Leadership Team Member of Al Gore's Climate Reality Project; Animal Rights Activist; Mom of Senegal Parrot, ToQer; Wife of Art Brickman; Chocoholic; Singer/Songwriter; Poet; > Catch up on the latest Tara's Thoughts – offerings about climate issues, animal rescue, musings about current events, the written word and people who write. Tarasitser.blog
There is, in WordPress Land, a marvelous source of inspiration for writers, authors and poets. Her name is D. Wallace Peach. I offer this entry into her fantastically wonderful stories and to the opportunities she creates for the community of writers who connect with her through her blog called Myths of the Mirror.
To move us forward into the New Year she presents this challenge:
Write a story or poem about your TBR pile.
This is familiar territory for book lovers: TBR = “To Be Read”. The books that sit on your shelf waiting for you to get around to reading them. I have many such stacks and collections. So, even though I have never attempted a writing challenge, I felt compelled to jump in and add my voice. Thank you, Ms. Peach for providing the diving board!
A Reader’s Dilemma (with apologies to Dr. Seuss)
Books in baskets, Books on shelves, Books in stacks of tens and twelves
Books piled high in every room. Books that shimmer in the gloom
Enticing me with cover art just begging me to make a start
Books around me everywhere! Books are waiting here and there
Books of interest, Books of stories, Books of many categories
Offering a chance to learn. A chance, I fear, I’ll have to spurn
Books recalling ancient times. Books of prose and books of rhymes
Books I’ve owned for many years, highly touted by my peers
Alas, I cannot find the time to launch this effort’s mountainous climb
As I lay me down to sleep this couplet in my brain does creep:
Books behind me, Books ahead. Books are calling To Be Read
This post is directed to all the writers out there who may have an interest in sharing your vision for a world that has found its way through the Climate Crisis. AND there is prize money involved here, folks! Grist is accepting submissions through April 12, 2021 (11:59pm US PST).
Grist was founded in 1999 as one of the nation’s first online-only publications, covering serious topics without taking ourselves too seriously. TIME magazine calls Grist the Colbert Report of climate change … except with real reporting and analytical journalism.”
And here is their Media byline:
“A non-profit news organization for people who want a planet that doesn’t burn and a future that doesn’t suck.”
Well said!! OKAY, so. Here is what Grist is offering via FIX, their Solutions Lab:
“All 12 final stories will be published in a digital collection on Fix’s website, and the authors will be celebrated in a public-facing virtual event.”
Here are the rest of the details and submission guidelines:
“Welcome to Imagine 2200 — a new climate-fiction contest by Fix, Grist’s solutions lab. What we’re seeking: short stories that envision the next 180 years of equitable climate progress. What we’re offering: $8,700 in prizes, publication, and a reason to stay hopeful.
The world is crazy right now, and the stakes are high: just, you know, our entire frickin’ future. Our newsfeeds are full of denial, delay, and doom that make us want to scream into our pillows. But that’s just the old story. At Fix, we are telling the new story, of a path to a clean, green, and just future, and the people who are driving it. Our mission is to make the story of a better world so irresistible, you want it right now.
With that goal in mind, we decided to launch our first foray into the world of hopeful, forward-looking fiction — to inspire visions of the future that haven’t even been dreamt up yet, and welcome more voices into the climate conversation. Join this uprising of imagination, and help us turn the page on earth’s next chapter.
Nuts & Bolts
Entry is free!
The contest is open to writers anywhere in the world.
Authors must be 18 years or older at the time of submission.
Submissions must be short, fictional stories, between 3,000–5,000 words.
No previously published, multiple, or simultaneous submissions accepted.
Submissions will only be accepted through Submittable — click the “submit” button at the bottom of this page when you’re ready! If you need accessibility accommodations, please email the team at imaginefiction@grist.org
Stories will be judged by a board of literary experts, including authors Adrienne Maree Brown, Morgan Jerkins, and Kiese Laymon.
The first-prize story will be awarded $3,000; second prize $2,000; and third prize $1,000. Nine additional finalists will each receive a $300 honorarium.
All 12 final stories will be published in a digital collection on Fix’s website, and the authors will be celebrated in a public-facing virtual event.
Worldwide copyright and ownership of each story remains with the author.
If a story is accepted for publication, Grist retains the first serial rights of the work to publish, produce, reproduce, distribute, and market.
All other remaining rights revert to the author upon publication.
Find more information about the contest at Grist.org/fix
(When you are ready, click the SUBMIT button at the bottom of the Portal page.)
