Edmund and Bridget Catherine and William
My great grandparents.
I have found certain facts about my maternal great-grandparents but I want to know more. They left their homeland of Ireland, knowing they would probably never return, to travel to America to begin a new life. What did they expect? Were they afraid? Was what they found what they expected? There are many answers I will never know, but I've begun to dig deeper in my research . . . . a process I have labeled genmoir - a combination of genealogy and memoir. I need the facts, dates and places, but I also want to find the story.
This week, I learned that Edmund worked at Parkhill Manufacturing Company. I found a picture of the mill, sitting along the edge of a river in Fitchburg, where he labored to support his wife, Bridget, and six children. Several advertisements and copies of old photographs helped me begin to put together pieces of his story beyond birth, marriage, and death dates.
Each piece that I collect fuels my desire to find another . . . to get to know Bridget, Edmund, Catherine and William just a bit better.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Monday, March 7, 2011
Period of Development
To borrow a phrase I heard Ron Howard use during a recent interview, I am in a period of development. I don't know what my next project, essay topic, or endeavor will be, but I am developing ideas, collection information, and thinking.
Joyce Carol Oates said "I have always spent most of my time staring out the window, noting what is there, daydreaming or brooding. Most of the so-called imaginative life is encompassed by these three activities. Entire mornings can slip by in a blissful daze of preoccupation." I try to fully enjoy my own daily moments of blissful daze of preoccupation.
I am also reading an odd collection of works. The first post-graduation book I read was a gift to myself. A Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh. I haven't read this small gem in years but I received a copy of the new edition from a friend who made some major changes in her life in 2010. With her courage in mind, this book seemed a wonderful first read of the new year. I took the time to read slowly, one chapter at a time, and let the words become a personal reflection for me. My book club selections have included Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou, and Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer. I am almost finished with Middlemarch by George Eliot. A bit of poetry and random short stories. I just completed The Writer's Desk by Jill Krementz. This is a look at writers, their work spaces and their "own commentary on the creative process or musings on individual work habits and habitats."
And, I am writing. I wrote a haiku - my first in decades. A simple ode to the falling snow. Working on dialogue exercises. Finding sensual language to enhance lovers on the page. A try at fiction - working on an ending that is worthy of the journey of self-discovery that my leading lady is undertaking. Revising an essay that I will send out this month.
Good things will result from this period of development. I just need to be patient, keep writing every day, and be open to whatever creative opportunities appear.
Joyce Carol Oates said "I have always spent most of my time staring out the window, noting what is there, daydreaming or brooding. Most of the so-called imaginative life is encompassed by these three activities. Entire mornings can slip by in a blissful daze of preoccupation." I try to fully enjoy my own daily moments of blissful daze of preoccupation.
I am also reading an odd collection of works. The first post-graduation book I read was a gift to myself. A Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh. I haven't read this small gem in years but I received a copy of the new edition from a friend who made some major changes in her life in 2010. With her courage in mind, this book seemed a wonderful first read of the new year. I took the time to read slowly, one chapter at a time, and let the words become a personal reflection for me. My book club selections have included Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou, and Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer. I am almost finished with Middlemarch by George Eliot. A bit of poetry and random short stories. I just completed The Writer's Desk by Jill Krementz. This is a look at writers, their work spaces and their "own commentary on the creative process or musings on individual work habits and habitats."
And, I am writing. I wrote a haiku - my first in decades. A simple ode to the falling snow. Working on dialogue exercises. Finding sensual language to enhance lovers on the page. A try at fiction - working on an ending that is worthy of the journey of self-discovery that my leading lady is undertaking. Revising an essay that I will send out this month.
Good things will result from this period of development. I just need to be patient, keep writing every day, and be open to whatever creative opportunities appear.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Change . . .
Slowly, this wintry imagine is giving way to something new.
Also, I just received two emails announcing summer camps.
Both give me hope.
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