Writing in the Bahamas

This time last week, I was wearing flip flops and my swimsuit and sitting at a picnic table with professionals from the publishing world. Folks who know their business inside and out. People like big-wig editors and well-known agents and best-selling authors.

I’m not bragging.

What I mean to say is that normally if a person were lucky enough to find herself in the presence of this audience, she might put on something more than sunscreen.

Okay, there was a swimsuit cover-up. But in the Bahamas, one can’t worry about her wardrobe (or her hair for that matter).

So, I left my heels behind and lugged notebooks and manuscripts around instead. I whittled down the lead in my pencil filling pages with notes from the Salt Cay Writers Retreat: tips on the craft heard from speakers on the panels, words of advice from my one-on-one, and ideas and insights gathered during workshop, even when it wasn’t my piece in the spotlight.

We took breaks, mind you, because it was impossible to ignore blue ocean waters just yards away. But even when I walked the beach or rocked back and forth in the waves, I was thinking through story, considering character and strategy, imagining the setting of the cold, north woods while basking under the burning, tropical sun.

It is possible.

And that was one of the biggest gifts from this retreat: the possibility of this novel that I’ve dreamed of and pushed aside and worried about and picked up again.

My notes are linear but disorganized, but I can’t wait to share more with you. And I will, bit by bit.

Where did you find possibility this week?