Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story?

Ten Things So Lit (and I FINALLY saw Hamilton)

Aug 20, 2024

It’s been an epic summer of travel, happiness, milestones, and vows to start eating better. Here are ten So Lit(erary-ish) things to share with you:

Your response to me keeping a sketch book when traveling. My accountability buddy, Julia, wrote There is now a small sketchbook (that has lay dormant for years) and a pencil pouch of colored and drawing pencils now in my "Friends of the Wythe County Library" bag that I take everywhere. Along with a notebook for writing ideas. Julia’s email made me so HAPPY. It’s another reminder how we need and inspire one another! Some latest sketches from Iowa…
How do you draw clouds? Also, angles. Let us learn together, cherubs.
I FINALLY saw Hamilton at Eccles Theater in SLC. It was brilliant.
A few dazzling lines by Lin Manuel Miranda…
”Every other Founding father story gets told. Every other Founding Father gets to grow old. And when you’re gone, who remembers your name? Who keeps your flame? Who tells your story?”
"Young man dying is easy living is harder!"
"The moments that you're in so deep, it feels easier to just swim down..."
"Legacy... what is a legacy? It's planting seeds in a garden you'll never get to see"
“Forgiveness. Can you imagine?”
"When my prayers to God were met with indifference, I picked up a pen, I wrote my own deliverance"
"I know my sister like I know my own mind, you will never find anyone as trusting or as kind..."
"In the same spot your son died is that why?"
Are you now rapping along with me? What a show.
Beatrix Potter. When “scuppered” on the side of the road for five hours in England’s Lakes District, I was comforted to at least be wandering Beatrix conservation land. And then
Jillian Hess
wrote about Beatrix Potter’s Naturalist Notes. As an ardent Peter Rabbit fan, I’m obsessed (and thought maybe Jillian wrote this just for me :).
Eric and Mel’s Wedding. Why is this literary-ish? Well, the words. My brother is such a good writer (former editor-now-attorney). His words have helped us all navigate profound grief after the unexpected passing of his wife, Cassie, eight years ago. Eric recently wrote: For a long time, I never thought I’d get married again. Looking back, I feel like grief had become so intertwined with my life that it had become a part of me and my identity. Giving up that grief has, at times, felt like turning away from my past. As I started to grieve less, it felt like I started to care less. That, in turn, made it feel as if Cassie slipped further and further away… Giving up my grief and watching the memories slowly fade away has often felt like enduring a second death. Yet, at the same time, Mel has brought a degree of happiness I never thought I would have in life. She has taught me how to love myself and embrace all of the love in my life, past and present, while showing me that the life we are building enhances, rather than diminishes, the love we experience in life. At Cassie’s funeral, I made a comment that I hoped would one day come true but, before Mel, was doubtful that it ever would: “We should consider ourselves fortunate knowing that our profound grief is born in our profound love for Cassie. And knowing we have loved until it hurts, we can look forward to the day when the hurt finally subsides. And all that will be left is love.”
Mel has played such a huge part of us healing and knowing that it’s okay to make room for more love. I made a reel of their wedding bc I really like doing that :)
A Fiction Writing Contest. Write a story with 499 words or less1, with the main character being a TEACHER. The judge is bestselling author, ALA Carnegie Medal and LA Times Book Prize winner Rebecca Makkai. DETAILS HERE (I’ve already started mine!) Deadline: Sept 1, 2024.
Avid Letter Senders, you better send that Last Letter to Your Lover now - Forever Stamp prices are going up :( The Postal Service projected a $6.5 billion loss for its fiscal year. So when you get my next letter, you’ll at least know that I really, really love you (the only thing so lit about stampflation).
“Creativity is not about being artistically accomplished or professional. On the contrary. The benefits may be greatest if you are a beginner,” Arthur Brooks for The Atlantic writes. “Make creativity a life habit. That means working at your creative practice regularly, not just when you feel like it.” Living up to our creative potential might be the simplest way for someone to improve their life, and I’m down with that.
Remember: “Do not get discouraged…it may be the last key on the ring that opens the door.” -Mrs. Charles M Cowman, Jim Reimann via
Linda Williams Jackson
I Mean, the Girl Can Write: After releasing The Tortured Poets Department, Taylor Swift, the 14-time Grammy winner wrote on Instagram that the collection of songs "reflect events, opinions and sentiments from a fleeting and fatalistic moment in time - one that was both sensational and sorrowful in equal measure. This period of the author's life is now over, the chapter closed and boarded up. There is nothing to avenge, no scores to settle once wounds have healed. And upon further reflection, a good number of them turned out to be self-inflicted. This writer is of the firm belief that our tears become holy in the form of ink on a page. Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it. And then all that's left behind is the tortured poetry."
I try to make a new drawing or painting every single day, writes Catherine Raynor. Watch Catherine bring Bennet the Basset Hound to life, HERE.
Catherine Rayner
inspires me, and I love that she shares so much of her process.

Have a great - and literary - in this penultimate week - of August…

Amy

The Last Part:

Tapering: For a 10-miler this Saturday. Hills, hills, and more hills race. Sometimes I ask myself why I do these things :) Oh wait, I’m gonna run ‘til I’m dead. Run with me!

Scheduling: I love author visits. My first one of the fall is in Norwell, Massachusetts. Will travel. Be in touch.

Eating: The plums and nectarines falling from my parent’s tree in Utah (I packed a BUNCH in my suitcase and only one got smashed).

Reading: Fish in a Tree by Lynda Mullaly Hunt

Praying: For Patrick <3