Moved

Hi!  I've moved to a new location.  Come over!  Burst of Fruit Flavor dot com.   :)

Something Worth Saying

So much going on!

I'm trying to do something creative and productive every day.  I don't always succeed but every day I wake up happy that I have another opportunity to try.

I did a big thing.  I signed up for a year long writing workshop.  It starts in September and meets every Monday night for three and a half hours.  Each session, the group "workshops" 30 page chunks of work.  I talked to the teacher and she said that the group consists of some published novelists, some novice writers and others that are in the process of writing their novels/memoirs.  I need to have a good amount, at least 30 pages, written by the first meeting.

Each step forward I take surprises me.  A few years ago, I would have laughed in disbelief if someone told me that I would be doing a year long writing workshop so that I could put my memoir together.  But here I am, writing a little, reading a lot, putting deposits down on ONE YEAR workshops!  Just crazy.

Also, as promised, I'm giving up anastasiaspeaks.com.  In a week or so I will be transitioning to a new website.  The blog itself will be same but it will have a different URL/web address.  I haven't found anything I absolutely love, which hasn't already been taken, so it might be the one I mentioned last week:  www.writingdownyourlife.com.  It's simple and describes both what I'm doing and what I advocate for everyone.

Lastly, life has been so fun with my boys lately.  They say funny things and give me lots of hugs.  I'm grateful for this time and hope that the hugs never stop, even when they're ornery teenagers.  :)

Don't Turn It On

Not news but TV is the devil.

If I don't turn it on, I'm good.  All day, productive, creative, thinking, doing.  But God forbid I turn it on just for a few minutes to watch reruns of my favorite sitcoms (Frasier, Everybody Loves Raymond).  I'll be stuck there for way too long, wasting the precious time I have each day to do other much more important, creative, and necessary things.

Breath.  OK, now that I'm at my desk and the TV is off I'm ready to do things. 

I hope you're having a great day and that you are doing things!  :)

Thought of the Day

What would we do if we knew we could not fail?

Using Your Voice

Happy Mother's Day!!!

So far, mine has been relaxing and yummy.

In terms of the writing, I went to my first workshop yesterday.  It was a one day class on personal essay writing.  I got some good tidbits and met some interesting people but I need to find something that is more tailored to what I need help on, structuring a book, finding my voice, working on style etc.  I am looking at taking a year long workshop that is being offered by a writer in my neighborhood that meets every monday night.  It might be perfect but I'm a little hesitant because of the long commitment and the price.

As a friend recently said, the most important part of writing a memoir is finding (or revealing) your voice.  That's been tough for me.  You would think after over a year of writing on this blog I would have found my voice but every time I sit to write about my life in "memoir" form, I start to write in a way that I think books should be written as opposed to just talking in my own voice, with my own quirks and faults, which is what I need to make my voice authentic.

Though out my life, my best friends always told me that I should write a book because I would tell funny stories all the time about growing up in a crazy family.  When I told them that I was writing a memoir they were thrilled.  One said, "what will be different about your memoir is that the stories will have your quirky and crazy sense of humor."  I told her that I just didn't know how to write funny.  Everything I write tends to sound like a sociological analysis of the need to belong and be loved.  It's so preachy and sappy.  Why can't I make it funny and light and say the same things about my life?  Is it funny to be a kid that leaves her country at 8 and never feels quite right again until she meets a man that loves her so completely that he gives her a sense of belonging she's been searching for since childhood?  How can I make that funny?  I'm sure there's a way.

I'll will try and figure it out. I will either succeed, which will be totally awesome, or fail, which will suck but will give me more material for the stories I tell people at parties!

Today I'll be thinking about how to bring out my own voice in print.

Any suggestions welcome!  :)

Testing The Waters

I bit the bullet and signed up for a writing workshop.  It's a one-day six hour long workshop  on Saturday about essay writing taught by a writing professional.  I'm so nervous about it.  Mostly because I'm afraid I'll get there and realize that I'm a terrible writer and have no real shot of creating something good.

I was writing yesterday about my life in Vancouver and in the middle of typing I just stopped and looked at the screen and thought: "Who the hell is going to care about this? How is this interesting at all to anyone but me?"

