My New Year’s Resolution came from Nicole Gulotta’s book Wild Words. She writes that she wants to think of her life as poetry, and like a poem, I loved the wish before I understood it.
Like all resolutions, it hasn’t been easy to figure my life as poetry. Perseverance and I think imagination must come into play. There must be some shifting of perspective and expectation.
The times I’ve found are the easiest to see the poetry in my life are the times that are the most simple, everyday moments: walking Harper across the golf course to the bus stop, or eating a grapefruit and remembering how sweet winter can be.
Accepting simple does not come easily to me. I tend to lean towards complication. And while I can’t explain what it means to think of my life as poetry, I think I’m learning that like a poem, it means to have a willingness to come back to it again and again, taking note of these small things, and claiming them for yourself.
I haven’t given anything up for Lent since 1996 when I made a passionate vow to omit ice-cream during an Ash Wednesday chapel service. The vow lasted about as long as the ashes stayed on my forehead. Since then, I’ve considered things to add – laughter, a risk, acceptance. I like the idea of seeing my life anew everyday, and so it is with that sentiment I came up with a little writing practice, though I don’t think it’s meant only for Lent.
It’s a $10 instant download. Each day, you’ll focus on one word, and see what reflection you can write for it. I have written one example for you. You can find the download here.
A couple of weeks ago, I was in a writer’s workshop. We were in groups of four, spread out in various rooms of our hostess’s home. I’m always pleasantly surprised at how much silence is produced from discussing words, and while my group was considering one of our pieces, I overhead another group turning over a phrase a writer had used to describe how something felt. “It was like trying to hold a wild strawberry in your mouth.”
It made me think of the strawberries Harper grew in our backyard one year, and the strawberries in small, turquoise baskets we buy at the Farmer’s Market on rare Saturdays, or the ones we pick up at the grocery store on busy Saturdays. Their sun-ripened red makes us consider baking shortcake, or dipping them in chocolate, or just rinsing them off, pouring them into a bowl, and snacking on them all day long.
There’s so much wildness to find in the everyday, I think. Maybe that’s the point of living a life like a poem.
I am so, so excited to write through Lent with this guide. Thank you!