Are you kidding me? Failure is a huge deal. Immediately, some of my worst failures come to mind:
Cartwheels
Breaststroke
A Job in the Big Apple
Vaginal Birth
Agent Elimination
I’ll expose these failures to you in hopes that you’ll reciprocate in the comments section below. Continue reading
If I was a genius scientist, I’d find a way to prove that you can’t “time” – time.
Time – as in seconds and minutes, hours and days – goes slower or faster depending on the, um, time.
Almost everyone who exists on this planet knows that fact, but for some reason, the supposedly brilliant scientists throughout the world have not been able to show evidence of its validity.
Here’s my scientific proof. Continue reading
Thank you for following me. But, um, are you following ALL of me? Every single last bit?
In other words, do you see me the way I want you to see me? 
Do you see the real me? The one with all my bells and whistles, with my form just right, my hem straight, my colors matching, the headlines bold and brilliant?
You can only answer yes, honestly, if you click on me.
Or more precisely, if you click on the title of my post when you receive it in your Inbox every Friday.
If you don’t click, but read my post as it arrives to you in e-mail form, you’re not seeing the real me! You’re seeing an outline, a draft, a ghostly form of my true intention.
So PLEASE, click on the title (like the one above that says “Please Click”) and enter the world of Roughwighting the way I intend you to see it. Full of background baby-blues and a white landscape for a differently colored font each post. Photos that pitch perfectly to the right or left of a phrase that I want to focus on. Quotes that are highlighted and indented “just so” – just so my reader, YOU, gets the gist of what I’m flashing about this beautiful absurd disturbing chaotic and incredible life of ours.
The way I’m meant to be viewed…
Please click on the title of my post each week. I promise, you’ll enjoy the benefits of color and pizazz. And, if you’re in the mood, you can read further down the blog post to see the replies of the brave, brilliant souls who have the courage to comment and (hopefully) commend.
Clickingly yours,
Roughwighter
The Writing Instructor
The refrigerator hums like a turtle in a small trickling stream. Soft, contented, but with a slight hiccup now and then.
I try to ignore the soothing hum and continue to talk on, too loud at times, but there’s a cougher in the group, and I don’t want my words drowned out.
What an expression: how can words drown? Well, I guess the same way my ideas seem to drown at times. When I’m trying so hard to express myself, I get intense, yet I see a dazed expression on my listeners’ faces, so it must be me, my words, that are drowning them in boredom.
Oh shoot, am I boring? I stop the conversation mid-stream, and no one seems to notice. If a small
waterfall suddenly stopped in the middle of Yosemite, you’d think those around would notice. The hikers and bikers, the park rangers and sightseers would shout out: “What in the world?”
But no shouts of concern from my listeners when I shut my mouth and halt my waterfall of a fascinating story about writing. Well, I have been told that my stories can go on and on, and on, for paragraphs when they could be just a sentence or two.
So I order them to practice what I have just preached about Cinquains.
A 5-line poem, invented by the early 20th century poet Adelaide Crapsey and inspired by the Japanese tanka, with 22 syllables arranged in a distinct pattern, no mandatory rhyme scheme, stanzas of 2, 4, 6, 8, and 2 syllables. Crapsey always titled her cinquains, effectively utilizing the title as a sixth line.
“WRITE!” I command.
But before I begin I pause in our little writing room (a converted kitchen/dining room, in fact), which vibrates with the sound of fingers tapping on flat black keys and ink sliding against paper: a happy sound; a creative, invigorating, satisfying sound; while the low hum of a dog’s sleepy snores surround my group in a warm writing hug.
Now, a challenge – do you dare create your own cinquain here?
Flash!
Scientists are trying to understand the creative brain.
Hmmm, some people in my family have been trying to understand my brain for decades. My dad used to shake his head at me and intone, “It’s just your imagination, Pammy.”
He never knew how angry that statement made me. What did he mean, JUST my imagination? Did that mean it didn’t count?
But now, wonderfully, neuroscientists and psychologists are claiming that “imagination is the cornerstone of creativity.”
Unfortunately, back when I was growing up in the “olden” days, creativity wasn’t so highly touted. But now a neuroscientist and director of the Brain and Creativity Institute of the University of Southern California says, “having original ideas is a process, not a place (within the brain).”
The implication is that it takes a lot of brain to pull off imagination and creativity.
So my capability to see tiny, dragon-like lizards on top of maple trees that suddenly glow purple, is not “just” my imagination.
It’s genius!
Researchers are now determining that imagination is only possible with the use of (1) memory (yes, it’s good news that you remember the smell of your 7th grade science teacher’s hair spray) and (2) emotions.
Falling in love, in “Carousel.”
Here’s one of my good (emotional) memories: my brother sneaks down to the basement where I’m watching an old movie on TV – “Carousel” with Shirley Jones, in which the love of her life is killed. Little brother taunts me because I’m sobbing at the end, but my dad defends me, saying, “The world would be a better place if all people had the imagination to feel other people’s pain and joy.”
Which brings me to another point researchers are discovering. Some people are inherently more creative and imaginative than others.
I always knew that. Now, perhaps others will view creativity and imagination as immensely special and as a talent to strive for, not ignore.
In fact, a Harvard University researcher noted: “the brain is a creativity machine. You just need to know how to manipulate your software to make it work.”
Hector
Yes, that’s what I do at 5:30 a.m. when I gently wake up, neurons firing, the vivid dream world slowly fading away as I locate Geminia and Frederica, my two soul soothers/imaginators who sit invisibly within my eardrums.
“Did you notice the large whale swimming in the Bay this morning?” Geminia whispers as I begin my early morning walk.
I see a hiccup of a splash in the middle of the bay, and then a seal slaps up, barking an explanation: “That’s Hector. He gets lost all the time. He’s supposed to be in Hawaii by now!”
Ah, Pammy, there’s your imagination again….
roughwighting 
