When Harrison was let out of the crate on Thursday, he stood still for just a moment. Then ran around the house in circles like it was his personal racetrack. and, I guess it is. In his excitement, I believe he hit his foot on something when I heard a small whimper, but he trudged on not letting a minor incident damage his enthusiasm.
Healing is a process and so is life. The latest book I read, "Scribbling Women, True Tales from Astonishing Lives" demonstrates the process of how life creates writers, in particular, writers with whom you may not be familiar. But you should because these women writers set the stage for all women writers after them. They wrote when many women were barely allowed to learn to read.
Marthe Jocelyn captured my attention on the first page of her introduction. Just for the record, as I type this blog, I am sitting on my patio, the birds chirp and Harrison lays on the cool decking of the pool relaxing in the sun. Jocelyn writes:
"I like to write outside, at a table on my front porch, or even in the hammock. Sometimes I sit on a park bench and scribble away while I watch the world around me. Once in a hwile, I stay in bed on a cold winter morning, with a hot water bottle, a cup of team, and notebook across my knees. I am a professional writer. I write books for young readers and get paid for it."
Jocelyn turns to her research and explains how she came across the letters of lady Mary Wortley Montago. "As I learned and thought about Lady Mary's life, I realized that there must be dozen of other women who had written letters, or travel journals, or essays, or diaries; women whose observations, like Lady Mary's had chronicled or changed the world around them, even in very small ways."
After much research writing over three years, Jocelyn shares with us eleven women who took the time to scribble. From Sei Shonazou who lived from 965-1010 to Doris Pilkington Garimara born in 1937,these women traveled the globe and give a unique perspective into their lives. Surely, none of these women could have imagined how Jocelyn would uncover their writing much less publish it for the entire world to read. But I see Jocelyn's book as a victory for them. This book should be required reading for all writers, especially women. What we share in our diaries, blogs or stories to our children can make us immortal by what we leave behind.
Isabella Beeton lived a mere twenty-eight years yet she wrote a book with five hundred and fifty-six thousand words. Her book sold sixty thousand copies during the first year and two million within the decade. I shall be forever grateful that she standardized cooking measurement and the layout of recipes which continues today.
Life is a process we live day by day, and we need to revel and scribble in every moment of it. Whether we enjoy composing outdoors or on a couch or at a desk, it really doesn't matter where we do it. As Jocelyn wrote "What will your own story be? Get scribbling..."
