Finding Hope

Many years ago--was it twenty?--Joy and I drove to Boerne to our first writing group.  We sat in a circle of chairs in a downtown coffee shop, holding fresh notebooks, waiting to meet our leader--a woman named Hope who had recently moved here from New York, where she'd been an editor at Harper and Row.  (I'm thinking of the tone used in the Pace Picante commercial: NEW. YORK. CITY?!")

When she walked in, Joy and I looked at each other and one of us said, "She looks like she's from New York!"--as if New York women were fundamentally different enough to have defining features.  She wasn't wearing Texas casual or tennis shoes, that I know for sure.  She was glamorous, and she wore dark flowing clothes and lots of silver jewelry, though I could possibly be embroidering on the jewelry point.

Joy and I were shy and a little giddy that first night; we were in a writing group and we loved our  leader from New York City!

Hope and I have the same last name--though at the time, mine was buried between my first name and my then-last name. We called each other Sis.

One night, full of trepidation, I left her some pages I had written about "women and houses." I was a nervous wreck--as I waited to hear her response, far more so than I'd ever been turning in a paper for grading in a graduate school class.

I will never forget the euphoria I felt when she called to say she loved my writing! I would have  parachuted out of a plane if she'd told me to--but what she said was this:  "Put those pages in an envelope and mail them to the Breadloaf Writing Conference right this minute! You'll be accepted." I did and I was!

When I gave up my land line, I saved the answering machine because it still holds the message Hope left for me when she read my finished book all those years ago.

Hope moved back to New York and I visited her twice in her home in the Hamptons. We spent my 46th birthday on Shelter Island, and I visited one of her writing groups and thought: this is it, this is what I want to do!

Leading writing groups, I so often think of Hope--who gave me the idea to do this work I love so much!  There's always a sliver of regret, though, that I didn't follow through and publish that book--I wish I had done both!

When I found her online Sunday night, I was so excited!  On our first phone call in years, she asked, "So what have you been doing for the last ten years?"

Certain people make profound differences in a life--sometimes without even knowing it.  Hope is one of those bright lights in my life, and I'm over-the-moon happy to have found her again!