Volume III, Issue 32 September 8, 2014
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Are you familiar with Sara
Bareilles's song "Brave"? One of my many generous students first shared with
me, before it became a runaway hit. And what's not to love about a song that urges us to "be brave" and "say what you want to say"?
Every time a new WordPlay class starts, I'm struck by the bravery of my students. It takes a lot of courage to admit you have a dream, to walk into a room of strangers and share your first attempts at reaching it. And yet there's little better, at least in my mind, than having a community of kindred spirits to match your bravery with their own, to cheer when you succeed and encourage you all along the way.
I will never forget when Kathy first shared her idea for a program to support parents and caregivers in giving
children the very best support in all developmental areas from birth all the way to age 7 -- what a ride it was to the finish line of three finished books, with checklists, activities, and CD's! It's also brave to invest so many hours into a writing dream without knowing how it will turn out, and to do what it takes to get your writing out into the world. This may not be what brave looks like for you,
of course. You have your own dreams, your own style, and, yes, your own challenges, too, which are often what trump our bravery into emerging. Whatever it looks like for you, , as Sara Bareilles says, "I just want to see you be brave." And to celebrate the ways and times you have already shown others -- and yourself -- how brave you can be. Today's featured writing is from a memoir by author Kelly Corrigan called The Middle Place. Kelly recounts much bravery of her own as she and her father battle cancer at the
same time, and she does so with much humor and warmth. I hope you enjoy the excerpt I picked, which inspired this week's prompt. (I used it as I played with last week's word, labor. You might enjoy writing about your first job and/or what you bought with the first money you earned, as well as to explore brave.) Love and light, Maureen Upcoming
WordPlay
WRITE LIKE A GENIUS (Expanding Our Creativity; Learning New Tools for Our Writing and Our Lives; Creating New Writing) Starts Sunday, September 21st at the John Campbell Folk School, a wonderful place to spend a week --think summer camp for grown-ups, with delicious, healthy food and creative people of every ilk from all over the country. Full details here. One spot left! Discover your own genius as you learn to apply seven fascinating approaches of Leonardo da Vinci to your writing at a week-long writing class in the North Carolina Mountains. These techniques enliven non-fiction, poetry
and fiction. Expect fun, inspiration and writing galore in your preferred genre, with opportunities to share your work. WHERE: John Campbell Folk
School, 1 Folk School Road, Brasstown, NC 28902.
WHEN: Sunday, September 21 - Saturday September 27, 2014.
COST: $594 for one week-long session, plus lodging and meals.
TO REGISTER: Click here.
-------------------------------------------------------------- FALL WRITING RETREAT
(Writing - and More - as Renewal / Creating New Writing)
Renew and delight yourself. The Fall 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.WHEN: Saturday, October 11, 2014, 10 am - 5 pm.
TO REGISTER: TO REGISTER: Register online here. Or email info@wordplaynow.com or phone 704-494-9961 for details on registering via mail.
-------------------------------------------------------------- COASTAL WRITING RETREAT
Connect with Your Creativity at the Sunset Inn (Writing-and more-as Renewal and Inspiration)
Full details here. Register now if you want to come: just two spots left!
WHERE: The Sunset Inn, 9 North Shore Dr., Sunset Beach, NC 28468
WHEN: Friday, November 7 - Sunday, November 9, 2014. TO REGISTER: Contact the Sunset Inn at 888.575.1001 or 910.575.1000 (if you would like to handpick your room, view your choices here first, then call).
-------------------------------------------------------------- COASTAL WRITING RETREAT: PROJECT BOOK GET YOUR BOOK
OUT OF YOU AND INTO THE WORLD (Writing; Publishing Your Book-length Writing Project)
A hands-on workshop for any writer who would like to write and/or publish a book and 1) doesn't know how
2) doesn't get around to it
3) feels
a) intimidated
b) confused
c) overwhelmed
d) uninspired
e) all of the above Full details here. WHERE: The Sunset Inn, 9 North Shore Dr., Sunset Beach, NC 28468
WHEN: Friday, November 14 - Sunday, November 16, 2014. TO REGISTER: Contact the Sunset Inn at 888.575.1001 or 910.575.1000 (if you would like to handpick your room, view your choices here first, then call).
More WordPlay opportunities here. Featured Writing An excerpt from the memoir
The Middle Place
by
Kelly Corrigan The bravest thing I ever did was kill a
snake. It was an accident, but it still counts. The snake came to Wooded Lane the same spring that my dad gathered us around the kitchen table and made this speech: "So, you all have your chores, yeah?" "Yeah." "And you" -- he looked at me -- "want a dollar for every time you take out the trash, right?" "Right," I nodded, comfortable with my pricing. "And you" -- he looked at Booker -- "you want ten dollars for cutting the lawn, right?" "At least," Booker replied, definitely implying he may have underpriced the project for a good guy like my dad. "So that's just passing money around the inside," he said, eyebrows raised, slowly nodding, like "get it?" "Huh?" Booker said. "What?" GT said. "Dad?" I said. He stuck to this seemingly self-evident phrasing while he waved his arms around in circles, eyes wide to make his point. "We're passing money around the inside. We're ready to start bringing it in from the outside." He fished around in a paper bag I hadn't noticed on the
counter. Booker slumped over, apparently catching on before I did. "We're ready to get out there and start drumming up some business on Wooded Lane." He lifted a grass green T-shirt out of the bag that said CORIUGAN CUTTERS in big white block letters. "DAD!" Booker whined.
"DAD!" GT echoed. I stayed quiet. Girls did not cut lawns. "Corrigan Cutters!" my dad broadcasted, as if it were perfectly obvious. Then he flipped it around to show us the back. THE BEST
FOR LESS! Then he reached back in the bag and pulled out a pink T-shirt that said CORRIGAN CLEANERS ... THE BEST FOR LESS! I was appalled. "Are you crazy?" Fortunately, the cleaning business never took off in the way the lawn business did. I had a couple three-dollars-an-hour gigs up at the Dunlaps', where I wiped down walls while Mrs. Dunlap nursed her third baby from one colossal breast then the other, but that was about it. Booker, on the other hand, saved up fifty dollars in no time and became a man possessed by
a dream, a dream to own a boa constrictor.
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
"brave." The opening words in the excerpt above from The Middle Place got me to thinking about what I would say was the bravest thing I ever did, and how much I would enjoy finding out from all the people I know what they'd say was their "bravest thing." And wouldn't this also be a great question for fiction writers to explore
on behalf of their characters? So there you have it... PROMPT: Write about the bravest thing that you, or anyone else, real or fictional, did. You may want to start by taking a few minutes to make a list of all the brave things that come to mind, and then pick one of them to put into words, as a scene, story, poem, essay,
etc.
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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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