Finding a Magic Island at the Circus of the Arts

Left: Laura Vaughan and I co-chaired this year's conference. See that fuzzy boa she's wearing? One of our members knit a boa for every attendee -- in an assortment of funky colors!
Photo by Helene LeBrun, Gainesville Branch, NLAPW

Clowns cavorted, word acrobats wrote guerilla poetry, improv artists created theater, jewelry sprang from the imagination, and music filled the air -- all at the Florida State Association of the National League of American Pen Women's 2009 Biennial Conference, Circus of the Arts!

Held November 19-22 at the Hyatt Regency in Sarasota, the conference allowed members -- professional women writers, artists, and composers of many types -- to connect with colleagues from around the state.

As conference co-chairs, Laura Vaughan, from the Daytona Beach branch, and I, from the Clearwater branch, reached across the state to organize the conference, held in a third location in the county south of where I live.

Talk about a three-ring circus!

The emails flew back and forth, and women from other parts of the state contributed ideas and elbow grease. In the end, it was so worth it.

One of our Clearwater Branch co-president's, Charrie Hazard Moscardini, displays the poster, featuring branch activities, we created for the conference's Parade of Presidents. Photo by Helene LeBrun, Gainesville Branch, NLAPW

We shared ideas about how to market our work, learned how to make our Web sites roar like a lion, and listened to musical compositions ranging from symphonies to songs for children. Our members-only contests drew about 250 entries total, and we distributed about $2,800 in prize money.

So what did I get out of the conference?

Aside from some new friends and great ideas, my most serendipitous moment came Saturday evening when the hotel miscounted the places they set. Instead of setting up six tables of 10, they set up six tables of eight -- needless to say, we had a bit of confusion when our state and national presidents and a dozen or so other members walked in to the dinner and had no seats.

Good humor prevailed, however, and the hotel hurriedly brought in an extra table and squished in other place settings at the already seated tables. But it meant that a few of us found ourselves with unexpected dinner partners.

I joined a table comprised of women from the Sarasota and Southwest Florida branches. On my right, was a woman who, for 18 months, sailed much of the world in a boat built by her husband when he retired. Imagine!

But it was while I was chatting with the woman on my left that I felt my stomach do one of those "Oh my" flip-flops. Readers of this blog will know of my passion for children's literature -- and this woman, Elizabeth Waterston (not the actress), turned out to be co-editor of The Selected Journals of L. M. Montgomery (five volumes).

Yes, THE L. M. Montgomery who wrote Anne of Green Gables.

Waterston also wrote Magic Island, published in 2008, a readers' guide to Montgomery's work.

Oh my, oh my, oh my.

Home Again, Home Again Jiggety-Jig

It's been a busy week in Lake Woe . . . oops, wrong show. Apologies, Mr. Keillor.

But it has been a busy three weeks in Writer-ville. A statewide conference in Sarasota -- I'll tell you all about it and, yes, that's a mustachioed me! -- a week in North Carolina and all the catching up to do once we returned home.

PLUS our church Christmas program is this coming Sonday, December 13, at 9 and 11 a.m., which means a bulletin and PowerPoint to prepare and all the last-minute costumes, mikes, and props to pull together.

Then there's my day job.

"Are you working?" people ask me. What they mean is, "Have you found a job working for somebody else yet?"

OF COURSE I'M WORKING!!!

I'm a freelance, self-employed writer who works at least 40 hours a week and often more. I write ad copy, I'm in the second round of editing a travel guide to the Tampa Bay area, and I write short stories and articles, some of which get published and paid for. Other work I do is along the lines of promoting myself and my work through involvement with a couple of different organizations, and still other work is volunteer work for our church and elsewhere.

But it's all work and I work hard at what I do. I also happen to love what I do and working.

So . . . the next few posts will be to catch up my faithful readers on my whereabouts and activities as I've been gallavanting, cavorting and otherwise carrying on for the last few weeks. It's been a circus -- and more!

Best Advice I Ever Got: Know When to Quit

I can’t pinpoint a particular source for this piece of advice. Maybe that’s because it’s one of those maxims applicable to a variety of situations and circumstances.

Eighth grade Home Ec, for instance. I remember making a fruit salad that was held together with whipped cream. In the days before tubs of pre-whipped artificial fluff, that meant beating heavy cream until it thickened and held its shape.

Beat it one turn of the mixer blades too long, however, and the cream separated into butter and whey. No turning back, no turning back. The only thing to do was to start over with a new batch of cream.

Art can be like that, too. It’s tempting to work and rework a painting, a poem, a play before we let go of it. Just another few brushstrokes here, rework a scene there, and it will be perfect, right?

But work it too long and art suffers. Maybe not quite so visibly. But somehow inspiration and technique separate, and we lose the impetus that drives us to share our work. And isn’t sharing our work part of the point of creating it?

Quitting too soon, of course, isn’t good either. Cream not whipped enough returns to its liquid state, resulting in runny fruit salad. Half-baked plots result in stories that fall apart.

Knowing the point at which a creation is ready to be presented to the world is an art in itself. Not too soon, but not too late, instead of being hidden away under the pretext of not being quite finished.

I wrote this for the August/September 2009 "Hoot O' the Owl," the newsletter of the Clearwater Branch of the National League of American Pen Women. Enjoy!