12/25/10

To the person who tried to buy Verizon prepaid minutes with my debit card today

You took two cameras, a GPS and a Zune, my wallet, twenty dollars, and an insurance folder from my car. After calling State Farm, I know that the total value of all this is estimated at $744.00. After talking to the police, I learned that there’s not much that’ll happen now. Although, he did take fingerprints from the car, which felt a little like CSI.

The insurance folder included insurance cards, registration, some napkins, and a 10mm socket wrench. In my wallet, there was my license, my school ID, three different insurance cards, a credit card, a debit card, and a significant stack of punch cards that I collected from various restaurants. The worst part about losing the cameras is losing the memories on them. The GPS was broken anyway.

I don’t know why you did this. I’ve imagined a lot of reasons why, but the one I like best is so your kids could have presents on Christmas. I know that doesn’t explain everything, like the insurance stuff, but I still like to imagine your children unwrapping one of the cameras, or the music player, or whatever on Christmas. In my head, they’re younger—maybe nine or ten, but they might be older too. It doesn’t matter. I imagine they’ll be excited, that they’ll wonder how you got the money together to afford something like this. They will probably hug you. They will be so excited. And, when I imagine this, I wish you would have taken more.

12/16/10

“Only Brazil worms, only Brazil worms, only Brazil worms!”

This is a line from an essay written by Amy Leach. Karli recommends her. I read a recent interview and want to post some of her quotations.

About her--"On October 27th, Chicagoan Amy Leach, Instructor at Northwestern University, author and musician, won the 2010 Whiting Writer's Award.
This prestigious $50,000 award recognizes ten young writers for their extraordinary talent and promise and is one of the most coveted prizes for new writers. Awarded annually since 1985, past recipients include Michael Cunningham, Kim Edwards, Tobias Wolff, Jeffrey Eugenides, and Mary Karr – all have since become acclaimed, bestselling authors."

Good Quotations--
"The best writing is when you're writing about something you love- it's not about sounding smart or anything. It's the language itself."

"When I write, I don't start with any kind of message really, or any meaning at all. I want to learn about and think new things, to feel new things. Every time, I'm learning about a new subject, making an imaginative effort."
"Writer's 'block'? I stop writing and read a lot, walk the dog, replenish." As a teacher of creative writing, a lot of time is spent on other's writing. "I like sharing ideas in the classroom." What does she tell her students about writing?"
No hesitation here; her answer:
 "I tell them to combine personal experience with truth."
"They've become wise in a way only they can be- by not just accepting someone's truth or way of thinking, good writers, in their writing, are thinking for themselves and coming to their own wisdom, coming to their own truth." James Baldwin and  Allen Ginsberg influenced my writing."

Good stuff.  Thanks Karli.

12/9/10

Hello

I like the new look. I haven't checked this blog for ... boy, six months? More?

Firstly, I think your unintentional post is lovely, Meghan. I almost hesitate to follow it, because it's so honest and ... oh, I hate to use the word "profound" -- what does that even mean? -- so I'll just call it truthful. For the record, I think that worrying about writing, my writing, being profound is one of the biggest obstacles that stands between me and putting anything on paper. I always worry about writing something profound.

When I was in sixth grade, I remember hearing my teacher, Mrs. Bass, praising my brother Tanner's writing (Tanner had the same teacher a couple years previous), commenting that he wrote some "deep" essays, or something like that, I can't remember what adjective she used. Anyhow, I thought that I should be writing deep things, if my brother was, so for the next writing assignment, I wrote this paragraph about a old man, except I think it was just his head, floating in dark space, and he had a really long beard, and his beard was tangled and there was a key stuck in the tangles, I think. He may have been sad. It was completely meaningless.

Well, I don't have a whole lot to say. I have really enjoyed reading everyone's posts on here. Reading the writing of friends inspires me to write more than anything else. Outside of my journal and my work, these few paragraphs are possibly the most writing I have done in months and months. There's a good chance that it's the only extra-curricular writing I will do for a few more months. I miss you all, and I hope you are all doing well as you grade finals and create finals, carve out your prospective and nascent motherhoods, and work through the various tangled, key-filled beards of your winters.