On Wednesday, November 17 at the Writer's Cafe, I gave my favorite exercise to the women and men in the group, "Nine Things I Don't Remember"  and "Nine Things I Do."  This extraordinary writing prompt was given to me by Abigail Thomas, whose memoir writing and instruction can be easily found on http://www.abigailthomas.net/.

I promised to post what I had written last February in a group class  that Abby conducted at the Woodstock Writer's Festival. Alas, I can't find the notebook with that entry. So I suppose that should be one of the "NIne Things I Don't Remember" this time around.  But by way of proving to the doubters that this exercise is illuminating, I thought I'd give myself the same challenge, again. Old work is good to revisit when it needs to be revised. New work is a diversion and serious avoidance if you haven't completed what you've started.

An aha moment for me!  I'm on a deadline with the third piece in my series about my father  for the www.goodmenproject.com, and this "remembering" exercise can get the juices flowing for that piece—which is slow in coming. It is tentatively called " Scheherazade of the Stove." In the opening of the memoir that I'm writing for publication on or about November 25, my parents are having a violent argument in the dining room in our lake house in the Berkshires. Here are "Nine Things I Don't Remember" about that argument.

1. I don't remember why my mother was in her dressing robe in the middle of the afternoon?

2. I don't remember  how my mother kept that dressing robe, mended and tidy.

3. I don't remember who followed who into the dining room where the argument escalated

4. I don't remember if the sun was shining through the picture window that looked right out onto the tranquil lake

5. I don't remember if they knew I was there?

6. I don't remember what I said to god when I prayed they would get divorced?

7. I don't remember when I switched to praying  they would stay together?

8. I don't remember when I started thinking my father would kill her.

9. I don't remember which one of us carried my mother to her four poster bed.

Tomorrow I will write the "Nine Things I Do Remember." Obviously, I will by then have approached my looming deadline with more knowledge than I had at the start of this post. "Nine Things You Don't Remember"  are a good way to come into your "memory room." Sneak in. See what makes you tremble when you deny memory.

If you attended the Westport Arts Center's November 11, 2010 performance and readings of memoir contest works about war, I could tell you that all of these works in the original written form didn't have the dramatic core well integrated into the medium—which is often just a difference in writing a 1500 essay for print only, and writing for listeners.  The authors all  had stories to tell, and luckily they were open to having some of their work revised—the way editors revise. But this is performance work, and playwrights rarely give the director/producer carte blanche for narrative progression.

However, I can easily demonstrate how if you're a writer, listening to your own work matters. I will be uploading the audio for both the October 17, 2010 readings and the Veterans Day readings next week, and you'll easily be able to feel how if you "read" your work aloud, you'll get the maximum bang for you ink-buck.

When I was an editor in a large noisy newsroom, I use to make my reporters read their stories aloud before they filed them for editing.  At 5 pm for a morning newspaper, there was always a low hum in the clicking clacking computer terminal humming newsroom—ten or twelve people yakking away to themselves —as if they were talking on a cell phone on a Manhattan street corner. But here's the thing they all learned: You can be the best writer in the world, but you may have less than perfect pitch in your ear. No problem. If you read your work aloud, you will hear where you need to change up sentences, move descriptors, and "ings" and "howevers," and all sorts of tricks to make the music of what you write sing louder. It can't hurt. Try it.

Finally!

The Tuesday evening series that launches on January 25th  at the Westport Arts is in the casting phases.If you have a a good story on the following theme, email: ina@mousemuse.com or call 203 247 3346. If you're selected, we will work with you to get that story into a dazzler, under 10 minutes no matter what, and you'll see, you'll be hooked. You'll want to be a storyteller again and again.

The End of Innocence—We want to hear your stories of End of Innocence.

We often think that young kids are the only innocents in the world, and indeed we try to protect them from as much reality as we can. But we are all kids in certain ways, and the end of innocence keeps popping up throughout our lives. Maybe you were six years old when you noticed that the Tooth Fairy slipping out the door looked just like your mother? Or perhaps you were just at retirement when your genius stockbroker turned out to be Bernie Madoff?

Disillusion is a kicker no matter when it happens. Maybe the boneheaded guy who cheated on his exam in high school ended up getting into Harvard? Maybe you suddenly realized that the guy who finally asked you on a date really was only after one thing?  How long did it take for these eye opening realities to sink in? And how did they change your life? Did you go for vengeance or acceptance? If we’re lucky, and if we are to grow, each end of innocence brings some retrospective humor, wisdom, and knowledge.

Think about it. You've got a story. We want to hear it. So does everyone else.