Tag Archives: epiphany

Friends Care And Do–

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Writer Wendy’s weekly blog

Today I am going to Biltmore to see the Christmas lights. Today is Epiphany, the proper day on which to mark the end of the 12 days of Christmas. Tomorrow Biltmore will take down the lights.

It is bucketing rain today. A dear friend widowed during COVID has on her bucket list to see the mansion decorated for the holidays. She has a ticket. She meant to go last week, and everyone going with her got sick. Today is the last day she can go. Being a widow means finding the courage to do many things alone that you would have done with a partner (or even over a partner’s objections). My friend took up salsa dancing. She went back to work, taking diverse jobs using all her considerable skills both in office work and in compassionate human care. (She is my parents’ weekly home care assistant.) She does not want to go alone, because Christmas lights on Epiphany are a thing to be enjoyed with a friend.

I dislike Biltmore. But I like my friend. She isn’t a victim; she’s a survivor who helps other people survive. She won’t care if I make fun of some of the opulence she will be so richly enjoying, and I’ll try to tamp down my natural sarcasm about the excesses of rich people’s stuff. These are the spaces we make for one another. These are the things we do for one another.

I am going with her because she does not want to go alone. She has shown kindness to my family, courage in the face of devastating losses, resilience in becoming a great salsa dancer–even though her church friends think it’s a little weird and perhaps too powerful and sexy for a widowed woman–and her determination that her walk with God not be dictated by her circumstances.

She wants to go see the lights at Biltmore today. It is bucketing rain and going to freeze tonight. We are going to see the lights at Biltmore because this is the kind of thing we who care do for each other.

This story may smack of “Ain’t I great taking my friend to do something I don’t care about in the teeth of a winter storm.” But that ain’t it, either.

We are here for each other because we have known each other a long time and understand the limits of human endurance. She wants to see the Christmas lights. She gets to see the Christmas lights. It’s good to have snow tires. It’s good to have friends.

WRITE COMES TO THE CUMBERLANDS

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The Write Whisperer
(guest post by workshop attendee Lizbeth Phillips)

kizbethAccording to Flannery O’Connor, an epiphany is not permanent. After spending a day with Wendy Welch at WRITE COMES TO THE CUMBERLANDS, I have a new understanding of what O’Connor meant. Being an educator, I can come up with a hundred reasons a day to not make or take the time to write. For years, I have used it as an excuse to abandon essays, short stories, poems, and my first novel. No more!

Why? Because epiphanies are not permanent. Either you let them go or you do something so that whatever enlightening moment flashed before your eyes becomes intrinsically absorbed in what defines you. I am many things, especially a writer.

What did I learn at WRITE COMES TO THE CUMBERLANDS? First, excellent writing has strands of universal themes so that writers can connect to readers. We have to evaluate how words appear to the reader—just in case our notions are a bit alien.

But even before that, just get it down! Write the first draft without revision. Whether we start at the beginning or the middle, we have to write to the very end before we go back and restart. A first draft is not the final draft. After writing the first draft, evaluate the work and clarify. Add details to make the narrative and dialogue credible in the eyes of the reader. In other words, ask if my imagination transfers to the page so the reader sees the same movie I saw.

Becoming aware of the narrative arc and anticipating how to string a story along so that characters grow has released me from the big writer’s pit that equipped me with excuses not to finish my novel. I can now write straight dialogue without any narrative (and visa versa) and communicate to a reader.

I used to flounder on strong narrative and ruin dialogue or write dialogue at the expense of the narrative. Until today, I am not sure I had a handle on blending the two. If I am to move my novel along and not write myself into a corner, I have to create the proper mix! Writing is unforgiving. So are readers.

I came to the table with all kinds of reasons and excuses for not committing. When I left at the end of the day, I was an empowered writer.

If inspiration gleaned from attending WRITE COMES TO THE CUMBERLANDS were bit-coin currency, I would be the richest person on the planet right now. And since epiphany is not permanent, I’m going to spend my time cashing in on all that inspiration so it counts.