OctPoWriMo Day 25: Celebrations, Good Times and Poetry

To begin: we are going to take a moment to s-l-o-w d-o-w-n.

Think for a moment about the important rituals, holidays and other significant celebrations in your life. 

How about three inhales and three exhales and just open your mind and heart to YOUR holiday or special day.

Today marks a very important day to me: in two months my daughter, Katherine, will turn twenty-two years old. 

I swear, I don’t know how my children grow up and I continue to look and feel as young as when they were little – but nonetheless, December 25, 2013 marks the start her being twenty-two. I’m sort of nervous because I got married at twenty-three. Youch.

For many people, December 25 is an important holiday.

For others, there are other significant dates and times to get through: my younger daughter abhors Thanksgiving, which for the United States is in the end of November. I’ve decided I will create a special party the Sunday before that holiday and have people bring a variety of foods and we start crafting a new sort of Thanksgiving Emma can love.

Going "poemcrazy"

“Poems arrive. They hide in feelings and images, in weeds and delivery vans, daring us to notice and give them form with our words.”

~ Susan Goldsmith Wooldridge

Thus begins the introduction to her book “poemcrazy”. Through a combination of personal stories and poems, Susan pulls you into her word world and invites you to begin making poems of your own.

One of my favorite anecdotes centers on her seventh/eighth grade English class and her teacher, Mr. Mabie. She speaks of how his was the first class she ever had in school that allowed her to express the person she is instead of the “good girl I was supposed to be.” I only wish I would have had a similar experience so early on in my academic life! I have only begun to find that same sense of creative freedom now in my mid-forties.