Memoirous

Recently on PBS ln American Experience there has aired a two-part series on the taking of the American Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and what became the American Hostage Crisis that lasted 444 days. Pretty much the course of American policy in Iran since then has been stuck. Very little has changed diplomatically. That period of time was the background for my novel Cloud of Witnesses about a boy growing up in rural poverty in southern Ohio. What, you may ask, has the Iranian Revolution got to do with Athens, Ohio. Well, I was a student then at Ohio University and there were many internationals on campus and from there I spun out a story about an unlikely friendship between 2 boys coming to terms with their own feelings of being an outsider. One was an exile within his own family and the other was truly learning that he wouldn’t be able to go back, that home was out of reach. I tend to start first with an idea and then flesh it out with story. Sort of like a philosophical challenge or...

On Sunday, my day off, I did all the necessary stuff: laundry, dishes, etc but I also was outside in the cold bright and early just taking in the sunrise and snow, when I trundled to the shed for Christmas decorations. It’s been a number of years since I put up a tree—just doesn’t seem worth it—but, yet, I continue to hang around me the orbs, glass fangles and dangles, and tape Christmas cards to the walls. I’m overwhelmed by the love each object represents that I want to remember those who have remembered me. Thus, over SEVERAL hours I carefully went through my bin. In Chicago I had a schematic in my head where everything went, now it is new territory and I had no idea where things might go or work best. Several bigger framed pieces had to vacate a hook or nail and my nature shelf sacrificed space, so that in the end I have a cozy Tiny House ready for Christmas—complete with a poinsettia! First, playing with my theme of blues against the far facing wall, I stretched a piece of h...

Available wherever you download books or in print from Amazon. 

  Many of us are looking to write memories—either in the form of literary memoir or simply to record family history. This how-to book looks at memoir in small, bite-size pieces, helping the writer to isolate or freeze-frame a moment and then distill it onto paper. 5.0 out of 5 stars   Excellent Fantastic Resource! Reviewed in Australia on November 22, 2018 Verified Purchase I am a huge fan of flash fiction and lurking in my writing interests has been the desire to document my personal history - but it is a daunting process, coming that close to hurts and pains, without just documenting all the good stuff and making a one-sided biog. Jane Hertenstein has made this process soooo much easier by teaching the writer in me to touch into my history in small flashes. That single 'freedom' has made this book so valuable that I have read it twice in the 9 days I have owned a copy! And the second time around I found I was - for the first time - drawn to a style of poetry I feel I could t...

 More Snow! (Friday, 11/18/22) Even the older climate deniers here in Michigan say: I remember when I was a kid, we’d have a foot of snow by Halloween. And, I’m thinking . . . I don’t. But I grew up in Dayton, Ohio, so a little further south. Plus we didn’t have a Great Lake at our doorstep. Up here, Michigan is bordered on three sides by Great Lakes. So, yeah, from the north and west the winds and weather blow through and take that moisture and voila: Snow! When I woke up this a.m. in my cozy Tiny House and climbed down the loft ladder and in the dark looked out the front door windows—there was literally, but not literally, a blanket of snow cascading down the decks off the main house sliding back door. It was perfect and pristine. I wish as a writer I had another word than blanket or carpet. But, it is not a cliché, it is soft and inviting like a blanket and the undulating folds really do resembled mussed bed clothes. When it is this fresh and white and glistening, one on...

  AVAILABLE FROM WHEREVER YOU DOWNLOAD BOOKS We begin with a sudden memory, follow it to see where it leads. Yet so many of us tend to ignore these flashes. We think later yet later on we might have forgotten or lost the relevance of the moment, the urgency that led us there. I recommend a process I call write right now. In the amount of time it takes you to brush your teeth, you can jot down the memory and an outline which can be filled in later. The prompts in this book are designed to spur memories, to get you writing. I’ll also direct you to resources, authors to read and study, and places to submit.  5.0 out of 5 stars   Don't Create Without It! 5.0 out of 5 stars   Great writing prompts -- no more writer's block! 5.0 out of 5 stars   Great for writers and teachers of writing. 5.0 out of 5 stars   Terrific resource for flash

