Volume VIII, Issue 39
October 2, 2019
Dear ,
Given how much I have always loved traveling, the word nomad has always appealed to me. And given that my husband and I love the camper we bought from friends a few years ago, the cover of Jessica Bruder's Nomadland leapt out at me when I saw it at Chautauqua Bookstore this past summer. We were "nomads"
by choice, not by necessity. We were not "houseless."
And when I heard Jessica read from the powerful work that resulted from her three years and 15,000 miles of immersion journalism, traveling with her protagonists "from the beet fields of North Dakota to the National Forest campgrounds of California to Amazon’s CamperForce program in Texas,"I knew I wanted to share her, and Nomadland, with you.
Not only does it give readers an opportunity to spend time, as Jessica did, with older Americans who are meeting financial derailment with creativity and resilience, Nomadland
is a wonderful success story in and of itself. It began as a cover story for Harper's, and grew into an award-winning book (New York Times Editors’ Choice + Notable Book, Discover Award Winner, J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize + Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism Finalist, Kirkus Reviews Best Books of 2017, Library Journal Top Ten Book of 2017, Booklist Editors’ Choice of 2017, and Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle Selection) and is now being
made into a movie by Fox Searchlight Pictures.
I found Jessica, along with all the people I came to know through her story, inspiring. Nomadland both overturned and broadened my understanding of what a nomad can be, and I hope you enjoy the
excerpt and prompt below.
Love and light,
Upcoming WordPlay
As host Landis Wade says, in this conversation:
"we meet author and writing coach, Maureen Ryan Griffin, who reads poetry from her collection Ten Thousand Cicadas Can’t Be Wrong and guides us through her writing book, Spinning Words into Gold: A Hands-On Guide to the Craft of Writing.
This is a great episode to get your writing juices flowing, whether you are seasoned writer or one that wants to start dabbling, because writing can be for everyone.
Among other topics, Maureen explores the why, when and where of writing, and discusses some of the secrets to good writing.
We start the show with Maureen reading her poem: 'Why You Can Go Back to a Story You Abandoned Years Ago and Finally Finish It.' "
Find it via your favorite podcast app, or here on the Charlotte Readers Podcast website.
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POETRY ROCKS!
Would you like your writing — prose and/or poetry — to be more graceful, powerful, beautiful? Do you sometimes find poetry confusing or intimidating and wish you could “crack the code”? Or do you enjoy writing and reading poems, but want a more thorough understanding of what makes a poem good? Then this poetry extravaganza is for you.
Expect a good time exploring what makes a poem a poem, gaining the knowledge you need to confidently create and revise poetry, and strengthening your writing skills in all genres.
It would be a joy and an honor to share what rocks about poetry with you!
HERE’S WHAT YOU GET:
- 23 poetry creation tools, delivered one per day (Monday through Friday) to your inbox — in honor of National Poetry month. Use them as you get them, use them when you can, use them over and over to create poems. Each tool zeroes in on one aspect of poetry and provides an innovative method to approach writing a poem. Many of them are great for creating prose,
too. The tools include:
* a purpose, so you’re clear what you will learn
* background information when helpful
* “how-to” directions to create a poem
* an example that illustrates the poetry tool in action
* a short reflection to solidify the concepts covered
* “Hone Your Craft” suggestions for further exploration
* a short reflection to solidify the concepts covered
- A PDF document of each tool that you can print or save on your computer
- An audio recording of each tool, so you can learn by listening and/or reading
- Instruction on the role of audience, reading like a writer, and the process of revision, including a handy Revision Checkpoint Chart — this information can be applied to strengthen your prose as well as poetry
- Additional poetry resources
- An e-book that contains the information and resources covered, as well as your 23 poetry creation tools for ongoing use
WHERE: From the comfort of your own home, via the web.
WHEN: Any time you want! And once you receive all 23 tools, they’re yours to keep, which means that you can keep using them for years to come.
COST: $45
TO REGISTER: To pay with a check via mail, email info@wordplaynow.com for instructions. To register for Poetry Rocks online, click here.
More WordPlay opportunities coming soon. Stay posted!
Photo by Todd Gray - © Todd Gray.
Jessica Bruder is a journalist who writes about subcultures and social issues.
For her book Nomadland, she spent months living in a camper van, documenting itinerant Americans who gave up traditional housing and hit the road full time, enabling them to travel from job to job and carve out a place for themselves in a precarious economy. The project spanned
three years and more than 15,000 miles of driving — from coast to coast and from Mexico to the Canadian border. Named a New York Times Notable Book and Editors’ Choice, Nomadland won the 2017 Discover Award and was a finalist for the J. Anthony Lukas Prize and the Helen
Bernstein Book Award.
She is the author of Burning Book and is currently writing about trust in the age of surveillance.
Jessica has been teaching narrative storytelling at Columbia Journalism School and contributing to The New York Times for more than a decade. She has also written for New York Magazine, WIRED, Harper's Magazine, The Washington Post, The Associated Press, The International Herald Tribune, The New York Times Magazine and The Guardian.
