Shawn L. Bird

Original poetry, commentary, and fiction. All copyrights reserved.

Grace February 28, 2011

Filed under: Grace Awakening,Literature,Pondering — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:30 am
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In Grace something is transcended, once and for all overcome. Grace happens in spite of something; it happens in spite of separateness and alienation. Grace means that life is once again united with life, self is reconciled with self. Grace transforms fate into a meaningful vocation. It transforms guilt to trust and courage. The word …grace has something triumphant in it.    ~Yrjö Kallinen

I found this quote on the Facebook status of friend who works at the UN. Aside from the concept of grace which is so beautifully explored here, I am fascinated that it was written by a Finn.  If Yrjö Kallinen was writing this in Finnish, it opens up another interesting language exploration, as there isn’t a single word for ‘grace’ in Finnish.  Perhaps Kallinen was thinking of gratia as there is a bit of the wealth of gratia gratium parit reflected here.

I want to know more about this.  If you know where this quote is from, please leave a comment so I can explore more.

Kiitos Yrjö!

Addendum:  March 1, 2011

I found this clip of Kallinen.  He’s speaking Finnish, and so the majority of you will have to read the sub-titles, but if you’re curious to hear his lovely clear enunciation that even I can make sense of have a listen.  Apparently Kallinen was a pacifist and conscientious objector who nonetheless was Finland’s Minister of Defence from 1946-48.  He is speaking about life and dreams and how to revolutionize thinking.  Quite apropos to what is happening in the Middle East at the moment.

Elämmekö unessa? (Are we living in a dream) pt 2 – 1 Translation(s) | dotSUB.

 

Thinking again February 24, 2011

Filed under: anecdotes,Grace Awakening,Pondering — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:25 am
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Well, I am glad that Thinking Day occurs in Scouting Week, so I can carry on with my theme of Girl Guide memories with some impunity. 

Another fun memory of Guiding is singing around the campfire.  I even put a campfire scene in Grace Awakening to celebrate these moments.  One of my favorite things is making up a verse of Quartermaster’s Store for everyone present around the fire.

Got a name?  I’ll make you a verse!  I’m serious!  Send me the name (and pronunciation if it’s not a common name) in the comment section below and I’ll make you a verse for your personal use within Guiding (or wherever your campfire happens to be).

 If you don’t remember the song it goes like this:

♪ My eyes are dim I can not see ♪

♪ I have not brought my specs with me ♪

 ♪I havvvvvve no-ot brought . my. specs. with. me. ♪

♪ There was Shawn, Shawn making out with John ♪

♪ in the store ♪ in the store ♪

♪ There was Shawn, Shawn making out with John ♪

 ♪ in the quartermaster’s stor-or-ore ♪

Come on- gather ’round my fire!

PS. My husband is John.  My Guides loved the naughtiness of this! lol

 

Still Thinking… February 23, 2011

Filed under: anecdotes,Grace Awakening,Pondering — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:39 am
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When I was involved in Guiding, there was a need to create non-denominational graces for units to use at events.  I had a lot of fun creating several graces sung to the tunes of popular songs of the time (e.g. “The Barbie Girl Grace”) as well as common Guiding tunes (e.g. “Shawn’s Grace” to the tune of “Fire’s Burning”).  Some of them are still circulating at http://www.users.ms11.net/~gsong/Graces/nondom.html

I find it somewhat ironic that if you search Grace and “Shawn Bird” on the internet, these old graces show up, along with references to Grace Awakening.  The graces are all given for free use within Guiding and I am thrilled when every once in awhile I stumble across some reference to one being used at a Guiding event.   It’s kind of nice that my words are still being used within Guiding.

You’ll notice that my collection of Rotary Invocations follow the same model.  I create non-denominational invocations for use in Rotary.  If Rotarians would sing, I’d get them to use those Guiding Graces, but I just can’t see it happening.  😉

 

waiting for the other shoe February 12, 2011

Filed under: Grace Awakening,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 2:46 am
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It felt too easy. No one else had a publishing story that went, “finished my book, pitched in to a publisher at a conference, she took it, seven months later she asked for more, two months later she signed it…”

Every other author I’ve met has a long list of rejection letters. I don’t. Grace has charmed everyone who’s ever heard about her. I know she’s loved, because those first beta-readers were ruthless enough to ensure the later beta-readers (delta readers?) loved it right off, without reservation.

