Friday Interviews: Zev Levinson, Author

Friday Interviews: Zev Levinson, Author

Today I am excited to bring to you an interview with friend and author, Zev Levinson. Zev and I were introduced through my friend Jen Rand, and through them I found my way to the Lost Coast Writers Retreat. I have had the joy of getting to know Zev as a person, a poet and a writer. His writings are eloquent and colorful. He brings images to life in his poetry, especially in his new book that walks the reader through the  beauty and history of Humboldt county. His book, Song of Six Rivers, is a delightful epic poem to read and a visual experience with pictures from the archives of Humboldt State University. His writing comes from a deep connection with the Humboldt region through his working and teaching.  Zev is also a teacher of poetry working with California Poets in the Schools and works with the Redwood Writing Project.

1) Please introduce yourself to us. Tell us about your work with California Poets in the Schools as well as the Redwood Writing Project.

I have been with California Poets in the Schools since 1998. It’s one of the largest writers-in-residence programs in the country. We go into schools, hospitals, juvenile halls. I get students to read and write a lot of poetry. I’m in a classroom or several classrooms for a week at a time. Since I mostly do this for my living, as well as being an editor, I sometimes stay a week at a time in places far enough away from home to preclude commuting.
I’ve been with the Redwood Writing Project [RWP] since 2001, which is part of the National Writing Project. When I joined, its two main objectives, as I understood, were teachers teaching teachers about writing; and also that if you teach writing, you should be a practicing writer. With the RWP I have been teaching the Young Writers Camp since summer 2003, and the main poetry teacher for their Young Writers Conference which is a separate event. When I teach in the schools, I always advertise RWP’s Young Writers Programs, so we get a lot of crossover signups for these events.

2) What drives your passion to stay involved with these projects?

[Laughs] I don’t know what else I would do. I was on the path to become a professor and that didn’t work out. Teaching kids was going to be a side project. I received so much positive feedback from teachers, principals and parents that I kept teaching. I keep my calendar filled with teaching nearly every week during the school year. I have seen thousands of young minds light up when I present poetry and love the interchange that happens. All kids are ready to be poets if they aren’t already, whereas adults have walls up. Even when I walk into a place with reluctance and resistance, I try to break the ice really quickly and blow their minds really quickly. Most of the time, one hundred percent of the students get on board pretty rapidly. It’s been impossible to want to turn away.

3) Let’s talk about your new book. Tell me about the title of your epic poem, Song of Six Rivers.

It’s about the area I live, Humboldt County, in the far north of California. With the title, I had some guidance from Jim Dodge, a great local author. He encouraged me to settle on a title that didn’t specify a politically mandated name like “Humboldt County.” The area where I live is called the Six Rivers region or the Humboldt Bay region. We have the Six Rivers National Forest, emphasizing six main watersheds. It sounds good and people know the area. It’s a bioregional name. The poem is an ode to the region as well as to Guy Kuttner, who is its muse. When I was searching for the right title, Bob Sizoo, former codirector of the RWP, suggested it.

4) What are your connections to Humboldt County and what does that bring to your writing?

I haven’t lived here my whole life: less than thirty years. But I am deeply connected to this place. I moved away, and came back, and never want to leave again. Humboldt is a special place. It has very beautiful natural surroundings, rural, with a small population. We’re on the ocean; we have the mountains and the forests. There’s a strong sense of community with people helping each other a lot. I bonded with the place quickly. When I moved here I became Dan the Flower Man, selling flowers in Arcata and Eureka. That’s how people knew me. Then I kept morphing into one thing or another, mostly a teacher and writer.

5) Can you tell my readers about Guy Kuttner and what is his significance to your poem? What is your dad’s influence in the poem?

Guy passed away about seven years ago. He was an educator, naturalist, peace activist, and one of the founders of the Lost Coast Writers Retreat. Bob Sizoo originally created the retreat through RWP, mainly for teachers. When funding dried up, a group of us turned it into a retreat for writers with published authors presenting workshops. It was a lot of work and we had to charge campers much more than we do now. We would have meetings in Guy and Cindy’s living room [Cindy was Guy’s wife]. Guy kept saying that if this was too much work, we should just rent Camp Mattole by ourselves and let it be a collective with our own workshops.

