start a writing group

But I do kind of have a creativity group on line with my 100 in 100 creative challenge.

Who says we have to go from 0 to 60 in one shot with our goals?

So I’m not ready to start a real life sit down writing group. So what? The more I am used to being the organizer, the more I am thinking about helping others build their creativity, the more community I am building around this, the better.

If I start here, on the internet, it might very well be easier to jump into a group IRL. And maybe the internet thing will grow and will actually turn into something I would consider a real writing group.

Oh, you know what? This winter, I actually did join a writing group on line and we created an awesome multi media, multi author novella.
http://burninglines.blogspot.com/

If you want to read it, start in December 2008. We started a new one, but everyone was busy and we all kind of left it unfinished.

totally languishing at this goal as I have been since I put it down however many years ago I started up here.

Except for the outline that I started in my journal for an Ebook I might write… one that would also be an outline for a curriculum that I might be able to swing in an online manner, but i am still working that idea out.

Not face to face, but it would still count.

A daytime parents’ NaNo meet up in November. It wouldn’t precisely be for a “writing workshop” because it would be WITH the kids there, running around, and it’s hard to get writing done like that, but it would be for support.

And it would be nice to get together people who were fighting the same fight.

I mentioned it to my Williamsburg area ML. It looks like there are going to be meetups here in my neighborhood this year for NaNoWriMo. So it’s not precisely “starting” a group, but it’s being a part of one. Oh. I suppose joining NaNoWriMo is being a part of a writing group, too.

Atleast for the next few months, so I can start thinking about this again. Although I don’t think I want this one to be the one where I am “leader” or “teacher.” I’d rather just have a conglomeration of people who have a similar goal. A fellowship, if you will.

The Fellowship of the Pen. (cue heroic music)

;)

but life has bumps that sometimes get in the way.

It turns out that the landlord has decided not to renew our lease and wants us out in March. Chances are that we will not be able to afford another apartment in this neighborhood, what with the gentrification and exhorbitant rents. There might be a semi-miraculous happening and through connections we find a place somewhere here, but it’s not something to bank on.

I don’t know where we will be. It could be anywhere from down the block, to Queens, to California. We just don’t know.

So because I don’t know where we will be, I don’t want to start a writing group, giving just enough time to bond before we move and I have to start all over again. But hold on a darn moment… even though I like the idea of starting a writing group wherever I do end up, as a way to meet people… who says the writing group I start has to be some formal, huge thing? I could simply meet up with my friend Heather, who I met during Nano last year when I sent out a call on the neighborhood mom’s site, asking for fellow Nanoers.

I should call her about this. Anyone else who wants to come can come and we can talk about things other than mommyhood. Fine, we’ll meet up at the baby cafe, probably, or maybe one of our houses, and talk about what we want to do for Nano. Even my fiance has said he might like to write something for Nanowrimo… that detective novel he’s been ruminating over.

Okay, so I’m not going to give up, even if I can’t start a formal group until later. Truth is you can reach all your goals if you want them bad enough, try hard enough, and are open to reframing them when you need to.

I still want to start a group, but am not tied to it being a writing group specifically.

I know I said September, but it’s August now, and I have done nothing towards it. I have though, taken up a new goal of selling my art on etsy.com and am afraid that the new goal will take too much time to commit to another big thing like this.

I could do a creativity group, one that uses many different media, maybe even incorporating writing. But that might be the biggest commitment of all types of groups I might start. If I follow what I have done before, I would need to develop a curriculum and outline lessons… maybe it wouldn’t take that long, as it would be only brief plans, but I know it would take up a lot of brain space as I tried to figure out the best way to address the issues of motherhood and creativity. I know because it’s happened before. I would be the leader and insructor of this, and it would be a bonafide workshop and I’d have to do all sorts of set up.

The easiest would probably be just to put out a call for like minded individuals to meet for an evening writing group in some neighborhood bar on a night when S can watch the kids. But I worry that this avenue would interfere with my other goals.

