This Wonderful Life: Creative skills reap benefits beyond the arts

Columns

Discussion

COMMENTING ON STORIES:

Welcome to our story comments feature. We welcome your thoughts and your opinions, including the unpopular ones. We only ask that you keep your conversations clean, civil and on the topic of the story you are commenting on.

Coinciding with our websites redesign, we launched our new story comments feature through Disqus.

Disqus gives users the ability to log into our story comments feature so that they may be able to track their conversations, receive emails when their comments get a reply or to even have your comments update onto your Facebook or Twitter accounts.

For the time being, our story comments feature will continue to have the ability to post comments anonymously. We reserve the right to require registration in the future using your name and verified email address.

Not all comments are deemed printable. Some are disqualified at the newspaper’s discretion for a number of different reasons. Please follow our Online Rules of Conduct at all times.

RULES OF CONDUCT:

We reserve the right to remove comments that are unacceptable, to wit:

1. False and inacurate statements.
2. Personal attacks. Explicit name-calling.
3. Harassing, harmful, vulgar, obscene and defamatory language.
4. Threatening statements or statements that suggest violence.
5. Hate speech of any kind.
6. Intolerant comments on religion, race, age, gender, sexual preference or disabilities.
7. Accusations of criminal activity.
8. Content that is harmful to children and minors in any way.
9. References to any type of sexual activity and other private matters.
10. Random and inflammatory statements that are off topic.
11. Advertising of any kind.
12. Typing in all caps.

WE ENCOURAGE REASONABLE AND COURTEOUS COMMENTS THAT:

1. Create conversation on issues of interest and concern to fellow readers and local community members.
2. Express opinions and contrarian views.
3. Stimulate debate with respectful language.
4. Stay within the boundaries of these rules.

WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO SUSPEND OR TERMINATE ACCESS FOR:

1. Violating any of these Online Rules of Conduct.
2. Deliberately disrupting discussions with repetitive messages, meaningless messages or spam.
3. Misrepresentation of identity or impersonating another user.

WE WELCOME:

1. Flagging violations of these rules that you observe to our attention.

MONITORING:

We monitor comments regularly Monday - Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Approval of comments outside of this time will be sporadic.

comments powered by Disqus

June 12, 2009

This Wonderful Life: Creative skills reap benefits beyond the arts

Anonymous The Cooperstown Crier Fri Jun 12, 2009, 09:08 AM EDT

I know it’s hard to believe by looking at me now, but I was once a shy, bookish, unathletic child. And by ``hard to believe,’’ I mean ``it’s hard to believe things could have been any other way.’’

It wasn’t easy, especially in school, where physical and athletic prowess went much farther in determining social status than the fact that you had read every one of the ``Chronicles of Narnia,’’ back-to-back over the course of only 10 weeks. Somehow, that little accomplishment didn’t hold much sway in a game of dodge ball or Red Rover.

You never heard: ``Watch out for Elizabeth. Get close to her on the field, and she’ll open up a can of Judeo- Christian hero archetypes...’’ Even teachers could be guilty of favoring students whose athletic skills outshone their academic dedication. Perhaps the schools I attended in Virginia and Florida were unique in that regard; I’m sure that kind of favoritism never happens here.

My school life — and my opinion of school in general — were saved by a few teachers who valued and nurtured my love of words and creative expression. In fifth grade, my teacher, Ms. Phetteplace, assigned the class an exercise in writing a descriptive paragraph.

I can’t recall exactly what I described, but I will never forget the praise she wrote in the top margin after grading it. ``Very creative! You are an excellent writer!’’

It’s not an understatement to say that her encouragement changed my life.

Many creative types can tell similar stories. My friend Jeannine, who writes a beautiful column for another local paper, shared this story with me: It was the first day of eleventh grade. We had a new English teacher. I loved English. I loved writing. Nothing was more exciting than pouring over a thesaurus, replacing all the common words of my compositions with words that were big and flowery and impressive. It was technique that had earned me many a ``A’’.

With great flourish, I tackled my first writing assignment for this new teacher. He handed it back with no grade, just a brief, typed note. ``I don’t want to read this. I want to hear your voice.’’ That moment forever changed my writing. I stopped hiding myself with words. We all have our own, ever evolving voices. Writing gives that voice a song.

It doesn’t have to happen in the classroom. Creativity can and should be nurtured and explored anywhere. Human beings are, by nature, creative creatures.

We use our creativity in all aspects of our lives from solving complicated problems to building relationships. Most children won’t grow up to join the ranks of professional artists, writers, singers or dancers. But the creative muscles you develop through those endeavors will serve you well no matter where life takes you.

Sadly, a lot of children live with a deficit of creative outlets.

Where children used to play with blocks and dolls and trucks (the building blocks of creating your own stories and plots), they now play with games and toys that demand as much personal creativity as manning your terminal on the factory line or operating a cash register. It’s a shame that the economy in this country is shifting away from those factory jobs to jobs where creativity is key.

Like I said, creativity can be nurtured in any number of ways and settings. One place where creativity will be kind this summer is in a series of workshops in Cooperstown. I’m very honored to be part of this project. Along with professional graphic designer Susan Strandberg and fellow writer Jeannine Bohler, I will be teaching classes for children in elementary and middle school.

We’ll be writing our own fairy tales and memoirs.

We’ll be creating unique designs inspired by nature. We’ll learn to write like food critics and travel writers. If you want to know more, join us for a pre-registration Open House from 5 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, June 23, in the studio of Cooperstown Performing Arts, on the third floor of the Key Bank Building.

If you can’t make it to the open house, but you’re interested in learning more, e-mail me at villagewordsmith@gmail. com.

Elizabeth Trever Buchinger is a shameless promoter for creativity. You can connect with her at www.moremindfulfamily.wordpress.com