Response to another writer

Dear Deb,
There is so much about what you say that is true about the creative process. There is nothing untrue about good fiction, or even some not so good fiction. What happens when someone accesses the places from which fiction arises is as much a mystery as any art. It is a conversation between the medium and the one with the keyboard or the chisel and that suble vision the ancients called Muse. Michangelo said that it was his job to take away the excess marble so that the statue within could emerge.
Now let's talk about truth and fact. Truth itself has little to do with fact. Fact itself is a bit of mythology that has risen from our worship of the measurable and touchable. Such a small slice of reality to deservie so much attention, such a dusty corner to invite our consistent attention!
You are not ill. You are a story teller. People such as you were celebrated in less technological cultures. Bards they were called. They roamed between the clans taking the mundane activities of each day and spinning tales that were grounded in each village and their happenings, but were not limited to these small events. So, when the people heard the Bards' songs they saw themselves as part of something more than scrabbling in the dirt of survival.
Fiction? Are we not more than sad and scruffy creatures who scrabble for survival, however sophisticated our tools? Are we not able to love, to feel passion, to sing, to reach toward that which is untouchable? Do we not sense that just beyond our sight there are kingdoms of light and glory? Do we not dream? These are not the imaginings of fools. They are the food that nourishes those who refuse to live within boxes whose bounds are determined by practicality and utility.
There is a craft to what we do. It is the craft that is learned to unleash and channel the art that surges up within us. Tricks? No, Technique. Our ability to bring ideas and dreams into light, language itself is a technique, a mysterious and wondrous craft learned by every child who moves from babble to 'Ma' and 'No.'
You need not attend any meeting or convention to be what you are. You might learn, but you might be bored. Choose and be at peace.
The cautionary part of this tale is to never forget who you are and what you have been given. Surely it is theraputic. Most therapy has to do with expression. Surely it is addictive. It changes your perspective and your perception. But you are not alone in your world or in your craft or in your calling.
The world needs us. Whether it believes it or not, whether it buys it or not has little to do with this truth.
Keep on truckin'.
Blessings.
David.

What Do We See?

I was standing on the chancel, up in front of the church, half way through a funeral. A granddaughter was speaking about her ‘Pop-pop.’ I was behind her, backing her up in case she fell apart. Above her head, all the way on the other side of the sanctuary, colors, deep stained glass colors shining out of the louvers that control the volume of the pipe organ. The colors came through the organ, all the pipes, bellows, air boxes in the dark back there behind the balcony. I stood there, amazed.
Later, I looked up and the lovers were in a different position, revealing only shadows. I real ized I’d never look up there again without searching for the stained glass shining through.

What do we see when we look at something or someone? How much of our expectations have to do with a moment, a glimpse that becomes the template for what we see? How many of our prejudices, our fears, our guilts, barriers that separate us from each other and from hope and acceptance have to do with simple perspective? How many walls in our world are nothing special until we see through them to the colors shining through the darkness?

I think I’ll alter my expectations about blank walls and shadows. You never know what might come shining through.