RETROSPECTIVE LEARNING

 [Any of you who were present recently at one of my speaking engagements will find these words familiar.  The next two blogs will be loose excerpts from the talks I have recently given in Belton and Center. I thought a couple of my points were blogworthy. Thanks for your patience and loyalty to keep showing up expecting something worthy of your time!]

“Get skillful and godly Wisdom, get understanding (discernment, comprehension, and interpretation); do not forget and do not turn back from the words of my mouth.”  Proverbs 4:5 (Amplified Bible)

Lately I have come to see some added dimensions to this scripture.  The ways we get understanding and discernment are not limited to reading other’s books, listening to other  people’s lessons or sermons, or even reading the Bible. Sometimes God, the Master Teacher, reaches us through our own memories. Come with me on a little journey as I describe some lessons God is teaching me as I work as an author.

I think I used to believe that learning happens first, and then the writing happens as a means of teaching or at least imparting what we have already learned.  (Now, translate “learning” loosely, please, because you and I both know that true learning doesn’t happen the first time a fact settles upon our brains uncontested.)  But after laboring for years with high school freshmen who swore to me that they had nothing whatsoever worth writing about in an essay, I came upon an exciting and inspiring quote by the celebrated author, E. M. Forster.  He quite enigmatically probed, “How can I know what I think until I see what I say?”  At the time, I thought it was a catchy quote and true in an oblique sort of way.  But now, after having completed the writing of my first novel (a novella, really), I really do know what he was talking about!  He wasn’t quipping or being cute at all; he we was commenting upon the same phenomenon that happened to me as I wrote Out of the Chute in Azalea Heights ( amazon.com- paperback and Kindle).

When the first time we ever latch onto a truth is when we see it roll out of our pen or onto the computer in front of us, it is indeed a strange phenomenon. It is so strange, in fact, that I must attribute it to the supernatural Spirit of God at work to afford in us something I can only call retrospective learning.

As I stamped those fifty-year-old images onto solid paper— images of my daddy’s fascination with the Cold War and the Birdman of Alcatraz; visual images of the Center, Texas Dairy Queen and the Rio Theater;  and, sharp, audible recollections of Brenda Lee and Johnny Horton (“I’m Sorry” and “North to Alaska”); memories of mysterious hidden staircases in the Shelby County Courthouse—I fell into a meatier experience than I ever could have dreamed.

What I believed would be nostalgic meandering began to evolve into more profound discovery.

*        In chronicling a simple concrete confession about a clandestine midnight moped adventure, I gleaned the weighty abstraction that it almost always takes longer than we thought it would for mental realization to make its trip down into the realm of physical actualization.

*     What I meant to be a light entertaining tale about a wild-eyed hater of ruffles and petticoats turned into a stark realization about something Jesus said.  Jesus said that the eye is the lamp of the body; if the eyes are bad, the darkness is terrible.  This means that much can be gained or lost simply by the way we see things…and much of how we see things is our choice.

*         I just meant to take my readers on a vicarious jaunt down a homemade zip line from the top of a pine tree, but on my journey down I sensed a loud philosophical voice proclaiming, “It behooves us to straighten the tender sapling before it grows into a crooked tree.”

*       While making a graphic confession of a short but shameful profession as a 10-year-old fountain-pen thief, I found this pointed lesson rising up to intercept the superficial narration I really intended: Never underestimate the dangers of visionary children who are hell-bent against monotony and safety.  Never challenge the old adage about idleness being the devil’s workshop.  No truer words were ever spoken!

*      Nor should we ever underestimate God’s fervent desire and creative ability to redeem His perdition-bound children, regardless of the children’s ages- whether 10 or 90-in amazing ways!  The Almighty finds a way even when all the natural resources are shaky or depleted.