Seven Sides of Self

by Nancy Joie Wilkie

  SEVEN SIDES OF SELF

  Copyright © 2019 by Nancy Joie Wilkie

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, digital scanning, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please address She Writes Press.

  Published November 5, 2019

  Printed in the United States of America

  Print ISBN: 978-1-63152-634-3

  E-ISBN: 978-1-63152-635-0

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2019907666

  For information, address:

  She Writes Press

  1569 Solano Ave #546

  Berkeley, CA 94707

  Cover and interior design by Tabitha Lahr

  She Writes Press is a division of SparkPoint Studio, LLC.

  This collection of short stories is dedicated to all of those who have encouraged me to pursue my writing, my music, and my art. Special thanks to Jennifer, Amy, John, Beyhan, Jim and Barb, and my editor, Rebecca.

  And—oh, yes—to my Dad.

  CONTENTS

  PREFACE

  (Simplyummy)

  THERE ONCE WAS A MAN …

  (The Storyteller)

  THE LEDGE

  (The Skeptic)

  MICROWAVE MAN

  (The Survivor)

  AN INTRICATE BALANCE

  (The Saint and The Sinner)

  OF THE GREEN AND OF THE GOLD

  (The Scholar)

  JOURNEY TO PRADIX

  (The Seeker)

  OLD MIMS

  (The Savior)

  EPILOGUE

  (The Spirit)

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PREFACE

  IT ALL CAME TO ME in a flash. I had just spent the morning exploring my favorite art museum. My mind was full of ideas for new art pieces and projects. I then made the short drive to the nearby artisan village. After visiting several shops, I found myself hungry and walked over to a little sundry shop—simplyummy. I placed my order and prepared myself for a wait of a dozen minutes.

  Without warning, the idea for this collection of stories came to me. By the time my sandwich and salad arrived, I had sketched out the general structure for the book on a paper napkin. As I stepped back out into the hot southern afternoon after finishing lunch, I carried with me the seeds for Seven Sides of Self firmly registered in my mind.

  Oh, yes—and I had a beaming smile on my face! The Muses had chosen to bless me once again with their spark and inspiration. GOD bless them!

  July 28, 2010

  THERE ONCE WAS A MAN …

  (The Storyteller)

  THERE ONCE WAS A MAN who wanted to write. He wasn’t quite sure why he wanted to write. He wasn’t even sure about what to write. He only knew he felt a strong urge to write and that was all there was to it. He had always envied the great wordsmiths, their seemingly boundless pools of creativity, and the ease with which their words flowed across vast numbers of pages. He was fascinated by the ability of his favorite authors to paint grand vistas and draw people into imaginary journeys with just the right sequence of words.

  He surprised himself during his first years of college by actually putting some of his thoughts onto paper. In his spare time, he managed to collect a notebook full of poetry and even wrote a short story. His early attempts at writing pleased him. Then graduation came along and a full-time job filled up his life. Just as many aspiring professionals often do, he focused on his career and put everything else on the back burner. So—despite his deep yearning to write—he devoted little time to writing in the years following college.

  The older he got, the harder it seemed for him to sit down and write something. But he did still think about writing. When he turned thirty-five years old, he began to worry maybe he was too old and it was too late to start putting pen to paper. When he looked back at what he wrote fifteen years earlier, he feared what others might think of his creations. He feared his ideas would not be good enough and that no publisher would actually pay him for his work. He became convinced his efforts would never gain the respect and the admiration of others. More than anything, though, he dreaded discovering he had no true talent for writing.

  “What if people think what I write is total gobbledygook?” he would muse. His father’s age-old warnings would always break into his consciousness at this point in the man’s internal struggle. “You can never make a living at writing! You need a respectable profession! You will have a family to feed!” Then the imposing voice of his mother would follow. “Stop daydreaming! You should be outside playing with the other boys instead of sitting in here and thinking about writing books!”

  The need to resolve the creative yearnings of his heart with the voices inside his responsible and professional mind eventually came to a climax. The words “desire, ask, believe, and receive” jumped off the pages of a self-help book he read and filled his entire being with promise. He mulled over this sequence of words and their significance. Clearly, he had the desire. Maybe he had just never asked. But ask who? GOD? And what about faith? Did he believe somewhere out in the Universe a Supreme Deity would provide the words if he just asked? More importantly, could he learn to resist the urge to judge himself and his creations too harshly if he did ask and did receive?

  When he finally started to think seriously about what he could do to attain his long-dormant dream, he decided he would need to conquer his internal doomsayer. To silence this overbearing critic, he must overcome the self-doubt and start to think of himself as someone who could write and write well. To reinforce this idea, he decided that every morning when he awoke and every evening before he went to bed he would repeat to himself these words: “I am a writer. I am a good writer. The words I write are gifts given to me by the Creator. My role is to write the words, not to judge them.”

