Jodi Hills

So this is who I am – a writer that paints, a painter that writes…

Tag Archives: writer


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Building a soul.

I was nervous to take the test. If I didn’t get it right, then what did anything mean? The podcaster explained how it would work. A professional author was being challenged by Artificial Intelligence. Both were given the same prompts. Each was to write a short story. Without giving away the authors, both stories were going to be played and it was up to us, the listeners, to guess between human and AI.

The first story began. Immediately specific and elegant. My heart quickly raised its hand with an “ooooo, ooooo,” convinced that it knew this had to be the human author. Hold on, my brain urged, but when they reached the part where, on the dating app, the man texted the woman that he made eye contact with the woodpecker that sat on the horse, simply to explain what sort of mountain biker he was, even my brain had to concede that this must be the human. (It sounds a little crazy without context, but it was delightful). The second story began. It had all the prompts. Contained the right words. Seemed grammatically efficient — so efficient that it was boring. One might say, artificial.

The podcaster began talking with the human author. Which one did you write? The first one, she answered. My all’s right with the world angels sang in perfect harmony. I shook my head in constant agreement when the podcaster said the second story – the AI one – lacked soul. Yes! I thought, maybe even out loud.

I am not afraid of AI. It will be able to perform all sorts of tasks. Quickly. Efficiently. I suppose what I am more afraid of are the humans that spew out, with the same ease and speed, words of hurt and destruction. Dehumanizing others, as if neither had a soul. And I am afraid of the humans that hear these words and simply fall in line.

For me, I’m not willing to throw it all away so quickly. It takes a long time to build a soul. And constant upkeep. I know I’m getting older. With a little grace, I hope I’m getting wiser. I know for sure that we have to begin and begin again. We have to trust in it, follow it, nurture it along the path, and when we find ourselves, shoes deep in gravel on the side of a mountain, the heart yelling, “ooooo, oooooo,” and the soul yelling, “Look, a woodpecker on a horse!” — we have to listen!

The brain agrees. Nods gently. Never breaking eye contact with the soul.

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A trail I won’t forget.

There was nothing really “western” about it, this growing up in the Midwest. Maybe that’s why I remember them — the bookends my mother had — wooden cowboys riding wildly on horseback, not taming, but protecting each author in our living room on Van Dyke Road. 

And surely it was my mother’s love for the written word and her wooden bookends that led me to the “Cowboy Sam” series on the bottom first and second grade shelves of the Washington Elementary library. We read together each night, a trail I won’t forget.

When the years roughened the edges of the metal bottoms that slid under the books, she lined them with green felt, and the words rode in comfort once again. She taught me that each story was precious, to be held, cared for — even hers, even mine.

I never would have imagined then that some of the plots we lived through could be gathered, softened… even protected. But she, you see, was and is the green felt that slides the cowboy ‘neath the wildest of my words, my dreams and keeps them alive. 

First, I was a cowboy. Ever and still, I ride. 

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To rise above.

I began mixing up the bread dough this morning. The first thing I have to do is to proof the yeast (to make sure that it actually does what it claims it can). If it’s good, with a little sugar and warm water, it will show you exactly what it is capable of. And when it works, rises up to meet you, you’re good to continue. 

Maya Angelou said, “When people show you who they are, believe them the first time.” People will often say, after doing something wrong, “Oh that’s not who I am…” Or after being mistreated by someone, say, “It’s ok, that’s not who they are…” I’m sure I have been guilty of both. I’m sure we all have. But Maya was right. People will show you who they are, again and again. Some good. Some very bad. And the key is to believe them. To stop asking for proof when someone is kind to you. To stop aking for proof when they are not. 

Last week, when making bread, for the first time in a long while, the yeast didn’t work. I threw it away and started with some new yeast. It never would have occured to me to try and proof it again — it told me right from the start — “I’m not going work.”  Maybe it’s a bit harder to see in humans, but it’s still there, usually right in front of us. We just have to be willing to see it. Embrace the good. Walk away from the bad. 

I want to be better at this — be who I claim to be — who I want to be. And see others for the truth that they offer. What if we all did that? Offered the world proof that we truly can rise up!

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Travel day.

Today we will be traveling from Marseille to Paris. Paris to New York. New York to Minneapolis. The fact that I get to type words like travel and Paris and New York and Minneapolis, and that I have stories from each place, memories, footprints, even artprints…this fills me!

Maybe it was from Ernest Hemingway that I first learned about this “feast.”

“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a movable feast.” – Ernest Hemingway, to a friend, 1950

My “lucky enough” was that I always found a way to feast, even with what some would call absolutely nothing. But what they couldn’t see was I had words. I had hands. I had paint. I had an imagination. This took me everywhere — long before I stepped onto a plane. And it has stayed with me. Hemingway was right. It does stay with you – if you carry it, nurture it, give thanks for it – every day!

Zipping up the luggage now. Giving thanks. Time to feast! Bon appétit!

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