Starting to feel ‘recovered’ from the Writers’ workshop at Loyalist – recovered from early morning wake-ups, Tim Ho’s twice a day for 5 days in a row – is there much caloric & nutritional difference between a sun-dried tomato bagel & a maple-pecan danish? The flavor difference is minimal.
What Tim’s lacked in variety our workshop certainly made up for – we looked at pieces that went from falling through the ice to basking on rooftops in India, from women banished to Cape Breton purgatory to ‘scatter-brained’ ladies murdering their 2nd (that we know of) husbands.
Participants included some Mesdames of Mayhem – Madeline, Joan, Rosemary – each of who lead polished, perceptive discussions on the state of the publishing industry. Rosemary Aubert’s decision to farm out some of the course material to us students paid off well. Richard one day & Nancy another, give great presentations as well. Their’s were so great I invited myself into their writers’ group. Time for me to wade into those waters.
Campus life was comfortable. For less than $35 a night the rooms were luxury suites. This year I actually got some use out of the microwave. Also enjoyed suppers in our pad with Richard (he shared the pod with me) – and Nancy & Liza – these three are members of the writers group I’ve joined. Though after my first story they may regret it 🙂
As I’ve done in past years I bring suppers for three nights. Our last night there we dine out as a group. I had loaded up a special Loyalist playlist – lots of Chopin, Gabor Szabo – with a dash of retro pop from Sugar Loaf, Rare Earth, The Grassroots & Sal Mineo (yes he did have a recording career).
By Friday all of us were tired – using our brains this intensively can be exhausting but everyone was eager for another week of it as well – but this is all we get. Happily Rosemary A. is already planning next year’s workshop. If all goes well I’ll have Smashword-ed City of Valleys and can really jump in on marketing discussions.
TOpoet 