Letters from the Homestead: February 2023
What standing in space has taught me about writing. Also, I love Lent.
Emily Dickinson called her Amherst home “The Homestead.” I lovingly call my apartment in St. Louis the same thing (although I definitely get out more than Dickinson). This monthly newsletter is my attempt to work through what it feels like to put down roots as a writer in my own Homestead.
On writing and standing.
In 2+ years of clinic escorting at an abortion clinic, I’ve learned that the kind of protestor who loves to upbraid me the most, with only a handful of exceptions, is the white man. The age doesn’t matter. I’ve been yelled at, prayed at, lectured at, and sad-eye whimpered at by all ages of white men. They are convinced of their righteousness, and the comments they make to me generally follow the same pattern. Here are some examples:
“You’re on the side of hell, young lady, and I’ll pray for your soul… You must have had an abortion yourself if you’re so willing to stand out here. I’ll pray for your baby in heaven… We’re out here trying to give people free healthcare, and you’re out here trying to get people to pay for the same things… I don’t want your soul to be damned to hell, please come talk to me… Did you know that Margaret Sanger was a eugenicist? And doesn’t it bother you that most of the women coming in today are Black?… We can offer women real options, not the option of killing their babies… How do you sleep at night? … Those people wanted to talk to us and you kept them away. Is that what you call giving people ‘choice’?… They weren’t confused by us. They wanted to talk to us… You could turn away from all of this. Come work for us. We’ll pay you to stand out here and won’t keep you from talking to anyone… I pray for you every day, Courtney. I’m praying for your soul…”
If I could engage with these men, I would tell them that none of these comments are effective. They only make the gap between us wider, fueled by the sting of mutual judgment. The more I ignore them and the more assertively I move cars along when they manage to get a patient’s ear, the more they act as though I am persecuting them.
My theory is that women are used to being ignored, so it’s no shock to the women protestors when I ignore them. (Planned Parenthood requires that we ignore them as part of the non-engagement policy). But the white men act like they’ve never been ignored in their entire lives. I suppose there’s plenty to be said about a white man’s conditioning to believe anyone will respond when he addresses them, but I’m more interested here in working out some of the things standing in the open and getting judged has taught me about writing.
I know. An odd connection, isn’t it?
This may be strange to acknowledge, but clinic escorting has (selfishly) taught me a great deal about my own writing practice. Maybe it’s silly to claim that standing in a parking lot has made me a better writer, but I’m always searching for scraps of meaning that make the rough work of writing a little easier.
A few things clinic escorting/standing in space has taught me about writing:
To resist engagement with inhospitable responders. I’m not perfect; I’ve snapped at the protestors before. But my best mornings at the clinic are the ones where I lean into the silence. In the end, of course, I’m not ignoring them. I have to be alert to all their behavior in case something gets dangerous. To “ignore” is an active pursuit, not a passive one. For me as a writer, this means that I’m not interested in hearing critiques from people who’ve already made up their mind about me, even if the critiques I imagine are merely hypothetical. I know that hard critiques exist (“she doesn’t prioritize plot,” “her stories are weird,” “she doesn’t follow the rules,” etc.), but I don’t have to spend time engaging with them when I could be getting more writing done.
It’s a challenge to stand still and compose in your mind, rather than composing while sitting at a desk or going on a walk. There are famous stories about poets who compose their poetry while going on a walk. And there are even more tales of writers who chain themselves to their writing desk in the wee hours of the morning. It’s been a different experience for me to try and make sense of my writing ideas while standing still. The momentum is all internal, not ambulatory like when you’re on a walk. There’s also a kind of discomfort. Most people don’t just stand in the same spot for a few hours. You stand in one place long enough and you start to get grounded in new ways, letting your boots sink into the top layer of pavement and finding your internal balance. The words come differently when you’re standing still.
To allow someone to be frustrated with you. When you create a new written work, you have to be content with the fact that your work will frustrate someone—thematically or structurally. It’s impossible to please everyone. What uplifts one reader annoys another. When you stand in front of the clinic, you feel the heat of the protestors’ frustration. And it’s sort of liberating to just…allow them to be frustrated with you. You let them be. You don’t try to quell their agitation or make things easier for them. You release yourself from the urge to manage another’s emotions, an important skill for writing what really needs to be written.
To cultivate soft focus—seeing the whole, noticing how small things are incorporated in the whole. In the parking lot of the clinic, I see so many things: red-winged blackbirds, mockingbirds, crows, protestors in their orange vests, anti-abortion signs, the interstate, the grass, the dogwoods, the traffic… Standing in space like this, you can practice shifting between the large frame of the soft-focus (the setting, the atmosphere) and the narrow focus of individual characters. Shifting in and out of this perspective has helped me think about dimensionality in my writing—i.e., How much are my eyes holding at once? Where is my interest drawn? How do I articulate that interest?