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Please let me know if you decide to submit your story. And, by all means, share this opportunity with any other writers you know.
I will end with one more quote from the Grist web site:
“Climate, sustainability, and social justice are the most important stories on the … well, on the planet right now. The stakes are high: just, you know, our entire frickin’ future.”
So write your hearts out and use your vision to inform, educate and enlighten, well, everybody you can so we can create a healthier world that, as they say on the Grist site, doesn’t suck.
One of my goals for this blog is to offer a platform for authors whose work I admire. I know a lot of wonderful writers and poets. When a new work is available I make it my mission to feature their work or point to it so you can take a look at it.
This charming little story was sent to me by Carole Field, MFT, published author and playwright. You can find her books, “Dating Down And Those of Us Who Do It” and “New York Guns, Kansas Nuns, Birth Control!” on Amazon. I have known Carole for many years. We talk about everything. She is an educated listener and a deep thinker. I can always count on her to give me a unique, well-considered perspective on any issue.
Knowing her as I do I can absolutely accept that she wrote this story in one session while sitting in the parking lot of the Food 4 Less! “The Smell of Make-Up” struck me as engaging, lovely, funny, and touching. Here she captures a moment in time that takes a bit of nostalgia, a bit of fantasy, and our current planetary restrictions and ties them all up together into a little bit of hope. Seems like a gem of a holiday gift.
THE SMELL OF STAGE MAKE-UP by Carole H. Field
I am never really vexed by the randomness of thoughts. I’m aware our synapses aren’t linear. Ultimately, we just make them work. But this particular, glaring, non-sequitur was so unhitched, I had to go home and scribble it on paper.
So- there I sat in the parking lot of Food 4 Less on Van Owen Blvd. Not the most religious of experiences. And I watched the masked and gloved, largely Mexican, families cajoling and joyously poking each other towards their/our essential pilgrimage.
And so, what else do I think of when I’m in a grocery store parking lot on a scorching, Sunday morning during a pandemic? None other than- how much I missed the smell of stage make-up. Naturally.
Yes- the smell. Not the pretty colors or what it did to these deep-set eyes, but the smell. That first blast when you unscrewed the lid and it hit you, without permission.
“How do you do, Sugar? We’re in this together “, it would say.
I would light up like a twin finding his counterpart, or, even, a virgin birth.
The make-up from Macy’s or Bloomies or the cheap drugstore on W. 53rd never had that certain smell, nor, the voice, avuncularly calling me Sugar.
That darling little man on E. 41st s who never looked up from reading Backstage or Show Business but could accurately advise you from some third eye.
“Watcha up to?” he would ask.
“Yay- I am going out with ‘No, No, Nanette’ next week, “ I would respectfully reply.
“Mazel tov,” he would say. “Get the Max Factor #5. You’re part light olive, part pink. Anything else will drown you out. We got new lip brushes from Berlin. They’re on sale. “
And, I’d leave there, smiling, with my new stash, still never seeing the color of his eyes.
And in the subway, I’d steal a bench, peruse the area to begin my new relationship with no interruption, and uncap one of my new potions.
And, there it’d be again. The waft, the greeting, the historical ambrosia left by every actress before me and every actress henceforth, hoofing, in “No, No Nanette”. And it would say,
“Hi, Sugar. We’re in this together.”
Whether it was the Belasco, or a black box on Melrose, or Temple Israel‘s backstage in Detroit, the smell of stage make-up had the same voice.
I pulled myself inside the grocery store. No doubt everyone in there was thinking the same as me. Understandably, I hobbled over to the lonely make-up stand. There, far from commanding, smiled the Revlon and the Maybelline. They were trying. But I pretended, for just one second, that I was surrounded by the smell of Max Factor and Ben Nye and….And, that the word pandemic was only something cobbled together on a Scrabble board. And, that the lights were as radiant as ever on the Great White Way. And, the only masks anyone was wearing were for effect, for something theatrical, under the silly magicians, cheesy sleight of hand. Undoubtedly.
“Sugar,” said the voice from Max Factor #5. “Hey- you got it goin’ on. This pandemic thing is temporary. They all are. Go with your inner resources. Go for the love, Carole. Because whether you’re basking in the smell of odorous, legendary, rouge, or of the inhibitions produced by your mask, it’s all about the love. Did you ever believe it was about anything else? “ he laughed.
I cautiously moved away from the make-up stand and filled my basket with food. I now had to look at Food 4 Less with different eyes. Yow- who knew that roast chicken and mascara had so very much in common?
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