Sock-Sacks and Happiness

Okay, so after Writers in The Field, I have a new thesis statement: we have too many huge, giant, apocalyptic nigh-unsolvable problems in this country, and not enough small ones.

On Saturday, for example, my main problem was not dropping the cookies (that LB Clark and Erin McGowan brought all the way up from Galveston!) while a hundred of us were running through the mud to escape the tornado warning.

On Sunday, my main problem was not owning a second pair of shoes. (As it turns out, grocery sacks make fair-to-middling sock-condoms.)

Today, my main problem is that I can't quite figure out how to get up off this couch.
And all of these are small, satisfying, and completely surmountable challenges.

I didn't have to worry about getting Kathryn McClatchy up off the floor of the ticket booth during the tornading, because Marsha Hubbell is a PTA Green Beret. Didn't have to figure out how to feed everyone after the food truck fell in a ditch, cuz Alex and Allison Campolo delivered pizza through flooded roads like Evel Knievel jumping the Snake River Canyon (in a Lexus, no less). Didn't have to know how to get the food truck *out* of the ditch, because as far as I can tell, Shane Richmond just Force-lifted it up like an X-wing from the Dagobah swamp. Didn't have to stop and thumb-type every late-breaking announcement, because Kathryn and Sarah and Amanda blew up the hashtags harder than a questionably-colored dress. Hell, I didn't even have time to wonder about getting the margarita machines in during the storm, because Brandon Burgess is the all-weather swashbuckling Jimmy Buffett this country needs.

My point is: all of these very short, specific, twenty-minute micro-crises are now 100% handled. Mostly because we had exactly the right people on point to handle them.

But also - you know, in a world where everything we need magically appears on a shelf or in a box at our front door (even as we wither in constant, paralyzing, existential fear), it was so good to remember what small, short, tangible challenges feel like. And now that I'm back home, clean and dry in my climate-controlled condo-box, I am jonesing for my next fix. Can these shoes go the dryer after I hose them off? I don't know, but I can't wait to find out!

Because Blood Is Thicker than Hilton Water

Question of the day: who here already knew that David Douglas was a miracle-working shoemaker-elf, and what are you leaving out for him at night?

Seriously, y'all. He is singlehandedly holding up half a dozen different writers organizations over here, and I am just so bowled over and thankful for him on the daily. And for Shane Richmond and William Humble and Kathryn McClatchy and Sarah Hamilton and ALL of the WORD crew, who have been BUSTING IT for weeks now to help us get Writers in the Field off the ground.

And for you guys. Man, I can't think you enough for all that good love you gave us yesterday, right when we really needed it. We blew our ticket sales target *totally* out of the water, and for the first time since, like, May, I am waking up with a cut in my strut and a glide in my stride, cuz I don't just have to believe we are doing good work - I can SEE it.

Big, big love, y'all, and endless gratitude from all sides. I know what we're doing isn't the most important thing in the world, but you sure are lighting up our little corner of it. Thank you for being our ice-cold cucumber-jalapeño water of life: we don't have to know how or why you happened to us to be strangely proud that you did.

Writers in the Field, Weigh In!

Man, y'all. I've been Oregone for two weeks, Idahoed with the best of the best, and got myself a sweet summer Montan to boot. Now I am home again, and there is no place like couch. Thanks, y'all, for putting me up and holding the fort!

If I can ask one more favor: Texish writer-buddies, will you weigh in and tell us what you want to see at Writers in the Field: Chapter Two this year? We need to know which Hogwarts professors to invite and what carnival marvels you want to see.

Survey is here!

WORDfest Cometh!

I haven't said much about it lately - but man, I am SO proud of everything WORD - Writers Organizations 'Round Dallas is doing and becoming.

We're up past 30 member organizations now (including the brand-new fantastic writers group at The Published Page Bookshop in Cleburne!), WORDfest is about to smash 400 registrations, and Dana Austin and Michelle ONeal have kindly volunteered to help us bury the bodies for our forensic science / crime scene investigation demo at Writers in the Field: Chapter Two :)
 
And if you're going to WORDfest - go check out our updated schedule and exhibitors list right over here. Next weekend is coming up fast, and you do NOT want to miss out!

Writers in the Field in the Books!

I don't have any photos of Writers in the Field, partly because we were using my phone as a wifi hotspot for the ticket booth. But here's some of what's been filling up my feed over the past couple of days.

And really, you guys. I already knew Shane Richmond and Leslie Richmond couldn't put on anything BUT a phenomenal show. I already knew that Marsha Hubbell and Sarah Hamilton and Daniel Wells and the rest of the WORD crew would ride-or-die to make it happen. And I was *pretty* sure that William Humble would do the hardest job - namely, translating and diplomatically buffering between the word-nerds and the sword-geeks - with his inexhaustible good humor. 

But even so, I was knocked acock by the enormity of the enthusiasm we generated this weekend - on all sides. People like Lauren Liebowitz and Kelly L White and Dominick D'Aunno dropped everything and diverted to WITF to showcase their particular expertise. People like LB Clark and Misty Ellen Mikes and Sanan Kolva moved heaven and earth (and literally slept in their cars) to get themselves here to drink it in. And people like Pamela Skjolsvik and LeAnn Robinson and Alicia Holston have graciously endured the most monstrous neglect while we threw 110% into making this thing happen. (I'm done being a zero, you guys - I promise.)

Usually after I get home from a big event weekend, I hit the emotional skids in a big way - as if I've used up a month's worth of joy in three days, and wake up afterwards with a horrible serotonin hangover. But this doesn't feel like the end of the show. It feels like we've just tossed a match into a whole fountain of good-will gasoline.

