Self is teaching an on-line class for UCLA Extension’s Writers Program, and it’s nonfiction. Now that the holidays are near, and the writing prompts get more complicated, she worries that her students will fall apart. Self is like a mother hen, clucking over her chicks, constantly admonishing, Don’t let the thought of carving the bird deter you from your writing tasks!
She begins each course with instructions on doing daily writing, emphasizing the importance of dailiness to honing the writing “muscle.”
Now, in the fourth week of the class, a student turns in an assignment about “a better version of you,” a version that carries a notebook around town (Los Angeles), “the notebook is like a travelogue of sorts: city skylines of home and away fill the pages, each thoughtful stroke of her pen drawing a connection to the past. She is always inspired and she is, above all, hopeful.”
Way to go, oh resourceful UCLA Extension writing student. Way to go.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL!
Kanlaon 