June is proving to be as busy as May

                At two-o’clock Friday last, my schedule finally cleared. Now I could leisurely read the daily papers that had piled up. I could check blog stats, Facebook, online news-and-opinion as long as I wanted to.

                Keeping me from that retirement ritual was not anything I couldn’t control, but things happened in an odd confluence of events and time. First, was a week’s writers retreat at Hemingway-Pfeiffer Museum in Piggott. Then Florida son flew up for the weekend. The extensive, quarterly Calliope poetry column was due. Finally, I was to host the local writers group on Friday last.

                In this case, the hostess gives the guests gifts; those were bought earlier: a flower-motifed clip, a box of Vanilla Honey tea bags and a gel pen, fine point.

The hostess must clean the areas that writers access: living room, from entry through the room, dining room floor and path to the bathroom, plus said bathroom. The work area—the dining room table—must be redressed. The correct-sized table cloth scrounged for, from either the buffet or the linen closet.

                I don’t think I’d be called a slob, but cleaning for company is about the only time I bother. With only the cat as “family” I DO make sure his area is cleaned enough to keep down the odor.

                Our group schedule is to snack first since it’s a mid-morning meeting. I determined in a Facebook conversation with Linda Ann Yarberry Bragg to use my “good” dishes from now on, so I pulled out snack plates and cups, large and small matching bowls to center the two partitioned platters—all in the Dewdrop pattern. Oh, and we had tea.

                At Harvest Foods on Thursday, I’d filled bag after bag with fruit: 4 plums,4 peaches, 2 grapefruit, 4 nectarines, a container of strawberries and 4 Kiwi. At the cheese display, I selected Cheddar cuts, Colby cuts, Provolone, and Muenster slices. I searched for gluten-free crackers, to no avail, but in passing, I spied a package of Simply White Cheddar Cheetos. It was mine! On the back side of the sack, clear down to the last line was: GLUTEN FREE. Hallelujah!

                We got down to the meat of the day: critiquing previously-submitted pieces. Mine was a new incident for the memoir, which I devised at the H-P retreat earlier in the month. Another was Chapter 7 in a novel. A third was a 10-year look-back on the anniversary of the moon landing, and a fourth was a blog post from an earlier time. It was 12:30 when we finished commenting and praising and asking for more.

                We adjourned to Tacos for Life for our meal. Noisy! Full! A queue! But we all enjoyed our selections. Two of us took boxes of uneaten (too much!) food home for later.

                Serendipitously, we were offered a week’s getaway in July, so our next assignment will be due then.

                One member commented, “Why is it so hard to write when you have so much fun doing it?”

Three writers together; what might they do? Play a game!

Marilyn, me and Christine - at the Lucidity Poetry Retreat, 2017

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

                Early in April, three women were in residency at Dairy Hollow in Eureka Springs. Lee, from NOLA, Kay from Tulsa/New York, and Pat from AR. All three of us were working on memoirs. [They are not the women in the picture, except for me.]

                At 9:30, the night before two of us left for home, we gathered in the 505 kitchen. Kay brought a novel with her. “For a game,” she said. She and I drank wine; Lee had dessert: banana cream—a sliced banana (and a little sugar) covered by fat-free Pet Milk. I couldn’t—and still can’t—imagine anything with Pet Milk in it as tasting good.

                We “gamed” while we visited. Here are the rules: One writer picks a sentence or two from a novel, writes it on a lined sheet. Then she passes it to the next, who reads it (silently) and writes something that continues the first. But before passing it to the third writer, she folds down the first sentence so that only the second sentence is visible.

                The third writer reads the second sentence, then writes a response to that, folds it so that only her response shows and passes it on. Around and round it goes until the page is full. Here is the complete “story.”

                “Beth puts a finger to his lips. He stops talking. / “Don’t say it. I can’t hear it now. Let me have this moment of not knowing. This one moment.” / “Okay, I’ve settled down enough to respond to your accusations. But be nicer. Don’t forget to give yourself the feelings and not blame me.”