There are numerous times each day that I think I'm wasting my time doing this project.  That I'm just kidding myself if I think a non-writer can just sit down and write an entire book without years of experience and publications under her belt.  That, frankly, I'm just delusional about the whole thing.

But then I remember the promise I made to myself and to you.  The statement that I've made about myself by making this promise out loud for the world to hear.  That I will do this thing no matter how hard and how unlikely it may seem to others.  And that makes me want to keep going. 

Just write one word at a time.  Take one step at a time.  Go to the workshop and see how it goes.  Don't worry about your husband having to take care of the kids all day by himself.  He'll be fine.  The kids will be fine.  Just go. 

Nike really hit the nail on the head when they came up with: Just Do It!

Writing Down Your Life

So I didn't actually write the story yesterday but I started.  Does a few sentences count?

I was so emotionally twisted up yesterday and so tiered.  I just couldn't keep my eyes open the whole day.  And then I had a lovely night out with some friends.  I have to remember not to talk about my "job" or my stories that I'm working on so much.  I'm sure it's not that interesting to others.  Especially since I'm still in the process of working it all out. 

I'm excited to see a good friend, Kate, today who I consider a great writer.  She's got a wonderful blog and I think she writes very naturally.  And on top of that, she's just a really fun and supportive person.

OK, it's 9:30 am, I will write for at least one hour today.  :)

Oh, and I was thinking about new link to this blog...something about writing down your life.  I think everyone has a story to tell and I love the whole writing-down-your-life movement that has flourished because of blogs and the proliferation of memoirs.

What do you think?  writingdownyourlife.com? 

A Picture Is Worth Five Hours

The days can go by so fast and you suddenly turn around and wonder what you even got done in the last week.  I'm terrified of not being productive now that I don't have a regular job.  I say "regular" because I am fully into this writing challenge so I'm counting that as my new job.  One of the main problems, however, with this job is that I may never actually get paid for it!  Oh well.  C'est la vie!

Ok, going back to being terrified of doing nothing productive.  I find myself each day ready to attack my writing chores...write, read, think, write.  But then something (or more accurately many things) happen each day to steer me away from that task.  The TV's not working, the bathroom sink is dripping, it's teacher appreciation week (gifts, cards flowers), play dates, groceries, life...AHHHH, it's just stuff I have to get done but it doesn't contribute to my self regulating job.

So I've decided that instead of being totally hard on myself, I will be happy if I do something, even if not writing or reading, that forwards my cause.  Yesterday that thing was organizing over 20 years of pictures. You see, I sat down to write a great story about my mom's opposition to birthdays and my 11th birthday fiasco when I realized it would be so great if I could find a picture from that time to spark some authentic visions and memories.  So before typing one work, I was off to the basement to find that picture.  Well, as anyone that has attempted to organize a giant box of pictures knows it can take forever and lead you to wasting your whole day looking at horrible outfits and should-be-outlawed hair styles.

Five hours later, I had a box of organized pictures and an aching back.  No story written but I found some great pictures.  A lot of the pictures made me sad but they helped me to appreciate today, which is always good.

Today's task, actually writing a draft of that story!

:)

The Not So Big Reveal

You might have noticed that I've changed my name and e-mail address in my profile section.  I thought it was time to take off the mask and be authentic.  This was especially important to me because my entire journey for this project is one of authenticity.  My memoir is a lot about being your true self regardless of the world of differences around you.

So for those of you that didn't know the real me, here I am.  Rebecca.  And I will go forward, in the same way that I've been doing the last few weeks, to share my writing thoughts, struggles, triumphs and lessons with you.

One thing that I need to do to finish the unmasking is to change my website link.  I need to say goodbye to www.anastasiaspeaks.com and adopt something more fitting.  Any suggestions?  I want something simple that reveals something about me, my path, and my blog.  I'm having a hard time coming up with something.

I thought of the following as possibilities:

Whitepicketfence - It was taken.  I love this because of its happy life feeling.
Thegift - taken.

I want a happy, idealistic but not naive, achieving your dream, anything is possible kind of name.

Hmmm.  What do you think?