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writingmoonstone · 5 years ago

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Change

I step off of the rough wooden porch, and place my right foot atop the soft green foliage, still damp with hints of the morning dew. The air is hot and muggy, thicker with moisture than the average Wisconsin summer day, causing an unpleasant sensation to permeate throughout my body as I immediately begin to sweat. The sun behind me, peeking over the dark grey tiles of my roof and beating the heat down on my back, I stare out at the tree line, separating the back of our yard from the neighbor’s beyond it, the faint sounds of rustling leaves blowing in the lightest of breezes. Our property stretches dozens of yards before that tree line though, and it feels different than I remembered. The small sections of yard lined with moderate sized rods of wood once used to grow berries of striking red and circling vines of beans, but now stand overgrown with weeds and uncut grass, left unattended. The wood of the jungle gym I had played on since I was a child had become old and decrepit, growing a crusty blue moss and lightly splintering, and so it was taken down, leaving only holes in the dirt and patches of cracked soil where the foundations were set. The yard feels different. It has changed. And yet it also feels more lively than before.

The pale red of a female cardinal catches my eye as she lands on the bird feeder, hanging from the curve of a dark, metal pole, stuck upright in the overgrown garden. She calls out a lovely series of chirps and whistles as the starker red of her mate soon follows, both now picking at the seeds. Through the overgrowth beneath peeks the deep shimmering red of the cherries that we had thrown for the squirrels after they had sat in our fridge a day too long. In the nearby pine tree, the single tree growing in our yard, far from the tree line, I hear the chirps and calls of more birds, the coos of a mourning dove, the tweets of a robin, the song of a goldfinch. That tree had been planted alongside me; I remember growing with it, being taller than it. It now stands wide and thick, its peak cresting well over a dozen feet above my head, shedding pinecones and thin needles of green. A friend, and now a haven for the life around it. The yard has changed.

Smoke begins to rise from the yard to the left. A large stack of branches and leaves begins to crackle and burn in a wide pit of brick. The smell of gasoline and burning wood begins to float softly to my nose, carried by that light breeze. I reminisce of the times when that tree line continued on past our yard, all the way down to the road that ran perpendicular to ours. The heat has gotten stronger, and the sweat has begun to build up in the fabric of my shirt and exercise shorts. I always disliked the heat, especially when paired with such an intense humidity. I turn to head back inside, stepping off of the grass and back onto that hard, unmoving porch. The yard has changed, and I need to cool off.

#short story #change #nature #man vs nature #immersive

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sologxlaxies · 8 years ago

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Sofi’s Season’s Change Writing Challenge

Yes, it’s me again! So, I just realised it’s been about a year since I started this blog, and it also matches me moving to a whole new country and experiencing seasons for the first time (Yes, we do not have seasons in the Equator...) and in order to celebrate, I thought about hosting a season themed writing challenge. Thank you so much for sticking with me and supporting me, and let’s hope the road ahead is just as bright <3

Rules:

Must be following this clumsy sunflower (me)

Likes/reblogs on this post are appreciated but don’t count as an entry

All writing genres are allowed! that means fluff, angst, smut, etc...

It can be a Drabble, one-shot, multi chaptered fic... whatever you like!

Send me an ask with the song/sentence/prompt of your choice but make sure it’s not already taken

Please include the character you’re writing for in the ask (you can pick any Marvel or Seb character)

Please use your prompt accordingly. This means that the plot of your fic should fit with whatever season and prompt you choose.

Either one-shots, drabbles or multi part fics are fine! as long as they’re minimum 500 words long

AU’s are more than welcome! (I love AU’s)

The due date for the fics will be October 25th. If it’s a series, the first part needs to be posted on or before the due date.

I understand that life can be difficult, so if you need more time to post or need to drop out for any reason, please let me know at least 24 hours before the due date, and don’t worry! Just give me a heads-up.

Tag me in your fics when you post them! I’ll be making a masterlist with your submissions. Please use #sofi’s scwc as a tag so that I can keep track of them and reblog your posts.

If you have any questions, feel free to sed me an ask or message and I’ll do my very best to answer!

But first, here’s a little explanation...

