Volume III, Issue 17 May 6, 2014 |
Dear , I love this photo of my mom and dad with my daughter and son at the Erie Zoo, which, as it was only about a mile from my childhood home, Mother took us to often. In fact, I could often hear the lions roaring at night through my open bedroom
window. With Mother's Day coming up this Sunday, I've been thinking a lot about Mother, who took obvious delight in, not only zoos, but also children's books, movies and songs. She sang along to the choruses of my nursery rhyme songs and to those on my brother John's "Captain Kangaroo" albums. She especially loved a song about a trip to the zoo in which
Captain Kangaroo's cohort, Mr. Greenjeans, insists the zebra is really a "Horse in Striped Pajamas." And when my kids were little, she had just as much fun singing along "Going to the Zoo, Zoo, Zoo" with us (and Raffi). Isn't it something, how a single word can return entire memories to
us? My Ohio friend and fellow writer Melissa Ballard has zoo memories, too. You can read about them below. And then, of course, write one of your own. Unless, that is, you'd rather write zoo fiction. Or zoo poetry. Or zoological musings... Whatever your pleasure, write
on,
Maureen Upcoming WordPlay
SUMMER WRITING RETREAT (Writing - and More - as Renewal; Creating New Writing)
Renew and delight yourself. The Summer Writing Retreat is an opportunity to create new pieces of writing and/or new possibilities for our lives. Enjoy various seasonal prompts; they have not failed to elicit beautiful material that can be shaped into essays, poems, stories, or articles. After a communal lunch, you'll have private time which can be used to collage, work with a piece of writing from the morning, or play with a number of other writing prompts and
methods. You'll take home new ideas, new drafts, and new possibilities. $97 includes lunch and supplies. WHERE: South Charlotte area. Details will be provided upon registration.
WHAT: SUMMER
WRITING RETREAT: Saturday, July 19, 2014
10 am - 5 pm TO REGISTER ONLINE, CLICK
HERE WordPlay Success Story
"Maureen filled every minute
with samples of inspiring prose and poetry, amazing writing prompts, and plenty of time to share and discuss our writing. She somehow managed to provide a perfect mix of encouragement, nurturing, and nudging."
Meet Melissa Ballard I met Maureen when we were both participants in a summer writing class at Chautauqua Institution four years ago. It was the first week-long writing class I'd ever taken. After I read an essay about
my grandmother aloud, with sweaty palms and a flip-flopping stomach, Maureen looked at me over her half glasses and said, "Oh, that stuff about the towels is just great. You should end it there. You don't need the rest." She said it nicely, but I was shocked. She was asking me to part with my precious written words. I was new to this process, and my immediate thought was to stab her (gently, of course) with the .7 mm lead in my mechanical pencil. But there were too many witnesses. Later, I
realized that this was called editing and, if you are a lucky writer, you find an editor like Maureen. I revised the piece, ended it with the towels, and sent it off. When it was rejected, Maureen told me it was "too nuanced" for the market I chose; I loved her for that. The second submission did the trick, and you can read about my towels here.
When Maureen let me know
she would be teaching a writing class at Chautauqua the following summer, I immediately registered. The atmosphere in that class, and the one I took with her the following year, was positive and productive. Maureen filled every minute with samples of inspiring prose and poetry, amazing writing prompts, and plenty of time to share and discuss our writing. She somehow managed to provide a perfect mix of encouragement, nurturing and nudging. In one of her classes, I workshopped an essay that was subsequently published in Brevity. Thank you, Maureen, for being a wonderful friend, writer, teacher, and editor.
Addendum by Maureen: Melissa is getting ready to retire from Oberlin College, after a number of years of making an incredible difference in the lives of her students (check out an essay she wrote about her Oberlin experiences here). She recently wrote me that she's "starting to imagine building my life around writing and other pursuits, and getting very excited." Congratulations, Melissa, and all the best to you in your new life! STANDING WITH THE BEARS, RUNNING WITH THE LIONS by Melissa Ballard
Our family albums are generously sprinkled with photos of our daughter, Emily, standing with a large, concrete bear that guards the entrance to the Cleveland Zoo. Annual father-daughter trips to the zoo were a
tradition for many years, and that bear serves as a measuring stick. In the first photo, Emily huddles in the bear's stone embrace, grinning. As she gets older, she stands next to him, looking mildly amused. In the last, taken the summer before she went off to college, she towers over the bear, draping one arm around his shoulder while smiling patiently at the camera. A few years later, we visited Emily in Chicago, where she had found her first post-college job and settled into a tiny, meticulously decorated studio apartment. The building was old but well maintained, with the reassuring presence of a resident manager and a well-lit and locked front door that faced the street. I was weak with relief after surreptitiously inspecting it. I was also basking in our mutual ease. Having survived the usual parent-child ups and downs,
we now seemed to be in a good place. As we walked down the leafy residential street, Emily hooked arms with her dad. "The zoo is just a few blocks away," she said. "Sometimes when I run along the lake I can hear the lions roaring." The song "I am Woman, Hear Me Roar" went through my mind, but I kept it to myself. My daughter has already done more and traveled farther than I, and I am both excited and terrified to see
what will come next for her. "We'll go to the zoo tomorrow," she continued. "That will give mom a chance to spend hours in a bookstore." Back at home later in the week, I opened an email message from my husband. It contained a photograph of Emily, standing in front of a massive stone wall with "Lincoln Park Zoo" in bold lettering. She looks very much an adult in a long coat, skinny jeans, metallic ballet flats, and
designer sunglasses. For no reason I can articulate, I scrolled all the way up. Atop the wall is a sculpture of a female bear with her two cubs. The adult bear is looking down, and I am almost certain she is keeping a maternal eye on my daughter.
~ Melissa Ballard
WordPlay Now! Writing Prompt
This is WordPlay -- so why not revel in the power and potential of one good word after another? This week, it's
"zoo." PROMPT: A tool I call "The Sprawl" is a great one to turn to when you want to explore the writing possibilities of a single word. It works like this: - Put the word you want to write about in the middle of a blank sheet of paper.
- Moving out from that center, free associate words and phrases for ten minutes, letting one lead to another. When one strand of your Sprawl runs out,come on back to the center and go out in a different direction. You may want to circle your center word, or all your words. You may want to connect your words and phrases with lines. Experiment.
- Look over your Sprawl. Pick the most evocative idea, and Sprint until you have explored it as fully as you can.
- Craft your Sprint into a piece of writing.
I'd love to see what you come up with! Email it to me at info@wordplaynow.com -- you could be featured in a future Word-zine. |
MAUREEN RYAN GRIFFIN, an award-winning poetry and nonfiction writer, is the author of Spinning Words into Gold, a Hands-On Guide to the Craft of Writing, a grief workbook entitled I Will Never Forget You, and two collections of
poetry, This Scatter of Blossoms and When the Leaves Are in the Water. She believes, as author Julia Cameron says, "We are meant to midwife dreams for one another."
Maureen also believes that serious "word work" requires serious WordPlay, as play is how we humans best learn -- and perform. What she loves best is witnessing all the other dreams that come true for her clients along the way. Language, when used with intentionality and focus, is, after all, serious fuel for joy. Here's to yours! |
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