Topic of the Month: Happy Holidays from The Ink Well!
Writing Tips: Seasonal Sensations
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Topic of the Month: Happy Holidays from The Ink Well!
Hello friends. This time of year many of us are hustling and bustling, perhaps attending holiday events, or shopping for gifts, or writing annual letters to friends and family. We all come from different walks of life, different regions of the world, and different religious or secular traditions.
Yet this wonderful world of writing and creativity brings us together. And so we wanted to take a moment to thank you for your participation in the community and wish you a happy holiday season — regardless of which traditions or holidays you may celebrate!
The seasons can be a wonderful source of writing inspiration. Whether you live in a temperate climate, or one that turns cold this time of year, the seasons, the weather, the sights and sounds of holiday celebrations and festive events, and other sensory experiences can fuel one's creativity.
Here are a few tips!
What foods do you and your family make this time of year? If you live in the Northern hemisphere, perhaps it is soups, roasts, stews, and other hearty meals. If you live closer to the equator, or "down under" then you may be more likely to eat fresh salads and enjoy the abundance of the garden. Regardless, the aromas and flavors can provide a rich experience that you can integrate into a creative nonfiction or fictional story. Write down those sites and smells, and try to capture that experience in words.
Think about how you can integrate changing seasons or oncoming storms into your writing. Weather systems can be powerful as a backdrop to a story you want to tell. Instead of always coming up with the words to describe settings from your memory and imagination, consider writing down observations about changing weather so you have those to draw from when you write.
Consider the holidays and traditions from your culture or family, and how those things come in cycles... always the same and yet ever changing. Do the same people participate every year? Or are there subtle and startling changes as kids grow, parents become elders and so on? Look for inspiration in moments large and small — wrapping paper torn too quickly, a long drive home from a party, a phone call from someone far away — and how these kinds of things carry more weight when people are in a mindset of carrying on with important or long-standing traditions. The holidays and the seasons can bring stories forward in our consciousness, reminding us that our lives move in cycles, and that what we return to is never quite the same. All of these things present possibilities for storytelling!
Happy writing!
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