In a recent blog post, Ole Blue the Heretic wrote, “People who have sorrowful looking eyes may be very happy, yet people who have happy eyes may be filled with sadness. We are all actors on the stage called life and each act according to their own life script.” You can read the rest of the post here.
Ole Blue’s words brought three things to mind. First, that writing lifestories gives us the opportunity to allow people to peak behind the mask of the role we’ve created for living our life script. Most commonly we write about events that conform to our own life script. It doesn’t have to always be that way. You can write the Truth behind the eyes. Some of those stories will be intensely private, written for your eyes only. Others may be intensely touching when others read them.
The obvious next thought was that the choices we make about which stories to share are generally consistent with the life script we’ve chosen to live, or at least the script as we understand it, view ourselves and want to be remembered. It takes a conscious and deliberate choice to share a story that moves the mask aside.
Finally, I recognized what may be the key source to discomfort associated with writing about the human frailty of relatives and friends. These stories dislodge the masks of those other people. Messing with someone’s mask, especially in writing, is serious business. If I slide your mask aside, I’m at serious risk of having my own ripped off!
With those three things in mind, I’m suddenly challenged to consider just what life script I’ve chosen for myself. I have some fuzzy idea, but I couldn’t simply sit down and write it out, even for myself, without some floundering. What a fascinating assignment for personal exploration! I see the potential in this exercise for opening new avenues of personal growth I might never discover otherwise.
What about you? Have you thought about the nature of the role you are reading on the stage of life? What’s the story behind your eyes? Is this a story you could tell the world, or perhaps one you’d benefit from writing, then shredding?
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
Tuesday, May 30, 2006
Miracle or Coincidence?
One of my favorite pieces of jewelry is my cartouche, an Egyptian nametag of sorts. Modern cartouches, patterned after the Pharaoh’s name plates, are made of gold, with hieroglyphic symbols for each letter in a person’s name soldered onto a bordered gold oval with an elaborate hanging loop above and the traditional bar across the bottom. I bought mine in the gift shop at the Pyramids Hotel in Geza, where we stayed, right across the highway from the Pyramids.
Its valuable to me went far beyond being a customized and unique piece of gold jewelry. Whenever I wore it, I remembered that special trip to Israel and Egypt, and it also reminded me of the tiny gold nametag my father bought for me on my first birthday. I wore my toddler nametag constantly for years, and my cartouche almost as much.
I was devastated one day over two years to discover that the tiny gold bar at the bottom of the cartouche was missing. We were sitting at dinner in San Antonio at the time, and I assumed it had fallen out somewhere during our trip. For two years I grieved each time I saw that forlorn necklace lying unworn — I would not wear it without its bar. It seemed wrong.
I priced having it repaired, and the cost of the new bar was about 150% of the original price of the necklace, a price I was unwilling to pay. Finally, a couple of weeks ago, I glued a small piece of cheap gold-colored wire in place and began wearing my necklace again. Any bar at all is better than none. I don’t care if it’s real gold. I want to wear my necklace! I thought.
Yesterday I vacuumed the shag rug in our bedroom. When I finished, I noticed something that appeared to be a single speck of lint. Rather than turn the vacuum back on, I bent down and picked it up. To my utter astonishment, it was the missing bar from my cartouche!
This wee thing is not even a millimeter in diameter and less than half an inch long. It has lain in the rug all this time. Now I’m not a fanatic about vacuuming, but over the course of two years, I’ve done so more than a couple of times, yet this tiny object was not sucked up by my industrial-strength Hoover. It remained there for over two years, then it surfaced, caught my attention, and I’m on my way to have it soldered back into place.
Miracle or coincidence? I leave it for you to judge. To me it’s a miracle, a sign, and I celebrate accordingly.
I could write more about the importance to me of signs and miracles, but I’ll leave it here for now. How about you? Have you experienced a miracle, or met an angel? What do you make of such things? How about writing of your experiences? How about a short note in a comment here? We’d love to hear it.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Its valuable to me went far beyond being a customized and unique piece of gold jewelry. Whenever I wore it, I remembered that special trip to Israel and Egypt, and it also reminded me of the tiny gold nametag my father bought for me on my first birthday. I wore my toddler nametag constantly for years, and my cartouche almost as much.