We made us some magic here, y'all. We started something huge. And I SO appreciate all of you who came, who helped, and also who dauntlessly led the cheer squad (Jennie A Komp, Jenny Hanniver, I'm looking at you!) New things always need extra love, whether they're animals or human beings or stories or ideas, and that extra helping of faith and affection has made all the difference today.

Writers in the Field: Your Hogwarts Letter Has Arrived...!

Okay, so you know that whole thing about karma: whatever it is you dump out into the cosmic ocean on a daily basis will eventually wash back up at your front door. I can't say for sure that it's true, but I have been striving (however imperfectly) to pour out Exxon-Valdez quantities of love and realness and radical generosity. Helps cut down on water weight, if nothing else.

Of course, you never know exactly whether or how your moral exports will come back to you – but a few months back, a bona-fide unicorn beached itself at my feet. Only this is a marine metaphor, so like... maybe a narwhal or something. His name is Shane.

He's basically Mead Hall Dumbledore.

Anyway, so you know that thing, when somebody just randomly says to you, "Hey, so my wife and I own sixteen acres down south of the airport, and we've been running this big-ass awesome steampunk ren-faire for a few years now, and I'm not a writer or anything, but I'm a huge reader, and... how do I say this... is there some way I could help you guys like, not screw up your fight scenes?  And period clothing and such? Like, if I got some of my sword guys down here, and a poisons expert, and the WWII artillery crew, and some folks who could show you how to pick locks and sew Victorian underwear and make real-life herbal remedies and stuff... do you think writers would be interested in a thing like that? We can throw in a wine-tasting too, by the way. Do writers like wine?"

And y'all... when a dapper pipe-smoking karma-narwhal asks you a thing like that, there is really only one thing to say.

It's called Writers in the Field. It is going to be PHENOMENAL. And I am asking for your help in making it an unforgettable smash hit.

Shane and his crew have thrown themselves into building this event. They've been hammering away at the pavilions and the booths for weeks now.

They've brought in a slew of experts from their huge arcane Rolodex, for every kind of hands-on tutorial and demonstration you can think of.

A small sampling of the faculty. Anybody know a good potions professor?

They've got first aid, security, parking, concessions, restrooms, vendors, electricity, and wifi all taken care of – and kept the ticket price for the entire glorious weekend to only $45. Yes, really.

This is it, guys. This is your Hogwarts.

This is going to be an incredible event, y'all. It's built - it's happening - and the only thing we need now is you.

And let me be clear: even if you live a thousand miles away, we still need you. 

If the logistics don't work out for you to attend this year – we still need you.

If this isn't exactly up your genre alley, or your writing is on the back-burner right now, or you've already given your bottom dollar for worthy causes and don't have a penny to spare – we still need you. 

Because damn it, the fun's not going to have itself!

If you're thinking "man, this is such a cool idea - why hasn't anybody done this before?", let me tell you: it's because an event like this is a five-leafed clover. Because nailing down the venue AND the outdoor-event-management know-how AND the talent AND the community connections AND still keeping the cost down to something the humble striving scrivener can afford... is damn near impossible. You can't do all this when you are hiring for each of those positions. You can't create something like this as a strictly transactional enterprise.

Which means that something like Writers in the Field can only happen under the most perfect and unlikely conditions – when you have *exactly* the right balance of passion, talent, generosity, and one-in-a-million golden opportunity. We just-so-happen to have lucked our way into the perfect primordial alchemy here - and you are the lightning that is going to bring it to life.

Your playground awaits...

So. If you like the idea of making hands-on education and research opportunities accessible to writers from every walk of life – if you want tentpole writing events that go beyond the ballroom of the airport Hyatt - if you want to see this event come back next year with even more variety of activities, for even more kinds of writers – if you want to help us establish a strong precedent for one day having something like this in YOUR neck of the woods – then we need you to come out of the gate *roaring*, as fierce and enthusiastically as you ever have. We need mentions. We need shares. We need good old-fashioned buzz. More than anything, we need 'proof of concept' - and that means tickets sold.

...and so does your saloon.

And of course, I wouldn't ask you to do anything without putting my own skin in the game. So let me make you a deal.

1.    If we can sell 150 two-day tickets between now and midnight on Sunday (three days from today) I will personally read 5,000 words of your work - any format, any genre, any combination - and you and I will have half an hour of undivided real-time conversation about it. Phone or Skype or whatever you want to do. Once we hit the 150-mark, you forward me your ticket receipt and attach your doc file and we will make us a date.

2.    If you can't attend Writers in the Field but want to get in on the critique deal – or again, want to vote with your dollars for more events like this one – we can totally do that. Just buy a ticket and use promo code GIFT when you check out. We will give the ticket to a local writer who couldn't otherwise afford to go - and you will get the critique, even if we don't hit the 150 mark. Like I said, y'all – this is about love and realness and radical acts of generosity. And, you know, learning how to hit people with swords.

This is how we do it, guys. This is how first-evers become first-annuals, how we know more and do better, how we give ourselves something fantastic and special to be proud of, even when it feels like the whole rest of the world is going all to hell. This is how game-changing greatness begins.

It is also how legends begin.
Epic, unforgettable, totally-worth-the-hangover legends.

Are you pumped? Are you ready? Then pick out a job below and go!

• Help us collect likes, shares, and follows: Facebook event - Facebook page - Twitter - Instagram (hashtag #writersinthefield)
• Volunteer to do a demonstration, help out at the event, or request to be a vendor: email findyourtribe@wordwriters.org
• Print and post flyers for your writers group, coffee shop, library, etc. (remember to ask permission!): download our full-size flyer here
• And of course, visit the website and buy tickets - yours or someone else's!

Set your watches now, y'all: in one month exactly, we make literary-adventure-field-trip history!