I awake under my warm blankets in my little loft My nose close to the ceiling where my breath and The frigerator humming down below create its own heat After climbing down, the cold ceramic tiles stun the feet I hustle to my toilet, as cold as an outhouse, soon though The thermostat is pushed up and the tiny house is cozy And the light is on, paler light still outside my window, trying trying To wake up the world, the sky almost a haze, then The first specks, not even flakes, more like paint splatter appear Dotting the deck, optical illusions, almost, could be But soon the leaves are covered in a carpet of white and a hush As it comes down, ticket-tape confetti to celebrate the season It’s November and the bare trees hold forth catching snowflakes On their tongue boughs, the first taste of winter   We expect an inch or two

  Many of us are looking to write memories—either in the form of literary memoir or simply to record family history. This how-to book looks at memoir in small, bite-size pieces, helping the writer to isolate or freeze-frame a moment and then distill it onto paper. 5.0 out of 5 stars   Excellent Fantastic Resource! Reviewed in Australia on November 22, 2018 Verified Purchase I am a huge fan of flash fiction and lurking in my writing interests has been the desire to document my personal history - but it is a daunting process, coming that close to hurts and pains, without just documenting all the good stuff and making a one-sided biog. Jane Hertenstein has made this process soooo much easier by teaching the writer in me to touch into my history in small flashes. That single 'freedom' has made this book so valuable that I have read it twice in the 9 days I have owned a copy! And the second time around I found I was - for the first time - drawn to a style of poetry I feel I could t...

  Available wherever you download books or in print from Amazon. 

Readers of this blog, both of you, know that I worked the polls in Chicago for 20 years. By mistake I signed up to do the same here in Michigan . (I thought I was registering to vote.) After the last major presidential election poll workers and officials have come under attack and increased scrutiny. Listen, no system is perfect—that’s how America planned it. We have juries made up of one’s peers, same goes for the folks sitting at the tables at your local polling precinct. Human error is inherit, but that doesn’t mean the system is rigged. I worked an eighteen hour-day and tried my best to make sure everyone was welcome and the process went smoothly. We saw sooo many people. Close to 500 voted—this in addition to those who voted absentee. I was also impressed by the diversity of the electorate. Voters of all backgrounds, age ranges (several first-time voters), and those differently able (a few wheelchairs etc). If anything, it buoys my belief that things do work. That we’re all d...

It occurred to me the other day as I reflected back on my year in Michigan and my first year of employment at the bike shop that a Denny’s bookends my short, varied professional career. When I was just out of high school my first job was a deep-fry cook at Wendy’s—but not for long—I went on to bigger and better things as a waitress at Denny’s restaurant. It was down the street from my house and on the way to school. I stayed long enough to earn my 5 year pin. I was terrible. Even now looking back, I ate way more than I should’ve from the cake case and consumed a lot of “mistakes.” Perhaps, it had to do with also moving out of my parent’s house and living on my own about half way through those 5 years. I don’t recall hardly ever grocery shopping. And, as opposed to my attitude now, I could care less about cleaning and sanitizing. I did the chore check-list grudgingly and didn’t look for additional projects. But, I did rake in a lot of money by today’s standards in tips. Fast forwa...

November, the month of birthdays This first week of November is teed up with my friend’s birthdays—you know who you are! We are not together to celebrate, but from afar we wave across the lake, across the miles, from tall buildings and tiny houses, from Rogers Park to Okemos to Wilson Avenue. I’m listening to Taylor Swift’s new album (like the rest of us) and feeling twenty-three. Remember— When we moved to Chicago, when we made mad strange choices like love and mercy, and chased around after midnight to save a friend’s life, and late-night pizza runs, and early-morning el train rides to Cook County, when we got on the big red Jesus bus. The bus has long gone to the junkyard graveyard and we have one foot there too, but, still . . . We exist, we’re here, we beat Covid and the other stuff, friends all this time. Funny, isn’t it?

What a perfect Halloween we just had! The weather cooperated in being foggy, murdurously spooky. Water beaded on cobwebs, lurking low clouds caught on spikey pines. The sun never breaking through. Who needs news or those political ads in scary voices of the coming apocalypse. World ending, life as we know it, doom. I feel it, through the gloom, in the owl-hooted hush, the karma witches watching over us, the crazy clowns warding off enemies, keeping the bad juju away. For another day. Even in these fearful times—we were able to let go and live in a netherland,