I was devastated one day over two years to discover that the tiny gold bar at the bottom of the cartouche was missing. We were sitting at dinner in San Antonio at the time, and I assumed it had fallen out somewhere during our trip. For two years I grieved each time I saw that forlorn necklace lying unworn — I would not wear it without its bar. It seemed wrong.
I priced having it repaired, and the cost of the new bar was about 150% of the original price of the necklace, a price I was unwilling to pay. Finally, a couple of weeks ago, I glued a small piece of cheap gold-colored wire in place and began wearing my necklace again. Any bar at all is better than none. I don’t care if it’s real gold. I want to wear my necklace! I thought.
Yesterday I vacuumed the shag rug in our bedroom. When I finished, I noticed something that appeared to be a single speck of lint. Rather than turn the vacuum back on, I bent down and picked it up. To my utter astonishment, it was the missing bar from my cartouche!
This wee thing is not even a millimeter in diameter and less than half an inch long. It has lain in the rug all this time. Now I’m not a fanatic about vacuuming, but over the course of two years, I’ve done so more than a couple of times, yet this tiny object was not sucked up by my industrial-strength Hoover. It remained there for over two years, then it surfaced, caught my attention, and I’m on my way to have it soldered back into place.
Miracle or coincidence? I leave it for you to judge. To me it’s a miracle, a sign, and I celebrate accordingly.
I could write more about the importance to me of signs and miracles, but I’ll leave it here for now. How about you? Have you experienced a miracle, or met an angel? What do you make of such things? How about writing of your experiences? How about a short note in a comment here? We’d love to hear it.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Lost Civilization, Lost Knowledge
The May 2006 issue of National Geographic Magazine features an article on a tattooed mummy found sealed in a tomb in Peru. The 1500 year old mummy is a woman from the Moche society, which predated the Incas by several centuries. Archeologists found artifacts including golden jewelry, golden sewing needles and golden weaving tools, and many types of weapons.
This article brought to mind the fact that we know many early societies were able to refine metals, recognize the value of gold, and develop other relatively sophisticated technologies, but they didn’t have the ability to write down instructions in a durable form, and today we have no clue how they did these things.
This discovery led me to realize that today, if our own Western Civilization children were transported to the mountains of Peru, or some equivalent, only a tiny percent would have any inkling how to even grow food, let alone discover, mine and process metals. Would they be able even to shape stone hatchets for felling trees and managing a supply of firewood?
How fascinating that we consider ourselves so wise and evolved, but we are such prisoners of technology.
Perhaps you have memories of basic survival skills you learned and practiced as a youngster on camping trips or similar adventures. Have you taught these skills to your children and grandchildren? Have you written about them? What are we doing to prepare future generations for life in the post-petroleum era that’s likely to begin within their lifetimes, if not within our own? Are they prepared to cope with natural disasters that disrupt power and other services?
Do you have memories of wood stoves, cooking over a campfire, growing and drying food, or other skills that would serve you well in survival mode? Have you shared those stories? Let’s pool our memories of basic life skills, for the good of our families and communities!
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
This article brought to mind the fact that we know many early societies were able to refine metals, recognize the value of gold, and develop other relatively sophisticated technologies, but they didn’t have the ability to write down instructions in a durable form, and today we have no clue how they did these things.
This discovery led me to realize that today, if our own Western Civilization children were transported to the mountains of Peru, or some equivalent, only a tiny percent would have any inkling how to even grow food, let alone discover, mine and process metals. Would they be able even to shape stone hatchets for felling trees and managing a supply of firewood?
How fascinating that we consider ourselves so wise and evolved, but we are such prisoners of technology.
Perhaps you have memories of basic survival skills you learned and practiced as a youngster on camping trips or similar adventures. Have you taught these skills to your children and grandchildren? Have you written about them? What are we doing to prepare future generations for life in the post-petroleum era that’s likely to begin within their lifetimes, if not within our own? Are they prepared to cope with natural disasters that disrupt power and other services?
Do you have memories of wood stoves, cooking over a campfire, growing and drying food, or other skills that would serve you well in survival mode? Have you shared those stories? Let’s pool our memories of basic life skills, for the good of our families and communities!
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
How Did You Feel About That?
Books on lifestory writing uniformly suggest including personal reactions to events in your stories. (Please understand that that I make this blanket statement based on my own memory, without rechecking the dozen plus volumes on my shelf.) I was recently involved in a lively and enlightening discussion of this matter with a group of students.
