The Right Place to be told You’re in the Wrong Spot

I had debated joining the writers’ group on the poster for weeks.  I’ve been known to be terribly analytical – every angle played through to its end.  It was both a way of being smart about choices and a way to defend myself – a carried-over scar from childhood.  The boogeyman can’t get you if you know all his ways in.

So finally my brother, being the man that he is, told me to just do it.

So I did.

It was the now-defunct Borders Book Store and I had arrive at the time of the meeting.  Standing in this offset alcove underneath a sign that read “HISTORY,” I waited for the assembly of this secret society.  The Highland Writers Group.  The title was both exactly descriptive and withholding of truths in the same breath.  All I knew was that they formed in this hushed void off the store’s beaten path and that they met at 3pm.

People began to gather in this cavernous section, nigh invisible to the other patrons.  From the chatter and talk I could tell these people knew one another.  I stood while they gathered and sat – somehow I was invisible to the invisible.  Another skill pulled from childhood scarring.

And then I hear the words “Excuse me, this is a writers group, could you please move?  We need to put out chairs.” And there he was – this little old man with gray hair and gray beard.  A maroon sweater vest, forgettable dress shirt and gray slacks.  His glasses caught everything at once and served details up to him.  In just that moment, you could tell that Larry Ginensky summed a person up in breath.

I said “Good, I want to join.”.

Larry looked at me and smiled.  It was sincere and devilish.  It was mentoring and a tricking.  That was Larry – guide and miscreant; navigator and fog; group member and moderator; angel and devil.  Most of all, he was both reader and writer.

“Well welcome,” he said with his nasally New York sound.  And I grabbed a seat and began my journey.  Later, after a nervous bout which left me unable to read my own story aloud, I saw Larry in the store.  He told me I was a very good writer and he hoped I would return.  I said I would and I held to that promise for nearly eight years.  Every Saturday at 3pm.  I would slide from the rest of the world and turn invisible with this group.

And I would be better for it for the rest of my days.

 

Five Steps to reading Black Parakeets Only Hatch in December

I could be biased but Black Parakeets Only Hatch in December is a book worth reading.  Why?  Because it has done its job – telling stories that have made people laugh, cry and feel – especially about moments in their own lives.   For those who have yet to experience this little birdie, here are tips on truly enjoying Black Parakeets!

  1. Open up – Black Parakeets is about more than a black male growing up in Northwest SMALLER Pages from Black Parakeets Only Hatch in December-FINAL-COVERIndiana.  There have been countless people of different walks of life that have found the book striking a chord deeper and closer with them than they expected.  Open up because the Parakeet is about human connectivity and you’re human so get connected.
  2. Read randomly – The book is written in episodic form and does not run in order.  This allows readers to pick up and jump on anywhere.  This makes it the perfect book for reading while on the road.
  3. Compare to yourself – You might be thinking “I’ve got nothing in common with Chad Hunter.” This is untrue (especially if you’re a member of my family!) because being human means we’ve experienced a lot of the same emotions and experiences.  As you read, let the stories remind you of similar moments in your life.
  4. Do what you’re asking yourself to d0 – Laugh.  Cry.  Think.  Ponder.  Do whatever it is that you experiencing as you read.  A fan of the book read it while sitting with a family member undergoing chemotherapy.  She found stories hilarious and laughed while in an otherwise potentially somber environment.  The book brought her humor in a tough situation and she went with it.  Do the same when the story is right.
  5. Enjoy – Possibly the most important tip of all.  Have fun with the book.  It is meant to share, to discuss and to enjoy.

 

The ultimate cheat sheet for reliving your childhood

adult-playground-1Childhood.

Yes, it invokes that duality of both dread and excitement, sorrow and joy, beautiful rose-tinted memories and nightmarish-exaggerated terrors.

Yet so many of us long to relive them – them being our childhood – our years long past and our ages long lost.  Our childhoods are our moments of purest innocence, our times untouched by the cruelty and mediocrity of adulthood and the sorrow of broken hearts, deflated dreams and brutal reality.    For too many, childhood was too fragile, too harsh and too brief.

