Thank you for reading Opera Rose and Other Devotions,
our showcase on Southern Writers Guild, for the past few weeks.

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Opera Rose and Other Devotions is complete.

Over the last several weeks, we’ve followed Gray from the edge of a bluff, through grief, and finally into the quiet, complicated work of learning how to live again. Thank you for reading along. Your comments, messages, and encouragement have meant so much to me.

If you’d like to revisit the collection, I’ve also put together an Opera Rose mixtape—a collection of songs shaped by the mood and emotional landscape of the soul behind these stories. Give it a listen while you read, drive, paint, pray, or just sit with your coffee for a while. You can find the link here.

Tomorrow night, the Southern Writers Guild will post our wrap-up conversation about Opera Rose and Other Devotions. We’ll talk a little about the stories, the writing process, what surprised me along the way, and a few SWG projects currently underway. If you have questions you’d like us to address—about any of our feature stories, Southern Writers Guild, or anything we’re working on—leave them in the comments and we’ll do our best to answer them.

Thank you again for spending time with Gray. These stories began for very different reasons than the ones they ultimately fulfilled, and somewhere along the way they taught me a few things I wasn’t expecting to learn. I’m grateful you came along for the journey.

See you tomorrow evening.

Get notified. Watch here.

Re-read the story. Start here.

Opera Rose and Other Devotions is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive.

Before she was Gray, she was Grace. A girl who learned early how to care for everyone else, how to keep her own heart tucked away beneath layers of old paint. Home was always a moving target—a series of temporary arrangements: a suitcase at a cousin’s house, an empty bed, a makeshift safe place of bean bags and Christmas lights.

In The Bluff, a young girl stands on the edge of something she doesn’t yet understand—watching the boy she loves dance with gravity, already learning how to survive.

In Headstone, a woman finally opens herself to love—and discovers that healing doesn’t mean you won’t be asked to pay for it. What follows is not just grief, but the unraveling of everything she thought she had already sorted through.

In Opera Rose, she is left with what remains: memory, ritual, and the quiet, deliberate choice to feel again—or retreat into the safety of what she knows.

This is a story about midlife becoming—not the kind that announces itself, but the kind that happens quietly, in kitchens, in cars, in the space between who you were and who you’re still becoming.

It’s for the keepers of prayer candles, the makers of analog mixtapes, and anyone who has ever had to learn that human emotion doesn’t run your life—it runs beside it. And that is more than okay.
—from Opera Rose and Other Devotions

I’m very excited and honored to share that Opera Rose and Other Devotions—
a triptych, novelette-length collection—
has been our showcase on Southern Writers Guild the past few weeks.
Opera Rose is the final installment.

I hope you’ll read along.
And if you don’t want to miss when it goes live, you can subscribe for notifications.

Notify me about Opera Rose

Before Opera Rose and Other Devotions, I thought I knew exactly who Gray was. Not just the Gray in these shorter pieces, but the version of her who lives in the pages of the bigger novel I’m still working on.

But there was a point in this process where she stopped obeying my outline.

That’s where the real story began.

The Bluff started out as a character study. Headstone was never even supposed to be part of Gray’s official canon. But somewhere along the way, I started learning things I didn’t know about her—and then Headstone completely changed who I thought she was.

So I needed to find out what happened between the young girl on the bluff and the woman standing outside the columbarium.

The answer was Opera Rose.

If Headstone proved that grief isn’t linear, Opera Rose taught me that healing isn’t either. You don’t just learn the lesson once. In that unfinished novel, I want to explore what healing looks like when it’s finally put into practice. What I discovered while writing this final backstory piece is that it’s incredibly messy.

The final installment of Opera Rose and Other Devotions (and an accompanying mixtape) goes LIVE tomorrow night on Southern Writers Guild at 6:00 PM Central.

I hope you’ll come with me one last time to see where Gray finally lands.

Thank y’all from the bottom of my heart for reading, commenting, and walking through this difficult, beautiful space with me. It has meant more than you know.

See you tomorrow evening.

(Opera Rose, the final movement, goes live tomorrow night.)

Read the story here.

Opera Rose and Other Devotions is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive.

Before she was Gray, she was Grace. A girl who learned early how to care for everyone else, how to keep her own heart tucked away beneath layers of old paint. Home was always a moving target—a series of temporary arrangements: a suitcase at a cousin’s house, an empty bed, a makeshift safe place of bean bags and Christmas lights.

In The Bluff, a young girl stands on the edge of something she doesn’t yet understand—watching the boy she loves dance with gravity, already learning how to survive.

In Headstone, a woman finally opens herself to love—and discovers that healing doesn’t mean you won’t be asked to pay for it. What follows is not just grief, but the unraveling of everything she thought she had already sorted through.

In Opera Rose, she is left with what remains: memory, ritual, and the quiet, deliberate choice to feel again—or retreat into the safety of what she knows.

This is a story about midlife becoming—not the kind that announces itself, but the kind that happens quietly, in kitchens, in cars, in the space between who you were and who you’re still becoming.

It’s for the keepers of prayer candles, the makers of analog mixtapes, and anyone who has ever had to learn that human emotion doesn’t run your life—it runs beside it. And that is more than okay.
—from Opera Rose and Other Devotions

I’m very excited and honored to share that Opera Rose and Other Devotions—
a triptych, novelette-length collection—
is being showcased on Southern Writers Guild over the next several weeks.

I hope you’ll read along.
And if you don’t want to miss an entry, you can subscribe for notifications.

Notify me about Opera Rose

I’m really floored by y’all’s response to last week’s installment of Headstone, the second movement of Opera Rose and Other Devotions. I truly appreciate you walking into this difficult space with Grace.

Last week, I sort of mentioned that I knew this story belonged on Southern Writers Guild because I think Grace is the epitome of a younger Southern widow. Relatively speaking, anyway. She’s not twenty-three—she’s a woman already carrying a life behind her.

While writing it, I realized that for a while, widowhood became the identity she wore. Not just grief, but the rituals of it. The weight of it. The responsibility of carrying someone’s memory forward.

But I also realized she can’t stay there forever.

This week, she’s still deep in it. But maybe she turns a corner.

The next installment of Headstone goes live tomorrow night on Southern Writers Guild at 6PM Central. I hope you’ll stick with me and see what it means for Grace to carry love, grief, memory, and still somehow keep living.

Also, the proof copy of Opera Rose and Other Devotions is supposed to arrive later today, which honestly feels surreal. Fingers crossed everything looks good. I’ll keep y’all posted.

And truly—thank y’all for reading, commenting, sharing, and encouraging me through this project. It’s meant more than you probably realize.

(The final movement in this series drops next week.)

Read the story here

Opera Rose and Other Devotions is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive.

Before she was Gray, she was Grace. A girl who learned early how to care for everyone else, how to keep her own heart tucked away beneath layers of old paint. Home was always a moving target—a series of temporary arrangements: a suitcase at a cousin’s house, an empty bed, a makeshift safe place of bean bags and Christmas lights.

In The Bluff, a young girl stands on the edge of something she doesn’t yet understand—watching the boy she loves dance with gravity, already learning how to survive.

In Headstone, a woman finally opens herself to love—and discovers that healing doesn’t mean you won’t be asked to pay for it. What follows is not just grief, but the unraveling of everything she thought she had already sorted through.

In Opera Rose, she is left with what remains: memory, ritual, and the quiet, deliberate choice to feel again—or retreat into the safety of what she knows.

This is a story about midlife becoming—not the kind that announces itself, but the kind that happens quietly, in kitchens, in cars, in the space between who you were and who you’re still becoming.

It’s for the keepers of prayer candles, the makers of analog mixtapes, and anyone who has ever had to learn that human emotion doesn’t run your life—it runs beside it. And that is more than okay.
—from Opera Rose and Other Devotions

The windows were starting to steam over. Grace leaned against the counter as Nin dropped the jars into the boiling pot. She hadn’t always been interested in helping make the end of season jams—as a matter of fact, for a long time she scoffed at the idea of anything so old fashioned. But these last few years she’d started returning to Preservation Mountain, Alabama, to visit her grandmother and great aunt to learn about jam making—and maybe a few other life lessons.

These women took it seriously, making these jams. They entered the best batch in the Preservation-Fest Jam Contest every year. The Mountain Jam had always been Grace’s favorite. Every year it was a little different, depending on what was left—the last fruits of the summer jammed up with a little pumpkin, always pumpkin. They’d called it The Smith Girls’ Mountain Jam in their family since forever.

They weren’t mountain people exactly. Round about the stateline, the mountains softened into foothills and lake water, Appalachia still brushing against them—close enough to preserve some of the echoes. Gossip and ghost stories held court around kitchen tables still.

