Tribe.net. Local Connections gregcollver http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/dd2e28cc-4697-4236-b741-1d5a15810667 2005-12-03T23:34:44Z 2005-12-02T20:40:18Z

<div>Has anyone read William Zinsser? I picked up his book "Writing to Learn" and it is possibly the best book I have ever read. He is most famous for "On Writing Well." <br/> <br/>See my tribe profile for quotes from Writing to Learn. <br/> <br/>Greg</div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 2 replies </div>

gregcollver 2005-12-02T20:40:18Z tormod http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/f311db28-26fd-4945-89d3-23d4b7795c2e 2005-07-18T07:36:46Z 2005-07-17T16:17:43Z

<div>Tonight I&amp;#8217;m tired. And all I want is to get rid of the tiredness. <br/>I stay up. I would like to watch a film. I&amp;#8217;m too tired. Hmm, I <br/>want more than that. I would like to spend time with her. <br/>Start something fresh. I know we can make conversations <br/>baby. Don&amp;#8217;t you know? This is not fresh. This is my first <br/>post in this group.</div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 1 reply </div>

tormod 2005-07-17T16:17:43Z Scarahliz http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/2ff3427a-8040-4241-8e7e-7c8ccaa70e3b 2005-07-17T16:39:45Z 2005-04-01T19:28:58Z

<div>Leaving New York is like leaving the best friend I never had. <br/> <br/>It's also like leaving a lover, who is really really really really good in bed, and who has endless stamina and only lets you not have sex from 5 am to 11 am. <br/> <br/>Pacifica is like any lover I've ACTUALLY had -- really pretty, but just ain't so great when it comes down to it. And it won't take you anywhere, it just sits in its underwear all day drinking a beer watching football. Ok, maybe that last part isn't any lover I've had. <br/>Bad analogy.</div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 6 replies </div>

Scarahliz 2005-04-01T19:28:58Z arielarchaicflame http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/0bddc92b-7796-49d2-b826-a9226ba44cf2 2005-07-08T02:07:38Z 2005-05-20T22:13:13Z

<div>Yeah, I've been hesitating, lingering so much to put my words out here. So much life, so much emotion, bouncing around in my stone shell, aching, burning, yet cold as ice inside. Sure writing comes as natural as breathing to me, and has always been just as important, then again, I'm a girl of many of the same voices, yet they all resonate through the prism differently, and fear is always comforting yet well, scary... <br/> <br/>People always look at me funny or react as if their talking to a stranger, a pariah when I explain that dreaming to me is like walking in another world, a dream realm. The journey begins every night that I slip out of the conscious, physical realm, and again, I'm dumbfounded by the reactions. Maybe my creativity has gone haywire, maybe it is a real realm. Whatever dreaming might be, the last couple journeys in the last couple of nights have been wonderful nightmares. Oh yeah, they've been disturbing, shocking, scary, exhilirating, romantic. It's not until I wake, until my body is no longer hybernating and my spirit has descended again back into my blossoming body that I find myself disturbed as my intellectual mind tries to make sense of a spiritual place that our simple complex brain full of complex simplicities tries to interpret an experience....</div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 2 replies </div>

arielarchaicflame 2005-05-20T22:13:13Z sweetajuma http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/af2c6163-8e7b-445a-a1a6-49e885588b89 2005-04-28T22:30:19Z 2005-04-25T04:39:44Z

