Writing Workshop – The girl and the jam jars

Posted by Josie on Oct 24, 2011 in Creative Writing, Writing, Writing Workshop | 7 comments

She sat in front of two jam jars, one smelling faintly of pickled onions and the other so old she couldn’t even remember what had been in it. With looped lines she wrote two labels and stuck them on, one on each: Missing and Found. And then she sat with the pen in the end of her mouth and thought hard.

With a sigh, it was easy to write the first one, her hand moving to fetch a slip of paper she had cut, writing in careful, neat capital letters, folding the paper to drop it into the Missing jar. Best to get that one out the way, and no need to dwell, was there really. Those thoughts had been thought before. She could bury it under other things missing, to help forget about it for a while. And after all, she doubted that particular aspect of her life would be missing for that long. “You’re just in there temporarily, okay?” she said aloud, reaching for another slip of paper. Right, what else was missing? She prodded the word in her head, but found it unbudging. Words sometimes like to take on the character of resistant old toads, she had found, so she shrugged, fair enough, we’ll come back to that one then.

Writing Workshop Prompts – What Today Meant

Posted by Josie on Jul 4, 2011 in Moments, Writing, Writing Prompts, Writing Workshop | 1 comment

Morning you lot. Hope you’ve all had a good weekend. I have a small, naked pirate on my lap as I type and something smells funny in my kitchen, so all normal here.

While I go and have a read of all your entries from last week, it’s time for you to start thinking about your next one – this week’s workshop is going to be based on a post I wrote yesterday about finding beauty…

(For anyone unfamiliar with my Writing Workshop, have a read all about it and browse old workshops here, or if you’re an old hand at this you can carry on straight to the prompt.)

Prompts

What made you feel alive today? What made today mean something?

Write about a moment, a thought, something you did, something that happened to you, something somebody said to you, that made you stop for a moment. It doesn’t have to big or impressive, just one thing that left you different because of it. Something that felt significant, beautiful, or that just made you feel something. It doesn’t have to have made you feel good, not all days bring us that, but it needs to have touched you.

Try and capture it and pin it down with the words you use.

Writing Workshop Prompts: Personality Catwalk

Posted by Josie on Jun 20, 2011 in Writing, Writing Prompts, Writing Workshop | 4 comments

I spent a lovely couple of hours yesterday reading all your workshop posts from last week. Thank you so much for joining in and sharing what were such a mix of personal, honest, brave and creative entries. We had personal stories, poems, we had descriptive writing, fiction, we even had an audio reading - it really did make me fall in love with the workshop again and remind me why I do it. I mean it when I say that it was an absolute privilege to get to share your head-space for a while, and while I may not have time to comment on all entries every time, I will do my very best because I do think it’s important you all feel like your writing has been well-read when you put so much of yourselves into it. So thank you – I hope you’ll find this week equally inspiring.

Long-time readers of this blog will know that one of the things that it chronicles most vividly is my journey in trying to figure out who I am, understand better about how I tick, and. harder still, try to like the person I find. More recent readers will know that at this stage of my life I’m probably closest to that as I have ever been, with me finally beginning to feel a sense of real identity and a confidence in it.

Rather weirdly, but perhaps not coincidently, my interest in fashion has echoed this. For a long time I felt too unattractive, too uncomfortable in my skin, too nothing to give much thought to clothes or how I look, but these days the clothes I wear are really starting to be another way in which I express myself and tell the world about who I am. Now… I’m broke, so this means more charity shop scouring and mix-and-matching supermarket sales bargains than anything else, but as my sense of self is growing, so is my sense of style (at least, I’d like to think so!)

Maybe I’m a little late in the game to this one, but I’m beginning to love how a certain pair of shoes, or a hat, or a bag, or an anything can say something about me. And I’m enjoying discovering what I like, and what I don’t like and what suits me and what makes me feel good.

Which leads us on to our Workshop prompts this week…

The Writing Workshop Returns!

Posted by Josie on Nov 8, 2010 in Writing, Writing Prompts | 14 comments

I don’t know about you but I miss the Writing Workshop. Actually, not just that: I miss blogging. I seem to have forgotten how a little bit. I’m a bit buried under layers and layers of thought and feeling and not sure what to do with it all. And, after all, that’s what blogging is FOR, or at least, it is for me. It’s about teasing out those strains of thought and emotion and experience and finding a way to translate them on to the screen.

Images provide a wonderful way to do this, which is why Tara’s Gallery is so lovely, but I miss the words too. Writing is such an intrinsic part of blogging and words hold so much power. I want to find that power again.

I very much needed the break, but I think it’s about time I got back in the saddle. And to help me do that I think I’m as much in need of my writing prompts as you are.

So let’s do this. Time to begin again.

Are you ready?

For any newcomers to our Workshop, here’s how it works: each week I’ll give you five writing/blogging prompts. Pick one, pick two, or do them all if you’re really keen – it’s up to you. How you respond is your choice. You could write 10 words or 1,000. You could share a real-life story, or make one up. You could write a poem or just free-write without thinking too hard and see what happens. It can be funny; it can be serious; it can be emotional. It can be whatever you want it to be. The only rule is to enjoy writing your post and get something out of the process.

Prompts each week take their inspiration from blogs, current affairs, daily life, or just whatever I happened to be thinking about that week. If you’d like to suggest a prompt for a future workshop then send me an email or catch me on Twitter – I would love to hear your ideas.

And remember! We’re not looking for perfection here! Just have a go! The best way to get better at writing is PRACTISE. All the best writers aren’t afraid to write badly. So turn your inner-critic off for a while and just see what words come out.

For our first week back in business I have chosen prompts inspired by titles of books on my book shelf. I’ve provided some interpretations as a guide but don’t let these restrict you if you’re feeling creative.

1. Catch 22 (by Joseph Heller)
- Are you feeling stuck with no discernible way out of something?

2. Coming Up For Air (by George Orwell)
- Write about a time you found peace after a difficult time. Or, alternatively, write about breathing spaces. What helps you re-charge?

3. On Beauty (by Zadie Smith)
- Tell us about finding beauty somewhere unexpected. Or about what beauty means to you.

4. Past Secret (by Cathy Kelly)
- Do you have a secret from your past you are brave enough to share?

5. The Book of Lost Things (by Joseph Connolly)
- Write about something you have lost: emotionally, physically, or metaphorically.

Now here’s what you have to do. Write your post and publish it on your blog between now and THURSDAY. On Thursday come back and use the widget that will be up to paste in the URL of your post to share. Then take some time to read some of the other entries and leave some comment love! We’re not here to critique – just to have fun and support each other in our writing experiments. So be kind please. Anyone who would like to submit something via email, or even anonymously will be more than welcome to do so. I’ll post them on the site here and include the link in Thursday’s round-up.

See you on Thursday!

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This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop in the U.S.