The Thursday! Newsletter 1-6: Use That Jewel

Volume 1, Issue 5

I was reading a book of Emily Dickinson poems last week, and...

Well, yes. I know exactly how that sounds. Snooty. Like I should be tucked comfortably in a leather armchair by a roaring fire whilst sipping port poured from a crystal decanter, the wine casting burnished bronze reflections upon the rare folio of poems sitting on the side table. Of course, all of you would be peering in the window, shivering in the cold, because you were not reading Dickinson poems last week, were you?

No. You were not. No port for you.

In reality, though, I was reading the book in the parking lot of my local laundromat (which, oddly enough, is immortalized in a piece of fine art) while waiting for my laundry to dry. The book, a paperback Dover edition, cost me all of 50 cents at the Salvation Army thrift store. I sipped iced tea from an aluminum travel cup. The only thing truly classy about the scene was the poem I read, called "The Lost Jewel".

I held a jewel in my fingers
And went to sleep.
The day was warm, and winds were prosy;
I said: "'T will keep."

I woke and chid my honest fingers, —
The gem was gone;
And now an amethyst remembrance
Is all I own.

It got me thinking, as good poems sometimes do. I can't count the number of figurative jewels I've held and lost in my life because I figured they'd always be close to hand. What's more, I don't really want to count. I used to, though. I used to total up all the lost opportunities and squandered dreams and plans abandoned prematurely for reasons which I considered bulletproof even though they were as flimsy as drizzle-damp toilet tissue. I can still give you a list of a dozen or so chances I had to do something better, something happier, something more fulfilling, something at which I might fail but would never regret trying.

I can, but I won't. Not anymore.

Here's the thing about that poem. I don't think Dickinson really wanted us to focus on the lost jewel, even though she put it firmly in the title. I don't even think she wanted us to focus on the sweet, sad memory of what she had. I think she wanted to warn us.

Emily Dickinson was an odd duck. She was brilliant and sad, preoccupied with death and faith and gardening. She didn't leave her house very often (and later in her life, I'm not sure she left at all except to work in her garden) and what few relationships she formed, she maintained remotely through letters. She was never confident her poems were worthy of publication and decreed that, when she died, much of what she had written should be burned. It is only through what I'd call good fortune that we have most of what she wrote.

To my thinking, she held a number of precious jewels in her hand over her life, and managed to lose most of them. I am sure she had more than her fair share of regrets and I think "The Lost Jewel" was her way of explaining how heavily their weighed on her.

As I said, I think it was a warning to anyone else who might come across it. You hold in your hand at this very moment a precious jewel. The weather is warm and the wind is prosy and it would be very nice indeed to nestle yourself onto the soft, clean grass and take a long nap. If you do, though, that jewel won't be there when you wake up. Dickinson never says what happened to the jewel in her poem, but it doesn't matter, does it? She had something precious and she let it slip away, unguarded and unspent. All she has is the memory of the jewel.

And the regret.

So, what does that do for me? For you? I have too many memories of jewels lost in my life. You might as well. Those memories simply don't matter to us here and now. Today, we hold a new jewel. It's right there. You know it, even if you don't want to look clearly at it because doing that means you have to decide whether to nap or to do something cool with it. But look at it. See it. It could be anything, couldn't it? What do you want to make with it? What chance will you take with it?

Might as well try something cool. If you don't, you'll just lose it come nap time. And then you'll just have that amethyst remembrance, which is dark and smoky and quiet and looks a whole heck of a lot like regret. I've done regret more than enough, haven't you? Let's try the cool thing a few times and see what happens.

I wonder what color those remembrances will be. - - - - - - - - - - - -

Here Are the Arts And/Or Letters I Promised...

By the time Rose sat down for breakfast she’d rolled two more trays of truffles, setting them on the high shelf that ran around the porch (after removing an astonishing amount of spiders, three empty plant pots, and a rather dashing hat she’d liberated from a half-forgotten boyfriend and then lost years ago. It still looked better on her than it had on him). She’d also made neat, handwritten labels for the jars she intended to put the truffles in, including a small but clear warning that these truffles were rather more suited to adults than children, especially if consumed in quantity. The whole kitchen smelled of spice and melted chocolate, and she hummed to herself quietly as she spread marmalade on her toast, Angelus watching her carefully. Robins were congregating on the bird feeder outside, skittish in the thin morning light. They flitted back and forth without wanting to settle, and Rose frowned at them, wondering if there was a cat in the garden, and whether cats were particularly partial to truffles.

And then there was a noise from the porch, small but most certainly not robin-like. It wasn’t all that cat-like, either. In fact, it sounded very much like the creak the bench gave when she sat on it to take her boots off. Angelus looked around, his ears twitching, and Rose slipped off her chair and crept to the door. She curled her fingers around it, then jerked it open with a shout of, “Ha!”

Well, that was the plan, anyway, but that particular door could be sticky, and it didn’t open on the first try, so she just jolted her shoulder and shouted, “Ha!” at the blank back.

-- An excerpt from "A Partridge in a Pear Tree -- A Toot Hansell Christmas Story".

I very much love Kim M. Watt's books about the fictional village of Toot Hansell, the people who live in it, the mysteries and mayhem that occur there, and the dragons that live in the nearby glades. Yes, that's right. Dragons.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Here Are Links, Either Useful or Fun!

• I'd never heard of The Cinnamon Bear myself, but it was quite the tradition for a lot of kids back in the day. Maybe you can revive it and make it a new tradition? We could use some really good Christmas traditions these days, I think.

• Austin Kleon is right. When it comes to creativity, quantity really does lead to quality.

• Expect great things!

- - - - - - - - - - - -

One Last Thing.

If you'd like to talk back to me, encourage me, suggest something you'd like to see or you'd like me to write about, you can always hit the reply button! I can't promise I'll always answer back, because I'm quite forgetful, but I'll read everything you send.

Remember, Thursday! is a constant work in progress. I didn't have a certain plan for what I wanted the newsletter to be when I started, so it'll change as we go along. Let me know what you like so I know I'm getting it right, okay? Okay!