The year we decided to change it to a collective, he died suddenly. He was stricken with a rare disease and within a few weeks he was gone. He was a really powerful presence. Several hundred people came to his memorial. He was uncompromising in his beliefs, kind, loving, gentle, and changed our community. He had a big personality. When I began to write the poem, I was nearing fifty, wondering about my own legacy and what I would leave behind when I go. In the poem, I am asking why am I here, what am I doing, is my teaching in the schools enough? Guy responds by speaking to me from the beyond and instructing me to sing of these lands that we both love. He was a mentor figure to me as well as somewhat of a father figure, being twenty years my senior.

My father was also a community leader, a professor, a cantor in a synagogue, and he died when I was fourteen. He was in a car accident, then a coma for four months, then died. A thousand people were at his funeral. So that has always been a part of my psyche. He was my role model who left behind this legacy. He was also a published author, and there is still a Robert Levinson Memorial Lecture every year at San Jose State University where he taught, as well as a library named after him. There is all of this legacy in my life. As I was working on the poem, I was asked to work on the third edition of his book, The Jews in the California Gold Rush. The first edition was published while he was alive, the second one after he passed. Now a third edition was requested by the Commission for the Preservation of Pioneer Jewish Cemeteries and Landmarks in the West.

It was the first time that the text was digitally scanned, which caused a whole riot of errors and I had to go in and correct them, comparing one text to another, all the while working with an editor from someplace else through email. It turned out to be a complicated process. The book took four years to put together. While I was writing the poem, I was very present with my father as well. You might say that editing his book was my first collaboration with him ever. It was a deep process to read his words over and over.

It had taken me decades to read his book in the first place, telling myself I wasn’t too interested because it was dry history. Of course I was in denial, not wanting to get that close to him after he was gone, open up the wound. When I finally read it, I could hear his voice speaking every sentence and it was as though he was talking to me. So I read it very, very slowly and savored that. Then he unintentionally walked into the poem. He is not as present as Guy, but the two books came out around the same time.

6) What inspired you to take on the project of writing an epic poem about Humboldt?

I was wanting to leave something memorable behind. I didn’t know it was going to be as long as it was, but I did want it to be somewhat epic in scale, to honor the land. The poem spontaneously formed as I continued to work on it. I didn’t always know where it was going. The more I went with it, the more I realized it was a sweeping view of the Humboldt area. In order to name so many places here, and to honor the Native Americans living here now and the ones who were decimated, it was going to take a lot of lines. I guess it was two things: I was going for something big, and the epic suited itself to my needs. And it was also fed by my love of British Romantic poets who wrote epic poetry. I was also inspired as a teenager by progressive rock, musicians who created great epic songs. I felt I was working in a true vein. When I was younger, before I was serious about or schooled in poetry, that kind of poem would come to me. The musicality of meter and rhyme works well for me.

7) How does teaching influence your writing?

I’m inspired by the natural beauty of the places where I teach. And teaching and writing feed each other. I couldn’t have written Song of Six Rivers without the teaching aspect. Since I go all over the county to teach, and sometimes stay for a week at a time in faraway communities, I take walks every day, asking the locals about good places to explore and what secrets I ought to know. I get invited into people’s homes for dinner, and get to know the communities intimately.

Although my poetry isn’t always inspired by teaching, I am grateful that poetry has become the main focus of my life. As I’ve gotten older, poems have come less spontaneously to me; so one of the benefits of teaching is that during writing time in the classroom, sometimes I can work on my poems while students are writing theirs. I might chip away at a poem for years while working in schools.

8) Tell me about your writing routine. What was your process in writing this poem?

My routine is not as rigorous as I wish it were. This is mostly because I’m a self-employed freelancer who spends a lot of time organizing my work. Being an editor and a teacher means that often I don’t have time for my own writing. When writing an epic poem, you can’t just go back to it a day at a time because there is so much to read through, to recall, to mull over. I need chunks of time, and that’s what’s so valuable about the Lost Coast Writers Retreat and having some summer vacation. It gives me time to reorient myself and remember what I was trying to say.

