What We Talk About When We Talk About Writing, Part the Last

In this last installment of my thoughts on writing, I would like to offer up a short prayer of thanks to the following writing mentors:

• Natalie Goldberg ~ Taught me how to set loose and just write. About anything. No dead white men from the 1800's had the monopoly on my writing, or gothic Southern writers, neither. Just write. I've been following her example, with a Sheaffer pen, by the way, since 1990.
• Dr. Clark Closser ~ Taught me how to trust my love of reading, and fed that hunger. He also taught me that it was okay to look for patterns in the cosmos between what was around me and literature. Gave me a love of Camus. I've been following his example, complete with a German name, since 1998.
• Tim Friend ~ My high school English teacher let me publish stuff in his paper. Well, the school's paper. And I had no threshold of common decency. I think that was a prerequisite to write for him. :) I've been following his example, with a green pen on some days, since 1987.
• Nancy Schlosser ~ "I don't get it; it must be good." Nothing determines my writing, in any medium, like that line. If I hear that, I know it's no good. My mother kept/keeps me real. I've been trying to follow her example, with the same middle name, since 1972.

There's Springsteen, too, but he didn't teach me anything. I just love his work.

That, and he's the only one of the group who's never read me.

Onward, dear reader, and writers. Back to the single posts per week, unless my mind takes off on other tangents.