Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith by Anne Lamott

My first encounter with Anne Lamott was during my sophomore year at GC in a Fiction and Poetry class: 20 seniors, Brad Shaw, and myself. Lamott came at a good time (I was asked to actually write and share poetry---in the grand scheme of things, I would live in cute, Fiction land where the things in your mind actually sprung to life and you went to talk about them at the local ice cream shop that looked like a 50’s diner with lots of colors for inspiration, while those Poets would spend all their time at Walden Pond being transcendental like and looking a lot like Thoreau-just looking for the right word that, as everyone knows, is actually worth fifteen sentences in prose writing, because it’s that fitting and perfect.) Needless to say, I was a little intimidated. Bird by Bird, written by Lamott about the actual task of writing, helped a lot. And I fell in love with her style of writing-sort of a more liberal and outspoken Lauren F. Winner of the 90’s.

I really appreciate that laced throughout Lamott’s story of coming to God and then Jesus is her emphasis on prayer. Prayer for Lamott means stopping what she is doing, writing out her request to God, or kneeling and putting her face in her hands, and knowing that she will have an answer even if it is weeks later in some form she may not recognize at first. She also describes her need for prayer as her ‘inner little child reminding her to pray about something that seems trivial or outlandish to her.’ For Lamott, keeping the communication open between us and God is the most important thing. Today, as I was expounding on this thought on my walk, I was getting myself into an unproductive mindset, to say the least, and then I talked to God about it, and it wasn’t that hard to change my mindset when I wanted to. Which is encouraging because I spend a lot of time thinking about things (intellection) and not actually doing them—putting faith into action, the pedal to the metal, and all that jazz-type metaphors. So I moved past appreciating what Lamott had to say to actually experiencing it.

Lamott’s comparisons are perfect. She tells us that her son couldn’t possibly understand the concept of having a bad self image because he is a cross between God and Cindy Crawford. She described baby’s rolling around in the sand next to her as ‘breaded veal cutlets.’ She personifies grace as a person (Grace Paley) and when things don’t go the way that Lamott wants them to go, Grace says “It was what it was.” But there’s always another (better) chance waiting for the next time.

Lamott would definitely be out at Walden Pond, waiving her left wing banners as her dread locks bounced up and down while she thought of a perfect comparison of the entire thing in her mind. Her books are also laced with poetry, showing her love and appreciation of just one or so many thoughts being captured in so few words. If we ever met, I’d bring a milk shake from the diner as an icebreaker and we’d sit out by Walden Pond and we’d be able to enjoy its beauty together. In other words, I’d want to talk to her about stuff that she’s written in her books, but I’d probably come off as a blond fan that says something like “wow, your hair is Super cool.” But there’s always the hope that we’d be able to look past our exteriors (and my intimidation of someone who has made it in the writing world) and just talk.

I opened up Plan B right after I was done with Traveling Mercies and a book mark for Book Man Book Woman flew out. I didn’t even see the lady put it in there in Nashville! It says that their books range from $4.95 to $75,000….but mostly in between $10 and $14. What costs $75,000 there??