I started working on Song of Six Rivers at Camp Mattole [Lost Coast Writers Retreat] because it has become a sacred place for all of us who knew Guy. Cindy even had us release some of Guy’s ashes at our favorite swimming hole. That’s where I began working on the poem. I finished half of it by the time the retreat ended. I wrote the other half over the rest of the summer. I made myself keep working on it. It was such a challenging process and I wanted to run it by someone like Jim Dodge, who has such a keen eye and ear.

He tore it apart. He’s kindhearted but an unforgiving critic. He didn’t finish reading it, as other things had come up in his life. He said he’d read the rest if I wanted, but I was trying to be generous and I regrettably told him that I got the overall gist of his comments. I wish I had had him continue with detailed critique. Besides some helpful ideas regarding logic, he pointed out weaknesses in the meter and rhyme scheme and stanza structure. So I ended up rewriting the whole thing. The first draft was around four hundred and fifty lines but I tightened up the meter, changed the rhyme scheme and the stanza structure. It took another year to finish it.

9) How did you discover that writing was your path?

Writers always say that it’s something they can’t help but do. The hard-core ones say they would rather not be alive than not write. I’m not so extreme. When I was younger I was inspired more by music. Music was probably more important to me than poetry. Then a shift came and I didn’t care about the labels: musician, writer, etc. When I was a teenager, poems would just come to me, and that continued into my twenties and beyond. As for a career, I wasn’t sure. I always loved reading and writing, so I chose the path of becoming a teacher of writing. The writing grew over time. I think I would have written some book on my own—and I have put together unpublished collections over time—but I was lucky and discovered the Redwood Writing Project which led to the Lost Coast Writers Retreat. Without those, the epic poem, the book, wouldn’t have happened. Now that it’s out in the world, I feel more that being an author is a possible career, enjoying working hard to get other books into the world.

10) What is the most difficult aspect of writing?

Getting the words perfect. A writer wants to share inspiring ideas. It’s not hard to share these, but to share them in a powerful and intriguing way . . . that is the great challenge. And poetry has to be musical as well. It has to sound good or history won’t remember it. I like to push language. I like to make it unique, sometimes verging on language poetry, where the emphasis is on the sound and normal channels of meaning are not always accessible.

11) Did you plan on Song of Six Rivers to also be such a visual book?

No. I was only thinking of the poem. When I presented it to Kyle Morgan at Humboldt State University Press, he liked the project. But he also saw it as a visual book, with accompanying archival photos from the library’s Special Collections. I said yes, even though I thought the poem stood on its own. I was pretty naïve about that, since many people buy the book for its visual appeal. There was a team at HSU that put the book together. CM Phillips and Ashley Schumann went through over twelve thousand photos that the public mostly hadn’t seen before, and matched photos with the text. In the end, forty-something archival photos were used, as well as four contemporary photos from local photographers. My partner, Jennifer Rand, also helped with the design a bit. Now it is this beautiful book to look at. Pharmacies even buy it because it’s not just a poem about the area; folks can look at it and see the pictures too. I am now much more open to books being visual.

12) Are you working on another project?

Well, I can’t talk about the subject of the current project. I’m one of those people for whom talking about it lets the air out of the balloon, takes away the magic of creation. However, I am working on something that is twice as long as the last one. I learned so much about the process of creating an epic poem that I am happier as I put this one together. I don’t know if I’m going to keep writing epic poetry, because a thousand-line poem takes years to put together. One- to two-page poems still pop up from time to time, when they want to. I also have a couple of other writing projects that aren’t poetry: books on different topics.

