Pat McNees's Next Life Stories and Legacy Writing Workshops
Six Wednesday evenings, Jan 11 - Feb. 15, 2012

What will be written on your headstone? What will your obituary say? How will you be remembered, and what has your life meant? The goal in this nontraditional workshop of short personal writing is to capture your personal and family legacy for the next generation, the friends and family who will survive you. Knowing that you are writing not for publication but to set the record straight—in your own mind, as much as anything—may liberate you, allowing you to examine with candor your important life choices and experiences, achievements and mistakes, beliefs and convictions.

Through a series of exercises designed to open a rich vein of personal material, you will begin the exploration and storytelling that may help you either develop a personal or family history or write a personal legacy letter to your survivors. No whining, no boasting, no name dropping: Just an honest examination of what went on in your life or your family, with an emphasis on fleshing out the characters and stories to be found there. This course, which grew out of the warm-up exercises for Pat's workshop on ethical wills, will encourage you to reminisce deeply: to mine your life (and family) experiences for personal stories, myths, themes, and values.

Six Wednesday evening sessions
Jan 11 - Feb 15, 2012
7:15 to 9:45 pm
Instructor Pat McNees
The Writer’s Center
4508 Walsh Street
Bethesda, MD 20815
Phone: 301 654-8664
Writer's Center online
http:/​/​www.writer.org
postmaster@​writer.org
$220 for members, $260 for nonmembers

You can e-mail postmaster@​writer.org and ask to be notified when workshops go on-line for registration. Include your mailing address and ask for a hard copy of their brochure of workshops.

Ask to be put on the Writer's Center's mailing list, to get a printed list of their seasonal workshops.

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Washington Biography Group

Next regular meeting: Monday January 23, 2012,
7 to 8:45 pm
Topic: How is the writing of a biography affected by whether the subject is living or dead?

February meeting (date to be decided): we'll be talking about self-publishing: the ins and outs, ups and downs, pros and cons

The WBG meets once a month, usually on a
Monday from 7 to 8:45 pm at the
Washington International School
3100 Macomb St., NW
Washington DC 20008
We meet in the Goodman Room (new name for the Terrace Room) in the main building. Members often bring a snack or drink to share. I (Pat) send out e-mail notices of the meeting dates and topics, which are also posted under “Events” on both Pat McNees’s website (www.patmcnees.com) and Writers and Editors (www.writersandeditors.com). Check out the website page about the Washington Biography Group (WBG). Go here for fuller instructions on where the WBG meets.

To be added to the e-mail list and receive meeting notices and Pat's e-letter about memoir and biography, send a message to Pat's WBG email: (spelled out to elude spammers: washingtonbookgroup at gmail dot com
Convert that to traditional e-mail formula)

Occasionally parking is a slight problem, if the school is also holding an evening event. At one meeting someone came in and said the owner of an SUV had left its lights on. Marc responded, "This is not an SUV kind of group" and sure enough, it wasn't one of us (although there are SUVs among us).

Topic delayed until later in 2011: How do we determine our subject's world view? What are the dominant characteristics that shape what we think of them? Their religion? Where they grew up? What else?

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Curious about people's lives?
Love to listen to (and help shape) stories?
Looking for a satisfying line of freelance work that involves interviews, writing, editing, and production?
Learn about helping private clients write their memoirs or family histories
(at the very least help them identify the people in those photos, and hear the stories that go with them)
Learn about helping communities and organizations publish their histories.

Attend the Fall Conference of Personal Historians 2012

Do you help others write their memoirs or tell their family (or organizational) stories? Join others doing similar work at this year's conference of the Association of Personal Historians
October 17-21, 2012 in St. Louis, Missouri

A great place to talk shop, talk technique, talk equipment (and how to use it), and talk about the interesting (and varying) directions this fascinating field can take us. I write mostly for print, but love watching the video tributes and video bios that are shown during Media Share.
Disclaimer: I have been APH president (2010-2011)

The Moth: Storytellers Finding Success on Stages Large and Small: Going Solo Gets Crowded by Alex Williams, NYTimes 8-14-09; Songs of Themselves (Jim O'Grady, NYTimes, 11-14-08); and The Moth, a nonprofit group that runs storytelling events in New York and Los Angeles.

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Dancing in DC

Here's the dance calendar for Glen Echo Park, where most ballroom dancing goes on in the beautiful Spanish Ballroom, though some dances are held in the fresh-air-conditioned Bumper Car Pavilion (repurposed for dancing during the ballroom's renovation) or in the small but nice "Back Room" (behind the Spanish Ballroom), where Blues Dancing is now taught. Click here for info on social dance classes (and a look at the beautiful ballroom).

For those who miss the old LaSalle Orchestra, there's good news: The once-a-month Sunday afternoon tea dance now features the Hot Society Orchestra, which plays music from the '20s, '30s, and '40s: foxtrot, waltz, two-step, cha cha, swing, rumba, etc. This group is brand new to Glen Echo and plays very danceable music!

For more dancing in the capital area, check out the information and schedules at
• Dancing: A Guide to the Capital Area
• DC DanceNet
• Dave Moldover's excellent site (especially for country, hustle, hand dancing, & West Coast swing)
• Capital Tangueros
• Fools Night Out (Scott Mitchell's site, good for Cajun/​​Zydeco, Latin, Swing, and other dancing, plus venues for blues, swing, rockabilly, zydeco, and occasionally Latin, Ska, and Cajun music)
• Contra Dancing
• Irish céilís and set dances
• Folk dancing

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Writing a Legacy Letter

If you had only one hour to live and the only way to communicate with survivors was to leave them a letter, what would you write -- and to whom would you write it?

Events like Hurricane Katrina and the shocking mass murder at Virginia Tech remind us of the fragility of life. This workshop will help you figure out what personal messages,
stories, or life lessons you want to leave for those who survive you. Often written in the form of a loving letter, the legacy letter (a version of what some call an ethical will) is a way to explore and articulate who you are, what you have learned in life, what
you value, and what you wish for the family members who survive you.

Your last will and testament conveys what you want your loved ones to have -- and is legally binding. The legacy letter is an informal message that conveys what you want your survivors to know--which may include how you want to be remembered, what you cherish and regret, what you forgive and apologize for, what you loved (maybe even chuckled about) about your loved ones, and other important things you would not want left unsaid should you die unexpectedly.

Nothing scheduled yet
The Writer's Center
4508 Walsh Street
Bethesda, MD 20815
Phone: 301 654-8664, Fax: 301 654-8667
http:/​/​www.writer.org
email: postmaster@​writer.org
http:/​/​www.writer.org/​index.asp (online info and registry)
Writing a Legacy Letter
Code for registering: SU07NON51B
Members $50; nonmembers $65

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