Honoring Ring

At the Box Factory for the Arts, where I have a writing studio and am the director of the writing programs for the artist guild, we are launching a gallery show and programming to honor Ring Lardner.

He was born in a city near here and, even though he was working nearly 100 years ago, he's still probably the most famous writer from our area.

The most famous writer hardly anyone really knows. Including me!

I first ran into his name when I was reading about Hemingway and Fitzgerald, of whom he was a contemporary. Lardner was a sports reporter (he covered the Chicago White Sox during their shameful 1919 throwing of the World Series) but he was also the most widely read humorist of his time.

We will honor him with an exhibit, a writing workshop and writing competition and a showing of a movie that he wrote called "Alibi Ike."

When it's all over, it will have been a lot of work, and I wonder if it will be worth it. Certainly it won't matter one way or the other to Ring Lardner. But will other people get something out of it?

It's one of the difficult things about doing programing of any kind, but especially the writing programing I work on. Writing is important to me and the enjoyment of my life - I guess I just assume that other people would be as eager to participate. But, I learned long ago that it's a matter of putting it out there and see who takes advantage of it.

And in the meantime, it doesn't hurt to recognize the writers who paved the way.

Inside / Outside

I love being outside!

I show a photo here taken by my daughter, not showing my best side, but looking out over the Snake River in Wyoming in the Grand Teton area this past spring.

I love being outside, but my life conspires to keep me inside. I'm a writer and a lot of that means sitting inside at a computer. I try to take my laptop or notebook out onto the deck as often as possible, but I'm a whimp. If it's too hot, too cold or too buggy - inside I go.

I'm also a quilter and a lot of that must be done sitting at a sewing machine, but as often as I can I take my handsewing and sit outside, except if it's too hot, too cold, etc., etc. (see excuses above!)

When we go on trips to the national parks, I'm so limited by my sore knees from doing the kind of hiking I would love to do. But it doesn't keep me from being outside. I like to sit on a porch or balcony, or even on a rock in the field and drink it all in.

So, I'm looking forward to our trip to Utah in October and hope it will tide us over the long winter in Michigan when being outside isn't that much fun.

32 & Counting

This day 32 years ago after our wedding Tom and I posed for this photo standing in my fancy Trans Am with our wedding party all around us.

It doesn't seem like that much time has gone by, but it has. When we stood at the church and said our vows "for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health" they were just words really - we had no idea what they would mean in the long run. How could we? I look back on it now and realize how naive we were - how naive all wedding couples are at that age.

What it means 32 years down the road is that we've had some of all that "better, worse, richer, poorer, sickness, health" stuff and we've survived it all. What it means is that we traded in our fancy sports cars for more practical vehicles and what we got in return was three kids who keep us broke, a house that needs constant attention and a few pets who do strange things at inconvenient times.

But we also got a family that has given us another set of contrasting scenarios "joy and sadness, hope and despair, pride and shame" - but most of all true delight in watching them grow and move on into adulthood and the honor of being in their lives.

With Tom I feel I have genuinely led a charmed life. We have had some difficult times, but somehow we always land on our feet. Now we get to spend more time together and also anticipate being grandparents to the next generation - one of which is already the light of our lives.

It's been a fun 32 years, Tom. We're still naive in a way, we certainly don't know what the next years will bring. I'm just very lucky I'll get to spend them with you. Much love, D.

Peach Pie Memories

I made a peach pie the other day. I used Michigan peaches, but they were not as sweet and juicy as I would wish. But it tasted good anyway and the crust was decent.

When I was a kid my mother or grandmother would make whatever kind of birthday "cake" we wanted and I always wanted peach pie. Because my birthday was in May (not peach season), peaches would have to be saved from the previous summer in the freezer. When my grandmother died several years ago, we found a pack of peaches frozen into an ice block in her freezer labeled "Denise's peaches." Who knows how long they had been there! At that point it had been quite a while since the ladies in the family made me a peach pie regularly.

But this pie I made sparked those memories. My grandma made the most delicious pies - especially her crust, and this blog name of "butterscotch pie" is in her honor.

I'm thinking more about the ladies in my family lately since my writing quartet is embarking on a new project - writing letters - and I'm going to write letters to my daughter about these women in my family. The letter about grandma will certainly have to touch a bit on her pie, although she was an amazing woman in several other ways too.

Judy's on the Lake

We met at Judy's house for Quartet this month and she lives in a house that overlooks a small lake that is nearly covered this time of year with lily pads.
We sat out on the deck and ate sweet cherries from a yellow pottery bowl, a delicious dinner and blueberry buckle for dessert.

Then we each read some of the writing we've been working on. Ali recently lost a close friend who was in her 50's when she died from cancer. Ali was freshly back from the funeral out of town, and read the eulogy she wrote, which was so touching and sweet, but also really good writing.

It's funny how some of the best writing comes when you are in the middle of an emotional time. Ali and I talked about this at lunch a few days later.... how this kind of writing comes straight from the heart when you are feeling too vulnerable and weak to put up the usual walls and do the self-editing that comes automatically when we think about things too much.

Ali's friend was lucky to have someone who cared so much and was so talented that she could send her off with a beautiful sentiment that perfectly captured her personality. I hope I'm that lucky when it's my turn to go.

Visiting Sparty

Tom and I just returned home from a weekend at Michigan State University in East Lansing where we stayed at the Kellogg Center, the on-campus hotel, and went to see Garrison Keillor's traveling summer version of "The Prairie Home Companion."

It was a fun weekend, where despite the rain, we managed to do a little antiquing, and stop at the dairy store on campus for ice cream. We even managed to bumble around campus a bit and drive by Sparty the statue.

Our daughter Sloan, who goes to school at MSU, wasn't in town this weekend, and I think it's the only time in three years we've visited the campus without coming to see her. She'll be back in town this week, and we'll be making a couple trips there to move her from one place to another.

She is entering into her senior year and Tom and I were wondering if we will come back to this town once she graduates. May as well enjoy it now, I guess, and this weekend was fun!

Travelling with Tom

Last year I gave Tom a photography workshop for his birthday and wanted to do it again this year, but he opted for a photography trip out west instead. Although we were just out to Wyoming this past May, he wanted to head back to Southern Utah.

He invited me to come along, and since it's about my most favorite place in the world, I said "yes" even though most of the time will be spent watching Tom do things like this photo of him at Monument Valley.

I don't mind. It gives me a chance to do something I've been calling "plein aire sketch writing" - which is a borrowed term from the art world which means creating art, usually painting, outside on site.

When I do sketch writing I try to capture with words the scene as Tom is seeing it through his camera, only I try to capture the other senses too. Not just, what am I seeing?, but what am I hearing, smelling, feeling, even tasting?

I experimented a little with this concept in the Grand Tetons this spring, but plan to use it more in Utah this fall. I'll post some examples when I have them.