It was a pleasure to interview Zev, and to share his writing with you. Here are the links to purchase his book. If you want to support and independent book store you can request the book through IndieBound.org or you can purchase through Amazon, Song of Six Rivers. Visit him at his website: www.zevlev.com

What I know to be True

What I know to be True

I have made no secret of how much I love a good TEDTalk. I find them educational and inspiring. The most recent inspirational talk I have heard was from this year, 2017 TED Conference. It was by Anne Lamott, well known in writing circles for her book Bird by Bird. In this particular talk, Ms. Lamott discusses the twelve things that she knows to be true, written just before her 61st birthday. It is a mildly humorous and thoughtful way to look at the lessons we learn from life.

 

Inspired by Ms. Lamott’s talk, I decided to write my own list of things I know to be true at 43. Here is my list below:

  1. We are each traveling on our own journey through this thing called life. However, occasionally, we bump into other people on their journey, and we decide to take some of it together. This makes the voyage not seem as lonely or as difficult.
  2. A good piece of chocolate will calm most nerves. And the smell of fresh vanilla makes most people smile.
  3. Writing out what you want to say, especially when upset or angry, can be as cathartic as it is helpful to know what you want to say.
  4. If it doesn’t work, do not bang on it. Suck it up and contact customer service, just make sure you allow plenty of time for waiting.
  5. When you fall down, you will rise. You may take your time. You may need some help and some dusting off, even recovery from injuries, but you will rise again.
  6. Dress for your Joy. Nothing else matters. If people are going to judge you, they were going to do so anyway, so be happy and comfortable in what you are wearing.
  7. Creativity belongs to everyone. There isn’t a single person alive that does not have creativity within them. It looks different in every person but that is what makes it cool not absent.
  8. Time alone is good for the soul and the mind. The world can be loud and overwhelming, learn to disconnect.
  9. Be Grateful. Say thank you for any good that comes into your life. It changes how your mind sees the world. You begin looking for the good that there is.
  10. Be Kind. Nothing replaces kindness. We have a chance to be kind or to be cruel; to make someone’s day or to tear them down. Be Kind.

 

Click to Download Poster: What I

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Jim Steinberg: Following the Scent of Story

On a writing retreat a year and a half ago in a place called the Lost Coast, on the Mattole River, I met writer, Jim Steinberg, author of two short story collections and the novel, Boundaries. Jim is a quiet man with a friendly disposition. He is warm and welcoming and was always up early writing away, drinking coffee with one or two of us early birds. This last year at the retreat,
as we were chatting while I was laying out all the breakfast stuff, he said to me that he was just going to have his coffee. “Breakfast is a social affair,” he told me.
That to me, sums him up well; friendly, thoughtful of others around him, and when writing, his nose is to the keyboard, following the scent of his story line by line, scene by scene.
Why do YOU write? What motivates or inspires you to write?

I write to scratch itches. I feel the impulse rising from within, wanting attention, so I want to scratch it. I follow impulses telling me there is a story that is waiting.
In my writing, I follow the words of Richard Ford, author of Independence Day, “I want everything I write to be useful.” My writing is serious fiction; I want to say something useful to my readers. I want to connect to them.

Writing is how I communicate with the world, like a long-term conversation between writer and reader. In writing, it is my hopes that I may also inspire others to have the grist to be creative and find their story.

As a teacher, I was getting by but knew it would to learn more about storytelling. I enrolled in a summer institute at Humboldt State University: the Redwood Writing project for teachers who teach writing.

During the course, I fell in love with writing stories. Eventually I turned one assignment into a work of fiction that now appears in my second short story collection: Last Night At The Vista Cafe, Stories.

2) In discussing “the genesis of a story” you said it is something “seeking a place of greater repose?”

a) What does this mean to you?
b) How do you begin?
c) What is it to “follow your nose?”

When I am responding to an impulse, it is a chance to visit, or revisit, memories. In this way, I settle them. I put them to rest within me, in a better relationship, making my peace with whatever emotional or psychological aspect that came to the surface. I pull the essence of the failed marriage or relationships, childhood experiences, or from mediation experiences, to spring into the fictional story. It never looks the same as the real experience, and the fiction does not rely on the actual account, but the greater truth that needed to be settled, is allowed to be expressed and peace made.

