Come Write With Me: Pictures and Postcards
by Barbara Deming
Several years ago I began to teach memoir writing classes to the elderly. It all began as a fluke. I had a book to promote, sent out press releases to everybody and God, and did set up some book signings and talks on writing. One of these was at an apartment complex for retirees; I address the monthly Ladies’ Breakfast during the month of April which just happens to also be Women’s History Month. My talk and my book were a success. The activities director asked me if I would get together a plan for teaching residents how to write their memoirs. I call the class “You Can Write Too” and it is in its third year.
The first session of my classes is always a get-to-know-you, what-you-want-to-write-about, and what-can-I-do-for-you sort of thing. At the end of each class, no matter what I am teaching, I give my students a prompt or starter for the next session. I never expect that everyone will write about this prompt; there are members who are already into their writing and want to continue with the flow. This first assignment is always the same because it produces amazing results: find an old photograph from your past that intrigues you. Write about it.
Where was the photo taken? Who are the people in it? Why are they there? Tell your readers/listeners the story that goes along with that particular photograph. If you don’t know, make up one that you feel could be the story.
I do the same at a later time with an old postcard. Where was it mailed from? Who sent it? Describe the postcard, the trip made or the reason behind sending it and the person who sent it. Were there special circumstances surrounding anyone involved with the postcard?
These two exercises never fail to trigger more than the story of the article in hand. I use the photo and/or the postcard to kick start the writer into action, to help them discover what they want to write about. But more importantly, this exercise proves to them that—yes, they can write too.
*************************
Barbara Deming lives, teaches, and writes in San Marcos, CA. Her latest book, Growing up Barefoot in the South (Essays by a Southern Writer), and her collection of short stories, The Quilt Maker, may both be purchased at www.Amazon.com. A completed novel is with an agent and she is working on another collection of quilt stories, a romantic suspense novel, and a nonfiction book on hooking your reader.