It’s back to work, and I find myself still reeling, hung over, really, but not in an alcohol-induced haze, more in a mind-still-blown haze from my weekend spent with almost 5000 other remarkable women, and a few men, at #BlogHer13 in Chicago.

I say other, because one of the most remarkable discoveries, reminders, I got this weekend was that I, too, am a remarkable woman.  This is something I tell myself sometimes, but don’t really believe.

I go through the laundry list:  You had a child alone at the age of twenty, whom you raised alone for the first 7 years of her life, you owned and operated a restaurant as a white woman whose husband was only home on the weekends, in a 98% black, severely socioeconomically depressed city for three years, you usually successfully managed a blended family and raised two beautiful, loving, remarkable women, you healed your own infertility and successfully added a beautiful baby boy to the then teen his&hers daughters you already had, recovered him from and prevented further vaccine damage, and you survived a two-year stint an entire country away from said daughters, and used (half of) that time to grow and discover yourself and you didn’t (quite) manage to kill your husband (not my story to tell, yet).   

And then there’s the professional stuff that’s happened in the last two years:  you were featured on BlogHer 3.5 times, you submitted an essay which was accepted for inclusion in a book that’ll be out later this year, and the theme for that essay earned you a Voices of the Year Honoree nod from BlogHer.  You wrote and taught Creative Writing for Fourth Graders to your son’s class over three sessions, and spoke before the local Depression and Bipolar Alliance about the connection between gluten intolerance and depression, anxiety, bipolar, and neurodegenerative disease.  You have so much more in you, just busting to get out, and all the while, you’re working again on your novel about a woman dealing with infertility.  Almost forgot, you taught yourself and built two complete websites all on your own.

It’s everything, it’s so much, and yet it’s nothing compared to some women.  This struck me over and over again, particularly as I listened to the other Voices of the Year Honorees who read their beautiful pieces to us on a stage, emceed by none other than The Queen, Latifah, herself.

As I commented on Feminista Jones’ post about Queen Latifah emceeing the #BlogHer13 Voices of the Year Reception: 

“I have adored Queen Latifah ever since ‘Bringing Down the House,’ and probably well before.  For her heart, strength, humor, obvious intelligence, talent on SO many levels, and her spectacular beauty that is the antithesis of petite, she is a role model who tells me to be myself even when a huge part of me wants to hide because I'm not the size zero I once was.  My family placed far too much importance on looks.  It's been a battle to find the midlife value in my own heart and my own intelligence and my own voice.  In a moment of false clarity, my weight can wash away all I’ve gained.  I'm five feet tall.  It isn't difficult to simply look over me; to not see me at all, [or to not see myself]. 

This is my brain shit, not yours, and you probably have enough of your own shit and don't even think to look past.  When I write, when I blog, I perceive that people recognize my intelligence and hear my voice first and, I pray, accept me for my heart before they see my size.  Writing, posting is bliss because for the moment *I* can forget.  I thought I was growing past it.  But even among all of [the women of all kinds, races, shapes and sizes], even attending as a #BlogHer13 Voices of the Year Honoree, at times it was insurmountable to introduce myself.” 

Why do we discount ourselves?  Why is it that I can sit in a room full to the brim of other midlife bloggers, recognize myself in them, yet feel too self-conscious to reach out to them as they have reached out to me after BlogHer?  Many of the Generation Fabulous women have since generously put out their arms and welcomed me into their fold.  How is it that I didn’t know before I attended that panel discussion that there are so many midlife women bloggers out there? 

How is it that we are still so underrepresented in every facet of life: corporate boards, politics, sponsorship, etc., etc.??  How is it that we so often don’t even recognize it?  We are 51% of the population (hence the book, 51%: Women and the Future of Politics), and yet we represent less than 19% of congress?  It seems we are largely complacent with being slotted into the role of teachers and school board members, raising the children, building the foundation of our future—all vitally important stuff that many of us probably don’t want to leave to the men.  But the fact that we are not nurtured to do otherwise isn’t good enough.  The fact that many of us don’t even think to seek otherwise isn’t good enough. 

And woe to those of us who didn’t attend college.   Whether or not it’s truth, the lack of a college education, time spent staying home with our children and the consequential holes in our resumes, can paralyze many of us with fear.  It halted me.  I allowed my lack of a college education to stop me from becoming something more, from finishing my book, from seeking and touching more of me.  

