My goal to write daily has been met so far. Thursday was the blog, of course. Friday I took the day off work in part to go to a workshop led by Ellen Bass. It was a inspiring workshop, and she is a good poet and a good person - gentle and thoughtful, but also with a sharp wit and keen ability as a teacher. She teaches creative writing in Santa Cruz, and apparently has done so since 1974. She spoke about "The Poem of the Moment," and she gave us some examples. She also had each of us try to start such a poem our own, at the end of the workshop. There were so many people in the room, about a dozen of us were sitting on the floor. I had a corner of a table to kneel at while I wrote.
I wrote a poem about telling R. about menstruation (the event itself is recorded in my 7/21/04 blog entry). And I was one of a few people who read their poems to the group. People laughed loudly at the right spots, which was gratifying. And Ellen said "Good work," among other nice things. But better than everyone's reaction was the fact that I wrote something new, and with some more work, I can add it to my collection of poems that are about life in general. (The other poems are about, or inspired by, role-playing games). And Ellen provided me with another look at what happens if you write poetry and send it out into the world and try to improve. I wouldn't mind having the awards and grants and recognition and publications under my belt that she has under hers. I have about twenty years to get there, I figure. "Lord willing and the creeks don't rise."
I also finished reading my neighbor's novel and wrote up a critique and got it all back to her (500+ pages of her double-space manuscript and 4 single-spaced pages of my comments and observations and suggestions). Phew! Glad to have fulfilled that obligation.
And I got a good start on cleaning out the house one corner at a time. Worked on our closet tonight. Threw out such things as the empty jacket for Heart's Little Queen LP and a slew of old AAA travel magazines. If we want to go somewhere, we'll look it up online.
I had thought I would go to bed but got a second wind. This after a day of running errands, horse-back riding lessons for R., a party for 3 hours and digging in the adobe for another 2 hours. I just feel energized. Or maybe the word I'm looking for is "manic."
(But at any rate, Clare, you'll be happy to know that I'm living more and more outside of my mind and in the present, where it's oh-so-nice to be.)
Here's a link to an Ellen Bass poem about praying in everything you do. K & B, please note the reference to riding the bus. You see how riding the bus really is very important in the whole scheme of things. It is not necessary to make fun of certain role-playing characters for liking to take public transportation. Public transportation is cool.
End of random thoughts for the day. I also worked on the new poem, earlier, and updated my "fitness" blog, so I met my goal again today.
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