Author: Jackie Pick

Jackie Pick is a former teacher and current writer living in the Chicago area. She is a contributing author to multiple anthologies, including Multiples Illuminated, So Glad They Told Me: Women Get Real about Motherhood, Here in the Middle, as well as the and the literary magazines The Sun and Selfish. She received Honorable Mention from the Mark Twain House and Museum for her entry in the Royal Nonesuch Humor Writing Competition. Jackie is a contributing writer at Humor Outcasts, and her essays have been featured on various online sites including McSweeney's, Belladonna Comedy, Mamalode, The HerStories Project, and Scary Mommy. A graduate of the University of Chicago and Northwestern University, Jackie is co-creator and co-writer of the award-winning short film Fixed Up, and a proud member of the 2017 Chicago cast of Listen To Your Mother.

Shallow Thoughts, Imaginary Philosophical Conversations, Yoko Ono, and Skullduggery. Day 51 of 100 Days of Writing.

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As I work on my Aspen Travelogue-Love Note, other thoughts creep in. It’s Sunday. I let myself wonder.

For a long time I’ve been awed by those who write something “complete” every day. Those who eschew the idea of writer’s block and daily whip up (or slave over) something that is meant to be consumed/shared. Those who, without plan or character or notion or theme, pick up paper or laptop and write something to completion.

Today I wonder: Is it worth writing, committing, if on a given day, you have nothing to say? What is the value? What is the price? Is there value in not writing for others on those days our thoughts are steadfast in their banality? Completely, unforgivingly of no use to humanity, yet presented/published/shared rather than kept private?

Age old questions about the relationship between artist and audience and the ever provocative “What is Art?”

This is a discussion I would love to have with artists and artisans (storytellers all, be they in the performing arts or other realms where art meets science/craft) over some amazing cocktails and tapas.

I’m pretty sure at some point one side or the other of that argument would bring up the collected works of Yoko Ono, and both sides would have a valid point.

I rarely have fretted over writing for a silly blog piece like I am fretting over the Food and Wine Classic piece (Parts 3 and 4.  Part 1 can be found here, Part 2 here). It was a weekend of immersion in passion and food and geeks…my people. I want to craft the piece, not blurt it out. I can feel some paralysis waiting to jump at me…ignoring that little monster and just plugging along, cooing over my brief encounters, remembering one professor in graduate school who, God love him, told us that “Good writing is never finished, it is only surrendered.” At some point, my ruminations about that weekend will need to leave the nest so I can move on to my next thoughts.

The grocery store on a Sunday morning is other worldly, especially if that other world is inhabited by people who have woken up that morning with a full-on, spiritual understanding that their lives will never get better than nabbing whatever soup is in the fresh-deli case.  Most shopper have completely given up on life and can be found sobbing next to the Boboli crusts. They won’t move for you. They won’t move for anyone. Their acceptance is your Aisle Seven speed bump. Godspeed, shopper. Find some joy in the yogurt case. There are so many options now.

In addition to sweet song licks, my ear worms also include random words. Today: Skullduggery.

It is astonishingly beautiful outside today. The lilies are glorious. The sky is brushed with the wispiest of clouds.  I am grateful to have a hammock and every good reason to be in it.