Live Virtual Group Session: 6PM EDT May 23rd 2022

20 Comments

Thank you to everyone who joined us for this session!

For this session we a read a short story The short arm of chromosome 4 by Frank Huyler, posted below. 

Our prompt was: “Suddenly it was clear —”

More details will be posted on this session, so check back again!

Participants are warmly encouraged to share what you wrote below (“Leave a Reply”), to keep the conversation going here, bearing in mind that the blog of course is a public space where confidentiality is not assured.

Also, we would love to learn more about your experience of these sessions, so if you’re able, please take the time to fill out a follow-up survey of one to two quick questions!

Take the Survey!

Please join us for our next session Friday May 27th at 12pm EDT,  with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions page.

The Blood of Strangers. Stories From Emergency Medicine. An Owl Book. Henry Holt and Company | New York 1999.

Short Story The short arm of chromosome 4 by Frank Huyler

20 thoughts on “Live Virtual Group Session: 6PM EDT May 23rd 2022”

  1. Elizabeth

    Suddenly it was clear.
    We are all bringing our own perspectives,
    We are all bringing our own pasts,
    We are all bringing our own narratives,
    Into everything that we touch in life.
    What we do with this information
    Suddenly isn’t clear.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply
  2. michele348

    Suddenly it was clear~~~

    Four years ago, my daughter and son-in-law were expecting my second grandchild, and the proud parents found out the baby was to be a girl. What a blessing since their first child was a boy. So they would now have the best of 2 worlds. Early in the pregnancy, they received news of a different nature… this precious baby would come into the world with an extra chromosome, chromosome 21. She would be born having Down Syndrome.

    Initially, there was surprise, shock, and concern. But never was the thought of welcoming this new life without anything less than an abundance of love.

    She is a beautiful child, full of happiness and love. Any obstacles in her path, she faces with a willingness to try. When I look into her beautiful eyes, I can’t help but smile. I am proud to be her grandmother. Through her eyes, the world is full of amazement and love. It became clear that she is truly a gift to all of us who have come to know her and have her in our lives.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply
    • Elizabeth

      Michele, your piece reminds us how the unknown is scary…Including the unknown in people.If we could only open ourselves up to the possibility of getting to know people… Who they are at their core individually….our preconceived notion’s can fade away.Your granddaughter sounds like such a blessing.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
  3. Scarlet Kinney

    Suddenly it was clear
    That death was approaching,
    Perhaps on the chill breeze that rippled the lace curtains,
    Perhaps ushered in by the ghosts of the ancestors
    Gathered around her bed, and
    That she would embrace it,
    Go with them,
    Leaving us, the still living,
    Behind.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • Scarlet Kinney

      Sometimes the writing done in these sessions keeps working on me after we’re done, presenting themselves or parts of themselves in new forms in random thoughts that come at the most inconvenient times. Yet I’ve learned from experience that should I ignore those communications, they’ll float away back to their inaccessible source, never to be heard from again. Better then, to work on them when they start working on me, which sometimes results in adjustments to the original piece, sometimes to additional pieces altogether.

      Like

      Reply
      • Scarlet Kinney

        Suddenly It Was Clear REWRITE

        Suddenly it was clear
        That death was approaching,
        Perhaps on the chill breeze that rippled through the lace curtains,
        Perhaps ushered in by the ghosts of her ancestors
        Who had gathered around her bed, singing her name.
        Suddenly it was clear
        That she would embrace those singing souls,
        Take their hands,
        Go with them into their world,
        Leaving us, the still living
        Who loved her so in this world
        Behind.

        Like

    • michele348

      Scarlett, sometimes I wonder at the moment of death when there is silence ‘cept for the sound of sobbing, who is present to serve as guides for the departed to the other side…departed family/friends. It is a comforting thought for me that they do not stand alone but have others to guide the way.

      Like

      Reply
      • Scarlet Kinney

        That does often seem to be the case. Starting about two months before my mother’s death, she told me several times that she felt so strongly that her own departed mother was nearby that she’d turn and look, expecting to see her standing beside her.

        Like

  4. Elizabeth

    Scarlet, you created a scene for us. Your last words… Leaving us, the still living, behind… Leaves me wondering about the feelings and reactions of those who were left behind.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • Scarlet Kinney

      Wow, that’s a great insight, Elizabeth, because of course, that’s what the poem is about…the inevitability of death, and our inability to stop it when it comes for those we love…or for us. I’ll be thinking about the feelings of those left behind. I think there may be another poem in there, waiting to be acknowledged. In fact, it’s starting to come to me, or at least some imagery from it is coming to me. It’s a charged subject for me.

      Like

      Reply
      • Elizabeth

        Scarlet, Your writing is so much from your heart… You will figure out when to write and what to write. Follow your gut … It serves you beautifully with your writing.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Scarlet Kinney

        2.
        Suddenly it was clear
        That our careful preparations
        For handling this moment we had known was coming
        Were as insubstantial as the shapes of those ghosts;
        That how each of us would respond in the actual moment of loss
        Was in fact, an unknown;
        How could I have known that my body would propel itself
        Onto her lifeless form as it lay there bereft of its soul?
        That I would scream and scream and scream, keening like a banshee?
        That I would come to myself
        Only when a tiny voice somehow pierced that terrible noise, and said, quaking,
        “I’m hiding behind the curtains.”
        She had always been skittish, my little sister.

        Like

  5. Elizabeth Hussey

    Undesired Outcome

    Suddenly it was clear
    To Us
    this long road was over.
    The optimistic hope at the beginning,
    the second birthday on transplant day,
    the jokes about new physical characteristics,
    received from a youthful donor.
    Months later
    ravaged by diarrhea, bleeding, GVHD, confusion,
    suddenly it was clear.
    He wouldn’t make it to Day +99.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
  6. Elizabeth

    Elizabeth, first thanks for being called Beth in the session to make things easier for the facilitators. Second, I was so moved by this piece when you read it in the class. It seems to me that there is that line of demarcation from hopeful to hopeless about the situation. I’m not saying this is bad, just a realistic line. It brings up the following questions for me… When do we give a hope? Do we have to give it up in the face of reality? Thank you so much for sharing this with us. It is beautiful piece.
    Elizabeth

    Like

    Reply
    • Elizabeth Hussey

      Thanks so much for your comments Elizabeth. I have found it can be quite a personal decision regarding when someone wants to keep fighting and when they want to let go, and that it doesn’t necessarily align with what a provider might think. This poem however holds a lot of back story for me. I worked as a nurse for 7 years in a bone marrow transplant unit. When the excitement of a possible cure turned into multiple complications, it could be heartbreaking for all involved. And sometimes more importance was put on getting patients to an important statistical marker used for rating transplant centers than considering if palliative care would be the compassionate choice, which this poem alludes to, at least in my mind!

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
  7. Elizabeth

    Elizabeth… Thanks for the backstory…It actually gives me a different context. I thought I could be any kind of transplant, but this is specific. Thanks for sharing your words with all of us.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • Scarlet Kinney

      Thanks, Elizabeth. Sometimes the prompts keep working on me for a while after the session is over, in ways that are hard to ignore. Or sometimes a question or comment about the session writing will inspire a little more writing.

      Like

      Reply

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.