From the bough under which the catbird mourns I gathered a bushel of wild grapes so that together — your Memory and I — could make sweet wine to share with the family of swans who remember
outstretched wings, your solo flights across the pond
the kingfisher who cheered green heron and osprey and chickadee the turtles and frogs and snakes and songsters all
remember you, old friend
We’ll drink our wine by your weathered white bones narrate again your prehistoric startle from this cove the seemingly impossible lift and soar your meditative poses and postures
And I? I will tell them of the winter we walked step-for-step by the back pond how the world was silent and we listened to snowfall the sharp haunted joy of us and no others
that moment last spring — the shock of morning wing song watching as you landed on a branch crown-high, balancing on its sway how every time I looked up, you were still there and still there and still there
until you were no longer
I have pages now of poems for you stories to tell to the gathering and one last prayer these fall flowers at your feet beneath a birch that once was as well with gratitude forever more
The air smells of wild grapes and skunk but I don’t dare walk to the curb to see if the devil has taken another one, my heart is already broken so much the weight of its bits and pieces is pain now living in my bones — so I ignore all of that and stand barefoot in the damp grass soothe the catbird worrying with a tick tick tick of tongue I learned from my grandfather who loved birds enough to sing to them but not much else, I don’t think except maybe whiskey — and guns — the devil comes in all forms, doesn’t he? angry men and scared men, men with a throttle between their legs so blind with power they don’t slow down to spare the skunk, her mouthful of sweet grapes, the joyous morning that could have been.
Don’t MissAuthors in Conversation: Poets Jen Payne and Julie Fitzpatrick discuss Sleeping with Ghosts at Breakwater Books, October 13
Three Chairs Publishing is pleased to announce the publication of its newest book, Sleeping with Ghosts: Poems & Musings by Branford, Connecticut poet Jen Payne. Known for her meditations and musings about our outside world, Payne takes readers inside this time…into the heart and mind of a poet, where memories wander, hearts break, and ghosts appear in dreams.
Those ghosts — her lovers, soulmates, and muses — reveal themselves slowly, chapter by chapter, in this wistfully reflective, time-traveling memoir that Branford Poet Laureate Judith Liebmann, Ph.D. calls “Beautifully crafted and luminous…an intimate and unforgettable journey of love found and lost, the joys of creativity, and the power of memory.”
Sleeping with Ghosts will be the subject of the Breakwater Books AUTHORS IN CONVERSATION event on Sunday, October 13 (5pm) with Payne and Guilford performer and poet Julie Fitzpatrick. Join them for a convivial exploration of the ghosts and stories from the book. In additional to reading selected poems, the two — who recently collaborated on Fitzpatrick’s poetry book Church on the Screen — will talk about the creative process and the experience of making books.
Come enjoy poetry, creative conversation, and sweet treats during this author event and book signing. Registration is required for the Breakwater event, and books will be available for purchase the night of the event. Please register now at tinyurl.com/ytbujx4h, or visit EVENTS on the Breakwater Books website, breakwaterbooks.net. (Please note there is a $5.50 charge to register, but on the night of the event, you will get a $5 Breakwater Bucks store credit to use any time.)
Sleeping with Ghosts will be featured in a national WOW! Women on Writing Blog Tour beginning October 14, and Payne is part of an Authors in the Shop series planned at Guilford Art Center in November. Details can be found here.
Copies of Sleeping with Ghosts (5.5 x 8.5, paperback, 182 pages, $20.00) will be available at Breakwater Books (81 Whitfield Street, Guilford) and the Guilford Art Center (411 Church Street, Guilford) in October, or pre-order your copy from our Etsy Shop now.
They hardly slow down for me solitary on the side of the road walking before the heat rises, so what of her, anyway?
There have been so many this year one bunny, two bunny… I count like my grandbaby advises three bunny, four bunny…
Dead bunny.
Wonder if the driver slowed at all, considered his violation, said a prayer if not for her then for the three babes one bunny, two bunny… asleep in the down dreaming of their mum and mornings in dewed grass.
But what of her anyway? She, no matter, just a long red stripe over which I step this morning — there but for the grace of god — wary of the next car coming light speed around the bend.
I see them on the side of the road have to hold back tears or suffer similar fate — we are merciless these days our endless race to get from here to there nevermind the casualties — so I file them away with Roadside Tragedies too much to bear for any family
until they reappear in a dream their sweet furred selves, mom and her babes masked and giggling running circles on a green shag carpet that could be grass or forest or pillowed green moss
a soft landing for heartache, respite from the cruelties of our hard, brutal world
You, my friend, are on the wrong side of history and someday, years from now, they’ll write about you like they’ve written about your kind before. They’ll include photos of your red hats, and your fandom flags. They’ll roll clips of the playground bully, the fakes and fools, your lockstep hate, the idolatry and rhetoric that set the fate of your country — and your offspring — at the edge of a wild precipice. They’ll speculate at the types of personalities who were more easily duped, who followed out of fear or inferiority, weak mindedness or — worse — some base interpretation of god, and they’ll make comparisons to the evil we used to read in books, the ones our families fought wars for, and they’ll shake their heads, scorn your poor decisions, scorn you and the long, sad wake of your ignorance.
Come the day when your god falls out of favor what then?
When you must face Mecca five times a day, obey the Buddhist Precepts posted in your schoolroom, worship the Golden Plates, honor a Saturday sabbath, abstain from
sex coffee alcohol smoking pork pornography swearing gambling dairy shellfish modern medicine electricity music
dancing?
abstain too from the worship of false prophets your idolatry of evil men and criminals
I want to wake up thinking about my To Do list or the last slice of Zuppardi’s pizza I’ll have for breakfast.
I want to turn over and pet the cat glance at the book I’m reading and think about Sunday: coffee, book, cat and that’s that.
I want to lie for a while and plan out the road trip we wanted to take — its next leg from Wyoming up and around and down to California if we can — wonder at how we’ve managed all these years like that and when we will again.
