M. Suzanne Terry

• {Day 3} What You Learned: On Thursday, February 28, link up at Preston Yancey’s blog and write about these questions: What surprised you this week? What did you take away from the discussion? What blog posts did you find particularly helpful? What questions do you still have?

This week was full of surprises, and all of them were good.

There are so many rich, wonderful voices in the places where feminism and Jesus collide – so many more than I knew.  So many more than I can choose.   Between working and reading, I haven’t slept a lot this week, but my sleep-deprived haze is a dreamy one – the euphoria of living in the magic of a book I can’t put down. FemFest has been that book this week.

This discussion has not stayed quietly on paper (er…screen?).  Several people saw my links on Facebook and Twitter and have stopped by to have conversations or emailed me to continue the conversation.  Many of them have experienced the same Happy Book Stupor that I’ve experienced this week in reading the posts, and they are thirsty for more.  I encouraged them to post their own pieces, and they responded that they didn’t think that they could say it as well as it had already been said.

Let me encourage you again to do the thing that this week has driven home to me the most – this time in writing.  Your voice is important.  What you have to say is important, and no one can speak your mind better than you can.  Speak.  Write.  Dance.  Sing.  Paint.  Play.  Fight.  But join the conversation.

To that end, I want to start a group.  I’m not sure if I want it to be a writer’s group or a reader’s group or both.  I think I would prefer for it to be a face-to-face group, if for no other reason than I make a mean frittata and would love to have another excuse to feed people.  I also think that there are specific things to be done and said where I am that don’t really translate to anywhere else.  But I have met me, so I’m pretty sure I won’t be able to resist expanding discussion via the intrawebs, at least in part.  The group is just a baby idea right now.  Who knows what it will grow up to be?

Step one – gauging interest with my face-to-face crowd.  More to come on this.

Thanks for inspiring me this week, FemFest.  This was fun.

Edited to add – !!!  Congress passes VAWA.