5th Annual San Diego Memoir Showcase Memoir Showcase Winners: Q & A with Cindy Jenson-Elliott & Susan J. Farese, SJF Communications
SJF: In a nutshell – tell us about your winning memoir piece for the 5th Annual San Diego Memoir Showcase.
CJE: My memoir piece is called “Hatching,” and is about the experience of hatching a chicken in my science classroom and the unexpected relationship that grew out of the experience.
SJF: What has your experience been taking classes/workshops and writing memoir in San Diego?
CJE: I teach Nonfiction and Informational Writing for Children at UCSD Extension in their program for Children’s Book Writing and Illustrating, and I’ve taken all kinds of writing classes there, from news and feature writing to Writing and Illustrating Picture books for children. I’m the author of 17 books of nonfiction for children and am working on a novel in verse and a nonfiction science book for kids that will be out in Spring 2021. I also blog, and blogged through my experience of helping my dad downsize a couple of years ago, as a way to process the experience at https://downsizingdad.wordpress.com. Memoir is very therapeutic. San Diego has so many opportunities for writers of all genres to practice, learn and collaborate. We have a very literate, creative community here.
SJF: If you had a magic wand, what kind of opportunities would be available to memoir writers in San Diego?
CJE: I think people in every community need opportunities to tell their own stories and to hear others’ stories. I think in a nation as fractured as ours has become, telling and hearing our truths can bring people together. Memoir opens our hearts and minds and helps us find common connections. Imagine if we could all tell our stories without being judged, how much more we would understand each other.
SJF: What are you excited about when it comes to participating in the 5th Annual Memoir Showcase?
CJE: I am so grateful to be able to hear these stories told onstage. There is something very powerful about hearing your own words performed and in being a witness to other people’s truths. It’s beautiful and healing. It’s an honor to be a part of this and I would like to see these opportunities extended into every community.
SJF: What advice would you give to a new writer in San Diego?
CJE: Give yourself time and opportunities to write. Honor your own stories and truths by writing them down.
SJF: Favorite Memoirs?
CJE: Rosalie Lightning, a graphic memoir by Tom Hart about the loss of his daughter. Just Mercy, by Bryan Stevenson, Twenty-Thousand Years in Sing-Sing, by Lewis E. Lawes, are memoirs I’ve recently read that have helped me ponder bigger issues of loss and injustice. My favorite memoirs, though, may be the college essays I get to read with students. College essays can be beautiful memoirs when kids can tap into the experiences that have made them who they are.
SJF: Many thanks, Cindy
Photo Credit: Roxyanne Young