                “Oh, you narcissist! I come to you with my pain, and all you can do is say ‘Don’t blame me’!” / “That is not what I said. It’s complicated, don’t you get that?” / “No, it’s not. It’s simple. You simply admit you’re wrong and I’m not.” /

              “Oh, yeah? Is that what your ex-husbands would say?” / “No. In fact, they wouldn’t say that. Why bring them into this? Deflecting again? Can’t you have this conversation?” / “Yes, I could, but, why do it? It’ll just make things worse—if they could get any worse!” /

                “Of course, things can get worse! Aliens could land in Eureka Springs. The zombie Apocalypse could happen!” / “Sure. Make fun. This is funny to you, isn’t it? I’m done. When you get serious—if you get serious about dealing with this, you know where to find me.” / “Until then, I’m moving to Texas. Let me know when you’ve decided.”  THE END

                We three agreed this worked very well with “in-tune” writers. Since I changed the names of the other two, and they gave me the sheet, I transcribe it here without asking.

          The next morning, after we had coffee around the same table, Lee began her 10-hour drive south. I left two hours later for a four-hour drive. Kay stayed for three more weeks.

         In a day or two, two or three new residents checked in to the writers colony. Perhaps Kay will suggest they play a game. Every day is different. Every writer is different.  Every game will be different.

It’s so much fun being a writer.

[The women pictured at the top are poets from Texas and were in my workshop group. Here are the others in that group.] I have no photos of Lee and Kay, sorry to say.

Phyllis & Pat 

Mary and Carol             Above: Phyllis & Sandra

     

Once again in the mountains –no, in the valleys, she said

Mailbox at 505, the Usonian house that's now part of the campus

                Last week was my bi-annual trip/ trek to Eureka Springs for two reasons: one, a poetry sub-group meeting and a chance to continue work on my latest book, a memoir, “When I Had Another Name” or “Edging Past Eighty.”

                The Wednesday night dinner--a gourmet meal--included lentil soup, curly endive salad, mashed potatoes, ham slices, baked Brussel sprouts and a sweet potato-squash-mushroom galette. Dessert was pear torte.

                Five writers and one Writers Colony at Dairy Hollow board member partook of the food and—uncharacteristically for me, at least—sat around the table until 8:00 discussing subjects de jour.

                Elise was the board member. She owns both Basin Park and Crescent hotels. She sponsored one of the scholarships that Alia, from Richmond, Virginia, received and who was in residence. Elise’s the one who told us the geographical history of Eureka Springs. It used to be an ocean, she said. When the water receded, it took the soluble rocks with it leaving terrain characterized by barren, rocky ground, caves, sinkholes, underground rivers, and the absence of surface streams.

            The other writers’ homes spanned the width of the country: from San Francisco through Cincinnati, and to New York. I was the lone Arkansan. But I added my two-cents worth to the conversations, believe me (to quote a man-too-much-in-the-news). Being the eldest of the group didn’t stop me. The next-eldest told us she was the same age as Hillary.

                Thursday was spent in my suite revising the latest submission from the writers group at home––the third section of the memoir that takes me through junior high school. I also read some from the book I brought with me, Hemingway vs. Fitzgerald. And I napped.

                Thursday night was the monthly meeting of Poetluck—a potluck meal followed by readings from the Colony residents first, then from the local and area attendees. One unusual “pot” was purple sweet potatoes brought by a couple who live on Bohannon Mountain in Marshall and who grew them on their acreage. I read “Ash Wednesday” from Hiding Myself Into Safety. Later, someone asked me if I were a preacher.

                Friday noon, friend Vicki picked me up. In her VW, we crawled through the busyness of downtown out to Hwy 62 to La Familia. We had a great, needed catch-up meeting over lunch.

By Friday night, Anne Marie from near St. Louis, had joined the group. Baked chicken with roasted cut fennel bulbs, green salad, rice, and a medley of veggies comprised the meal. Dessert was tea cookies. We sat around the table afterwards, discussing various topics until 8:30!

Saturday morning, a Facebook friend, Dan, from a town nearby, dropped by for a first-ever, face-to-face visit. And eventually coffee in 505, since I didn’t have sense enough to figure out how to program the high-falutin’ coffee machine in the Main House. Dan writes a column in the Eureka Springs Independent, so I asked him to autograph my copy. We had a great time. First time I’d ever hugged a man whom I’d never seen before!

At 80, how many more ops to hug handsome men will I have? Huh? Huh?