Posted on

The Many Layers of a Gifted Book

Layer one: it was a surprise. I live in a town with a post office, and pick up my mail once or twice a week, usually around bill time. This time, amid the flyers was a parcel card, and I hadn’t ordered anything. The box came out, return address from a dear friend. Woo hoo! Considerable weight for a little box. Layer two: felt like books.

Gifts are magical in many ways. Planned or spontaneous, objects or experiences, casual or intimate, gifts take many forms and are given and received with many intentions, and when done in the spirit of sharing joy, always bring a moment of light into the world. But to me, a book as a gift is all of that and then some. Layered as the pages within it, the sentimentality, the message, the energy shared in the gifting of a book.

So, back to the  small box holding great promise on a rainy Monday morning. Coat off, bags stowed, I stand at my table and tear in. Sure enough, books.

Layer Three: all gifts of books are honoured and deeply appreciated. Whether I read them or not, would choose them or not, I hold in my hand evidence that someone took the time to share something they thought would be of interest to me, would bring me joy, and perhaps something that intrigued, delighted, or even annoyed them but you might see something I didn’t. The start of a conversation across the miles, their experience inviting mine.

I spread my gifts on the table. Three books. Curious choices. Clearly used. I read the note, and felt the warm wave of grateful tears. These were not just books. These were her books, ‘a piece of my history’, she shared in her letter.

Layer Four: a gift of the sacred, nothing to do with the content of the books, everything to do with what those books represented to a dear friend, where they went with her, where they took her. If those books could talk … and in a sense, they do. Her letter describes the two books she discovered in the aftermath of her beloved husband’s sudden death, which 20 years later still brings her to tears. Those books, paperback, thick with guidance on finding joy and caring for self with humour and ‘spunk’, as she called it, were read in warm bubble baths, perused with a glass (or more) of wine, have the warping and markings of splashes, spills, and no doubt teardrops as well. She is ready to move on, and chose me to witness and share in her journey for whatever it may offer me.

Book three is fairly pristine, barely read once … a book she found interesting in parts but overall a challenge to connect with, written by someone with more money and resulting options than most of us will ever know. What will I read it in? She invites me to learn for myself.

And there is the final layer in my surprise gift of the week: what will I do with my gift, through my gift? That is a question I ask myself daily about my gift that is writing itself. Do I sit on it and do nothing? Do I stack these books with the others for reading ‘sometime’, just as I stack words and ideas deep in my brain and body for ‘sometime’ when the tasks I deem important are not as pressing? Or, do I honour these books as the invitation they are to dive in, explore new parts of myself, make new connections that feed a more expansive life, honour the words captured and shared as the divine energy they are? And will I allow myself to see the metaphor that explains why I have so many words to share and so little time to share them?

The answer is always Yes … and on days that I forget to ask the questions, I have enlightened people in my life to remind me.

Used books. Divine invitations. In my infinite world, they are all the same, and more. So much more. Just like each of us.

Only a book can do that. A book written. A book read. A book shared. Why I do what I do, and sometimes, don’t do it enough. In a world starving for connection while drowning in content, our presence as writers and readers, whole in ourselves and sharing in community, invites energy flow into darkness in ways that cannot be duplicated.

And yet another layer, from gifts I have given and received in the form of new books, especially those written and produced where I live. A book purchased from a local author, publisher or bookstore adds financial energy to the unique perspectives and heartfelt offerings that we in the book biz dish up daily, seeing and feeling and describing things in our own unique ways, inviting you to do the same.

So write, read, share, and know that every moment spent in the presence of your words, or another’s shared, is a moment of grace. Just like moments shared with friends, with loved ones, with self. Enjoy it all, and spill a little wine or coffee, or splash some bubbles in the process.

Thanks for reading, and writing 🙂

  • Jennifer

Want to learn more?

As writer and CODE Model Coach™, I engage Quantum TLC ™ for my own discoveries and can guide you in learning how to engage it for yourself.

CODE Model™ or Creation Out of Deep Energy™,  and Quantum TLC ™ are part of the WEL-Systems® body of knowledge developed by Louise LeBrun.

I offer:

  • 1 on 1 conversations/explorations/coaching to discuss your writing and the story behind the story of not writing
  • Whispers from Within ™, a 10-day email exchange that delves into limiting beliefs through daily writing and written conversation
  • Small group conversations, in person or virtual, among those of us called to explore what lights us up and what challenges us in living a fully authentic life.

If any of these options resonate or pique your curiosity, email me and we’ll set up a time to chat.

Visit
https://wel-systems.com/self-directed-evolution/

This space for exploration includes articles, audio files, and referrals to CODE Model Coaches™ who can support and guide your journey.

Posted on

New Book Rising:

A Full Moon/Summer Solstice Weekend Leads to Production of a Book 25 Years in the Making

“There Goes Six Bucks.”

It had me at the first read.

So much said in so few words, just like the man who uttered it: Arnold MacMillan, “the stoic lobster fisherman who doesn’t think holding the same job for 60 years is any big deal” and who would no doubt think it foolish that he’s mentioned in a book.

I kept reading. ‘There Goes Six Bucks’ was not only a brilliant phrase. It was also a reflection of the entire story to follow. So much said in succinct well-chosen words.  The proverbial apple didn’t fall far from the tree.

