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Friday, February 15, 2008

#98 - Sleep (and/or Teeth)

In honor of Natalie Goldberg, who I am going to hear speak tonight about her new book, I have chosen a prompt from one of her old books, Wild Mind. Here, in her words: "An area not written about much -- but which once thought of becomes a rich vein -- is sleep. Try it. Write about sleep patterns, sleepless nights, sleeping in the day; how two brothers sleep together, two lovers; sleeping outside, beds you've slept in, sleeping on trips, in foreign countries; no sleep. What is sleep, anyway? It's like the old trick of saying your name over and over again until you don't know it anymore. Sleep is the other half of our life, the underbelly. We should explore it."

She goes on to say, "Another good topic, not written about much, is teeth. Go for twenty minutes. See how much you have to say about them. Don't forget your own buck teeth, your sister's braces, your dentist's bad breath, the crooked front tooth on the girl you fell in love with."

There you go! Have fun!

60 Comments:

Blogger Liza on Maui said...

Excellent Prompts! I so agree with Natalie Goldberg. These two topics are rich - we can discuss it in so many ways and angels. i am excited. My mid is starting to grind. I will be back with a post (or two:) )

Thanks! have a great weekend :)

Liza

9:40 AM  
Blogger Liza on Maui said...

on the other hand, instead of writing something new about my teeth, I decided to dig up an old post. It's now entered in the Mr. Linky. Thanks again :)

9:49 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

this was fun...missed out the last one, but this made up for it. Thanks.

10:12 AM  
Blogger Shelley said...

Back after a long absence, and happy about it. If a little sleepy!

10:26 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi everyone, it's been awhile since I wrote here. I posted a short story called "Multiple Renegades". I hope you like.

Rose

xo

1:12 PM  
Blogger Maree Jones said...

I didn't know Natalie had a new book out - I finished Wild Mind a few weeks ago. How exciting! :)

4:17 PM  
Blogger Lilibeth said...

Alright. I posted a poem about sleep.Now what can I write about teeth?

4:36 PM  
Blogger Lilibeth said...

Ah. I remember something that actually happened to a friend of mine. It might just fit the bill.

4:46 PM  
Blogger Devil Mood said...

Hi!

I chose teeth.

5:05 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ive posted my initial thought. I hope to have something more substantial when I've slept on it!

http://keithsramblings.blogspot.com

5:22 PM  
Blogger --jenna said...

i liked this prompt...a lot. it was surprisingly on spot for me! sleep AND teeth. how often do those two subjects get to cross paths???

5:27 PM  
Blogger Granny Smith said...

Great prompts! I may submit two this week, this one for wild mind. If I have time I'll also write one inspired by your other post, teeth.

6:03 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oh, man I messed this up so bad this week. Here is mine and I think it's in 3 or 4 other spots too. :-(

8:03 PM  
Blogger myrtle beached whale said...

Showing an uncharacteristic surge of ambition this week, I wrote several blogs. This one for Sunday Scribblings and some bonus blogs for no reason at all. Pleaee read down past this first one.
http://myrtlebeachramblings.blogspot.com/2008/02/sunday-scribblings-teeth-21708.html

8:21 PM  
Blogger Marilyn said...

Natalie's one of my sheroes. "Writing Down the Bones" one of the pivotal books of my life (I attribute living in the Caribbean to it). ;) I just got her new book via Amazon a couple of days ago...looking forward to delving into it this weekend.

2:42 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

One of your best girls ... http://over-it.blogspot.com/2008/02/sunday-scribblings-98-sleep-teeth.html

Hope you've done a revue on Natalie G for us!!

4:11 AM  
Blogger Lucy said...

thanks for the toothless memories
:)

6:43 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Please let me catch up on my sleep!

Snooze time, baby!

7:23 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Channeling Heath Ledger down the rabbit hole of sleep ...

8:41 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

People left me such nice comments last week, that I'm doing this again this week!

9:39 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

My first time, kind of random....

9:46 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is my first time participating and I am so very excited to have discovered this site. I wrote about both sleep and teeth. By the way, can any one tell me HOW I can get the link widget html code of the SundayScribbles so I can put in blog? I would love to do that.

1:00 PM  
Blogger Vanessa said...

i had just posted about my little boy losing his first baby tooth when i saw the prompt! so i went back and linked up (and added photos!)
i, um, think i doubled up on mr. linky by mistake though... sorry!
happy SS
Vx

1:04 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I've done another one! Sleep 2.

6:27 PM  
Blogger Tumblewords: said...

What fun! Thanks for the prompts and the site!

6:48 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ok, I am offically using up more brain cells than I can replace.

Exhibit #1: J.C. Montgomeryt

Obviously I've become incapable of correctly spelling my own name. But hopefully the poem I wrote faired better.... *sigh*

Thanks for the great prompt(s)!

8:59 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Alrighty! Well, that was a fun exercise. It marks my first Sunday Scribblings post. Got the idea from Devil Mood...plus I'm a Natalie Goldberg fan--read "Writing Down the Bones" and found Natalie's way of putting things clicked. Well, Meg, Laini? Great job, this site. It's a commendable venture that adds measurable value to the blogosphere. :-)

9:13 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

After tossing and turning, I finally came up with an idea about sleep. I hope you enjoy my Tribute to the Sleepers of the World.
http://cricket51.wordpress.com/2008/02/17/sunday-scribblings-tribute-to-the-sleepers-of-this-world/

10:12 PM  
Blogger World So Wide said...

