WordSisters

Author: Ellen Shriner

  • 5 Things I’ve Learned About Writing Blogs (Reflections at the One-year Anniversary of WordSisters)

    May 31st marks the one-year anniversary of WordSisters. Yippee! We’re still going strong. All two of us. 

    MP900341653Here are some discoveries I’ve made –

    1. Total strangers follow WordSisters. This still amazes and delights me. I figured 20 or so of our friends and family members might read the blog out of curiosity and loyalty. But we now have dozens of followers, many of whom came to us through the magic of the Interwebs and social media. How cool is that?!? Thanks for reading!
    2. Writing a blog is good discipline. Every other week when it’s my turn to blog, I have to write something. Sometimes I’m excited about it. Sometimes I’m lukewarm. But either way, I’m committed to doing this (and I can’t let Beth down), so I write. That’s a lot of blank screens. That’s a lot of words, thoughts, and stories. That’s 26 times per year that I have shared something I hoped would make you smile or think. Your comments and Likes tell us we’re succeeding.
    3. Writing a blog is different from writing a personal essay (beyond the obvious differences such as links, tags, and visuals). With the personal essays I hope to publish, I may revise 8-10 times during the course of a year or two as I refine what I’m trying to say. I think hard about meaning and style. But with blog posts, which are often meant to be timely reactions to current events, I don’t have the luxury of being so meticulous. I write more quickly and hope to get down the essence of what I want to say. I have to accept that good enough is good enough. As a former writing teacher who now writes for a living, it’s hard to let go of perfectionism. But I’ve learned that if I’m not completely satisfied with a post, well, better luck next time!
    4. I love the power of self-publishing! I love that if we think a topic or piece is worthy of your attention, we can simply put it out there.
    5. By blogging regularly, I’m creating a body of work. I hadn’t thought of this, but blogger Dan Blank had, and he wrote a guest post on Jane Friedman’s website about publishing. I think he’s right. Our blog style and content is still evolving, but looking back I can see how we each have distinctive voices and certain themes recur.

    Going forward, we hope to invite other writers to post on WordSisters and we want to make it easier to find past posts.

    Thanks for coming along for the ride!Beautiful Fireworks

  • Labor of Love

    Last September, my oldest son carried the last of his boxes to his car, hugged me goodbye and drove off to greet his future. He was moving across town, not across the country, but I was not fooled into thinking it was a minor move. He was launched and not likely to live with us again. I was proud, happy, and sad.

    My husband, in a fit of cleaning and reorganizing our now-empty nest, brought a box of fabric down from the attic. Inside were remnants from the baby quilt I made our oldest along with the design I drew, and the calculations I made before cutting out the pieces. The pattern was simple: soft periwinkle blue and white cotton triangles joined to make rectangles with dark red grosgrain ribbon running diagonally along the seams where the triangles joined. The rectangles were set in a butter yellow border. I’d never made a quilt before and I didn’t know what I was doing—the top of the quilt turned out narrower than the bottom—but it didn’t matter. I did the best I could and learned as I went—like so much of mothering.

    Three days before he was born, I was still stitching it. My back ached that dark winter morning, and every time I stood up and stretched over the dining room table to pin a piece, my water leaked a little but I didn’t recognize the signs of his impending arrival.Mike Quilt

    Twenty-three years later, I’m well aware of the signs of his arrival at adulthood, and I see the symmetry in the beginning and ending of this phase of active motherhood.

    Fabric scraps and design notes from our youngest son’s baby quilt were also in the box. He had recently returned to college, a less permanent departure. One side of his quilt has pink, blue, lavender and gold birds flying across a field of aqua. I was immediately drawn to the fabric I found in Victoria, British Columbia while I lumbered around seven months pregnant during our last family vacation before my youngest arrived. Greg Quilt

    The other side of his quilt has a white center that’s bordered by strips of lavender and pink. I hand stitched the outlines of the imaginary birds and butterflies in colored threads against the white. I indulged in this artistic moment during a garage sale we held before moving to a house roomy enough for two boys—by then, I’d learned to enjoy the moments of grace that occasionally occur during the mundane—the essence of motherhood.

    Happy Mother’s Day to all the Mommas out there.

  • Free Vase

    For more than 30 years, I’ve displayed a hand-thrown porcelain vase in my home. It has an opalescent glaze that I’ve always liked. As an off-again, on-again potter, I admire the skill needed to make the vase. Recently, when I wiped the shelf it sits on, I saw the artist’s name inscribed on the bottom and recalled the odd coincidence that led to me having the vase.  Inside Vase

    My younger sister Margo and I are two years apart, and during college, we ran in different social circles. One quarter, we each took an introductory ceramics class at the Toledo Museum of Art (my class was at 9:00; hers was at 1:00). Consequently, we worked in the same ceramics studio but at different times of day.

    Two assistants—both accomplished potters—helped students figure out how to use a kick wheel to throw a pot. To do this, you have to balance on your left leg and use your right foot to regularly kick a bar that keeps the pottery wheel spinning fast enough so you can use both hands to center your gray lump of stoneware. I was WAY too uncoordinated to do this, but gamely tried for the duration of the class.

    Fortunately, I was better at making hand built pieces, so my grades on those pieces kept me from failing. Margo was a little better at throwing pots on the wheel, but not much. We both produced awkward heavy bowls we should have trashed.

    Unbeknownst to us, the two assistants were good friends, and they had taken an interest in us. Jeff was attracted to Margo, while Pete was interested in me.

    With her waist-length dark hair and dimples, Margo had been turn-and-stare, good-looking since she was 14. I didn’t come into my own looks and style—honey blonde wavy hair—until I was in college. I wasn’t as used to being noticed as Margo was.

    30 years later . . .
    30 years later . . .

    We both enjoyed flirting with our respective guys, but neither Margo nor I mentioned the minor flirtation we each had underway. We both had jobs and school and didn’t see each other that often. Similarly, the guys didn’t know they were chatting up sisters until one day during finals. After our pathetic bowls and mugs had been fired in the kiln, Margo and I came in together to pick them up. Jeff and Pete were cleaning the studio while they waited for students to claim their pieces.

    Jeff was about to discard the porcelain vase he’d made because it had a small chip off the bottom and the some of the glaze on the side was too opaque. We asked if we could keep it—it was so pretty, especially compared to what each of us had made. Pete, in turn, gave Margo two tall porcelain vases.

    But although I have dusted it a thousand times, I rarely see it anymore, so I think it’s time to give it to someone who will like it as much as I have. Do any of you want it?

    This blog was inspired by a book called The Secret Life of Objects by Dawn Raffell.