Reinventing the 40-hour work week in the 21st Century – Meyer

According to a recent study conducted by the Center for American Progress, Americans now consider a 40-hour work week as “part time” in most professional jobs and as a sign of a stagnant career.

As a professional writer, college instructor, and owner of a small publishing company, I find myself working 70-80 hours per week, and still feeling that it isn’t enough. We are often told as authors that we must have at least 10,000 followers (Twitter, Facebook, blogs, etc.) but with social media reciprocation, this means that we also are following 10,000 people. How do you follow 10,000 people? And who is deceiving who?

With the inherited work ethic from our parents and the pressure of social media from our peers, most 21st century professionals “live lives of quiet desperation” neglecting family, friends, and our physical, emotional and spiritual health.

When you look back in history at all those brave men and women who fought so valiantly for the 8-hour work day and the 40-hour work week, it boggles the mind that we have now turned back the clock and re-shackled ourselves to their bondage. What would they think if they could see us now? We don’t have time for recreation. We don’t have time for our families. We don’t have time to lend a helping hand to a friend or neighbor. We don’t have time to go to church or take a stroll around the block or watch a sunset.

We see the problem but is it really possible to reinvent the 40-hour work week and make it a practical and sustainable lifestyle while still being successful in our chosen careers?

I say, “Yes!”

If we step away from our computers at 5:00 PM every day and stay away from them for two full days, what is the worst thing that could happen?

What is the best thing that could happen?

Want to join me in this grand adventure – and find out?

Dorene Meyer
http://www.dorenemeyer.com/
http://www.goldrockpress.com/

Author of Missy to be released March 26: http://www.mcnallyrobinson.com/event-11168/Northern-Writers----Launch-of-Five-New-Books

Inventing the Truth - Rose McCormick Brandon

Recently, I wrote about a hospital stay. I was ten. Left in s big city facility by my parents. I begged my mother not to leave. Of course, she had to and I was forced to find my way among strangers for the first time in my life. That’s if I don’t count beginning school, an event that was more catastrophic for me than for most children.

In the children’s ward, I made friends. Most were mobile, healthy for the most part. One boy was in an iron lung. This contraption appeared as harmless as a fallen garbage can but it wheezed like a dragon. And by ten, I knew a lot about polio, the disease that forced a boy my age inside the dragon.

I told my story as I remembered it, all the while, conscious that if I were to visit that children’s ward, and if it hadn’t been remodeled since my stay, that I likely wouldn’t recognize it. It’s vivid in my mind, its windows, walls, its cheery nursing staff, the pajama-clad children I scurried with after evening visiting hours. Yet, I know if I connected with one of the other children, whose names are all forgotten, they would say, “That’s not how I remember it.”

Our memories are uniquely ours. Much of what I write is personal experience. I can tell my story however I choose because it’s my story, my memory. The tough part of telling our stories is when our memories also belong to someone else, another family member, for instance. They may say, “The event didn’t happen like that at all.”

Five family members can attend the same event. Each one will leave with a different story. One has a conversation with a stranger that colors their entire experience. Another meets an old friend. One eavesdrops. One is aware of color, innuendo and drama. Another takes away facts only.

In writing our stories, we should be aware that someone else’s memory of the same event may differ. That doesn’t invalidate our take-away. It’s our story, after all. And we must write it, not to please another person, but to let the reader know how the memory shaped us.

William Zinsser says, “Memoir is how we validate ourselves.” Therefore, our experiences must always remain our story. We have to get over the idea that someone else will read them and disagree with our take on how events unfolded.

About telling our stories, Annie Dilliard writes, “The act of writing about an experience takes so much longer and is so much more intense than the experience itself that you’re left only with what you have written, just as the snapshots of your vacation become more real than your vacation.” We can write our personal stories freely if we refuse to care who reads them.

My hospital story ended up being about the first time I realized that good writing hums. In the tiny children’s ward library, I discovered The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Mark Twain’s words hummed in my chest – it was a marvelous discovery that lasted beyond my short hospital stay and remains with me today. I’m guessing that no one else in that hospital left with the same experience as I did.

