Windsor Writers' Group

I've just gotten back from the first meeting of the Windsor Writers' Group. It was held at Pause Cafe in downtown. Technically, the cafe was closed, but the owner (whose name I can't recall) held it open just for us.

I am very bad at guesstimating crowd sizes, but certainly more than 20 people were in attendance. I had to chuckle as it appeared that I was one of the younger people in the crowd. That's really saying something for a middle-aged English teacher. The meeting was organized by Lenore of Cranberry Press and Elaine of Walkerville Press, both local self-publishing companies. They both mentioned that the city of Windsor had not had a proper writer's community, but small pockets of writers who regularly got together. This meeting was an attempt to bring many writers together for mutual support and idea sharing.

There was a fair amount of discussion about what people were looking for from a writers' group. Not everyone shared, but the loud-mouth that I am, I tossed in my two cents. It was decided that the people in the group would e-mail their ideas to Elaine and Lenore. For example, should poets just meet with poets and prose writers just with prose writers? How would the group come back as a whole to share or hold readings? Hopefully, all of those issues will get hashed out quickly and the writers can really sit down and get to work.

I am really looking forward to this group for a lot of reasons. One, it's important to be reminded that others are struggling with some of the same issues as me. Whether it's writer's block or that eternal struggle between balancing work, child-rearing, and the writing passion, we all suffer at one time or another. why reinvent the wheel when others can offer valid help. Moreover, I hope to make real connections in this group. Not working in Windsor doesn't give me a natural entree into the Windsor social scene and I've been relying on others to help me. Frankly, after eight years of living here, I still basically know no one. That's my fault and I hope to rectify that by meeting people with common interests.

Since the concert on Friday, I've written quite a bit. I "finished" Chapter Seven and I started the eighth. I find that I need a fair amount of external stimulus to help my brain generate ideas. If I spend too much time in my own brain, I get mired in stale musty cobwebs. I hope that just getting out of my normal routine and talking about writing will shake things up for me a bit.

Having said all that, I am looking forward to the next meeting.