Mike’s Musings

So today was the first day of the Saginaw Bay Writing Project Summer Institute, and wow!  I wrote a lot today.  But I’m not complaining at all; it was wonderful!

Right after lunch, we have what’s called Sacred Writing Time for an hour and fifteen minutes.  I cut my lunch short by a few minutes then made my way to the top floor of SVSU’s library to stake a claim in the beautiful reading room that overlooks the entire campus.  It’s nothing but glass and views.  Incredible.  I used to grade essays there when I taught as an adjunct for SVSU a few years back.  It’s where I’ll write every day of the institute, if I’m able to.

So, I sat down at one of the tables, pulled my notebook out of my bag, and got down to business.  I really wasn’t sure where my creativity was going to take me, but I never expected to end up where I did.  For the first time in over five years, five years after my thesis was finished and bound, I heard Nathan’s voice in my head and my pen started flying.  Nathan is the main character in my Masters thesis, called _Skinny Boy_, and he has eating disorders.  It ended up being a novella and it charted his journey from developing the eating disorders to his hospitalization.  At any rate, I thought I was done with Skinny Boy and have been making notes about the next book about Nathan, so imagine my surprise when Nathan took me back to his hospitalization again today.  I wrote six pages (handwritten) in 45 minutes, plus two pages of “Oh my God, what just happened?” journal-like pages.  He’s let me know there’s at least two more chapters he’ll be contacting me about.  I’ll follow where he leads, no problem.

After all that writing, my brain is tired.  And here I am, writing more.  Time to stop for today.

Namaste… MS