Showing posts with label Diana Coogle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Diana Coogle. Show all posts

Monday, November 30, 2009

Birthing my blog


"She's as cute as a Bug
Short as a minute
She's a pretty little package with
Everything in it"


One of my favorite blogs, Ruth at synch-ro-ni-zing has challenged fellow bloggers to post about how they named their blog. So I have decided to use the excuse to peel and reveal.
My blog title above was stolen mid-concert from a line in a Lyle Lovette song. I had a few other possibilities rumbling around in my bird brain that I was considering, but when I heard him sing that line, Short as a Minute, in the song "Cute as a Bug", chorus above, in that instant I knew that was it.
I took a writing class about 8 years ago at our local community college from a wonderful local author and a superb teacher by the name of Diana Coogle. My main excuse at the time was that I spent too much time wringing my hands over even writing a mediocre email, but it was coupled with the fact that I was recently divorced and needed to get out of the house and among other peeps. It was a fantastic class and little did I realize at the time, how in more ways than one it would prepare me for blogging. There were about ten students in the class and weekly when we arrived with our pads, pencils, and fears, we were given a topic or word to write about and 20 minutes to do it. Then each of us would read our singularly diverse stream of consciousness on that topic, out loud. What I remember the most is the cup of courage she gave each of us, her enthusiasm rendered with a sweet little southern accent and how she found the beauty in what each student had written. Initially I didn't think I could do such a thing - sit and just write for twenty minutes, but now six years later, and fourteen months into my blog, its a piece of cake and I have over a hundred posts.
Oh yes, my blog title, it was part of that line in a Lyle song and it also is in reference to my petite stature, a mere 4 feet 6 inches.

After the concert I hung around the exit, I had heard that he often stopped to talk to fans and pose for photos on the way to his tour bus. And suddenly, there he was, towering over me, shaking my hand, asking me my name, then dropping to one knee in his beautiful pressed suit to pose for a picture.
Thats how my blog was named....

Monday, August 18, 2008

What it is...

I've heard it said, write in down, make it happen.
Inspired by my friend Leahs' blog Barn Door Tagz , I've decided to start an online creative journal.
Mostly overwhelmed with whats going on in my world outside of my art, I'm attempting the possible, a little bit here and there when I can, I'll post photos, jobs I'm working on and most importantly, what in my wildest dreams I would love to be working on.
Since my crazy life is so much more than the assignments that come in, (or these days rarely come in) music, cooking, photography are all going to be woven into this blog as well.
As I embark on this journey, I think its important to thank two individuals in addition to Leah, one I have met and the other not. I'd like to thank Diana Coogle, whom I took a short writing class from 5 years ago, her voice, encouragement and joyful spirit left a permanent imprint on me... and one of my favorite authors, Anne Lamott, whose books I read one by one over the course of a summer in 1999. Her book, "Bird by Bird" gave me the motivation to begin this...word by word.