Age Discrepancy - Eleanor Shepherd

This month I will receive my first pension cheque from the government.  I am having a difficult time accepting that.  It is not that I don’t want the money.  Who does not welcome money coming in?  What I am struggling with is what this says about my age.  How can I be old enough to qualify for a pension?  I always thought pensions were for old people and that is where the rub is for me. 

I have discovered a significant discrepancy exists between what all of the official records indicate my age is and what my self-image perceives as my age.  Even when I look in the mirror and know that staring back at me the face of someone who must at least be in her late fifties, I see a thirty-five year old.  Reality attests how ridiculous that is when cold facts affirm that my daughter is that age and my son five years older. 

I suspect it is fear of what being old means that holds me captive to this irreconcilable cognitive gap.  If I am as old as all of these documents attest, that means that most of my years are behind me, and I am not sure that I have accomplished all that I had hoped and dreamed of doing.  My fear is that life has passed me by when I was not looking.  Is it too late?  Will I never become all that I was going to be when I grew up?

So many years were spent in waiting:

·      Waiting to be old enough to do the stuff that the older kids did, 

·      Waiting to be old enough to drive a car, or vote, or have a boyfriend,

·      Waiting to meet that special young man of my dreams to come into my life,

·      Waiting for him to ask me if I would marry him,

·      Waiting for our wedding day to finally arrive,

·      Waiting to find out that the child I longed for so much was on the way,

·      Waiting for the children to reach the next stage in their growth and development,

·      Waiting until my daughter would grow up so we could experience that unique feminine companion of mother and daughter

·      Waiting for the moments to write so my first book could be completed, in the midst of all of the activities of life

·      Waiting for a publisher to accept my manuscript when it was finally completed

·      Waiting for the medical breakthrough that will heal my son’s quadriplegia

·      Waiting to become a grandmother and know that my line would continue after I am gone

In all of the years of waiting, did I lose sight of the way life was slipping away from me?

            I have come to realize I am now all grown up.  I no longer have to wait for events to happen.  Perhaps the years bring the wisdom to know that in the course of time, those things that I most desire may come or if they never do, the world will not end.  I can choose how I respond to the events of life.  If what I desired does not materialize, life can be good anyway. 

            Does this choice to accept the inevitable make me passive and keep me from striving to become all I want to be?  I know that I must work through the conflict I feel about my age and my longings.  I am the age that my birth certificate tells me I am.  However, I still have a future.  What I really need to decide is not whether I will become all those things I wanted to be – rich and famous and beloved by all, or whether I will choose to become someone who leaves a legacy after I have gone, by my imprint on the lives of others. 

            Maybe I have achieved my goals.  I am rich, not necessarily in money, although compared to how most of the world lives I have more than my share of material prosperity.  I also have the riches of relationships with so many wonderful people all over the world.  All l need to do is open my Facebook page and see how blessed I am. 

            I may not be famous in the way that I dreamed of, having my name become a household word to millions.  Nevertheless, my name is valued in my household.  My husband has proven his love and loyalty as together we have walked through good days and bad for forty-two years.  My children consider me their friend and choose to be with me when they have other options.  They believe in me and encourage me.  If in their eyes I am famous, that is enough.   Even the cat, follows me around and settles down beside me as I work.  To her I am a Very Important Person. 

            I may not be beloved by all and that is not surprising, in that at times my words and actions are less than loving and could not elicit a loving response.  In some circumstances, the difficult and unpopular decisions I have to make create tensions with others. 

  However, I know God always loves me unconditionally.  He is the One who has determines my value whether I am six or sixty-five.  When I begin to understand His perspective I think I might be on my way to resolving that discrepancy between my age and my image. 

Winner of 2009
Word Guild
Award of Merit
Human Interest Story

 

 

Winner of 2011
Word Guild Award
Christian Leadership

 

 

           

Disappointment and Courage make good friends/MANN

Despite disappointment as an experience I want to avoid, it can drive me upwards and onwards. Sometimes it’s a little like seeing dominoes fall after one leads the way, leaving nothing more to happen except to consider the heap of the black and white mess. I sometimes say, “What else can go wrong?” Feelings of ‘I wish I had of’, or maybe ‘if I’d done this or that’, or even ‘why’d I bother with this anyway’ fight for recognition in my already on-hold mind. It takes a while to get over the disappointment and sometimes it takes more energy to begin again.

