Dishwater Words
Here’s a link to Hope Clark’s blog about dishwater words. How often do we use these watered-down words in our writing? If you’re guilty, this post will help you clean up your manuscript! http://hopeclark.blogspot.com/2011/06/dishwater-words.html
Read MoreNicollet Mall Poetry Contest
Hi everyone! I just found a new contest that looks really interesting. Nicollet Mall is looking for theme based poems of 30 words or less which will be placed on signs between Washington and 4th Street in downtown Minneapolis. There are cash prizes, too. Make sure you use one of the required (themed) words they have on the website. Doesn’t this sound like a fun project? My hometown library did something similar. Five poems were selected and imprinted on the sidewalk next to the newly remodeled library. I’ll be reading my poem (an untitled haiku) tomorrow at 1 p.m. at the Pine City library. For those of you who can’t make it to the library, here’s my poem: Days flutter past like/the pages of an empty/book read by the...
Read MoreClothesline Cowboys
Finally, after days of rain and cold, the sun is shining here in Pine City. I took advantage of that sunshine this morning and hung the laundry on the clothesline. As I snapped the wet clothes to the line, I thought of my mother and how hanging clothes on the line wasn’t a luxury to be enjoyed on a sunny day, but a chore she did no matter what the weather was like. She would carry the wicker basket of wet clothes to the hill behind our house and clip the clothing on the line, overlapping the edges to save on clothespins. My job was to hand her the wooden pins as she smoothed the creases from the clothing. Your assignment is to write about your experience with clotheslines. Post your writing below so we can all enjoy. And if you have a few extra minutes, I...
Read MoreSuper Memories
Last Sunday, Sixty Minutes had a segment about people with super memories. These five people possessed the ability to recall dates and events from years ago in only seconds. Is this ability a gift or a curse? As memoir writers, wouldn’t it be wonderful to recall almost every day and event of your life? To remember entire conversations word for word? So what’s the science behind memory? According to the expert I watched, adrenaline is the magic bullet that sears a memory into our brains. I have often said that emotion is what drives us to remember an event. But if you think about it, an adrenaline rush is probably a part of that emotion. Scroll back through the significant memories of your life and try to attach an emotion to each event. I can almost...
Read MoreI Remember Dick and Jane and the Hokey Pokey
As memoir writers we are asked to write about things we remember. Think about your first school experience. Our district didn’t have a kindergarten program, so my first school experience was as a first grader in a one-room school near Underwood, Minnesota. I remember my teacher, Mrs. Gense, and the brass bell she rang to call us in from recess. I remember Dick and Jane books and how I dismissed them as “baby” books, too easy for me. I remember playing Hokey Pokey during a rainy lunch hour. But when I try to remember more about first grade, there are large holes in my memories, things I just can’t remember. I can’t remember what subjects, other than reading, I studied. I can’t remember what it was like to eat lunch from my...
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