Let me give an example of “following my nose.” In my short story collection Filling up in Cumby and Other Stories, there is one titled “Highway 47.” It began as a story of a man unhappy in his marriage about to get stuck on a highway in a snowstorm. Inside a cafe, a young boy sets the table for the man. His mother owns the restaurant. The mother reluctantly offers up her hide-a-bed, and the story turns toward two strangers deciding whether they are going to have an affair. However, the story takes a turn when he begins talking to the child, who had no father, during the evening. The friendship that develops between the man and the child, rather than the dreamed about affair, becomes more important for the man than what he was dreaming of.

Character, setting, a conflicted situation, or the emotions from real life become a springboard into entirely fictional people and storylines. I want to give free rein to my imagination. A once famous writer, I forget who, said “write your stories as if everyone has been dead for one hundred years. Good advice for discovering the emotional truth of a story. I find the emotional truth by pulling the fiction from my imagination.
This is what I mean by following my nose. I allow the characters to determine and change the path of the story. It’s their story.

If you ask how I begin, I sit at the keyboard with my impulse, start writing and see what comes. I don’t outline, write a synopsis or do character sketches. I give the story the room to breath as it needs to.

My novel Boundaries is a blending of two stories that decided they needed to be the same book. They are incidents from from two different experiences. The first was a law case I had when practicing law in the 1970’s in Colorado Springs, working for a legal service that served impoverished clients. The second was a chance encounter I with a woman I met in a restaurant on the north coast of California during unusual circumstances in the 1980’s. The client in the first experience was very powerful and influenced me greatly in the case and in my practice. The woman in the restaurant really got my attention. I combined them into a single character. In doing so, I created a story about a lawyer and a client having a very unusual relationship.

3) Please tell me a bit about your video series on your blog. 

There are twelve videos in total. Ideally one comes out each week but son has graciously been helping me during his free time, so we do our best to get them out. They are conversations between myself and poet Bob Davis. They are conversations on what it means to be human, meant to bring the writer and reader together on the same conversation. We talk about the genesis of story, writing to explore the story, revision, and allowing the story to happen. Here is the list of topics:

1. Genesis Of A Story
2. More On Genesis Of A Story
3. Take A Ride On Your Work
4. I Love The Exploration
5. A Theme Discovered: “Highway 47” – (a short story)
6. A Theme Discovered: “Uncle Eno’s Bad Day” – (a short story)
7. Always Fiction, Always True: “An Apple Totem” (a short story)
8. Genesis Again: “Boundaries,” A Novel
9. A Crystal Memory
10. Revision
11. Reading Stories Aloud
12. Writing Or Reading? What Do You Prefer?
4) What kind of conversations would you ideally like to have with writers and readers?
What are your favorite topics of discussion with other writers and with readers?

I want to create a virtual salon or cafe for writers and readers to discuss fiction in the same way you may sit in a coffee shop with a writers group or a readers group and discuss topics related to story. Writers and readers are all storytellers, and we can give and take from one another in a conversation that includes both. I want conversations about the flesh and bones and bumps and scars that I think serious stories should include.

5) What is it for the story to have “real flesh and bones with bumps and scars?”

It is to examine what really hurts people. I write about characters who struggle with misfortune and difficult experiences. For example, characters who dwell on a moral edge, making the wrong choices for perhaps honorable reasons. I stay away from stereotypes, writing instead from the perspective that not everything is pretty. I want to expose their wounds to the reader, allowing them to watch how the character deals with them. It is my hope that readers will see the characters with an “unconditional positive regard”, keeping them open to compassion and empathy towards the character.

6) Tell me a bit a you next novel, Third Floor.

Third Floor is the story of fraternal twins, Rachel and Joseph. It begins when they are seven years old. There are issues between the two parents, and in an effort to escape the nighttime fights, Rachel creates a retreat on the third floor. One night Joseph joins her when he discovers she isn’t in her room. They continue to hide out there. Rachel is very strong, and Joseph relies on her strength. I am hoping to tell it in seven-year increments, but in following my nose, that may change. Eventually the twins will be separated and will come together when their father is ill. At least that’s what I expect thus far. I never know for sure! To know the rest, you will have to wait until it is published next year.