How many people travelled to Florida to take in the Daytona 500, only to get rained out? Know anybody who went to a winter resort this winter and wished they’d bought rain coats on the first day. A book, you saw on the shelf one day, all at once disappears when you go to get it. You sleep in and the automatic coffee perk doesn’t turn on or you miss an important appointment that’s been marked on the calendar for a month. You get a rejection letter from a publisher that’s totally missed your point. Or you get a conditional acceptance of your book proposal that requests scads more work. Disappointment, feelings of inadequacy, frustration or fear that you just can’t raise the bar seems to frame your mind in capital letters.

Sometimes when life just does not unfold the way you plan, it’s helpful to remember that ‘it ain’t over 'til it’s over’. Kids on American Idol suffer such disappointment, and yet you can almost see that gleam in their eye, behind all those tears, that next year may be different. Writers who don’t give up, have discovered there’s always a different way to write the same thought that is more meaningful. And is it possible that whenever a disappointment causes you to reflect, that a new and perhaps more interesting and inventive way awaits you.

Perhaps disappointment and courage should go hand-in-hand. Disappointment is inevitable and courage in its midst gives you the tenacity to move ahead and not get lost in your misery. When we look ahead, we quickly gain sight of the original goal and begin to press on. Didn’t the apostle Paul used these words: “But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead . . . (Philippians 4: 13).
So press on, friends. Good things await you. Stretch tall and catch a glimpse of God’s original call to you. And, we can’t escape being responsible for the little things in life, thinking God’s call is only for the big and important achievements. Remember the “The one who is faithful in a very little, is also faithful in much. . . (Luke 16:10)

Blessings,
Donna Mann
http://www.donnamann.org/

Carolyn Wilker--In the World of Storytelling

One of the first and most frequent lessons I learned as I began to write seriously was that I should show more often than I tell. In time, I learned that storytelling is a useful way of showing.

When I write devotions, a story shows what I mean. When I’m writing an inspirational piece, there’s no better way of sharing than by telling a story, mine or that of someone else. When I’m teaching my class and need to give an example, I use a story or anecdote where appropriate.

Even a poem can be a mini story to share some small slice of life. I could tell my readers that when I was a child I played in a sandbox beside a birch tree and that we had trucks and cars and water, but the poem does it better: “Once Upon a Sandbox” from my book of the same title (pub 2011):

Once upon a sandbox

its painted boards once leaned against

the silver birch

that shaded hatless children

sand turned to muck with hose and bucket

we built roads and riverbeds, fields and lanes

tractors planted and trucks got stuck

we drove those roads at five and seven

with tiny wheels and hoots of laughter

played out life with sand and water

Storytelling doesn’t stop with writers; it’s for speakers too.

Early in my membership in The Word Guild, one voice rang out strong. N. J. Lindquist, co-founder, reminded us that someday we may be called on to speak about our writing, give a workshop on writing, or promote a book. As much as standing in front of an audience was uncomfortable to me, I decided that I had better get ready.

Upon joining Toastmasters, and in giving speeches and practising impromptu speaking, I again learned the value of story. I can get up and speak on values, but in that process, I’d better have a story to illustrate it.

After achieving my Competent Toastmaster designation (now called Competent Communicator), I started on advanced manuals, including the Storyteller manual. As I worked through those projects, other Toastmasters said that I had a good storytelling voice. With a desire to learn more about storytelling, I attended an Open Story night at The Story Barn in Baden, Ontario, and then joined the storytelling guild too. It meant that I could listen to other’s stories while I learned about the art of oral storytelling. In truth, I was hooked on stories, not just for teaching, but as entertainment too.

Recently, I participated in a public event as a storyteller, at Steckle Heritage Farm, for their Winter Fun Day. I used folk tales, Aesop fables, song, and personal stories. Parents and children listened and participated, and at one point, a young girl who knew the story supplied the next line for me. She was so involved that she wanted to participate. Isn’t that what storytelling is about? Bringing the story to life through spoken or written word?

