Functional assistance in functioning

On wednesday 8/20 we had our first real meeting of the writers group hosted by Wil and I, you know I wanted to say Wil and me but some grammar freak on the internet would be headbutting their computer monitor. You win grammar! Anyway, it was at 6 o'clock same place the North Star Cafe which was insanely quiet. Nothing but very solemn people tapping away on lap tops, I got their early and so I relaxed into my nervousness. I didn't want to head into a situation where writers of varying talent were depending on me to take them to some higher plane of literary stature. I AM NOT THAT GOOD, also there is no higher plane of literary stature anymore(I refuse to believe the higher plane of literary stature is where Dan Brown exists).

I've been writing since before I could write I would walk around and dictate stories to my mother while she wrote it all then I would draw the pictures. Writing is all I've ever done and wanted to do but I'm still not that good, talking down to others about writing also INSTANTLY makes you a bad writer. Writing is a zone...a frame of mind and if you fall out you might never be back.

Wil was excited he just came out of Nationals and wanted to share concrete ways to get better like breathe control and projecting he knew my job was a little harder. I was in charge of addressing content and I knew he would help greatly because we both share that same idea that the human life is the baddest motherf#cking thing ever and if your writing can inch at all close to that you win.

It went well, it was a small crowd and we got comfortable with each other and talked about who we were through our relationship with writing and how to address things in a way that will surprise the reader...pleasantly. How to tone down the bad anger and pump up the good anger the righteous kind that makes other people mad too.

A couple of them were just happy to have people to talk to about their writing who wouldn't throw a big happy smile on top of everything they presented. Someone who could look at them and say "That wasn't as good as the first one" or "Where is the rest of it..." and Nate stopped by and helped out it was a really solid vibe. If Port Veritas is a community then its important that we as the ones who help to make it function dont act as an aristocracy that we reach out to everyone so that they will reach back and perform. I relaxed quickly once I realized what everybody wanted was a genuine critical voice I can definitely be that. If you want someone to be fussy about poetry, short stories, prose come to the writers group on Wednesdays its going to happen every week till the wheels fall off.

Party for the death of an era

We used to not be we at all, The group that meets at the North Star Cafe at the top of Congress street used to just be a lot of people reading and Nate. Nate would put out the list and I would sign up and wave sheepishly at him. Wil would walk in with a bag that contained a gatorade and he would sign up then drink the gatorade and sit waiting for Kelly. That was normal, Nate booked the features, maintained the website, organized events, acted in plays and the other people that helped only did so in such marginal fashion that I am not even going to give them detail. Great people, but not detail worthy.

This week we celebrated the death of the spirit of that normality. We can no longer afford a comfortable stability, we must move molecules until confusion gets us noticed. I thought that the great confusion would resolve itself after our team came back from the National Poetry Slam and placed....anywhere. It turns out that was only the beginning, now we have a group of people with the taste of more and better. Once a poet or a writer can see better or more from where he or she is a good one won't stop. A good one will hit an all out sprint to get there and that is what I underestimated.

Now we are all each other's keeper and that's serious, we're a beach that feels every grain of sand washed in and washed away keeping count. Every voice that comes through that microphone is ours for an instant and maybe more, if we do everything we can to embrace it. It's for me no longer about love, I love Nate or I love Wil or I love Sean. I am Port Veritas and will do whatever I can to help it, I know they are too and so we will pour buckets of "expendable" income into this to grow it.

It's a funeral for accepting just enough to keep it going, its a pact to send lightning into Frankenstein and wake up the neighbors. Not only will I help organize but i'll pound keys until I've got something fit for you, more and better then I ever was. Things will be changing in the next few weeks and we need whoever cares to care more and better.