My response to this prompt is loosely based on the form of the ghazal and reflects some of the themes that have occurred in my dreams lately:

In sleep

2:25 AM  
Blogger amy said...

This was fun. And thanks for reminding me of Natalie Goldberg!

4:45 AM  
Blogger thefirecat said...

Natalie's "Writing Down the Bones" turned up under my Christmas tree twenty years ago (good GOD, that makes me old!) and reaffirmed and reshaped my life as a writer.

http://thefirecat.blogspot.com/2008/02/while-you-were-out.html

5:06 AM  
Blogger Write From Karen said...

Teeth. It's all about teeth in my family, in fact, it's a downright "issue."

Write From Karen

5:29 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I always seem to forget to link to the ACTUAL post in Mr. Linky's list.

Anyway, my Scribblings are up here:

http://lorivillarreal.typepad.com/do_you_realize/2008/02/sunday-scribb-2.html


Have a great weekend!

6:46 AM  
Blogger amy said...

Oops. Sorry, didn't mean to "bottom list", just wanted to leave a link here in the comments!

http://amyrigby.blogspot.com/2008/02/grinders.html

7:56 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

This was a great prompt, conjuring up all sorts of thoughts; thank you! I had fun with this one. I'm looking forward to reading yours now :)

http://bellamocha.wordpress.com/2008/02/17/sunday-scribbling-sleep/

10:37 AM  
Blogger ell said...

I've had nightmares about teeth - but we won't go there today. So, sleep it is.

Sleep

Oh, and just to be clear the drug-induced part isn't personal. :-D

10:37 AM  
Blogger cherry angioma said...

emotionally stressful, but completed. this is my first time here.

12:16 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

last week reminded me of why i like scribbling on sundays. :) back for more on sleep this week.

2:26 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

One of my favorite topics to write about...

Thanks for the great prompt!

4:26 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Thanks for the great prompt. Aha! A topic we can sink our teeth into!

Here's the link to: "Lipschtick."

http://practicallyathome.blogspot.com/2008/02/lipschtick.html

Blessings, Linda

4:33 PM  
Blogger Susan Helene Gottfried said...

Prompts always take me interesting places...

7:27 PM  
Blogger ChefDruck said...

I set off to write a piece on sleep deprivation and ended up writing on traveling by night train as a child. You never know where these prompts will take you!

http://chefdruck.blogspot.com/2008/02/night-train.html

7:44 PM  
Blogger Thom Gabrukiewicz said...

OK, I'm going through everyone's now, to see if anyone else equated teeth to vampires. Anyway, I want to explore more sleep - still under the weather - but come look and tell me what you think:

http://thomg.blogspot.com/2008/02/sunday-scribblings-teeth.html

8:12 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

ah...somehow got my links mixed up last time. reposting with the proper link. :)

8:26 PM  
Blogger Jessica R. said...

My husband guest posted for me this week.

9:25 PM  
Blogger catryan said...

Those are both great topics. I chose sleep because of a weird real-life coincident with a dream this week. I'd love to hear Natalie Goldberg speak. I followed the link to the new book and it looks great!! I'll have to get it myself.

9:39 PM  
Blogger wendy said...

The weirder and more random they are.. the easier they are for me to write to.

Says a lot, huh?

11:55 AM  
Blogger Thom Gabrukiewicz said...

OK, I'm home from work, sick with crud. Might as well wax poetic about sleep:

http://thomg.blogspot.com/2008/02/short-piece-about-sleep.html

12:53 PM  
Blogger Macie said...

I'm so glad I found your blog! I'll be trying this out this weekend! Among other reasons, part of the reason I started blogging was to improve my writing skills.
http://maciesreads.blogspot.com

7:11 PM  
Blogger Alatariel Anwamane said...

Ok, so this is VERY cool! I'm writing about both! It's been a LONG time since I've sat down and done some good writing. I've geen in school for the last 8 years getting my advanced teaching degrees, so the most writing I've done is research papers! It'll be nice to have some pleasure writing done!

11:51 PM  
Blogger Shammi said...

Hmm... the teeth prompt brought out some forgotten irrational dislikes! :)

6:01 AM  
Blogger lissa said...

Oops! I enter my entry on the wrong post - fridge space instead of "Sleep/teeth".

Sorry about that.

7:08 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Sorry I'm so late with this one-I was out of town and now I have this awful cold.

http://roswellgray.livejournal.com/108601.html

8:51 PM  
Blogger ren powell said...

http://sidesteppingreal.blogspot.com/2008/02/language-of-dreams.html
I just kept going with this prompt

9:19 AM  
Blogger David said...

I like it. Thanks.

4:49 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

read my post here
http://myimaginationinthisworld.blogspot.com/2008/02/phone-call.html

9:39 AM  
Blogger Marilyn said...

I see the Linky is closed, but I'm just getting caught up on several prompts today...so I'll post my sleep one here:

http://marilyn.typepad.com/moojo_cafe/2008/03/sleep.html

6:07 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Good JOb! :)

3:43 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

i would have loved to hear Goldberg speak about her new book! I didnt know it was on! is there anywhere in YouTube or somewhere i can view this? Have you read her new book? How perfect is it? I really do love her, she is my idol!

Brilliant Post!
Marina

10:24 PM  
Blogger Eddie Storms said...

There are a lot of things that you can write about teeth. For example, you can write about your lost tooth or your nephew's lost tooth, or the relief of getting your teeth pulled. Well, I guess teeth would be a great topic for a novel! LOL!

Eddie Storms

3:59 PM  

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