MUSE LOG: Getting Started    
 Getting Started4 comments
23 Apr 2003 @ 22:32, by John Ashbaugh

Tuesday, at eleven thirty-seven towards the middle of the night.

Tomorrow morning, I’m going to tell my students to start writing their writing improvement plan. As they struggle with this concept of a strategy that will further them down the road towards clarity in thoughtful written expression, I need to reflect on a strategy of my own. Now I am going to be in on the ground floor of a creative writing group in the New Civilization Website. Five others and myself so far and probably a few more, but not likely too many, perhaps about a dozen will be a part of this exchange. I need to decide what I want to show these people, what I want to tell them. I haven’t written for anyone in particular like this since I don’t remember when, except for the occasional letter, to some particular friend or another, or a brother or sister to whom I had some special message to convey.
I associate my writing with the concept of letters, one characteristic of which is its timeliness. I have fragments of journals that I have been writing since my early twenties, sitting in some dustbin corner lost amongst other detritus I have managed to carry from place to place in my search for a place to sit once and for all, if there is such a place. Very rarely do I ever go back and read some of those notes to myself, reminders of where I have been and guesses about tomorrow. There is always this search for transition, to leave something behind and step into a new river valley, a new lakeside, a different kind of forest, another quality of desert.
The flames at night cast light into the shadows as pages inscribed with my heart are consigned to smoke and ashes. One of those Loves who disappeared so that I had only my pen to speak with and nowhere to send those words. Two years of living in another world with people whom I will never see again. Letters to the sky, the stars, and the rain. As leaves crumple into dust and memories evaporate, there is only now, another page that needs to be filled. 12:19, April 23

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4 comments

24 Apr 2003 @ 11:18 by swan : Strategy for writing...humm
Whatever strategy you used to write the last paragraph works very well, John. One of my trepidations about being in a creative writing group is about losing some of the freshness, beauty and innocence of spontaneous writing to the process. My strategy, if I was to think about it, would be one that retained those things, satisfied my need to put words to page and also touched others.  

24 Apr 2003 @ 11:46 by invictus : Well...
One of the main things I think we're trying to do here is to create an atmosphere that allows for all the freshness, beauty, and innocence in the world, just by being nice and stuff, and having creative gems like Johns writings, like the above, to inspire people. It got me in a very reflective mood; like, about what I'm doing when I write all the things I do, and why I'm even doing it. Thoughts... so many thoughts. Head spinning. Writing is probably the form of expression I'm best at, when I put my mind to it. But so often... Moody Goblin. I'm immersed up to my eyes in the search John talks about above. If I don't step into a new river valley soon, I'm going to go bonkers. Writing is one of the only ways I know of doing it; of stepping myself through the process. I'm learning to open myself up more to a piece of paper, but I have serious apprehensions about sharing the words that come out when I'm more opened up. Mmm; your entry has gotten me in a reflective mood indeed, John. It often happens that ideas all try to come out of my fingers on to paper (or screen) all at once, and jam the door up. But the door doesn't often get jammed with reflections. How do reflections fill up that much space?  

24 Apr 2003 @ 20:05 by martha : starting
Thanks John, swan and andy for your thoughts. Rather than fill you in on my writing saga it is sufficient to say that I miss the playfulness i found in writing several years ago. Focusing on what you might want to accomplish is one way. Another is to go with the flow. To help me unblock my thoughts I started writing with my non dominate hand and amazed myself at the words and ideas that flowed. I went on to write the first draft of a childs book.(middle reader) Now I am emersed in more mundane writing (pattern book) though I still manage to put in some humor.
Swan I think being in a small group requires sensitivity and understanding. Egos need to leave as we discuss how to open up more.  

25 Apr 2003 @ 01:31 by koravya : Followup
April 25 already, at one fifty-one nighttime.
Had a dream of flying the night before last after writing the above entry. Cruising through my old childhood neighborhood from not far above the rooftops over to my grade school schoolyard filled with children of all grade school ages during recess. After two morning periods of whatever subjects, this was the time for mixing it up with the crowd, playing whatever games we happened to think up with our best friends.
All of these children are unfamiliar to me, like they are from another generation. Some of them notice me slowly traversing the sky for the length of the playground, but even in noticing, they seem hardly to care, and go about their own concerns. I look down on my childhood and I don’t know anyone there and those that are there are fairly oblivious to this observer sailing over their games.
I was looking for myself down there, but I was nowhere to be found. Leaving the schoolyard behind, continuing up the narrow residential streets of the neighborhood lined with tall maple trees and occasional parked cars, going farther and farther away, block after block to where the boundaries of this extended neighborhood begin to merge with the boundaries of neighboring neighborhoods, where there are kids who don’t go to our school, and the horizon begins to extend to the boundaries of the city, and from there to everywhere.  

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