Guest Blogger Alison Luterman writes about going deep with your writing. Originally posted in her May 1 newsletter. Many years ago, in Hawaii, I got a chance to go “scuba diving.” I’m putting the words in quotes because it was really pretend scuba diving for tourists. There was no training involved other than the most basic instructions on how to breathe through a tube connected to the oxygen tank that was strapped to each person’s back. I think we had to sign a waiver saying we would not sue the company if we drowned. Then a group of us waded out, submerged, and voila! We were “scuba diving.” Well, not quite. My man-friend, S., had heavy bones and big muscles and he descended like a stone to the ocean floor. I could see him fifteen feet below me picking up beautiful shells while I floated directly above him. I couldn’t…
Tag: Alison Luterman
“At the Ice Rink” by Alison Luterman . . . Prompt #349
Today’s writing prompt is a poem by Alison Luterman. When the prompt is a poem, you can write on the theme or the mood of the poem. Or use a stanza, a line, or a word to inspire your writing. Just Write! At the Ice Rink I came here to fail and to fall but not so well as that man careening over the ice sliding into the wall as if into second base shambling up, grinning, like a great bear, and taking off again, saying, over his shoulder, “You’ve got it backwards. Learn to fall first, then skate.” I end up clinging barnacle-like to the sides, inching around the perimeter like a caterpillar. Wall-hugger. Nothing has changed since I was eight and my parents paid for skating lessons in hopes I would become more balanced. Now as then I am wobbling, terrified, feet frozen like blocks of wood…
Alison Luterman and Patience
Guest Blogger Alison Luterman writes: January 2018 Happy New Year! A few weeks ago I read something on-line about the concept of a “word for the year” and being a sucker for all things woo, decided to try it. Someone had used the word “Delight” and her career exploded into a lovely confetti burst of rainbows and candy canes. Sounds good, I thought. I’ll take “Delight” too. But wait! It turns out that you can’t just choose a word willy-nilly. It’s more like the word chooses you. The next day as I sat scribbling morning pages it came to me in a sickening flash of insight: my word is Patience; unsexy, old-fashioned Patience. Not the ever-popular Abundance or Adventure or Sex Goddess, (even those are all very good words and you’re welcome to them). But as soon as I saw my pen writing “Patience,” I knew: It’s what I…
Go With The Flow
What do you call it when your creativity just seems to flow? Alison Luterman had an epiphany: I was singing in a little pop-up chorus this past month. It was a tricky classical piece, and the other women were all looking intently at their sheet music. I don’t really read music, so I ignored the paper and gazed at our teacher, trying to meld my brain with hers. Okay, I know this is going to sound woo-woo, but that night in chorus, watching the teacher’s hands on the keyboard, hearing her sing the parts, my body understood the music on a level my mind couldn’t. In Interplay we call this “ecstatic following” and we often do it as a group in dance. I remember being introduced to the concept and having an immediate suspicious reaction to it: “Ecstatic following– you mean you surrender your critical thinking? That’s how we end…
Guest Blogger Alison Luterman writes about the “shadow”
Guest Blogger Alison Luterman talks about “how to be true to the complexity of intimate relationships, while at the same time protecting the dignity of all concerned.” The other night in essay class, a student read her story aloud. Behind her moving account of her mother’s death, I could sense something missing. “I can tell from your description what a wonderful woman she was, ” I said. “But there are hints here and there about things that might have been difficult as well.” “Yes, that’s true,” she admitted. “We got into some tangles, but I didn’t know how to write about that part. Maybe I wasn’t ready.” I knew exactly what she meant. I also struggle with how to be true to the complexity of intimate relationships, while at the same time protecting the dignity of all concerned. I don’t have any one-size-fits-all answer. I just know that the weight…