2/20- Love Letters, Tulips, and a Hair Hare.

Love Letters, Tulips, and a Hair Hare.

On Wednesday, the class met at Fleet Street to:

I.  Participate in a Love-Letter-Writing Workship

II.  make tulips

III.  Fawn over a very dapper rabbit.

Part I

After some socializing, snacks, and perhaps a bit too much chocolate on my part, the class and guests settled down and formed a circle to participate in Katerina Stoykova-Klemer’s workshop entitled “Bigger than They Appear, A Close Look at the Very Short Poem.”

            A. Katarina first discussed the merit, and import, of scope when dealing with such          a short poem, with a focus on answering the questions:

i.  What are the characteristics of a short poem?

ii.Why do we want to write them?

                                 

iii.  When are they appropriate?

iv.  How to start writing a very short poem?

                       

v.  How long is a very short poem?

B.  After we mulled over these questions, Katerina  shared with us “several tools of the short poem.” These included:

i.  Title

                        ii. Word Choice

                                   

iii.  Use of well-understood principles and concepts

                       

iv.  Creative use of clichés

            C. Katerina asked that we go around the room, reading the various examples of each of these tools. We were then asked to go around in a circle, reading poems from another handout

i.  My personal favorite was by Chocolate Waters:

                                               

                                                I Used To

                                                make love.

                                                Now I

                                                make coffee.

            D. We were then encouraged to take a moment to reflect and create our own        short poems, and to share them with the class (if we felt so-inclined.)

                        i. I had no idea I was being closed in on by so many great poets

ii. I loved it.

Part II.

The class concluded with the mass production of origami tulips

A.  I’m not very good at making origami tulips

           

B.  I am, however, very good and sneaking off to stash more chocolate for later     while others are making origami tulips.

Part III.

While stealing (read: creatively taking) chocolate, I made great friends with a rabbit. His eyes looked into my soul, and he may have let me touch his ear.

A.  I’ve never touched a bunny before.

B.  Bunny ears are magic.

            C. I loved it.

class notes from 2/7- Love Letters for Mintons

Potluck, Poetry, and (Unrequited) Platonic Love

On Wednesday, the class met at Minton’s to:

I.  Gorge ourselves

II.  Take part in a love-letter writing workshop

III.  Bask in Bianca’s presence

Part I-I

A few notes on the art of mashed potato making:

I.  When you go to Kroger, your brain is going to be like “Kremena said there could be upwards of 30 people there... you should probably buy a second bag of potatoes.”

A.  If your brain is like mine, don’t listen to it.

                                    i. It’s a liar.

                                    ii.  It’s kind of dumb.

B.  You’re also working on the assumption that all 30 of these potential attendees will be so enamored with your shitty mashed potatoes that they will be forced to cast off the rest of the potluck bounty and consume every last bit of what you make.

i.  That is an incorrect assumption. (See I-I.I.A.ii)

II.  Method:

            A. Quarter and Boil apprx. 90 lbs of redskin potatoes until tender.

i.  This will require every pot and burner you have, and some that you don’t.

            B. Drain

i.  I would be greatly impressed if you managed to mess this up

ii.  I messed this part up.

            C.Throw in a pallet of butter, a drum of cream, a desk of romano cheese, a                hammock of garlic, and oregano/salt/pepper to taste.

            D.Mash the cuss out of it.

i.  Really just get in there.

Part I-II

A Veritable Smorgasbord

I.  Once twelve people helped me drag all of my mashed potatoes into Minton’s, we all set about a very lovely meal which consisted of:

A.  Potato Salad

B.  Mashed Potatoes

C.  Chicken casserole

D.  Two leafy salads

E.  Some oranges

F.  This amazing cold apple/sweet-potato/craisin stuff

G.  Hummus and Gaucomole

H.  Black Bean Salsa

I.    Carrot/Cayenne Juice (a la The Juicery)

J.   Various Breads

K.  Some really delicious looking wine (that I was 11 months removed from) courtesy of Archie

L.   Several Desserts

M. A wonderful tomato soup made my Ashely Minton Herself.

Part II.