Arnold is not the main character in this story. His nephew, Lorne Matheson, is. Lorne wrote this story in 1999 as a series of daily emails to family, friends and colleagues about his adventures in leaving the ‘big city’ for a four-month sabbatical on an island in the middle of the Northumberland Strait in eastern Canada. Lorne’s mother Nina was born on Pictou Island, and in the 1960s they returned each summer for family vacations. In 1998, Lorne purchased the family land with the plan to build a vacation getaway from his corporate Toronto life. Does life go according to plan? Not for Lorne, who at age 40 and with a supporting cast – Uncle Arnold and assorted other colourful relatives, neighbours and friends – schooling him in new ways of life, those four months took on a life of their own. In 1999, Arnold MacMillan was known by many on the mainland as the lobster fisherman from Pictou Island. In 2024, Lorne Matheson is known as the ‘guy with the Wooden Tents.’ Who knew he was a writer as well?

Turns out I did. In fact, I thought that’s what he did for a living, and why he was living on Pictou Island. Your own slice of island life, off grid and online with nature, every direction offering stunning views and waves to lull your senses … a perfect place for a writer.

I had encountered Lorne years before at a library writer’s group. Our paths crossed again years later as the parents of daughters in the same friends group at school.  On a parallel track, I felt the intrigue of Pictou Island for years, and slotted it into ‘I should go there sometime.’ Sometime. The proverbial circular file of great ideas. I have lived within minutes of the Pictou Island ferry for more than three decades, but it wasn’t until a random Facebook post in early June of this year that the plan firmly clicked. A weekend special at the Wooden Tents: two nights ‘glamping’ and a lobster dinner, all at a great price in honour of the summer solstice and full moon. Cosmic alignment, and at 9 am on the Friday morning of the first day of summer, I set foot on Pictou Island and was greeted by Lorne the Wooden Tent guy to officially escort me to my new home for two nights at One Wharf Road.

Each tent was named for a relative. I didn’t know the significance of the tent I selected until after the visit

Fast forward to Saturday night, when Lorne and his partner Wendy opened their home to us tent folk for a fabulous lobster feast and island hospitality. As we sat digesting Wendy’s fantastic cooking the conversation shifted to ‘so, what does everyone do when not hanging out on Pictou Island?’ Medical technology. Counselling. Yoga instructing. Students. And then me. “Well, I’m a writer by trade … I’ve written some books and published some for other authors,” and then another click, this time from Lorne. “That’s how I know your name!” he said. “When you signed up I knew there was a reason I should know you … I was told to talk to you about my book.”

The next morning, I sat in Lorne’s lush little vineyard as he thinned vines and shared his story. This year was the 25th anniversary of his arrival on his piece of the island, at the time a few lobster shanties, overgrown bushes and downed trees. He had kept the original emails and video from those first four months. Could we create a book by the end of the summer? I offered to take a look. A day after I arrived back on the mainland, a file arrived in my inbox. I started reading, and didn’t stop.

By the end of it I felt like Arnold and his other relatives were family. I relived the summer of ’99 through a completely different lens,

one stunning in its detail and energy and in some cases, irreverence. Lorne is clear on who he is and what he knows. When the world works well, it is magical. When the world makes no sense, he says so. And all of it, shared in the moment 25 years ago, brings a unique awareness into this current state of land and humanity.

“There Goes Six Bucks.” Arnold uttered this as he watched his nephew, lobster fishing for the first time,  lose out to a lobster intent on escape. As it squirmed out of Lorne’s grip and splashed to freedom over the side, Arnold made the wry comment and kept on with his work. Actions have consequences. You can’t win them all. The best you can do is keep doing, and keep doing better. These are among the many lessons Lorne learned that summer of ’99, and that we can learn by reading his play-by-play account in the fall of 2024, or the summer of 2025, or whenever. Some of the characters in this story are no longer alive on the Island. Their essence and wisdom live on in the memories of those who knew them, and in the story Lorne carefully guarded all these years, for use somehow, sometime.

Our chance meeting, of course, was not by chance at all. Our respective ‘sometimes’ were kicking some proverbial butt and nudging us both to share what we knew and create anew. The tangible result: “There Goes Six Bucks.” It’s a smooth read, and not too long. The story and the characters bringing it to life, well, they’re in for the long haul. As Lorne says in his book: “When my two-day-old chainsaw was giving my 40-year-old muscles an unmistakable message, Arnold said “some day you’re going to look at your road and say ‘I cleared that’.” Simple.”

Lorne didn’t set out to be an author 25 years ago any more than he set out to become an Islander and ‘the Wooden Tent guy.’ He’s now all of those things, and more, and good at them, good for us.

This project reminds me of the joy and power of books … reading them, and creating them.

“There Goes Six Bucks” is now available for sale, from the author, or in Our Bookstore. 

Thanks for reading.

  • Jennifer

Jennifer Hatt is a professional writer, author, consultant and CODE Model Coach™ connecting personal evolution to the writing experience.  She is owner of Marechal Media Inc., a publisher and publishing services company in Pictou, Nova Scotia, Canada.