  At first, this exercise proved to be a very difficult thing to do. Something way down inside of him could not accept this mantra. With each passing day, the struggle to embrace the message lessened bit by bit. Maybe the “someone inside” not wanting me to write is slowly giving up some of his claim over me, he thought. I need to rid myself of this shadow’s hold on my dream.

  He also took a look at the many “someones outside”—those in his professional life and in his personal life. Did these people understand his need to be creative? Would they support his efforts to be creative? Or would they express unhappiness when they realized his writing took time and energy away from them?

  This caused the man to consider another barrier to his goal—time. He came to the realization that unless he made a significant change in his lifestyle, there would never be time to write. He knew his job kept him very busy, and when not at work, household chores ate up his few free hours at night and on the weekends. So he made a commitment to himself to schedule time to write. The more he contemplated what it would require to reach his goal, the more he realized the size of the commitment he must make. When he first started to change his routine, he felt as though he must accomplish his dream in one giant step. As the months went by, he found taking a series of small steps to be more realistic, and he felt a sense of satisfaction with each baby step he took.

  He next considered what other steps he might take to enhance his creative abilities. He decided he should surround himself with an environment that would stimulate his imagination. He resolved to build himself an office. No—better yet—a studio. And instead of the stark, barren walls in his extra bedroom, he would decorate his studio with posters and pottery. He would fill the
room with comfortable furniture and a warm-colored rug. He would install stereo speakers so the retreat would reverberate with his favorite music. He could hardly wait!

  Every spare hour during the next winter, the man spent planning, purchasing, building, and painting. At the end of each weekend, he would sit in his new room and relish each new accomplishment. He would imagine what the room would be like when finished. Before he knew it, the finishing touches to his new space were done.

  “Today I will write!” he declared one sunny spring afternoon. “My new studio is complete, all of my errands are done, and all of the bills are paid. I no longer have any excuse not to finally start writing.” He selected his favorite music and turned on his stereo. He felt the call of his idle typewriter and sat down in front of it.

  “What shall I write about?” the man asked himself. He took several deep breaths. He let his mind wander. The minutes ticked by. After a while, he quietly remarked, “I’ve sat here for an hour and I don’t know what to write about. In all of the years of wanting to write, I have only ever had glimpses of stories in my imagination. Now, I can’t seem to capture anything on paper.”

  Another hour came and went and still the man had no inspiration. He felt as though he was a lumberjack who had finally sharpened his axe, ventured out into the forest, and arrived to find all of the trees chopped down with only stumps remaining. Perhaps I will try again tomorrow, he thought with a sigh.

  The following morning the man again sat down at his desk. He opened up his mind, hoping for a spark to ignite some hidden story. One hour passed. A second hour passed. The man still was unable to put so much as a single word on paper.

  The man then thought about the affirmations he had been repeating twice a day. He knew doing this exercise helped him to think of himself as a writer—or at least that someday he would be a writer. After all, it had helped him to create a writing space, and it had given him time in front of his typewriter. He found he did like the feel of walking into his studio and sitting down to write. Maybe that was it. But he now needed to start acting like a writer, too. If nothing else, he thought he would go into his new studio and sit at his desk while he recited his affirmations.

  And even though no story, manuscript, or essay came to him, the process of going through the motions did make him feel better. As he sat in his antique desk chair one morning, a seemingly brilliant idea came to him.

  “Maybe if I tried a different set of surroundings,” said the man. “I need some fresh insight. Maybe some time away from my home would help to feed my starved imagination.” With it being Saturday, the man got into his car and drove to a nearby scenic overlook. He studied the valley beneath him. He pondered the mountains around him. He listened to the cries of the birds. He smelled the sweet aroma of the flowers.

  “If only I could describe the lushness of the vegetation in the valley or the majesty of the peaks, or put into words the awe I feel when I watch the circling of the birds overhead or smell the perfume of the flowers—and then could weave all of them into some spellbinding story,” he mused. After several hours of surrounding himself with nature’s richness without any stirring of his creative juices, he turned his car around and headed for home. He began to feel as though nothing would help him out of his predicament.

  This pattern repeated itself many times over the following weeks and months. The man tried writing at different times and in different places. He tried reading books, watching movies, and visiting art museums—all with the hope something might unleash the spark he knew must be buried inside.

  He asked himself over and over again why he couldn’t produce even a simple short story. He wondered if part of his writer’s block was due to fear of success. What would happen to his life if all of a sudden he became a wildly successful author? Or maybe his block was because of a fear of criticism. Writing does expose one’s soul. It did seem dangerous to put one’s innermost self on paper for all to see. Maybe writing wasn’t such a good idea, after all.

