This is what a studio of creativity looks like. Humans gather to talk about their favourite
authors. I wonder what authors are my favourite today? When I was a little girl, it was A.A.
Milne, the author of Winnie the Pooh; this is what he has to say about the writing process:
“Ideas may drift into other minds, but they do not drift my way. I have to go and fetch them. I
know no work manual or mental to equal the appalling heart-breaking anguish of fetching an
idea from nowhere.”
‘Lucy Maud Montgomery.’ She fascinates me, mostly because I relate to the exquisite
language of her imagination and to see her house and her things make my heart skip a beat. I
want so much to be a writer like her and engage my characters that put life into the world of my
past budding girlhood. Then it was my sister’s book called ‘Virgins’ by Caryl Rivers. My dad
threw the book away just when my sister and I were halfway through the novel. I was angry, my
sister still has left over animosity towards our dad.
I wanted to enjoy Shakespeare in high school, but somehow our English teacher beat the
language to death, which made me literally kill Shakespeare’s ghost. I wonder if I read Romeo
and Juliet again, if I would feel the same way?
These students in this class seem to be advanced in their speech and writing. I fear I have
taken the wrong turn getting here? Was choosing this class a mistake? Oh shit! Here I go again,
thinking about myself. No wonder my mother calls me selfish every now and then. Somehow,
trauma and suffering can cause havoc on emotions and health in a person.
“We won’t have a formal critique,” Jake said. Did he really say what I think he said? I
never met a Professor like this before. How radical, how exciting. I am curious and completely
engaged. This is rather a comfortable place, a place where… if I were naked in my writing, no
one would strip it further to the point of killing my words to the bone. I will not worry; this is
dialogue of creative minds. Open the idea and look inside, you hold a delightful find.
These authors, Saunders, is he Russian? And who is Flannery O’Connor?
My desire to read these authors and learn who they are might push my language into the
abyss of endless words that may break through the blocks that blur.
Curious and more curious, I found some quotes written by my favourite authors that interest me
in this writing process:
“Smell is the closest thing human beings have to a time machine.” by Caryl Rivers. Now that is
profound. It is hard to describe the sweet, seedy taste of a strawberry, or describing the scent
after fresh rain in spring, thinking about fresh rain, that is a smell that if I could bottle it up and
sniff it daily, I think I would drop from the sky down into the soft tall meadows of wet dew
seeping through my dress. How I love a blanket of nature enfolding me in a kiss.
How about this one:
“Nothing is ever really lost to us as long as we remember it.” By Lucy Maud Montgomery. My
goodness, that quote makes me think of a wonderful mother I know well who was recently diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s. What a horrible thing to think about at this moment. Imagine this beautiful mother one day won’t remember anything and will lose everything! That thought is enough to bury all the memory files, letters, historical facts of her dear family that were ever recorded thrown away into Niagara falls. I cannot believe that words can disappear from connections of a highly functional and articulate brain such as hers. You know what calms me at the moment? It is the realization that even though all is lost at some point in the future for this dear woman, is the very fact that love is found written in the heart of a tender and gentle soul of a good mother.
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