“Sweet Pea, get the sorghum from the cabinet.”

Grace wrinkled her nose as she walked over to the low cupboard. When she and her cousins were little, her grandmother had installed chalkboards on the inside of the doors. The children would sit there and draw pictures and play school while Nanny cooked dinner.

The dark syrup had looked like the inside of Nin’s special pecan pie to little Grace and she could not control her blossoming sweet tooth. Somehow she forced the lid off—cemented on by the syrup—stuck in her little index finger, and snuck a taste.

It tasted nothing like she thought sweetness was supposed to taste like.
It tasted earthy, dark, and musty.
And a little complicated.

She wanted to cry. Wanted to run to her Nanny over the syrupy betrayal. But she wasn’t supposed to have sweets without permission and somehow, even after tasting it, she figured this qualified.

Nanny chuckled as grown up Grace made her death march toward the cupboard. Nin shook her head as she reached for her fourth cigarette today.

“It doesn’t taste as bad as you remember, you know it?”

Grace turned on her heel. “You know?”

“I always knew, hon. A poker face, you ain’t got. You nare your grandfather, rest his soul.”

Nanny stepped on the stool her late ex-husband had made for her and stretched to reach the upper cupboard.

“If you knew, why didn’t you stop me?” Grace asked as she set the syrup jar on the counter.

“Because sometimes you have to taste it yourself to understand.” Nanny said, reaching past the flour to the very back of the dark shelf. “There it is”

She pulled out a mason jar filled with a clear, amber-tinted liquid—a vanilla bean split in two, floating there with quiet purpose. She nodded toward the sorghum.

“Give it a little taste.”

Grace’s visceral reaction to the very thought made the older women laugh.

“What if she double dog dared you?” Nin asked her, snubbing out her cigarette.

Grace rolled her eyes as she lifted the lid and peeked inside, not sure what she expected to see, really. Her pinky dabbed at the top of the thick syrup. It resisted.

I should probably take note of that, she thought, forcing a bit onto her finger.

She gave it a sniff and tossed a doubtful glance toward Nin and Nanny. Bringing her pinky to her lips—she put the tiniest taste on the tip of her tongue. She thought about it. It wasn’t bad. It was actually… pretty good.

Her eyes widened as she looked up.

“See there? You grew into it.”

“But what’s this?” Grace held up the mason jar toward the window. It was still hot as hades, but the world had already gone golden. The light shone through the liquid as she turned it in the sunbeams.

“You ain’t growed into that yet,” Nanny said, swiping the jar from Grace’s hands.

“Sister, neither have you.” Nin coughed a smoker’s laugh, side-eyeing the jar.

Then she muttered, “Your grandmother’s never had a sip in her life but she trusts Earline McCreedy’s ‘shine over store-bought vanilla every time.”

Nanny sniffed. “Earline’s been supplying me since before I don’t know when.”

“Only because she got paid in jam and Christmas cake,” Nin muttered. She looked up at Grace. “She kept your mother and aunt when Nan worked nights. Put up a closed sign. The men in town grumbled, but she wouldn’t budge.”

“Nanny,” Grace reached for the jar, but her grandmother kept it just out of reach. “I am far older than ‘of age’ as you well know.”

“It ain’t for drinking.”

Nin winked at Grace. “The vanilla bean makes it morally acceptable.”

“You hush,” Nanny swatted at her sister, pouring the last of a hot pepper jelly batch into a mason jar.

Grace retrieved more jars from the pot on the stove and set them out. The next batch up was the Mountain Jam—pears, figs, and, of course, pumpkin this year.

“Pears keep well,” Nanny told her.

Grace reached for a spoon from the drawer. Nin stopped her.

“Never metal, sweet pea,” she said, handing her a spoon made from Red Cherry wood. “Make sure you scrape the bottom as you stir.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Grace dragged the spoon through the jam every now and again to test the consistency, like they had taught her.

Nanny told Grace she’d know when it had jammed up. “Just look at the back of your spoon.”

Nin took another cigarette break. “You know Mr. Fillmore is entering his peach preserves again this year.”

The winner of the jam contest got a gaudy blue ribbon, fifty dollars, and their name on the courthouse plaque.

“I heard he’s adding bourbon,” she continued. “He wants his name on that Preservation Wall before Jesus calls roll.”

“Everyone deserves to leave a legacy,” Nanny said, skimming more foam from the simmering jam.

The kitchen went silent for a beat. Grace stirred, counter clockwise or the jam won’t jam, Nin told her. Grace wasn’t entirely convinced the jam cared which direction she stirred, but for some reason she didn’t want to challenge the theory.

After they poured up the jam, Nanny almost whispered, “This is our entry.”

She didn’t always enter the Mountain Jam. The recipe changed every year and she liked to play it safe when it came to the contest.

“You’re gonna break ole Fillmore’s heart, Nan.”

“I might want to be preserved, too, Nin.” Nanny started cleaning up, not that there was much to do—one thing she’d always taught Grace was to clean up as you go.

She paused, her hand coming down near Grace’s as they both wiped at the counter.

“You’ve been quiet about that fella you met a while back.”

Grace kept her eyes fixed on her dish towel.

“We went out again last night,” Grace smiled. “We started off antiquing, then got some dinner.”

She was suddenly very concerned about a spot of jam that had dried on the counter.

“And. Well. We didn’t want the night to end yet, so we went for ice cream after. He likes mint chocolate, too.” She looked up for a half a second and tried not to grin. “Then we found a mini-golf place that was still open and went around twice.”

She looked up at her grandmother.

“But then I told him I had to get home and get packed because I was leaving at the butt crack. You know how I hate driving up this mountain after dark.”

Nin and Nanny both nodded.

“And he said, ‘let’s just listen to this one song first’… and Nanny… it ended up being a 34-minute Allman Brothers’ song!”

Her grandmother cocked her head and looked her over. Heat rushed to Grace’s cheeks.

Nin walked over to the kitchenette table and pulled out one of the yellow vinyl chairs. It squeaked as she reached for another cigarette. She looked at Grace over her glasses.

“You make sure he treats you right.”

Grace sat down and smoothed the plastic checkered tablecloth. She nodded.

Nanny sat down across from her. “Because Lort help, if he don’t and you already love him.”

Grace looked at them. It struck her then that these two women had once been young enough to ruin their lives over love, too. There had been whole chapters before she’d ever entered the story. She looked at her grandmother waving away her sister’s cigarette smoke. This was a woman who’d loved something fierce.

Grace saw Nin nod in agreement as the sisters’ eyes met. She wasn’t sure if Nin had lived it herself or had just been witness.

Nin put out her cigarette. And then, the first jar pinged.

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Y’all. We’ve been featuring my collection of stories, Opera Rose and Other Devotions, over on Southern Writers Guild. I’d love it if you’d check out my latest installment, Headstone.

Southern Writers Guild

Opera Rose and Other Devotions: Headstone

Opera Rose and Other Devotions, by G.L. Merritt, is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive…

Read more

a month ago · 8 likes · 6 comments · Gray

Stories from the Jukebox

Mountain Jam

Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers and readers that love music — Subscribe now…

Read more

a month ago · 12 likes · 14 comments · MJ Polk

I’m very excited and honored to share that Opera Rose and Other Devotions—
a triptych, novelette-length collection—
is being showcased on Southern Writers Guild over the next several weeks.

I hope you’ll read along.
And if you don’t want to miss an entry, you can subscribe for notifications.

Notify me about Opera Rose

Like The Bluff, Headstone was never supposed to be a story I shared.

But unlike The Bluff, it didn’t begin as a character study.

It began as me trying to work through something.

I don’t know if you’d call it a journal entry exactly. Maybe that’s part of what it was. But somewhere along the way, it became a story.

And it became one that affected me in ways I wasn’t expecting.

I tend to insert myself emotionally into all of my writing. I think most writers probably do. And I pour my heart and soul into every story I write.

But this one was different.

This was the first story I’ve written where I truly did not know where it was going while I was inside it. Literally living inside it.

I wasn’t writing toward an ending. I couldn’t even see the ending.

I was just moving through it section by section, emotion by emotion, trying to understand what the story was becoming while it was happening to me in real time.

And there were moments while writing it that I had to stop completely.

Because I was overwhelmed by it.

I’ve never really experienced writing that way before.

Headstone became six sections somehow. And when I finished it, I still wasn’t sure anyone else would ever read it.

But eventually I realized this story belonged in Gray’s backstory.

Maybe it always did.

The first half of Headstone goes live tomorrow night on Southern Writers Guild.

(Part 2 of Headstone debuts next week.)