One student encouraged another to include at least a brief explanation of personal feelings and responses in stories covering content that would normally evoke an intense emotional reaction. “When you don’t tell us your reaction, you seem sort of detached or dispassionate. I can’t believe these situations didn’t affect you somehow. I’m looking for that information.”
Another student took a different view, pointing out that many people don’t typically express these views when they talk of the experience, so it would be out of character to include them in written accounts. “People will come to their own conclusions about how they feel about these situations.”
Both of these astute observations are valid. Reporting feelings is a personal decision, and one that can only be made by the writer. If you don’t report your own feelings and reactions, readers are likely to attribute their reaction to you. This may not accurately reflect your experience. Perhaps the best guideline is to consider the result you want to achieve. If it matters to you that people understand how you felt, you must tell them. If it doesn’t matter, then follow your natural inclination.
Also, when you talk about your experiences, facial expression and body language indicate how you felt, so people sense your reaction even though you don’t specifically tell it. If they wonder, they can ask when you’re talking in person.
It needn’t take more than a few words to include reactions. For example, many years ago my husband and I climbed Mt. Monadnock in New Hampshire. On the way back down, ascending hikers began warning us that there was a dead man down the trail. About twenty minutes later we finally rounded a bend and found a sturdy hiker collapsed on the ground beside the trail. His skin was gray, but otherwise he looked as if he were merely asleep. Several hikers were keeping watch over the body, waiting for the family and park officials to arrive.
I could leave the description at that, and let you experience your own reaction. Or, I could write about my intense anxiety upon seeing this youthful and apparently healthy looking man lying dead beside the trail, or tell you how excited I was to see an actual dead body, or report the awe I felt at seeing an aura hovering above the body, or how I had to step to the side of the trail and hope nobody saw me lose my lunch…I could, but each of those reactions was fabricated for effect. In truth, the memory remains sobering nearly twenty years later, and it served as a wake-up call to the fragility of life.
You can see that it didn’t take many words to convey each of those sample reactions, and you see that many reactions are possible. If it mattered to me that you know how I personally felt, I’d have to tell you myself, rather than relying on the accuracy of your assumptions.
Are you naturally inclined to include your feelings and reactions? Try looking at stories you’ve written about intense events and consider whether adding more feelings would give readers a better sense of your nature. On the other end, are you including so much emotional content that other details of the story get lost? Balance is something to strive for.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
One student encouraged another to include at least a brief explanation of personal feelings and responses in stories covering content that would normally evoke an intense emotional reaction. “When you don’t tell us your reaction, you seem sort of detached or dispassionate. I can’t believe these situations didn’t affect you somehow. I’m looking for that information.”
Another student took a different view, pointing out that many people don’t typically express these views when they talk of the experience, so it would be out of character to include them in written accounts. “People will come to their own conclusions about how they feel about these situations.”
Both of these astute observations are valid. Reporting feelings is a personal decision, and one that can only be made by the writer. If you don’t report your own feelings and reactions, readers are likely to attribute their reaction to you. This may not accurately reflect your experience. Perhaps the best guideline is to consider the result you want to achieve. If it matters to you that people understand how you felt, you must tell them. If it doesn’t matter, then follow your natural inclination.
Also, when you talk about your experiences, facial expression and body language indicate how you felt, so people sense your reaction even though you don’t specifically tell it. If they wonder, they can ask when you’re talking in person.
It needn’t take more than a few words to include reactions. For example, many years ago my husband and I climbed Mt. Monadnock in New Hampshire. On the way back down, ascending hikers began warning us that there was a dead man down the trail. About twenty minutes later we finally rounded a bend and found a sturdy hiker collapsed on the ground beside the trail. His skin was gray, but otherwise he looked as if he were merely asleep. Several hikers were keeping watch over the body, waiting for the family and park officials to arrive.
I could leave the description at that, and let you experience your own reaction. Or, I could write about my intense anxiety upon seeing this youthful and apparently healthy looking man lying dead beside the trail, or tell you how excited I was to see an actual dead body, or report the awe I felt at seeing an aura hovering above the body, or how I had to step to the side of the trail and hope nobody saw me lose my lunch…I could, but each of those reactions was fabricated for effect. In truth, the memory remains sobering nearly twenty years later, and it served as a wake-up call to the fragility of life.
