Whatcha Brewin', Britt? (Patreon)

Welcome to another edition of Whatcha Brewin', Britt? I have some updates to talk about!

***DISCLAIMER: I am not being paid to advertise any of these teas; I'm just a tea lover who likes to share what I love with others.

Brew name: Earl Grey

Brew Blend: Black tea with bergamot

Brew Brand/Makers: Twinings but a North American release (aka not imported from England)

Size of cup: Maybe about 14 oz?

Thoughts on Brew: London's import (purple logo) is better

What's Brewin' On the Backburner:

Tonight I attended 

Monday Night Write Night

Monday, March 28, 2022, 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm, Online event

Description (according to their website)

Writer in Residence will be hosting Monday Night Write Night from 6-8 pm. Those interested in refining their prose writing are  welcome to join.

Take some time to discuss the art of writing, practice your writing and recognize the work involved in creating your best story.

The Monday nights writing workshop will explore how to write a story that you love because if you don’t love it nobody else will.

This is an online program.

To be honest, I thought this would be a one-night event that is hosted multiple times by this Writer-in-Residence. But what it seems to be now that I've attended is an on-going event. Apparently some attendees have attended more than one session. 

I don't mean to criticise the organization of this but it would have been helpful to know in advance that fact and furthermore the subject(s) that will be covered for each night so that I know what nights I'd like to attend. Luckily, I know next session will have a focus on memoirs because some attendees requested it tonight. So I know not to sign up for next week, at least. I may sign up for the following session just to see what the focus will be for that one and decide whether I stay or skip.

But tonight we learned more on how to do "landscape writing" with a focus on using the description of surroundings/landscape to help establish emotions of a character, theme(s) of a piece and indirect character description.

I got a few ideas that I'd like to explore further from tonight. I would like to share the writing I did tonight with you all even though I feel it didn't fulfil the assignment/challenge. It was good to just start writing again with little inhibition. This is straight speed writing without editing so there are things that you'll see that indicate this is a draft. Here's what I did in 20 minutes:

The dirt was an expanse of pure black, like an abyss devoid of all the senses; an endless pit that swallows up all that is good, and bad, and creates nothingness. There is room for nothing here but life sucking ____.

This place of dirt was once vibrant with colour and feeling. It had green grass of no particular shade that led up the hill spotted with structures of various colours and sizes. This hill was once lively even without movement. It had character, it had a warm and welcoming feeling.

So to behold black dirt levelling the hill with no sight of colour or shape felt wrong to anyone who witnessed this change now.

For some, dirt holds promise, reminds of spring, provides a safe space for growth and potential.

Not here. Not this muddy wasteland. This space that goes on farther than imagination can fathom or conceive holds a feeling of death, of air that is hard to breathe, of a space difficult to traverse. This space takes away, it does not give. Life cannot thrive here. Life here has been cut prematurely short. One’s spirit feels all consumed by too much negative emotion and yet all at once suddenly devoid of emotion as the eye takes in the mud and dirt and the lack of any shape or size of anything around here.

How can such a place exist as a neighbour to beauty which can be found in the blue, glassy waters to the right, in the green hills in the distance and the trees that sway in a breeze that feels cool and warm and inviting, pulling the body and the spirit to a place that overtly opposes the black hole tugging to the left?

Even the lack of sound here contributes to the isolation and feeling of desolation and desperation to cling to something that will keep you afloat in the expanse of misery that at once consumes you in this place.

Being here, you want to run, to feel your feet pound on something solid and real, to feel the air rush past you as it does not blow upon you if you remain stationary, to hear your own heart or your feet hitting ground or the wind or anything that reminds you that you aren’t lost forever, you aren’t swallowed whole by this monster that has consumed so much of you already in so short a time.

I won't share where this is describing or the thing I sorta loosely hand in mind for the "regret, sorry or fear". I'll just let you have your own ideas :D

I found this challenge difficult. To describe a place I have been and base it on my own inner turmoil with short notice was difficult without advance notice and without it being a character or a fictional place or both. I don't know that I have many negative places to describe physically to echo what I feel inside. At least not in the surface thoughts.

Anyway I'm looking forward to continuing on trying different things of professional development over this next year. Right now, I'm shifting focus onto PD vs producing content consistently. I want to release content, but it for now has to be less consistent. So I thank you for your understanding and support of that! This patreon will be restructured over the next months as I begin to find what works for me. I know that it'll be temporary; that the blog will turn back around to content releases as its primary function. So for now, you're going to get a few things but not as much as you're used to. I apologize for the up-in-the-air nature of this right now. I will keep you in the loop throughout this journey, though!

So in conclusion, thank you for being my patrons and being patient as I work behind-the-scenes on professional development and professional planning. You rock! Thanks for sticking around I promise great things are in store soon!!!

-Britt xoxo