Volume VII, Issue 29 July 16,
2018 Word of the Week: souvenir Dear ,
I mentioned last week that Richard and I were getting up early to see what we hoped would be a stunning sunrise on the 10,023-foot summit of Haleakalā (house of the sun), the East Maui volcano. It was indeed quite spectacular to see the sun rise above the clouds over the volcano—well worth getting up at 2 a.m. for!
I know our cellphone photo doesn't do the experience justice, but it does give you some idea of how beautiful it was. I am a
sunrise junkie, and this one is definitely in my top two. (The one that startled me awake on my 52-hour bus ride from Erie, PA to Flagstaff, AZ when I was 19, on my way out to the southwest for the first time, was such a quintessentially perfect introduction to red rock country that it will probably always be my number one sunrise.)
Speaking of volcanoes and sunrises, we flew from Maui to the Big Island last Tuesday, and my big brother Mike took us on a boat ride out to see the current Kilauea volcano action. What an adventure! The boat was rocking and bouncing like crazy, so the photos are all very blurry, but this is what the eruption from Fissure 8 looks like from six to seven miles away. Scientists estimate it is pouring out about 98,000 liters of lava per second. The yellow glow in the background that looks a bit like a sunrise is Fissure 8 (Look at all that
steam!), and the yellow fire in the foreground is one of the many spots where lava is spewing into the ocean.
The most moving part of the experience was that the boat driver and his two assistants had all grown up in this area, and shared
their experiences, both from childhood and in the past months. "The mayor gave us one day at Isaac Hale Park," one of them said, "where we always went to swim, so we could swim there one last time before it was covered in lava." He told us the water, once so clear, cool, and blue, was a warm, muddy brown, but they swam anyway. His dated litany of the people he knew who'd lost their homes: ". . .my best friend, May 25th, my grandmother, May 28th . . ." was nearly matter-of-fact. But we
heard the emotion in his voice when he told us, "A house can be rebuilt. But the beach where we learned to surf, the land—that is gone. One last time. Now all we have are memories."
We left for this four-hour boat ride at 4 a.m. That morning's sunrise, on the starboard side of the boat as we were headed back to Hilo, is my most haunting one.
After a nap, Richard, Mike, his wife Linda, and I headed up to the top of Mauna Kea, the highest point in the state of Hawai'i. Here's a photo of me and Mike near the top.
Which brings me, finally, to the word of the week: souvenir. We, as English-speaking Americans, use this word as a noun. We buy souvenirs of places we've been. But in its original French, souvenir is a noun: to remember. Sometimes, when not even a photo remains, our memories are our only souvenirs.
This week's featured writer, Lauren Coggins, is the one who inspired my using
this word in the zine. It happened weeks ago, when I received a message from her that made me jump for joy: "Maureen, I have to share some excitement. I know so few people who would appreciate this . . . I had a poem published in The Briar Cliff Review recently and the two copies arrived today. It’s apparently their 30th anniversary edition, and here’s the thing—my little poem is five pages away from a poem by Ted Kooser. So tickled." (Whether or not you are one of the myriad of people who don't know that Ted Kooser is the 13th Poet Laureate of the United States, I know you can see why she was excited about sharing this news with someone she knows does. In fact, there's a terrific Ted Kooser poem in Spinning Words into Gold.)
Knowing what a fine poet Lauren is, as I've been fortunate enough to have the chance to work with her, of course I had to ask if I could read her poem. Not only was I totally taken with "Pick
Yourself Up," it was a synchronicity for me, as my husband and I had just gone hiking with our son and his girlfriend during which we'd quite a conversation about the importance of "leaving no trace" when our Eagle Scout son wrapped up and packed out his apple core instead of tossing it in the woods like the rest of
us.
Lauren's poem feels like even
more of a synchronicity from here in Hawai'i, where the land is so new, so full of surprises. "It’s just a little poem that came together in a way that surprised me," she said. "Which tends to be a sign of good things!"
Indeed. What a lovely souvenir. My thanks to Lauren for allowing me to share it with
you, so that you can reflect on your own memories and souvenirs.
Love and light,
Maureen
Upcoming WordPlay
GIFT OF MEMOIR WRITING PERSONAL AND FAMILY STORIES (Preserving Family History; Writing for and about Your Family; The Art of Memoir)
NOW TAKING REGISTRATIONS FOR FALL 2018! 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., starting in September, 2018. COST: $285 TO
REGISTER: Please email us at info@wordplaynow.com to start the registration process by filling out a short "Clarity Tool" to share your writing dreams and goals and where you are in the process (anywhere you are is a perfect place to begin).