But good though it is, publication coming so easily seemed surreal. Where was the challenge? the suffering for the art? the constant re-sending of the manuscript? I asked if perhaps we could move up release to the summer so I could get in a book tour before school started, and the editor was open to look at that, if the editing went well, when he started it in February. Everything was going just too smoothly.

Then the shoe dropped, and January 31st as I read the email that the publishing house was closing down and that the contract was voided, I actually thought, “Ah there we go. That’s what I was expecting would happen!”

Now Grace Awakening is off to meet a new publisher and the waiting game begins again. Hopefully only another week or two before I hear, and hopefully I hear that they love her as much as everyone else loves her, and is eager to have her out in the world representing their publishing house! Wouldn’t it be awesome if they fast tracked, and got her out by July so I can do a really thorough summer book tour?

 

freaky coincidences strike again… February 10, 2011

Filed under: Grace Awakening,Grace Beguiling - Petrarch,Mythology,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 7:59 am
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Click to view full-sized image

All the time I was writing Grace Awakening, I’d look up some myth or fact and there would appear a strange coincidence that made the hair stand up on my arms.

I just had another one. You know that famous picture by Sandro Botticelli- Printemps? I use the close up the Three Graces component of that picture to illustrate the Grace Awakening section of this blog. If you pull out the perspective a bit, standing right beside the Graces in the centre of the  painting is a young woman. I understood that she’s supposed to be Aphrodite/Venus. She’s supervising everything that’s going on.

Guess who Botticelli based this particular image on? Are you sitting down? I’ve just learned that it was Laure de Noves de Sade, muse of Petrarch who is standing there watching the Graces dancing with that beatifical expression.  Apparently Laure beguiled Botticelli as well as Petrarca.

(The source is Mario Fubini, Laure in Dictionnaire des personnages littéraires et dramatiques de tous les temps et de tous les pays , Éd.)

Wow. Creepy.

But oh so cool!!

Grace Beguiling, indeed!

.

PS click on the painting and it will enlarge to full screen

 

helpful connections February 3, 2011

Filed under: Grace Awakening — Shawn L. Bird @ 9:32 pm
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I’ll be off to France in a few weeks to do some research on the prequel of Grace Awakening which (so far) I’m calling Grace Beguiling. I’ll be doing the research in Avignon, and we have booked a really nice small family hotel located within the walls of the old city. It is called Autour de Petit Paradis, which bodes well for a lovely time: I’m looking forward to staying in a little paradise! (and may wish we’d booked a longer visit there). From the reviews the hosts are very helpful and personable, and quickly after our online booking we received a lovely email from the proprietor Sabine, assuring us that they were at our disposal for any information.

I took that opportunity to let her know that the purpose of our trip was to research the lives and times of Petrarch and Laure. She has been very helpful, sending me photos and links to places for us to explore. How wonderful to find such a local connection! I can hardly wait to get there.

Another helpful connection I had with this book was a French genealogist who provided me with a lot of extremely helpful information on Laure’s family.  She married Hugues de Sade, (a marquis, but several generations before the infamous one).  They had several children, and they will be showing up in my novel. 

Autour du Petit Paradis within the walls of Avignon's old town

 

metaphor for the publication journey February 1, 2011

Filed under: Grace Awakening,Poetry,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 7:22 am
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The sun is gleaming
so brightly that the snow is blinding.
The future’s so bright I’ve got to wear shades.

Every day another supporter, another booster,

another enthusiastic participant
in the waiting game asks, “WHEN?”
Soon, I assure them. Soon!

A flicker on the computer screen
“I hate to have to tell you…”
and a gleaming dream
is buried in a white out of
black uncertainty.
I don’t know now, I have to tell them
I can’t see anymore.

.

.

80 minutes ago I received word that the publisher for Grace Awakening is closing down in 30 days.  Grace was scheduled for release in 240 days.  That is 210 days too late, unfortunately.  Now we’re back to peddling a manuscript.  Poor Grace!

