Musings on the presence of spirits in our literature and in our lives.
Books by Picault, Saunders, Telgemeier. And thoughts from my creative journal.
I offer a short piece on an old man dealing with dying.
Continue readingMonth: March 2021
Joan Didion and Elmore Leonard encourage us to leave room in our writing for the reader’s imagination. Don’t overdress the blank form with smothering words.
Less is more.
I offer you “Showtime at the Stella.” Another character sketch for Kelsey Graf.
Continue readingMannequin Monday – Moving the Scene Along
SNL original member Laraine Newman teaches us about improv, about moving a scene along. We clothe our bare mannequin with purpose.
And I offer another character sketch, this one with a touch of humor. Enjoy.
Continue readingMannequin Monday – You Make the Rules
You decide what the mannequin wears. You dress the blank form. Your words. Your vision. Your rules.
Advice from a business writer and from a poet. You make the rules.
I mark one year of these Mannequin Monday posts today.
And I offer a brief story of my own. Enjoy your week.
What I’m Reading
This week marks post #52 in the Mannequin Monday blog series. I believe what so many say: 80% of success is showing up. And thanks to you for showing up to read my thoughts. You are always welcome here.
Yesterday I received a weekly newsletter from B2B writer Ed Gandia. Ed runs his own copywriting business. In this issue he offers advice about determining deposit amounts you can ask of a client. Ed says:
“Most good prospects are willing to comply with what YOU want. And once you understand this, you’ll get more confidence to make other improvements in your business standards.
Remember: YOU make the rules.
There’s no board of governors deciding what you must do. There’s no union. No upper management from which to get approval.
It’s up to you. You have full reign over how you operate your business.”
A good piece of advice I can see working in other walks of life. You make the rules. Segue! This reminds me of Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem The Art of Disappearing. Here are a few lines. You can read the entire poem here.
When they say Don’t I know you?/ say no.
If they say We should get together/ say why?
Continue readingMannequin Monday – “A lot of pain in that invisibility”
“If you weren’t so quiet, you wouldn’t have searched so desperately for a way to speak.” Springsteen and Obama on the Renegade podcast.
A ten-year old girl in post Civil war Texas learns English to find her voice.
And a chapter from my book, A Twin Long Gone. Trying to re-create a voice.
What I’m Reading
I started this week listening to the first two episodes of the podcast Renegade on Spotify. Bruce Springsteen and Barack Obama engage in a long conversation about music, America, their individual backgrounds.
Early in the first episode Obama mentions the shy quality he sees in Springsteen. That sparks a long comment from Springsteen about the shyness prevalent in so many entertainers and performers.
“If you weren’t so quiet,” Springsteen says, ” you wouldn’t have searched so desperately for a way to speak. The reason you desperately pursue your work and your language and your voice is because you haven’t had one. You realize that, and you feel the pain of being somewhat voiceless.”
Springsteen goes on: “The performance becomes the mechanism from which you express the entirety of your life. Previous to that I was pretty invisible. A lot of pain in that invisibility.”
It’s all about finding your voice, about desperately pursuing that voice. A matter of survival. Speak or die invisible.
Author and artist Austin Kleon says in his book Show Your Work the only way to find your voice is to use it. He goes so far as to say, if you’re not on the Internet, you don’t exist. Strong words, but they echo Springsteen. You express yourself because you feel the pain of being somewhat invisible.
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