She Looks Ready

“Any mood is a good writing mood. The trick is to simply enter whatever mood like a room and sit down and write from there.”  --Julia Cameron

“Live as if you were to die tomorrow; Learn as if you were to live forever.”  --Mahatma Ghandhi

Burning Desire to Write

The first thing that’s necessary is to have a burning desire to write.  You wake up in the morning and want to write about yesterday’s discoveries.  When something spectacular happens to you, you want to write about it, and when you’re having a bad day, you want to get it out and let it go.  Stories come to you at odd moments, and you want to get them down right then and there with no interruptions exactly the way it was in your head and you get frustrated because it’s hard to hold onto those ideas because they’re more than ideas, they’re sensations and beauty and complicated relationships and the orange in the sky over the lake streaked with lightening, a hint of the afterlife.  Your ideas are more than you can handle in the span of a very long lifetime, and you know they’re good ideas if only you can write true and deep and get it down.   Your writing is a seeking to know and wanting to connect with what truly must be God. 

Word Lovers - Fall 2011 - Idlewyld B&B at Lakeside

We ignite possibilities one retreat weekend at a time at the Word Lovers retreats.  The Fall 2011 retreat is  November 4-6 at the Idlewyld Bed and Breakfast in historic Lakeside, Ohio.  The food and wine experience will include cooking together and optional winery tours and tastings. Friday evening begins with writing prompts, and Saturday sessions include a session on writing a non-fiction book (based on Claudia’s experience of writing her book Ohio’s Lake Erie Wineries) and writing about food and wine. The cost is $110 for the weekend (which includes three meals) plus the cost of a room at the Idlewyld. Hold you spot with a $50 deposit and your desired room choice. The deposit should be sent to Claudia Taller, Igniting Possibilities, 26408 Chapel Hill Drive, North Olmsted, Ohio 44070.

Lakeside Memories

When I was a child, I slept on a cot on a sleeping porch of a Victorian cottage in Lakeside while crickets serenaded me. Rows upon rows of cottages with postage-sized front lawns and comfortable front porches cozied up to the quiet narrow streets. I sunned on the dock that stretches into the Lake, played miniature golf in the afternoons in Central Park, licked ice cream that ran down a cone on a hot day, and paid $.50 to see last season’s movie.

Retreating

A decade ago, I fell in love with the idea of retreating from the world in the company of other seekers of the creative muse and a life free from outside tethers. Maybe that’s called running away to some, but for me, it feels like I’m walking towards who I was meant to be. In those moments in time, my spirit lifts, and if I start putting words on paper, I am connecting with a creative force, with God. The words flow, and it’s almost as good as being in love.

“Any mood is a good writing mood. The trick is to simply enter whatever mood like a room and sit down and write from there.” --Julia Cameron