<div>Excuse me if you read this on another tribe... <br/> <br/>The sound of a wine glass clinking...two glasses are touching...and I feel two sets of eyes are also making noise. Why do I go on trying to make the square fit into the circle or the octagon fit into the square. He is climbing up walls, looking for me. I am looking around at my own walls, seeing hot sauce drip down the walls, watching all the gossip I've heard or said dance off the walls into my space. Since when have I turned into an adult. I remember when I was 19, and I would listen to 30 somethings with their plaster-a-paris make-up and drawn-on eye brows talk about work. The topics were tedious and all consuming. I would try to find another table where I wouldn't have to hear this...but now I find myself within their circle. <br/> <br/>Before I only spoke of ideas, ideals, emotions and new lovers, now I speak of what he is, what she said....etc. I need to put my foot down...and stamp it out of me. I keep dreaming of little things, dying....little things I have neglected and ignored, so they are dying...or are dead...and they keep changing forms. I used to think these little things were my inner children...but now I realize they are the writer in me...all the stories I have dropped, the projects I have abandoned. And it is not sad, but amazing to think of how these things have autonomy, life...substance. If they can come back and talk to me, trying to find their creator/mother to be saved, then maybe I should listen? I should surround myself with them...and let them run all over my insides, letting their wildness drip from my walls, and out my eyes. Instead of thinking of all that I missing, maybe I should start to think about, and work on all that it there...but neglected. </div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 4 replies </div>

sweetajuma 2005-04-25T04:39:44Z sweetajuma http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/1f3fb7d8-bcc6-45e1-b318-9cc899101261 2005-04-02T23:23:35Z 2005-04-02T23:23:35Z

<div>A post previously from small CHUNKS OF WRITING--my tribe that died...but this exercise fits with this new tribe as well! ... <br/> <br/>OK, so here it is. I have been trying to come out of a pretty serious depression lately. I feel great now that it is warming up over here. It was so cold before that it felt like my face would fall off every time I stepped outside. It was a bone chilling cold here, wet and frosty. <br/> <br/>So now, I have been reading an excellent book on writing exercises, "Writing Down the Bones" by Natalie Goldberg. I am going to steal exercises from her from time to time (or all the time) to take the pressure off having to come up with my own every week. Of course...I will embellish them as well... <br/> <br/>In her book, Natalie talks about free writing. She says that writing is not a ready made, prepackaged product like a McDonald's Hamburger...or I guess it shouldn't be, if you want it to be organic...to arise from a place of true voice rather than contrived or forced. <br/> <br/>So from a very beginning place (the best place to start) try to write in a non-literary way...not writing to get a reaction or based on what someone else will think...Just be alone with your thoughts and allow your mind to jump from thought to thought, freely. Some of my best stories/songs have arisen from "playing around" like this...not taking my words so seriously and just allowing my mind to wander. <br/> <br/>While you write do not edit yourself...quiet the inner critic...just let the writing flow. Do not stop writing...just keep your pen moving...Try this for 10--15 minutes...once, twice, or 6--7 times before the next exercise, it is your choice. Share your favorite freewrite with the tribe. <br/> <br/>You don't know what you'll end up with!!! And this is the exciting part...it will be living writing! <br/> <br/>Good luck! and Joy! <br/> <br/>Shannon </div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 0 replies </div>

sweetajuma 2005-04-02T23:23:35Z sweetajuma http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/44afc6ef-3dc3-4980-aebb-97996dc5e3c2 2005-04-01T15:56:15Z 2005-03-30T14:37:35Z

<div>I sang in harmony today with my pregnant co-teacher. I've been thinking a lot about the scattered ways of my being today. I have tried to be a singer, writer, yogi, savior...uh many other things... <br/>But I always return to the pen...or in this case, the computer and keyboard. I try to make my experiences sing for me, but I find they want to be bottled up...they don't want me to force themselves out of the jar...so they stay stuck...like me. <br/> <br/>My sad state of writing...I don't want to see it as something I am always trying to resuscitate...bring back to life, out of the closet... <br/> <br/>But things often don't have lives of their own...you have to keep pumping blood into them...or pummeling them until they feel again...a fly slamming his head into the glass...but not until his death, until he breaks through to the other side...or finds a small crevice of open space to fly through and end up at his destination, the other side. By writing, aren't we just all trying to get to the other side: whether that other side is the other side of the day, the year, a conversation with a lover, your parent. Writing is struggle, it has lungs of its own and it wants to shout to me. But often I find myself keeping it muffled...I watch Sex &amp; the City, eat pints upon pints of ice cream, and truffles...and I stuff the voice down...till it comes bubbling up one day..and I have to pull it out till it comes up, stalks, hairy roots and all...our from the the depths of the earth and it says, "AAAAaaaaaaaaahhhhrg! You fucker...never put me back in the refrigerator again, don't try to eat me and swallow me down to be digested and flushed down to the toliet...Listen to me you fucker." But most of the time, I hear it as a muffled, shy grin, something that is curled up instead of bold...I shake it by its corners and wait to see what will come out of its pockets...will a wide range of colored balls roll out, or will it be only eight balls...coming at me...or snake eyes...the same dismal numbers coming up again and again? Or will I roll and the dice come up blank...my ultimate fear. <br/> <br/> <br/> <br/></div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 1 reply </div>