Stories— that my mother told at bedtime, that our teachers told or read in school, and that our pastor shared in confirmation class—passed along a love of story that I’ve never lost. I come home from a storytelling night or a concert so filled with story that I continue to think about it. Ursula K. LeGuin wrote, “There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but there have been no societies that did not tell stories.”

As storytellers, we are the vessel through whom the story comes to life for the audience. The audience receives the story and is immersed in it. As writers we, too, need to take our readers on a journey. Just be sure, as writer or storyteller, that you bring the audience back when the story is over.

Book signing for Once Upon a Sandbox on March 10th, at Chapters Waterloo, King Street N. Waterloo, from 1-3 pm

When marriage died in Fishtown ... - Denyse O'Leary

When marriage died in Fishtown ...

... so did a lot of kids’ futures.

In Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, sociologist Charles Murray offers some figures to think seriously about. He estimates that in working class neighborhoods today, like his emblematic “Fishtown,” nonmarital births as of 2008 were around 43 to 48 percent of all births. (In nearby fashionable Belmont they were around 6 to 8 percent.)

But why does so-called “nonmarital” birth matter?, some ask angrily: Aren’t all kids precious? Who cares if their parents have wedding rings? What matters is love! And maybe, just maybe, some people are too obsessed with their private uptight morality, judging others when they should be helping them. Stop hating, stop judging, just help!

No problem, we won’t hate or judge. We will just help. But now a problem arises: What does the child of a lone parent lack that strangers can provide?

Commentator Mark Steyn provides a snapshot of Fishtown reality to set us thinking,

If, as I do, you live in the country, you have dozens of neighbors like Miss Strader – nice high-school girls who babysit your kids; you lose touch, they move to the next town, and you bump into them a couple of years later doing the late shift at the diner or the general store; they’re 23 or 24, with three kids by three different guys. And they’re still nice, and still kinda pretty, if aged beyond their years. But life and its opportunities are fled.

There are reasons why, throughout history, women have avoided having children on their own by several different guys. Here are two of them:

Are We There Yet?

by Glynis M. Belec

He called a little child and had him stand among them. And he said: “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 18:2-3


     When Ruthie, Eddie and Jannie came to visit one week, I was reminded about what it meant to be a mommy to junior munchkins all over again.

The week was…uh…well…full. Yes. That’s it – full. Full of creativity cleverly disguised as messes. Full of cooperative play opportunities often interpreted as arguments. Full of educational moments initiated by questions upon questions upon more questions.

     When my visiting trio walked into a room they exploded. Books, toys, craft supplies, dress-up clothes I’d forgotten even existed, were scattered about the house. Messes I could overlook. A sore back from bending to pick up after everyone could easily be soothed by a good night’s sleep. Who knew how many kilocalories I burned dancing around the kitchen with five-year-old Ruthie to the ever hip sounds of “Going to the Zoo, Zoo, Zoo; How about You, You, You?”

     Activity and creativity I could handle. It was the not-so-cooperative play part that sent me into colorful stages of bridling the tongue. Whining made me crazy. Bickering caused headaches. Telling tales grieved me somewhere in my teeth. That week I experienced a taste of all three. But I knew my junior relatives were going home soon. So I decided to grin and put up with it.

     The voluminous questions were the best. “Are we there yet?” was Eddie’s favorite. Every 60 seconds I had to give a run down on lap time, RPMs, distance, speed and ETA every time we went anywhere.

     One afternoon we went swimming. I think the best question that day came from Ruthie’s lips. “Aunt Glynis. Why do you gots two towels?”
“Because I have a lot to cover,” I said with lilting laughter.
“Oh,” came the sweet little beep in response. Ruthie didn’t get the joke. She believed me. I could tell by the look in her eye. Now she would tell everyone I was fat and needed two towels to wrap around me. She didn’t hear me say I was kidding. I should have known better.