I’ve split the prompts into four categories, and because it’s a season themed writing challenge, the categories are: spring, summer, autumn and winter. Each category is divided into: songs/lyrics, sentences and general prompts! What’s a general prompt, you might be asking yourself? One example is: sunglasses. That’s it! it can either be an element or a general situation if you don’t want to include a specific sentence in your fic, and they’re all related to each of the seasons. Whatever prompt you choose, please make sure to include it in your work.

Now let’s have some fun, shall we?

Spring

1. Ho Hey - The Lumineers (holy-smoaks96 -> Steve)

2. Open Spaces - Marc Robillard

3. “I missed the sunlight” (supersoldierslover -> Steve)

4. “We’re going outside today! No staying home and huddling inside, nope.”

5. “But I brought flowers!” (marvelle -> Steve)

6. Picnics (bladebarnes -> Bucky)

7. Bare feet

8. Getting caught in the rain (untimelyideasforstories -> Bucky)

Blue Jeans - Lana del Rey (Persephone-is-her-omg -> Chase)

Garden escapades

“You taste so sweet’

“No amount of fruit tarts is going to make me change my mind, but nice try.”

Summer

9. “Summer’s meant for loving and leaving” White mustang - Lana del Rey (rotisserie-rogers -> Bucky)

10. Summertime Sadness - Lana del Rey (sanjariti -> Steve)

11. Cheap Sunglasses - RAC (-alltimelilly- -> Tony)

12. “Are you... wearing a suit? at the beach?” (theassetseyeliner -> Carter Baizen)

13. “You look amazing” (aelin-blackstairs -> Bucky)

14. Stargazing (a-splash-of-stucky -> Steve)

15. Going to a music festival

16. Barbecues (fanlove-fandomlife -> Bucky)

Summer lovin’ - Grease

13 Beaches - Lana del Rey

“I wish we could stay here forever”

“It’s the thing about summer love... Nobody ever talks about it like it’s supposed to last” (hellomissmabel -> Bucky)

Autumn

17. Shiver - Coldplay (whothehellisbella -> Bucky)

18. Sweater Weather - The Neighbourhood (captnbarnesrogers -> Steve)

19. “Don’t tell me this is your first hot chocolate!” (wingtaken -> Bucky)

20. “Did we just interrupt them doing what I think they’re doing?” (whothehellisaemun -> Bucky)

21. “I’m telling you, this is my pumpkin. If you want it, you’re gonna have to fight me” (buckys-fossil -> Bucky)

22. “pumpkin spice...what?” (sgtbxckybxrnes -> Bucky)

23. “Who knew baking cookies was this hard?” (buckys-shield -> Bucky)

24. “Don’t be afraid” (haven-in-writing -> Steve)

25. Camping (denialanderror -> Bucky)

26. Haunted houses (dammitparker -> Steve)

27. Corn mazes (whiskeyandwashitape -> Bucky)

“It’s your fault that we’re stuck here in the middle of the night” (tasting-writers-block -> Bucky)

“Don’t look at me like that, this was not my idea” (onceupenahiddleston -> Bucky)

“I swear to you, that thing just moved.”

Brooklyn Baby - Lana del Rey

Winter

28. I’ll Find You - Lecrae, Tori Kelly

29. Snow - Angus and Julia Stone

30. Winter song - The Head and the Heart

31. “Sorry, it’s not me, it’s the eggnog” (just-some-drabbles -> Bucky)

32. “You remind me of the Grinch, you know? Except his heart grows three sizes and you stay an asshole” (Buckthegrump -> Bucky)

33. “It’s not an ugly sweater!” (twisnies -> Peter Parker)

34. “You look cute when you’re cold” (starker parker -> Bucky)

35. “Here, you can borrow my blanket” (buckysinthesinbin -> Bucky)

36. Getting snowed in (themcuhasruinedme -> Sam)

37. New year’s Eve kiss (call-her-little-bird -> Bucky)

38. Frostbite (the-witching-hours12-3 -> Clint)

“You can’t carry mistletoe around so that other people will kiss you. That’s called cheating”

Going Christmas gift shopping (vibraniom -> Steve)

“How am I not expected to freeze if you’re holding all the blankets?”

