Bette, Lana, Connie, Barbara and Dorothea

On September 22nd, local writing instructor Dorothea Helms, a.k.a. The Writing Fairy, introduced four of her former creative writing students.

Lana Cutrara has been published in “The Globe and Mail,” “There’s No Place Like Home,” “Today’s Homes,” “Career Choices,” and “The Mom Project.” She enjoys her role as the Membership Co-ordinator for the Writer’s Circle of Durham Region (WCDR).

Come Lie With Me (2:48)

Each week of the creative writing course, we were asked by The Writing Fairy to dip our hands into the mystery box for next weeks assignment. I unfolded the paper to find “400 word love scene“.

Bette Hodgins is a freelance writer and health care consultant who lives by the motto, “You cannot discover new oceans unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore.” An award-winner in two national writing contests, Bette has a writer’s enthusiasm for challenge and adventure.

24 Hour Contest – Smart (4:48)

Bette entered this piece in the 2005 Writers’ Circle of Durham Region 24 hour On-line Non-fiction contest. Absolutely thrilled to receive an “Honourable Mention”, Bette was doubly excited to see it published on the WCDR website.

Barbara E. Hunt has been published with CBC Radio One, “The Globe and Mail,” “The M.O.M. Project” and “Homemakers.” She is on the board of WCDR, teaches poetry, and is a finalist in LICHEN Arts & Letters Preview “One Hundred and One Words Non-Poetry Challenge.”

Sick Kids (2:12)

Last year I was so impressed by the entire Sick Kids experience which is so different from other hospitals and this is the poem that came from spending a week there with my child. This poem is unpublished.

Missing (2:03)

Stephen Lewis among other speakers this past summer made an immense impact whenever the topic of Africa came up. This poem is unpublished.

Connie Jamieson has enjoyed success in healthcare, outdoor recreation and other freelance writing. Her short fiction piece was a finalist in the Writers’ Union of Canada 2003 Postcard Story Competition; her “Opinion Shaper” articles appeared in Metroland newspapers in 2003; and her memoir won the Fall 2004 WCDR 24-hour non-fiction contest.

Perpetuity (2:03)

Metamorphsis (1:49)

Following my aunt’s funeral in April 2005, I wrote the memoir “Perpetuity.” When I read it at my writing circle, Northword Edition in Uxbridge, Dorothea challenged me to rewrite it as a poem so I spent a day scribbling prose and rhyming forms. The resulting ballad “Metamorphosis” won the poetry division in the 2006 Haliburton Highlands Writers’ and Editors’ Network contest and was published in the anthology Liaisons 2006, proving again that a sprinkling of fairy dust works wonders.

The Thomas Foster Memorial is 70 years old. Inspired by the Taj Mahal in India, the Memorial was built in 1936 for $250,000, and is made of solid imported marble and 22k gold mosaics. To commemorate this historic landmark, the Town of Uxbridge is holding a series of “Friday at the Foster” events. On September 22nd, local writing instructor Dorothea Helms, a.k.a. The Writing Fairy, will introduce four of her former creative writing students.

Lana Cutrara has been published in “The Globe and Mail,” “There’s No Place Like Home,” “Today’s Homes,” “Career Choices,” and “The Mom Project.” She enjoys her role as the Membership Co-ordinator for the Writer’s Circle of Durham Region (WCDR).

Bette Hodgins is a freelance writer and health care consultant who lives by the motto, “You cannot discover new oceans unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore.” An award-winner in two national writing contests, Bette has a writer’s enthusiasm for challenge and adventure.

Barbara E. Hunt has been published with CBC Radio One, “The Globe and Mail,” “The M.O.M. Project” and “Homemakers.” She is on the board of WCDR, teaches poetry, and is a finalist in LICHEN Arts & Letters Preview “One Hundred and One Words Non-Poetry Challenge.”

Connie Jamieson has enjoyed success in healthcare, outdoor recreation and other freelance writing. Her short fiction piece was a finalist in the Writers’ Union of Canada 2003 Postcard Story Competition; her “Opinion Shaper” articles appeared in Metroland newspapers in 2003; and her memoir won the Fall 2004 WCDR 24-hour non-fiction contest.

Come and enjoy a medley of literary voices as each writer shares her unique style!