I want to rest easy in this wide, soft bed in this comfortable, quiet home knowing I have taken good care of it and myself enough to outlast the Zeitgeist roaring outside my window.
But instead I wake too early wondering if I should stockpile Ramen, learn how to shoot a pistol, hoard enough barbiturates for me and the cat, consider my escape route if I should be so lucky.
The poems in the new literary review are long winded like me and my menopausal middle (or end) wide and seemingly without boundary word upon word upon word they write and write and write until what?
until the train of thought (finally) subsides or the ink runs out or the smooth gray lead breaks or the ribbon runs dry
Wait! Does technology even have an end point Does it ever run out? save for the Who came up with the idea of a battery-operated keyboard anyway?
I confess the poems are so long three pages, six pages, eight pages I can’t even read them… my glasses run out of patience
Is that bad? Does that make me a poeta non grata?
What little I can read / bear / swallow are full up with words in LONG POEM form like the exercise of writing a 500-word essay in school gathering flowery fragments of tethered expressions joined by marks intended to separate elements and clarify meaning onto the page
It’s me, I’m the problem. It’s me.
This stew of hormones and ego fear and frustration resistance even in the face of its futility
Please don’t make me fit into this form wear spanx abstain from ice cream suck in my belly while I write and write and write
until I’m as out-of-breath as me post core workout post parking lot incline post headline skimming post anticipating the bleak future that lies ahead
“The long poem is just right for our confounding, fractured age” writes a woman named TessI do not know
Perhaps that explains it: poets wanting to sink into this epic age “represent the sheer unmanageable scale, the vast and messy confusion, the epic ambivalence, of the 21st century”
while I am pen-wielding and at-the-ready to slip out the back door and tell you about the voles who have taken up residence here in this hundred-year-old cottage built by a family who wanted nothing more than a place to enjoy their summers — listen to bullfrogs in the pond and watch fireflies dance over the edge of the mossy granite ledge where now I plant iris and wait to catch a glimpse of the bobcat who only once visited my yard, but still…
But still…ness is what is required in these monstrous days when even poets can’t sit idle or wax nostalgic about bobcats and large bowls of ice cream or plain old simpler times charged instead to take up the pen and the sword write and write and write
It had become meager, the smallest portions of love metered out in tiny bowls, with tiny spoons even, in gestures that implied generosity and she would smile at the novelty of the dollhouse scale into which she had settled; it was a full-face smile so her eyes could close pretend she didn’t see it all for what it was which was just enough to hold her feet glued down in the pretense of it the pretending it was all enough that stingy love to which he couldn’t even give a name because that would be too much don’t go fishing he chastised when she said she loved him one last time, trying to reel in the catch she knew she had to throw back before she got so small she disappeared.
Was I the only one to pray for you before the sun fully arrived to take you back to summer ashes or sky burial, feted by crowsong
Was I the only one to remember your face masked among morning shadows, wondering if the cat and I could see you — it was just yesterday, my sweet friend
Was I the only one to tend to you roadside ravaged and alone, laying you down in soft green comfort a gathering of god-words at your feet.
The chipmunk, through no fault of his own, sat trailside wounded perhaps I interrupted his prayer — final words on the wind — but he startled slowly and limped across my path with labored breath into the shady solace of honeysuckle as I whispered comfort in a soft, quiet voice stayed a while as witness
found myself still thinking about that chipmunk through no fault of his own wounded, trailside as the blue car crashed more silently than you might think into the white minivan on the busy byway pieces of metal flying in front of me, wondering
did he die without fear quietly — there — in sweet release?
Deep in the woods a spider casts her story across my eyelids invites an intricate dream of fine woven memory raindrops as sweet wine, and stars come down to glisten, listen eavesdrop into her delicate days the tightrope balance of patience and power the writhe and wriggle in her sacred dance, even she wonders sometimes what stories they have to tell — the ant, the fly, the beetle — but pays no mind for hunger is deep and instinctive, she whispers, it knows small mercy.
Writing guru Natalie Goldberg advises: “Say what you want to say. Don’t worry if it’s correct, polite, appropriate. Just let it rip.” And author Neil Gaiman suggests, “This is how you do it: you sit down at the keyboard and you put one word after another until it’s done. It’s that easy, and that hard.” Explore what it is about writing — about creating — that has us so frequently stymied. Ask yourself: Why can’t we Just Do It?
INGREDIENTS: collage, color scans, digital art, ephemera, essays, original photographs, poetry, quotes, vintage artwork. With thanks to Emily Dickinson, Peter Fischli and David Weiss, Grey’s Anatomy, Madge Kennedy, the New York Zoological Society, Oliver Twist, Harry Potter, Natasha Pulley, and Taylor Swift.
16-page, Full Color 4.75″ square booklet and a curated Spotify playlist. Cost: $8.00.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
MANIFEST (zine) issue #15, WRITE,is on its ways to the printer and should mail sometime in June! I hope you’ll consider supporting this creative project by subscribing today! Your subscription of $25.00 gets you the next 4 issues of MANIFEST (zine).
“I have a room all to myself; it is nature.” — Henry David Thoreau
Retracing my steps at Nauset Beach…Lunch at Coast Guard BeachNauset LightNewcomb Hollow BeachDriving the loop at Province LandsA final sunset at Herring Cove
You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on. Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers. Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, are heading home again. Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting — over and over announcing your place in the family of things.
