Off to Summer Camp for Writing

This will be a short one. I'm slightly brain dead and very focused on the few remaining tasks I have to do to finish up the low-residency program in children's lit. I teach in at Hamline University. But I wanted to capture a few thoughts.

In this program we are kept busy basically nine to nine. Workshops, lectures, readings, BBQs, square dancing, zombies, deep reflections, and of course late night talks followed by early morning walks. I have taught in this program for over three years now, July and January, and while I don't seem to be doing it a lot easier, I feel that I'm getting ever more out of it. I worked with Ron Koertge this time in workshop and his quiet, steady humor and gentle persistent questions led me to cut about half the first chapter on a new middle-grade book I'm working on.

I'm home for an afternoon. And Peter (my guy and fellow writer) told me I had to stop thinking about the program for a while. So I sat down and wrote the first four pages of my next Claire Watkins. This books is pushing to come out. I'm promising it the rest of July and all of August.

Three more days and I'll be home. Very full of inspiration.