Adventures leaving a Writing Retreat

 In the =It's always something category. I didn't worry about Kindling Words staff not giving us lunches to take with us, because I thought I'd get some food at the airport or on the plane. But when I got to the airport, all the food places were using computer screen ordering instead of people, so - not wanting to touch something that thousands of others had touched, I decided to wait to eat on the plane. A few minutes before the plane was to let us get on, we all got messages that there would be no food or snacks or anything on the plane because that service was on strike. (and the closest food place to the plane was about a half mile back into the airport, so we didn't have time to go buy food) Luckily, they offered us water bottles on the plane, so I survived on bottled water until I got home. 

Despite not having eaten for hours, when I weighed myself at home, it turns out that I may have gained about 5 pounds at Kindling Words. Wonderful time, great food, and got a draft of my book done.

Poetry lessons from author/poet Nikki Grimes

Last week at Kindling Words West, we not only spent our days writing, we had an inspirational lesson in the morning to kick-start us. Our lecturer was the famous (and wonderful) Nikki Grimes.  To get just a taste of some of the things she taught us, here's what Lynne Kelly, one of the other writers there, had to say in her blog, Making Stuff Up and Writing It Down about our Found Poetry lesson.

I was one of the other writers who created a "found poem"from that snowstorm article as well.
Here's mine:

READY FOR WORST, NEW YORK GETS FIRST MAJOR SNOWFALL

Snow

Storm

Freakish Halloween blizzard

Travel advisory

Trains running losing track

Bright Winter

Happy sledding: “Do it again”