Enjoyed a Poets in the Park Walk around Blackwater Pond with the National Park Service. This was poet Mary Oliver’s favorite place to contemplate nature and poetry.This was a long day that included a hike, shopping in Provincetown, Wicked Little Letters, and a late afternoon hike to Highland Light. This is the oldest and tallest lighthouse on Cape Cod.The view from Highland LightSunset at Herring Cove while watching whales breach in Cape Cod Bay
“Hope is radical openness for surprise — for the unimaginable. If that is the attitude with which we look, listen, and open all of our senses, we enter into a meaningful relationship with whatever Life offers us at a given moment.” — Brother David Steindl-Rast
A quiet walk at Head of the MeadowA good day to write, rest, read. Repeat.The gift of a rainbow…And sunset over Provincetown
“I began to make plans for what my future might be—what once felt like a mad dash to the end of a cliff now felt like an interesting path in a beautiful wood that may or may not lead to the top of a mountain. And yes, the chances of my arrival at that destination were uncertain, but oh! What a mountain! And oh! What a view! And what a pleasure it was to keep moving forward.” ― Kelly Barnhill, When Women Were Dragons
Coast Guard Beach, Eastham
Sunset from Head of the Meadow, waiting for the MoonThe Frog Moon rises
“Anytime we approach a state of awe, we are in relationship with divinity. We are awake.” — The Wild Unknown Animal Spirit Book
Sunrise on the first full dayTime and spaces to read, write, and regroup.Morning walk in Truo, Provincetown in the distance.Feeling very grateful…First view of Nauset Beach in Orleans, my favorite beach.Much later in the day, sunset at Race Point Beach.Sun sets, moon rises…
“Every person needs to take one day away. A day in which one consciously separates the past from the future. Jobs, family, employers, and friends can exist one day without any one of us, and if our egos permit us to confess, they could exist eternally in our absence. Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for. Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares which will not withdraw from us.”
― Maya Angelou, Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now
Playing on the radio at this very moment? Ace of Base, “I Saw the Sign.” A good sign indeed!First look, Newcomb Hollow Beach
Dear Maya: one also needs provisions.
Water to my east and west…perfect views, perfect spot!Feeling right at home.
In celebration of my blog’s 14th Anniversary, I offer you these 14 Fun Facts about Random Acts of Writing…
1. Random Acts of Writing is followed by more than 1,700 people around the world, including my high school English teacher who reminded me, early on, that it was important to keep my writing universal so more people could understand and appreciate it.
2. In total, there have been close to 37,000 visits to Random Acts of Writing and more than 110,000 distinct views since 2010.
3. According to WordPress, most folks like to read the blog on Mondays at 11:00 a.m. That’s…random.
5. Travel is often featured here on Random Acts of Writing, with frequent posts about Texas, France, Cape Cod, day trips, and the awesomeness that is the American Road Trip.
6. Alice in Wonderland makes regular visits to this blog, as do Henry David Thoreau, Emily Dickinson, and my Dad. But it was Gene Kelly who starred in the opening number back in 2010.
7. As a graphic designer as well as a writer, I know the importance of images. That’s why there have been more than 3,000 images posted, including famous and obscure artwork and original photography.
8. Random Acts of Writing is a fifth generation creative effort that has its roots in the 1980s zine culture. The Latest News was its first incarnation, which I published from 1989 – 1996.
9. It turns out, I am an internet research geek. Many of the posts you read are infused with details from Google Books, Wiki Art, the Library of Congress, Wikipedia, Bible Hub, and Quote Investigator. I once spent four totally nerdy hours on Google Patents and had to stop because my mouse hand cramped up.
10. The intention of Random Acts of Writing has shape-shifted over the years, but its most-talked-about topics include creativity, books, nature, spirituality, and poetry.
11. Every April since 2015, I have attempted to write a poem a day for National Poetry Month. You can see all of the results here.
12. All of that writing — more than 2,000 posts — led to the publication of four books: LOOK UP! Musings on the Nature of Mindfulness, Evidence of Flossing: What We Leave Behind, Waiting Out the Storm, and Water Under the Bridge: A Sort of Love Story.
13. All of that writing has also fed my quarterly publication called MANIFEST (zine) and my new book, Sleeping with Ghosts, coming out this fall!
14. This is the 14th time I have written an anniversary post, each of which has ended with gratitude to YOU, my readers, for your Comments, your Likes, and your support since 2010. It has been a blessing to share this journey and this ongoing conversation with you.
Three Chairs Publishing is psyched to present MANIFEST (zine) issue #14: You Mean a Woman Can Open It?
As a woman born in the late 60s, there’s never been any question that I can be whatever I want to be. It’s what my parents and teachers taught me. It’s what my role models in the 70s and 80s demonstrated for me — Mary Tyler Moore, Marlo Thomas, Judy Blume, Madeleine Blaise, Madonna, Jane Fonda. And it’s how I’ve lived my life since I was old enough to make my own decisions about things — how I work and play, where I live and love, what I do and how. My own terms. My own expectations.
Of course, that doesn’t sit well with some folks. Mostly male folks of a certain genre. And there have always been attempts to keep me “in my place” — verbally, physically, financially, and so forth. But like so many countless women, I have persevered and succeeded, despite the obstacles and objections.
YOU MEAN A WOMAN CAN OPEN IT? is in honor of ALL the women who can, who do, and who keep on doing — who persist — no matter what.
INGREDIENTS: collaged elements, color copies, color scans, digital art, ephemera, essays, original photographs, poetry, quotes, vintage artwork. With thanks to the voices of #metoo, Ruth Orkin, Man Ray, Augustin Pajou, Céline (Melle-T), Bethany Armitage, Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing, Carol Nicklaus, Elizabeth Warren, and Wonder Woman.
20-page, Full Color 5×7 booklet, free bookmark, and a curated Spotify playlist, Cost: $8.00 or subscribe and get 4 issues for $25.00.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
1. The Law of Attraction says that positive thoughts bring positive results into a person’s life, while negative thoughts bring negative outcomes.
and
2. Humans are unable to look away from a train wreck.
I point this out because there is energy in thought. And there is energy in where we put our focus. This is the concept behind prayer as much as the Law of Attraction.
I want to remind you of this — remind all of us — as we head into that contentious and energetic conflict we call Election Season.
