Bear With Me

January 2015

I signed up for Roxanne Snider's writing class to help me break the bad habits of 20 years of writing as a bureaucrat. 

The classes work around "prompts" - short writing assignments. I've done two so far; the third one's brewing.

There are six of us in the workshop, all women, but other than that we have almost nothing in common.

We read our assignments in turn, Roxanne gives her feedback and then we all comment.

The first prompt was to write about something that happened to me as a child using language and perceptions appropriate to my age at the time:

I’m outside. I’ve had my breakfast. I’m cold in the shade behind the house. I look up at the clear blue sky. A gold bracelet floats in the air. 

This scares me. I look again at the gold ring. I should know what it is but don’t know what it is. 

I'm bothered that I don’t know what it is. 

I try to think. I have seen one before. But it wasn’t a bracelet. It was another thing.

I hear two voices. 

In the next yard are the brother and sister who live in that house. They lift dripping pink sticks to their lips and blow.

Soap bubbles.

The second prompt was to use description to create a sense of place. I found this tough. What follows is very different from what I read in class.

The Cavallo Point Lodge hotel is a repurposed military base nestled at the foot of the Golden Gate bridge. Red roofed clapboard houses circle a parade ground surrendered to moles and wild grasses.

On our last day, we sit on the porch of what might have been the mess hall and is now the charming pub. We have blankets over our knees and sunglasses on our faces. 

Sparkling in the sun on a narrow table in front of us are fifteen dollar cocktails and six dollar bowls of fancy spiced popcorn. 

For free all around us is the sunny afternoon.  The bay’s ever present sea salt haze makes the air glow. The bridge towers are a stark silhouette in the distance.  

We are the only people outside. There are no conversations but our own, no sounds of traffic from the bridge. The air is perfectly still, the temperature balanced between chilly and just fine. 

Thanks for reading!

Have a great week!

Karen