A whole day of free writers' workshops - Apr 14th

Who can resist a whole day of FREE writers' workshops? Everyone who responded to my poll wants to go to Lit Fest instead of the Grind on Sat April 14^th, so let’s do it. Details of time, place, and web link are at  bottom.  Here’s what info I could get from Douglas College Security at the New West campus for Lit Fest day.  Check the schedule of workshops for the day.

Meeting up
There’s a break from 12:15 to 1:30 so let’s try and meet up then - in the Caf.  We won’t be doing free-writes or anything – just hanging out, having a break. The Security guy said the easiest way to find the Caf is to go to the Security kiosk in the main foyer & ask for directions.  To make life interesting, they have 2 Cafs. I’m talking about the one on the 2^nd floor. He says it has greater choice of items.

Getting there

·         SkyTrain - nearest stop is the New West SkyTrain Station – about a 300M walk up one of those Streets of San Francisco New West hills.  As you get off SkyTrain – he said: come own one level and, once off the stairs, keep going straight and then you'll hit the first road. Go left up the hill.  8^th St., he thought. He was from Australia, so what does he know - google the map, you’ll see. Or ask someone at the New West stn.

·         Car – some people are carpooling. If you're a Grind Writer you know the email address so at   email before Apr 7 if you need, or if you can offer, a ride. Can't do anything after Apr 7th on this. 

All the info – map, schedule of the day’s workshops etc.

http://artscouncilnewwest.org/12/general/lit-fest-new-west-coming-soon/

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Story Ideas

 

I am grateful for.....the Closet Writers (R. Jefferson)

What are you grateful for and why?

Prompt given at the Closet Writers group, November 23, 2011

            I am grateful to be here as it has been eons since the last time. And I feel good here—despite not always writing nor “being a writer.” It’s a small, practical oasis and totally different from what I do other places, whether working, playing with friends and family or exercising my stiff back.

            I am grateful that the group seems to be open to pretty much anything—from level of involvement to level of ability. How wonderful that personalities like this exist and exist with the kind of talent to give ideas, support, guidance, motivation, and encouragement.

            I am grateful that I was exposed to the group’s nature, that a member was present enough to make a connection between my expressions and providing information.

            I am grateful that I can immerse myself in a different brain corner for a while—one that is not focusing on pain, the past, the future, the problems and possibilities.

            Just write.

            Keep going.

            It doesn’t matter.

            The outcome is not the point.

            Finally, an outcome-free zone. No standards to meet, process to complete, etc. etc. Although I guess I didn’t read the whole journal yet: maybe there is a procedures section. Maybe there are certain thoughts and beliefs I’m supposed to have and fulfill by the end of the writing. Maybe that’s my problem of not getting more writing done.

            Maybe.

©2011  R. Jefferson
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The Box by Wayne Smith

The Box
Feb 4th 2012

Audio Recording:  Read by Wayne Smith

http://db.tt/mndZrK7S

I saw the box only a  few times in my lifetime. Mother would be carrying it, tears in her eyes.

My mother  passed away recently and I asked my Dad if I could have the box. He said:

"Take it."

I was delighted; the box looked old yet well preserved. 

I opened the brass latch, lifted back the brown leather lid.  Inside I found old family
photos and my grandmother’s saved letters home from her lost son Roy while he was here in Canada training to be a British Lancaster bomber pilot.

Near the end of the Second World War, Roy’s plane was shot down over Nuremberg, Germany. His body was never found.

My grandmother hoped he had been taken prisoner and would return home once the War was over.  She waited many long months, in vain.  I believe she wrote letters in search of her lost son.

It is that loving grandmother’s search that makes me feel, and the memory of my own mother’s pain whenever I saw her with the box, that is a reflection of that painful search.

Roy’s letters home are the hopes and dreams of a  twenty year old British lad. In them he asks if his mom could send him clean pajamas.  Or he is telling her the only girls the army could find for them at the airmen’s dance were all thirty years of age or older.

"Oh, Mum—I had to dance with thirty year olds, I will never live it down."

Ironically, he never did.

Today I hold the box as a treasure of love and hope, held for so many years by my grandmother, my mother, and now by me.  I hope to add the gift of a story to that box, passing the box on one day to someone who holds a memory precious.

Thanks, Mom.

(c)2012 Wayne Smith

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New York (sigh) -- always a couple of years behind Vancouver

Last fall American science fiction author Mary RobinetteKowal took a month-long vacation from using the internet. 

She asked anybody & everybody to communicate with her by post and paper letters.   

And they did.   

So now she has these correspondences going, and she’s delighted: “When I write back, I find that I slow down and write differently than I do with an email. Email is all about the now. Letters are different, because whatever I write needs to be something that will be relevant a week later to the person to whom I am writing.”

