A Question

Moments ago, a person from my email hit me with a question that cycled in my mind like a squeaky hamster wheel.

You might say I have too much time on my hands, but I don't. My house is a mess, and my yard needs attention, and I came to my office to write, but first, check the email, right?

Here’s the question I found that stuck with me. It came from Katherine May from her Substack site:

"If you could burn one book you had to study (without anyone thinking you had slid into fascism), which would it be?"

"Candide," I yelled. (See I can yell in my office.)

However, I only knew how to say the word, not spell it. It's pronounced "Conde."  I knew it was French, so I googled and found it was spelled "Candide," written by Voltaire in the mid-18th century.

And I learned why it bugged me so.

I figure you are a writer and might identify with my issue, and why I remember that book after so many millennia.

At first, I thought I was wasting time by tracking down a book I read so long ago, but then I realized why I hated that book—it represented the same issues I had then and still haunt me now.

Please tell me if this resonates somehow in your psyche.

Voltaire wrote Candide, a classic philosophical novel in the mid-18th century (called "The Enlightenment Period.") It was required reading for my Humanities college class.

It's the classic story of the hero getting kicked out of paradise and encounters the world for the first time. You know the drill; it is the hero's story of being forced out of paradise, or at least out of his comfort zone.  He becomes like an orphan who must figure out everything for himself.

Voltaire introduces Candide as a good-natured young man living a sheltered life in the idyllic castle, where his teacher, Pangloss, presents the teaching that everything is predetermined to be for the best. Candide's belief in Pangloss' optimistic philosophy is shattered when he is expelled from the castle after being caught in a romantic encounter with Cunégonde, the baron's daughter.

In the outside world, he encounters a series of misadventures, and Candide experiences the harsh realities of war, poverty, and the cruelty of mankind, all while questioning the validity of Pangloss's teachings.

The baron refuses to allow Cunégonde to marry Candide, although Candide saves himself and her many times. And to add insult to injury, the women in this book are used and abused by men. Cunégonde ends up as an old lady and a slave, having lost her beauty and her innocence. Still Candide wants to marry her, although she no longer presents his ideal. And still, the baron refuses to allow her to marry someone beneath her station.  (Some station.) The beginning of the book sets the stage for Candide's quest for understanding and happiness in a world rife with suffering and injustice.

For a young questioning girl fresh from a Christian background, this presented a series of questions I have encountered throughout my life. And for a writer and want-a-be novelist, this also smacks of the hero's journey that is the basis of a story. (You know, without angst, you have no story.)

First, you kick your protagonist out of paradise, or from their comfort zone, you throw rocks at them, aka, send them into a series of struggles and challenges or abject cruelty and see how they get out of it.

Sometimes the struggles cause PTSD instead of a glorious ending regarding the splendor of life.

Voltaire's book came on the heels of Cervantes's Don Quixote—two poor fellows thrown out into the cruelties of life. On top of that there was the rape of women.

What was that professor doing to us?

Showing us the stark realities of life? Maybe he was teaching us to grow up.

It felt more like the evil Knight holding a mirror before Don Quixote forcing him see how crazy he was.

Yes, there are conflicting messages in life. There is uncertainty, doubting, and questioning. And through it all, the individual seeks to find their center.

There is faith in a religion that can and does, for many, give them security that someone, a higher power, has their back and will be there for comfort.

We have science that provides many answers and questions, and we know that even researchers have biases.

There is a philosophy that asks the big questions and has some answers depending upon which door you open.

Some know THE TRUTH.

There is Truth that varies according to the person telling it.

There is history according to the person who writes it.  (HIS -STORY.)

Some say, "The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it."

Am I doing the same thing the professor did to me by presenting so many options that the student becomes overloaded?

Or do we say, "I have an internal knowingness that will guide me? I will trust that it will not steer me wrong, and if I am mistaken, it will correct me, for I am a child of the Universal Consciousness that is ongoing and forever changing."

“I will go along for the ride.”

And we know that sometimes a moment of understanding hits us with such vigor we fall off our chairs and then from our position on the floor—the one we just swept—we look up and see The Muse smiling.

 

(Watch the Ron Howard movie Parenthood, in which some like the merry-go-round that goes in circles. And some like the thrill of a Roller coaster that goes up and down.)

