Sign up for the Nieman Storyboard newsletter, delivered every Friday in your inbox.
***
Dear Storyboard community:
I am away this week, so I’m excited to welcome journalist, author and Storyboard contributor Mallary Tenore Tarpley for a guest edition of our newsletter. Happy 4th! — Mark Armstrong, Editor
***
Summers are for vacationing in places that conjure up old memories and make way for new ones. They’re for sitting poolside with a beach read that transports us elsewhere. They’re an annual reminder that it’s good to not only get away, but to slow down.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately as someone who squeezes as much work as I possibly can into every day. The idea of slowing down feels almost daunting. But I know it’s also necessary for the writer’s life, which thrives not just on productivity but on pauses. It demands space to “loiter creatively,” as Sue Monk Kidd says, or to “observe perpetually,” as Henry James inspired Virginia Woolf to do.
I’m trying to follow suit by reviving an old pastime: people-watching.
In many ways, it has become a lost art. We wait at subway stops and stand in lines with our eyes fixed on our phones. We look up endless information on our devices instead of looking up inquisitively at the spaces around us. I’ve even seen children riding bicycles one-handed so they can look at their phone in the other.
I’m just as guilty of scrolling as anyone else, but lately, I’ve been setting the phone aside in favor of people-watching. I did this recently while on vacation in Cape Cod, during a family day at the beach. Instead of checking my email or Instagram notifications, as I normally would, I sat and watched my children dig holes with their flip-flops because they didn’t have any plastic shovels. I saw a young girl run through the sand as her father followed behind. “Daddy, run faster!” As I witnessed an older man stare out at the horizon, my mind started wandering: How often does he come here? Why has he been standing there for so long? Little questions led to bigger ones. What is he searching for?
It’s these kinds of questions and sightings that open up avenues for inquiry and narrative. They train the mind to quiet and the eye to observe, sharpening our awareness of everything around us. As I people-watched, I became more attuned to children’s laughter, their parents’ Boston accents, and the sound of the ocean meeting its shoreline.
Listening to it all reminded me of a notable Toni Morrison quote: “All narrative begins for me as listening. When I read, I listen. When I write, I listen—for silence, inflection, rhythm, rest.”
When our beach day ended, I “rested” by writing. I opened up my journal and engaged in an exercise that I learned during a retreat with the author Dani Shapiro. I found it so helpful that I’m hoping to do it each day this summer. I encourage you to try it, too, by doing the following:
- Open up a journal. On the left-hand page, draw a spiral until you feel a spark of readiness. This is a playful exercise intended to help you put pen to paper.
- On the right-hand page, draw four quadrants with the following words at the top of each one: “Saw,” “Did,” “Heard,” and “Tasted.” (You can swap out any of these headers for other words like “Felt” or “Touched.”)
- Write the numbers one through six under each header.
- Spend a few minutes writing about six things you did, saw, heard and tasted that day. They can be concrete or more abstract, depending on whether you want to move up or down the ladder of abstraction.
- Read what you’ve written and see what stands out.
I’m optimistic this micro-journaling exercise, coupled with people-watching, will invite pauses that become portals into a richer writing life.
Links of note
- Applications for the Kari Howard Fund for Narrative Journalism are now open through July 12. The grant provides funding for journalists to develop a substantial longform narrative. It’s named in memory of Howard, who was a longtime editor for Reuters News and the Los Angeles Times, and the former editor of Nieman Storyboard.
- Brooke Warner, co-host of the Memoir Nation podcast, suggests that writers stay curious about how and why they get derailed when writing. In moments when we feel stuck and can’t seem to make any progress, “forgiveness is key,” Warner writes. “Because in order to get back in the saddle, you have to forgive yourself for dismounting in the first place.”
- In a recent Freelance Writing Direct podcast episode, author Dionne Ford offers helpful tips for blending journalistic research with personal reflection, as well as thoughts on the importance of writing stories for future generations. The full interview is worth listening to.
- In her newsletter For Dear Life, author Maggie Smith offers a pep talk for writers dealing with rejections and criticism. “It helps me to remember that I’m not for everyone. My work isn’t for everyone,” she writes. “You and your work aren’t either. If you’ve made something no one would object to, it’s probably something no one will feel passionate about either. So if your writing is loved by some, it may well be hated (or found meh) by others. Rejections and negative reviews are part of every writer’s life.”
- In a New Yorker story about AI usage detected in award-winning short stories, Katy Waldman writes: “The sloptimists are betting that writing devoid of an inner purpose can rival the stuff ripped out of an author’s chest with a claw grapple. Any serious reader knows that it can’t.”
Keep up your own writing,
Mallary Tenore Tarpley
Journalism professor, University of Texas at Austin
Author of the memoir “SLIP” and creator of the Write at the Edge newsletter
Follow Nieman Storyboard on Bluesky: @niemanstoryboard.org
Subscribe to Storyboard
Get insights into the craft of journalism and storytelling in your inbox, delivered on Fridays.
Follow the Nieman Storyboard Podcast
[ Follow us in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app ]
