I felt the end of the residency keenly today, taking time to ship some things home and generally catch up on last minute details for my departure in two days. I picked up gifts for family and a few more postcards (which are still unwritten), then managed to hoof it up the hill for Marion Dane Bauer’s lecture on POV and Psychic Distance. I feel pretty confident on my ability to figure out POV in a piece of writing, but it was a revelation that POV was a matter of choice for the writer, that the writer could set out to tell a story in a particular way by choosing the POV at the outset or changing the POV completely during revision. I’m an organic writer, letting the story unravel as I hear it in my head, but after Telling as a performer, I understand that stories do change depending on how you manage the story landscape.
I hoofed it back down the hill to ship my package and grab a quick lunch of Chicken Ceasar salad. The waitress asked me if I wanted anchovies and I expected little dried bits to be sprinkled on top. I was delighted to see real anchovy filets on the chicken. Delicious and a treat to be sure. I hoofed it back up the hill (wondering if I’ve actually gotten in shape this past week) just in time for Margaret Bechard’s lecture on dialogue which ended in a lively discussion about the ending of Hemmingway’s Hills Like White Elephants. I’m not a Hemmingway fan (please, no stone throwing!), but I have to admit, the use of dialogue and space scenery really was effective… for it’s time period. I doubt a writer in current times could pull something like that off (at least not without a critic referring to the original Hemmingway), especially if they are in a workshop or critique group.
The intensity of last week has definitely tapered off and after lecture and dinner, I was back down the hill trying to cool off with my B&J shake and an excursion into online RP. The brain fry is evident as is the anxiousness to get home. Although there is a part of me that has grown accustomed to the pacing of my life, the ability to move where I want when I want while soaking up the wisdom of my writing elders.