Until I left my hometown in Michigan, hit San Diego and was forced to take a hard look at myself, I existed, I loved, I enjoyed life to a degree…I wanted more, but I was holding my breath. 

I’m no slouch.  Two college level creative writing courses in San Diego, a modicum of encouragement from my professors, and I haven’t looked back…but what if…?

Well, as Kelly Wickham of Mocha Momma said in her Voices of the Year reading about being a single mom that resonated with me so deeply, “that is unacceptable.”  Kelly also wrote in “Untold Stories are Sometimes Secrets,” about,” feeling invisible as a person of color at times.”  I want her to know that I often felt invisible as a very short woman before I was heavy, and only more so now as a short heavy woman.  Perhaps we all put on our own invisibility cloaks for any number of reasons…acne, too large breasts, bad teeth…the list of things we can’t magically change about ourselves goes on.

Before #BlogHer14, here’s something I can change:  I will endeavor to stand proud, to embrace all that I am, inside and out, to *believe* myself to be your peer, just as Queen Latifah tells me. 

Before #BlogHer14, I will reach out to other women.  I will return the embrace of Generation Fabulous, and follow in their well-forged steps.  I.  Will.  Finish.  Bluebirds.  I will seek more speaking opportunities, I will query publications.  I will get paid for my writing.  And as of tonight, I am going to submit my book to a publisher! 

And come #BlogHer14, I will extend my hand to you no matter what I weigh, and I will help wake up the next generation of fabulous women to all they already are, even if they don’t get to witness people like Sheryl Sandberg and Rita Arens and Kelly Wickham and the almost 5000 strong of us amazing, powerful, diverse women for themselves.

What halts you in your tracks?  Or how have you managed to overcome your own personal invisibility cloak?
If you heard about the #JudyBlumeProject at #BlogHer13, SUBMISSIONS ARE STILL OPEN!! 

I’ve developed a new passion, and it’s one that doesn’t threaten my hubby in the least.  Whew! 

I’ve discovered I have a passion and somewhat of a knack for Flash Fiction, and I wanted to share some of my stories with you here.

There are several opportunities I’ve come across via Twitter, and in fact Twitter itself is a good exercise for tightening up your writing, let me tell you!  I’ve never been someone with a shortage of words (probably why my hubs is more the strong, silent type), and you really discover what’s necessary and what isn’t in 140 characters! 

Same is true of Flash Fiction.  The requirements are varied depending on the contest holder’s prompt or not and set word count, but therein lays the fun.  To discover whether you can tell a complete story with rich, sympathetic characters in a finite number of words is great practice even for longer novel writing, and maybe particularly for longer novel writing.

My creative writing professor, Don Matson, PhD, of the University of California San Diego, tasked us to read many Flash Fiction pieces such as Ernest Hemmingway’s, “Hills Like White Elephants,” Raymond Carver’s, “One More Thing,” and Robert Parker’s, “The Professional.”  Of course we wrote some of our own, though it was a process I didn’t appreciate or enjoy very much until recently, when I began to see more of it done by women. 

According to Wikipedia’s description, Flash Fiction seems to have been a craft made most notable by men.  O. Henry, Bradbury, Kafka, Vonnegut, and other greats share a reference with short, short fiction, so perhaps you can understand my hesitation to attempt to join their ranks.  Thanks to social media and outlets like those I’ll share below, however, many women are quite successfully trying their hands at the art of less is more.  I’ve found it a great way to get your feet wet, to practice restraint, and to exorcise those little bits and pieces that swim around in your brain, or that might prove to be sprouts of bigger stories one day.   

It’s a process I’m delighted to participate in whenever the moment inspires, and I find it’s usually a knee-jerk reaction or image that pops into my mind, based on the topic or prompt.  It’s like something comes over me, and that is perhaps the best lesson of all.  It’s absolutely delectable to follow those little seeds wherever they take me, especially as a mental break yet mental exercise from working on my Novel In Progress, Bluebirds.  I find that each little success I have makes me feel only more validated to call myself a writer, which is in itself a gift beyond measure.

If you are a writer in your deepest of hearts, and wish to take a crack at some Flash Fiction yourself, I encourage you to start reading it first, and to give it a try through one of the many outlets available today.  Win or not, I’m always delighted with my results, and the pace of the contests often frees me from procrastination and the compulsive and usual need to rehash, review, tweak and perfect each little word.  It’s kind of a skinny-dipping-under-a-full-moon approach that I find deliciously freeing (cause Lord knows I don’t do THAT anymore…if I ever did….  I’m not telling!!)!