4 km north of Uxbridge on Durham Road 1
Google Map to Thomas Foster Memorial

No advance ticket sales – Donations at the door

What’s more perplexing is that I own a lot of books I’m not even interested in, but I can’t get rid of them in case someday I might be interested in them, and because, well … they’re books. Tiny microcosms of word-induced life. Mini literary planets inhabited by real and imaginary characters. Living ones and dead ones, zombies who spring up off the pages and prance through my addled mind like Puck in a fairie wood, wreaking havoc with sleep and work.

I think I need therapy; my emotional attachment to my books may qualify as obsessive. For example, sometimes I fondle them. There, I admitted it. I love to stroke the glossy covers on my modern hardbacks, imagining how the author must feel picking up a smooth clone of the baby she pumped out during a word-obsessed labour of love, and knowing that through the copulation of ideas and language she conceived the remarkable offspring we call “book.”

I also get a high from running my fingertips across the bumpy texture of the binding and gold-embossed spines on my 1917 Mark Twain collection. I conjure up images of who may have owned the set before my dad found it in a flea market 30 years ago and gave it to me. In addition, book covers provide visual stimulation that fuels my obsession. Sometimes I stare at the cover of The Alienist by Caleb Carr, or the book poemcrazy by Susan D. Wooldridge, and wonder why I don’t own flowing black clothing like a cape or a big, wide coat. How glorious it must feel to grasp the outer seams of such a garment and swing it into the air, or to have a stride so long that the fabric would flare out as I flow down the street.

I’m also enraptured by the handwriting in the fronts and margins of some of the old tomes I’ve picked up at yard sales. My copy of Short Stories and Essays selected by W. J. Alexander, Emeritus Professor of English Literature, University College, bears the copyright date of 1928 by the Minister of Education of Ontario, and was stamped by Cloke’s Bookshop in Hamilton. On the inside cover, former owner S. G. Whitelock signed the book with a fountain pen, and made notes throughout the pages with a pencil. Who was S. G. Whitelock, I wonder, and why did she/he part with this book?

My craving for sensuous stimulation from books is boundless. When I want to relax, I open my 1950 copy of There is a Tide by Agatha Christie, hold it up to my face and inhale the scent of the libraries of my youth. My shoulders droop and I let go of pent-up tension as I smell the aged paper’s sweet mustiness that I associate with dusty shelves, card catalogues and Dewey Decimal numbers. When I open my 1881 copy of Our Deportment or the Manners, Conduct and Dress of the Most Refined Society by John H. Young, A.M., I breathe in a different brand of staleness. This scent hints at a long-ago private home library, where the emanations of paper, leather and cardboard used to mingle with the aroma of onions cooking in a far-off kitchen.

Of course, there’s the satisfaction I get from the reading itself—from discovering how different authors packaged letters, syllables, words and paragraphs to create a whole that is always greater than the sum of its parts. Despite the books I own that I have yet to read, I sometimes re-read pet tomes. Now and then I re-enjoy John Irving’s A Prayer for Owen Meany and imagine I hear Owen’s coarse voice and see his wrecked body. Or I open up Barbara Kingsolver’s The Poisonwood Bible and experience once again how that novel breathes life into the jungle as a main character by inviting every one of my senses to dare to enter. Or I pick off the shelf my favourite book of all time, Twain’s Letters from the Earth and think back to high school when my Grade 11 English teacher warned me, “Whatever you do, don’t read Letters from the Earth.” He knew that because he told me not to, I’d go out as soon as I could and get the book—which I did. I have read it numerous times, and I marvel at how much Twain’s writing influenced my philosophy of life and views on religion.

Adding to the illogic of my book obsession, I do not treat all my babies equally. I avoid breaking the spines on most of them, and I don’t fold down page corners to keep my place. There are a few, however, that I have bent until they sit on a desk flat, marked up with pen, inundated with yellow stickies and shoved into enough backpacks and bags to introduce little rips to the edges of the corners. These are the books I use when I teach writing. I remember when I met Pat Schneider in 2002, I asked her to sign my copy of The Writer as an Artist: A New Approach to Writing Alone and With Others, and she was touched when she thumbed through the dog-eared, oft-turned pages. The thought that her book played such an important role in my teaching meant a lot to her.

For me, books also represent love. My three most cherished volumes were gifts from family members who share my addiction. My husband of 32 years knows that instead of flowers, perfume, jewelry or candy, I’d rather receive a book as a gift for any occasion. After three decades of watching me read obituaries and speculate about the deceased from their tiny write-ups in the paper, for my 50th birthday he gave me The Last Word: The New York Times Book of Obituaries and Farewells. I was and am still fascinated by its mini-biographies of well-known and not-so-well-known people such as Wrong Way Corrigan and Helen Bunce, the Mitten Lady. The book is priceless to me because of its content, and because of the caring that went into choosing it.