Now she’s challenged her friends & family -- and all her Facebook buddies-- to mail at least one item through the post every day through February, part of a bid to help the ailing U.S. postal service hold its head above water.

And it’s catching at close quarters: her own agent has actually promised to respond to an author query every day. And many other writers are joining in the call to put pen to paper.

Well, that’s New York, behind the times as usual.

In Vancouver, a shop called The Regional Assembly of Text on Main Street has for years been encouraging its customers to come in at 7 o'clock on the first Thursday evening of the month to write paper letters to their loved ones. The Regional Assembly hauls out their collection of old Remingtons and Royals, Underwoods and Smith-Coronas -- and encourages all us limp-wristed internet writer lightweights to pound our hearts out on those cranky old manual typers in their Writing Club.  

Glad to hear that the Big Apple is finally catching up.


(c)2012  Margo Lamont

2012 Grind Writers meetings schedule

Grind Writers meetings schedule
2012
Saturday, Feb 18 Sunday, Mar 4 Saturday, Mar 17 Sunday, Apr 1 Saturday, Apr 14 Sunday, Apr 29 Saturday, May 12 Sunday, May 27 Saturday, June 9 Sunday, June 24	Saturday, July 7 Sunday, July 22 Saturday, Aug 11  Sunday, Aug 26 Saturday, Sept 8 Sunday, Sept 23 Saturday, Oct 13  Sunday, Oct  28 Saturday, Nov  17  Sunday, Dec  2 – last one for 2012
Meetings start at 10am,  go til 12:30pm. Grind Gallery Café 4124 Main Street at King Edward Ave.

Email before you attend the first time: sometimes we go on field trips & artist dates an meet outside the Grind.
margolamont [at] gmail [dot] com

"READ DATING" FOR WRITERS - VPL's answer to speed dating

Wed.  Feb 15
6:30 - 8:30pm
Downtown Central Branch
in the Alice MacKay room on the lower level


Are you single and aged 55 or older?  Do you enjoy reading?  Want to meet others who are interested in the same thing? 

Come to our fun and casual Read Dating event for up to 17 dates in one night. 

This Read Dating event is a fun and easy way for singles to meet lots of potential dates in one evening. 

Participants are given 4 minutes to chat with each person, and will be provided with a temporary email to exchange. 

Bring your favourite book, DVD, or CD to discuss.

Registration has been underway since Jan.16th at the Popular Reading info desk on Level 2.

More info: Popular Reading Library
T:  604-331-3691

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Today's free-write prompt at Grind Writers - Jan 21, 2012

If you need more information on doing free-writes before you start - see "Free-writes, how-to" post of Jan 21, 2012.

Our prompts today come from EMOTIONAL CURRENCY (Kate Levinson, PhD. Berkley: Celestial Arts; 2011). The subtitle on this is "A Woman's Guide to Building a Healthy Relationship with Money" -- but most everything in this book applies pretty equally to men as well.

Prompt questions to write to around you + the cash:

1. What 3 things has the culture you grew up in taught you or conditioned you to believe about money?
2. Are you comfortable with your level of spending? (If not, how would you like it to be?)
3. What kinds of things are you seduced to buy?
4. What messages did you receive about being a man/woman in relation to money--making it, spending it, saving it, sharing it and giving it away, investing it?
5. Were money matters discussed in your family? In what manner were they discussed Did your parents retreat to discuss money in private, or did such discussions take place openly.
6. What relationships do you have that involve money?  And..?

Ok. Now, as Natalie Goldberg loves to say:  "Go: 10 minutes!"

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Margo Lamont

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Free-writes - how to

1. Set aside 10 to 15 minutes per prompt.
2. Select a prompt to write to. Do not spend too much time on this. It can be as easy as opening a book at a page, jabbing some line with your finger - then writing to that. Many writing-prompt sites online. Or get a book of prompts. Or randomly choose a photo in a magazine, or a newspaper headline.
3. Once you have a randomly chosen prompt, write to it. 
4. Write straight for 10 to 15 mins., no stopping. Pen does not leave the paper or hands do not leave hte keyboard. Just keep on pressing forward, writing whatever comes out. Whatever! Because this is just a draft, you might even write about what you want to write about around that prompt. Doesn't matter - just keep writing.
5. DO NOT EDIT as you write. Generating the words and editing them are 2 entirely different processes. They need to be kept separate. Repeat: write, do not edit.
6. Even if you hate your prompt, or do not feel like writing -- keep writing. Write about how much you hate the prompt or why you don't feel like writing.  Don't worry about language or grammar. Just write.
7. Don't have any expectations for this piece of writing to "be" anything.

Now you have something. A whole lot of drivel. A draft. Some ideas. A scene. Maybe a scrap of dialogue you'll use later.

Do a free write at least every day.  You'll be surprised what happens.

And read The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron about writing your Morning Pages and you can refine this.

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Margo Lamont


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