The boys of summer and the Personal Outrage of Nervousness

first off I have to tell everyone, I love making titles for writing. I have more fun doing it then Tom Wolfe did in the 70's. Anyway, I have been a flaming nervous wreck sitting out a home like the doting housewife of a soldier to war (although on a signifigantly smaller scale). The Port Veritas National Slam team who I now refer to simply as the BOYS OF SUMMER because I create nicknames all the time and without thought, came into Madison like a house of fire and took third place in their first bout. I left out a detail however the team they lost too WON the whole freaking tournament in 2006 and in 2007 came in FOURTH for a first time team to compete with people at a level like that is some serious David and Goliath sh#t right there. So in the first round Goliath kicked the tar out of us but it was a learning experiance. Nate was slow with the phone pickup and the National poetry website WAS NOT UPDATING FAST ENOUGH!!! I knew they had to come out like a house of fire in the second bout or we would come back feeling like our best foot hadn't come forward.

I did finally get to speak with Nate after calling him 3 times a day and he didn't mention anything about screwing up and since he never compliments himself(GOD I WISH I COULD DO THAT!) I knew he had scored well and apparently Wil had the high score for our team in the first bout. Nate and Wil were both fine so the wheels hadn't fallen off the cart we just needed to push the cart faster. The problem is in the second round we face White Plains New York who beat us already in a practice run and LOS ANGELES who are always inside the winning circle and captained by Shihan who is the talent scout and a routine performer on DEF POETRY JAM. Shihan has that effortless conversational vibe that KILLS!!!! I'm sure his team is going to be rock solid.

Well that was a bout going on Thursday and Friday I got the update....WE TOOK SECOND!!! OH YEAH!!!! First Maine slam team in over 10 years maybe 15 and we placed above Bostons Lizard Lounge team (Who are AWESOME) and the Chicago Green Mill team(who started slam) and most of the new england teams(except War chest her Mass THATS RIGHT I SAID IT WRONG ON PURPOSE! CORRECT ME!!!!) I promise no more exclamation marks for now but I was excited because our score was very good. I didn't find out till late saturday but it looks like the final listing came out and we were 36 out of 77 or so teams. I am worn out. Sean, Wil, Juba, Jake and Nate are so pumped up I'm not sure I could create a metaphor for it. The world is just a little bit different for them now and I'm probably most excite for Sean and Jake who are so young and so talented and this is just the start for them, its like being a first year quarterback in the superbowl even when you lose it you never lose the lessons you learn from it. They'll all be back in the superbowl next year. I'll do anything I can to make sure of that.

the cheesiest ending to any blog ever written.

I remember how excited my mom was to show it to me on the computer. I remember there was a buzz it was something that was written for school to complete some sort of foolish assignment designed to stimulate the minds of ragged youth. My sister had written a poem.

I remember reading it and thinking that this was the saddest shit any second grader had ever written. It was just creepy and detached but it lasted after you read it. It wasn't a matter of being impressed, it was something else entirely. It was hers and it always would be.

She kept writing feverishly as smart kids going through grade school do, surrounded by the social trappings of her environment she closed herself off and just did it. As far as I know she lost out on parties and keg stands and pep rallies. She was writing.

Her english teachers were so smitten that they couldn't even call her high school thoughts undeveloped(which is the job of an english teacher) they were in love with how creepy it was and how passive the anger was. My sister was born so clever and so quiet that sometimes I would poke at her until she insulted me and then just LAUGH at how funny the run down would be. She's so interesting I hate when she's quiet and tries to give a sly shy look. Its crap.

When she sits alone and writes she's in complete control now, she picks up the keyboard and shuffles from stanza to stanza like Tiger Woods going hole to hole. It's something to read, I'll tell you. She's taught me a lot about poetry and when she speaks about it I listen but make sure to never let her know that she's better then I ever was, creates a more layered picture in a shorter amount of words. Less waste. I'm older so I can't do that, I have to appear like the smart successful one and turn up the effects loud enough that she doesn't look behind the curtain. If she did she'd see me studying her stuff.

I have thought about why we both were drawn to writing, whether it was something my mother did or maybe our mutual love of superhero cartoons in the late 1980's. I have no idea and I have no solid leads on an answer anything I think of sounds pretentious and makes what we do even more important then I normally classify it. I don't like doing that. For me writing is just like brick building or selling fat cream over the phone. Its an art and all that really matters is that you have the capability to do it well. My sister has a hard time doing it any other way.