Beautiful people Beautiful problems - Lana del Rey ft. Stevie Nicks

#winter soldier imagine #bucky barnes imagine #steve rogers imagine #writing challenge #Sofi's writing chlallenge #Bucky Barnes #Steve Rogers

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kateelizabethfowler · 8 years ago

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New Essay: The Work of Place Keeping in Eastern Kentucky

The Work of Place Keeping in Eastern Kentucky Introduction by Kate Fowler, director of the Appalachian Media Institute:

It’s May in Whitesburg, a small town of roughly two thousand people in the coalfields of eastern Kentucky. The redbuds are in bloom on the hillsides and many of my neighbors are out in their yards, tending to gardens. The mountains that covered our valley in darkness during the winter are now full and warm, tangled with honeysuckle and laurel. Early this year our friend confided that winter is a particularly hard time for her. As the leaves fall from the trees, the scars on the mountains become visible and she feels confronted with the long history of coal extraction that has come to define this place. Each winter she wonders if she can make it through. Yet, when spring returns, as the hills fill out again, she resolves to stay.

A year and a half ago my husband and I moved to Whitesburg with an overloaded U-Haul truck and our two dogs. Available housing is hard to find here and we spent our first week as guests in the home of the founders of Appalshop—a media arts organization where I had recently accepted a position. Bill and Josephine Richardson graciously opened their home to us while we hunted for one of our own. Our first days were spent combing through the classified ads and searching the roads, with evenings around the Richardsons’ kitchen table, where we learned about the complex history of arts, culture, and representation in our new community.

In those first evenings we learned that the Richardsons had moved to Whitesburg from New Haven, Connecticut in 1969. Bill had completed an architecture degree at Yale University and received funding from a War on Poverty partnership between the American Film Institute and the federal Office of Economic Opportunity to start a two-year Appalachian Community Film Workshop, part of a national program to provide ten “minority and disadvantaged” communities with 16mm film training and tools.

Bill and Josephine still reside in Whitesburg and the Appalachian Community Film Workshop has grown into Appalshop—a forty-eight-year-old organization that has produced more than one hundred documentary films and is host to a radio station, theater ensemble, youth media program, record label, state-of-the-art archive, and creative community development initiative.

Our friend’s dilemma, of whether to stay or leave, has been reflected in the core of Appalshop’s mission since its beginnings. An early Appalshop film, In Ya Blood, produced in 1969, illustrates young filmmaker Herby Smith’s internal quandary—to leave Whitesburg and attend Vanderbilt University in Nashville or to stay home and work in the mines. After receiving his degree, Herby returned to his filmmaking career at Appalshop, where he’s still working today.

Many involved in Appalshop’s youth program Appalachian Media Institute (AMI) have relayed their own similar personal conflict, whether to leave for higher education or higher-paying work elsewhere, or to stay in the place they love with their network of family and friends. Brandon Jent, an alumnus of AMI’s 2015 Summer Documentary Institute has experienced the heartache of leaving his home culture, deep community, and family ties to further his education. He states:

Home is Colson, Kentucky in Letcher County—a small little place about 20 minutes out from the county seat, Whitesburg. Home is land that’s been divided up in my family from Deane to Isom, from generation to generation, from family gardens to churches to coal mines and a train that used to pass behind my house so frequently that I stopped noticing it.

Home is promising. Home is knowing that it was tough to live at home, that it’s still tough, that it may always be tough. Home is knowing that it’s worth it.

Generations of eastern Kentucky youth have had to contend with the question of whether to leave, alongside the demeaning narrative of the rural “brain drain.” This reductive theory posits that the best and brightest minds leave rural communities for urban communities. This simplification of data ignores the stories of those who choose to stay or are not able to leave. For many young people here, it is an act of resistance to stay in the community they love, or like Brandon, to return home.

In March, the New York Times published “Why I’m Moving Back Home,” an op-ed by author J. D. Vance. Announcing his return to “rural America,” Vance presented his move from Silicon Valley to Columbus, Ohio as an event worthy of a press release. “It’s jarring,” he states, “to live in a world where every person feels his life will only get better when you come from a world where many rightfully believe that things have become worse.” Reflecting on the “real struggles” of life in rural America, Vance added, “It wasn’t an easy choice. I scaled back my commitments to a job I love because of the relocation. My wife and I worry about the quality of local public schools, and whether she (a San Diego native) could stand the unpredictable weather.”