Flash Fiction is often dark, but it doesn’t have to be, as you can see from my first win with @99fiction, Never Dreamed:

[Posted here as ever so slightly edited, still 99(!) words or less]

My second win was with Mary Papas for, The Dinner Date, I believe we had to be between 300 and 500 words, this is 409, and I hope you’ll give Mary’s books of flash fiction a read:

[Posted here as since slightly edited]

And I’m deeply honored to have received an Honorable Mention for Retribution, in the most recent Flash! Friday Contest that occurs weekly, amid some very tough competition (I love that Rebekah works so hard to find us great photo prompts like the two above, and that our micro fiction is entered as comments under the prompt to be enjoyed and commented on by all).  It is 272 words:

[Posted here as ever so slightly edited, same word count]

Last but not least, it didn’t win or earn a mention, but just because I loved it, here’s another 209-word example of one of my Flash! Friday entries, Impasse:

Oh yes!  I’ve enjoyed another amazing success!  I’m attending BlogHer ’13 in Chicago at the end of July, because I’ve recently learned that out of the hundreds of thousands(!) of blogs posted to BlogHer in the last year, I’m a top 100 VOICES OF THE YEAR HONOREE for my second featured post, “The Enlightened Middle Majority and Why the Sides Are Alienating Us.”  Enlightened Middle Majority is the same post that has been adapted for inclusion in the book, 51%: Women and the Future of Politics, that’s due out sometime in 2013.

I hope my stories will convince you to try Flash Fiction yourself, because you just never know where it might lead...and what the hell...why don't you enter a little below in the comments!! 

I'd love to read 200 OR FEWER WORDS OF FLASH FICTION OF YOURS about FOLLOWING A DREAM--any sort of dream!  If you have a Twitter handle, please include it and your word count.

No contest, no deadline...just challenge yourself, ENJOY and be inspired! 

Yours truly, WRITER, and author:

--Kim Jorgensen Gane

Dear Judy,

In Grade 4, I was Sheila the Great.

I’m not kidding.

Despite my fuzzy hair and brown skin, I was convinced you had me in mind when you wrote the novel.

I was also Margaret and Tony and Peter.

I started a newspaper at my school in grade 4 because of your books.  I dreamed of being a writer because of your books.

And because at first I wasn’t sure how to do that, some of my earliest writings are letters to my grandmother that were copied almost verbatim from various pages of your novels.

Yes, I plagiarized you at the age of 10.

I apologize.

But I’m not sorry because those letters were never sent and 30 years later, my mother delivered them to me along with a host of other childhood silliness and the joy and tears that resulted from reading my words – your words- are worth any sanctions you may have to take.

What you gave me was a gift; an outlet.

I was a first generation Canadian kid with Jamaican parents trying to find my way through the school system. I didn’t understand cliques or bras. I didn’t know what questions to ask until you came along.

You gave me a guideline to being normally abnormal that has guided the rest of my life.

When my mother bought me “Letters to Judy: What your kids wish they could tell you.” I was insanely jealous of the fact that these kids had written to you and that you were responding.

I was far too in awe to have thought of sending my thoughts as well.

So now that I have the chance here’s what I’d like to thank you for:

Are you There God It’s me Margaret : It led to an awkward conversation between a father and daughter when I snuck up behind him to ask what a “period” was and “how I could get one.”  Good times.

Forever: The sneaky way you didn’t announce that this book wasn’t like the others, allowing me a full fifteen minutes of jaw-on-the-ground reading heaven before my mother came bounding up the stairs after getting a tip off from another parent. I’d also like to thank my mom for always hiding the “not until you’re older” book  in the same spot allowing me to continue my reading on the sly.

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing:  For giving me insight into the world of a boy, giving me something great I can share with my sons so they can get to know you too and siding with me in the acknowledgment that baby brothers were put on this earth to test your sanity.

Thank you for Iggie’s House that had a character that looked like me, and for Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great, Blubber, Then Again Maybe I won’t, Tiger Eyes and all the others that kept me up way past my bedtime, flashlight in hand.

All those years ago when I thought there was no one who understood me, you popped in with characters that have stayed with me my entire life.