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UNDER CONSTRUCTION
NOW TAKING REGISTRATIONS FOR FALL 2018! 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) and learn revision tools and methods. Each week, 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 from 10:00 a.m. – noon, starting in September 2018. (Other class time/day of the week may be available.) COST: $435 TO REGISTER: Please email us at info@wordplaynow.com to start the registration process by filling out a short "Clarity Tool" to share your writing dreams and goals and where you are in the process (anywhere you are is a perfect place to begin).
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EVERY PICTURE HOLDS A STORY - WEEK 8 Writing Class at Chautauqua
Would you enjoy
using favorite photographs and other visual images as springboards to write fiction, nonfiction, and/or poetry, and/or capture family stories? Then come learn some fun, easy methods to get started. We’ll also look at some ways successful writers have used images to inspire their words. If you like, bring your own pictures and photographs of things you’d enjoy writing about. A variety of images will be provided, too.
COURSE NO: 1710 WHEN: Monday, August 13th – Wednesday, August 15th, 2:00 – 4:00 p.m. LOCATION: Turner 105, Chautauqua Institution. 1 Ames Ave, Chautauqua, NY
14722. COST: $85 TO REGISTER: To register online, please click this link to be taken to the Chautauqua Institution website.
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WRITING OUR WAY TO HAPPINESS - WEEK 9 Writing Class at Chautauqua
Come explore time-tested ways writing can increase your happiness level. This class will jumpstart your pen and provide inspiration and knowledge about the process of creative writing, whether your genre is nonfiction, fiction, or poetry. Ideal for beginners, and those interested in expanding their writing -for personal growth or for publication.
COURSE NO: 1712 WHEN: Monday, August 20th – Thursday, August 23rd, 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. LOCATION: Hultquist, 201B, Chautauqua Institution. 1 Ames Ave, Chautauqua, NY 14722. COST: $99 TO REGISTER: To register online, please click this link to be taken to the Chautauqua Institution website.
WordPlay Success Story "[Maureen's] input has helped me become a better self-editor, and it’s helped give me the confidence to feel that my poems have a small place..." Lauren and her son at Wrightsville beach in
2016
Lauren Coggins grew up in Charlotte and lives in Lake Wylie. She’s been
delighted to have had a handful of poems published, in Southern Poetry Review, Reed Magazine, and Kakalak, among others, and remains hopeful in the eventual goal of publishing a chapbook.
About poetry, she has co-opted some advice she came across a while back, that was given to one famous author, by another. It works for poems, too: Gene Wolfe once told Neil Gaiman that “you never learn how to write a novel, you just learn how to write the novel you’re on.”
Lauren can be reached at lcogginz@bellsouth.net.
What Lauren says about WordPlay "A few years ago, I got back into writing poetry. Which is a short way of saying that I exhumed, and spent time with, a lot of old notes and ideas. With things that had once seemed completed.
As an undergrad at Queens (’01), I was lucky to take writing classes with poet Cathy Smith Bowers. I’m still grateful – her teachings on the “abiding image,” and on
poetry as “shining a light on a moment of intensity” were resonant. Over time, they proved resonant in ways that drew me back, eventually, to poetry.
But I needed someone who could read my poems in ways that I could not. Enter Maureen, whose coaching has been a catalyst. Her style makes it easy to be vulnerable, and to talk about the emotion behind the writing even as we’ve covered things like metaphors and line breaks. Understanding how she reads the poems, so that I can better understand them myself, has been so very helpful. What a joy, for someone to help you be surprised by your
own work!
Maureen’s passion for the craft is contagious. Her input has helped me become a better self-editor, and it’s
helped give me the confidence to feel that my poems have a small place – to lift words from Mary Oliver – 'in the family of things.'”
"Pick Yourself Up" by
Lauren Coggins we tell one another, in idiom, as though we could carry ourselves.
As though we could take our own hands and hoist ourselves upon our own backs,
like the packs of those Scouts whose credo goes: leave no trace.
And it
occurs to me that even in the wilderness of a person, I still
should be a good steward, should pack everything out I carried in, and leave
things as I found them. The way I once knelt by a stream while hiking,
stopped short by the clear, clear water, the
glint of mica in the sand
and the slurry of it so smooth when I reached in, that I might as well
have touched nothing – my palms in the current, full of that silt
I couldn’t feel. The sensation all in the seeing of it through my fingers,
and my hands so clean, after, that it seemed we’d repelled
one another, that earth
and me: a thing I couldn’t hold, that refused
to touch me back – neither of us the other’s souvenir.
~ Lauren Coggins
in The Briar Cliff Review, Volume 30
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 "souvenir."
PROMPT: Write, in some fashion, from your own perspective or that of another person or a character, about a souvenir—either a physical object purchased or gathered from a place traveled to or a memory of a place.
It's fun to play with prompts in community with fellow writers, and to be able to share the results when you're done. You can find out about WordPlay classes, workshops, and retreats here. 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 three collections of poetry, Ten Thousand Cicadas Can't Be Wrong, 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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