Let's continue our search for understanding.

Choose wisely.

Jo

P.S.

I mentioned the orphan, which can be interpreted as an archetype by which people live. I found this years ago in a book titled The Hero Within by Carole S. Pearson PhD. Archetypes explain so much to me for they represent our travels through life. Some become stuck at one archetype instead of embracing them all.

1.     We are born Innocent, where our needs are met.

2.     The Orphan Archetype represents something that happens which forces us to see the world—school happens, or something hurtful.

3.     When we finally realize that we must fight our own battles, we become The Warrior.

4.     The Wanderer travels the world in a state of awe.

5.     The Martyr. Those are times when we see that we are willing to lay down some of our desires for another.

6.     Finally, we realize that we are the master of our fate, and thus we become The Magician, where we find we have power over our own life.

The Magician sits beside the Innocent indicating that we come full circle. Only this time we have walked the steps, battled the demons, faced our fears, and thus we have earned to be called an Innocent.

No wonder The Muse watches for those innocent moments and it is there she bestows her blessings upon us.

 

On the Way to My Blog, this Happened

 When I was three months pregnant with my first child, my husband developed a rash the doctor thought was German measles—the sort that can cause congenital disabilities in the fetus if the mother contracts it.

A three-month pregnancy is the worst time to get German measles.  I knew I had the hard (9-day) measles as a child (my mother darkened the room for my eyes hurt), but I didn’t remember any 3-day or a second dose of measles. My husband and I had been married for seven years—we had waited to start a family until we both had our degrees, and he had a job. I felt I had waited even longer for I had always wanted to be a mother. I was overjoyed.

The doctor gave me gamma globulin shots in both arms and both legs. Gamma globulin is extracted from the blood of many individuals and used to enhance the immune system. At the time, the doctor told me that someone in the group of contributors would have had German measles, and therefore, antibodies from that person or persons would be present in the dosage he gave me, and hopefully that would give me immunity.

 (Thank you to the people who donated blood.)

Long story short, I never contracted measles, and my daughter was born healthy. I never knew for sure if the rash my husband had was measles, but the doctor was doing everything he could to make sure I didn’t catch whatever. I am thankful, and I bow down in gratitude.

My best friend was so concerned after my experience that she took her little girl, about age seven, to the house of a little boy who had measles and bite into an orange he had bitten into. For most children, German measles is easy and over within three days.  

After that came inoculations. 

 I was on my way to this blog when I passed by a notice regarding the measles outbreak in Texas, and it brought up this experience. You know how the Internet can catch you.

 

Before getting sidetracked, I took my phone/camera outside to photograph this magnificent Pink Dogwood tree outside my window. (See my window behind it.) 

 

 

Looking closely at the blossoms, I thought they were aging like me. Her flowers might not be as pristine as some of the young trees about town, but she is gorgeous, flourishing, and putting forth her magnificent celebration of life. Where does all that pinkness come from? Those branches were gray sticks all winter. Now look at them–like a bridal arch decorated with living blossoms.  

 

 

This tree has particular significance for me as two years ago, on May 1, 2023, I decided to write 50,000 words on a memoir before the blossoms dropped from the tree. (It beat me when I had only 48,000 words) but I enjoyed the rehashing of my life motivated by Natalie Goldberg's book, Old Friend from Far Away. Goldberg said that a memoir doesn’t have to be an older adult’s story; it can be any time. It can be for those moments that take your breath away.

It can also be for sadness and heartache, for that’s the joy of writing it—put it all on paper and emphatically place a period at the end of a sentence. (And you know that sadness and angst sells. Besides, we want to know we aren't the only ones feeling the way we do.) Putting that period at the end of a sentence can allow the cycling brain to rest. You know, the one that keeps telling you those sad stories over and over.

Everybody ought to write one.

Thus, I began typing while staring into the pink dogwood tree.

End of Rope?

 

Monday:

I had reached the end of my rope, and you guys caught me before I fell.

My writing wasn't working. I had no talent, no skill, no ability. Why was I doing it? Nobody was commenting. Nobody was following me. I don't know who my audience is. What am I doing here anyway?

