Hello Fellow Scribblers!
This is the first of what I hope is many editions of the online literary magazine called A Table in the Back. It is the brainchild of the Washington Creative Writers Club, which meets on Thursday Nights from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 pm, at the Bread and Chocolate in Chevy Chase, DC. Yes, Virginia, there is a Chevy Chase, DC. Anyway, this magazine, and the group that created it, were born from a need I had to continue writing when I came back from trying to permanently relocate to Scotland. We have 237 members, at least that is what the website, run through meetup.com says, but I have only ever seen 30% or so. Our aim with this blog is to showcase the many talented writers we have in our group, and to encourage people who have not been able to make it, to stop by. We come from as far afield as Accra and LA, and as local as 2 miles south. We sit at many tables, as people and as writers, it seems our lives are full of tables. This group has sat at tables in the back of three different places. Like the Algonquin Round Table, we too have gone up a step. We start the evening at Bread and Chocolate, always. When we first began coalescing, in true writer fashion, we moved the party to Chadwick's, a real dive. As one member put it, we were "drinkers with a writing problem." Over the year, we matured and became a touch more classy, and let's face it, a touch more flush, so we now meet in the more posh Clyde's. These then, were our tables, sometimes in the back, sometimes not, that lead to this "magazine", really a blog because we aren't flush enough for glossy print, just a wee dram or two.
This first issue, themed "Fish Out of Water", chronicles the different ways we have faced and dealt with the feeling of not quite belonging through the situations that we all face in our daily life. We, as writers, are especially susceptible to not quite fitting in, always looking into the room, not really being part of the crowd. Rather, we are observers and recorders of life, always looking at people as characters and events as potential plots. In this issue, six writers have come together to share their experiences of feeling like a fish out of water. I have asked each person to briefly tell readers what it means to be a fish out of water. These posts are titled alphabetically by author name, followed by their pieces. At times funny, like David Hutto's "Why MCA?", at times quite morbid as in "The Vulture" by Andrew Doherty, or poignant like M.M. Vellturo's "Middle Child Syndrome" and Kerry McKenna's poems "Here" and "There, There" all of our pieces will strike a familiar cord when read. Joe Oppenheimer's poems, at once humorous and touching, give a glimpse into a life loved and enjoyed, but as ever, as the observers we all are. As for yours truly, my poems in this issue deal with the quest to find a way to fit into a culture I never felt I belonged to in the first place as with "Fish Out of Water", and the ultimate quest, finding true friends and love as in the poems "Never Again" and "The Lighthouse Effect".
I hope that you all read these stories and poems, and decide to come join us. But most of all, I hope the courage shown by these writers, sometimes in baring their souls, encourages you to write fearlessly and love the process that is writing. Thank you to all who contributed, and many many thanks to my Assistant Editor, Joe Oppenheimer, without whom, this wouldn't have published on time. Your next pastry is on me, Joe. Enough blether, as they say in Scotland, get on wi'it, already.
See you next Thursday,
Tina
This is the first of what I hope is many editions of the online literary magazine called A Table in the Back. It is the brainchild of the Washington Creative Writers Club, which meets on Thursday Nights from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 pm, at the Bread and Chocolate in Chevy Chase, DC. Yes, Virginia, there is a Chevy Chase, DC. Anyway, this magazine, and the group that created it, were born from a need I had to continue writing when I came back from trying to permanently relocate to Scotland. We have 237 members, at least that is what the website, run through meetup.com says, but I have only ever seen 30% or so. Our aim with this blog is to showcase the many talented writers we have in our group, and to encourage people who have not been able to make it, to stop by. We come from as far afield as Accra and LA, and as local as 2 miles south. We sit at many tables, as people and as writers, it seems our lives are full of tables. This group has sat at tables in the back of three different places. Like the Algonquin Round Table, we too have gone up a step. We start the evening at Bread and Chocolate, always. When we first began coalescing, in true writer fashion, we moved the party to Chadwick's, a real dive. As one member put it, we were "drinkers with a writing problem." Over the year, we matured and became a touch more classy, and let's face it, a touch more flush, so we now meet in the more posh Clyde's. These then, were our tables, sometimes in the back, sometimes not, that lead to this "magazine", really a blog because we aren't flush enough for glossy print, just a wee dram or two.
This first issue, themed "Fish Out of Water", chronicles the different ways we have faced and dealt with the feeling of not quite belonging through the situations that we all face in our daily life. We, as writers, are especially susceptible to not quite fitting in, always looking into the room, not really being part of the crowd. Rather, we are observers and recorders of life, always looking at people as characters and events as potential plots. In this issue, six writers have come together to share their experiences of feeling like a fish out of water. I have asked each person to briefly tell readers what it means to be a fish out of water. These posts are titled alphabetically by author name, followed by their pieces. At times funny, like David Hutto's "Why MCA?", at times quite morbid as in "The Vulture" by Andrew Doherty, or poignant like M.M. Vellturo's "Middle Child Syndrome" and Kerry McKenna's poems "Here" and "There, There" all of our pieces will strike a familiar cord when read. Joe Oppenheimer's poems, at once humorous and touching, give a glimpse into a life loved and enjoyed, but as ever, as the observers we all are. As for yours truly, my poems in this issue deal with the quest to find a way to fit into a culture I never felt I belonged to in the first place as with "Fish Out of Water", and the ultimate quest, finding true friends and love as in the poems "Never Again" and "The Lighthouse Effect".
I hope that you all read these stories and poems, and decide to come join us. But most of all, I hope the courage shown by these writers, sometimes in baring their souls, encourages you to write fearlessly and love the process that is writing. Thank you to all who contributed, and many many thanks to my Assistant Editor, Joe Oppenheimer, without whom, this wouldn't have published on time. Your next pastry is on me, Joe. Enough blether, as they say in Scotland, get on wi'it, already.
See you next Thursday,
Tina
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