Your Stay at a Writer’s Colony Is a Fabulous and Frugal Choice

I’m a poet and a playwright, and as many writers like me, I find myself ever needing more dedicated time to write.  Even though I am now fortunate enough to work my day job from home, scheduling my own hours to complete assignments and attend conference calls, you’ll find me in-between those hours keeping keen watch on my computer and phone for incoming messages and requests.

By midday I may be off to teach yoga for a few hours at a time, and just when I return home to send off more tweets and Facebook posts on behalf of my employer, and maybe even then try to squeeze in writing a poem, another scene or a blog post such as this, I'll look at the clock and suddenly see it’s time to make dinner for my husband who’s spent another wall-to-wall weekday pounding that challenging turf called teaching English at a Chicago public high school.

Yes, like many writers who juggle life and work schedules, I yearn for more time to write. My writer husband definitely does as well.  Beyond that, simply as people and as a couple, we need a scheduled vacation every once in a while. Here’s the question: Why not combine both vacation and dedicated time to write, and apply for a stay at a writer’s colony? My answer to that question is, yes, I have done so a number of times, and stays at colonies have been among the most interesting, satisfying and creatively prolific vacations yet. 

I have gone solo, as well as with my husband, one time even bringing our small son along to a private writer’s casita in the New Mexican mountains for two weeks, where we mixed writing with side excursions to Albuquerque, Taos and Santa Fe. I have spent two weeks at a working organic fruit and vegetable farm, pitching in with farm chores in the mornings and writing in the afternoons and evenings in an off-grid cabin. I have served as a writer-in-residence in a circa 1835 townhouse in the rolling hills of southwest Wisconsin, and stirred up recipes that inspired food poems in the culinary suite of a writer’s colony in Arkansas.

Most recently, my husband and I were both accepted for a two-week residency at Rivendell Writers’ Colony in Sewanee, Tennessee, (pronounced swan’-knee) situated about four miles from the heart of town, in a grand old stone manor overlooking spectacular Lost Cove, an area where writer Walker Percy spent many a summer sojourn.  I chose to apply to Rivendell as it’s a day’s drive from our home in Chicago, while at the same time knowing the breathtaking Cumberland Plateau terrain would offer a total change from our urban life in the Midwest flatlands.

I chose Rivendell because while it’s part of an estate with a long history, it has been transformed into a writers’ colony only over the past few years. Not too many people know yet about this gem. The time to apply was now!

I also chose Rivendell because of its emphasis on food writers.  The Southern Foodways Alliance holds periodic workshops at Rivendell, and one of its directors serves as an advising editor to Rivendell. The colony director Carmen and her husband Michael nurture a lush garden of raised beds near the manor house, where residents can sometimes pick lettuce, tomatoes, herbs and other seasonal offerings to add to their meals.  

That brings me to mention Rivendell’s two kitchens, one country style and the other commercial grade, where residents can prepare and cook their own meals.

And lastly, I chose Rivendell because it is a short drive from the University of the South, home to Sewanee School of Letters, Sewanee Review and the Sewanee Writer’s Conference. Sewanee Review is one of the oldest literary magazines in the U.S., started in 1892. And the Sewanee Writers’ Conference has been an annual event for more than 20 years, gathering poets, playwrights and fiction writers from across the country. What a literary atmosphere in such a magnificent corner of Tennessee.

So what’s so frugal about a stay at Rivendell, which requires a fee for your residency, and where you need to supply your own food and cook your own meals? Firstly, the subsidized cost of a two-week stay is far less, perhaps one third or even a quarter of what you’d pay for a comparable hotel stay, if you are accepted as a writing resident. And, just as an aside, how many spots where you've stayed offers an open-air deck where you can practice yoga on a cool morning?

I don’t know about you, but the more I learn about food, the harder it seems to find restaurants where I’d care to dine.  When establishments serve Grade A eggs or meats, it does not mean that the animals weren’t factory farmed or fed GMO grains.  I eat more organic food than ever, and sometimes the only way to make sure I’m getting the caliber of meals using the wholesome foods I prefer is to cook them myself. 