 

A poem by Wendy Phillips January 20, 2011

Filed under: Commentary,Grace Awakening,Literature,Poetry — Shawn L. Bird @ 7:40 pm
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From Fishtailing by Wendy Phillips. This novel by UBC Creative Writing alumnus Wendy Philips is crafted in a series of poems in persona of several characters. There are students, teachers and administrators represented.

.

Kyle
Teacher staples my motorcycle dream
to the display board
Tricia wanders over
reads it
I watch
She turns
stares
raises an eyebrow
drifts to my table
Told you Farr would like it she says
Not bad.

I swallow a lump
Wanna ride sometime?
She lifts her chin
narrows her eyes
I look away from the glare
Yeah she says, today
walks away.

So
poems are good
for something.

I like this poem because it captures something that I see often.  Suddenly the communication options open when people master a new medium.  Finding new media opens up an audience they would not have reached otherwise.  I often set up a “Poet-tree” in my class.  It fills a wall.  A trunk and branches are on the wall.  Students can take green leaves and leave a poem on a wall.  It’s a non-credit thing, and some years it gets very little interest, but other years it is a hot-bed of creative communication.  Students from other classes will come in to read the poems, because hearts are bare on the wall, and voyeurs watch developments with avid interest.

A young man who has poetry in his arsenal has a powerful tool to capture the hearts of the ladies he admires!  If he can set his poetry to music, he has even more power.  The ladies will be virtually powerless from his charm!

Yes Kyle, poetry is good for something.  In Grace Awakening Ben takes full advantage of the fact!  😉

 

going through the gate January 1, 2011

Filed under: Commentary,Grace Awakening,Mythology — Shawn L. Bird @ 7:17 am
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Janus is the god of beginnings, endings, doorways, gateways, and time.  Here we are in January- the month that belongs to Janus, travelling through the gateway of a new year.

Janus is a two faced God.  One head faces forward to the future and one faces back to the past.  At this time of year many of us are prone to doing the same as we consider the events of the past year and consider improvements desired in the coming one.

2010 was a wonderful year for me, as personally we celebrated a quarter century of marriage with a wonderful trip to Italy and professionally we were thrilled with  the acceptance of Grace Awakening for publication next fall.  In 2011 I hope to see completion of another manuscript that has been in the works for awhile, and hopefully it will be picked up for publication this year.  As well, we are planning a research trip to France to work on a prequel to Grace Awakening (tentatively called Grace Beguiling).  It is a project that I think Janus would find amusing, Grace moving back in time.  I also look forward to improving health by remembering to take my vitamins and getting out for more walks.  The poodles will appreciate that effort.

How about you?  What are you planning in 2011?  What awaits you on the other side of the gate?

 

catalyst December 23, 2010

Filed under: Grace Awakening,Pondering — Shawn L. Bird @ 3:47 am
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In science, a catalyst causes a reaction in other substances without being used up itself.  In history, a catalyst is the precipitous event that causes other events to unfold.

Sometimes people we meet have a great impact on our lives.  While we are changed in amazing and dramatic ways, their lives go on much as before we met them.  

The impact can be positive. Perhaps the person was a teacher who inspired us to believe in ourselves.  Perhaps it was a celebrity who had a dramatic weight loss.  Perhaps it was an author whose words transformed our morals.

The impact could be negative, though.  Perhaps a stranger spoke cruel words that led to rash decisions.  Perhaps following a celebrity’s high life, we were led into alcohol and drug abuse.  Perhaps bullying leads to suicidal depression.

In all cases, the person is blissfully ignorant of the results of his or her interaction with you.  Will you tell him or her?  Will you put an ad in the paper or post a poem on a wall to announce it?   Will you write poetry? a novel?  blog entries?

If you’re a writer, you probably will.  Send the person a letter and let them know.  Teachers love to get those letters, I know.  Authors toiling with their typewriters are eager to distract themselves from their writer’s block with a return note to you.  Everyone likes to be appreciated.

Now consider, if  small throw-away encounters can change your life, how much more can years of encouragement and highly charged encounters influence you?   How much can you influence others with loving attention and respectful interaction year after year?

Catalyst. 

The power behind change: for better or worse.