Tuesday thoughts

A slip of paper I stuck in a book three weeks ago as a bookmark (in Elizabeth McCracken’s excellent short story collection: “Thunderstruck”) brought me to tears this morning when I rediscovered it. The simple phrase – “Work together as a society” was the result of an artistic exercize that I gave my Teen Writing Academy students this past summer at the Ross Creek Centre for the Arts. During the two week intensive, I challenged the five writers in the Academy to write down 50 things they fear. They, in turn invited their peers to add their fears to the

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Ross Creek Teen Academy

This summer I’ll be co-teaching the 2018 Teen Arts Academy writing course at the Ross Creek Centre for the Arts with Two Planks and a Passion Theatre’s artistic director, Ken Schwartz. “The goal of the Academy is to provide students 14–18 years old with an intensive hands-on experience in the arts in an environment that emphasizes creativity and innovation while using constructive critiques by professional artist mentors  to assist in artistic growth.  Students enroll in one discipline as their core activity with focused collaboration projects across all disciplines to create original multidisciplinary work.” Check out Ross Creek’s website for further

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a perfect day

Opening night for Two Planks and a Passion Theatre’s 2017 season was absolutely glorious! The weather was perfect for both shows — Nothing Less! set on a hill overlooking the beautiful Nova Scotia landscape;  A Midsummer Night’s Dream performed around a roaring campfire, the Bard’s words rising up with a near-full moon. I only wish my grandmother had been there to see it. We all have those moments—at weddings or the birth of a child; or during a spectacular sunset; or even upon pulling a loaf of bread, perfectly browned from the oven — when we wish more than anything

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This week in tweets

  Sometimes 140 characters just doesn’t cut it, so I thought I’d introduce a new feature on my blog called “this week in tweets.” Every so often I’ll take a couple of my tweets from my Twitter feed and give you annotated versions of them. “youngest boy lost his last baby tooth this a.m. and then left for a week at camp. Good thing this lonely mama has edits to revise. #writermom” The boy-o was off to the Ross Creek Centre for the Arts for his first full week of overnight camp. Animation workshops! Pirates! Silly songs! Campfire! As the

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