7) What is your favorite, no holding back meal, and where is one place in the world you would like to travel to?

Meatloaf with mashed potatoes and molasses and green beans. That’s comfort food for me.

Once I wanted to travel to Kiev or Lithuania where my family is from, but now I want to go to the Scottish Highlands. It’s a landscape with a history that fascinates me.

 

coffee with Jim on the SquareJim Steinberg has been a lawyer, blacksmith, middle school teacher of English and Social Studies, college teacher of Criminal Justice, hippie, and director of basic law enforcement training at a community college. He now divides most of his time between his loved work as a mediator (thirteen years in a small private practice in his home and in tribal courts in Northern California) and his greatest love of the last two decades, writing fiction. He has published one novel, “Boundaries,” and two short story collections: “Filling Up In Cumby And Other Stories,” and “Last Night At The Vista Cafe, Stories.” His current project is a second novel – “The Third Floor,” a story about twins, a brother and a sister.

Jim’s stories have appeared in Clapboard House, The Greensboro Review, The New Renaissance, Sensations Magazine, Cities and Roads, The Lone Wolf Review, The Bishop’s House Review, Voices From Home – A North Carolina Prose Anthology, and Best Of Clapboard House. He writes his stories to scratch the itches that rise up from within him, to answer the impulses that ask him to visit and lay them in greater repose. When these impulses arise, he finds himself at the beginnings of trails he knows he will follow with minimal planning and no synopsis, plot, timeline, or character description. He jumps right in and finds the stories, making each a discovery for him, the first reader.

Jim is a Fellow of the Redwood Writing Project of Humboldt State University and a founding member of the Lost Coast Writers’ Retreat, a week-long gathering on the Mattole River on the remote Northcoast of California. For the last fourteen years he has described this time in a close knit writers’ community as his best week of every year. He believes that writing stories is the best way he can get his hands around experience. He believes that the world would be a better place if everyone wrote stories because they all have them, and they are all worth passing on.

You can talk with Jim about writing stories on his blog: “Follow Your Nose Fiction, A Blog About Writing By A Guy Who Writes.”

Christine Musser: The Wandering Writer

I first met Christine nearly fifteen years ago as we both entered Vermont College in Montpelier. She came with a big smile, and a bubbly personality that lit up the room. Her love of history was so deep that she would sleep with history books stacked on her bed, reading until she fell asleep. She lives life full of passion and brings that passion to her writing, her photography and now her teaching.

Christine can often been found wandering through her favorite places in Pennsylvania. Her camera is her companion; she always has it on her. Her pictures often posted on her Facebook page of the beauty she discovers. Let me tell you what makes her so special. She is a great friend. Always there to talk to and willing to fly to California to surprise me for my 40th birthday. Friends, and such passionate people as her are priceless.

How did The Wandering Pen came to be?

I have wandered since I was a child and still enjoy doing it. I like to explore and learn new things. I like to write about places I’ve been; I mainly did this in my journal then decided I would blog about the places I’ve been to.
What inspired you?
It was probably growing up on a 92 acre farm where roaming was endless.

Where do you wander? What are some of your favorite places to wander for photography and/or writing?  

I wander often to rural areas; I love the country & the mountains. I am also drawn to water; such as the Conodoguinet Creek (Native American name means water with many bends) or the Susquehanna River; named for the Susquehannocks who lived in South Central PA in the late 17th century. These are places I like to photograph, as well as old barns and rustic looking buildings.

Where does your love of history come from?

My love of history comes from my love of family. I am a believer that history needs to be told or learned in order to understand who we are. I believe that family history is important. And in learning family history you can’t help to think about the periods of time our ancestors lived in or their struggles during those periods.

Where do you see your path leading you in the future of writing and teaching?

Both. I believe they are intertwined, at least for me they are. For me writing is teaching. I believe teaching will inspire me to write.

I know you were a history major and love history but did you also always want to be a writer? 