Following the election of President Trump with 62% of the rural vote, Vance’s memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, gained the attention of a nation reckoning with the growing divide it had long ignored. Since then, Vance has become a prominent voice in discussions surrounding the political, cultural, and economic climate in the rural East from the coalfields of eastern Kentucky to the Ohio rust belt. Winter is tough here, but Vance was talking about Columbus—one of our nation’s fastest growing mid-sized cities. For many living in these mountains, there are starker worries: access to clean drinking water, health care, nutritious food, employment, and livable housing take precedence over concerns about the weather.

Eastern Kentucky is no stranger to the complexity of media representation. For nearly a century, this area has witnessed the dual capacity of documentary storytelling to both impact social change and reduce a people to a simplistic, often derogatory, stereotype. A powerful example of this dichotomy is Harry Caudill’s 1963 book Night Comes to the Cumberlands, which inspired Lyndon B. Johnson’s federal War on Poverty and catalyzed a national discussion about the disparity between the quality of life in the suburbs of postwar America and Caudill’s home—Whitesburg itself—in the coalfields of eastern Kentucky. Revealing the controlled poverty of an extraction-based economy, Caudill outlined the economic, environmental, and human toll of an industry that supplied fuel to our nation’s steel mills, households, and military.

The release of Night Comes to the Cumberlands accelerated the national media’s extensive coverage of life in the Appalachian mountains: sitcoms like The Beverly Hillbillies (1962) and documentaries like CBS’s Christmas in Appalachia (1965) through PBS’s Country Boys (2006) and an abundance of contemporary films, television shows, novels, and journalism, including Ron Howard’s forthcoming film adaptation of Hillbilly Elegy. Too often, the narratives that define economically impoverished communities are created by those who have left (or were never there in the first place). These perspectives seldom offer the richness and complexity of those shaped by residents, whose stories develop over time, through relationships, and with a depth of context that is hard to achieve in the media industry.

It’s important to acknowledge the valuable role of the national media in the widespread dissemination of stories, yet we should not regard national media professionals as the primary authority or voice in any narrative of place. Indeed, dynamic representation requires a diversity of perspectives—from the nuance and knowledge of life within community to the critical distance afforded to those outside of it.

For nearly five decades, there has been a sustained movement of eastern Kentucky residents who have used media as a tool to critically address the challenges and opportunities of their home. Many of these residents are committed to staying in or returning to their communities—in spite of an economy that is recovering from the collapse of its primary industry, and challenges in not just quality of life, but subsistence. In his New York Times essay, J. D. Vance proposes that not all communities should be economically saved. After my short time in eastern Kentucky, I’d contend that for places such as Whitesburg, we should move beyond a rhetoric of “saving” and listen to the strong narrative that’s coming from these hills of arts, culture, talent, and resistance. This is not a community worth “saving,” it’s a community worth investing in, and its narrative runs far deeper than the contemporary discussion prompted by Vance or the 2016 presidential election cycle.

“Growing up, I really didn’t know until my teenage years that my home was any different from the rest of the world,” reflects twenty-three-year-old filmmaker Oakley Fugate, who came of age during the collapse of the coal industry. Early on, Oakley was encouraged to work toward a future outside of the mountains, to leave his home. “It wasn’t until I got older [that] people told me I had to leave, that the only reliable career was in the coalfields. My teachers told me to give up on filmmaking, that there would be no way to make a living off of it, but media making is what drives me in life. I don’t want to leave. There really isn’t another place like home, a place that I’ve lived and know the majority of the people. I couldn’t make my films anywhere else.”

Over the next four weeks, we will share a series of films produced in collaboration between the youth filmmakers of the 2016 Summer Documentary Institute at Appalshop’s Appalachian Media Institute and filmmaker Jordan Freeman. The films show excerpts of the documentary projects produced by filmmakers Oakley Fugate, Elyssia Lowe, Josh Collier, Jaydon Tolliver, Aaron Combs, and Oliver Baker, along with interviews about their motivations and processes. Their full documentary films can be viewed here. Published in The Oxford American Magazine: http://www.oxfordamerican.org/item/1223-i-couldn-t-make-my-films-anywhere-else

#oxfordamerican #placekeeping #appalshop #appalachianmediainstitute #kentucky #easternkentucky

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