March is for Mona’s Work
Leah’s Creative Every Day theme for March is stories. If there is a fit for me, I like to participate in her themes because she has an outstanding blog to support creative efforts along with an outstanding readership who comment regularly on her posts. For creative people it is like having a coffee shop with a talented host and an open mike just for them.
I’m committed to working on my book Mona’s Work which has an introduction on my Gaia blog and an entry here on Creative Potager in “Potatoes to Potato Salad.”
My challenge: how much or how little do I share with you as I go? The writing will be “hot” and like most writing, it is better when it has cooled, been reviewed, and is then served to you after editing several times. I am leaning towards providing snippets of writing and mostly blogging about the writing process and my behind-the-scene challenges and decisions as I work through the source material, my memories and the developing of the structure of this book.
I’m sure this challenge will work itself as I set down to prepare the blog post each day. However, I would be delighted to hear what aspects of Mona’s Work YOU most want to find when you click to open your Creative Potager post, Monday through Friday for the month of March.
Sprout Question: How do YOU decide when it is right to share your creative efforts?
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I love this question….for me, there is usually a relevancy to the sharing…a painting that was perhaps inspired by another and I’m ready/eager to share that with them ( and the rest of my twitter readership just benefits;) Or maybe the art fits the mood of the day, or a song that I just listened to. Sometimes, a painting lies in wait for a long, long time, before I feel ready to share it with the world. It’s personal…I share only when something within me feels inclined to do so….Thanks for your always thoughtful posts…xo
Michelle thanks for being our first sprout today – and what a strong shoot it is! I think you have hit on something that is behind my hesitation with “sharing as I go” creating of Mona’s Work. It is very personal. Like you, I sometimes want to savour a piece of creativity just for me before it is released to the world. Because once I let go and put the work out there it tends to take on a life of its own and is only remotely still attached to me. Maybe similar to grown children. They are always yours but they belong to themselves in a world that often goes beyond your reach. So glad you came by:)
What a fun and interesting project! I agree – it is hard sometimes to decide what to include about yourself. I’m totally inconsistent in that dept – guess I haven’t figured it out yet! lol nancy
Nancy welcome to Creative Potager. Thank you for coming by and offering a sprout this morning. You might feel “totally inconsistent” in depth but you are very consistent in high quality, interesting post on your “Nankestuff” blog. Wonderful Read. I will be back to visit your corner of the world again soon.
I wonder if your “hot” writing might just be seen as “different tasting” writing. Sometimes the most effective writing is that raw, uncooled, just off the fire writing….
Maybe something for you to try on as we dive into stories – hmmm.
I often times feel like the deciding isn’t totally in me. Sometimes my most effective work is shared when I (as in my ego) doesn’t want to share it… and yet when my heart overrides the wailing, “I don’t wanna, I don’t wanna, Don’t you dare, you freak!!” I get the best feedback and the best connection with my readers, audience members, viewers….
Great question.
Julie I think you have “caught me” in a way that I sort of knew but wasn’t quite clear enough about to acknowledge. There is a danger in cooling my writing where I want to take vulnerability of “raw, uncooled, just off the fire writing…” you speak of. I am going to keep this in mind – “be bold” my writing coach Dr. S Fuller told me when writing Leading Raspberry Jam Visions: Women’s Way. In a way you are suggesting the same thing to me and that this has been a successful experience for you. Extremely valuable Sprout Julie!
Terrill – Your entry, “Potatos to Potato Salad” is just one of the many reasons that I recently told the Gaia Community:
“I subscribe to Terrill’s Creative Potager blog and make a point of visiting it on a daily basis. There’s always delightful eye candy (her photographs) and delicious food for thought (her writing). Sometimes she even shows her drawings. It’s really a high calorie restaurant for the soul.”
Sprout Question: How do YOU decide when it is right to share your creative efforts?
That’s easy. I listen with my heart and respond accordingly. http://holessence.wordpress.com/2010/02/27/listen-with-your-heart-2/
Laurie thank you for sharing your enthusiasm for Creative Potager. The past two months and a wee bit of hosting this blog for us creative beings continues to be a thrill beyond anything I could have imagined when the idea came to me. Your sprout is so YOU Laurie… like an elegant evening gown that comes with matching clutch purse and doesn’t require footwear to sashay around your creative room. Thank you as always for sharing.
(I wish wordpress would allow comment responses to make beautiful embedded links as well – just a wish… we can and do live without them)
Terrill – The word picture you painted made me laugh. You know me well — no mention of pantyhose!
I never would have considered “pantyhose” and Laurie in the same word-picture – they just don’t go together!
I love your project idea, Terrill. I so enjoyed reading Potatoes to Potato Salad. I was right there with you and your little brother as you brought vegetables in from the garden on that fresh summer morning long ago, and prepared a potato salad with your grandmother. I look forward to reading more of the same.
Your Sprout question is one I deal with daily. So much of what I write in my Magda books relies on my experiences, both as a child and as an adult, and also on my present life here on Mayne Island. I want to include local colour but hesitate over descriptions that might seem to describe a real person or a place. I want the characters and setting to appeal to everyone, not just local people looking for someone or something they recognize.
Amber, I’m so glad you came by and planted this great response to today’s sprout question. I am reminded of something I shared awhile ago on Coffee Messiah’s great blog…
In the preface of Paul St. Pierre’s book Smith And Other Events: Tales of the Chilcotin he states “I have exercised the prerogative of the fiction writer, which is to try to tell the truth with a lot of lies. For instance, it is true that there is a Lakeview Hotel. It is not true that the owner/manger, during the fifties, threatened to evict a guest who declined to join a drinking party. That was Benny Abbott of the Maple Leaf Hotel.”
Mayne Island is possibly a bit smaller than the Chilcotin was at the time Pierre was writing this but not by much. I love how he handled this same kind of issue with humour right up front.
I look forward to reading, whatever you share.
Lovely story, BTW!
I still hold things back, probably because they’re better than what I do show and I’m afraid of a nice response.
Besides, I started my blog, to stay in touch with family and friends. Got involved in a music blog, then the Peace Train (political blog, which is now closed) and now, I’m all over the place. I enjoy hearing what others think, but do not wait to hear anything. I notice more people look than comment anyway.
Cheers!
Coffee Messiah I greatly enjoy http://coffeemessiah.blogspot.com blog. And thank you. And thank you again for coming by and sprouting an answer to today’s question.
Yes, I too notice readership is much greater than the number who comment and mostly that is a relief. If everyone who came by commented I would sink – though I love and want to hear from EVERYONE:)))) I used to be able to thank all my “tweet friends” who responded on Creative Potager but even that has become a challenge. So if you follow me on Twitter and haven’t seen a “thank you” tweet in the past few days – please, know that you are loved and I am so appreciative of all comments and engagement.