I have always been a writer. At times I feel cursed because writing is something I have to do. I think it picked me rather than I picked it.

Was writing something you fell in love with later?
No, writing and I have a love- hate relationship.
My love-hate relationship with writing is because there are many times I want to call it quits with my writing, but like a stalking lover, it won’t let me be. I have to write, even if it’s just writing in my journal. Writing is in me. I am always thinking about writing and what to write.

What influences your writing and your photography?

Everyday living really. The media, family, and people. My photography can influence my writing, but it’s not at the foundation of it.

 I notice a lot of your photos are local to you. Is this where your heart is?

A lot of my photos are taken within Pennsylvania; mainly because that is where I’m at most of the time. I do have places I really enjoy shooting like the Susquehanna River along Fort Hunter and the Rockville Bridge.

What are your current projects?
Currently, I am working with Silver Spring Township on their own book narrative. This will be different from what I published with Arcadia,  which was more of a pictorial history with photos used from private collections. The new one will be mostly narrative with some photos of historical buildings in the township.
The book, Silver Spring Township, can be found at here.
It can also be purchased via Arcadia, Whistlestop Bookshop, & Amazon.

I am revamping my website, and in October I will start substituting at local schools. I am also working on another book of my own.
I’m keeping the subject confidental, but I found the topic while working on my book for Arcadia.
Where does the love of history come from?

My love of history comes from my love of family. I am a believer that history needs to be told or learned in order to understand who we are. I believe that family history is important. And in learning family history you can’t help to think about the periods of time our ancestors lived in or their struggles during those periods.

Where do you see your path leading you in the future of writing and teaching?

Both. I believe they are intertwined, at least for me they are. for me writing is teaching. I believe teaching will inspire me to write.

Do you think the Bosler story was a spring board into your other projects? That it was a good place to begin this journey?

The Bosler story took me out of my comfort zone. My drive to tell the Bosler story took me to Wyoming, Nebraska, and South Dakota; where otherwise, I probably would never have gone to those places. The one hold up with the Bosler story I need to do further research and that needs done in Sioux City, Iowa and I am just not sure when I will have the opportunity to go there. I will more than likely need to spend a month there. Back to your question about the Bosler story being a spring board, yes, it was a catalyst to where i’m at now.  I haven’t completed the Bosler story, but it’s always on my mind. Just the other day i received an email from someone inquiring about the Carlisle Boslers. I go back and forth with whether or not to move forward with the Bosler book

The last questions are just FUN ones. What is all your all time, no holding back, favorite meal/food and where is One place you want to travel to that you haven’t yet?

It has to be something that has black beans, salsa and hot peppers and really messy – like Mexican Quinoa.
Petite syrah (thanks to my friend Laura bringing the wine in September to Vermont) with pepper jack cheese.
Where to travel to? That’s an easy one – the south of France.

Below are a few of Christine’s beautiful pictures. 

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2015-10-01Christine Musser holds a bachelor’s degree in American History from Vermont College at Union Institute & University. She has also taken history courses at Shippensburg University towards a master’s degree in Applied History. The Educational Testing Service (ETS) approached Christine in 2011 to use her article, “Preserving Memory: National Holocaust Memorial Museum Controversy”, in the Advanced Placement (AP) exam booklet. In March of 2013, she was approached again by ETS for permission to print additional copies of the article. Her article is currently referred to in AP English classes. Christine published Silver Spring Township for Arcadia Publishing “Images of America” series ; a pictorial history of Silver Spring Township, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. She has published several articles online and in print. Christine has participated in various historical events and an archeological dig at the Ephrata Cloister in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Currently, she is a member of the Silver Spring Township Conservation & Preservation Committee. Besides her interest in history, Christine also loves photography and to travel. Contact information: the_wandering_pen@yahoo.com
You can also find her at the following:

Author: Silver Spring Township
Facebook Page: The Wandering Pen
Twitter: The Wandering Pen
Blogs: The Wandering Pen, Happenings Around Cumberland County, PA, Happenings in Christine’s World
Photography: The Wandering Photographer

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