Happy Musical Monday!

Nothing starts a week on which I'm going into surgery (!) like a little Debussy that I'm presently working on...and was long, long years ago, when I was in school. It can be an emotional trip pulling out this music that I "know" so well, and yet had to be introduced to, and learn, all over again.  It would be a worse emotional trip for YOU all if I were to subject you to the still-rough version of this I'm polishing! 

Therefore, we'll let Aldo Ciccolini grace your ears with it instead. 

Enjoy!

Janny

It's Tuesday, and You Know What That Means...

Tuesday WRITING TIP time!

Check out this week's--and previous editions...here.

Enjoy!

Janny

Wanna Dance Your Way Into the Week?

Here you go, courtesy of Musical Monday!

Enjoy!

Janny

It's Bright! It's Shiny! It's New!

 ....it's a new book. Working title, PARADIDDLE.

And if you infer by that title that this book will have something to do with percussion...

...you're right.

Cover me. It's gonna get close to the bone soon!

More to come,

Janny

Leadership--Apparently, Ai Haz It, Part 2: Serendipity

Leadership. Some of us apparently "got it"...and that's not always good news!

Last time, we talked about one of the instances of my serving in a leadership capacity that brought about not being appreciated.

And there have been others. I won't rehash the incident (s) now, but if you're curious, check out some of my blog posts from 2006 about RWA, the "flak," and "becoming a public person"...and you'll see that I've earned some good leadership breaks along the way.

Fortunately, I've been granted those--and in some unexpected ways.

I've become vice-president of our church women's group, the St. Anne Sodality, through a process that's almost funny in itself...considering I wasn't even planning on going to the meeting at which the elections were held, for various reasons. Only the Holy Spirit nudged me to go, and the next thing I knew...

I've become a member of the Welcoming Team, part of the Leadership Team for the grief support group I attend--again, when I had no intention of stepping into a leadership role, and just wanted to sit by in the background, listen, share, and go home. (If you know how deeply my introversion goes, you're laughing even harder that the leaders thought I'd be "perfect" for sharing the responsibility of making other people feel welcome at a group!) But, to my absolute surprise, these people clearly adore me...and now I've stepped up as well to help reorganize our group's library, something that was in dire need of doing. 

All this by way of saying that some of us, no matter how we try to avoid it, seem to get tapped for leadership positions--sometimes for no other reasons but that we see something that needs doing, start throwing ideas on the floor as to how it can get done, and before we know it...we're in charge. This has happened to me from grade school on: remember all those "teams" teachers used to put you in to do projects? Yeah. Half the time, I'd end up heading those up, mostly because I actually had a plan and was willing to push for it when the other kids were trying merely to do as little work as possible.

In a way, this also explains why I'm a lousy employee but a great temp worker, too. Temp workers, after all, are usually handed bare-bones descriptions of the jobs they're going to do, and they are expected not only to Figure Things Out, but in some cases, to figure them out as fast as possible, and often in crisis situations. Like the time I walked into the administrative office of a locked psych/substance abuse unit in a mental hospital, and the counselors turned to me and said, "Help?"

My son caught onto this phenomenon in high school as well, when he shared that he was "afraid" he wouldn't get to play the position he wanted on the football team--safety. (The kid had a nose for interceptions and loved doing them!)

To which I said, "Oh? Why wouldn't you get to do that?"

"Because," he said, with a shrug. "They'll make me quarterback instead." 

Why? Because he shows the same leadership quality I have--reluctant as we are to do it sometimes. It's a combination of Having a Clue and Being Willing To Step Up.

A formidable intelligence doesn't hurt--which he also has.  

And he was right. They did make him quarterback. And not only was he really good at it, but he enjoyed it to the hilt. 

But he also got to play safety now and again...and he did pick off more than one pass.

And that's the "serendipity" part of this phenomenon: when you get to do what you want to do in addition to doing what people want to enlist you to do!

The point of all this?

All of us have a bunch of "somethings" that we know we're good at...

...and then there are the "somethings" that other people see in us, and are willing and eager to employ in their own ways.

The only time it's a mistake to give in to that "employment" is when it's something we really, really, really don't want to do...for our own reasons.

Or when it's morally or ethically wrong.

Or when saying "yes" one more time is going to completely exhaust us.

But sometimes, saying "yes" to an offer of leadership, even when we don't see ourselves in that role at all, can open up other doors for us.