She was a staff reporter at The Oregonian. Her photography appears in Nomadland and Burning Book and has been published by The New York Times, The New York Observer and Blender magazine.
Jessica has a B.A. in English and French from Amherst College and an M.S. in magazine writing from Columbia Journalism School. She’s grateful for fellowships at the Bellagio Center and Yaddo that have supported her work.
Going back further, she was a Starbucks barista, a snowboarder, an electric guitar nerd, a music store clerk, a junior camp counselor and a really lousy waitress. She is, eternally, a proud and patch-wearing member of the Madagascar Institute and the Flaming
Lotus Girls.
She lives in Brooklyn with a dog named Max and more plants than you can shake a leafy stick at.
Bio from https://www.jessicabruder.com/about-3.
an excerpt from
Nomadland
Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century
by
Jessica Bruder
Foreword
As I write this, they are scattered across the country—
In Drayton, North Dakota, a former San Francisco cabdriver, sixty-seven, labors at the annual sugar beet harvest. He works from sunrise until after sunset in temperatures that dip below freezing, hoping trucks that roll in from the fields disgorge multi-ton loads of beets. And night he sleeps in the van that has been his home ever since Uber squeezed him out of the taxi industry and
making the rent became impossible.
In Campbellsville, Kentucky, a sixty-six-year-old ex-general contractor stows merchandise during the overnight shift at an Amazon warehouse, pushing a wheeled cart for miles along the concrete floor. It's mind-numbing work and she struggles to scan each
item accurately, hoping to avoid getting fired. In the morning she returns to her tiny trailer, moored at one of several mobile home parks that contract with Amazon to put up nomadic workers like her.
In New Bern, North Carolina, a woman whose home is a teardrop-style trailer—so small it can be pulled with a motorcycle—is couch surfing with a friend while hunting for work. Even with a master's degree, the thirty-eight-year-old Nebraska native can't find a job despite filling out hundreds of applications in the past month alone. She knows the sugar beet harvest is hiring, but traveling
halfway across the country would require more cash and she has. Losing her job at a nonprofit several years ago is one of the reasons she moved into the trail in the first place. After the funding for her position ran out, she couldn't afford rent on top of paying off student loans.
In San Marcos, California, a thirtysomething couple in a 1975 GMC motor home is running a roadside pumpkin stand with a children’s carnival and petting zoo, which they had five days to set up from scratch on a vacant dirt lot. In a few weeks they’ll switch to selling Christmas trees.
In Colorado Springs, Colorado, a seventy-two-year-old van-dweller who cracked three ribs doing a campground maintenance job is recuperating while visiting with family.
___________
THERE HAVE ALWAYS BEEN ITINERANTS, drifters, hobos, restless souls. But now, and the third millennium, a new kind of wandering tribe is emerging. People who never imagined being nomads are hitting the road. They’re giving up traditional houses and apartments to live in what some call “wheel estate”—vans, secondhand RV's, school buses, pickup campers, travel trailers, and plain old sedans. They are driving away
from the impossible choices that face what used to be the middle class. Decisions like:
Would you rather have food or dental work? Pay your mortgage or electric bill? Make a car payment or buy medicine? Cover rent or student loans? Purchase warm clothes or gas for your commute?
For many the answer seemed radical at first.
You can't give yourself a raise, but what about cutting your biggest expense? Trading a stick-and-brick domicile for life on wheels?
Some call them “homeless.” The new nomads reject that label. Equipped with both shelter and transportation, they’ve adopted a different word. They refer to themselves, quite simply, as “houseless.” From a distance, many of them could be mistaken for carefree retired RVers. On occasions when they treat themselves to a movie or dinner at a restaurant, they blend with the crowd. In mind-set
and appearance, they are largely middle class. They wash their clothes at Laundromats and join fitness clubs to use the showers. Many took to the road after their savings were obliterated by the Great Recession. To keep their gas tanks and bellies full, they work long hours at hard, physical jobs. In a time of flat wages and rising housing costs, they have unshackled themselves from rent and mortgages as a way to get by. They are surviving America.
But for them—as for anyone—survival isn't enough. So what began as a last-ditch effort has become a battle cry for something greater. Being human means yearning for more than subsistence. As much as food or shelter, we require hope.
And there is hope on the road. It's a by-product of forward momentum. A sense of opportunity, as wide as the country itself. A bone-deep conviction that something better will come. It's just ahead, in the next town, the next gig, the next chance encounter with a stranger.
Read more of Nomadland here.
Purchase a copy of Nomadland here.
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 "nomad."
PROMPT: What thoughts and emotions did the above excerpt from Nomadland stir in you? What could you shape from this response?
This week, engage in what I dubbed a "Leapfrog": Reread Jessica Bruder's words about modern American nomads, looking for one or more words, phrases, and/or ideas to leap out at you. Begin here, and write whatever wants to come out of you, whether that's a rant or a ramble, poetry or prose.
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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