Donald Trump and the MAGA zeitgeist is a train wreck of epic proportion, and it’s hard to look away. It’s hard not to watch the video clips and stare at the headlines in agony; not to gasp, mock, or tremble with horror at the hypocrisy and hate spewing forth; not to share “look what they’re doing now” posts on social media.
Believe it or not, all of that — those reactions — are actually innate human responses. Watching disasters — like staring at a car accident when you drive by, watching news broadcasts about tornadoes, or fixating on Trump’s behavior — triggers our survival instincts.
Our brains are wired to perceive potential danger, analyze and interpret the situation, decide if we should fight or flight.
And studies have shown that we are also prone to what is called “negative bias.”
One study published by the American Psychological Association found that we react to and learn more from our negative experiences than we do positive ones. ‘Humans are prone to negative bias and negative potency,’ explains psychologist Dr. Renee Carr. ‘Negative bias is the tendency to automatically give more attention to a negative event and negative information than positive information or events.”(1)
This explains why we know more about Trump’s criminal activities and abhorrent behaviors than we do about all of the good news in our country and around the world.
I bet you didn’t click on any of those links. That’s part of the negative bias. We’re likely more interested in what other angry things I have to say about Trump than we are that deforestation is decreasing in the Amazon Rainforest, that formerly endangered species like the American bald eagle and the humpback whale are recovering, that there’s a new malaria vaccine about to change the face of public health in Africa.(2)
Negative bias isn’t all bad. “The healthy component of watching disasters is that it is a coping mechanism,” says clinical psychologist Dr. John Mayer. “We can become incubated emotionally by watching disasters and this helps us cope with hardships in our lives. Looking at disasters stimulates our empathy and we are programmed as humans to be empathetic — it is a key psychosocial condition that makes us social human beings.”(3)
But let’s come back to the Law of Attraction. As the book explains:
The Law of Attraction says: That which is like unto itself, is drawn.Whenyou say birds of a feather flock together, you are actually talking about the Law of Attraction. You see it evidenced when you wake up feeling unhappy, and then throughout the day things get worse and worse….You see the Law of Attraction evidenced in your society when you see that one who speaks most about illness has illness; when you see that the one who speaks most about prosperity has prosperity.(4)
We are what we think. We attract that on which we focus.
“As you observe things on the television or in the newspaper, that, because you do not want them, make you feel negative emotion — you hinder your allowance of what you do want.”(5)
While that negative bias — focusing on the negative — is a good coping mechanism, it also means we’re investing our time and thoughts in seeing all of what is wrong and bad, and not what is good and possible. The negative gets all of the attention, and the algorithm of what we see and how we perceive things gets skewed.
So let’s bring this home — to 2024 and the election season.
The more we focus on Trump and the tsunami of fear and hatred, the more our energy — our emotional energy, our thought energy — is projected in that direction. The more we think about something, the more we attract it. Not to mention the fact that the more we read his headlines and share his news, the more free air time and advertising we’re giving him and his campaign.
In an ideal world, there would be a setting to block how much Trump news shows on our feeds. Like Parental Controls, only maybe called Peace of Mind Controls?
Because the more bandwidth he gets, the less there is for headlines about all of the good things happening here in the U.S. and across the world. And the less we see and share the good news, the harder it is to have faith that things will get better, to have hope for our future as a country, and ultimately, as a race.
Think there’s not enough good news to share? Then check out the Good News Network with positive and uplifting stories about conservation efforts, medical and scientific achievements, people making a difference, and all of the good things happening around the world and right here in the United States!
I remember the first time I was ever gobsmacked by art. Do you?
My WHOA! moment was back in the early 80s at Amherst College’s Mead Art Museum. I was wandering one of the galleries clockwise and came first, unmoved, to Thomas Cole’s painting The Present showing a castle in ruins, abandoned and backlit by a sunrise or sunset. But it was his second painting, The Past, that stopped me in my tracks. It depicted the same castle and landscape, only at some mythical point in the past, broad daylight, with throngs of people and a jousting tournament in play.
I remember the paired paintings — and my reaction to them — vividly, to this day.
I love when art MOVES us like that. Makes us stop, gasp, internalize it. Carry it with us, decades later. For me, it’s Rodin’s Crouching Woman at the Hirschhorn Sculpture Garden in D.C., Canova’s Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss at the Louvre, Shepard Fairey’s Arab Woman at the ICA in Boston, Van Gogh’s Starry Night at Yale.
With that same sense of a visceral experience, I spent several hours at the Yale Art Gallery again this weekend. Maybe it was the fact that it was my first time in a large museum since COVID, or that I spent the day with a friend who was equally enthralled and inspired by the energy of the space and the vast amount of famous and fantastic art — but I left full up with awe and appreciation, and a deep gnawing urge to create something WHOA myself!
Here are some sights from the Gallery…
Plato
Ceiling Tiles from Dura-Europos
Bodhisattva of Compassion, Guanyin
An Allegory of Intemperance, Hieronymus Bosch
Rooms by the Sea, Edward Hopper
Camden Hills From Bakers Island, Marsden Hartley
Sentinel I, Wangechi Mutu
Mayflower, Marisol
Portrait of Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, Jacob Morland of Capplethwaite, Kehinde Wiley
Try to learn to breathe deeply, really to taste food when you eat, and when you sleep, really to sleep. Try as much as possible to be wholly alive, with all your might, and when you laugh, laugh like hell, and when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough.
— William Saroyan, The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze
I knew it was coming. In that same way the slight rumble in the sky tells you there’s a storm coming, the telltale first cough told me Sick was about to arrive.
It started on a Friday, early in the morning. By noon, I was enthusiastically coughing, by three, I was losing my voice and canceling dinner and weekend plans.
Dr. Google confirmed it was not one, RSV, and a COVID test outruled the other. So I gathered my potions — wild cherry bark syrup, Throat Coat® tea, slippery elm lozenges, magical immune support tablets — and took to the couch.
