It felt as if I didn't write from 1965 to 1988, but that wasn't true. I kept diaries beginning in 1972 — a daily log of weather, activities, and natural events. I began doing so because my mother kept such a daily log for years and years — weather, bales stowed, calves born, visits of children and grandchildren, juniper grubbed, quarts of blueberries picked, gallons of syrup boiled. My earliest efforts were notating the arrival of the first redwing, song sparrow, robin, oriole, bobolink, veery, hermit thrush, whippoorwill …birds have been my love.
By the mid 80s, I was editing and writing blurbs for the Vermont Land Trust Quarterly Reports, the Parents and Teachers for Social Responsibility newsletters, and the Old Brick Church/Old Meeting House newsletters. It didn't feel creative, except for the long poem on the then-current status of farming I put in one VLT Report. I also prepared the churches' weekly orders of worship for about ten years, with my drawings of the churches on the covers.
On January 1, 1988, I "published" my first poem (since high school) on that Sunday's bulletin cover, a short prayer for the new year written the night before. Poetry flowed in 1988. Poems of memories, of introspection, of observations and my feelings about what I saw. They flowed onto the Sunday bulletin covers, interspersed with other poets and writers whose words spoke to me. It was, I realized much later, a form of ministry. I also realized how fortunate I was to work with an encouraging minister and a congregation who appreciated reading my work.
In subsequent years, the flow diminished; I wrote new ones when opportunity and, sometimes, need arose. All it took was an opening line or two to start running through my head, and the rest would follow.
In 1992 I quit the Sunday bulletin gig, and it wasn't until 1996 that I discovered The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. I thought it would help me start oil painting again; instead, her assignment of morning pages got me to writing personal essays.
My son had been writing "Blind Crow's Journal" for a fledgling web-zine called Seeker Magazine, and he introduced me to its creator, Denise Ruiz. I began a column called "SkyEarth Letters" in May '97, writing about books I had read. In April '98, Denise passed the editorship to me, and the editor's letter, "Thoughts of a Seeker," was added to my repertoire. "SkyEarth Letters" became more personal essays of opinion and observation…with photographs. That's where I'm at right now, at www.seekermagazine.com.
I have not published in hard copy for I've not submitted poems or essays to literary and other types of magazines, although I have entered several poetry competitions and submitted entries to become a Denver Post Voices columnist.
What are my goals?
About a decade ago, I answered the question "what would you do if you knew you only had a year to live" by saying I wanted to travel the country, take photographs, and write about the experiences. Just load up a van and cruise. Two years ago I did a Denver to Maine trip by myself, which was hardly a nibble, but which generated a Sky-Earth column on the experience.
An immediate task is to pull together a collection of the nature-oriented essays and poems that I've written, and submit them for publication or self-publish them.
It is my desire to be published in a format that reaches a wider audience than I currently do. The natural world is being so battered and abused that it needs every voice possible speaking on its behalf, in as many places as possible, and particularly in places where we are not "preaching to the choir."
Cherie
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