Writing Retreat Wrap-Up

Sunrise at the lake

I don't remember how the topic came up last February. A bunch of us writers were sitting around the Wayward Coffeehouse, talking about finding time to do our thing. One of the group had just come back from--or was just leaving for--a weekend retreat, and I remember being sad I'd never attended the Rainforest Writers Retreat.

As an aside, this particular group meets weekly for dinner and typing. Our focus isn't critiquing, so our conversations usually ramble and trail off into hilarious obscurity. This time the subject stuck.

After some discussion and a quick search by one writer's husband, we picked our location, began the initial headcount, and a couple of other writers set up a group schedule so we could narrow down a free weekend. The first one wasn't until September.

Basically what I want to convey is that we were all involved in the planning. Later I made the reservation, and here we are today.

Even with a couple of tiny hiccups, the weekend couldn't have gone much more smoothly. We drove up Friday evening and ate dinner on the road. Friday evening was filled with setting goals and hanging out.

For Saturday, I'd put together a tentative schedule since it was our main work day. Blocks of writing time were broken up by meals--everyone volunteered to prepare a meal for the group--and we had some scheduled down-time. In the evening, we hung out some more. Half the group eventually went to bed, and the rest stayed up to write a while longer.

Sunday morning was mostly spent on breakfast, cleaning up, and a little bit of writing.

I spent most of my weekend in the lowest level of the house, staring at a wall decorated with many corks. I revised a new horror story, but I also managed to start a superficial outline of a novel, and to begin a new story.

I'm very happy with my productivity, and I had a great time.

The writers in attendance were wonderful to share space with and I'm so glad it all came together as it did. It was one of those experiences I'll look back on and remember fondly for a long time. No doubt about that.

Here are a few camera phone pics:

Pre-breakfast busy-ness


A wall decorated by hundreds of wine corks!


Closeup of the cork wall