Tag: writing

Closer to the Heart of God: a review of God in Disguise

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Today I’m excited to share the book review of God in Disguise that was just posted on the Englewood Review of Books! It’s written by Kelly Treleaven, a fellow writer and a public school teacher who has a book of her own coming out next year that I can’t wait to read. Kelly and I went to high school together, but it’s only recently that we’ve discovered what kindred spirits we are, and have enjoyed getting to connect over writing, current events, spirituality, and the quirky experiences we both share from having grown up in the same small town. Kelly has a quick wit and the gift of being able to articulate both the profound and the hilarious aspects of life, and I am incredibly honored by her beautifully written review of my book! Here’s how it starts:

“As a teacher in the American South living in an upper middle class neighborhood and wrestling with my own religious identity, I didn’t expect to feel as personally moved as I did by an account from a Christian missionary seeking solidarity with the poor in India. But that’s exactly what good memoirs do, they connect: across continents, through spaces and experiences and beliefs. With admirable narrative dexterity and piercing vulnerability, Trudy Smith relates her spiritual and physical journey in a way that will reach those longing to hear God’s voice, especially those who may suspect they are unworthy of hearing it, incapable of interpreting it, or deaf to it altogether…”

Head on over to the Englewood Review of Books to read the rest.

God in Disguise: a guest appearance on Fuel Radio

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Last week, I had the privilege of being interviewed as a guest on a friend’s podcast, Fuel Radio. It was fun to reflect with Rod Janz on the process of writing my book, God in Disguise, the lessons I carry with me from having been immersed in urban poor communities in India, and the way my spiritual journey has continued to unfold since my book was released last year. In particular, I enjoyed having the chance to intentionally remember the ways that failure and pain have unexpectedly become catalysts for the deepest healing in my life over the past few years. You can listen to the whole half-hour podcast here.

If you’ve read God in Disguise, I’d love to hear from you about how to book resonates (or doesn’t) with your own spiritual journey. Whether you’ve read the book or not, have you ever experienced an unraveling of your faith or your worldview? What happened next? Have there been times that you have found God in unexpected places, or found healing through what felt at the time like a dark and hopeless situation?

Today I wear shorts: A poem written in anger

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Sometimes  when I experience street harassment, I confront the inappropriate words or behavior right there in the moment. But much more often, I am so taken off  guard–or uncomfortable, or even afraid–that I either find myself unable to meaningfully respond at all, or I make a calculated decision to exit the situation as soon as possible instead of reacting, for my own safety. In such instances, rage or disgust tends to start welling up inside me as soon as I walk away. These emotions are directed towards the person who violated or intimidated me, and also–unfairly, I know–at myself, for my own silence and passivity, or for not thinking quickly enough to find the words or the action that I needed in the moment.

map

In her book The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron writes that “anger is a map” that “shows us where our boundaries are,” what is important to us, and “where we want to go.” When respected and “acted upon” instead of “acted out,” Cameron says, anger helps us find a way forward. So today, instead of stewing powerlessly on my anger and replaying this infuriating episode over and over again in my head, I’ve decided to write it out–what happened, and what I wish I had been able to say at the time. What I still want to say to the world.

Here it is, a poem mapping out my anger to put it to use:

Today I wear shorts

Today I wear shorts
Because the weather is warm.
Because I want to be free.
Because I have not felt the pleasure
of a temperate breeze
against my bare legs
since I bundled up last October.

And yes, because my legs are beautiful.
Because I am not ashamed of my body,
and because I have no reason
to hide my God-given limbs
from you or from anyone else.

And no, I do not owe you any explanation
for the shorts I wear today.
But it would appear that I do
need to explain the self-evident fact
that I am not wearing shorts
for you to take pictures of my ass
on your cellphone
while you wait in line for the bus
while my head is turned the other way
while another man loudly announces to me,
and to others,
what you are doing.

Perhaps, in the privacy of your addiction
you have seen so many women on the screen—
performing a false intimacy,
giving you something for nothing,
posing and moving as though they belong to you—
that you have forgotten:
we all belong to ourselves,
and you are not entitled
to my body or to anyone else’s.

Or perhaps, you have learned
to treat people like things
because this is the cycle
your own experience brings.

I’m sure that there are reasons,
but whatever they are,
none could constitute an excuse.
So stop.

The story I carry inside me

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bowen island

“The past year has perhaps been the most difficult one of my life.”

So begins the blog post I’ve written for The Mudroom today. It’s the most vulnerable thing I’ve written recently: a reflection on the experience of deciding to leave India and then struggling to find my feet again in the West. The piece is a very brief snapshot of what has been and continues to be a difficult and beautiful journey for me.

