Truth is Not Pie

on creativity, self-censorship + pastry

Welcome to Slow Folk - a community for gentle hearts and rebellious creatives, thirsty for a slower life in a world obsessed with speed.

Welcome to the Unbusy Revolution.

I’m not sure what’s wrong with me lately. Maybe it’s being yet another year older.

Perhaps, as each year passes more of my precious give-a-damns slip from the holes in my pockets, unnoticed, each-by-each and one-by-one. I reach for them and instead - I open my mouth and the truth tumbles out. Not the polished pebbles of youth.

The bare-faced, painfully beautiful, unwanted truth.

Is this another symptom of aging? Along with my bladder that barely makes it down the stairs each morning, or the stubborn army of greys?

Is there a cream or a lotion for truth-telling, I wonder?

Get to it, woman.

Alright, out with it. Here’s the nub -

How do we, as artists, as writers, ever expect to be useful if we cannot tell the truth?

How do we tell stories, make sense of the prickly thickets and thick, lush meadows of life if we cannot wander out into the world with open hands and hearts and eyes, and come back with the luminous stones we’ve collected there?

Hold them up to the light for all to see? To turn over in our cool palms, feel their heft, trace a finger over their delicate curves?

Mary Oliver commanded - Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.

And Maya Angelou - There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

How on earth can we do that if we are afraid to speak?