  And what about the effect writing might have on other people? The man knew authors could cause readers to take a long look at themselves in the mirror, either as individuals or as a society. Some stories might even cause readers to feel a sense of shame at what they saw in those highly polished mirrors. After all, shame can be a powerful motivator. Perhaps some writers attempt to evoke emotions in their readers, even strive to manipulate them somehow. But that kind of storytelling was not what the man had in mind. He didn’t want to create stories for the sake of controlling the thoughts or actions of others.

  Some of the man’s friends who knew of his unwillingness to give up his passion for writing tried to show him how silly the whole thing was. But the man was certain of his desire to write and nothing his friends could do or say had any effect. He eventually came to see his friends as reflections of his own internal critic.

  After a time, the man did start to receive a few rewards for his efforts. Every once in a while, the man thought to himself, I’ve got it! He would drop whatever he was doing and rush to pick up a pencil and paper or go to his typewriter. A few lines or even a paragraph or two would find their way from his mind, to his fingers, through the typewriter, and come to rest on a blank page. But it always seemed that after a brief flurry of words, the idea—with all its vividness—would evaporate. This never disappointed the man, however. In fact, he only became more determined as he started to collect more and more pieces of paper half full of his false starts.

  His determination often caused him to analyze how his own mind worked. He became fascinated by the things influencing creativity. He noticed that every time he had a strong desire to write, he felt like a young boy asking his parent for permission to do something. If the imaginary parent said no to the idea, then the words stopped in their tracks and never made it on to the page. So often the thoughts offered up by his child writer became the target of his imaginary parent’s scrutiny. The man soon realized this imaginary parent had stifled so many of his attempts to give birth to the stories he knew to be hiding inside his mind, afraid to come out.

  He also contemplated the role his job played in this whole process. The man was employed as an editor by a small equipment manufacturer. He would take highly technical notes provided to him by the engineers responsible for inventing some new apparatus, figures and photographs given to him by a graphic artist, and ideas on style and presentation suggested to him by the Marketing Department and weave all of these things into colorful and informative brochures detailing the proper use of the equipment.

  When he stepped away from the complexity and the pressures of his position, he eventually came to see himself as a creative person. He thought about the three individuals with whom he interacted the most—the engineer, the artist, and the marketer. They, too, were all very creative. But their creativity was of a different sort. He felt as though they created material out of thin air, whereas his contribution was assembly more so than synthesis. But the manner in which he assembled words, graphics, and style was a skill he had developed, nonetheless. Perhaps he could develop writing stories as a skill, as well.

  As he thought about what he did at work every day, he realized the difference between the skills he utilized to produce technical brochures and his attempts to write stories was when at work there were people feeding him raw material. He would have to learn to supply his own raw material.

  He wondered what the engineer, the artist, and the marketer had that he did not. He envied their energy, their artistic flair, and the way they let their intuitions guide them. He would have gladly traded a little bit of his intelligence and analytical precision for some of their creativity.

  After some time, the man came to the startling conclusion that the more he examined his desire to write and his inability to concoct the novel of his dreams, the more he ended up examining his life. And the more he worked on bringing out his writing skills, the more he worked on who he was. The more the man nurtured his unfolding talents, the more he cared for hi
mself and those parts of himself he had previously neglected. He felt very good about all of this.

  Much to his surprise, the man even began praying to GOD for the creativity necessary to launch his writing career. He thought that if GOD could create an entire Universe, He must know something about creativity. He must have an unlimited supply of ideas, energy, and means to channel these gifts to those willing to be receptive. The incredible number of authors, both living and deceased, seemed to support this conclusion. The more he thought about the enormous volume of works brought into the world every day, the more he became convinced everyone must have equal access to GOD’s gifts of creativity.

  “GOD—if you can help me write, I would be eternally grateful,” prayed the man. “Teach me, GOD, the simple art of listening to you. Please, may your creativity flow through me.”

  As the months tumbled by without the man finding the inspiration for which he so earnestly prayed, he met a wonderful woman and fell in love with her. She was as intelligent as she was beautiful—perfect in every way. She even understood the man’s desire to write and encouraged him in his quest.

  Maybe this was GOD’s answer to his prayers, he thought. Here was someone who understood all he wanted, who supported all of his efforts, and who loved him unconditionally. What more could a man ask?

  “Certainly, now I will find something about which to write!” exclaimed the man to his soon-to-be wife. “Love seems to fuel the imagination of so many artists and authors. With kind words from my true love, my internal critic will pack up and leave.” They were soon married and lived quite happily together.

  But the man’s dream of writing went unfulfilled. Years went by and the man’s life became full of other activities. He found himself struggling again to find the time to devote to his writing, such as it was. He rarely recited his affirmations. He again found himself asking why he wanted to write so much. And just like all the times before when he had asked this question, no answer came to him.