For the past 10 months in Vancouver, I’ve been prevented from working or beginning grad school because of a lengthy immigration process. I’ve often felt trapped by my powerlessness to do anything about my permanent residency, and I’ve been frustrated by having so much time at loose ends. I said when I came here that I was looking for a season of rest and healing, but I have continued to fight that every step of the way, wanting desperately to jump into another busy season and another purposeful role that might provide a new identity for me instead of allowing my identity to be completely separated out from what I do. Who am I when I simply am?

When I allow myself to accept what is happening instead of trying so hard to change it, I recognize the gift of this time. I was able to go to counseling for several months to process my experiences in India (and my life up to this point); to gain valuable insights and skills. I took advantage of the opportunity to go on a few days’ silent retreat during Advent, and I’ll be returning to the same tranquil island for a 10-day silent retreat at the end of this month (a prospect which both thrills and terrifies me). I’ve had the time to get to know refugee claimants at Kinbrace, holding babies and cutting birthday cakes and eating delicious foods that remind my new friends of their faraway families and homes. Andy and I have been sheltered by a church community and befriended by a circle of wonderful people who make Vancouver feel like home for us weary travelers.

One of the biggest gifts of my enforced joblessness has been the freedom to write for long stretches of time. I’ve written a few freelance pieces here and there, but mainly I’ve been writing my book. I had no idea how long it would take. When I finished my first draft after six months, I remember thinking, “How do people spend years writing a single book?” Now I understand. Though not as much as I’m sure I will understand a few months from now, when I realize (again) how many steps I didn’t know about!

The process of writing a book has often felt like bushwhacking a trail through the jungle; I’m never sure what lies ahead or how far away my destination is. But without fail, at every moment of uncertainty a sign has appeared—in the form of a person I meet, a conversation I have, or a piece of information I come across—to direct me a few paces further. It has been by turns exhilarating, tedious, and discouraging. I’ll work on one part of my manuscript and think, Damn, this is good. Then later I’ll come back to it and think with alarm, This will never turn into a book.

I didn’t realize what a deeply personal and reflective process the writing would turn out to be. I didn’t realize how much of my own story—before, during, and after India—I would have to be willing to spill onto the page. I’ve had to face my fears of failure and of vulnerability again and again, but here—on the third draft—I’m feeling a growing confidence that there will actually be something to show at the end of all this craziness.

“The end” hasn’t yet been assigned a fixed date on the calendar, but it’s probably a testament to the growth of the past few months that the uncertainty no longer destabilizes me. In the meantime, click on over to The Mudroom to read more about the journey that is continuing to shape me, and my book.

burnout recovery process

Crash

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Friday night on my way back from dessert with friends, I was riding my bike along the dark, empty streets of east Vancouver, relishing the quiet, the cool wind on my face, the glow of the streetlights cracking through the thick, dark canopy of leaves arching across the road. Just a few blocks from home, I was speeding down the big hill on tenth avenue when I hit something—I couldn’t see what—and the next thing I knew I was continuing down the hill at an even steeper incline, balancing on the front tire with the back end of my bike in the air.

Continuing to hurtle toward the roundabout at the bottom of the hill while doing an accidental, reverse wheelie was not a good idea. Neither was clamping my hands around the brakes, but that was what I did—either out of my instinctive desire to slow down or because the weight of my entire body was already on my wrists and trying to hold on for my life was an unconscious decision. Then I was flying past the handle bars, floating over the pavement, hearing a scream that must have been mine, and feeling the impact of the cement against the heels of my hands and then my shoulder blades.

Thank God I was wearing a helmet. I ended up on my back as I slowly rolled over and stood up, I saw blood on my hands and slung across my purse, but could hardly feel any specific cuts. I had the good sense to stumble out of the road myself, but not to move my bike. I stood in the grass staring at it in the street, red and white lights still flashing.

Then things got melodramatic. A couple of neighbors came outside to check on me; in shock, I sunk down to my knees and started to cry as I fished out my phone to call Andy. The two women who found me were nice enough to move my bike out of the road, make sure that I knew my name and what day it was, and begin helping me walk my bike in the direction of my apartment.

I don’t handle blood very well. I am absurdly, comically overwhelmed with wooziness by the sight of it. These were not life threatening injuries: scraped hands and shoulders and foot; bruised hip and sore neck muscles. But if I lived by myself, I likely would have gone to sleep on the couch still covered in blood and with gravel in my wounds, because looking at them–much less trying to clean them–made me feel lightheaded and weak like I was about to pass out. Fortunately, I live with a loving husband who has a stronger stomach than I do. He doctored my wounds and patiently put up with my need to sit on the  bathroom floor and take deep breaths every couple minutes throughout the process. (Seriously, it’s embarrassing how I react to blood. Pain tolerance: HIGH.  Blood visibility tolerance: ZERO.)

