Helena Clare Pittman

It is six or so weeks ago that I entered clicking and sliding into the maze of Facebook. I have managed to set up that third profile. When it asked for my face, I was blank. My page sat that way, blank of face, until about a week ago when I clicked willy-nilly on something punctuated with many of my faces, my column of the Good God knows what—is it my story? Is it my private news feed? Is it my timeline? I’ve yet to understand...

When I got to midtown and parked the car, I combed the sheet of newspaper, four pages, double sided. There it was, the story of a man who had bought a shoe store during hard economic times. One shoe store became two, then three, then twenty-five. A chain of shoe stores! The man had accumulated wealth, and had the means to help others—which he did. “During hard times, expand,” is what he was quoted as saying.

"...it is a rediscovery for me, that the teaching I do is not just about me. That alone is affirmation. We are all in this together. Writing for Children and Writing a Small-Scale Memoir teacher Helena Clare Pittman shares some insights into both her teaching and creative processes.

When I write, I really do want it to come from deep within me. Once the writing is on the page, I look at it. Then I ask, who is this for? What’s the voice? I assess where I want to coax the piece. So when writing began to come to me with older picture book voices, I was surprised, and I went with it...

Two nights ago, sitting by the open window in the quiet country woods, late July, I heard a bird sing—chirp! Chirrup! Chirrup! I listened and heard it again. Then it must have moved on. Startling to hear a bird at night—full dark...

When personal computers were brand new, in the late 1970s, a friend showed me exponential progression on his computer screen. “Look at this!” he said. I was awestruck...

Fall is late in coming this year. Our leaves, here in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains, are usually blazing reds, yellows and oranges by September— two, sometimes three weeks in. Branches are bare by mid-October. But the trees in my woods are as full and green as summer, even after first frost three nights ago...

I’d visited a writers’ group in a nearby town. This is a rural place. Nearby is an hour’s drive. But the weather was still good, I’d heard they were serious writers, and there is no group nearer home...

The bears are asleep now that the temperature has dipped into the single digits, nights in these foothills of the Catskill Mountains. So, I’ve put out the bird feeders. I acquired this wisdom soon after coming here 23 years ago, when my sturdy feeder, made so that squirrels couldn’t chew it through, disappeared...

A semicolon has been used to punctuate complete thoughts within a sentence; it is somewhat arcane, I’ve thought, and been replaced by a period or an em dash (—). The above sentence could also be written this way:...