I was reminded how obvious my interest in obituaries has been over the years, when my grown daughter presented me with a copy of Famous Last Words – Fond Farewells, Deathbed Diatribes and Exclamations Upon Expiration compiled by Ray Robinson. I asked what was the occasion, and she said, “No occasion – I was in a gift store in Uxbridge and saw this book and thought, Mom HAS to have that.” I’ve read the book twice, and I love it all the more because my daughter knew how much it would mean to me. The third in my collection of the heart is The Ventriloquist by Red Skelton. It’s a signed limited edition copy that my now 29-year-old son and his wife bought for me in Highway Bookstore in Cobalt, Ontario, back in 1999 when they were still engaged. They were driving north along the highway from North Bay and noticed a bookstore in the middle of nowhere, and of course had to stop and explore. They said as soon as they found the Red Skelton book, they figured I HAD to have it. They had heard me speak of Skelton as a childhood idol and one of my favourite comics of all time. In addition to enjoying the book for the heartrending story Skelton wrote, I was and am touched that in the middle of nowhere, a book inspired thoughts of me in my children.

Books are so much more than “just” books. As I grow older, they take on an even deeper importance in my life—perhaps because I have published my first book on writing, and I am in the process of writing a novel. As I tap the computer keys that animate my characters and ideas, I keep books in view so that I am reminded of what my work may someday mean to others. Many people dream of exotic vacations, prestigious awards, fabulous love affairs. I fantasize about a stranger somewhere fondling my epidermis, breaking my spine, writing all over me and storing me on a shelf with other loved ones.

After eight weeks, I was still in a cast from my broken leg, still in a rented wheelchair, crashing into trim and baseboards. Hemorrhoids had reared their ugly little heads, and I could feel a bladder infection coming on. My chronic cough was worse than ever. It was 2½ weeks before Christmas 2000, and I had 30 people arriving that weekend for my husband’s 50th birthday bash. Writing assignments were piling up, as clients called needing last-minute jobs completed before the holidays. I wasn’t done shopping, hadn’t started baking and was considering not decorating the house at all. And there on the other end of the phone line was a creative writing student I hadn’t seen or heard from in more than a year—asking if I’d type in a handwritten entry for a short story contest so he could submit it by the end of the month. My first reaction was to say “No”— and I did. “Can’t you find a friend to type it in?” I asked. As he explained how reluctant he was to let anyone else see the story, my battle-weary brain cells snapped into temporary formation, and connected a face with the name and voice.

Ah, yes, the young man with the soft eyes; eyes that betrayed a hard life. The young man who wrote his assignments by hand because he couldn’t afford a computer. The young man who stammered when he read his work aloud. The young man who apologized for … well, everything. The young man with the poor grammar and spelling skills. The young man I considered one of the most gifted writers I’d ever encountered. And (as he reminded me) the young man to whom I had made a solemn promise: “You did say that if I ever decided to enter a writing contest, you’d type the story for me.”

I had meant it the previous year when I reassured him: “You can learn grammar and spelling, but your ability as a storyteller is a gift. Work on the mechanics and let the stories flow.” In fact, I envied him. It’s an awesome moment in a teacher’s life when she realizes she is guiding someone who is more talented than she. It’s also thrilling. I daydream about writing the kind of fiction that streams from this man’s imagination; yet there he was in mid-December saying, “If you think the story’s garbage, tell me. Change anything you want.” As he handed over the black folder containing that cherished segment of his soul, I sensed his excitement — and his fear. He’d been criticized before, his pop fiction-loving friends telling him his work needed more “action.” Understanding my responsibility to him, I promised to be honest.

Several days before Christmas, I decided to read his story through once before typing. I cried — not just for the compelling content, but for the exposition. I wept at the sensitive, poignant lead he had created, and for how he had varied his sentence structure throughout. I melted inside when I read his startling metaphors, and I reveled in his sensuous word choices that allowed me as the reader to hear, see, feel, smell and even taste each scene.

He had put into practice just about everything we had covered in that 10-week college course. The characters spoke with distinct voices that weren’t his. The surprise ending was prefaced by seeds of foreshadowing he had sown with his unique brilliance. The symbolism he wove transported the story to a depth that no amount of “action” could mine.

