nancy drew

There and back again

Here’s a picture of my Nancy Drew roadster, parked yesterday in the middle of “The Promised Land.”

Each aspect of this story, a stretch of the imagination. Every claim, now proven, more outlandish than I expected.

To be fair, we found beauty in this hardscrabble environment, and we were greeted by fascinating people with generous hearts. But on the whole, the area felt desolate and inhospitable–not at all an oasis. In no way could I ever picture this as a sanctuary of any kind.

Please forgive me if I don’t comment on your blog entries today…I’m still processing yesterday’s discoveries. But if you wanna see something really cool (no exaggeration!), check out the LiveCam images of Mama Phoebe’s adorable new hatchlings! ♥♥♥

Tracking clues

I’m revving the engine of my roadster, in preparation for a day trip to the hinterlands. It’ll be fun, but also arduous, so I’m glad my gal pal Stace (aka “Bess”) is riding shotgun.

I’ve done a great deal of legwork already. Hoo boy, that was quite an adventure! Long story made short (and illustrated metaphorically), it goes something like this:



Sometimes the tiniest shred of evidence yields an inkling of an idea. And questions about a mislabeled photograph might lead you to an unexpected answer.

You may encounter resistence from some corners. 

Matter of fact, some will do everything within their power to shout you down or shut you out. 

But you know Nancy: She’s nothing, if not persistent. And lucky girl, she’s surrounded by loving friends who help clear away the underbrush…who steer her back to center whenever she loses her bearings.

I admit that I’m a wee bit apprehensive. But also? Very excited. It’s not been easy, and I’m not there yet. But I’m beginning to think it’s possible to trace this tangled web back to the original knot.

Images via “Celebrating 75 Years of Nancy Drew,” University of Maryland Library

Happy 80th birthday, Nancy Drew!


Nancy Drew, especially the Nancy of the original story, is our bright heroine, chasing down the shadows, conquering our worst fears, giving us a glimpse of our brave and better selves, proving to everybody exactly how admirable and wonderful a thing it is to be a girl. 
                                                         –from "I Owe It All to Nancy Drew," by Nancy Pickard


Wow, 80 years old, and still going strong! She’s a wonderment, isn’t she? For tons of trivia about our titian-haired hero, check out the Nancy Drew Sleuth Unofficial Website.



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Offerings

I’ve been unsettled by a recent Nancy Drew discovery. Over Tuesday lunch, my writing buddies offered compassion and sage advice, which brightened my mood considerably. I wrote all afternoon, buoyed by their support and inspired by their wisdom. 

But when night fell, the darkness decended again. 

I gathered up my art supplies, in hopes that creative journaling would help calm my inner chaos. Pens, gesso, watercolors…I scattered them on the table. I flipped through an old issue of L.A. Yoga Journal, searching for soothing words and images. In doing so, I discovered a poem I’d previously overlooked.

You are stunned, powerless.
You thought you knew
What was going on.
Now you realize
You don’t have a clue.
You are stopped in your tracks.
Everything within your skin is shaking.

Enter this shaking.
Right here, in the midst of commotion –
Get curious, look around inside with wonder.
Unmind your mind.
All the walls have fallen down.
Go ahead and dissolve.

The One Who Has Always Been,
Who has seen much worse than this,
Is still here.
             ~Sutra 89 of The Radiance Sutras

The poem cradled my spirit, helped ease me into a peaceful sleep.

Fresh coffee in hand, I greeted the new day in my garden. Fog swirled around the rosebushes, swaddling the citrus trees like a gauzy blanket. "Soften your gaze," it seemed to say, "find your peace within." 

As the sun kissed the morning, my backyard was filled with the fresh scent of citrus blossoms.

And when the fog cleared, a tiny rose blossom appeared. The first of the season–the harbinger of many–she lifted her sweet Angel Face to the endless blue sky.

As promised, Joy cometh in the morning.

Branching

1) I came home on Tuesday to the sound of chainsaws in the yard behind me. The neighbor’s gardeners were chopping down all the pepper trees along our fence line! Sanctuaries for untold numbers of finches, mockingbirds, hummingbirds, plus other species I can’t yet identify. Shelter against the blazing heat of summer and the encroachment of suburbia. *weeps*

As I watched them hack away at the tree branches, I felt my own habitat being diminished. I panicked. I called my sister, crying. Then I sobbed on the phone to my husband. But at some point, I shook myself by the shoulders. If you don’t voice your concerns to the right person, I said to me, you have no right to complain. None whatsoever.

So! I grabbed an armful of refrigerated water bottles, slid into my flip-flops, and hurried over to the neighbor’s house. I begged, cajoled and pleaded…on behalf of the trees, the birds, and the environment (natural and man-made). And in the end, he relented. *good graces all around.* Sadly, the gardeners had already chopped back most branches to the trunk. But the homeowner agreed to leave it at that. And since pepper trees are hardy, prolific and fast-growing, the damage will (crossed fingers!) ultimately be undone. 

Hope survives. It always does, in one form or another. This time, it takes the shape of a mockingbird, who this very morning is perched in the highest remaining limb of a pepper tree, singing its little heart out. Hope, the thing with feathers. When we look for it, we find it. 

2) My story took yet another surprising turn, leading me to another mysterious branching of my family tree. I can’t say more than that right now, other than that I’m playing Nancy Drew today, and I’m (re)learning another life lesson in the process. To wit: We typically see what we want to see, discover what we expect to find. But as we learn to detach from expectations, we expand our vision…and that, I believe, adds new dimensions to our writing.

Mockingbird image credit: Duncraft

Breathing lessons

I went to yoga class yesterday, to try to smooth out all the tensions that developed while I was away from my regular routine. Due to scheduling issues, I ended up in an ashtanga yoga class–way more intense than the classes I usually attend, and full of unfamiliar asanas (aka headstands and other upside-down poses). Shortly after the class began, I was feeling somewhat like that creature in Kafka’s Metamorphosis–out of sorts and inept. "I’m so not good at this," I told myself, as I toppled over for the umpteenth time.

God help me, I so wanted to quit! But the teacher kept inviting me to reposition myself and try again. And then, a voice spoke from somewhere deep inside, repeating of my favorite mantras, "Be the neutral witness, discerning without judgment." I won’t say I transformed immediately. I won’t say the poses came easily. But as I swatted away the inner chatter, I felt the knots begin to untangle, and my body eventually elevated itself into the correct position. Ong namo, guru dev namo. I bow to the teacher within.

I’m thinking about the lessons I learned in that yoga class and how I can apply them to my writing. After several weeks away from the keyboard, I’m a distance from my manuscript. I’m struggling to reacquaint myself with my writer’s voice, to find my place again on the page. I’m knotted up especially about how to approach the modern-day Nancy Drew segments–how shall I weave them into the past-tense story? Before I can move forward, I need to recenter myself. So I’m encouraging myself to breathe in awareness and acceptance of where I am now, releasing all judgments so I can relax and play.

Namaste, my friends. Here’s to another day of stretching toward the Light. xo

Retracing the Sawdust Trail


I spent several hours combing through the newspaper archives at the Los Angeles Central Library last Saturday. Lucky for me, they’ve digitized over a century’s worth of the L.A. Times!  Along with other artifacts, I unearthed this classified advertisement for one of my father’s tent revival meetings. It was filed among those belonging to the biggest stars in the evangelical orbit of that time period—Billy Graham and Marjoe among them.

I’m grateful today for the forward-thinking individuals who stored these images where I could find them. Thanks to their efforts, I’m able to piece together certain elements of my past. And in a larger sense, their efforts have kept the Sawdust Trail from being swept into the dustbin of history.

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