Do You Follow or Subscribe to jules?
You should as she is the bomb
Several days ago I wrote an article quoting several comments from several of my stories with the intent to show my family that my writing on Medium for paltry financial reward is actually a pricelessly valuable experience and a springboard to my desired mid-life correction to become a professor of spirituality and ethics.
I shared it with my best and oldest friend. This is us at the time of our lives when we played hide and seek without hiding and our parents just smacked their heads and rolled their eyes in disbelief.
Richard loved the story and pointed out to me that I should let my family know that not only am I helping other people but that I receive back as much or more pleasure than I impart.
Before I get to the heart of that matter, Richard’s thoughts reminded me of an article that I posted in early January — “Teachers and Students Inspire Eachother,” in which I wrote:
I am presently the mentor to two, possibly three, aspiring writers. Holly Kellums’s piece [“A Crucial Key To Success — Mentorship”] inspired me to think about these relationships and her article. The article is really about the law of osmosis — surround yourself with people who are successful and by osmosis, the secrets to their success should get absorbed by anyone who is less successful and open and willing to learn. That environment probably exists within any number of publications on Medium.
It also inspired me to think about the words involved: MENtor, MENtee, and the MENtor-MENtee relationship. I am surprised at the absence of an outcry of sexism, and that evangelicals have not denounced it as an affront to God.[emphasis added — maybe no one read it and if they did, my pun / double entendre was certainly lost on them.] Thus, being a bit of wordchemist, I set my mind to the task of solving for this while we remain in a calm before a storm of political correctness, and I propose that the word imparter or a new word, impartor, replace mentor, and that a new word, impartee, replace mentee as the recipient of the benefit of the former’s experience. The relationship itself then succinctly becomes an impartnership.
That’s a bit of a digression, which is a style of writing I enjoy.
Richard’s thoughts also harkened back to this story that I posted in February about the pleasure I received from helping one of my impartees achieve curation, in which I expressed the pleasure that his success granted me, which us Jews call nachas (no, antisemitic Grammarly, I did not misspell nachos)(that was an exaggerated dig but Grammarly is pretty stupid sometimes).
“My” first curation
Nachas is the joy you feel over the achievements of someone close to you, because you’re so connected with that person, that it’s as if the accomplishment is yours. It’s often translated as pride, but it’s much more personal — an individual pleasure derived from someone else’s success.
I am crying. This is nachas. I’ve never been curated as a writer, and I am a damn good writer, but I am also a nonconformist, which does not bode well for curation. Fact is, as well as I write, I am a better editor. I am an excellent editor, which is far more than proofreading — I think about the piece and the message and the reception, not just grammar. I mentor my writers as well.
Here’s another:
The Heart of the Matter
I decided to write this story as a two-way reward between me and the most fabulous mentee one could ever hope for — jules.
I have had mentees for whom I would make the same types of edits story after story (passive voice (I despise it)— telling the story from the wrong narrative perspective (too much you and not enough I)— and not fully forming thoughts). Not so with jules — she wanted to improve and with each successive essay, she did. I never had to make the same types of edits in each story. Occasionally she would fall back into big-picture bad habits that we had worked on, and I would simply point that out and she always thanked me and then improved the stories without me editing.
Here are some examples of great essays of hers. The first deserves much more love than it received and presented to me a concept that I had not formulated before — spiritual intelligence.
Not too long ago, jules expressed to me that the language of poetry was lost upon her, both as a reader and a writer. I did not accept that and challenged her. Being the proud woman that she is, and knowing from our relationship that when I challenge her the results have always followed, jules rose to the occasion. I suggested to jules that she could learn to understand poetry, and then write poems, by posting stories interpreting the poems of others. So, please, hit these links, all of which are her stories, to read about our process, her results, and my reward, and thus know experientially through me what nachas means.
First, she wrote this excellent essay about a Maya Angelou poem and how it spoke to her:
Then I challenged her to both learn poetry and support the community by reading, interpreting, and learning from some of the top poetry writers on Medium.
To be honest, struggling to understand the power and the language of Poetry haunted me. Marcus, my writing and editing mentor, gave me the challenge to “write a story or two a week about how reading someone else’s poetry affected you.”
Ravyne graciously provided a special place for my stories. So, without further ado, Welcome to jules interpretations of Poetry.
First up on the list is “Are You Fraught” by thief. One of the poets Marcus recommended.
Ravyne commented:
Marcus gave you a great first poet to analyze. Thief writes some amazing verses. I think these interpretations will definitely help you. Allowing yourself to feel the words, as well as hear them will go a long way to helping. Read the poems out loud. Examine how the words feel on your tongue. Many poets do this mentally, but I’ve been known to speak my poems out loud before the words hit the page before.
In her next interpretive piece, jules imparts this lesson to all aspiring poets:
Learning the language of poetry, as I am discovering, is not about the words but the feelings behind the smooth glide of terms — the incredible ability to take your hand and lead you through a land of feelings and emotions.
Next up:
In there, jules discussed one of my poems called Onomatopoeia, with self-deprecating humor, made fun of herself, and then wrote such a delicious example of onomatopoeia containing poetry that I beamed with tears of a mentor-nachas.
jules had written in her first interpretive piece above:
In addition to reading others’ Poetry, I am teaching myself the foundations of Poetry such as the elements, structure, and purpose. Poetry can be difficult to understand and requires effort. In our fast-paced visual world, we prefer things to be easy, a scroll through social media and life without the efforts of digging deep into ourselves and others.
What could make a teacher prouder than a student who takes the initiative and does her own research to seek to self-improve as opposed to being spoon-fed?
The results speak for themselves. Of her fourth interpretive piece, in which she rose to the occasion and wrote a poem in a new form that Dr Michael Heng invented, Ravyne commented:
Such a gorgeous poetry form and such a gorgeous response poem! I think you are getting the knack for this poetry stuff, Jules! Thank you for sharing your journey with us through mindfulness, the muses and poetry.
I could not have been prouder.
I’ll conclude with this fantastic poem jules published yesterday:
In Rama I create, with soul-energy surging through my body, inspiring me and breathing wind into my sails,