After grumbling, I checked my blog, The Best Damn Writer's Blog on the Block (You know I'm the only one writing one), and what happened?

Two thousand and nine of you guys showed up on one day.

Thank you for tying a knot on the rope's end so I have something to hold onto.

 

 

 

My morning mistake was to check the political scene. And if you are trying to do anything that requires thinking of anything positive—forget that.

I wondered how people were doing. Some are okay. I don't know if they are thriving under this political regime, if they are numb, aren't watching, don't care, or think he is doing a good job. Some must hate America so much they want to see it trashed. 

 

I lived when Hitler did. I heard about the atrocities under his regime.  He was a loser, too, before he lighted a fuse to the meanness of his country.

How does that happen?

Now, some people are whitewashing Hitler; some say the Holocaust wasn't as bad as spoken of. WHAT? Haven't they seen the pictures of skin stretched over the bones of concentration camps prisoners. Didn’t they see the mass burial grounds, or the crematorium? Don't they know about the little girl who hid with her family in an attic and wrote her heart out in her diary and was captured and died in one of those brutal starvation prisons?

 "And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto me." –Christian Bible.

Don't they know about the barrels of teeth, yes teeth—pulled from the mouths of Jewish people to mine their gold inlays? Barrels, yes barrels. The people weren't worth anything to that regime, but the gold in their teeth was.

Do you know that to save their children, many parents shipped their children to Britain. Dr. Ruth, the famed sex therapist, was one. My daughter was the caretaker for another. Mariam, at six-year-old, was sent via a train to Britain never to see her parents again.

What if that happened to you or your children?

I can't stand it. No wonder I felt lower than a snake's belly.

And I hear someone saying: "It will all work out. We'll see. We'll see."

In the meantime, rough-shod boots are ripping our backs to shreds.

And still, 44 % of the American people approve of this action?

I don't believe it.

 

It's stacked against us folks, and we opened the door for it.

 

That was my Monday morning. I try to have a blog ready by Tuesday.

 

Tuesday came and went. No blog.

 

"All is not well, but some things are." –stolen from Austin Kleon (Steal Like an Artist)

 

Wednesday morning: I was awake but didn't feel rested, so I took myself and my little dog, Sweetpea, out for coffee. She had a Pupachino, a little cup of whipping cream. I drank an iced mocha well laced with chocolate. She napped. We were in the pickup—my office on wheels—because I can relax there, and Sweetpea likes where she could sit alongside me on the blanket covering the console. Together, we can park in the sun and look out over fields of green.

The sun was shining gloriously, and when we got back to my office, the pink dogwood tree outside my window that had popped out flowers a day or so ago somehow in the sun's glow coming through my window, it had carried pinkness with it that spread across my white desktop.

Wednesday evening:

I took my Grandson to a Youth meeting, and afterward, we gave a ride to his friend to his house. On the way home, my grandson and I stopped for hamburgers, but when I reached into my purse to pay for them, my wallet was missing.

I had a credit card and paid for the meal. I figured I would find the wallet after we got out of the truck.

Nope, no wallet containing my driver's license, American Express card, and other cards. Rats, a mess.

I retraced my steps of the day—I usually carry my bag back to my office so I have it over my shoulder while carrying other items—maybe I had it over my shoulder when I rescued a chicken caught in the fence. Perhaps I laid my wallet on the seat when I bought the coffee. Maybe it fell out when the kids climbed in, or it followed one when they got out. I drove back to the facility where I dropped my Grandson off, to see if a blue wallet was lying on the parking spot asphalt. It wasn't. After the meeting, the parking lot was gated (for vehicles, not walkers) so that few people could have seen it.  I drove over to where we dropped off his friend. Not there. It's 3 am.

Thursday Morning: I take my eagle-eyed husband into the yard:

]

#1. The Culprit: a bag with the zipper unzipped.

 

 

#2. The Motive: I stopped to photograph apple blossoms in our side yard.

 

 

 #3. The Result:

 

Found wallet.

Husband dear found it in a plant alongside the driveway

 

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“You’ll never find your voice if you don’t use it.”-- Austin Kleon

 

https://www.bestdamnwritersblog.com/

 

If all those flowers turn into apples boy, are we going to be loaded.

 Yeah, Jo, like the followers you are going to get.