Sick transformed pretty quicky into bronchitis. There were some days I swear I was about to meet a lung in person for all of the coughing. I sounded like a Muppet and, thanks to a round of pinkeye, looked like a zombie for most of December.
And while I missed the month-long fray of holidays activities, I also missed the month-long fray of holidays activities. Instead, I rested…a lot.
I took it easy. And I napped. And I slept. And I sat on the couch and read books. And I watched all eight of the Harry Potter movies (again). And then I slept, again.
Even Work took a back seat to Sick for the month. Lots of things did. But, it turns out, being sick was just what the doctor ordered.
In the past month, I’ve managed to reset my nervous system that’s been in fight-or-flight mode for a very long time. I feel calm and centered in a way I have not since the quiet days of 2020.
I have not set my alarm clock since December 1, and my sleep routine feels balanced and healthy. It turns out, I need NINE hours of sleep, not six — and if I allow it, my body sleeps and wakes in an easy natural rhythm.
If I allow it, I move around in an easy, natural rhythm, too. I remember this rhythm — it’s the beat I dance to when I’m on retreat or vacation, when I listen to my inner music that says: go for a long walk, you need a nap, take some time off.
I suspect we all need more rest than we allow ourselves. We all need more time on the couch with books and comfort movies. Now, in these precarious times more than ever.
Question: is it possible that the only resolution for 2024 is REST?
I’ve been doing the Goodreads Reading Challenge for 10 years now, and this is the sixth year I’ve successfully met my personal goal of reading 50 books — 52 actually! This year’s statistics, according to Goodreads’ My Year in Books, included 14,328 pages read with an average book length of 276 pages. The shortest book, clocking in at 52 pages, was Marigold and Rose by Louise Glück, and the longest, at 676 pages, was Habibi, a gorgeous graphic novel by Craig Thompson.
Some of my highest rated books, with five stars, were also some of my favorites: From My Button Box: Collected Essays in a Pandemic Time (Judith Bruder), Leaving Time (Jodi Picoult), The Book of Longings (Sue Monk Kidd), The Invisible Hour (Alice Hoffman), Julia and the Shark and The Dance Tree (Kiran Millwood Hargrave), Frankenstein (Mary Shelley), The Book of Lost Names (Kristin Harmel), November 9 and Verity (Colleen Hoover), The Paris Library (Janet Skeslien Charles), and Other Birds (Sarah Addison Allen).
For better or for worse, I often find book inspiration from List Challenge, and I am so tempted to consider reading Rory Gilmore’s Reading List or the 100 Books to Read Before You Die or Books to Read to Be Considered Well Read. But I much more prefer wandering the shelves at the library or following breadcrumbs from this book to the next.
My next pile for 2024 includes not so much books as authors. I want to read more Jodi Picoult because we’ve only just met this year. Also Ann Patchett, John Green, and Isabel Allende.
How about you? What have you been reading lately? And what are you looking forward to in 2024?
“All these migrants crossing the border! They’re destroying our country!” she proclaims, just arrived from Christmas mass, where the whole congregation rejoiced the arrival of Jesus. The hypocrisy shocks me silent, my heart screaming “Jesus was a migrant, for Christ’s sake.” The next chapter in this merry-making-gift-giving story includes his parents’ flight from oppression, how they sought refuge in a foreign country to find a better life for their child. Or didn’t you read that far? Do your holiday prayers exclude empathy and compassion, do unto others, Matthew 25? Did you forget the ALL of the purpose of the child?
In these post-pandemic days with the black veil of politics, wars, mass shootings, and climate change draped over our collective humanity, I suspect we are all suffering, in some way, from what clinical psychologist and psychotherapist Dr. Scott Eilers, calls “ambiguous grief.” It’s the realization that something you always thought you’d have will never come to be, or mourning the loss of an alternate version of yourself — or Your World — that will never exist. This small zine touches on that big subject through seven poignant poems.
Color, mini booklet + Inserts and a curated Spotify playlist, Cost: $8.00or subscribe and get 4 issues for $25.00.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
I am sitting on my screen porch in the Love & Relationships bagua of my house eating Liangfen. Called “Rice Bean Jello” on the menu, it is a bowl of delicate, translucent noodles served with cilantro and chili oil; a Sichuan dish sometimes called “heartbreaking jelly noodles.”
If you feel sad or heartbreaking, go and taste it, then your sadness will go with the wind sinceit is too spicy, so that all the feeling you have is a spicy taste.
I ordered Liangfen for just this moment — Sunday lunch on my screen porch and quiet meditations on Love & Relationships — part of a mindful evaluation process a friend and I are working through this fall.
It is not surprising to me that the Love & Relationships bagua of my home — the far right corner of the nine-squared feng shui map — is a screen porch. A place where seasons come and go, where winds shift and conditions often change.
And so, the Liangfen and its intention to chase away sadness are good company as I take inventory of Love & Relationships, and honor all of the changes that line up in multiple columns on what I call my Loss List.
If I were more inspired, the Loss List could probably be one of those fancy word clouds, but for now it’s just a long list; the friends, clients, loves, acquaintances, advisors, and communities to which I am no longer attached. The people and places no longer part of my present — or my future.
Sometimes, I want to point fingers, blame the pandemic, firmer boundaries, age and natural attrition, poor choices, humans. Other times, I just want someone to validate the losses with a giant YES stamp, I GET IT.
This is grief of course — heavy, messy, capricious GRIEF that breezes in and out of my days like the unpredictable breezes from Long Island Sound.
And there’s a lot of it — like climate changing levels of grief. The kind that shifts the ground, floods your reserves, erodes hope. Or…maybe it’s the kind that burns off the detritus in a blazing firestorm to eventually become beautiful new growth?
But I’m not there yet.
Today, I’m sitting on my screen porch enjoying the first chilly afternoon of fall, there’s a hawk bearing witness to my tears, the cause of which is only this bowl of Liangfen — just heartbreakingly spicy enough for a quiet reckoning.