As a food poet, of course, cooking (and even drinking) are surely part of my research! Even making different popcorn recipes that I shared with other residents in the evenings helped inspire a new poem. What could be more frugal and fantastic than passing around a bowl of buttery popcorn, chatting on the outdoor patio overlooking the cove, and checking out Rivendell’s vivid sky full of stars.

Of course, frugality-wise, it didn’t hurt that I also applied for and received an Illinois Arts Council Professional Development Grant to help fund my stay, food purchases and road trip expenses. 

Check your local arts council and see what type of help they can extend for writing retreat stays to help you complete your latest writing project. At Rivendell, I did just that, writing a number of new poem drafts (sometimes two a day) to add to my current manuscript, “Botanical Bandwidth: More Poems About Food, Drink, Herbs and Spices.”

In addition, it just so happened that the first week of our summer residency at Rivendell also coincided with the last week of the Sewanee Writers Conference taking place in town.  Besides the paid workshops and meetings the conference participants attended (of which we weren’t part of and costs upwards of $3,000), there was a sizable schedule of daily lectures and readings open to the public, free of charge. 

Not only did we enjoy two lectures on fiction writing and one on playwriting, we personally met some of our favorite writers who were on hand, including poet A.E. Stallings and fiction writer Tim O’Brien. What frugal serendipity!

Noteworthy to any working vacation, the town of Sewanee is surrounded by a spectacular network of hiking trails, with views that are priceless. What writing experience isn’t enhanced by an inspirational hike through the woods?

Find out more about Rivendell.

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Your Stay at a Writer’s Colony Is a Fabulous and Frugal Choice

How Knife Skills Changed My Life

Learning to wield a knife correctly proved to be a two-edged sword. Would my cooking live up to the new skills I was now so proud of? My world and attitude were turned upside-down as onions took a pole shift from latitudal cutting to longitudal.

Layers became easier to control. Onion slices and dices became more uniform and more attractive to the eye – and palate. You are what you eat, and others will eat what you slice, if it looks appetizing and not haphazard. Soon, my onion cubes made my pico de gallo stand taller with personality, and my sautéed onion slices added lavish luxury to my omelettes.

In the learning process, my knives became sharper along with heretofore dull skills. Who knew there was a difference between a sharpening stone and a sharpening steel? I certainly didn’t. Along with overeating, over-sharpening with a stone can be too much of a good thing. And along with no one seeming to drink enough water these days, it also seems that cooks don’t use a steel on knives nearly enough to keep those edges under control. Now I rely on both stone and steel, each in their designated times and frequencies.

(images courtesy of Food and Wine magazine)  

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How Knife Skills Changed My Life

Heighten Five Senses: Taste

A sense of taste, like any other sense, can be developed. According to "The How to Think Like Leonardo Da Vinci Workbook" by Michael Gelb, you can self-assess your sense of taste through the following statements:
-- I can taste the "freshness" of fresh food.
-- I enjoy many different types of cuisine.
-- I seek out unusual taste experiences.
-- I can discern the flavor contributions of different herbs and spices in a complex dish.
-- I am a good cook.
-- I appreciate the pairing of food and wine.
-- I eat consciously, aware of the taste of my food.
-- I avoid junk food.
-- I avoid eating on the run.
-- I enjoy participating in taste tests and wine tastings.

No one becomes a good cook or an afficiando of the world's great cuisines overnight. Like first poems, your first attempts on the stove-top might likely end up in the trash can. Mine did for many years -- in both cases. I believe two elements you need to develop a keen sense of taste is a spirit of adventure and a willingness to make mistakes.It's the same as approaching any other creative aspect of your life, be it writing, skiing, cooking or traveling. You'll never know what octopus tastes like until you try it, or how ginger might enhance an apple dessert until you make one yourself.

I'm not a good enough cook to create my own recipes from scratch or just "throw things together." Maybe I'll be able to someday. I have, however, enough "taste" experience to imagine what a dish will taste like just from reading the recipe. So recipes and cookbooks are my friends. I sometimes cross reference two or three recipes for the same dish and make a hybrid of it, or simply "tweak" a recipe, usually because I lack a certain ingredient or two and would rather substitute with something I have on hand. It does take a little kitchen experience to know which items can suffice as substitutes. But it all comes with time, as does a seasoned palate.

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Heighten Five Senses: Taste