You can see that it didn’t take many words to convey each of those sample reactions, and you see that many reactions are possible. If it mattered to me that you know how I personally felt, I’d have to tell you myself, rather than relying on the accuracy of your assumptions.
Are you naturally inclined to include your feelings and reactions? Try looking at stories you’ve written about intense events and consider whether adding more feelings would give readers a better sense of your nature. On the other end, are you including so much emotional content that other details of the story get lost? Balance is something to strive for.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Sunday, May 21, 2006
Tales of Gratitude
To my own amazement, I just did a search and discovered that I have not yet written here about the topic of gratitude. Personally, I wouldn’t consider any account of my own life complete without covering this topic and the role it has come to play in my life. I want succeeding generations to know of the power of gratitude to maintain a cheerful spirit, emotional balance, and healthy relationships.
Although we learn about the concept of giving thanks for our food, writing thank you notes, and saying please and thank you by the time we reach kindergarten, relatively few people discover the full meaning of this powerful word. I hadn’t given it serious thought myself until two things coincided a few months ago.
First I had the opportunity to attend a local program by Dr. Mawaru Emoto, author of The Hidden Messages in Water. I can’t begin to do justice her to Dr. Emoto’s work, but you can learn more about it by going to his website, Hado.net. Shortly after that program, I received an e-mail invitation to visit the Go Gratitude website to view a fascinating flash movie about the whole concept of gratitude, and after viewing the movie, I signed up for the free 42 day Go Gratitude e-mail program. Each day I received a thought-provoking e-mail on the topic.
As a result of this saturation process, I have discovered that focusing on gratitude is one of the best ways to lift my mood, focus my stories, and keep my writing flowing. Whenever I feel stuck for a story idea, simply pulling out the Gratitude Journal I’ve started is like attaching jumper cables from the battery in my car to my brain. Zzzap! A story is off and running.
I highly recommend making your own list, or beginning a gratitude journal (it doesn’t have to be long, daily, or structured, just random thoughts will do). To help you get started, here are a few items from my own list:
What about you? Has gratitude played a major role in your life or thinking? How did you learn about the importance of gratitude? How do you express your gratitude? What aspects of your life are you especially grateful for?
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Although we learn about the concept of giving thanks for our food, writing thank you notes, and saying please and thank you by the time we reach kindergarten, relatively few people discover the full meaning of this powerful word. I hadn’t given it serious thought myself until two things coincided a few months ago.
First I had the opportunity to attend a local program by Dr. Mawaru Emoto, author of The Hidden Messages in Water. I can’t begin to do justice her to Dr. Emoto’s work, but you can learn more about it by going to his website, Hado.net. Shortly after that program, I received an e-mail invitation to visit the Go Gratitude website to view a fascinating flash movie about the whole concept of gratitude, and after viewing the movie, I signed up for the free 42 day Go Gratitude e-mail program. Each day I received a thought-provoking e-mail on the topic.
As a result of this saturation process, I have discovered that focusing on gratitude is one of the best ways to lift my mood, focus my stories, and keep my writing flowing. Whenever I feel stuck for a story idea, simply pulling out the Gratitude Journal I’ve started is like attaching jumper cables from the battery in my car to my brain. Zzzap! A story is off and running.
I highly recommend making your own list, or beginning a gratitude journal (it doesn’t have to be long, daily, or structured, just random thoughts will do). To help you get started, here are a few items from my own list:
- My hubby, who vaporized a thundercloud by drawing a cartoon for my eyes only, showing the humor in an oppressive situation.
- Reyna’s Mexican Market — the only place in Pittsburgh to buy chili powder with the fragrance and bite of New Mexico.
- Living in our own personal wildlife park with deer, groundhogs, turkeys, squirrels, rabbits, the occasional possum and raccoon, and centuries old oak trees.
- Our amazing local and county public libraries that put a universe of knowledge and ideas in front of my eyeballs — at no charge!
- Computers, the Internet and open-source software that has unleashed creativity and fostered connections with people around the globe.
- Readers of this blog, especially those readers who leave comments....
What about you? Has gratitude played a major role in your life or thinking? How did you learn about the importance of gratitude? How do you express your gratitude? What aspects of your life are you especially grateful for?
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
The Power of Perception
Today’s blog is about readers and perception. It was inspired by two e-mails I received yesterday (two on one subject is a serious sign), and is intended as counterpoint to the piece on perfection, to help you remain balanced.
