Why or why not?

Q is for Queen: Freddy would have loved this painting

The Queen's Pride was his ship, and he loved her.

~ William Goldman, The Princess Bride

Back in January, I began the One Page a Day Challenge and immediately threw away my quill.  Now in April, I’m participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge and prepping for a Wilderness Writers’ Retreat.  I need ink, a stiff drink and therapy.

Q

is a lonely letter.

Queasy.

Quiver.

Quick.

Quack.

Queen.

And that annoying dude on Star Trek who was always making a mess for Captain Picard to clean up.

Q is for Queen

Another painting for you today.  Don’t worry.  By Monday, this will all be over, and you can breathe a deep sigh of relief and go back to being bowled over by my ink blots of wit and wisdom.

For now, gaze upon this thing of beauty:

Seaport with the Embarkation of the Queen of Sheba

I know, it’s not a PRB painting, but I do like other art periods, you know.  I just choose to talk my head off about the Brotherhood.

This painting depicts the Queen of Sheba, who visited King Solomon in Jerusalem, and was painted in 1648.  I love how the sun seems to literally shine through the painting, and the buildings have such elegant, Grecian lines.  The colours are also vibrant for a painting of this period. 

You can read more about the painting and the artist at the National Gallery.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Have a restful weekend, dear readers!