I’m not sure if it’s evident here, but I have a history of being a worrier and thinking myself out of taking action because I always want to do the exact perfect thing. Plus I’m a little lazy.

This is my goal date to start a writing group.

I have quite a few decisions to make by then. The first one will be whether this is a class that I charge for and then lead as a teacher—or a workshop of peers where I am a facilitator.

I need money, that is true, but I always have issues with charging money for things like that. I have trouble making mysel the authority- well, no not really. I have no problem with giving my expertise away for free, but I struggle with feeling like my knowledge and experience is worth anyone paying money for. Silly hang ups.

Another question is how to incorporate the mom-status into this thing. Where do the kids go? What are they doing? I just had the idea that if I hook up with another mom, we can do a kids class at the same time. Mom/kid creativity. Is this making it way too complicated?

Maybe it should just be a workshop for moms. Do it at night at some bar or cafe, when we can get the papas to take the baby shift.

Again, there’s the question, should I charge money??? I feel like I shouldn’t, but there’s a lot of time that goes into coming up with a ‘curriculum’, exercises, critiquing people’s work, and so on. Why shouldn’t I be paid for my time? And then, people have a tendency to take things more seriously when they have to pay for them. They are less likely to blow them off, more likely to show up consistently, more likely to do the tasks and assignments. If it were just a free, get together kindn of workshop, there is the risk that it would become a gab fest or bitch session or therapy.

I’m just imagining all the people here in the neighborhood. They seem like such authorities themselves. My insecurity asks why I have a right to put myself over them and ask for money when they could just do it themselves.

Ahh… but can they? I am a good teacher. I have a masters degree in it. I have been writing for 20 years. True, I don’t have a masters degree in writing, no MFA here, but I have pretty much done so much work on learning about writing that I got one on my own—minus the connections, the nice shiny degree, and the cost. Other people who have taken my writing and creativity workshops have gotten a whole lot out of them, both teenagers and adults.

Dammit. Now I’m thinking about how I should apply for a job teaching poetry to teens online, but I know I need to publish. Why haven’t I worked harder on publishing my poetry? I’m a coward, that’s why. Now I’m still behind on my career because I keep ignoring the publishing aspect.

When am I going to get my energy back? When will I get out from under the tidal wave of baby care? I need to get a handle on all of this and not be so exhausted by it so that I can continue with the other parts of my life. I cannot drop them, writing, teaching, art. I must do them for my own happiness, but also to make money for my kids. This isn’t just my career we’re talking about, this is our livelihood.

Has this raised the stakes sufficiently to get over all my insecurities and self sabotage? Maybe, but it hasn’t helped with the sleepy/achey/braindead/exhaustion. Please say it’s just the post partum junk and the hormones from nursing. It’s the having two under two thing, and in one month when G turns 2 years old, all angst and exhaustion and struggle will magically lighten.

Poof! Baby overwhelm gone! Continue on boldly in your life, Ro. Nothing holding you back!

Sigh.

A mom sent me an email about how her second baby, just born a couple of weeks ago, has exhausted her. She mentions that maybe it is because she has had no creative outlet, since she has been so focused on domestic things.

This I understand. This I have been going through, too.

It’s just another reason to do this goal. I honestly don’t know if I am ready, though. I have so much organizing of my home and head to do first. And I think I need to get used to having another baby. Maybe I would like to wait another month. Then Ivy will be 3 months old… that is a big milestone. Fourth trimester over.

I think I would like to continue thinking about this and planning it, but I don’t want to take action on this goal until a month from now. My positive goal is to put this to the side until I am ready, not pretend I am going to do it, and then feel bad when I don’t. I choose NOT to do this right now. When I pick it up again, I will actively and positively be doing so.

We have the date for our first meeting. So, once it actually starts, I can cross this puppy off. My last writing group was not much fun so I hope this one is.