Waking early, now the clocks are turned back. Sun lighting the room. Today is my Wednesday morning writers and I have some preparation still to do, but out the door and toward the river and into the woods we cover some good distance in sunshine, through patches of mud and large puddles of pine needles along the trail. I’m tired today, a bad night’s sleep, and my energy is still low from being sick, and so my enthusiasm for my workshop is muted, even though I like my idea and trust it will go well. I have asked the writers to bring a photo from childhood – a picture, if they can find one – of themselves as a child, happily at some kind of play or activity they loved, when they felt free and engaged, joyful and alive. If unable to find a picture, I said, take a picture of something that reminds you of that time, or bring an object, and all of them do. We read two poems about childhood as a warm-up, including W. S. Merwin’s “The Laughing Child” – and here are a few lines from it:

The writing from the prompt is magnificent. Every writer drafts a story or poem full of emotional complexity – the territory of childhood, of the child at play, is so fertile. I could have sat listening to these stories all day, not only for the universal truths they exposed but for the hidden personal qualities that came to the surface to reveal the creative essence of the child of each woman in the room. We laughed, we cried, we listened as we let the children have their say so exquisitely this morning.