Today I cranked the volume on a song called The Wind That Shakes The Barley. This version was sung by Loreena McKennitt. I wanted my son to hear the lyrics to this powerful ballad. Here’s a sample from the third verse:

While sad I kissed away her tears
My fond arms ’round her flinging
The foeman’s shot burst on our ears
From out the wildwood ringing
A bullet pierced my true love’s side
In life’s young spring so early
And on my breast in blood she died
While soft winds shook the barley.

The song made me think about history and how it is passed down, and how it has strength in its impact. If we read about this part of Ireland’s history in a text-book for example, we might skim, maybe get bored, worry about memorizing the important points for the upcoming test. But when that same piece of history is told in song or story, it becomes, once again, alive. We usually don’t feel tears on our cheeks reading a text-book.

When we can take a piece of history and bring it alive through telling of the lives of those who lived it, we not only remember those people, we honor what they lived through. I’m not talking just about this song’s time period, but about all history, from the ages past through to how our parents met. Or the birth story of our child.

I’m also not talking about that sad outcome of so many songs based on culture, where they have been sang so often they have become a cliché. Danny Boy  comes immediately to mind, to continue the Irish theme.

The power of history is in the stories, songs, and photographs that come directly out of the time period. I could write a story about wagon trains and it might ring true, but it wouldn’t have the power of the entries in Women’s Diaries of the Westward Movement. The power of the words is in the source, a story coming from someone who lived through the event. Or from those who remember.

Although I have to point out that sometimes the power is in the storyteller. The song above was written in 1800’s about an event in 1798. But still, I’m sure you get my point.

So think about the power of storytelling, oral and written, the human, intensely personal aspect that gives words life. In a way this is what all writers strive to bring to their work; words that ring true, that pull up deep emotional responses, and remind us of things that shouldn’t be forgotten.

It makes me feel like I have a long, long way to go to reach that place.

And it makes me feel very humble.

No photos of barley, but here’s a fuzzy one of my sister’s house in the wheat.

While grocery shopping this weekend with my friend Jenni, I told her how it fascinates me to see what grocery combinations people buy. I think I would make a terrible teller because I’d be going slowly wondering about the items. I pointed out that in my cart I had french bread, ricotta, mozzarella, and Italian sausage. Someone looking at that would think, ‘aha, someone’s having lasagna for dinner!’

When I see the person in front of me buying NyQuil and chicken noodle soup, I’m going to stand back a few feet. When I see someone buying a home pregnancy test and a bottle of wine, I’ll stand in the line wondering if the wine is for the husband, the partner, to celebrate, to drown sorrows.

When I see the woman purchasing low-fat yogurt, fresh fruit, and a large Snickers bar, I wonder if she is rewarding herself, or buying it to sneakily eat on the way home. I imagine her virtuously eating the healthy food in front of her spouse. While he’s eating a burger and feeling guilty because his wife is so healthy.

I was very surprised to hear Jenni tell me that she has never tried to figure out what the combination of people’s groceries meant. I assumed everyone did that while in grocery lines. She told me she thinks it’s something only writers do, creating stories, asking ‘why’ and ‘what if’, and ‘how come’.

So I have to ask. Is there anyone else out there who tries to solve the riddle of groceries on the conveyor belt?

Several months ago I attended Write on the Sound, and blogged about writer’s conferences. It was a nice conference and I had some panels that I learned from, like the ones by Priscilla Long and Ron Gompertz. I came away with a little new knowledge, a couple new resources, but not enough that I thought it worth the cost of the conference, the hotel, the gas.

Last week I escaped to a small writer’s retreat, joining authors Susan Schreyer and Kaylan Doyle. We got up early and spent the day writing. While we worked on our own projects, we were in the same vicinity. There was little noise as we delved into our story worlds. Every so often one of us would get stuck, would ask permission to break the writing. And then there would be a few minutes of a different sort of productivity as we helped each other figure out what was going on, brainstormed solutions, read a piece of work, received feedback. And then the silence would fall again.

I have never done something like that. Writing in a group setting never appealed to me, let alone talking about my work in progress before the first draft was finished.

So what made the difference this time? Well, first off, my writing routine has changed dramatically over the past two years. From writing at night to writing in the morning. From writing to music to writing to silence. But more than that, I think it was the safe environment. I was in the company of two writers who, while all three of us have different ways we write, were trusted. If something wasn’t working, I knew they would give me honest feedback that I could take away and use or not. And there was absolutely zero pressure to produce or to share. Several times I’d glance up to see one or the other staring out the windows, lost in their work, even though fingers were still.

In the early evening, we took a break, went for a walk, went out to dinner. Then we came back, the tea kettle and coffee pot went on, chocolate came out, we sat around the table and talked writing and swapped tales. And then drifted back to our writing.

I have learned that I can write in the presence of other writers, I can share a work in progress (at least snippets), and that I got way more value from this retreat than I did from the conference.

I’ve also learned that I need to do this again. It pays to stretch out our fingers, take a deep breath, and allow our writing to try something new.

Below is a photo of Leavenworth, WA, where we wrote..