Homeward Bound...Well to what used to be my home

Homeward Bound to the land I grew up on.  My parents' expecting me earlier in the day but trains which are always on time (ha) got delayed today because of flooding in Fargo.  I knew earlier this week that I should have built an Ark.  But I just did not have the patience to do so or the money for the building permit. The measurements, since I lack in math skills would have been off.  My boat probably would have sunk.  Luckily, I am better at other things.  I performed this past Monday at the comedy club after not having done stand-up comedy in three years.  It was a natural high lacking hangovers, police involvement, and all the other garbage that goes with getting high on drugs.  Still feeling pretty good and enjoying the train ride.  I probably would have gotten motion sickness on the Ark anyways.  I often wondered how Noah handled motion sickness.  But I digress.

Journey to the otherside

Once upon a time, okay it was about 10 years ago in February.  I was prescribed a medication to help with my mental illness and suicidal thoughts.  I was on the medication for three and half days when I began to tremble uncontrollably.  What ensued was a Gran Mal Seizure on the fourth night.  I not only had the seizure I fell backwards, cracked my head open on the cement floor, dislocated my left shoulder and died.  That is right!  I died.  A first responder was there and did the life saving CPR on me.  I came back quickly, as if pushed back into my shell by the Creator.  She said it was not my time.  Re-birthed was I as came to.  Knowing that not only the medication that was supposed to keep me from killing myself made me lifeless, but that my breath was sacred and needed to be returned to me.  Dying changes a person life when they come back to tell about.  It sure changed mine.

Revise This...

I started out as an oral story teller and did not start putting pen to paper or typing the fingers in the keyboard till much later in life for example when I got to college the first time.  I always had stories in my head, jokes and poems that I could do.  I even did impressions of people but writing was not my strong suit.  So, when I got an opportunity to take a Creative Writing class in college...I was quite frankly nervous.  I knew I could tell stories quite well but write them that was a whole different thing.

The creative writing class involved writing poetry.  Something that I did not think I would ever write in my lifetime.  The professor was also a writer and not just a professor.  He was working on a book.  He was immensely into revising your work as I think all English professors are.

It came time for the first assignment.  The professor was so delighted by my writing and overly praising the excellent writing he then had the nerve to ask me "How many times did you revise this?"   "Revise,"  I said.  "This here on the paper is the first and only draft there will be.  I did not revise nor will I.  It flowed out of me like the creek to the river which in turn flows to the sea."  He turned beat red when I added, "I wrote it in five minutes.  Thanks for all the wonderful compliments about my work but I never revise.  It is what it is."  He did not believe me about the no revision thing.  Every class, I got wonderful praises for my work and then the question came..."How many times did you revise this?"  "NONE!"  Would always be my answer and I felt a lot of tension in classroom between us. With all his wonderful praises and never critiquing my work I was sure I was going to get an A in the class.  Disappointment set in when my final grade was a C.  He apparently was jealous that I never had to revise and he was making constant revisions. 

The morale of the story is trust. Trust in the talents God gave you, God made you and said you were good just like the rest of what God created.  Trust in that.  Don't revise yourself and lose who you are just adapt to things around you.  You are good.