I corrected a few misspelled words and rearranged a handful of commas as I typed, but I left the writing intact. When he came to pick up his story, I shared my opinion: “This is too good for a contest; it’s worthy of a literary journal.” But we agreed that the contest was a start. “You put a lot of work into this,” I said, “and it shows.”

“I looked over all my assignments from your course, especially the corrections you made, and used all your advice,” he offered, not realizing the impact those words had on me. In a humble gesture to dismiss my compliment, he waived his right arm and said, “I rewrote the story so many times, I’m sick of it.”

Ah, the mark of a true writer — AND an unexpected boost to my often flagging confidence as a writing instructor. Most artists realize that a writer’s life is plagued by self-doubt. “What gives me the right?” asks the fledgling author who has no choice but to assemble words into unique literary packets. But the writer MUST write, just as the painter is compelled to orchestrate pigment and shape, and the musician fulfills passion by tinting the air with emotion-charged waves.

Teaching writing is lonely, too. What gives ME the right to presume I can shape the abilities and imaginations of other writers, many far more skilled than I? My computer-less friend answered that question for me. He handed me a box of truffles to thank me for the typing favour, but his real gift to me was validation. He had listened to me. Trusted me. Acted on my advice — and the result was breathtaking. He trotted off with three copies of his submission: one for the contest, one for his files and one for his mother. Chocolates and a copy for his mom—you gotta love a guy like that, don’t you?

His words represented one of the most wonderful gifts I’ve ever received. The next time someone reaches out to me for a favour, hemorrhoids or not, I won’t be so quick to say no.

Every now and then my husband says something profound. Last time it happened was in 1992 – the year I celebrated my 41st birthday. I was grumbling about the fact that I was halfway through my life if I was lucky, and that I’d always wanted to be a writer, and wasn’t it too bad that I hadn’t pursued a writing career, blah, blah, blah.

With that irritating male logic look in his eyes, my significant other stopped my whining with, “So, be a writer.”

“Huh?” I countered.

“Be a writer,” he insisted. “Find out what writers do, and do it.”

He doesn’t remember making that suggestion, but like the urgent reverberations of a church bell, his statement echoed within my consciousness, reminding me that time was running out to worship at the career altar of my choice. They say that if we’re open to receiving new ideas, life hands us what we need, and what happened a few days later was evidence enough to convert me to the faith of synergy. I opened the local college calendar and saw a creative writing course listed. I called, registered and took the first step on an exciting – and in many ways terrifying, new life path.

How accurate clichés are for describing that 10-week experience: “It changed my life”; “I never looked back.” Corny, maybe, but from the first class, my life has been different. The instructor didn’t so much teach us to write, as give us permission to be writers. To allow first drafts to flow without agonizing self-doubt pushing aside possibilities. To risk rejection in order to revel in the rapture of opening an envelope and seeing the words, “We want to publish your article.” Cast in the role of Annie Sullivan to our Helen Kellers, she led us to the well and pumped and pumped until one by one we cried out “Wa” in our unique literary voices. Most of us were in our thirties and forties and felt we’d finally made the connection – we write, therefore we are writers.

Recently I was reminded of that first-night euphoria in the same course at the same college – except now, I teach it – have for several years. Class one generated the kind of magic that happens when like-minded people who have felt alone in their passions come together and share. We talked about how it feels to know you’re a writer but to be afraid to say it in case maybe deep down you’re really just a fake. We discussed the intense need to record ideas, experiences, desires and despairs, as though the stroke of a pen or click of a keyboard sets them in some kind of timeless concrete. We confessed a common addiction to the intoxicating lure of reading. And we helped each other realize that even the most celebrated authors of all time started somewhere and had many of the same insecurities. As soon as I announced that class was dismissed, a young woman in the back row raised her hands in the air and announced, “I feel like I’ve come home!”

I said, “Yes, you have. This is the mother ship. Welcome.”

Oh, we laughed at my little joke, but her comment was much more than a bit of fun. She wasn’t kidding, and I KNEW exactly what she meant. I understood the fevered heat that pushed her past the threshold of comfort into her new world of identity. I understood that the fever was and is contagious, and that each student’s life would now be different – not because of me, but because of the writing.

Over the years, I’ve taught dozens of people who, like me, came to writing as a profession later in life. Who, like me, thought that maybe they were weird to want to write as a serious pastime. Who, like me, needed a nudge to declare for the first time, “I am a writer,” and to experience the incomparable feeling of exhilaration that accompanies those words. It’s been ten years since I first uttered them, and the only thing I’ve found that feels any better is inspiring someone else to do the same.