The first e-mail consisted of the following gobbledygook. You may have seen it yourself, but it bears repeating:
i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng! is tah t the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs forwrad it.
If I’m not mistaken, you had no trouble reading it. Now take a look at a second item and find the sentence with the error:
This one is tricky. It may take you several minutes to find the answer, which I’ll give at the end of the post here.
Together these items point out the capability of the human brain to find patterns and sense in any jumble of words. You can rest assured that even if you don’t write with the fluency of Hemingway, your readers will still be able to follow along, albeit with a certain amount of effort at times.
The second item also demonstrates that we see what we expect to see and easily overlook things that don’t fit. It reminds us that readers derive their own meanings from stories, and the meanings they derive aren’t always the ones that we intend.
Put the writer's quest for perfection next to this evidence that readers will make some sense of anything, based on their own sense of perfection, then throw away your shackles of doubt and fear. Write your stories with playful abandon, the best you are able, and rest assured that readers will each find the meaning that matters most to them.
In case you haven’t found it, the error lies in the triangle, with the sentence, “I love Paris in the the springtime.” The line break causes your eye to skip right over that second the.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
The first e-mail consisted of the following gobbledygook. You may have seen it yourself, but it bears repeating:
i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng! is tah t the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs forwrad it.
If I’m not mistaken, you had no trouble reading it. Now take a look at a second item and find the sentence with the error:
This one is tricky. It may take you several minutes to find the answer, which I’ll give at the end of the post here.
Together these items point out the capability of the human brain to find patterns and sense in any jumble of words. You can rest assured that even if you don’t write with the fluency of Hemingway, your readers will still be able to follow along, albeit with a certain amount of effort at times.
The second item also demonstrates that we see what we expect to see and easily overlook things that don’t fit. It reminds us that readers derive their own meanings from stories, and the meanings they derive aren’t always the ones that we intend.
Put the writer's quest for perfection next to this evidence that readers will make some sense of anything, based on their own sense of perfection, then throw away your shackles of doubt and fear. Write your stories with playful abandon, the best you are able, and rest assured that readers will each find the meaning that matters most to them.
In case you haven’t found it, the error lies in the triangle, with the sentence, “I love Paris in the the springtime.” The line break causes your eye to skip right over that second the.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Thoughts on Perfection and Purpose
I’ve been thinking about perfection and how life is about growing and changing and learning. We can’t learn without experimenting and making mistakes, and in any event, perfection to one person may be an absolute disaster to another. Today I was reminded that mistakes are okay, that accumulated wisdom and compassion are more important to me than perfection.
That ties in with writing. The need to be perfect may be the number one champion cause of writer’s block. As I ponder this reality, my mind drifts back sixty years. My mother was a seamstress par excellence, as was hers before her, and presumably sew on up the maternal line. That I would follow the same path was assumed. No early seam went uninspected, and no flaw was too small to ignore. I spent a major chunk of my girlhood using a double-edged razor blade to rip out flawed seams with slight puckers and uneven stitching.
Before too many years, Inspector Mom had taken up residence in my head. A decade or so later, while ripping out stretch stitches (nothing is more challenging that ripping stretch stitches from knit fabric!) to remove a tiny pucker from the back of a sleeve seam in a pajama top for my toddler son, I had a epiphany. I realized this was not a good use of my time! I discovered the concept of “good enough,” a balance between perfection and purpose.
Several decades have passed since that pajama top was outgrown, and I keep learning new angles about perfection, purpose and myself. New challenges continue to emerge. Sometimes I laugh at myself for obsessing about reformatting e-mail forwards. I remind myself that posting a blog with an imperfect analogy is better than not posting the blog. Or is it…? Blogs are a serious business.
Egad! I’m writing myself into a corner. How can I make this blog about perfection perfect? Obviously, I can’t. So I’ll quit trying and assume that you, Gentle Reader, will find your own way. I’ll assume that you are already discovering how to balance your own skills with your own purpose to convey your own message in your own wonderful and unique style. I’ll assume that you’ll be gentle with yourself, give yourself permission to write scribbles for the fireplace for practice, and be happy with the stories that reflect your own best and special self, serving as your own best judge.
I briefly pointed to my own early training in perfection at the point of my mother’s needle. I’ve already written several stories about this training and how it has shaped my life. What lessons did you learn about perfection and its significance? How has that shaped your life, and your writing?