I’m so glad to have the chance to finally write the letter I couldn’t all those years ago.

Your pal,

Heather

aka Sheila the Great


Heather Greenwood Davis is an award-winning feature writer with more than 20 years of journalism experience.  Her stories have appeared in numerous publications including most recently the June issue of "O" The Oprah Winfrey Magazine.  A yearlong trip around the world last year with her husband and two sons (ages 6 and 8) led to the family being named National Geographic Traveler Magazine "Travelers of the Year."  Stories of their travels and lessons learned also appear online at www.globetrottingmama.com.

Heather thanked US for the chance to purge her soul, but we couldn't be more grateful to her for sharing her memories of growing up with Judy Blume.  I couldn't be more grateful that she permitted me to share it with you as a guest post on my blog, and it ain't over, folks!  We welcome you to do the same or to participate via your own blog!  UPDATE:  Find out everything you need to know to participate ON THE #JudyBlumeProject PAGE!!

Copyright © 2013 Heather Greenwood Davis.  All rights reserved.  Reprinted with permission from the author.

Enjoy this moment in time #JudyBlumeProject piece by Denise DiFulco, writer/editor/author, at denisedifulco.com.


It’s the period book. Everyone calls it that. They never say its awkward, seven-word title. But also, that’s what it is: the period book. The one where the girl gets her period. And a bra.

I am 11 years old. I have neither my period, nor a bra. But I want to read the period book. Everyone is reading the period book. All they talk about is the period book. If I don’t read the period book, they certainly will talk about me.

Mom hasn’t yet pulled me into the basement, as she one day will, to talk about “it.” Not the just small “it”—the period “it”—but the big “it.” After a conversation where I declare I know what “it” is, she won’t say we need to talk about “it.” Instead she’ll tell me, “We need to talk about the birds and the bees.”

I know nothing about birds and bees and what they have to do with “it.” What I do know, I’ve learned from the other book. “The Book.” The one about the big “it.”

Finding “The Book,” the big “it” book, isn’t so easy. It’s not in the school library. It never would be in the school library. There are two copies at the public library.

This I know.

They sit atop a revolving rack—steps away from the librarian’s desk—some corner of their covers shorn away, spines bowed into an arch. On the front, a picture of a locket, suggesting the secrets within. I spin the rack, inspect the book about the fat girl, glance toward the desk. She’s looking down. Another turn. The locket reappears. A second check to be sure, only this time she smiles. I walk away.

Weeks pass and the girls at school are whispering and giggling in the halls. I, too, want to trade in whispers and giggles. I want to know what they know.

One day as I arrive at my fifth-grade desk, a friend shoves her hand into my knapsack. “Here,” she says. “Don’t tell anyone.”

I peer inside. It is “The Book.” The book about the big “it.”

The locket is half torn from the cover, but the contents are intact. I tuck it inside my desk to read the first page, then the second, then the third. Class has begun. I draw my loose-leaf binder over the lip of the table, the bottom edge of “The Book” resting on my thighs. The teacher is speaking, and the class learning something, I am sure. I am learning, too.

Next day I re-establish my cover: Binder pulled out, book beneath, resting on the edge of the tray. Its spine is so well-worn pages seem to unfold themselves. I am opening with them— following the words into another room—so when the teacher calls on me, I don’t answer. She walks around my desk, and as I realize this, I allow the binder to slip over my lap. She does not see.

Yes, I am learning.

Next time I’m more careful. I raise my hand. Answer questions. Look down thoughtfully. Continue my education.

By the time the bell rings, I, too, can whisper and giggle, trade in information so precious and rare no one dares speak its name. Somehow I am changed, though real change is far away. Many questions answered and so much yet to know. Like the noises. What are the noises?

I know they are important. There is no one to ask.

Denise DiFulco is a freelance writer and editor whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post, Ladies’ Home Journal, Martha Stewart Living and numerous print and online publications. She currently is working on her first novel—loosely based on family history—which chronicles the life of a Jewish man who leaves Nazi Germany and renounces his identity only to find he can’t escape his past. Denise is blogging about her fiction writing at her recently launched blog, Setting Anchor, Setting Sail: A Writer’s Journey.

I'm SO very grateful to Denise for allowing me to share her story here! 

Copyright © 2013 Denise DiFulco.  All rights reserved.  Reprinted with permission from the author.