Volume IX, Issue 10
March 4, 2020
Word of the Week: rhetoric
Dear ,
Happy National Grammar Day! Today is also my mom's birthday, which is very fitting, given that my mother is the one who taught me grammar, language, and rhetoric. I'm the baby on her lap in this picture of us taken in 1957.
If you're wondering why I chose the word "rhetoric," I was inspired by a poem I love by former North Carolina Poet Laureate Cathy Smith Bowers called "A Southern Rhetoric." It features Cathy and her mother and the love of language that flows between them, as it did between me and my mother. Seeing Cathy's name on the list of the many wonderful presenters at the High Road Festival of Poetry and Short Fiction offered by Press
53 on Saturday, March 28th put me in the mood to visit some of her poems. You can learn more about the festival below. It's going to be terrific! And you can read "A Southern Rhetoric" by Cathy Smith Bowers here at The Poetry Foundation
website.
"A Southern Rhetoric" is set in the kitchen, and begins with words spoken by the narrator's mother: "It's a sight in this world/the things in this world/there are to see." Amen to that! I couldn't resist sharing a piece about me and my mother talking in the kitchen from my cookbook memoir-in-progress, How She Fed Us, today, as a kind of
birthday gift for my mother, whom I lost in 2002. I hope you enjoy it.
March and April are great months for learning more about writing, expanding your skill at rhetoric, and growing your writing community! For starters, check out the offerings listed below.
Love and light,
Maureen
Community Learning Opportunities
The High Road Festival
of Poetry and Short Fiction
The High Road Festival of Poetry and Short Fiction
Saturday, March 28, 2020, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Embassy Suites
460 N Cherry St
Winston-Salem, NC
Spend a day of learning, writing, and sharing with some of today's top writers of poetry and short fiction. Design your own day of seminars, master
classes, and one-on-one critique sessions. Faculty includes former NC Poet Laureate Cathy Smith Bowers, David Jauss, Jacinta V. White, Anders Carlson-Wee, and many others. Information at www.HighRoadFestival.com or call 336-770-5353
(presented by Press 53).
Writing for Your Life Conference
If you write, or read, books that matter – books with substance and soul – then this is the place for
you.
Writing for Your Life welcomes you to Christ Episcopal Church at 1412 Providence Rd. in Charlotte, NC. The conference is open to all who
are interested in spiritual writing, as well as those interested in reading spiritual books . Speakers include Barbara Brown Taylor, other popular Christian authors, and representatives from the Christian publishing industry. The main conference will take place on March 24-25, 2020, with an optional post-conference
seminar: The Business of Being a Spiritual Writer (separate registration required) on March 26.
In addition to Barbara Brown Taylor, our speakers include: authors Leighton Ford, Margot Starbuck, J. Dana Trent, Patrice Gopo, and Kathy Izard, and literary
agents Kathryn Helmers and Jevon Bolden. You can learn more about each speaker through the links below. Also participating in the conference will be Park Road Books, CharlotteLit, AK Classics, WordPlay, and authors Kate Rademacher, Niki Hardy, and Erin Hall.
Registration Now
Open! Click on the link below to pay for your registration (credit cards, debit cards, PayPal, or PayPal Credit are accepted; all payments are processed through PayPal). After you pay, an email confirmation will be sent to the name and email address you enter into PayPal (or the one associated with your PayPal account) within 5 days. If you need to change the name or email address please let us know.
CLICK HERE to pay for your registration.
Sensoria Arts Festival
From March 27th - April 5th, Central Piedmont Community College is treating all of us to a wonderful array of cultural opportunities. Learn more and see the full schedule at https://sensoria.cpcc.edu/about/.
Don't Miss Joy Harjo, Current Poet Laureate of the United States and 2020 Irene Blair Honeycutt Distinguished Lecturer (Literature! There are two opportunities, both
free:
Thu. April 02 at 11AM
Thu. April 02 at 8PM
WordPlay's Write Yourself! Workshop
Give yourself the gift of exploring how creative writing (journaling, memoir, poetry, fiction) can enrich your life, and what your writing can provide for others. You’ll learn a number of fun, easy approaches to the writing process. Ideal for beginners and anyone interested in renewing and expanding their writing and their relationship to self, others, and the world.
WHERE: Plaza Midwood Library. 1623 Central Ave, Charlotte, NC 28205
WHEN: Saturday, March 21st from 10:30 a.m. until noon
COST: Free!
TO REGISTER: To register, visit the Plaza Midwood Library registration page here.
More WordPlay opportunities coming soon. Stay posted!
Featured Writing
an excerpt from the upcoming cookbook memoir
How She Fed Us
by
Maureen Ryan Griffin
EYES-IN-THE-BACK-OF-HER-HEAD STEW
My mother stood with her back to me, cooking supper. I was three years old and had propelled myself into the kitchen on my wooden riding horse. Climbing off, I stared at
the painted circus animals chasing each other around the colorful metal wheels. “What’s this?” I asked, pointing, knowing very well what it was.
My mother turned to look. “Zebra.”
I let her turn away before I asked again. “What’s this?”
“Elephant.”
“What’s this?”
“Lion.” She went back to chopping carrots.
“What’s this?” I kept going around and around the wheel, sometimes skipping animals just to see if she was really paying attention. She kept turning and answering.
Until a moment I asked yet again, “What’s this?” and she answered correctly without looking around.
I was absolutely amazed. “How did you do that?”
“I have eyes in the back of my head.”
“You do not!” I said. “Show me.”
She laughed.
I kept pressing. “But how did you know? You knew without looking!”
“It’s because I’m a mother,” she answered. “Someday you’ll be a mother, and you’ll be able to do it, too.”
Perhaps I remember this incident so vividly because it was the first time I encountered the idea that I would actually grow up, that I could someday be a mother, too. It seemed impossible, and yet, there was my mother, so sure of it she could say so in
the midst of making meatball stew.
Mother’s Creamy Meatball Stew
I painstakingly copied this recipe onto an index card in the late ’80s, when this was how we got our mothers’ recipes, so I could make it for my
children. Because Mother was right. I did grow up to be a mother.
- 1 pound ground beef
- ¼ cup chopped parsley
- 1 teaspoon salt¼ teaspoon pepper
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 8 small onions, peeled, whole
- 3 potatoes, peeled and cubed
- 4 carrots, peeled and cut into 1-inch diagonal slices
- 3 stalks of celery, cut into 1-inch diagonal slices
- 2 cups water
- 1 10-ounce package of frozen peas
- 6 tablespoons flour
- 2 cups milk
Mix ground beef with parsley, salt, and pepper. Shape into small balls. Fry in butter in a large pot until the meatballs are brown on all sides. Add onions, potatoes, carrots, celery, and water. Stir and cover. Cook over
medium heat, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are tender, about 20 minutes. Add peas and cook another five minutes. Mix flour with a few tablespoons of milk, then gradually add the rest of the milk. Pour in and stir until thickened. Serves 4 to 6.
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 “rhetoric."
PROMPT:
Write a dialogue,
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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