IWC's 2015 in Review

by

Sarah White

President, Indiana Writers' Consortium

 

Friends, it’s that time again.  Time to take a look back at another great year.  The Indiana Writers’ Consortium had a fantastic 2015!  Many thanks to all of the people who worked so hard to make our year a success.  We are an organization that is growing by the day, by the week, and by the event.  We have grown from 23 members in 2013 to our current 66 members and counting.  As many of us know, this community of writers is an invaluable resource to our region.  We share our work, our passion for writing, and come together to help expand our artistic (and necessary) presence in Northwest Indiana and beyond.  We provide excellent professional development opportunities and amazing experiences for those writers who choose to be involved in our many activities. This year, we hosted two Paper Fields Creative Writing Workshop events—conducted by award-winning writers— and eight Stream Line Readings in our special collaborative series with Purdue Calumet and Paul Henry’s Art Gallery.  Each one has been rewarding. I participated in one on Flash Fiction/Nonfiction, and it was a warm and edifying experience.  We conducted our regular Eat & Exchange Series (6 total discussions), and 3 Saturday Workshops.  Also, we hosted our always popular Literary Pub Crawl, introducing new voices to our organization. 

Once again, our Steel Pen Literary Conference brought many well-known writers to Northwest Indiana.  It was a full day of presentations and networking—a true celebration of writing!  Much appreciation to those who made sure our conference was the crowning achievement of our year, especially the efforts of the tireless Janine Harrison. 

In addition, each year, we sponsor the P.O.P.P. (Our Power of Poetry Project) for young children.  This year was particularly special because we offered the Tom Spencer Award.  Tom Spencer was a talented poet and great friend to the IWC who passed away this year.  He was a combat Engineer with the US Army, served during Vietnam, and a past Commander of the Lowell American Legion.  He was a member of Tri Creek Historical Association, Friends of the Library, Gleaners, IWC, Write On Hoosiers, NWI Poetry Society, IN and National Federation of Poetry Clubs.  What an amazing man and great supporter of writing.  Tom is truly missed.

Friends, thank you for your continued support of the Indiana Writers’ Consortium.  Thank you for making our organization such a wonderful community of artists.  As we continue to grow, our hope is to continue to build and strengthen our literary community here in Northwest Indiana, providing a showcase for the incredible wealth of talent our region possesses.

Here’s to a great 2016!  May all our writing dreams come true! 



The Season of Stories

by

Sarah White

 

 

Thanksgiving ushers in the most wonderful time of the year: the season of stories. Everywhere we turn, we are surrounded by the music of language. Families sit around dinner tables and talk about relatives alive or long since passed. Traditions are handed down in kitchens dusted with sugar and flour.  Children gather with beaming faces to listen to a man dressed in red speak about his reindeer and the mythical wonders of the North Pole. Churches, with pews bathed in the flickering light of candles, hush when The Gospel of Luke is read.  Menorahs glow brighter each night in celebration of light triumphing over darkness. The world hums with the murmur of a thousand celebrations.

The holiday season, perhaps more than at any other time of the year, celebrates the stories that define us, the narratives we cherish, the words we hold most dear.  We sing more songs.  We share our memories.  We revel in the magic of storytelling.

When I was a child, the Christmas season pulsed with the bustle of anticipation and the feverish energy of a little girl’s imagination.

For me, the joy of Christmas comes from one particularly special memory--it was the Christmas of 1980. That Christmas, when I crept downstairs and tore the paper off the boxes, I found things that I had ached to own. The world was abuzz with Star Wars. All of my friends had Star Wars figures, spaceships, t-shirts. And, there, in my hands, was the Millennium Falcon, one of the largest ships. Next, I found Princess Leia, Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Chewbacca, Darth Vader, C-3PO and R2D2, Obi-wan Kenobi--they were mine! I held the power of those films in my own small hands. I could create my own narratives, these figures the characters in my own vivid imaginings.

My Grandpa White made Christmas other-worldly. To me, part of the holiday was just listening to his "radio announcer" voice tell tales of Santa and the North Pole--his eyes twinkling. I never really "believed" in Santa Claus per se. I had a grate in my bedroom floor where I could peek down into the living room. I had seen my father in his briefs setting out presents once. Mostly, I humored Grandpa White because he seemed to believe in Santa and reindeer with such a childlike wonder you couldn't help but be swept up, too. Grandma and Grandpa White's house gonged with the chimes of dozens of clocks. Burl Ives, Andy Williams, Ed Ames, and all of the classic Christmas songs spun on their large record-player that was the size of a hope chest. The house smelled like ham, potatoes, apple pie. Grandma would fill up a huge crystal bowl with Hawaiian Punch and Sprite. We used ladles and fancy glass cups. We munched on peanuts, crackers and cheese. They would have their fireplace blazing. Much of the magic of my childhood Christmases comes from these memories.

