This is what 89 looks like.

Margie, in my writing group, turned 89 today and we celebrated with cake, ice cream, and warm conversation. Two of Margie's children took her away for a weekend of white water rafting (she insisted on having and steering her own raft) and luxury camping. She writes with verve and power, her mind is sharp and insightful, she laughs and cries and tells the truth with an edge, and she teaches Tai Chi. She is a wonder. (Edit: replaced B&W with color at Sue's request.)

We have known each other seven years, have been in this same writing group all those years, and this month we wrote our assessments--what do we want from our writing group, why are we here, what are we trying to do?

Mine is as much about photography as about writing, and though it is a little long-winded, I'm going to post it here, both as a way to save it for myself at a later time, and as a way, perhaps, if I'm lucky, to generate a little conversation about online communication, criticism, and that sort of thing. Here it is: 

When I was a child, books saved my life and my sanity, and so I set out from early childhood to read and write books and to study photographs in books. Now I spend time online--writing, reading, looking. But my attention-span shortens and it is easy to read and write sloppily. In books, my models were people who applied themselves to the crafts of writing and photography. Now I find myself reading the words of people who have not thought about crafting their words, who toss off any old word, a formulaic phrase, even letters: LOL. WTF. SMH. OMG. I look at pictures shot on cell phones with no particular skill or attention: badly-lit, poorly-composed snapshots on which others comment, “great shot,” “beautiful,” “stunning,” “gorgeous.” This feeds my native laziness.


A writing group is a way for me to focus my attention on the craft of writing, and I find working with a writing group is helpful to me in my quest to be fully present, to slow down and pay more attention through writing, just as sharing photography online with people who care about photography is a way to pay attention to the craft of image-making. I worry about losing my truthfulness, my edge, my sharpness and honesty as a writer and witness. I worry that I may produce cliché photographic images through the ease of sloppy internet communications and easy approval. A writing group calls me to a higher standard.


I want criticism, but skillful constructive criticism is an art few practice, and I think it is best practiced face to face among people who know and trust each other. Online criticism can do harm. I want peers who bring their own work to the table, peers who tell me when they want more detail, when something is confusing, or when my writing is not sharp, not surprising. I want to avoid predictability because daily life is not ordinary, never predictable. I want to feel as if I am sitting down with a room full of Mary Olivers every time I come to writing group. I want to be held to a high standard of truth-telling and word-crafting because we respect the life we are documenting. I want a group of co-writers whose personal energies and vulnerabilities match mine.



I am not interested in commercial publication, in finding work that will sell, in marketing, or in the business of making people pay for my work. I would feel I had failed if only those with financial privilege had access to my writing and photography. I am interested in writing as powerfully as I possibly can, making the best photographs I possibly can, and posting my work for free on the internet for those who can find it. By writing I learn what’s going on in me and I bear witness to what happens with others. In photography I document time and light, as a means to save a little of what is ephemeral. If I don’t write well, don’t take the best photographs I can, I won’t do justice to my life, and in turn I won’t be able to connect with others. The use of both writing and photography, for me, is connection--with the person I will be in some future time, looking back and trying to re-member; and with other people who may find that my experience helps them to know their own.