Curiosity's Tickle

Eleanor Roosevelt believed curiosity became a child's most useful gift. For Dorothy Parker curiosity cured boredom. She felt curiosity had no cure - thankfully. Albert Einstein claimed he had no talents. Life turned him, "passionately curious."

Curiosity begins in wonder. It travels like sparks once the fire ignites.

Looking up the word in the dictionary will reveal something else along the way.

Mysteries emerge in areas that we take for granted. While the media conjures negativity; our minds can search for positivity from the ruins.

By snagging a snapshot of attention, ideas leap in.

Playfulness and imagination extend the image.

What happens ?

Words in response to pictures help reflect and interpret the world. They form a relationship. 

Sentences search a world of paradox and investigate with creativity and positivity.

Find the pirate in the petals.









A duck peeks from a rose.

Feel the tickle of  curiosity today.

Punctuate Your Life

You have a unique story to tell.  Certain people, events, and themes figure prominently in life story. View your life in sounds, sights, smells, tastes, and memories.

Listen to the voices that travel through your mind. Hear your father, mother, siblings, children, lovers, friends, enemies, teachers, and heroes acting out their dramas on your life slate.  Hearing the voices within yourself will remind you of your place in a special clan. 

People will always inhabit you and return with your memories to help you create your stories.

Your group had traditions, rules, taboos, customs, ceremonies and habitual ways of interacting that shaped and shaded your personality. As a result, you have a complete cycle of legends, dances, and songs to be sung. Write these stories to enrich your life and share your history and memories with others.

Lifeline of memories:

How will you punctuate time?  Which moments will you isolate and give symbolic importance or single out for dramatic effect? 

Choose five pivotal events in your life. Detail the circumstances, characters and backgrounds of each scene. How are the scenes you have chosen representative of your present life? How did they change or affect you?  How has your view of them altered over the years?

Identify reoccurring themes in your life. Which ages were crisis periods? Consider the impact of personal, family, and social rituals or celebrations.

Turn your story inside out; try a new way of punctuating your life.  Create a persona to revisit a situation in your life.  How will you enhance or change it?

Train to Write

As a four-year-old, I attended a football game at the Rose Bowl with my father. We settled into seats with hot dogs, peanuts, and Delaware punch. Excitement filled the stadium and rippled throughout my body.

My father's first advice, "Watch reactions. Don't just follow the ball." During warm ups, he pointed out ways coaches related to the players and how they responded. He talked a lot about the intensity of training that went into the game. He also encouraged my writing training in similar ways.

Training to write begins way before pen meets paper or fingers tickle keys. Making a friend of curiosity initiates a first step of preparation.Writers need to chase experience. Nourishing wonder involves all the senses to receive transmissions from life's stimuli.

How do you train to write?

Investigate ways to stretch and train before writing.  Squint and notice how it changes your perspective.

Delve into discoveries by doing what you don't usually do. Try different points of view.

Listen to music of all types.

Play!

Practice imaginative thinking by a search for nuances and connections.

Notice reactions to situations. Investigate cause and effect. 

When watching sports like a football game, go beyond a focus on the ball. 

Observe the body language, reactions, and responses of players. In what ways do they anticipate way before a play unravels?  How to they hide responses in body language?

Nurture awareness by seeking adventure with a child's eyes. Let go with no agenda or time keeping for a set period each day.

Questions add another dimension to training. What amuses? What confuses?  Which mysteries need investigation? Let self-discovery push to the edges. Remain open to possibilities.

Choose another art form to cross-train your writing. Draw or paint. Dance to enhance movement and rhythm. 

Develop a yoga practice for breathing and balance. 

Take advantage of life's disruptions. Use them for story.

Become restless and relentless. Then write about it.

Writing goes way beyond the basics of grammar and syntax. 

Football season, just a month away, might inspire new approaches. 

Start your training today!