These are some of my favorite holiday memories and stories. 

What are yours?

 

 

 



Life is the Journey

by

Sarah White

 

The only things I know about travel writing are things I read in a book.  Pretty apropos, really. 

 

To me, that statement sums up exactly what travel writing should do—take a reader to a place and let that reader have the experience of that place whether he or she ever goes there or not. Setting becomes the main character in a narrative that revolves around the five senses, the context of history, and how that place affected the writer.

I have stared the Sphinx in the face and sweated inside the queen’s chamber of the Great Pyramid, but what I know that most people don’t is that across the street from the pyramids is a Pizza Hut, and when you push open the curtains, you have the most magnificent view.  I know what it feels like to stand inside Westminster Abbey.   I have tasted Sedona, AZ in the middle of a thunderstorm, and I knew what it must feel like to stare up from an ocean floor—no matter how fossilized and arid.  I touched the Thames and felt the whipping winds howl in my ears at Stonehenge.

Yet, have I ever been to Rome?  Shivered in Moscow?  Sipped miso soup in Japan?

Even before the Internet, travel writing connected readers to the world. People took journeys to “exotic” lands and published their adventures, leaving readers spellbound and amazed by the diversity of world around us. 

If you are interested in travel writing, you might check out the following blogs:

 

www.ridetowrite.com

www.everywhereist.com (Recommended to me by a noted local poet, Bethany Lee.)

www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-hodson/top-travel-blogs-discover_b_817283.html

 

Get out and explore your corner of the globe.  Travel writing doesn’t have to be about places miles and miles away. Sometimes, the best story is just around the corner.  Are there local festivals that more people should know about?  What makes your “hometown” special and unique?

A staycation can give you just as many stories as a vacation across many states or many oceans.

In the end, the thing to remember is what I tell my students every semester: It’s not what you write about; it’s how you write about it.

Take us outside of ourselves and away from ourselves for the span of a few minutes.

Let us “hit the road” and escape.  Let us refresh and renew our own perspectives and take a mentally journey we won’t soon forget.

 

 

 

 

 



Writers Seeking Writers

by

Sarah White

 



After I graduated from Bowling Green State University with my Bachelor of Fine Arts, I prowled the streets of my hometown desperate to find fellow writers in my community. 

In the newspaper (people read those back then), I found an advertisement about a writing group. It met at the local library twice a month. Immediately, I called the number and found out what days and times. The man was welcoming and eager to have a new member. 

When I went to the public library for the first meeting, I was ecstatic.  I was finally going to rejoin with a group of fellow writers who shared each other’s love of language and story.  In college, I had had workshops, deadlines, readings—a nurturing, artistic environment.  When it all suddenly stopped, I felt adrift, almost depressed.  But, here, I had found this group! 

I looked around and around at the various tables, and there, in the back of the library, were my two people. 

The woman was probably in her early 70’s and she wrote lyrical poetry with a staunch rhyme scheme and all the “thees” and “thous” she could muster.  She firmly believed that all love stories should focus on “beautiful people” because “nobody wants to read a romance about ugly people.”  I’ll never forget that. 

The man hovered in his early 50’s and he wrote stories about middle-aged male protagonists struggling with marriage and sex, sort of a blend of American Beauty and just about any Michael Douglas movie.  I’ll never forget that either. 

And, then, there was me—a 24-year-old who wrote literary stories that teetered on purple prose. 

This was my writing community. 

Eventually, the group dwindled down to just the man and me.  His critiques were helpful, and I learned a few things, but this was not the robust group of people starving and bleeding for their craft that my young imagination had hoped to find.

Being a part of a good writing community is necessary for every writer, regardless of his or her abilities, publication record, or education level. As previous posts have mentioned, writing groups provide with us networking, the chance to “break bread” with fellow artists, and the opportunity to have our work read and critiqued by peers.

We should never take a strong writing community for granted.

One of my favorite quotes is attributed to C. S. Lewis: “We read to know we’re not alone.” 

Isn’t it ironic that writers sit alone in front of typewriters and blank computer screens only to reach through space and time to let another person feel less alone?

Writing groups, likewise, let writers know we’re not alone. We may tell our stories in solitude, but it is always with the hopes of that story being read.

As Stephen King tells us: “Write with the door closed, and rewrite with the door open.”

Open up the door and join the IWC at one of its many reading and writing events!

Doing so may just give you a good story to tell.