To not engage can be a spiritual discipline. Social media trains us to engage with so much, especially if we see a post that offends our soul. In college, I learned from a book by Thich Nhat Hahn that true dialogue isn’t possible unless both sides are genuinely willing to change their minds. To not engage can be a way to resist the training of popular culture.
In front of the clinic, it just makes things calmer—and calm is what the patients need most of all.
Lent is my favorite time of the year.
I have always loved the forty days of Lent, in large part because it’s the final countdown to spring. St. Louis has its own “false spring” (in it right now), and we’re sure to get a few more deep freezes in the month of March. But once Good Friday arrives, it’s usually safe to put your seeds in the ground and pull out your sandals for good.
I like the somberness of Lent and how it mixes with the uncanniness of a fish fry on every corner. I love how it feels like the last mile, the final stretch out of the dark winter and into the light. In St. Louis, I enjoy how the season Lent is part of the city’s cultural make-up (we do Mardi Gras particularly well and, truly, the fish frys are not to be missed).
Most of all, I love the practice of re-centering. I don’t really “give things up” during Lent, but I do try to adjust habits and make small changes. Here are my big three for this year’s Lent:
Wake up before 8 am every morning. This may seem sort of silly, but life as a freelance writer means… well… no one is making me get up early in the morning. The winter months and all the accompanying darkness make me want to sleep much more than usual. I’m trying to break myself out of that pattern and give myself more hours in the day.
Avoiding unnecessary spending / Only buying things I need. When I stopped drinking alcohol, I replaced the urge for a dopamine rush with spending money. It’s taken me a lot of time to find balance with this. This Lent, I’m doing a “no buy forty days.” The goal is to only buy things I need (like groceries or replacements). No new items. No new “stuff.”
Go to Mass every Sunday of Lent. My good friend Evangeline (hey, girl!) and I are going to Mass together this Lent. I haven’t darkened the door of a church in years, and the last thing I wanted to do was enter into a space that reminded me of evangelicalism. So, I took the opposite route and decided on Mass. I’m hungry for ritual, and I appreciate how Catholicism lets you sit there quietly and not speak to anyone. Evangeline noted that what first drew her to Catholicism was the anonymity, and I’ve been reflecting on this ever since she mentioned it. There’s a lot I don’t agree with in Catholicism (especially as a queer woman who volunteers every week at an abortion clinic and doesn’t necessarily believe in a Christian God 😂), but as a theatre woman, I can get behind the healing powers of a little theatrical spectacle.
What I’m reading this month… (Lent Edition!)
This season always makes be “get back my religion,” at least when it comes to my reading life. Here are some books I’ve been reading lately. These aren’t necessarily endorsements, just some texts I’ve found interesting.
The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A Spirituality for Everyday Life by James Martin, SJ. A great overview of Jesuit spirituality, written by one of my favorite writer-priests. There’s a beautiful section in here on friendship. I’ve actually been listening to the audiobook version (narrated by the author), but I went ahead and checked out the book so I could follow up on a few things.
Reaching for God: The Benedictine Oblate Way of Life by Roberta Werner, OSB. I’m doing lots of research on the Benedictines for a writing project, and this book has been the best introduction I’ve found so far. An awesome breakdown of Benedictine spirituality and practices. (I’m trying to write some “nun fiction” about a Benedictine convent.)
Bread and Wine: Readings for Lent and Easter. This little collection has some lovely selections about Lent—I appreciate how short the entries are. It’s a nice “daily reader” for the 40(ish) days of this season.
The Seven Storey Mountain: An Autobiography of Faith by Thomas Merton. More convent/monastery/monk research! This book is wonderful. An incredible spiritual biography about a fascinating individual.
How I made money this month $$$
I believe freelance artists should be more upfront about how they support themselves financially, rather than maintaining the illusion that they are fully supported by their art (they usually aren’t). This is me attempting to live out that principle. So, here are all the ways I brought in money to the Homestead for the month of February.
Facilitating online graduate courses. Grading papers all week long!
Teaching artist work for Prison Performing Arts. Leading a weekly writing workshop that’s really been giving me life lately.
Course writing for an online education company. Finally finished this project of writing a new graduate course on literary analysis.
Paid Substack subscriptions! Thank you so much to those of you who are paid subscribers of Letters from the Homestead. It means the world to me.
Spring is on the way…
I’m so ready for the season change, but I’m trying to practice being here right now. Spring always comes in her own time.
Tonight starts a new month.
Yours ever & etc., etc.,
Courtney, Mistress of the Homestead, and Noble Midge the Cat 🐈⬛
P.S. - Consider becoming a paid subscriber of this newsletter!
