Saturday, April 3

writing again

I was accepted to what seems like a pretty hard to get into writers workshop. I needed this alone to be inspired again to write. It's such a weird thing that I can't just write and feel that what I'm doing has meaning and purpose. I need someone to push me, to read something and give me feedback, I need a room full of people to share their stories because it's like magic, and this kind of magic doesn't work alone, at least not for me. Today our instructor was Ben Fong-Torres, yes that guy from Almost Famous who worked for Rolling Stone and bossed around that little mopped hair kid to write his piece. He grew up in a Chinese restaurant in Oakland, shy, but with a passion to be inside the radio, writing or talking about music. He is 65 and said that he is, "barely here", making us laugh in between playing interviews with Michael Jackson and Jim Morrison and telling stories of what it was like to interview Quincy Jones. Then we interviewed each other and our assignment is to write up a profile of this person. I worked on it today on Em's porch and we're going to polish them up and then I'll share it here along with all the assignments from the workshop.

He pointed out that all of us in the class don't make much money and read from a list that ranks the best jobs out there that lists journalist and teacher in the high 100s. Seems I'm doomed.

What an inspiring and funny guy.
bft_macca
jacksonsdiningtable

2 comments:

Silvia said...

I can't wait to read your new stuff!

Anonymous said...

This is amazing! Congrats on your new class and can't wait to hear how the class and your writing progresses!