You know that good feeling you get when you eat dessert? That’s your brain’s reward system releasing dopamine. Researchers have shown that sweets rival sex and cocaine when it comes to dopamine triggers. Think about that.
Dessert — it’s as good as sex!
That explains a lot, doesn’t it? Researchers have also found that sugar inhibits stress-induced cortisol secretion, minimizing feelings of anxiety and tension. Maybe that’s why STRESSED Spelled Backwards Is DESSERTS!
Don’t miss this sweet issue of MANIFEST (zine) that includes results from the Get Your Just Desserts readers’ poll — on Sale Now!
INGREDIENTS: collaged elements, color copies, color scans, digital art, ephemera, essays, hand-drawn fonts, laser prints, original photographs, paper cut illustrations, photography, poetry, quotes, rubber stamp art, vintage artwork. With special thanks to Alice, Isabella Beeton, TJ Buckley, Sara Midda, Arthur Murray, Marcel Proust, E. J. Stanley, John Tenniel, and Mary Berry who inspired the title of this issue.
20-page, full color 5×7 booklet + Inserts and a curated Spotify playlist, Cost: $8.00or subscribe and get 4 issues for $25.00.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
It’s been five years since my dear, sweet friend Mary Anne Siok died. I haven’t re-posted this — her eulogy — for a few years, so I thought this would be a good time. And a good reminder. I don’t say YES nearly enough, but I say it much more often because of her.
Mary Anne and I met in a freshman English class at UMass in 1984. We were just joking a few weeks ago about how it’s been 30 years since we graduated. I said “How the hell did that happen?” and she said “Because we’re old.”
But the MA I knew – the one we all knew – was never old. Very often her texts would go on and on about what she was doing and where. (Even her cousin Katherine couldn’t keep up!) The weekend before she died? On Friday, after a full day of work and a train commute home to Rhode Island, she went out for sushi with Billy. On Saturday, she and I spent an entire day walking around the mall, shopping, talking, toasting her birthday with bloody marys. On Sunday, she was with friends at Foxwoods to see the Hollywood Vampires, and then on Monday she celebrated a gorgeous spring day with a drive along the coast and lobster rolls.
THAT, in a big long-weekend nutshell was our Mary Anne.
MA was my best friend, my secret keeper, my sister, my person…and the most fabulous yin to my yang.
Me ever so cautious and worried, the introvert full of specific plans to her come what may, live life to its fullest, hell yeah we’re doing that extrovert with an absolute love of life.
She was inspiring.
So much so that in recent years, I’ve taken to asking myself WWMAD? As in: What Would Mary Anne Do?
What would Mary Anne do? Mary Anne would say Yes.
YES to the next concert, the Red Sox or Patriots game, the fireworks, the dive bar, the music festival, the movie night, the road trip, the matching tattoos, and one more Hallmark Christmas movie.
YES to the beach. Always.
YES to anything in black, the sales rack, the sparkly earrings, the extra glass of wine. And YES to Dunkin Donuts. Of course.
YES to dancing … anywhere, drinks at the Hard Rock Cafe, going to the symphony, enjoying a home cooked meal, taking a spinning class … or yoga, cheering on her boyfriend’s band.
YES to shopping at the outlets, seeing an art exhibit, wandering a museum, getting tickets to a play, or a long full day at the Big E.
Jump off a 3-foot ledge into the ocean while a crowd cheers? Yes. Help you check off something on your bucket list? Yes.
YES to coming to your BBQ, your daughter’s dance recital, your campaign event, your nephew’s first birthday, your sons’ soccer game, your girls’ weekend, your wedding, your holiday dinner. Probably all on the same day … usually with a gift … always with that big, sweet, joyful smile.
A smile that said YES, I’ll move in with you. YES I’ll meet you at the winery. YES I’ll be at the party. YES let’s go shopping.
YES, we have to do this again soon.
Not everyone can do that — be so wide open to life and love and friends and experiences. No holds barred. Fearless. Hell yeah, we’re doing that!
And so, in honor of the blessing that was our wonderful, bold and brazen, brave and beautiful Mary Anne Siok, I challenge you — all of you — to say YES a lot more often.
And I thought we could practice right now…ready?
In memory of Mary Anne Siok, May 31, 2018. Click here to read her full obituary.
Though I have come to quickly despise the seduction of Facebook’s force-fed Reels feature, if I play it right, I get a delicious sequence of recipes and food things in my (literal) feed.
One such reel was a recipe by social media favorite and recipe developer Justine Doiron — aka @Justine_Snacks — called Crispy Lime Cabbage & Turmeric White Bean Mash.
The video, not the recipe name, is what caught my eye. Because cabbage? Kinda ew…or so I usually think. Until I watched the recipe and considered the flavors.
Then a quick Instacart shop and I was ready to test it out. Lots of ingredients, lots of steps…but the result? OMG, sooooo good!
So good, I ate is all week. You might too. Check it out!
This morning at 4, a tiny gray mouse looked up at me, somewhat frightened, and said “I-I-I think I took a wrong turn. I-I-I was supposed to go left but I went right and wha-wha-what is that orange creature scowling at me through the window?” “Shhhhh. It’s OK,” I whispered. “Please don’t be scared. Just turn around slowly and go back the way you came. That’s always best when you get a bit lost. Look for something familiar and hold on a while, take a nap, then try again when you’re back to feeling brave. It always works for me.”
Today’s warm breeze is not the first sign, of course, it started weeks ago when the clocks moved forward and the sun shifted, when I folded my favorite sweater for the last time and the wide windows welcomed the cacophony of spring sounds — motorbikes, lawnmowers, chainsaws, barking dogs, the hammering, hammering, hammering — soon the shimmery waves of heat will rise from the pavement, the mass throngs of people will congest on sidewalks, beaches, street corners, town parks, the hallowed trail I call Heaven, and the endless days will unfold hour by hot, humid, buggy hour while I stock up on iced things, hoard stacks of library books, move to the cooler part of the house, give praise to the window machine beneath which I’ll spend the months dreaming of those long and silent winter days, their fertile ground for contemplation and undisturbed peace.