With our stomachs full, and our spirits high, we were all called to attention by Kurt (via Marty) in order to begin our love-letter writing workshop.

I.  Bianca. Spriggs. Was. Sitting. Right. There.

A.  I had a couple of heart attacks

B.  Several “stomach-dwelling-insects” were in flight.

II. After recovering from that miniature freak out over my woman crush, I realized that she was in the process of giving us tips on love-letter writing.

A.  Bianca’s 10 Tips for Writing a Contemporary Love Poem:

i.  Don’t actually mention the word love

ii.Every poem, but especially love poems, are really disguised obsessions.

iii.            Cliches are no good

iv.           Consider extended metaphors

v.Write about love in binaries (negatives and positives)

vi.           Make the impersonal Personal

vii.           Read “the greats”

viii.        Name love by naming what it is not

ix.           be willing to make sacrifice for, and mention the risk in, loving your love

x.Memorize and forget i-ix.

III.  We were then given a worksheet entitled “Mirror Poem Exercise”

A.  Bianca was inches away from me when she handed our table those     worksheets.

i.  She even smells amazing. Why don’t I smell that good?

ii.  I’m beginning to think she some fierce mythical creature and/or figment of my imagination

            B. In this exercise, we read “Love Is” by Nikki Giovanni and were asked to             recreate it.

i.  Putting my inferior words into someone else’s form made me feel dirty.

                        ii. She complimented on my hair color while volunteering me to read my                linguistic frankenstein

                                    1. I’m never changing my hair color for the rest of my life.

IV.  She then introduced us to some poetry to highlight the beauty of the unconventional in modern love poems. We listened to:

A.  “The Last Love Letter From An Entomologist” by Jared Singer

B.  “Maybe I Need You” by Andrea Gibson

V.  Our final activity was a mad-lib-esque love portrait

A.  We were asked to think of objects from 22 different categories that describe     our “love-object” and use them to fill in the blanks of another poem form.

i.  Again, I felt like a sham.

Our class concluded with a playing of “Set me Free” (By an artist un-recalled-- but I am determined to find out.) It was a lovely evening.

Good bites, food insecurity, love letters, and a misplaced reception of birthday cake, 1/30

Good bites, food insecurity, love letters, and a misplaced reception of birthday cake.

On Wednesday, the class met at The Plantory to:

I.   listen to two presentations concerning

A.  the availability of healthy and nutritious food to children.

B.  the challenges faced by older Americans in securing enough food for themselves

II. Begin crafting our love letters to Lexington.

Part I.

A.  Our first presenter was the founder of the Tweens Nutrition and Fitness Coalition. The work she chose to share was with the organizations:

            i. Snack Strong: Better Bites

                        An organization dedicated to providing affordable, healthy, and nutritious                         snack options at public concession stands.

            ii. Good Neighbor Stores

                        Focused on making neighborhood “quickie-mart”s frequented by the  

                        low-income and transportationally-challenged safe, clean, and                    communally-involved while also offering healthy food at fair prices/ accepting EBT & WIC.

B.  The second presenter discussed the challenges faced by older Americans in                             securing enough food for themselves. Over the course of this talk, the presenter discussed:

i.  SNAP (supplemental nutrition assistance program)

ii.  The risk factors of food-insecurity in older americans:

a.  lack of socialization

b.  growing up food-insecure

iii.  He also discussed how familes who were considered to be “poor” (grossing less than $26,000 in a family of four) were less likely to be food insecure than those who are not. This led to the discussion of the average American’s ability to compute wants vs. needs.

Part II.

The second half of class focused on the formative phase of our personal love-letters to the city of Lexington and/or the people who might see them on Lexington buildings. 

A.  Kremena and Kurt circulated images that inspired the project, and gave us time to begin work on our own 15-words-or-less love letters. Along with some scrap paper to begin sketching on.

i.  Postcards featuring our love letters should be completed and available to share by Wednesday, February  6.

B. The class ended with the consumption of a cake made to commemorate Archie’s birthday. Archie was not present. It felt so wrong, but it was so delicious.