Three Life Lessons From Helen (Hunt) Jackson

Three Life Lessons From

Helen (Hunt) Jackson

by Doris McCraw

For over twelve years I have been performing as Helen (Hunt) Jackson. I am currently preparing for yet another performance for a series called “Think You Know History”. It is a project I wholeheartedly support.

You may notice I put Hunt in ( )?  I do so to honor her. She never used her first husbands name after her second marriage to Wm. S. Jackson. The practice started after her death in 1885.

Through the years, as I have studied and taken on being Helen, there have been many lessons I learned from this amazing woman. I thought I would share three with you today.

Number One: Life has loss, you just continue on.

Helen lost both parents before age seventeen. In her first marriage she lost her first child at eleven months in 1854. Her husband, Edward Hunt, a West Point graduate, died in an accident while working on an underwater 'missile' in 1863. Her second son died of diphtheria in 1865. Although she mourned her losses, she set about creating a new life. This led to her writing career and second marriage.

Number Two: There are two sides to an issue and you can change your mind.

One of my favorite poems of Helen's is 'Two Truths'.

Two Truths

“Darling” he said, “I never meant

To hurt you;” and his eyes were wet.

“I would not hurt you for the world:

Am I to blame if I forget?”

“Forgive my selfish tears!” she cried,

“Forgive! I knew that is was not

Because you meant to hurt me, sweet-

I knew it was that you forgot!”

But all the same, deep in her heart

Rankled this thought, and rankles yet,-

“When love is at its best, one loves

So much that he cannot forget.”

Helen would change her mind if the information called for a change. She famously changed her mind about a woman having a 'hobby' when she took up the cause of Indians rights. Prior to hearing Chief Standing Bear, Helen had not wanted anything to do with the popular causes in the mid to late 1800's. When she did change her mind she became a force to be reckoned with on the issue of the Indians. It led her to write “Century of Dishonor” about the broken treaties the government had made with the Indians. When that did not get the response she wished for she wrote the work she in most known for, “Ramona”.

Number Three: It's never too late.

Helen didn't start writing until after the death of her first family, when she was around thirty-five. She found a mentor and started with poetry. She soon added essays, novels and of course in later life, larger non-fiction works. Her routine was to write from early morning until noon. She wrote the novel 'Ramona' in eight months while staying in a hotel room in New York. In the twenty years she wrote prior to her death in 1885, the amount of work is astonishing.

There are many other lessons that I have learned and she is constantly teaching me new ones. Sometimes I go to her grave site and sit and ponder what she gave to me and the world. It was far more than we sometimes realize.

I will leave you with a bonus lesson I learned about writing from Helen. Follow your heart and don't limit yourself. Helen was considered the greatest woman poet of her time, some felt the best, male or female. She was always striving to be better. She tried new things, they didn't always work, but she kept trying. “Nellie's Silver Mine”, a childrens book was one of the first, if not the first to have the setting as a character. She was a keen observer of people and places. She used what she saw and heard to bring life to her work, no matter what she was writing.

I hope Helen may have left you with a few lessons for your own life. An amazing woman, one who continues to inspire me as I bring her back to life for others.

If interested you can read my haiku poetry and see my photographs at:

http://fivesevenfivepage.blogspot.com

My story of the first state film commissioner can be found in:

“Film and Photography on the Front Range” and can be purchased from Amazon