Without the use of my hands, I felt like an invalid all weekend. I couldn’t bathe or even change clothes without help. Andy did the gardening we had planned to do together, cooked all the meals, bandaged my hands, helped me dress myself, and even washed my hair for me.  I am married to a stellar human being.

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Andy planting leafy greens in the garden

Three days later, my cuts are scabbing over, the soreness is receding, and I’m going in to the chiropractor in a few hours to reset my skeleton. Looks like I’m gonna be just fine.

I spent all last week revising the manuscript of my book, and I finished just a few hours before my crash–good timing, since typing would have been a lot more difficult over the weekend. Andy put it in the mail to my editor the next day, so hopefully it will soon be polished and ready to submit to an agent or a publisher.

completed manuscript

My completed manuscript

Throughout the process of writing this memoir of my time in India, I have received so much helpful advice and input from other writers and editors. Every time I reach a point of not knowing what to do next, a conversation or a connection with someone pops up and illuminates the next step. It sometimes seems I’m bushwhacking my way through the wilderness, but I’m beginning to trust the journey, and that the grace which has carried me this far will continue. I know that this story is bigger than me.

I’m looking forward to sharing the book with all of you. Meanwhile, for those of you in Vancouver, watch out for the unmarked mogul on 10th!

I am writing a book.

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Three days ago, we had the first snowfall of the season, and it’s still on the ground. Here in Canada, everything is cold and white right now, and I sleep under thick blankets, type next to a space heater during the day, and try to learn how to dress properly with layers and layers of wool. I still remember those TV infomercials a few years ago about “Snuggies,” the blankets with arms that looked like cultic robes when the ad showed what looked like a family of suburban Druids enjoying a nighttime camp fire in their matching fleece ensemble. Now I am cold enough to wear a snuggie around the house without shame, cold enough not to care whether I look like an infomercial from the last decade or a member of a pagan cult.Advent has just begun: the season of waiting for the first spark of hope in the dead of winter, of looking for signs of life in the midst of death. Even Christmas itself will not the triumphant victory of Easter–it will be the quiet celebration of hope born into the world, even while oppression reigns. Shepherds and wise men visit this child in secret, because baby Jesus will still have to flee Herod’s genocide and grow up under foreign occupation before he leads justice to victory and inaugurates the Kingdom. I feel the tension and the hope of this waiting, this hope that is stubborn but uncertain of when fulfillment and completion will come.

I look at squirrel and bird tracks in the snow on the roof outside my window as I edit the manuscript of my book. The scenes outside are so different from the ones that linger in my mind. I’m writing about my life in India: what it was like to be an outsider accepted into community across boundaries of race, religion, culture, and socioeconomic background. I’m writing about how life with Muslim friends shaped my own faith, and how confronting suffering in the lives of my neighbors who were materially poor has challenged me to make sense of where God is in the midst of all the pain. I’m writing about how Muslims and Christians and rich and poor need one another, about what it means for us to love our enemies, and about the changes that community brings in us as individuals and in our world. I’m primarily writing about my own journey, and the love that I have continued to discover no matter how far I travel in any direction.

The process of writing has been good for me. It forces me to be present to process rather than destination, and this is certainly a process over which I have only limited control and knowledge about how long it will take or what the final result will be.

But it’s difficult, because sometimes spending my days writing feels like living with ghosts—not only of my friends and neighbors in India, but of many of my own dreams, expectations, and self-definitions as well. Aside from that, daring to ask for help, to show my writing to others, or to even say out loud that I am working on a book brings my insecurities out of the shadows, revealing my fears about whether this story really will come together in the end, whether it will get published, what people will think about it (and about me) if it is published.

But I believe that it is a story worth telling, even a story that needs to be told, and so I keep on writing. I am struggling, not to bring characters to life, but to allow the vibrant life of the real people I have known to shine through the pages. I want you to see them, to care about them, to learn from them. I am still learning from them myself.

Advent has begun: the season of waiting, expectation, and hope. Whispered promises of new possibilities to come. I am living towards these possibilities, working towards what, as yet, I have never seen but still believe is possible. I struggle on despite my fears, my fresh memories of loss, and the uncertainties of the future.

I trust that new life can begin even in the dead of winter, that those whispers of hope are trustworthy, and that we are but the midwives of the dreams God wants to birth into this world.

Stay tuned.