Writing Down the Bones
Following up on yesterday's post, The Bookshelves of Others, the book I spotted in the bookcase in my bedroom at VCCA was Natalie Goldberg's classic Writing Down the Bones. I entertained myself with scanning the shelves while brushing my teeth, and so I almost spat a mouth full of toothpaste on the shelf when I finally noticed it. For two weeks I'd been [...]
The Bookshelves of Others
The bookshelves of other people are fascinating. What do they tell you? When I'm invited to other people's homes, I appreciate when one of the rooms I get to be in features a bookcase. It's always worth studying. When staying at a friend's place, I love it when the guestroom features a bookcase to rummage through. A friend's taste in books won't [...]
Serenity at the VCCA
Oh, the serenity of a residency at the VCCA! I've returned to my everyday life in Chicago, and already VCCA's calm and focused atmosphere seems elusive. So I thought I'd collect some of my photos from my time there as a reminder. The tah-tong tah-tong of the freight train roaring by at the bottom of the hill - it's such [...]
Retyping and Plotting
Right now, this is the wall by my desk in my studio at the VCCA. I am still cutting paper into bits and pieces to work with text (see also my recent Cut and Tape post)! Right now I'm plotting; a common technique for fiction writers, but something I have never done before. My project for my VCCA residency is to see whether [...]
Walking the Woods at VCCA
I can hardly believe my good fortune to have been granted another residency at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (VCCA), and so, when I arrived and temperatures were in the high 50s (as opposed to below the freezing point in my hometown of Chicago), I just had to venture out on my beloved walk through the VCCA woods. [...]
Cut and Tape a Text
I love the cut and paste feature of Word, but every now and then, I resort to scissors and tape to arrange a text. Whenever I struggle with structure, I find that it helps to physically organize the text. I'm currently working on a list essay where the order of the items is especially important, and even after reworking the [...]