Broad Street is a nonprofit magazine featuring great true stories told in many different ways. At Broad Street, we hope to create an engaging platform where writing, poetry, and artwork can come together in one space to be enjoyed both by longtime fans of creative nonfiction and by those who are new to this exciting form. We are always looking for more talent to feature in the magazine, so if you have an interesting piece of writing or art please feel free to submit through Tell it Slant.
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Broad Street hopes to create engaging platforms. . .
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Write about a gift. . . Prompt #119
Part 1: Write about a gift someone gave you that you didn’t like, didn’t know what to do with or had no use for.Part 2: What does this gift say about the person who gave it to you?
Whenever there is a prompt like this, you can also write about the opposite.Part 1A: Write about a gift you loved, a gift that was a surprise in a good way, a gift that worked really well.
Part 1B: What does this gift say about the person who gave it to you?
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Challenging situation. . . Prompt #118
Sometimes you don’t know how you will act when faced with a difficult or a life threatening situation . . . until you are in the throes of it. Write about a time you were in a challenging situation. Use sensory detail.
OR: Write about one of your fears. . . from a fictional character’s point of view. . . write about “the worst thing that can happen” . . . then, have your hero or heroine conquer the problem. Ready? Set? Okay. . . think about one of your fears that just won’t go away. Bring your character to life with those fearful thoughts and emotions. Now write. Just write!This is similar to Prompt #47. . . only this time, have your character kick butt.
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“The biggest difference between a writer and a would-be writer . . .”
“The biggest difference between a writer and a would-be writer is their attitude toward rewriting. . . . Unwillingness to revise usually signals an amateur.” — Sol Stein -
An epiphany . . . Prompt #117
* “An epiphany is a sudden realization of a significant event. At that special moment, a life meaning becomes clear to you —an insight into your personality, a discovery of something you value or believe in, an acute sense of where you are in life.
Here’s an Epiphany Tale one elder told to her family:
I must have been around seven or eight. It was summer, and we were visiting my aunt Clara up at Crystal Lake. I was alone, lying on my back by the banks of the lake, looking up at the sky, and I had my harmonica in my mouth. I was just breathing through it, in and out, not playing a melody, simply breathing. And suddenly, I was overcome with this wonderful feeling of connection to everything in the world. I’d say now it was a spiritual feeling. I listened to the sound my breathing made through that harmonica, and I thought, I am part of the noise of the world. I am part of everything . . . I’ve had that feeling again, from time to time, throughout my life — a certainty that I am part of the universe —but that was my first time. I think that knowledge is one reason I’ve never found the idea of dying very frightening.”Your turn: Write about an epiphany you or your fictional character has had.
* Excerpt: From Family Tales, Family Wisdom — How to gather the stories of a lifetime and share them with your family, by Dr. Robert U. Akeret with Daniel Klein
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Guest Blogger Jean Grant-Sutton and glorious messy imperfections
Guest Blogger Jean Grant-Sutton writes:This time of year I am reminded so pertinently of the glorious messy imperfection of life.
I see it in an amass of leaves on the ground that are so exquisitely beautiful in their array of color, but they make for a lot of clean up and clutter in the yard.
Great in the compost to make nutritious soil — glad for that.
I take comfort in reality.
Life is made up of much glorious messy imperfection.
I feel like I’m one of them
And I continue to practice acceptance for that.
It takes courage to be imperfect.
Click here for a great article by Roger Allen on this topic. I hope you enjoy it.
Integrative Yoga Therapist, Jean Grant-Sutton loves to share writings that stem from an understanding of life based on the ancient art and science of Yoga. She writes to connect and relate with others about the journey of being a human being.
Jean Grant-Sutton ERYT/1000, CMT is a teacher and educator of yoga. She is currently the Yoga Program Director at P.O.S.T. Wellness by Design in Petaluma Ca. Her many years of practice and experience as a retreat leader, studio owner and director of teacher trainings award her the talent to construct transformative experiences in her classes. She skillfully brings depth, clarity, ease, and joy to this ancient bodywork practice. Click here for more information about Jean Grant-Sutton and yoga integrative therapy.
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Seeing red. Prompt #116
Today’s writing prompt: Seeing red.
Photo credits:
Red door – Colby Drake
Children and backpacks – Kent Sorensen
Holiday table – Laura Plunk Davis
Coffee – Laura Plunk Davis
Holiday scene – Jane Person
Red car – Marlene Cullen
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Art connects us.
“It’s a very deep experience for so many people to read ‘Wild’ and feel what they feel, because of course they’re not feeling it about my life, but about their own. And that’s what art does. It reminds us that we are more alike than different and that our common humanity connects us really profoundly.” — Cheryl Strayed, author of “Wild.” -
We write for a variety of reasons . . .
We write for a variety of reasons:~ To tell a story, or what happened as we remember it
~ To create a fictional story
~ To tell a fiction story, based on truth
~ To journal what happened and our feelings about what happened
~ To write non-fiction: share our knowledge or to tell what happened
All of this involves what we learned, what changed us, what impressed us.
It doesn’t matter why you are writing. It is important that you write.
No matter the motivation for your writing . . . Just Write!
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Pressure. Prompt #115
Today’s prompt: Pressure.
