Isabel Anders talks about being an editor and a writer

Isabel Anders talks about being an editor and a writer

Guest writer: Isabel Anders

“Editing and writing walk together, and they both require the eye and the ear.” —Found in the New Yorker (3/27/23).

It never failed. Every time I typed my name, Isabel, the spell-check on my old computer would change it to “usable.” I laughed, but there was a kind of logic to it.

Eventually, it accepted my name as a valid entry rather than a typo. If you stick around long enough, you get written into the story.

“Editors and their input are inconspicuous by design. … Editors work in the service of their authors and are the invisible shepherds (or packhorses or midwives, pick your metaphor) of the books we read,” wrote Sara B. Franklin.

My primary vocation as an editor has suited me perfectly—requiring accuracy, diligence, and solitude, and allowing a degree of independence while working on a manuscript. If only life were like that—a page spread out with identifiable bumps (errors) and cracks (omissions) that could, at one time, be “fixed” by an editorial pencil—but now succumb to the electronic delete key that wipes away mistakes completely.

An editor’s work should be invisible, allowing a piece to read and flow as though it had been written that way from the beginning. Injecting one’s own style is not the function of a responsible editor who serves the work.

Since I have written books on the side, I truly appreciated other editors who performed that useful function for me—because, as they say, “everyone needs an editor.”

Perhaps workers in any helping profession can easily relate to this need for focus: “Attention,” the psychiatrist Iain McGilchrist writes, “is a moral act: It creates, bringing aspects of things into being.” Those of us who are useful in some way are privileged to have a hand (though often an invisible one) in the process.

“Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might,” we’re told in Ecclesiastes 9:10. When the scroll of life’s story is fully unrolled, editors will likely not be needed.

Isabel Anders’ Mother Bilbee Tales is a collection of nursery rhymes and folktales with a twist that lets her editorial spirit have a fun ride.

Sing a Song of Six Birds and several others are available on Amazon.

https://www.amazon.com/review/create-review/?channel=glance-detail&asin=B0D53LDWQ8

Isabel Anders

Joanna Seibert. joannaseibert.com https://www.joannaseibert.com/

Holy Smoke at a Church Named Holy Spirit

Holy Smoke at a Church Called Holy Spirit

“And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, rose before God from the hand of the angel.”—Revelation 8:4.

I slowly rise from my seat next to the Bishop’s chair near the altar at Holy Spirit Episcopal Church in Gulf Shores, Alabama, as the organist plays the prelude to the closing hymn, “Lift High the Cross.” The music is uplifting, but suddenly I am transported to another place. An unusual burning smell fills the air. I look up and see two nearly straight lines of black smoke rising at least a foot above the altar, then disappearing into the air in front of the congregation. 

As the acolyte in the white alb passes by me to reach for the silver processional cross, I notice that she has just extinguished the two candles on the glass altar.

This smell is unfamiliar compared with what I usually notice at the end of the service. It is an especially holy scent, accompanied by an uplifting, holy smoke stronger than incense. It is raw and attention-getting, signaling that something has happened. The few in the front rows of the congregation can see the black smoke, but the smell probably lingers only around the altar. By verse two of the hymn, as the crucifer leads the choir members in their blue cassocks and white surplices out of the church, I realize what this is all about. 

The Altar Guild of Holy Spirit uses real candles, possibly beeswax, not the oil candles I am familiar with in many churches I visit. It is the smell of smoke from extinguished candle wax, and I am close enough to smell it.

I remember this scent. It lingers after a spiritual direction meeting with seekers as they depart. I light the candle at the start of a spiritual direction session to mark our meeting as holy, as we care for our souls. I extinguish the candle at the end of our time together to mark the passing of what we have shared. I know our time together as spiritual friends is holy work, just as our Eucharist on Sunday is sacred time. 

The smell and the smoke tell me that whatever has happened is now being lifted up, spreading into the air around us, into our universe. The Word we shared has now moved away from the altar or our meeting place and out into the world. We can no longer see the smoke, but it is there. I experience the smell only briefly, yet it is a poignant reminder of what is happening. 

The Holy Word has spread its healing blessing throughout the world, making a difference in all our wounded spaces.

Bless the Altar Guild of Holy Spirit for teaching me a little more about the movement of the Holy. 

Joanna Seibert. https://www.joannaseibert.com/

Poet Karen DuBert writes about Being a Tourist vs. a Pilgrim

Poet Karen DuBert  writes about Being a Tourist vs. a Pilgrim

Guest Writer: Karen DuBert

Two Travellers

Two Travellers

Dust we are—atoms from our world

transformed from minerals and chemicals

that swirled in the beginning

to coalesce into our radiant blue planet

our womb and home.

Living here—members of the same material—

separate by volition and movement:

creative spawners of cities to civilizations,

economies to technologies,

miniature images of Creation Genius

we live and move and have our being—a gift.

Striding or wandering

through an earth we cannot comprehend,

two paths appear.

Side by side the pilgrim and the tourist:

work, marry, breathe, grow, die

—hearts divergent.

The tourist walks weighty

to see, be attracted, entertained, impressed

an explorer seeking adventure and titillation,

leaving a litter-strewn wake:

debris of consumption and satiation.

Where tourists clump, trash and noise preside—

inhabitants mere local colour.

Selfies, rest stops, souvenirs, tickets

substitute for cooing doves,

early dawn breezes, daily rhythms.

Clattering cases on cobblestones—

spare no space for ponderous silence.

The pilgrim walks gently

to absorb, listen, smell, taste the awe

of each sacred place and time.

Finding the heart behind the beauty,

grieving history’s futile battles—

with bowed head

leaning into fratricide, oppression,

mountains of injustice

perpetuated by our very selves

in this our very home

on these our very sisters and brothers.

Seldom enhancing the economy—

a choice not to be laden with treasures

—lavishly given or discarded.

The pilgrim walks lightly, reflects deeply,

carries the essential,

guards the path, collects the litter,

brings the blessing, invites peace.

We leave footprints where we walk

it is our choice—

how we walk.

This poem is inspired by living in a tourism-driven city (Granada) and by seeing the difference in impact between pilgrims and tourists. Some thoughts, as so many travel during the summer.

(The image is from ChatGPT and is not copyrighted.)

Karen DuBert

Joanna Seibert https://www.joannaseibert.com/