I may as well be invisible in this library of ghosts only the manager sees me tells me I am early motions to the chairs by sunlit windows where flowers bloom my shadow cast long against the dusty floor it, the only other notice of my presence… conversations collide around me old friends embrace offer bouquets of smiles brush past without excuse so I step back, meditate on book spines pretend they are company enough until the show begins and I listen to stories and laughter my chair rocking slow — I bet they think its haunted.
Issue #1 – There’s No Such Thing as the Poop Fairy: 5 Things to Remember When You Walk in the Woods
People love the nature preserve where I often walk. Who wouldn’t? Its wide, criss-crossing trails offer welcome views of the woods and ponds and wildlife. It’s easy to forget that the busiest highway on the east coast is less than a mile away. It’s easy to forget the busy-ness of life in general — work and the To Do list and all the other mind clutter fade away when we spend time outdoors.
Unfortunately, as much as people love being out in nature, it’s hard to overlook the general disrespect many show for our protected natural spaces.
Just last week, on a brisk mile walk along my favorite trail, I spotted twelve discarded bags of dog poop. Twelve. That’s a poop bag about every 300 steps.
Some are tossed high and land on branches, like decorations. Some are tucked into hidey holes — knots in trees, crevices between rocks. But most of them are just set down along the side of the trail — as if someone is going to come by later and pick them all up. Abracadabra!
It makes me want to scream!
The thing is, once you start paying attention to them — once you start being angry about them — you start to see other things. The coffee cups, the nip bottles, the COVID masks, the dental flossers. The orange peels and apple cores. The Christmas ornaments and painted rocks, and similar garbage and graffiti.
There’s No Such Thing as the Poop Fairy: 5 Things to Remember When You Walk in the Woods was inspired by all of that. It’s a response that offers simple solutions: don’t litter, respect nature and wildlife, don’t leave your poop on the side of the trail.
At the end of the day, there is no magical creature — winged, wand waving, or white bearded — who is going to take care of the mess we keep leaving. It’s up to us.
Get your copy of the mini-zine There’s No Such Thing as the Poop Fairy: 5 Things to Remember When You Walk in the Woods today! $3.00 includes shipping.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
Last night I dreamt of my grandmother. She was sitting next to my dad toasting champagne in a luncheonette on Broad Street. You know, the kind with leather stools spinning around a counter and formica tables? I knew she’d be waiting, but the front door was locked, so I found a back entrance, pushed past the steel workers having lunch and ran to her. My heart was so full it felt like I was drowning, swallowing air and love; racing towards that hug that almost knocked us off our feet, her arms as tight as mine, holding on ‘til morning.
Not that long ago, at mile marker 86.5 near East Lyme’s Pattagansett River, you could pull off the highway into a small dirt turnout, grab a container from your trunk, and fill it to the brim with cold, fresh water pouring from a natural spring. The spring was pretty popular. You’d always see a car or two parked precariously on the side of the road — traffic slowing more for the incline of the hill ahead than the waterseekers themselves. It’s gone now, save for the old turnout, replaced by a cement culvert, its condo complex runoff too foul for thirst.
Harry Anderson saved my life. At least that’s what my wide-eyed younger self remembers. The man had a gun, after all. I saw it as he paid for his coffee, hitched up under his arm. I was working the overnight, back when a girl could do that on her own. And besides, the cops watched out for me. That’s why I called them. Harry was there in minutes. Dragged the man to the parking lot. Discharged the gun in a moment of midlife bravado that almost got him fired. I never forgot it — overfilled his apple fritters every time thereafter.
MANIFEST (zine) Consider a Gift Subscription. It’s a one-of-a-kind gift idea for the holidays!
Imagine a magazine that’s like a mini art installation. Each issue is filled with unexpected images and creative rabbit holes, poetry, quotes, a curated Spotify playlist, and so much more!
$25.00
Gift subscriptions include a custom holiday greeting/gift acknowledgement and four printed issues of MANIFEST (zine) starting with the Winter 2023 issue, Great & Small.
A Gift Subscription to MANIFEST (zine) is a one-of-a-kind gift idea for the holidays!
It’s like sending a mini art installation that features interesting images and creative rabbit holes, quotes, poetry, a curated Spotify playlist. Layered with colors, textures, meanings (and music), the result is a thought-full, tactile journey with nooks and crannies to discover along the way. Gift subscriptions cost $25.00 include a custom holiday greeting/gift acknowledgement and four printed issues of MANIFEST (zine) starting with our upcoming winter issue, Great & Small.
Visit our Etsy Shop to order individual issues as gifts or stocking stuffers. Each costs $8.00, which includes some cool extras and shipping. (Each Etsy listing includes a sneak preview video.)
Perfect for the book lover in your life, consider giving a book from Three Chairs Publishing. Each comes signed by the author with a few creative extras.
Looking for a festive shopping experience? Then be sure to visit the Holiday Expo at Guilford Art Center (411 Church Street, Guilford). You’ll find many of our Three Chairs Publishing creations on display, along with ceramics, pottery, glass, jewelry, homewares, fiber art, ornaments, accessories, toys, specialty foods, stationery, leather goods and more. More than 200 American artists, makers and designers are featured in this year’s event. Click here for more information.
Thank you for your support!
Just like shopping local during the holidays, shopping at Three Chairs Publishing’s online shop has ripple effects. Your purchases help to support the women-owned printing company that prints our books, the locally-owned print shops that print our marketing materials, and the U.S. Postal Service which reliably delivers our products to your doorstep. You also help the self-employed editors, proofreaders, typesetters, artists, and tech support folks who help turn my ideas into things I can put into your hands to enjoy.