But time, while a master of its own direction, can be thwarted if not controlled.  While we cannot turn back the clock and be young in body, we can be young at heart.  This is the ultimate cheat sheet for reliving your childhood.

  • Buy some toys – I’ll admit, when I see a great action figure, I think about my childhood.  Before the divorce of my parents.  Before the death of loved ones.  And when I think of my childhood and these amazing new action figures, I think about buying them.  So I stop thinking and I’ll do it.  My collection of Optimus Prime’s is impressive.  Let yourself enjoy toys you either didn’t have or would enjoy again.
  • Find those long lost treats – and eat them – I was at Crackle Barrel and saw wax bottle candy in their general store.  Instantly, I was transported in time to my childhood.  With the inexpensive purchase of penny candy, I was reliving a fun taste of long lost treats.  Find those moon pies or wax bottles or fool’s gold gum and be a kid again.
  • Enjoy the nostalgia of film – Goonies, Gremlins, Transformers, GI Joe and others were moments when I would seat cross-legged in front of my mom’s television and let my mind explore.  These were moments on both big screen and little that made a younger me smile, gasp and dream of heroes, damsels and villains.  Now, as an adult, I can find anything from then online or in-stores.  Ask that kid inside what he or she wants to watch and then be the adult that takes them to it.  You’ll thank yourself.
  • Hang around your kids – Nothing makes you feel young like children in your life.  Play with them.  Read with them.  Hang out with them.  Their energy is contagious.  Their wonder will overtake your cynicism and their dreams can renew your hopes.  Take some time and take your child, niece, nephew or grandchild to the park.  Have a go on the swings or go for broke on the see-saw.  Your childhood’s truest second chance is in the hands of the amazing little people around you.
  • Let go – I, like too many others, have things in my childhood that dug in talons and claws and left scars.  Moments that hurt.  Moments that stung and beg to define who I am and what I do.  But to battle these moments of a pained childhood is to feed them even more.  As my Yoda-like brother once told me “Let it go.”  If there are things in your childhood that left permanent scarring, forever wounds and eternal pains, do your best to let them slip from your grasp.  No foot stomping or chest beating.  Simply let them go.  Your childhood will be so much better to revisit and relive.

So there you have it – the ultimate cheat sheet to reliving your childhood.  Go buy a toy, get some ice cream and I’ll see you on the playground.

 

 

RC Cola and Molasses – Wisdom my Grandma Taught Me

When I was growing up, we had Grandma.  Daisy Earl was her name and she was always, to me, a little, slightly stooped over olive-skinned woman with wrinkles andimg_0304.jpg pepper gray hair that ran down to the middle of her back.  She was a blend of everything but most of her Native American and Caucasian features came through.  Grandma could have been near any tribe and would have looked right at home.

Her house always had a room with a seemingly endless amount of RC Cola bottles and somewhere, an open bag of Archway Molasses cookies.  That was Grandma, RC Cola and Molasses.

Yet while she was small and always old to my toddler eyes, Grandma had steel behind her eyes.  It was never necessarily any one thing she did to show us her mettle (or even her metal) but it was in what she did every day.  Even in her declining years, Grandma kept her house spotless, her clothes cleaned and folder and her house in order.  Even with us grandkids visiting and itching to run amok, Daisy Earl ran a tight ship and things were where they belonged – especially the cookies and cola.  Grandma did more before dawn than most people do all day.  Grandma Earl was a lot like the US Army.

So that was wisdom my grandma taught me – keep your house in order no matter what.  She had little and while all about her may be spinning, Grandma kept things in order.

 

NASA and bungee jumping

Kindergarten was the beginning of my bookish years. Depending on who you ask, I either never had those years or I never outgrew them. Mrs. Brown was an aged white woman who seemed to get older right before our eyes. Her class was never enjoyable and it was even worse on snow days. When white flakes fell from the sky, my mom placed me in a snow suit that required her, several NASA engineers and sixteen power tools to get into.

Somehow always a bit late, I would run from the car to the building in my all-purpose-environmental-Hazmat-snowsuit. However, with my brother’s scarf usually adorning my neck, I would find that even my Down-feathered-hobbling would allow the scarf to snag a Franklin El doorknob. I almost hung myself several times each winter with my horizontal bungee jump.