painted mitten
Fall in Interlochen.
A writer’s retreat with time and with Beth as we continue our writing journey. This was a short one – Memoir writing – which I can use as a gateway into my work. Playwrighting and short stories. A lot of review of story structure, but I did get some good information about small presses and submitting without an agent. I am inspired to submit to journals and smaller presses. The dream starts to simmer – all the literary magazines that might say yes! And yes, no. Submitting to the Dunes Review felt amazing and gives that thrill of forward movement.
The drive through upper Michigan was full of peak color and apple mills, just a perfect get away. I began to understand the market for the cozy mystery. Coffee shops and bookstores, small towns in the autumn. Electric Possum has some of this, but I don’t think it will be a cozy novel at all. Speculative Fiction in the woods?
When we went to camp as kids our grandmother put together “boxes” for us. Shoeboxes covered in masking tape, bulging with care package items for a 10-year-old: comic books, peanut brittle, gum, stickers, self-addressed postcards we sent out (or not). Last time I made one of these for Beth with many of the same items. This trip, she handed me a large, beautiful box with tattoos, writing stickers, a writing journal, elegant chocolate and my favorite butter pretzels. A gorgeous huge book travel mug. And a baby possum someone had knitted, his pink tail a rope to hang him from. His grey head sports a mohawk, his small pink felt hands complete with articulated fingers. This and a Halloween picture of a ghost riding a sincere looking possum are my sister’s offering to my inspiration for my novel as I fret about it being relevant.
Monday, I found myself still at Interlochen, at the Harvey Theatre, teaching a movement workshop for their seniors. A blast! We saw a student production of Heartless adapted (with permission, I hope) from a novel about the queen of hearts from Alice in Wonderland. Truly creative stuff.
So now, as far as writing goes – I’m at work editing Beth’s future chapbook – a labor of love and the writing is so engaging! Also revising the script of Buffalo Talks to the Moon for the cast and designers as it goes up late February. The unwritten/unfinished novels are bubbling – the ideas still coming. The draft of the midgrade is in the drawer. Discouraged by the state of the mid-grade market, I’m waiting until it wants to speak to me on its own. But knowing I have a first draft finished gives hope. I did that. I’m not sure what my take-away was for this retreat – didn’t get much time to write – mostly lectures. But beauty, sisterhood, permission to be a writer is a great inspiration never-the-less.
The trees on the way up through Michigan had been mostly green – a few yellow or orange patches. In the middle of the retreat nature took a paintbrush to the campus. We were in a Hallmark movie. On the way back home, and for most of the way down the mitten, the trees vibrated with color. We stopped at the Apple Mill, donuts and cider slushies, smell of a wood fire somewhere, then drove into the greener wrist of the state. We relished our final hour together and reviewed our take-aways from the retreat, a tiny possum swinging upside down under the rear-view mirror.