Yesterday, I attended a reading conference that was held in Podunk, USA.
It’s an annual event that local teachers and others from surrounding counties look forward to each year.
There are lots of workshops to choose from…lots of experts in education ready to share and inspire attendees.
This year’s keynote speaker was Janet Stevens. She’s an artist as well as a children’s book writer.
I’ll admit that I found her rather odd, at first.
She spoke in a strange voice.
It’s one that can only be described as the kind of voice kindergarten and first grade teachers use when they read.
But she was talking to adults.
I wasn’t exactly sure what her message was supposed to be…at first.
And then, I realized, as she took us through some of her books, annotating along the way, that she was explaining how she got ideas for her stories.
Then, I sat…completely enthralled…as she demonstrated how she took one simple thing, be it her sister’s blue dress, which she got as a hand-me-down, or a tennis ball that her dog dropped down a gopher hole…and created an entire book based on that object.
I got chills as I listened.
Why?
Because that is what I do as a blogger, although not nearly as well as Ms. Stevens.
The longer a person blogs, the more time that person spends thinking about what to write about.
Bloggers find inspiration in the smallest details of life and create stories…life lessons…around those details.
The artwork we include with our stories are the seemingly-random pictures we take throughout the day.
We never know what we’ll be writing about. Often, our posts begin with a moment that we’ve captured in a photo.
Ms. Stevens truly inspired me.
I’d love to write a book one day.
For now, I’m satisfied with writing on this blog of mine.
Maybe one day a book will come forth from this keyboarding fingers of mine.
We.
Shall.
See.
Filed under: This-n-That | Tagged: Janet Stevens, writing | Leave a comment »
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