Read the story here.

Opera Rose and Other Devotions is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive.

Before she was Gray, she was Grace. A girl who learned early how to care for everyone else, how to keep her own heart tucked away beneath layers of old paint. Home was always a moving target—a series of temporary arrangements: a suitcase at a cousin’s house, an empty bed, a makeshift safe place of bean bags and Christmas lights.

In The Bluff, a young girl stands on the edge of something she doesn’t yet understand—watching the boy she loves dance with gravity, already learning how to survive.

In Headstone, a woman finally opens herself to love—and discovers that healing doesn’t mean you won’t be asked to pay for it. What follows is not just grief, but the unraveling of everything she thought she had already sorted through.

In Opera Rose, she is left with what remains: memory, ritual, and the quiet, deliberate choice to feel again—or retreat into the safety of what she knows.

This is a story about midlife becoming—not the kind that announces itself, but the kind that happens quietly, in kitchens, in cars, in the space between who you were and who you’re still becoming.

It’s for the keepers of prayer candles, the makers of analog mixtapes, and anyone who has ever had to learn that human emotion doesn’t run your life—it runs beside it. And that is more than okay.
—from Opera Rose and Other Devotions

I’m very excited and honored to share that Opera Rose and Other Devotions—
a triptych, novelette-length collection of stories—
is being showcased on Southern Writers Guild over the next several weeks.

I hope you’ll read along.

And if you don’t want to miss an entry, you can subscribe for notifications.

Notify me about Opera Rose

The Bluff is the first story in this collection. I shared a little about writing it with you last week; you can check that out here. The second half of The Bluff goes LIVE tomorrow evening, at 6PM Central, on Southern Writers Guild.

Here’s a little more of the sidestory.

When I finished The Bluff, my stepdad was the first person I called.

I told him I’d started writing. We talked about how it can do something nothing else quite does—how it can even outpace therapy, if you let it. Then I told him I’d finished something. And I asked if he’d read it.

He said no.

Not unkindly—just honestly. He said it’s hard to give feedback on something written by someone you love. And I understood that. I really did.

So we talked a little while longer.

Then he paused… and said, “Okay. Send it.”

So I did.
And he read it.

And he told me he didn’t understand it

I thought I could take that.
I couldn’t. Not really.

He asked for a mission statement. I sent one. He read it again. Still, it didn’t fully land.

But he gave me notes.

Some of them were right.
Some of them were useful.
And some of them were asking for things I had intentionally left out.

Descriptions. Clarity. More grounding.

Things he needed as a reader—but not things I write toward.

And that was the moment. Not finishing the story. Not sending it.

Deciding what to change…
and what to leave exactly as it was.

The Bluff still looks like itself.

It’s been shaped. It’s been tightened. But it didn’t become something else just to be understood more easily. It stayed what it was.

And I think that’s where my voice actually started.

(Please stay tuned for the second story in this series, Headstone, next week.)

Read the story here

Opera Rose and Other Devotions is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive.

Before she was Gray, she was Grace. A girl who learned early how to care for everyone else, how to keep her own heart tucked away beneath layers of old paint. Home was always a moving target—a series of temporary arrangements: a suitcase at a cousin’s house, an empty bed, a makeshift safe place of bean bags and Christmas lights.

In The Bluff, a young girl stands on the edge of something she doesn’t yet understand—watching the boy she loves dance with gravity, already learning how to survive.

In Headstone, a woman finally opens herself to love—and discovers that healing doesn’t mean you won’t be asked to pay for it. What follows is not just grief, but the unraveling of everything she thought she had already sorted through.

In Opera Rose, she is left with what remains: memory, ritual, and the quiet, deliberate choice to feel again—or retreat into the safety of what she knows.

This is a story about midlife becoming—not the kind that announces itself, but the kind that happens quietly, in kitchens, in cars, in the space between who you were and who you’re still becoming.

It’s for the keepers of prayer candles, the makers of analog mixtapes, and anyone who has ever had to learn that human emotion doesn’t run your life—it runs beside it. And that is more than okay.
—from Opera Rose and Other Devotions

I’m headlinin’ y’all! Blue Flower by Mazzy Star is my prompt for this week’s Stories from the Jukebox from .

Have fun!

Stories from the Jukebox

Blue Flower

Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers and readers that love music — Subscribe now…

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a month ago

“I don’t like this blouse.” Grace’s brow furrowed as she studied the mirror. “It fits wonky.”

“Let us see.”

“No. I’m serious. It’s not a good look.”

“You never spend this much time trying on clothes, Grace.”

“She’s trying to find an outfit for her date.”

“Date? Grace!” Katherine’s voice shot under the dressing room door. ”Grace, you have a date?”

“What? No!” Grace stuttered. “How do you know?”

Katherine looked over at Elizabeth. “It’s not with Thin Soup Guy, is it?”

“No. She blocked him when he asked her for a full body shot.”

Grace stuck her head out of the door. She squawked, “How do you know about Thin Soup Guy?”

Elizabeth held a blouse up to her chin, eyeing the mirror. “I have your sign-in.”

“You’re not supposed to keep the sign-in.”

Elizabeth had been telling Grace to sign up for Hinge for months. And when she didn’t, she signed her up for it herself.

Grace was appalled. And slightly intrigued.

“Lizzy Em, this was my decision to make. Privately.”

Elizabeth turned to Katherine Dee, “The deal was for her to give it two full weeks before deciding how much she hated it. Talk to everyone who messaged her. Like all the profiles. She has literally nothing to lose.”

“Except nobody mentioned the screenshots until day four! By then, my face was already in the system!” Grace’s voice came from over the dressing room door.

“Screenshots?” Katherine asked, browsing through the boutique evening gowns.

“Yes! Apparently, if you say no—or if you have a boundary—or if you just say something they don’t like—they might post you. Like, hang your profile out on the internet with the rest of your dirty laundry.”

Elizabeth winced.

“Lord. Dating is not for the faint of heart these days,” Katherine shook her head.

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Grace had met a few nice gentlemen. And a few… not.

The “how r u” messages were landing like a thud.

Mr. Unhinged had opened with: You’re the first match I’ve had on Hinged in over a year. All these dating apps are shitty.

Then there was Thin Soup Guy. He kept on with a conversation but it was very… thin.

Until finally, one day he told her he was not six feet tall and skinny and if that’s what she was looking for, she should move on. She said it wasn’t. He seemed relieved. Then he asked her to send a full-body photo and they could “go from there.”

“He wasn’t the one for her.” Elizabeth said, matter-of-factly. She took an evening gown from her sister. “I don’t think she likes any of them.”

“It’s not that she dislikes them… she just dislikes that they aren’t him.”

For a second, Grace went still behind the door. “Y’all…”

Katherine pulled out her phone. “I signed her up for CatholicMatch. The only guy who sent a message on here is the guy she stood up at prom.”

“I did not stand him up!” Grace hollered. “I backed out.”

“Last minute.”

“Poor guy.”

“Online dating is brutal.” Elizabeth shook her head. Then she tossed the evening gown over the dressing room door. “Grace, try this.”

“Y’all. I’m changing the password tonight.”

Grace shimmied into the dress. Sky blue sequins. Faint blue flower pattern you could almost miss. She zipped the side zip. Then looked at the tag.

“Oh… no.”

“Grace, what is it?”

“Do you hate it? It looked perfect for you…”

“No, Katydid. I love it, but…” Grace’s voice dropped. “Did you look at the price?”

“I didn’t. Is it… wait… this is Hammers.” Katherine tried to peer over the dressing room door.

Grace started to unzip the dress.

“Oh…” Grace croaked. “Oh… nooooooo.”

“Grace?”

She tugged again, as sweat formed on her brow.

“It’s stuck,” she whispered-yelled, trying to shimmy out the same way she came in. She made a little progress.

“Come out here,” Elizabeth said. “Let’s see if we can help.”

“NO!”

“We’re coming in.”

Now all three sisters were crammed into the world’s tiniest dressing room.

Grace’s armpits were damp. Sweat slipped down her back.
Elizabeth fanned her with a sales flyer.
Katherine tugged at the zipper.

Nothing.

“Y’all. Get out. It’s hot. Let me think about this.”

She pulled on the zipper again. It gave just enough for her to wiggle the dress down to her hips.

Now she was half in, half out of the dress.

“Oh no.” A beat. “Oh dear.”

She caught her reflection.

“This… this is worse…”

“What’s worse? What happened?”

“I can’t come out. There are body parts exposed.” Grace glanced back at the mirror. “And… oh dear… it is not pretty.”

