I am writing Again

Hello students This is your old teacher Frank. I am here to tell you that I have been writing again. I welcome your comments and your stories and poems and essays.

These websites are where you will find my new work.

http://poetry367.blogspot.com/

http://stories367.blogspot.com/

Below you will find more work and two blogs

http://taomaster7.weebly.com/

http://storyteller7.weebly.com/

You can email me at taomaster7@yahoo.com
or taomaster7@gmail.com

Thanks,
hope to hear from you,
keep writing,
Frank

the tea party or drinking with Jamie till something comes out

Her mother is both surprised and glad. The surprise is to see me, a stranger at the door asking if Jamie is home. Not many people come here and no one for Jamie. She is glad for that - me being there to see Jamie. Jamie needs friends, she says.
I introduce myself as the neighbor next door, which I am. I do not mention that I am a policewoman. There is no need for that. I do not want to freak the grandmother out. There is nothing sinister in my visit, only my curiosity. I need to meet Jamie. I need to know how she knew what she knew. I need to know how in the world she knew Mr. Dander put his wife's finger in the margarine tub.
I am astonished to find that Jamie is a very small little girl. I find out she nearly four years old (her birthday is next month). There must be some mistake, I think.
"I knew you were coming," she says with a small child's certainty, "so I set another place for you."
"Thank you," I say politely trying not to show my utter bewilderment. How could she know I was coming when I didn't even know I was coming. She leads me to the kitchen where the table is set for six people. Jamie is sitting on one end, I am sitting on the other and between us there is a stuffed bear, a stuffed Sponge Bob, a large doll, and one empty chair.
"Who is that chair for ?" I ask.
"Mr. Pickles." is the quick response. "He is already here."
"Is that the Mr. Pickles that sent me this note ?" I ask holding up the red envelope.
"Oh, no," she says, "I sent you that note. Mr. Pickles wrote it."

Christmas Break Assignment #1

Dear Class:

I hope you are enjoying your break from writing. I am not. I need something to write about and I need students to encourage. So I am going to post an assignment here and I hope you will share with me some of your thoughts and/or stories, poems, . . . etc

So here is assignment #1

Write about something using SOS

You can either write about getting/giving help or you can use the letters SOS to stand for something else. Such as:

1) Same Old Shit
2) Secrets Of Santa
3) Suburban Orphan Society . . . well you get the idea. Use your imagination and send your writings to me and I will post them here.

my email is Taomaster7@gmail.com

Love ya and keep writing,
Frank

Last weeks class, what's ahead etc.

Thanks to all who came to last week's class. Thanks to all the writings - they were great.
Next week we have several suggestions on what to write about. They are:

1) Lies
2) Horizons
3) Come Back to Me
4) Forgiveness
5) Hurt Feelings

The writings should have at least one of these additional factors within:

1) Fiction (at the very least change the names of the people involved)
2) Humor (satire, parody, wit, puns, jokes, you name it)
3) Dialogue (have some people talking to each other)

And next week in class, we will have someone else , other than yourself reading the your work. This will give you an opportunity to hear your work as read by another. I will read them all myself. So don't worry - just write and make it so I can read it.

That's all for now - keep writing and having fun doing it,
Frank

The start of a new class

Yesterday, we once again had a great class. It is good to see old faces and some new ones too. Not a lot of old things were read so we had two writing assignments, one fifteen minutes long and the other five minutes long - both went very well.
There were several suggestions for topics to write about and these were:

Treasures of the Past

Excuse Me

Sentimental Journey

I don't have any

Mistakes

Keep up the good writing,
Frank

What a wonderful class we had yesterday !! Thanks to all. The creative juices were flowing when it came to thinking up topics to write about. So without further ado, here they are:

1. The Solution to . . .
2. Silence
3. Criminal Minds
4. Do I scratch it ? (or not)

Another exercise to try is: Write a story with multiple characters, having no central character or leading character. All characters in your story are equal stars (more or less). Not exactly equal but not having any one character dominate. This is not easy, but give it a try.

I will post an example of this soon. Right here.

P.S. Last night went to Palos Park Library for open mike night - heard a wonderful writer read from her book. I will edit in the detail later when I remember what they are.

Anyway, next month I (yes, yours truly) agreed to read some of my stories and or poems. So mark that date on your calendars and be there. April 7th at 7pm. Palos Park Library

thats all for now,
keep writing,
frank

Hello Want-to-be-writers:

Starting on Wednesday February 24, 2010
I am teaching both a afternoon class (1:00-3:00) and an evening class (6:30-8:30)

I will post here the writing suggestions for next week.

Topics for the afternoon class are:

1) Message in a Bottle

2) It was a terrible, terrible (storm or anything else)

3) Neighbors

4) Bits and Pieces (scraps)[incomplete ideas]

Extra credit for poems

Topics for the Night class

1) Rain

2) Terrible twos

3) I'm totally ( fill in the blank)

4) Bologna (all kinds)

Have a good time writing and remember these are only suggestions,
Keep Writing
Frank