     Then there was Jannie. Jannie was nine going on sixteen. She was a vegetarian, so she informed me. I thought vegetarians had to be at least 25 years old. Each evening she’d check out what was for supper and announce her hatred for the poor dead animal sizzling on the stove. “Eggs are okay as long as they are not fertilized,” she told me. I hesitated to tell her about Belshazaar, the macho rooster who dwelt amidst my contented egg-laying cluckers, lest she suspected. I pretended not to notice when I spotted her picking a bit of pork chop from her brother’s plate when no one was looking, though. I’ll wait ‘till she’s 25.

     Night times were the best. I had no complaints then. Was it the anticipation of lights out and tender, young bodies resting peacefully between the sheets?  Nah…it was the stories. I loved the stories. I loved to tell the stories. I loved to act the stories. Bedtime was fun.

“Stand back…I’m going to sneeze,” said the elephant. “Look out for the falling cloud!”

     Ruthie, Eddie, Jannie and I dove for cover under the bed. I was a kid again. I loved it.

     I sure do miss those kid-like moments. Big kids don’t ask for bedtime stories. Adulthood requires adult conduct – which doesn’t often involve high drama and various sound effects. Childhood is just too much fun.

     When I contemplate the scripture where Jesus talked about becoming like a little child, I get excited. I have a lot of grown-up hang-ups. But I also have a lot of child-like (much to the chagrin of many) urges. How hard can it be to become a child again?

     My adult mind tells me the criteria for entering the Kingdom of Heaven involves a little more than whooping it up when the elephant sneezes, though. I’m thinking this is more about the flawless faith of a child and his ability to wholly trust. Can I do it?

     I think it’s time to evaluate how childlike I really am.

The Prodigal--den Boer

Angela wanted a dog. She never passed up an opportunity to say so. I didn’t want a pet of any sort and adamantly said, “No.” Of course Angela’s younger sisters and brother were on her side.

Secretly my husband was too; but Marty knew how much I didn’t want one, so he quietly watched the campaign progress.

I didn’t want to feed or walk a mutt and I absolutely didn’t want to clean up after one. Angela begged and bargained. She would feed the dog, walk the dog and even scoop the dog. I didn’t believe her.

She argued; I argued back. She tempted me with a glorious promise. She said she would keep her room tidy to show she was responsible enough to take care of a dog. I laughed for she was promising the impossible. She smiled for she knew she had found the path to her pet.

She immediately straightened her room. She organized her dresser. She hung her clothes in the closet. She put her books on the shelf. And best of all, she quit stowing candy wrappers, pencils, hair barrettes and dirty laundry under her bed.

I was impressed. Angela didn’t miss the opportunity, “See I am responsible enough to have a dog.”

“It won’t last,” I said. It didn’t, but it took almost a month before I discovered clothes on her floor and candy wrappers under her bed.

Of course by then I was hooked on the neat room and effectively lost the pet battle by saying, “Your room doesn’t look like a dog.” Angela smiled and efficiently tidied up.

“Your room doesn’t look like a dog,” held magic. For me it meant an instantly tidy room. For Angela, of course, it meant she would get a dog eventually.

Reluctantly I found myself saying, “Maybe after our holidays.”

At once a chewed-up dog house appeared. Grandpa came to re-trim and re-shingle this garage sale acquisition for us. Then Marty fenced in the yard. The reality of a dog was closing in on me.

I was still unpacking vacation gear when Marty and the kids rushed over to the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA), just to look, they said.

They came home with a dog. He was a young but full-grown collie-cross with short cinnamon hair. He acted friendly and wasn’t a barker. I resigned myself to his presence.

The kids loved him. They showed him his backyard domain and his dog house, explaining that Mom didn’t want him in the real house.

The very afternoon of the day we acquired our nameless pet, Marty and I had a local wedding to attend. Before we could go Marty felt compelled to vacuum the van. For some reason there were little brown and white dog hairs on all the seats. After the wedding ceremony it began to rain, so we slipped home. We were met by tearful children, “The dog is gone.” They showed us a narrow gap in the fence. I managed to contain my inappropriate happiness.

The kids had already inundated the neighbourhood with lost-dog posters and recruited neighbourhood children to ride bicycles up and down the streets looking.

Where was that rascal?