Write on (imperfectly if you will),
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
That ties in with writing. The need to be perfect may be the number one champion cause of writer’s block. As I ponder this reality, my mind drifts back sixty years. My mother was a seamstress par excellence, as was hers before her, and presumably sew on up the maternal line. That I would follow the same path was assumed. No early seam went uninspected, and no flaw was too small to ignore. I spent a major chunk of my girlhood using a double-edged razor blade to rip out flawed seams with slight puckers and uneven stitching.
Before too many years, Inspector Mom had taken up residence in my head. A decade or so later, while ripping out stretch stitches (nothing is more challenging that ripping stretch stitches from knit fabric!) to remove a tiny pucker from the back of a sleeve seam in a pajama top for my toddler son, I had a epiphany. I realized this was not a good use of my time! I discovered the concept of “good enough,” a balance between perfection and purpose.
Several decades have passed since that pajama top was outgrown, and I keep learning new angles about perfection, purpose and myself. New challenges continue to emerge. Sometimes I laugh at myself for obsessing about reformatting e-mail forwards. I remind myself that posting a blog with an imperfect analogy is better than not posting the blog. Or is it…? Blogs are a serious business.
Egad! I’m writing myself into a corner. How can I make this blog about perfection perfect? Obviously, I can’t. So I’ll quit trying and assume that you, Gentle Reader, will find your own way. I’ll assume that you are already discovering how to balance your own skills with your own purpose to convey your own message in your own wonderful and unique style. I’ll assume that you’ll be gentle with yourself, give yourself permission to write scribbles for the fireplace for practice, and be happy with the stories that reflect your own best and special self, serving as your own best judge.
I briefly pointed to my own early training in perfection at the point of my mother’s needle. I’ve already written several stories about this training and how it has shaped my life. What lessons did you learn about perfection and its significance? How has that shaped your life, and your writing?
Write on (imperfectly if you will),
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Friday, May 12, 2006
Story ideas in Comic Strips
Several of the comic strips in today’s paper popped out as story ideas. Cathy features Mother’s recipe for Beef Stroganoff, consisting of a list of her beefs (pet peeves), with clippings, quotes, and other similar trivia thrown in for flavoring. Hmmm, I thought, I could make a list of my pet peeves. That sounds like great sport! Especially if I want to get depressed. Maybe I’ll make that a list of things I’m grateful for.
In Doonesbury, Alex is considering which track to take after graduation. Now, there’s a story. The summer after high school graduation. That was a storybook summer, for sure, and not one I’ve written about.
Frank and Ernest have a house for sale — by non-owners. We’ve sold our home two times, and both times were adventures, yet to be written.
In Family Circus, Dolly is shocked by a photo of herself as a baby, and Dennis the Menace is disgusted that Mr. Wilson didn’t get in trouble for saying a bad word.
Other strips featured thoughts about fireworks, decluttering, insomnia, alien abduction, getting a new pet, studying for final exams and revenge. I could come up with at least one story on each of those topics.
If you are feeling stuck for story ideas, just look around you. Memory triggers are everywhere, even in the comics.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
In Doonesbury, Alex is considering which track to take after graduation. Now, there’s a story. The summer after high school graduation. That was a storybook summer, for sure, and not one I’ve written about.
Frank and Ernest have a house for sale — by non-owners. We’ve sold our home two times, and both times were adventures, yet to be written.
In Family Circus, Dolly is shocked by a photo of herself as a baby, and Dennis the Menace is disgusted that Mr. Wilson didn’t get in trouble for saying a bad word.
Other strips featured thoughts about fireworks, decluttering, insomnia, alien abduction, getting a new pet, studying for final exams and revenge. I could come up with at least one story on each of those topics.
If you are feeling stuck for story ideas, just look around you. Memory triggers are everywhere, even in the comics.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Tuesday, May 9, 2006
A Blog-keeping Break
Today it’s time for a little blog-keeping. Those of you who signed up for notices of new posts via Bloglet will see a new form in your e-mail tonight. Bloglet quit working for the second time in four months. Bloglet is toast. I beg your forbearance for having arbitrarily transferred all subscriptions to Blogarithm. I think once you try it, you’ll like it. In fact, you can use Blogarithm to track new content on any website, not just blogs. Also, you’ll get a few teaser lines from the blog, not just the title.
