My Granddaughter (8) wants to be an Insecure Writer

WiFi and Insecure Writers

Quadrantid meteor shower, first of 2012, peaks tonight and in the hours before dawn January 4th

First, may I wish all those reading this a happy, healthy and wholly miraculous New Year.

I have been on intermittent connection with the Ether since mid-December. My usual readers will please forgive me for sporadic internet connection, solstitial/Yuletide hibernation and Wifi-free preparation for a magical New Year.

So magical will 2012 be, I believe, though, that we won’t have any need to feel “insecure” any more; Alex Cavanaugh (just joking, Alex) will have done such a good job of getting us all to ‘spill the beans’—the raison d’être of his monthly Insecure Writers’ Support Group (IWSG)—that in the catharsis, we won’t feel insecure any more.

So far, Alex’s initiative to encourage writers into releasing their (writing) fears–as well as bloghopping every first Wednesday of each month, lets other writers feel not so shy of plunging in. Besides, it’s a lot of fun bouncing around other writers’ sites in the “wee hours” of the new year.

That little ditty aside, I have to admit that my 8-year-old granddaughter, Oriah, stole the show and has this month won the contest in subject matter for today’s contribution: she completely put all insecurities out of my head. Instead she is sharing the opening lines of her new story with me and with you, gentle Reader.

She wants to be an ‘Insecure Writer’, even though she doesn’t feel at all insecure.

Because she admits to not being scared of plunging in, her own fearlessness is itself a tonic. Her storyline, setting, atmosphere and mood are all set in a couple of sentences.

Would we all had started out this way!

She has decided her story will probably be a long one, and so it may have to come in instalments.

Oriah, author of "Time Stopped", aged 8, writing for this month's IWSG blog

So, thanks to Oriah, this is her first instalment:

The violets in the mountains had made sweet sweet music that time had stopped.
One little animal could
start time again but no-one could find her no-one at all.
But one little deer sad and
alone–she didn’t know

Oriah’s story continues …and the drama unfolds…

Oriah and I offer this blog-story-preview as our contribution to this month’s fodder for hopping readers. And we hope you enjoy its sweetness, its innocence, and the feeling it offers to all of us who once felt this way about putting words on the printed page.

Thank you, Oriah, for being brave enough to let Grandma put you in her blog; and for bringing such a youthful and fresh perspective into this group of writer-dreamers.*

And…thank you, Alex, for allowing me to bend the rules…a little 🙂

*Brief insight: My granddaughter’s name was inspired by the words of another Oriah–Mountain Dreamer–who wrote in 1999:

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

“It doesn’t interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.

“It doesn’t interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive.

“It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life’s betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain! I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it.

“I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, to be realistic, to remember the limitations of being human.

“It doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul; if you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.

“I want to know if you can see beauty even when it’s not pretty, every day,and if you can source your own life from its presence.
I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand on the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, ‘Yes!’

“It doesn’t interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up, after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done to feed the children.

“It doesn’t interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.

“It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you, from the inside, when all else falls away.

“I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.”
by 
Oriah Mountain Dreamer
 copyright ©1999

Thanks to the indulgence of Alex Cavanaugh and his intrepid January blog-hoppers.

IWSG January blog ©2012Marian Youngblood