Marty promised to scout around, but first he drove me to the wedding reception where I sat, unaccompanied, wondering about my sad family. Meanwhile, Marty cruised the streets in vain, in what had become a pouring rainstorm. He arrived at the reception just as the newlyweds were leaving.

“At least he has a dog tag,” I comforted.

“That’s still in my pocket,” Marty admitted sheepishly.

We returned to our unhappy, pet-less abode. Marty phoned the SPCA. They remembered our wonderful animal and promised to return him to us if he were picked up.

Then the rain stopped, the sun came out, and a neighbour brought the news. He had caught a glimpse of 

Rascal (for that was his name now) up the street rubbing noses through a fence, with a girl
dog

.

That evening there was joy in our home. As for me, I identified with the elder brother in the parable of the prodigal son.

“The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him.” (Luke 15:28)

The displeasure I felt in sharing my home with a dog and my animosity toward Rascal are reminiscent of the anger the older brother expressed at the love their father showed to his contrite brother. It is also very similar to the way we Christians sometimes feel and express ourselves when the lost and broken try to join our church families.

This is an excerpt from Blooming, This Pilgrim's Progress by Marian den Boer.

Kingdom Poets Shares Marilyn Nelson - Martin

Marilyn Nelson is a Lutheran poet whose collections have, three times, been finalists for the National Book Award — including The Fields of Praise: New and Selected Poems (1997). She served as poet laureate of Connecticut from 2001 to 2006. In a recent interview with Jeanne Murray Walker for Image, she said that some of those who most influenced her early writing were the Harlem Renaissance poets, such as Countee Cullen and Langston Hughes, and other African American poets.

She is also known as a children's book author; at first, some of her adult poetry was published as books for younger readers — including Carver: A Life in Poems, a spiritual biography of George Washington Carver (2001), and Fortune's Bones (2004). She has now also intentionally written books for children.

The following poems are from her collection, Magnificat (1994).

Incomplete Renunciation

Please let me have
a 10-room house adjacent to campus;
6 bdrooms, 2½ baths, formal
dining room, frplace, family room,
screened porch, 2-car garage.
Well maintained.
And let it pass
through the eye of a needle.

Psalm

So many cars have driven past me
without a head-on collision.
I started counting them today:
there were a hundred and nine
on the way to the grocery,
a hundred and two on the way back home.
I got my license
when I was seventeen.
I’ve driven across country
at least twelve times;
I even drive
late Saturday nights.
I shall not want.

(Posted with permission of the poet)

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the award-winning author of the poetry collections Poiema (Wipf & Stock) and So The Moon Would Not Be Swallowed (Rubicon Press). They are both available at: www.dsmartin.ca

This is this week's post from: Kingdom Poets Follow this link to see dozens more, including some of the world's most celebrated poets, as well as some lesser known treasures.

A Silent Voice in a Small Box - M. Laycock

In his article, Rock in the Rain in Servant Magazine, Philip Yancey mentions the elections in Ukraine after the Soviet Union fell apart. He details how Victor Yushchenko opposed the standing regime, was poisoned and almost killed for his efforts. Undaunted he recovered and stayed in the race for the presidency. On election day he had a clear lead but through “outright fraud” the government reversed the results and declared him defeated.

But they had forgotten about a small detail on their national television broadcast – a small screen that appeared in the corner, providing translation for the hearing impaired. The translator, the woman who appeared in that small box, signed a very different message than the one the government wanted heard. Her communication, the truth that Mr. Yushchenko was indeed their new president, launched the “Orange Revolution” that eventually toppled the government and established him as leader of the country.

Mr. Yancey likens that small box in the corner of the big screen to the church. I liken it to communicators of faith, including writers like you and me.

In the midst of the barrage of lies that scream at us all continually, we are small, we are barely audible at times; yet, because we are speaking truth we are working for God’s kingdom and eventually it will prevail. All it took in that time of deceit and tragedy in the Ukraine, was for one person to have the courage to do what she could to get the truth out there. God did the rest.

We may be small. We may be almost unheard. But God will use our voices to accomplish His purposes. Keep signing from your small box. You never know who might see, who might hear, who might respond.

"Who despises the day of small things? Men will rejoice when they see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel. " Zech. 4:10