When graphic designer, illustrator, art director and painter Liz Kalloch invited me to be a part of her year-long Tools & Talismans story/painting project several months ago, I shared with her a photo of my most prized work tools and precious writing talismans—and wrote a short description of each, as requested. Choosing and honoring these precious objects gave me an enormous infusion of gratitude for … Read More
An interview with Jordan Rosenfeld, Author of A Writer’s Guide to Persistence
I have long admired Jordan Rosenfeld for her literary wisdom and grace. A powerful role model for persistence, she has three new books out this year, with a fourth on its way—and a long history of inspiring and informing writers striving to improve their craft and their practice. I’m thrilled to share our conversation about the recently released A Writer’s Guide to Persistence. SC: Why is … Read More
An audience of one changes everything
When you’ve completed a piece of writing, what do you do with it? Do you tell yourself something unfriendly about your skills or your poem/story/essay/novel/article? Do you let it languish in a mute folder in your computer or filing cabinet? Does your cat sleep on it? Do you revise it repeatedly until you’ve thoroughly exhausted the impulse that called this piece of writing … Read More
A path toward living well: Tuesday, October 7
In my adult life, I have had two parallel quests: writing well and living well. In the last decade, I have come to understand that these paths are inextricably intertwined. Such that writing well has actually revealed the path toward living well. When my son and I were awake every two hours of every night for the first two and a half … Read More
Pigeons under the eaves
At each elbow, I am flanked by cats as I sit propped on pillows in bed. Alongside the base of my bed, my beloved old dog lies facing out toward anything she might need to defend us from. On her dog bed, a cat curled tight into the dog-made center dent. Sleep has been so difficult for me in recent … Read More
Listen To Your Mother on May 11
On May 11, Listen To Your Mother will be “giving motherhood a microphone” through a series of live stage readings in 32 cities nationwide in celebration of Mother’s Day. I’m so excited to be reading in Portland’s inaugural event with an all-star cast of 12 women exploring the hilarity, heartbreak and humility of motherhood. (Much to my own mother’s disappointment, the stories are not … Read More
Are you making enough mistakes?
It was a 5-star review of The Productive Writer. The reviewer had clearly appreciated and benefited from the book. She spent a paragraph saying so. And then she dedicated the second half of the review to venting about a typo that displeased her. This fascinated me. Because I have come to see that one particular typo, repeated multiple times throughout … Read More
Making mosaics
These last three months have been a comedy of error in which everything imaginable in my life has broken. When it started raining into my bedroom, I discovered my roof needed to be replaced. My front and back doors fell apart, my blog got repeatedly hacked and corrupted, multiple faucets started leaking–you get the picture. I have lived long enough … Read More
Dear Raspberry,
When I returned Noe to the earth and she sent her staccato of sweetness up into the unending sky, I was not yearning for more than I was given. Then the blueberries got to chattering all along the lattice of the deck and you rose from your empty decade, your margin of darkness to reach a bracken arm in. Volunteer … Read More
Learn who to ask for help, what to ask for, and how to use the feedback
An interesting series of questions at my Wordstock workshop on Sunday got me thinking about how asking for help—and making that help useful—is an art unto itself in the writing life. I’d like to offer some guidelines that I hope will invite the best possible support for your work and your process. Pay attention to the feedback and support that … Read More