sweetajuma 2005-03-30T14:37:35Z Bulus64 http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/825a069a-cc48-4f0b-b8bf-6a0512183794 2005-04-01T15:50:24Z 2005-03-31T03:12:45Z

<div>Circles, this life keeps spinning in circles...no, <br/>spirals <br/>and coming back to where I stood <br/>another year ago, or two. <br/>Need more work, more time, more <br/>compassion, sorrow, pain, yeah right... <br/>need help to get off the spiral train, <br/>I don't remember buying a ticket. <br/> <br/>Been alone for ever longer than time can pass, <br/>a child's Birthday so far away, so close to mom, <br/>so far from home, but close to his. <br/> <br/>A round-about spinning cars off the center circle, <br/>a &amp;lt;a href="http://www.serverlogic3.com/lm/rtl3.asp?si=11&amp;k=merry%20go%20round" onmouseover="window.status='merry-go-round'; return true;" onmouseout="window.status=''; return true;">merry-go-round&amp;lt;/a> only all the riders are going somewhere, <br/>why the fuck can't I go somewhere? <br/>I can't even catch up to myself, <br/>I must be running behind me. <br/>Gotta get outta this rut before it's later <br/>than I thought.</div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 2 replies </div>

Bulus64 2005-03-31T03:12:45Z RebeccaRose http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/59798a39-0591-4d5d-9b91-1f2822f5fbc2 2005-04-01T05:37:33Z 2005-03-30T21:03:40Z

<div> <br/>Im not <br/>very petite <br/>used to wearing makeup <br/> <br/>eating dairy right now <br/> <br/>missing bitter <br/>lovers' insult <br/> <br/>writing for anyone else <br/> <br/>listening to the news anymore <br/>working enough <br/>eating too little <br/> <br/>fond of the war <br/>going to complain about it <br/>fuck another loser <br/>leave home without being ready <br/>or say yes when i mean maybe <br/> <br/>ever again</div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 1 reply </div>

RebeccaRose 2005-03-30T21:03:40Z sweetajuma http://thewritinglife.tribe.net/thread/f8c4121f-cdf5-4eeb-a87c-2e0b7f932d63 2005-03-30T14:35:11Z 2005-03-30T14:35:11Z

<div>Good writing walks on its own two feet. It is not a reflection of yourself, but carries its own person, or persona. Persona is a voice that comes on its own...it is a mixture of your experience of others, yourself, or some believe that writers become a sort of channel...with a voice rushing through one from hands to typewriter/pen. <br/> <br/>Fragments can bring about persona which I believe the best, "finished" or rather whole writing comes from. We can use these unborn babies for finished stories. <br/> <br/>So for now, I'd like to write my daily or weekly fragments. No pressure, no critique, just write about life...internal or external. Some fragments may inspire others, or they may not... <br/> <br/>This way, if you have a demanding job...but still want a writing life, you can have both. The small daily efforts (can be only 5 minutes) can turn into a big project, either alone or together. <br/> <br/> <br/></div> <div> posted in <a href="http://thewritinglife.tribe.net">The Writing Life</a> - 0 replies </div>

sweetajuma 2005-03-30T14:35:11Z