“Ok. I think we need something slippery. Lotion maybe”

“Ooooooh. Butter. Grace, want me to run down to the store and get some butter?”

“I do not.”

“Ice?”

“Why would ice—no. No ice.”

“Well. Maybe we could cut it off of you.”

At that, the sales woman materialized, faster than lightning, floating in on her tiptoes.

“Ma’am—” she called over the dressing room door. “Ma’am, we can ring the dress up while you’re wearing it.”

She turned to the sisters. “Plenty of people love their new outfits so much they just wear them out of the store.”

Grace groaned. She tugged, shimmied, contorted.
Eventually, the dress was back on.
One hundred percent.

After she gathered herself, she stepped out.

“Oh Grace.”

“You’re beautiful.”

“If he could see you right—”

“Well he can’t,” Grace cut her sister off, smoothing the dress over her hips. “Let’s just go.”

When Katherine started up the car, she looked at Grace. “Are you sure you still want to go?”

“Yes, but we’re stopping at the liquor store on the way. Do not fight me on this.”

Her sister nodded. They were headed to the Weed Eater Café—BYOB—and Grace… well, she deserved a drink.

Grace was silent the whole way up the mountain, watching the road, wondering if it could change its mind. She didn’t want to ruin their annual girls’ trip. They waited all year for the Weed Eater’s famous tomato pie. And peanut butter pie. And, at this point—why not?

She looked up at the shack. Two men in flannel shirts were smoking pipes in the rockers out front. She took a long swig and stepped out of the car. Then the sisters walked up to the front porch of the café.

The men looked up. Went back to their pipes.
The hostess greeted them. Took them to their table.
They pulled out the plastic lawn chairs. Picked up the sticky menus.

When the waitress came to take their order, she looked Grace over.

“Whatchall celebratin’?”

“A commitment,” Grace deadpanned.

“You gettin’ married?”

“No. Committing to something I didn’t mean to.”

“The dress,” Elizabeth nodded.

“Sure,” Grace sighed.

Here’s the mixtape.

Blue Flower — Mazzy Star
Wrecked — Turnpike Troubadours
Miss Ohio (cover) — Zach Bryan
Feathered Indians — Tyler Childers
You Should Probably Leave — Chris Stapleton
Blue Ain’t Your Color (cover) — Chris Stapleton
All Your’n — Tyler Childers
Honeysuckle Blue — Drivin N Cryin (runner up for the headliner song prompt)

My story, Opera Rose and Other Devotions, is the feature this month over at The Southern Writers Guild. Part one of The Bluff, the first movement, was released last week. The second part will be released on Thursday. I’d love it if you’d check it out and tell me what you think.

Opera Rose and Other Devotions is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive.

Before she was Gray, she was Grace.
A girl who learned early how to care for everyone else.
How to keep her own heart tucked safely out of reach—
sealed beneath layers of old paint.

Home was never one place.
It was a series of arrangements.
A suitcase at a cousin’s house.
An empty bed that might not stay hers.
A makeshift kind of safety—
bean bags, Christmas lights, and whatever quiet she could find.

In the first story, The Bluff, a young girl stands on the edge of something she doesn’t yet understand—
watching the boy she loves dance with gravity,
already learning what it means to survive.

This is where it begins. Stay tuned for future installments—subscribe so you don’t miss out!

Southern Writers Guild

Opera Rose and Other Devotions: The Bluff

Opera Rose and Other Devotions, by G.L. Merritt, is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive…

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a month ago · 12 likes · Gray

Here are our previous features:

Southern Writers Guild

First Light

1: Home Sweet Home…

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3 months ago · 10 likes · 2 comments · primalbeet

Southern Writers Guild

The Ugly Duckling- Ch.1

Chapter 1- Candy…

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5 months ago · 12 likes · MJ Polk

I’m very excited and honored to share that Opera Rose and Other Devotions—
a triptych, novelette-length collection of stories—
is being showcased on Southern Writers Guild over the next several weeks.

I hope you’ll read along.

And if you don’t want to miss an entry, you can subscribe for notifications.

Notify me about Opera Rose

The Bluff is the first story in this collection—but it didn’t start out that way.
It started as a character study, just me trying to understand someone—a character I was writing.

I was working on something else at the time. A bigger piece.
This was supposed to stay in the background. Just notes contained in a folder.

But it didn’t.

Somewhere in the process, it stopped being notes about a person…
and started becoming a real story.

And stories don’t stay contained.

I’d always admired my stepdad. In a lot of ways, I wanted to be like him. Especially as a writer.

He wrote a manuscript years ago. Never published it.
But I read it in my twenties, at a time when I didn’t even know where he was.

And somehow, reading his words made me feel closer to him than actually knowing how to reach him.

When he came back into my life, years later, I didn’t need the manuscript anymore.

I gave it back.

Because I had him.

When I finished The Bluff,
he was the first person I called…

(Part 2 next week.)

Read the story here

Opera Rose and Other Devotions is a triptych of a life—Southern-rooted, grief-marked, and stubbornly alive.

Before she was Gray, she was Grace. A girl who learned early how to care for everyone else, how to keep her own heart tucked away beneath layers of old paint. Home was always a moving target—a series of temporary arrangements: a suitcase at a cousin’s house, an empty bed, a makeshift safe place of bean bags and Christmas lights.

In The Bluff, a young girl stands on the edge of something she doesn’t yet understand—watching the boy she loves dance with gravity, already learning how to survive.

In Headstone, a woman finally opens herself to love—and discovers that healing doesn’t mean you won’t be asked to pay for it. What follows is not just grief, but the unraveling of everything she thought she had already sorted through.

In Opera Rose, she is left with what remains: memory, ritual, and the quiet, deliberate choice to feel again—or retreat into the safety of what she knows.

This is a story about midlife becoming—not the kind that announces itself, but the kind that happens quietly, in kitchens, in cars, in the space between who you were and who you’re still becoming.

It’s for the keepers of prayer candles, the makers of analog mixtapes, and anyone who has ever had to learn that human emotion doesn’t run your life—it runs beside it. And that is more than okay.
—from Opera Rose and Other Devotions

I had a thing. On a Monday night at the library. And it was kind of a big deal. I’ve had several firsts lately—yeses where I used to default to no.

As a matter of fact I said no to this.

Look, all I was going to do was go to this class, learn a little about public speaking, bump up my voiceover game. That’s it. But then I was “encouraged” to do the thing. See, Evil Dr. Vines—who I am sure is not evil in the least—was giving the Write Club tips on how to read their work aloud because some of the members were planning to read at Flash Night. But I was not.

I just wanted the free advice and I walked out with a death sentence—or at least, that’s what it felt like when I signed the clipboard.

So. I practiced. And I mean a lot. Every day. Recorded myself. Listened to myself. Slowed down. And my voiceovers got kind of better. And my nerves were shot to heck. The first time I practiced in front of a group, my voice shook uncontrollably and I walked off the stage midstory. Just like that.

But I kept on. And I guess I got better. I worked on eye contact. I trimmed my story in the places I stumbled. I slowed down, improved my cadence.

Then, someone told me my dialogue was flat.
At the dress rehearsal.
A week before the big event.

And it didn’t destroy me.

I nodded. Considered the validity of the statement. And the heart behind it. And decided at this point? The reading was going to be what it was going to be.

And it was. On a Monday night at the library.

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I woke up that morning and I cried. Not really sad? Not really scared. Just… overwhelmed. A nervous system that was shot out and a girl who had to keep it together.

This really was an adventure of a lifetime. One of many I’ve had in the past five months. One of many more that are slated to come.

But.

Nothing went as planned.
It was better than that.

I was supposed to go on after intermission. But at the last slot of the first half, I looked up. My name was already on the screen.

No warning. No spiral. Just—go. Mid breath. I had a death-grip on the podium like you wouldn’t believe. I almost laughed at myself halfway through the reading when I clocked my white knuckles.

Then, right at Holy Water Café and Creamery, I stepped outside myself—and the story—looked up at , and smiled.

His Stories from the Jukebox thing is the reason those words were on the page at all.

And that?

That’s something. It will always be something. To me.

So I kept reading. And people laughed. Out loud. At parts I kind of thought were funny.

Not polite. Not quiet. Real.
I almost didn’t know how to handle it.
But I did.
Somehow.

I asked afterward if they noticed my deathgrip. They didn’t. How about that?

Someone asked me if I was proud. And I don’t know about that. I don’t know if I had time to be proud.

Because the night—it was about more than the podium. More than the compliments (and there were some.) More than facing that fear.

It was about this realization: turns out this night contradicted one of my deepest fears. Deeper than the reading. Deeper than the crowd. Deeper than Evil Dr. Vines.

