Sturgis #selfies
ALRIGHT! I know you have ’em, so be sure to send them my way – those dozen or so selfies from the Fiction Craft classes!! Contact me via Facebook (or through my contact form here on Cape Cod Scribe). I would love to post your photos and what you learned from our time together! Learning that I’m somewhat weird doesn’t count . . .
For example: Juliana and Christian (left) learned that the three of us are apparently ghosts, revealed in our washed-out selfie. These two haunted me from their spots on my bus last year, and were shadowing me at Sturgis West as well! Proof that they are definitely spooky. :) I miss them on #14. Dying for stories from Christian and Juliana’s old bus? Tries these: Insanity, Knight Bus, and Rabid Wheels. FYI – the “Pansies for Peace” story (East versus West) is at the bottom of the page.
Shannon Glover (L) apparently had a ton of fun: “I
absolutely LOVED you coming in and teaching us this different techniques of writing! Please please please have the school bring you back again!!” She also rocked a few quotes that were plastered on her side from the projector! Hooray for technology!
Jordan Plummer also had a crazy time: “I liked everything! It was interesting & provided a twist and fun way to learn about something I was fairly familiar with. Any and all ideas were welcomed and that was cool! Everything we learned seems like it will be helpful to writing! I didn’t plan on being a writer but you made it sound so enjoyable and like something I’d actually like to do! You had so much personality and treated us as friends as opposed to students – I wish you taught at Sturgis because that’s a class I’d take every day!! I would totally want you to come back!”
Both Shannon and Jordan (as well as many, many other students) offered some terrific plot lines and characters that we built upon during class . . . although Jordan did like killing off people – LOL!
Brycee Thomas also didn’t fall asleep in class! Hooray! “I honestly thought your class was one of the most interesting writing classes I have ever taken! And I’ve taken a few! I’ve already starting using a lot of the techniques you showed us haha!!!” We also thought we were quite the set of rock stars in our photo, though I just looked like an escapee from the mental hospital . . . Brycee, however, did look like she belonged on stage with loads of screaming fans :)
Ada Garcia, who escaped the camera’s eye (aka not pictured) added her thoughts about the class: “So I just wanted to let you know that I absolutely positively LOVED your lessons today and yesterday. They we’re so much fun, and they showed us how to be real writers (not that English class doesn’t). You taught it in a fun energetic way and got everyone involved, which was amazing. You gave us great writing ideas, and inspired me a lot. I really hope you come back next year, & thank you so much for being here this year.” Yippee! *dweeby dance from me*
PANSIES FOR PEACE (written for Sturgis West’s Fiction Craft Class)
The rivalry between us and the Easties was nothing new.
But in recent years it had grown, like an endless mold that thrived off our sunless hatred, finally overrunning both schools. It became obvious to the faculty of East and West that we needed to find a truce, especially after Sam’s mean-as-hell curve ball that won us the last game, and turned America’s pastime into an all-out brawl.
No one could come up with a solution, not that we really wanted one. Even our cheerleaders wanted to de-smile the Eastie squad. As for the team and I, we wanted to pound the Easties with our bats, both on the field . . . and elsewhere.
Easties always saw themselves as so superior, with their midnight blue jackets, centralized campus, and the claim that they were the first.
First to open.
First to win.
First freakin’ everything.
But we WestEnders had a take-no-prisoners approach with baseball, and oddly, cheerleading. We dominated in those two arenas and no one could take that blistering rivalry from us.
Except Principal Carah.
She was my own five-foot tall nightmare.
See, there were three things that were undeniable when it came to Principal Carah: she loved books, hated sports, and was addicted to the school’s garden.
I, on the other hand, avoided the library, lived for baseball, and thought the garden was a place to toss my Hubba Bubba wrappers.
So when she came up with the “Pansies for Peace” idea, I nearly puked . . . along with most of the school.
Her idea, along with East’s principle Mr. Banes, was that our schools would exchange flowers – potted, living reminders that we should share our successes and joys equally.
Uh huh. Yeah right.
Everyone had to plant and grow a friggin’ Pansy. I quickly learned that a flower in my Red Sox bedroom made me look like a pansy as well.
God I hated that weed.
The schools exchanged flowers (along with a few evil glares and decidedly unfriendly fingers), and the days rolled by without anymore of Principal Carah’s lundacris ideas.
But then something weird started happening.
Our student body started acting less like WestEnders, and more like . . . Easties. It started first with Carah’s Garden Club, who granted, were little off to begin with. They began wearing blue more often. Started talking like Easties, saying how great the East teams were, and how cool East’s campus was.
And the Garden Club began growing more of those irritating red flowers from the Easties, handing them out to the other classes. Like, LOTS of them.
My teammates and I always ditched the nasty little things in the garbage – and so did the cheerleaders (and they’re chicks, so their hatred was pretty hardcore to ditch flowers).
Within two weeks, Principal Carah’s Pansies for Peace idea had led to something else entirely. East had invaded our school somehow, taking over the minds of the entire student body with one, devil-red flower.
Now me, and the team, just had to prove it.
Unfortunately our only allies had more spirit ribbons in their hair than the balloon guy at the mall carnival.
But if the pompoms could bring it, then so could my baseball team.
Game on Easties.
Game on.
Cape Cod Scribe 
Hey, KR, Great to meet you at the conference this morning. That feels more like three days ago now. I like your story, but I wonder what the baseball team has in mind, when they plan to bring the game to the Easties. I’m worried about those innocent flowers, LOL.
LikeLike
Hi Brenda! It was a pleasure to meet you at the conference!! I love your blog! Yes – the Pansies for Peace story was a writing tool for the Sturgis kids – they had to come up with what the baseball team’s plan was, who the characters were, what was the climax, how the Easties played into it – Everything. They had a ton of great ideas :)
LikeLike
Ah, so many doors opened by this story, what a great inspiring writing platform. You really have a cool ultra-creative spark, I like to see it in action: you animated and jazzed. It was contagious. Best of luck with your future writing. I am going to undertake a big edit myself, make my one book into two. Whew!! :-) Thanks for all your advice!
LikeLike
Pingback: Author Spotlight on K.R. Conway + GIVEAWAY | She Reads She Blogs