About Us...

Welcome to my Salon. A place for my creative friends to join in a conversation about writing, about the creative process and the creative life. We write and paint alone, but it's as part of the creative community that we find support and friendship. I originally launched my virtual cafe in support of the release of Karen Karbo's kick ass book about another kick ass woman, Julia Childs. From here on, I'll share what I know about the writing life and the experiences and musings of friends and colleagues in the Portland arts and letters community. Comments and Guest bloggers are encouraged and invited.

Thursday, September 26, 2013

An Eaux-mage to Karbohemia


Karbo Bakes Another Cherry Pie
...and makes my Oyster Stew!

How do we write? Why do we write? Where do we get the job done? These are the questions and discussions and buzz on every writing website on the planet. We write alone in our bedrooms in our pajamas,  at coffee houses, buried in laptops, at the kitchen table ignoring plates of stale pizza. We're alone in this, lonely mis-fits with our noses in our belly buttons, answering the call of the voices in our heads. We say thank-you or good-bye; we figure it out and make sense of the senseless, explain our meaning of life. But, if you are as infinitely clever as Karen Karbo, you create a series called Kick-ass Women and you let the women of your dreams do the talking. Alone? Shit no. You're having a party with some of the most entertaining women who ever lived: Georgia O'Keeffe, Coco Channel, Katherine Hepburn, and most recently, Julia Child. There are pies in the oven. I can smell them baking in my own corner of cyberville. Someone's in the kitchen with Karbo and she invited the entire writing community over to hashtag, LiveLikeJulia. Pick a chapter and go for it. Indulge your longing to hang out on social media sites and type in cute things. And do this about Karbo's upcoming and fun-filled episode of life with Julia. And I mean LIFE, because this woman knew how to live by the magic of her convictions. She believed in butter, cream, and everything French and trussed and caramelized. It was genuinely fun to grasp an enlightened concept of life, and I have become wiser for it, by living like Julia Child in chapter nine of the new book, Julia Child Rules. I was able to at least consider planting my flag in front of my true, if unworthy, self and not worry about keeping up with those who are more popular, more successful, and more deserving than I. That would be most people. But Julia didn't worry about such matters, she simply hogged the spotlight, liver spots and all, with glee. Living like her for a week or so helped me forget, for a moment, the worries of the adult world in which I live. She will always be a part of me and has joined the choir in my head. One day in the future Julia will appear to me, flour covering the front of her apron, and remind me to write the truth, my truth.