By the way, if you never signed up for notices via Bloglet, this is a great time to do so now. Just click that little button over there in the sidebar and you’ll always be notified when something new appears. Your privacy is guaranteed, and, as always, each notice includes the option to unsubscribe.
Another piece of blog-keeping is to announce that I’ve discovered a growing site, Stories in Common, where you can post your own stories, for free. This is a relatively new site, with threads for various types of stories, and that thread list promises to grow. Rather than explaining the whole site to you here, I encourage you to use the new permanent link in the sidebar to click on over and check it out for yourself. I think it’s a great opportunity for you loyal readers to post some of your work. You are cordially and eagerly invited to leave a link in a comment here when you do, so we can all follow along.
You’ll find another new link in the sidebar to a blog of stories written by Thelly Rheam, aka Story Lady in Cardiff by the Sea. Thelly is a long-time lifestory writer with over 500 stories filed away for posterity. She covers a lot of ground in her writing. Some are hilariously funny, some are touching, some are inspiring and a few are even sad. Spend a little time on her site for some ideas on writing style and story leads.
As for me, I’ve been out working in the yard lately, soaking up the balmy sunshine. I’ve never been much of a gardener, and our current cottage in the woods doesn’t require much, but the warm sun brought back memories of spring time long ago with liberation from heavy clothing, new balls, and the smell of newly mown grass. What does spring remind you of? Do you think back to childhood? Do you enjoy working in your garden and remember past years of seed sowing and setting bedding plants? Maybe you had a big adventure in the spring? Write it down and post away!
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
By the way, if you never signed up for notices via Bloglet, this is a great time to do so now. Just click that little button over there in the sidebar and you’ll always be notified when something new appears. Your privacy is guaranteed, and, as always, each notice includes the option to unsubscribe.
Another piece of blog-keeping is to announce that I’ve discovered a growing site, Stories in Common, where you can post your own stories, for free. This is a relatively new site, with threads for various types of stories, and that thread list promises to grow. Rather than explaining the whole site to you here, I encourage you to use the new permanent link in the sidebar to click on over and check it out for yourself. I think it’s a great opportunity for you loyal readers to post some of your work. You are cordially and eagerly invited to leave a link in a comment here when you do, so we can all follow along.
You’ll find another new link in the sidebar to a blog of stories written by Thelly Rheam, aka Story Lady in Cardiff by the Sea. Thelly is a long-time lifestory writer with over 500 stories filed away for posterity. She covers a lot of ground in her writing. Some are hilariously funny, some are touching, some are inspiring and a few are even sad. Spend a little time on her site for some ideas on writing style and story leads.
As for me, I’ve been out working in the yard lately, soaking up the balmy sunshine. I’ve never been much of a gardener, and our current cottage in the woods doesn’t require much, but the warm sun brought back memories of spring time long ago with liberation from heavy clothing, new balls, and the smell of newly mown grass. What does spring remind you of? Do you think back to childhood? Do you enjoy working in your garden and remember past years of seed sowing and setting bedding plants? Maybe you had a big adventure in the spring? Write it down and post away!
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Thursday, May 4, 2006
My Grandfather's Legacy
A young woman I know recently introduced me to the work of Sarah Hutt. Sarah is an artist who developed a unique concept for memorializing her mother, thirty years after her death. The project takes the form of a thousand-line poem, burned onto the bottoms of one thousand wooden bowls. You can read some of the inscriptions on her website, My Mother's Legacy.
I found this concept quite inspiring, and I’ve begun writing lines about one of my grandfathers, using the name I knew him by. Here are a few of them:
Perhaps you’ll also find this idea of starting a string of memories by using a name or title (my mother, my grandmother, my Aunt Bessie, etc.) followed by discrete memories a great way of jumpstarting story ideas or simply use the string of statements as a unique story unto itself. I’ll bet you have a fair idea of what my grandfather Pop was like from only these ten statements.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
I found this concept quite inspiring, and I’ve begun writing lines about one of my grandfathers, using the name I knew him by. Here are a few of them:
- Pop smoked a pipe
- Pop was a photographer
- Pop took Robin and me to baseball games
- Pop made the best sourdough pancakes in the world
- Pop taught me how to catch catfish
- Pop taught me to make purple-toned photo proofs with press frames and sunlight
- Pop thought everything I did was perfect
- Pop let Robin and me push his VW Bug up and down the driveway
- Pop laughed at every joke I ever told him
- Pop always had a smile on his face
Perhaps you’ll also find this idea of starting a string of memories by using a name or title (my mother, my grandmother, my Aunt Bessie, etc.) followed by discrete memories a great way of jumpstarting story ideas or simply use the string of statements as a unique story unto itself. I’ll bet you have a fair idea of what my grandfather Pop was like from only these ten statements.