Reveal sides to ourselves we didn't know we had, or were afraid to let anyone see...for fear they'd laugh at us.

The great and wonderful joke on us at that point is that not only do people not laugh--but they praise us for the effort. And that's a win, in more than one book. 

Often, leadership--even when we're not all that sure about it, or it feels thrust upon us--turns out to be enrichment, not only for the people we lead, but for ourselves. 

So don't be too quick to assume you're not a leader, of some kind, for someone.

You just might be surprised...and, by accepting, make a whole lot of other people stronger, too.

(And then you won't be tapped every time someone needs a leader! 😄)

Have you ever been "shoved into" a leadership position you didn't expect...that turned out to be way better than you expected?

Share that story in the comments!

Janny

Leadership--Apparently, Ai Haz It, Part 1: Or, Uneasy (Sometimes) Lies the Head that Wears the Crown

In my high-school days, I was famous for joining groups.

I was a member of Pep Club, a natural extension of how much I loved cheering at athletic events...and a natural extension of many of my friendships. My small group of buddies and I spent many a Friday or Saturday night at basketball games, in our uniforms of red vests and gray culottes, screaming as loud as we could for every basket and free throw...not to mention having already spend much of autumn in the bleachers cheering every touchdown and extra point. To the best of my recollection, I was never a "leader" in it,  in that I didn't hold an elected or appointed office. But that was one of the few instances in which I didn't! 

I was a member of Thespians, again, a natural match. I loved the theater, still do. And I earned my stripes through many an hour of securing props, doing makeup, and even--wonder of wonders--being one of the student directors for three one-act plays my senior year.

And I was a member of the staff of the literary magazine. By all reasonable measures, I was in line to be editor-in-chief my senior year; I'd served with distinction all four years in school, and all my peers knew I was the best there was. But then, I butted heads with the faculty advisor...and things got interesting.

First, someone submitted the lyrics to Jimi Hendrix's song "Little Wing" as a poem, signed only "J. Hendrix"...which I promptly brought to her attention. Clearly meant to mock us, to "dare" us to know where it'd come from. Well, I did. And I said so.

She pooh-poohed the concern, told me it had been submitted "anonymously" by someone who wanted to "use a pen name," and that surely I was mistaken. I offered to bring in the album cover of the Hendrix recording from home and show her, but she told me that wouldn't be either appreciated or necessary. And so, our literary magazine published--as if it were original--song lyrics for which we could have been sued, seemingly without concern or worry.

(In 1970, that didn't draw attention like it could have in 2022. Just sayin'. )

The second was my discovery of more plagiarism--of one of MY OWN PIECES of writing--submitted by a former friend who'd basically fallen out with me. She'd turned it in as work to her English teacher, gotten an A, and her teacher had submitted it to the magazine.

You can imagine my feelings when I read it...and who had supposedly "written" it. 

How did she get it, you ask? Simple. In my early teens, I was a fledgling writer whose close buddies enjoyed reading her work.  So, I'd shared it.

This piece was haunting, emotive, and pretty darned good for the 15-year-old I'd been when I'd penned it... but it was also MINE, not hers. Not even two years later, which was when it surfaced.

I squawked. I demanded to talk to both her and her English teacher. I offered to bring in other friends who'd read it, from my hands, two years before. And I kept squawking.

The advisor, faced with my adamant protests, unbent enough that she supposedly went to the other English teacher, who confronted the girl, who admitted to the plagiarism. And the piece was removed from consideration in the magazine.

But she was allowed to keep the A.  Without redoing the work.

I was livid. And I let the advisor know it. I told her, point-blank, to her face, that this was wrong. That letting this girl get away with keeping a grade was, in effect, rewarding her for cheating.

What did I hear in response? "Oh, she apologizes."

To which I said, "Not good enough."

To my knowledge, no other demand was never enforced.

And from that point on,  I was apparently regarded as "trouble."

The advisor gave the editor-in-chief job to a sophomore in one of her classes, one who had less than a tenth of the experience I had but who was one of her "pets"...and I quit. 

This all by way of demonstrating that, when I enter a group, seemingly inevitably I end up becoming a leader in it. For better or worse.

Sometimes, that leadership isn't appreciated at all. 

Sometimes, that leadership gets you publicly vilified.

But then, again, sometimes that leadership "thing" can pleasantly surprise you.

As it has lately, for me.

More on that in Part 2!

To be continued...

Janny