Wednesday, March 23, 2016

More Spider's Silk

"On or around June 1995, human character changed again. Or rather, it began to undergo a metamorphosis that is still not complete, but is profound — and troubling, not least because it is hardly noted. When I think about, say, 1995, or whenever the last moment was before most of us were on the Internet and had mobile phones, it seems like a hundred years ago." - Rebecca Solnitt


The ink was not yet fully dried. No never mind, there is no ink to fret about. I read the quote from
Rebecca Solnitt on Maria Popova's Brain Pickings, and the ends of spider silk sought the connections only a story can satisfy. It doesn't seem to take much to tickle my writing fancy, or prime the pump for something wanting expression. Perhaps it is my current retraining experience starting at ground level that spurs me onward? I am learning to walk on the balls of my feet, curling my toes to grip the earth; lifting my old habit of landing hard on my heels. It may be part of my Chiron's wound evolution.  Whatever the reason(s) I am grateful to continue pulling the silk through like Spider, and that makes for a continuity of interesting encounters with characters and circumstances both mythic and mundane.

Where was I in 1994-1995? I remembered that all too well. The bitter end and the blissful new starts experienced in one soul, one woman's body. Before there were cellphones and email there were letters. The life of an old(er) woman who is quick to tears and open to understanding their --tears-- many purposes has history to share with young people who call her Tutu, Grandmother. The story and the storyteller are not yet ready to leave the story alone. Ah.

So the Spider's silk picks up a thread from the Internet, and the sticky end catches on themes from The Mapmaker's Children by Sarah McCoy. The secrets. The messages. The creative mission of a daughter of abolitionist John Brown weave from the silk of a novelist. I am peaked in my curiosity. I see the two colored eyes of dolls with heads of wood, see the differently positioned swirls for cheeks. Only those in the know would. That is the thing. Only those in the know. There are letters in this book, too. Many letters are written. I remember letters written. Then too, in her acknowledgements the author Sarah McCoy names a woman "for truly being a second mother, singing "Going to the Chapel" in the car ...You are my magical God-mommy." The name of this God-mommy: Titi Ivonne Tennent. Titi is the name only my brother called me, and then all his family knew me only as "Titi". On my birth certificate, my name is Yvonne (Ivonne with a "Y"). The family name is completely different. But, in all those letters and words I see this acknowledgement. I know something is magically in place. I stick the silk to it and let the words fly.

The newest Spider's silk begins with two letters, here at Letters Remembered. 

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