Home again, home again.
Ok, I think it's time to kill the word game. Two posts without guesses means people don't want to do it.
The final count was: Renée- 18, Dawn- 17, Paula- 13, Rhonda-12, Melissa-4, Katie-2, Michael- 2.
Now that the business is wrapped up, on to what I really want to talk about- the writer's retreat.
My goal going into the retreat was relatively simple. Learn a little bit about writing and make some connections. And I think that I accomplished those goals.
I got to drive up and back with my friend Patrick (the one who is in my critique group.) Patrick and I are eeriely similar in background and viewpoints. In fact our current novels have overlapping ideas behind them- but they were developed before we knew each other... Also I think Patrick is hilarious. Patrick says that most people don't think he's that funny, but I think being nearly identical people I get his humor. And seriously. Homeslice is hilarious. Emily Bronte has a great quote in Wuthering Heights, "Whatever souls are made of, his and mine are the same." I think that could be said of Patrick and I-- as long as you take out the romantic context of Wuthering Heights- Patrick is firmly girlfriended and also seven years younger than I am. But that also means that we are free to just be friends without all the tension. So Patrick was great for my retreat experience. I had a friend I could sit with at meals and hang out with and who I could trust to like me and not think I was being clingy.
I'm always so afraid of being thought clingy.
Another thing that helps my experience is that writers drink... a lot. There were a few who didn't, but by and large if they didn't drink they also didn't hang around the people who did. Except, of course, for me. I didn't even have a sip of alcohol all weekend, but the great thing about everyone else being drunk when you are sober (and I put this on facebook, but it bears repeating) is that- at least for this shy girl- It's a lot easier to overcome your shy-ness because likely these people are not going to remember anything you said or did in the morning. Instead they will just have a generally positive impression of you with no real memory of why. And if you do say something stupid.. well.. so is everyone else. Also my chameleon-like abilities to mimic ensure that I don't stand out too badly as the sober one. :)
As far as writing goes, I think I learned several things, too. I think the most important thing was something one of the faculty said on Friday. "Don't be afraid to state the obvious." I am afraid to state the obvious sometimes. Most times even, especially if I'm writing for a literary audience. If it's for YA I think I'm less freaked, but for some reason I'm afraid of insulting adults... but then I got to thinking... Do you look at the Mona Lisa and are insulted because it's obviously the portrait of a woman? You look at Starry Night and are you angry that you know it's a landscape? No. It's about the style and the texture and the choices the artist makes that create the beauty. In fact, way more often people are angry if they look at some abstract piece and can't figure it out. So why am I afraid of being too obvious in my own writing? Dumb.
I read (something I'd written) today at the last workshop before coming home. I was afraid to, but I did it anyway. I was scared because 1) It was non-fiction and referenced two people who were in the workshop with me-- not in a positive light and 2) I cursed in it... a lot. 3) I was angry in it and you know that's not how I normally roll.
But I read it... and my voice was all low and shaky cause I was so angry/emotional. (But the theatre kid in me was just a little pleased with that because it gave the piece even more verisimilitude.) And when I finished there was a pause and then everyone in the room sort of let out their breath heavily and started clapping. (The clapping was normal... the pause and the breath were not.) But the breath let me know. It let me know that I'd gotten them. Somehow I'd managed to *get* the whole room in half a page. One dude even spontaneously cried out, "How are you not published already?!" Oh, and the guy whom I'd called out via words very generously announced to everyone in the room who he was in the story and then complimented me on my work.
I'm glad that I read it... though I sorta still can't believe that I was brave enough to do it... But in a way it feels like one more victory. A woman (who was also named Renee!) came up to me later and thanked me for reading it. She lost a sister to cancer and she said- "That was truth." Wow. *Such* a compliment.
I sorta hate that I made the widow "announcement" in such big public way, but at the same time, it might have been a good thing... there was no awkward searching for something else to say, no guilt-ridden changing of the subject. People could just comment on something that I'd done within the writing, and then we could all move on to someone else's piece. Then everyone could emotionally process me and put me into a new little box in their head before they had to actually interact with me one on one again.
There are a few other stories to tell- the compliment huddle and the awkward way I still haven't figured out how to tell an individual that I'm a widow, but those will have to wait for another day and another blog post. Maybe if you are lucky I'll have time tomorrow.
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