For all of that, and your continued support of my creative work, thank you. Happy Holidays! — JEN PAYNE
This past year has been a whirlwind for my little publishing imprint, Three Chairs Publishing. In February, I published my fourth book, Water Under the Bridge: A Sort-of Love Story. It kicked off with a warm welcome at the Guilford Art Center on Valentine’s weekend, and was featured by the Independent Book Review as part of “45 Books We’re Excited About from Indie Presses & Indie Authors.”
Close to my heart has been my zine project, MANIFEST (zine). I created five issues this year — Water, Endemic, Heroically Found, and The Lola Poems — each with a different tone and theme. I think that’s what I love most about the zine format. It allows my creative voice to speak its peace — maybe loud, maybe sweet, maybe rambling — hopefully always interesting.
Participation in THE EXCHANGE this past fall introduced my work to a new audience, as did a mention in the 25th anniversary issue of Broken Pencil magazine and reviews by Ken Bausert and Silver Nyx. My writing was included in Sunspot Literary Journal’s Geminga 2022 Contest for Tiny Prose, Poem, or Art, the Connecticut Bards Poetry Review 2022, and the Poetry Institute’s zine Circumference. Good stuff, right?
This Thanksgiving, I find myself thinking about good stuff like that, and about all of the people who have supported my work in 2022…from my regular zine subscribers and the folks who bought my books, to the staff at the Guilford Art Center and the Blackstone Library.
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the ongoing influence of my friend and mentor, author Dale Carlson, who passed away in January. And I am ever grateful for my ongoing creative conversations with Judith Bruder, Tara Buckley, Joy Bush, Laure Noe, and Mary O’Connor.
If you’re reading this, I am grateful for you, too! I could not do what I do without your kind and generous audience. Thank you.
Last night, while I slept in the just-right bed, my feet pressed against the tower wall, the Bears came and ate what was left of the wise Scribe’s apples. His favorites, he told me, bewitchingly red and wild, but rare these late fall days.
It’s quiet enough here to hear the wings of the Crow King as he flies through the stars, but not — apparently — the sound of Bears crossing the meadow in Moonlight. It seems they ate the Mountains too, or so the Fog might tell. Tell if it could speak that is, but all I hear is birdsong.
I am always inspired by those life moments that move us most — love and loss, joy and disappointment, milestones and turning points. When I’m not exploring our connections with one another, I enjoy writing about our relationships with nature, creativity, and mindfulness, and how these offer the clearest path to finding balance in our frenetic, spinning world.
Very often, my writing is accompanied by photography and artwork. As both a graphic designer and writer, I think partnering visuals and words layers the intentions of my work, and makes the communication more palpable. I hope you will agree!
“I have lived with several Zen masters — all of them cats,” writes Eckhart Tolle in his book The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. “Watch any plant or animal and let it teach you acceptance of what is, surrender to the Now. Let it teach you Being. Let it teach you integrity —which means to be one, to be yourself, to be real. Let it teach you how to live and how to die, and how not to make living and dying into a problem.”
THE LOLA POEMS is a limited edition, memorial issue of MANIFEST (zine) that honors the passing of my own little Zen master, Lola, by considering the lessons she taught me in our time together.
16-page, 4.25 x 5.5 booklet, Cost: $8.00or subscribe and get 4 issues for $25.00.
You can pay through PayPal using a PayPal account or any standard credit card. If you prefer the old school approach, please send your check, made payable to Jen Payne, P.O. Box 453, Branford, CT 06405.
I slept on a cot near my grandmother’s bed in a room that smelled like eucalyptus. The aluminum frame squeaked when I moved, despite my small size and efforts to keep quiet. My grandfather slept in the adjoining room, his presence as unnerving as the Jesus portrait on the wall. The story goes he woke her once with a pitcher of water, threw it on the bed so she’d make his breakfast. I wonder if the train whistle ever disturbed him, pulled him down the tracks to the steel mill, back to the stacks and hot slag where he belonged.
Of course you were the one to call. It was late, I remember, a rainy night like the last time we met. Cars on the wet, weathered pavement, wipers marking time. Starshine in puddles and you, light years away, saying you knew I’d want to know, knew he’d been important. You knew despite the distance in our orbits, despite our final kiss that birthed a galaxy between us. My heart. You knew.
Some days, I feel like the girl in the tub with the fish in the comedy show hitting so close to home but so far out in left field that eating popcorn while I watch doesn’t seem nearly as awful as eating chicken wings during an episode of Criminal Minds. Me and my dying cat curled up on the floor, my hand stroking her tail — and only her tail because otherwise she thinks I’m about to stick another pill down her throat and she’ll run to hide from me. It’s a terrible thing when a part of your heart runs and hides from you, but I don’t blame her. She likes me best now in the mornings, too tired and stiff for any chase. Instead we curl up, like the girl and the fish in the tub, floating there in the early morning hours as if nothing will ever change.
When I come back in my next life I want to be an artist AND I want to work at Quimby’s in Chicago. Quimby’s is an independently owned bookstore that sells independently-published and small press books, comics, zines and ephemera. They favor the unusual, the aberrant, the saucy and the lowbrow — and they are super enthusiastic about what they do!
Since I’m not dead yet, then I just have to enjoy Quimby’s vicariously through their website and weekly “New Stuff Saturday Livestream.” Check it out!
BONUS: If you watch the recent New Stuff Saturday and stay tuned to timestamp 20:20, you’ll notice a couple of familiar things in the pile: Manifest (zine) and Evidence of Flossing: What We Leave Behind.
That’s right, as of now, several of Three Chairs Publishing’s creations are for sale at Quimby’s. Get your butt to Chicago now…
Now that you’ve been learning about zines all month, are you thinking of making your own? On her website on “Hooked to Books,” Grace Plant suggests How to Make a Zine in 10 Easy Steps: Decide on your theme Choose a name Plan your features Choose a format Use a template Print a master copy […]
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