The fear that people won’t really show up for me.

Because. One by one. They did.

Not perfectly.
Not all in the same way.
Not necessarily in the way I’d script it if I could.

But truthfully. Real.

On a Monday night at the library, I found out that I matter.

Not, I might matter.
But that I did.
That I do.

And I have the receipts.

A beer waiting for me at lunch.
An odometer rolling in from South Georgia.
Flowers in my hand.
Front-row faces with intention.
A song sent across the ocean.
People staying exactly as long as they could, when sometimes they can’t.
Laughter in the room. Strangers saying kind things—more than just being polite.

I thought an adventure of a lifetime would look bigger than this.
Louder. Farther away.

But it turns out that sometimes it’s just a Monday night at the library—with a microphone (and a voice) you’re not used to—and a room that doesn’t let you disappear.

On a Monday night at the library, I found out that I matter.

And I have the receipts.

Southern Writers Guild

First Light, Opera Rose, and Grace's Date With Destiny

The Guild discusses it’s latest feature and introduces the next one, with a couple of left turns on the way…

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2 months ago · 11 likes · primalbeet, MJ Polk, and Gray

Stories from the Jukebox

Adventure Of A Lifetime

Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers and readers that love music — Subscribe now…

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2 months ago · 11 likes · 6 comments · MJ Polk

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The Debate Team Golden Boy Who Couldn’t Handle the Heat (and Called It a Fever)

“I quit.”

“My class?” Mr. O. leaned back.

“I’m quitting school. I can’t do this.”

I dropped the empty exam book on my professor’s desk. I’d been staring at the blank page, mid–existential crisis, for the past thirty minutes. This was worse than writer’s block—I felt like my whole identity, and future, and life as I knew it, all hinged on writing this one essay. Back in school after a rock-and-roll side trip, older than everyone in the class by a decade, feeling like I had something to prove.
To them.
To me.
To what I left behind.

He talked me off the ledge and convinced me to give the essay another try. I decided not to make a life decision that night. We chatted a bit, and it turned out that he was the father of Nashville, a high school crush.

I’m not sure how Nashville and I ever officially met. It just happened one day—I ran into him while I was late, of course, for AP English next door to his AP Algebra.

We flirted.
Hard.
And after that? I made sure to get there early every day.

The next year, I changed high schools for the third time. I was across town but Nashville and I could still talk on the phone late at night. And I made fast friends with the new debate team. The thing about debate teams is that everyone in the district knows everyone—especially if you’re the Golden Child like Nashville was. So there was connection.

I must have confessed my crush to one of the girls on the team—or maybe it was obvious. A poker face, I do not have. So, one afternoon, this little Debate Team Harlot told me how she’d hooked up with Nashville the night before.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“For your own good,” she smirked.

I shelved her. And Nashville. And went on to find much more worthy crushes.

He’d been on the shelf ever since—until my English professor, after having just talked me down, said he thought I’d be good for his son (he wasn’t wrong, by the way) and that he ought to have him call me—I told him that would be just fine.

Six months later, Nashville called. Real fast mover.

He told me he had a crush on me in high school. Cool story, bro, what’s the point? He lived in the next state over and, as things do in the long-distance realm of digital flirtation, we simmered quietly. Then, one of us had a whirlwind wedding and divorce. Spoiler: it wasn’t me. After that, things really kind of petered out.

Except, somehow, we were on again. And off again. And then on again. Until we both decided we would do something more than flirt around something. A real date. He drove down to see his parents, and we had plans to go out that night. I got a cute outfit, painted my nails with black fingernail polish, and picked out a restaurant.

He texted me on his way into town. He was sick. He couldn’t make it. That was it. So I did what anyone would do. I gave him the silent treatment and evaluated all of my life choices over a few bottles of Sorrow Drowner with a friend.

A few weeks later, he was in town to judge a debate tournament, and I agreed to meet him for lunch. I called him out on his ‘illness.’ He swore he was genuinely sick. “My mom even had to watch my dog!”

“But you didn’t reschedule.”

He told me I’d been putting too much weight on that date. This, from a man who once declared he viewed dating and marriage as literally the same thing—same level of commitment, exclusivity, emotional gravity. I just wanted to put on a cute outfit and some lipstick and re-enter the world; he was building a church in his mind. But I was the one doing the most?

I still hadn’t learned my lesson with Nashville. We kept going with the on again off again until he moved to China.

That’s one way to end things, I guess.
Or so you think—until you meet up again at a Cracker Barrel.

But there’s one last debater boy. No, he didn’t get sick or stand me up. Not really. But he did have a ghost that stood in our way…

listen here

Here’s what you may have missed:

Every week, Stories from the Jukebox gives us a prompt. Here’s mine from last week:

🎶 My most recent Jukebox:

📼 From the Jukebox Vault:

🪑 Southern Writers’ Guild:
If you haven’t visited MJ, Rick, and me over at the Guild yet, I’d love for you to check out this piece:

Southern Writers Guild

Sarah MacDougal's Mushroom Pie

FloydFest isn’t a festival so much as a temporary agreement between gravity, music, and a few thousand people who have decided to trust the mountain…

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2 months ago · 9 likes · primalbeet and Gray

🎥 SWaG Feature of the Week:
We just wrapped up Rick West’s feature, First Light. If you missed it, the whole thing is here:

Southern Writers Guild

First Light

It has been an honor to have my novel - First Light - featured here at the Guild over the past several weeks…

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2 months ago · 8 likes · primalbeet

Grief isn’t linear.
It sucker punches you three months out—

like,
out of nowhere.

And you’re left wondering, all over again,
how you were fileted so surgically precise…

almost like it knew exactly where to go.

This? This is dedicated to him.

And to what I’m carrying that’s unresolved
rolling around in my brain
weighing down my heart
while I show up in the daylight,
trying to pass for normal.

And it’s heavy.
Heavier than what was named.

I’m not broken.
I’m not unprepared.
I’m not afraid.

I’m—

a little tired
a little wounded
a little guarded

—but

I showed up anyway.

I didn’t do this for show—

what I’ve been building
in real time

while hemorrhaging
and dancing
and smiling
through
the
grief.

Here’s the mixtape.

Life During Wartime — David Byrne
I Don’t Care What You Call Me — David Ford
Good Enough — Michael Marcagi
Come Pick Me Up — Ryan Adams

Check out Rick’s novel, First Light, featured this month over on Southern Writers Guild.

Southern Writers Guild

First Light

My novel - First Light - is being featured here at the Guild for 4 weeks. This is Week 3…

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2 months ago · 9 likes · primalbeet

As always, I think you should check out all the Stories from the Jukebox. Maybe start here:

Stories from the Jukebox

Life During Wartime

Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers and readers that love music — Subscribe now…

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2 months ago · 11 likes · 6 comments · MJ Polk

But here’s what I learned:
Debate boys aren’t necessarily more mature.
They’ll leave you on read when they’re running scared.
They’ll cancel your Asheville dreams because of a ghost.
And they’ll absolutely ruin your night with Red Dye #5 and a white wall.

Which brings me to the first.

The Debate Team Legend Who Couldn’t Hold His Kool-Aid

New girl. New school. New debate team crush. Naturally. He looked great in a pair of Levi’s and was sarcastic as hell. Obvi, I was smitten. And low-key stalking him after school. I’d hang around until practice was over and walk out when he did.

But crushes are fickle. Teenage girls, more so. After he went off to college, the crush had just about run its course. But then my friend said he was back—and could he come to my party.

My mother was always out of town. She usually left me to fend for myself with $20 for groceries. I did not buy food. I had parties.

And I hadn’t thought about debate boy in months, but suddenly I was imagining us on the back porch, looking out over the bluff, discussing subjective reality and Sylvia Plath—while everyone else was inside getting stoned.

What happened was an explosion of red Kool-Aid and Everclear on my mother’s bedroom wall.

I was not impressed.
I. Was. Livid.

“Dude, you’re the oldest one here—and you can’t hold your Kool-Aid?”
(I’ve since learned age is no measure of maturity, folks.)

This legend-in-my-mind, passing out and falling off his pedestal, was a soul punch—but I didn’t have time to sit with it. I was trying to figure out how to rage paint a full bedroom in less than 24 hours.

I told his friends, “He WILL be back here tomorrow to clean this up—hungover or not.”

They promised. Then they picked him up like a rag doll soaked in vodka and dragged him out to the car. They hit his head on the door frame, rousing him just enough to mutter a fart joke and something about Nietzsche. The buzz had officially been killed.

To his credit, the boy showed up the next day with a bucket, bleach, and towels. And bless his heart—he scrubbed. And scrubbed. And the wall sparkled. But my crush? It had been permanently doused by Kool-Aid and hard truth.

