Volume VII, Issue 1 January 6, 2018 Word of the weekend: celebration Dear ,
Happy New Year! And Happy Epiphany, which you may or may not know is the official "Twelfth Day of Christmas" that celebrates the day the Magi, after "traversing afar" and "following yonder star," arrived with gifts for the "newborn king."
And happy entry back into "regular life" tomorrow, when the holidays are officially over. (If you'd like 2018 to begin with writing community and support, Under Construction and The Gift of Memoir both begin very soon, and there are a few spots left in each. If you're in the Charlotte area, I'd love to have you join in on the energy and momentum and fun. Details below.)
I am oddball enough to enjoy the twelfth day of Christmas, and the days that follow, even more than Christmas itself.
While the hubbub and hullabaloo of a big holiday is fun, I'm a fan of ordinary days.
Don't get me wrong, our Christmas was delightful, as this picture of "Grampy" with our youngest grandchild attests.
But, to me, there is nothing like the pleasure of days with plenty of time for writing, and walking. Those days offer their own beautiful celebrations, as today's featured writing, an absolutely
gorgeous poem by Denise Levertov, illustrates.
I hope you'll take the time today to check out "a day that shines in the cold." Bundle up and take in "every prodigy of green" that shines, even in winter!
Upcoming WordPlay
(Fulfilling Writing Dreams & Goals; Creating New Writing; Revising & Polishing Your Writing)
TWO SPOTS LEFT!
This class is designed to fulfill your writing dreams and projects. You’ll set goals and support structures and watch your writing flow! You’ll also get feedback on your work (any genre) each week, share challenges and receive support and solutions, and learn revision tools and methods. In addition, writing prompts will generate material for new writing or further a piece in process, whatever your preferred
genre. Through examples of accomplished writers, you’ll learn techniques to aid you right where you are in the process.
* For the benefit of participants, an audio recording of the class will be made each week so that participants are able to listen to classes they miss and/or review material covered at any convenient time and
place. These recordings are available throughout the class session, along with all handouts, in a shared Dropbox folder.
WHERE: Covenant Presbyterian Recreation Center, 1000 East Morehead Street, Charlotte, 28204. Click here for map.
WHEN: Wednesday mornings, 10:00 a.m. – noon.
January 10, 17 and 31
February 14 and 21
March 7, 21 and 28
April 4 and 18
May 2 and 16
COST: $425
TO REGISTER: Please email us at info@wordplaynow.com, and we'll get right back to you with all the
details! ---------------------------------------------------------------
GIFT OF MEMOIR
(Preserving Family History; Writing for and about Your Family; The Art of Memoir)
Our life stories are a precious legacy. Putting them in writing is a gift to all who know and love us—they can be treasured and enjoyed for generations to come. It is also a gift to ourselves. As best-selling author Rachel Naomi Remen says in her book Kitchen Table Wisdom, facts bring us to knowledge, but stories bring us to wisdom. If you are interested in writing family and/or personal life stories—those significant tales of adventure, transition,
love, loss, and triumph, as well as lovely everyday moments from times past or the present, come learn specific tools and techniques to retrieve and record them.
* For the benefit of participants, an audio recording of the class will be made each week so that participants are able to listen to classes they miss and/or review material covered at any convenient time and place. These
recordings are available throughout the class session, along with all handouts, in a shared Dropbox folder.
WHERE: Covenant Presbyterian Recreation Center, 1000 East Morehead Street, Charlotte, 28204. Click here for map. WHEN: Thursday mornings, 10:00 a.m.
– noon. January 18 February 1 and 22 March 8 and 22 April 5 and 19 May 3
COST: $275 ---------------------------------------------------------------
Connect with Your Creativity at the Sunset Inn (Writing—and
more—as Renewal and Inspiration) TWO SPOTS LEFT!
Renew yourself and reconnect with your own creativity, whether you are a practicing writer, closet writer, or as-yet-to-pick-up-the-pen
writer! The techniques and prompts we’ll use will spur your imagination, and can be used to create nonfiction, fiction, and/or poetry—the choice is yours. $418 + room tax for the weekend beginning Friday, February 9th through Sunday, February 11th. The Coastal Writing Retreat includes writing sessions, two nights’ lodging, two breakfasts and Saturday lunch (hotel tax and Saturday dinner at a local restaurant not included).
Want to extend your retreat? If you’d like to stay another day to write, or to just enjoy the beach, the Inn is offering Coastal Writing Retreat participants the opportunity to stay Sunday night at half price.
(Extra writing retreat sessions are a possibility too. Email info@wordplaynow.com if you’re interested.)
WHERE: The Sunset Inn, 9 North Shore Dr., Sunset Beach, NC 28468
WHEN: Friday, February 9th – Sunday, February 11th, 2018
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). Because the Inn is holding rooms for our retreat participants, a number of them are blocked off as unavailable online. Phone to check on your
choice.
*Also, please let the Inn know when you call if you are interested in staying Sunday night, February 11th, at half price. The Inn will hold your reservation with a credit card.
Featured
Writing
Celebration
by
Denise Levertov
Brilliant, this day—a young virtuoso of a day.
Morning shadows cut by sharpest scissors,
deft hands. And every prodigy of
green—
whether it's ferns or lichen or needles
or impatient points of bud on spindly bushes—
greener than ever before.
And the way the conifers
hold new cones to the light for blessing,
a festive
rite, and sing the oceanic chant the wind
transcribes for them!
A day that shines in the cold
like a first-prize brass band swinging along the street
of a coal-dusty village, wholly at odds
with the claims of reasonable gloom.
~ Denise Levertov
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 "celebration."
PROMPT:
What do you, and/or one of your characters, have to celebrate? Think beyond holidays. What ordinary comforts and pleasures are right in front of you/your character, waiting to be celebrated? What accomplishments and/or goals taken on are causes for celebration? Spend five or ten minutes making a list. Then pick one "cause for celebration" and craft it into a scene, a
poem, an essay, or even a micro memoir or micro story (also known as flash fiction). Here's a great example. 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! |
|
|
|