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
Monday, May 1, 2006
May Day Memories
Happy May Day! Do you have any May Day memories? The custom of May Day festivities seems to have died in the USA, so I offer these memories of my own as a tribute:
May Day was a quiet event in the early 1950s when I was a grade schooler. We often made decorated cone shaped paper baskets with hand colored flowers and designs, sometimes in school, others at home. We carefully created and attached handles long enough to slip over a doorknob. We'd pick a few flowers, whatever we could find (even clover and dandelions if that was all there was available). After we stuffed grass around to hold the flowers in place, we'd hang the basket on a neighbor's door, ring the bell and run.
One year one of my classes, maybe in third grade, had a May Pole dance. I looked forward to that for days, imagining something like faeries playing flutes while we pirouetted about in perfect order, finishing with an elegantly wrapped pole and True Love from then on. Just like in the story books. (Maybe, I thought, my brunette hair would turn golden for the moment. Yeah, right! Just like my dress would turn to shimmery gossamer silk chiffon, ankle length.) Surely it would be a magical day!
What a disappointment the day turned out to be. The May Pole looked like a closet rod, about six feet tall, obtained from the woodshop and stuck in the middle of the scrappy playground grass at a slight tilt. Somebody (the teacher?) had nailed a couple of dozen strips of crepe paper to the top, and we whirled around trying to weave in and out to wrap it. At the beginning, we sang a song. That didn't last long. Everyone was giggling and bumping into each other. Shrieks of pain soon replaced the giggles. Most of the streamers tore loose, the rest tangled, clothing became grass stained, and the whole thing was a big mess. I don't even remember if we had cookies and juice at the end. Surely so.
Not too surprising that was the only year I remember a May Pole! Somehow even the basket custom faded over the years and my sixth-grader grandson just informed me he never heard of this day. I hope my words will help keep it alive as at least a fact of history.
Do you have any May Day memories to preserve? What about other lesser holidays like Memorial Day or the Fourth of July? Did your family have a tradition of special picnics or other frolics that were unique to your family at specific times? How about celebrating these memories with a few words for future generations?
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
May Day was a quiet event in the early 1950s when I was a grade schooler. We often made decorated cone shaped paper baskets with hand colored flowers and designs, sometimes in school, others at home. We carefully created and attached handles long enough to slip over a doorknob. We'd pick a few flowers, whatever we could find (even clover and dandelions if that was all there was available). After we stuffed grass around to hold the flowers in place, we'd hang the basket on a neighbor's door, ring the bell and run.
One year one of my classes, maybe in third grade, had a May Pole dance. I looked forward to that for days, imagining something like faeries playing flutes while we pirouetted about in perfect order, finishing with an elegantly wrapped pole and True Love from then on. Just like in the story books. (Maybe, I thought, my brunette hair would turn golden for the moment. Yeah, right! Just like my dress would turn to shimmery gossamer silk chiffon, ankle length.) Surely it would be a magical day!
What a disappointment the day turned out to be. The May Pole looked like a closet rod, about six feet tall, obtained from the woodshop and stuck in the middle of the scrappy playground grass at a slight tilt. Somebody (the teacher?) had nailed a couple of dozen strips of crepe paper to the top, and we whirled around trying to weave in and out to wrap it. At the beginning, we sang a song. That didn't last long. Everyone was giggling and bumping into each other. Shrieks of pain soon replaced the giggles. Most of the streamers tore loose, the rest tangled, clothing became grass stained, and the whole thing was a big mess. I don't even remember if we had cookies and juice at the end. Surely so.
Not too surprising that was the only year I remember a May Pole! Somehow even the basket custom faded over the years and my sixth-grader grandson just informed me he never heard of this day. I hope my words will help keep it alive as at least a fact of history.
Do you have any May Day memories to preserve? What about other lesser holidays like Memorial Day or the Fourth of July? Did your family have a tradition of special picnics or other frolics that were unique to your family at specific times? How about celebrating these memories with a few words for future generations?
Write on,
Sharon Lippincott, aka Ritergal
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