Turns out, he wasn’t the last debate team guy to get sick and let me down…

listen here

Here’s what you may have missed:

Every week, Stories from the Jukebox gives us a prompt. Here’s mine from last week, such as it is:

🎶 This week’s Jukebox:

📼 From the Jukebox Vault:

🪑 Southern Writers’ Guild:
If you haven’t visited MJ, Rick, and me over at the Guild yet, I’d love for you to check out this piece:

Southern Writers Guild

Backstory of "The Cooler"

If you’re new here, you may be wondering right about now… What’s the deal with, The Cooler…

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2 months ago · 6 likes · MJ Polk, Gray, and primalbeet

🎥 SWaG Feature of the Week:

This month, we’re featuring Rick West’s novel, First Light. He’s treated us to the first ten chapters, then some real behind behind-the-scenes commentary.

This week, he’s giving us a little mix of both as he continues with the story:

Southern Writers Guild

First Light

My novel - First Light - is being featured here at the Guild for 4 weeks. This is Week 3…

Read more

2 months ago · 9 likes · primalbeet

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This week’s Jukebox prompt is Woodstock, and I don’t want to write it.

But I don’t want to lose my streak either.

Sometimes calling yourself a perfectionist sounds like a humble-brag. And I feel like some people might mean it that way.

But it’s not.
Not over here in Turtle Meat Land, anyway.

Perfectionism is exhausting.
It’s the residual of a life lived ducking
and bracing
and figuring it out on my own.

Perfectionism is a flaw, plain and simple, and I’m not proud of it.

I’m afflicted by it.

So, anyway—I caught myself thinking about half-assing it.

And I don’t love that phrase. Not because it’s not accurate, but because it sounds like I don’t care about the Jukebox, or , or any of it.

And that’s not it.
Not atall.

So let’s call it something else.
Let’s just say right now, I’m not doing this half-assed…
I’m doing it low stakes style.

I’ve had this low-level hum of anxiety the past few days, and it reminds me of the old days—when that hum was just… the background noise of my life.

But this doesn’t feel like it’s that.
At least, I hope not.

There are a few culprits I could point to. A few neat little explanations I could wrap this in.

I’ve got a live reading coming up—my brain says it’s fine, but my body is still clocking the danger. And yes, let’s just gloss over the fact that I even told y’all about that.

I’m doing some leveling up, and it’s kind of public.

There’s been some interpersonal ambiguity bubbling in the background.

I’ve been consistent for a long stretch—and that? That’s not exactly my MO, and it’s quietly raising the stakes.

But I also know this anxiety could be due to any number of things.

Or nothing.

But my brain wants to make sense of it—stat. And in the meantime, it’s like:

hey… maybe ease up a little
maybe don’t do the thing that keeps putting us out there

And I know that voice.

I’ve been down this road before.

So hopefully, this is just a visit.
Not a return. Just… a little smog rolling in.

And hopefully, it lifts soon—

and I can make it back to the garden—
or at least a place where the hum goes quiet.

Here’s the mixtape.

Woodstock — Joni Mitchell
Fast Car — Tracy Chapman & Luke Combs
Use Somebody — Kings of Leon
Shake the Frost — Tyler Childers
Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right — Bob Dylan (we’ll get there)
This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody) — The Lumineers
(because does this song just fit every aspect of my life or what)

Southern Writers Guild

First Light

My novel - First Light - is being featured here at the Guild for 4 weeks. This is Week 3…

Read more

2 months ago · 8 likes · primalbeet

Stories from the Jukebox

Woodstock

Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers and readers that love music — Subscribe now…

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2 months ago · 14 likes · 4 comments · MJ Polk

So I went to Publix tonight.

Nice guy in produce. Very polite.
Smiled at him. He smiled back.
He was blocking the aisle and moved his cart without being asked. Polite. You don’t see that every day anymore.

I’m crossing things off my list. Two casseroles to make for Easter brunch. Everything arranged according to store layout, because that’s how I roll. I’m making great time. Smooth sailing through the Publix aisles.

I also needed Ripple (pea protein milk, not the stuff Fred Sanford used to drink) and Good Culture cottage cheese because of course.

The Ripple was on the bottom shelf. Looked like only two bottles left. I thought I saw another one way in the way back—all the way back—but I didn’t feel like climbing into the refrigerator section, so I grabbed the two and moved on.

Then, in the freezer aisle, I started second-guessing myself.

All I have at home right now are smoothie ingredients. That’s it.
I need the protein milk.

So I doubled back.

By then, Mr. Polite was standing there, studying the selections. Once again, he moved out of my way. I reached all the way to the way back and grabbed what was clearly the last bottle of Ripple. Clearly.

“That’s what I was looking for!” he said.

“Oh! It’s the last one—but I already have two. Here.”

“No, no, that’s okay. You keep it.”

So I smiled, headed back toward my cart… and as I passed him, I put the bottle into his cart.

That’s when I heard him yell:

“HEY! I found another one!”

I turned around.

Y’all.

This man was booty-deep in the refrigerated section of Publix. Crawled all the way in there. He emerged holding a bottle of Ripple like he’d just completed a side quest.

“No way.”

“Yep. Long arms.” He handed it to me.

“You don’t need two?”

“Nope. Here you go.”

So now I have my three bottles.

Later—putting them into my fridge—I’m thinking.
I looked. I reached. I saw all the way back there.
There was not another bottle of Ripple.

Except there was. I guess.

Mr. Polite, you win the award.

Happy Passover.
Happy Easter.
And thank you—for all the Ripple.

Here’s the mixtape.

Good — Better Than Ezra
Ripple — Grateful Dead
Magic — Coldplay
You Make My Dreams — Hall & Oates
Accidentally in Love — Counting Crows
Banana Pancakes — Jack Johnson
Golden — Harry Styles
Cold Cold Cold — Cage the Elephant
This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody) — The Lumineers

Here’s what you may have missed:

Every week, Stories from the Jukebox gives us a prompt. Here’s mine from last week:

🎶 This week’s Jukebox:

📼 From the Jukebox Vault:

🪑 Southern Writers’ Guild:
Watch our Porch Talk with :

Southern Writers Guild

Porch Talkn with Harriet Corvine

Welcome to The Southern Writers Guild Porch…

Listen now

2 months ago · 6 likes · primalbeet, Gray, MJ Polk, and Harriet Corvine

🎥 SWaG Feature of the Week:
We’re featuring Rick’s novel First Light this month. Check out this First Light post. It’s good stuff, y’all. Behind-the-scenes, director’s commentary, the story behind the story...

Southern Writers Guild

First Light

NOTES FROM THE MARGINS…

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2 months ago · 9 likes · primalbeet

I saw a Hallmark movie once where the girl made a New Year’s resolution to say “yes” to everything. Or maybe it was “not to say no.” Just until her birthday in February. And for some weird reason I feel like her birthday may have even been the same day as mine—but I bet I’m remembering that wrong. But it was close. Either way, she was the kind who would overthink, say no to a lot, and who just… floated through life in protective gear.

I don’t remember the logistics of the whole thing. I think it may have just been “yes” to social invitations... I mean she wouldn’t have to jump off a building or anything but she did jump in an icy lake in January. So I mean, there were parameters. But still.

I don’t make New Year’s resolutions.

But I guess I did this year.

I started saying yes to a lot more, recently. Not just to requests and invites. Sometimes I said yes to me. And then sometimes? I even went out in search of things to say yes to.

And I’m not saying it’s going great.
Not at all.
See, here’s the part they don’t show you in the movies.

In the movie, she says yes. She takes the leap. She jumps in the icy lake in January and comes up laughing. Life opens up. Things fall into place. It all works out better than she imagined.

That’s not what this has been.

The first thing I said yes to?

It broke my heart.

Honestly, no one would’ve blamed me if I stopped and turned around right there.

They would’ve said, yeah… that one was rough. Not fair. Not the way it was supposed to go.
Go on back inside. Get under your blanket. You tried. You really did.

But I didn’t.

Instead, I let that failure launch me into more… failures.

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I’ve been accused of looking at things… optimistically.
Incorrectly, even.

And maybe that’s true.

But still—
I think it might turn out right.

There have not been any big triumphant victories yet. No clean upward arc.

Just more chances to be scared. More things that haven’t gone to plan. More moments where I thought, okay, this is the part where I finally learn my lesson and go back to no.

But I didn’t do that either.

I decided to take the show on the road. To Minnesota. (Seriously, it’s more exciting than it sounds.)

But flying alone.
Strange town.
Terrifying logistics.

Setting this up hasn’t been easy.

Plans have changed.
So many times.
Travel companions have, too.
Prices went up.
And tension.
And nerves.

Misunderstandings.
Things I can’t control.
Issues that are not mine to settle.
The threat of someone being removed from The Will.

What I’m saying is this has not gone smoothly.

But for some reason, I thought I was due.
I’m going in July.

And. I finally got tired of not being able to carry a tune or sing a song... or so I thought. It hit me one day that I could do something about it. And so I started voice lessons. Funny thing is, I’d been told all my life I had a terrible voice, but on the first lesson? I matched pitch on every note.

Let’s not talk about the third lesson where I forgot to breathe and ran out of breath on Happy Birthday.

It’s been a bumpy ride. My lessons are supposed to be every Monday night at 6PM. However, my voice coach has soccer games with her kids about as often as I have something else pop up on a Monday night. So we’ve skipped as many lessons as we’ve had.

But we’ll get there.

I am mostly remembering to breathe.

I’m still scared of the high notes.

And she keeps trying to take me higher.

Then there’s Portugal. Y’all. If you know me, you know that in the past, the question wouldn’t even been out of my friend’s mouth before I would have been shaking my head no absolutely not. I’m just not into flying over oceans. It doesn’t seem natural. Or safe.

But.

I said yes.

Like with a quickness.
Like before I knew what I was doing.

And this was after I’d just taken my first bike ride, after (cough cough) how ever many years, when I hadn’t even been sure at the beginning that my feet could leave the ground and hop up on the pedals. But now, all of a sudden, folks are balking about ticket prices and I’m like... but I already said yes.

In June, I’m going on a team building thing at the beach for us church ladies. A bunch of church admin at the Flora-Bama. What could go wrong really?

We’re stopping there for lunch—and I’m not sure that’s the wisest decision I’ll make all year. Not everyone loves everyone on this trip, if you catch my drift. But I agreed to go because there was a Troubadour Situation in it for me.

(The Turnpike Troubadours were supposed to be playing the night we’d be there—but now the trip date has changed. Twice.
I sense a pattern. And the pattern is: ain’t nothing working out like I thought.

This trobairitz will not be sneaking off—and leaving those old ladies behind—to catch a show anymore.)

But the new girl says we can still catch the Troubadours. We’ll take a mental health day and head down there—and sleep on the beach that night if we have to. I’ve never taken a mental health day. I’ve always been afraid to. It seems... dishonest. Slightly shystery. A little... I don’t know... rule-bendy.

But we’ll see.

Anyway. Now? Parasailing has replaced the Troubadours. I might have mentioned that I don’t like flying over oceans? This also most assuredly includes flying over the gulf.

In a harness.
Practically naked.
With no real protection that I can see.

But I said yes. Without even second guessing.

Then there’s something else coming up soon. Like, real soon. April 20-whateverth is barreling down the highway at top speed. And I had said no. I wasn’t going to do it. But these two buffoons* kind of talked me into it and I was kind of in this “say yes, not no” thing, right?

So I signed up to do the thing. I’ll tell you about it soon, but not today. But let me just tell you, right now? I’m doing it for real scared. Like even in practice. So I might go down in flames. Just maybe. Or at the very least run off the stage and into the hills or oblivion or wherever.

So no—this is not a story about saying yes and everything working out.

It’s a story about saying yes… and things falling apart anyway.

And then saying yes again.

And again.

And again.

I don’t know how this ends.
I don’t know what any of this adds up to yet.

But when I look back on it—all the false starts, the missed notes, the changed plans, the things that broke when I thought they might finally hold—

I don’t want to look back and wish I had stayed safe.
I don’t want to look back and say I told me so.

I don’t want to look back in anger.

I’m not even sure what I do want to see when I look back.

But—
even after this half-cocked sideshow I’m calling my life right now…

I kind of think
maybe
it’s going to be good.

Here’s the mixtape.

Changes — David Bowie (because we were just talking about it and it fits)
Change — Blind Melon
You Should Probably Leave — Chris Stapleton (because why am I still doing this?)
Wondering Why — The Red Clay Strays
Good Lord Lorrie — Turnpike Troubadours (look, it was either this song or Wrecked)
Flyover State of Mind — Michael Marcagi
Good — Better Than Ezra
Name — Goo Goo Dolls
Fix You — Coldplay
Don’t Look Back in Anger — Oasis (hit that high note, boo)
Into the Mystic — Van Morrison

*if you wanna know why I called these sweet boys “buffoons”
(a joke, I promise) give this a listen…

📲 Check out my thoughts on Autocorrect:

📝 Read ’s take on Writer’s Block and let him know your thoughts here

The Southern Copywriter blog

Admin Galore!

Make it easy on yourself — type your email just once below, and get The Southern Copywriter blog delivered directly to your inbox…

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2 months ago · 17 likes · 11 comments · MJ Polk

🥭 Y’all the mango is back. Check out ’s third installment here:

primalbeet

The Mango Chronicles - Episode III

Nothing made Stubs the pelican happier than a sea trout flopping in his beak. He stood ankle-deep in the inlet, regal as ever, head cocked toward the horizon. The sun was just punching through a fog that smelled of marsh and little miracles. He hurled the trout once, for flair, caught it again, and swallowed like a prophet accepting communion. Then the …

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2 months ago · 7 likes · primalbeet

Stories from the Jukebox

Don't Look Back In Anger

Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers and readers that love music — Subscribe now…

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2 months ago · 11 likes · 12 comments · MJ Polk

My typing on the phone without autocorrect is infinitely worse, I admit. I am a good speller. I charged my friends a dollar to do their Spelling Homework in middle school. Not only did I save up enough to buy a shiny white Swatch, but I really honed my skill. Don’t discount my high aptitude for languages either.

What I’m saying is, I shouldn’t need autocorrect. And I resent that fact that I do—deeply. But I’ve tried life without it, and it wasn’t great. It’s not so much fat fingers as it is tiny keys. It does not also help that Apple broke the keyboard.

There was the time I was having a deep conversation with a friend. About loss. Big loss. And a simple text meant to be consoling turned into well…look. I meant to send: Patience. Siri, in his infinite wisdom, decided to send: Panties.

Y’all.
I cannot.

Thirteen asterisks later, my friend admitted it was the first laugh he’d had all week.

And the number of times I’ve sent Love You! instead of what I really meant to type out? It’s ridiculous. I don’t even try to explain. If we’re texting and I send Love You! assume that I do, unless it would be weird if I did. Then just disregard. No asterisks needed.

Then there was the time autocorrect truly betrayed me.

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I was coming out of Mass. I had a question for my priest friend. And he asked if Mass was going long—he wasn’t the celebrant that day.

“No, the Mass is over,” I speech-to-texted him. “It wasn’t two hours long this time.” And then I started talking about what to take to RCIA that night.

“Am I feeding 30 people? Or 40?”

“Excuse me?” he texted back. “Grace… what?”

“Baked ziti is the cheapest way to feed them,” I continued. “Even if I add sausage.”

“Grace!”

“I mean, I don’t have to make ziti.”

“GRACE. Scroll back up and look at what you sent.”

I did.
I scrolled.
Up.
And there it was:
DUMBASS.

My heart sank. Then pounded. I had just called my priest a dumbass on the Cathedral steps. Why does this phone think I would EVER say dumbass? What in my previous texting history supports this change?

He screenshotted it.
He circled dumbass in red.
Every so often, he sends it to me.
Without comment.

As penance.

Here’s the mixtape.

Flagpole Sitta — Harvey Danger
All Star — Smash Mouth
One Week — Barenaked Ladies
You Oughta Know — Alanis Morissette
The Distance — Cake
Creep — Radiohead
Ironic — Alanis Morissette
Take Me to Church — Hozier
Send Me On My Way — Rusted Root

Here’s what you may have missed:

Every week, Stories from the Jukebox gives us a prompt. Here are my Dueling Jukebox pieces:

🎶 Dueling Jukeboxes:

🪑 Southern Writers’ Guild:
If you haven’t visited MJ, Rick, and me over at the Guild yet, I’d love for you to check out this piece. It’s nominated in a short story contest and just added an amazing reading:

Southern Writers Guild

The Alabama Jubilee Hot Air Balloon Classic!

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5 months ago · 10 likes · 3 comments · primalbeet

🎥 SWaG Feature of the Week:
We’re featuring Rick West’s novel First Light. Check out the first ten chapters here. Then stay tuned for some great behind-the-scenes commentary from the author!

Southern Writers Guild

First Light

1: Home Sweet Home…

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3 months ago · 7 likes · 2 comments · primalbeet

Also, Happy Easter, y’all. 🐰

Someone told me once that people who love the dark are stuck in it—and maybe by choice. I took that to heart for a second too long. Tried out No Rain. Stood in the sun a little more. Let it hit my face. Let it count for… something. And it was fine. Good, even. There’s something to be said for vitamin D.

But I like my gray, rainy days. I wear that like it’s a personality trait. Like if I tell you that, you’ll get it. Get me. Just like that.

I love a couch nap with a 1940s black-and-white movie in the background—maybe a Thin Man marathon—coffee in hand. Or better yet, the almond milk latte I braved the rain to go get on my way home. The window cracked. Thunder in the distance. The cozy blanket. A real pillow. A Solemn High nap…

And I do. I love it. I love the hush of it. The way the world feels like it’s been turned down a notch. No expectations for a minute.

After a while, I do start craving a little something else. A song. A sunset breaking through. A mimosa on a balcony somewhere—Cypress and Ruins, maybe—where the light hits just right and lifts the champagne haze for a breath. Where the wallpaper moves in the shadows and the air hangs with the eerie refrain from the music that’s just slightly… off.

It’s not that I want the sun exactly. No. I don’t want No Rain. I just want some movement. To duck into a used bookstore while it’s still damp outside—into the smell of old ink, brittle paper, dusty rain in the spine.

Just a shift.

Enough to remind me I’m not stuck here.

Here’s the mixtape.

No Rain — Blind Melon
Good Lord Lorrie — Turnpike Troubadours
Sleeping on the Floor — Colter Wall
Change — Blind Melon
Flyover State — Michael Marcagi

Here’s my other submission to Dueling Jukeboxes:

Stories from the Jukebox

Dueling Jukeboxes

Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers and readers that love music — Subscribe now…

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3 months ago · 11 likes · 26 comments · MJ Polk

Check out Rick West’s featured novel, First Light over at The Southern Writers Guild.

Southern Writers Guild

First Light

1: Home Sweet Home…

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3 months ago · 5 likes · 1 comment · primalbeet

She ran straight to me.

They’d been chasing her up and down the street all morning. I hadn’t even set my bag down yet when she came right up to me. I reached down and gave her a little ear scratch.

“Wait—don’t let her—”

My cousin came running toward me, my mother and my aunt following behind. The pup took off.

“Oh shoot. She got away.”

The ladies of the family had been out on the lawn trying to figure out what to do about the runaway pup when I pulled in.

“I’m worried about her,” my aunt said. “She was practically to the highway earlier this morning.”

“What happened?”

“She’s been running around all morning. I’m afraid she’s gonna get run over. I called the Smootses,” my aunt said. “Polly said ‘if she gets hit, she gets hit.’”

“Lord help.”

My aunt was appalled. My mother was outraged. My cousin was planning a dognapping billed as a rescue mission.

“I say get some Beggin’ Strips and she’ll hop right up in my van,” she said.

This wasn’t the first time my straightlaced, buttoned-up, clearly more enterprising cousin had suggested larceny. Or followed through with it.

Last Thanksgiving, we went to brunch at The Stone House. When we were leaving, I noticed some of the foliage along the walkway.

“Those berries would be perfect for my Advent wreath.”

They were tiny little orbs—far more vibrant than the holly berries I’d picked from my own bushes on my own property. My cousin whipped out a pair of clippers and helped herself. Once she had a good bouquet—in record time—she handed it to me with a shrug.

“Let’s roll.”

By the time I put my suitcase away and freshened up from the long drive, the girls were sitting around the table, working out a plan. All the guys were downstairs watching football or basketball or some guy in a tie talking about football or basketball or something. All I know is they weren’t concerned with what was happening in the war room upstairs.

My mother told me they were thinking of offering to buy the pup.

“That’ll go over well…” I mumbled.

The last thing she needs is another dog. They’ve already got four.

My mother texted back and forth with Mrs. Smoots. Turns out she was more than overwhelmed. Her daughter and son-in-law had landed back at home, indefinitely, with his two kids, a newborn, and this dog. She was stretched beyond her bandwidth and willing to make a deal. More than a deal—she was ready to hand over the leash.

Not nearly the most exciting option we’d discussed, but we were satisfied. We possé’d up and headed across the street, Beggin’ Strips in our pockets.

We collected the pup—a Goldendoodle. Did I mention that? And did I mention a Goldendoodle can be black? Who knew?

Anyway, we headed over to my mother’s house—she has a bigger backyard. As we walked, the pup kept falling back, slipping into step with me.

“You might be her person, Grace Lynne.”

“You need to take her home.”

I smiled. Gave them all the excuses, the top being my inability to keep most living things alive—myself barely excluded.

But… she was a cutie.

We got to the backyard and my mother released the hounds. The skittish pup would run around, trying to play, but after a loud bark or growl, she’d end up right back next to me. She’d hop up and gently place her paws on my thighs.

She’d try again.
Another bark.
Back at my side.

Or with her little butt sitting on my feet.

Again, they commented on how much she seemed to take to me. How I needed to take her home.

I looked down at my feet.

And the pup sitting on them.

It would be nice to come home to this every night…

We moved to the porch and my mother put the other dogs away. My nephew—I love him so—came out with treats galore. The pup inched over to him and he picked her up, cuddling her like a babydoll.

Well. I’m not gonna fight my nephew for a dog.

But… she sure was a love.

I started back to my aunt’s house for the night. As I walked across the street, my mother texted me one last time:

She’d be perfect for you…

The house settled in and I was snuggled in my bed in the Peach Room. I picked up my phone.

Nashville, I think I’m getting a dog.

Who are you and what have you done with Grace?

I’m serious. Look at her.

I sent him some photos and got him caught up on the situation.

She’s cute. You don’t need a dog.

But I think I love her.

Well. Nice knowing you.

He wasn’t a fan of dogs. Not allergies, really. Just… grumpiness, I think.

She loves me. She sat on my feet. She put her little paws on me.

You won’t be able to go out on a whim.

Who would want to, with that little face waiting at home?

You’ll have to take her on walks.

I walk.

All the time. Even when it rains.

I have an umbrella.

In July.

…well.

It’s hot, Grace. You won’t be able to opt out.

I can put my hair up.

Dang, Grace. U Got It Bad.

I did. I sat the phone down and drifted off, dreaming of a little Goldendoodle all night.

I got up the next morning and shuffled across the street to Mom’s for breakfast. They were making sausage balls—and special vegetarian ones for me—and serving up strong coffee. I was barely in the door—and sure hadn’t had my coffee—when my mother said it.

“Callie’s going to take the dog!”

“Uhm?”

“We sent her pictures last night. She fell in love.”

“Did she now.” My jaw set, and I looked at my feet. My lonely, empty, Goldendoodle-less feet. I plopped down in the cozy chair. The one by the door. Five steps from here to there.

“How about that.”

The rest of the morning was a blur. The pup hopped up, took a few spins, then settled in like a lap dog. Like my lap dog. We ate breakfast. Then dinner at my aunt’s. I usually stayed the whole weekend.

I told them I had to get home.

I called Nashville on the drive.

“They gave her to Callie.”

“What? Grace, I’m sorry. I really am.”

“I know.”

Then I called my brother. I told him everything.

“I’m sure I loved her. Why are they like that?”

“I don’t know Grace. I really don’t. And they know how you are. But I need you to do me a favor.”

“What?”

“Next time you want something? I need you to say something. I need you to speak up. Don’t think about it. Just do it.”

It’s true. I’m a slow mover. I have to mull things over. I was inching toward that Golden. But not fast enough. And someone else got her before I could. Some friends have offered to rectify the situation—to drive me right on down to the shelter to pick out a pup.

But.

I don’t want just any old pup.

I wanted her.

I had it bad.

But I didn’t speak up in time.

Dang, Grace.

Here’s the Mixtape

There She Goes — The La’s
You Are the Best Thing — Ray LaMontagne
Better Together — Jack Johnson
Stay — Lisa Loeb
U Got it Bad — Usher
Slow Dancing in a Burning Room — John Mayer
Landslide — The Smashing Pumpkins
The Night We Met — Lord Huron
Puppy Love — Donny Osmond

Stories from the Jukebox

Dueling Jukeboxes

Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers and readers that love music — Subscribe now…

Read more

3 months ago · 10 likes · 24 comments · MJ Polk

Things start to get good—
not big, not dramatic—
just… close.

A moment that lingers a second too long.
A conversation that dips under the surface.
Something real.

And that’s when it starts.

I see your nose.
Not just see it—
I notice it.
How it leans a little.
How I hadn’t paid attention before.

Or the way you say a word wrong.
Or the way your shir…

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