The road to
self-fulfillment
b y Lee L yn ch
I m o ved to O reg o n for a m yriad of reasons.
T h e S o uth ern O regon W om en W riters’
G ro up, G o u rm et E ating Society and Chorus
was o ne o f th em .
T h e lesbian and gay w orld is filled, perhaps
disproportionately, w ith ta le n t Is it the isola
tion w hich arises from our gayness that
prom pts us to reach out by developing our
T H E
AMAZON
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natural powers? O r is there som ething m ore
positive in gay culture w hich creates a fertile
d im a te fo r artistic grow th? W hatever we ulti
m ately fin d to b e th e reason, th e O regon hills
are no d ifferent fro m the rest o f this earth: full
o f talen ted dykes. A nd though it isn’t specifi
cally lesbian, a host o f us flock to W riters'
G roup.
Last w eek I received a note from G roup
m e m b e r Ruth M ountaingrove. photographer
and fo rm e r co-pub lisher o f W om anspirit
m agazine. Reading her w ords I realized, once
again, how really blessed w e are. She c o m
m en ted abo ut a recent m eeting, ” . . . a real
good W riters’ G roup. W hen people com e all
the w ay fro m E u gene we m ust have som e
thing — and we do.” W hat a dynam ic gather
ing it was. W hat a w onderful creation, this
G roup. W hose vision had it been and w hat
had m ad e it successful?
I called Tangren A lexander to find o u t A
college professor w ho's built her own h o m e 1
on the side o f a m ountain, she is one o f the
founding m em bers and a faithful participant
O ften to m e she feels like the keel o f the
group.
“O h well,” she said in that bashful l-can’t-
take-credit-for-any-of-it way o f hers, “I just see
it as a w ay to be heard." That, in itself, is pretty
special: a place w e can be heard. “It’s the
supportiveness th at’s im p ortan t for me,” she
w ent on to say and I w ondered how that
support was consistently provided, given the
w ont o f w o m en ’s groups to evaporate like
clouds and blow away.
“T h e re ’s not a lot o f brass tacks or working
over a piece. W hen we check in' we say what
we w ant, w hether it’s to get criticism , to be
encouraged , suggestions w here and how to
publish — o r anything else." T h e G roup,
then, is w hat each participant needs from it
As she spoke, I recalled m y first exposure,
in 1982, to these spirited w om en. W e m et in
th at little w o m an -b u ilt m ountain hom e, per
haps a dozen o f us stuffed into a room with a
w oodstove, a w ell-used rolltop desk, a long
row o f Tan grens’ journals, and an incredible
view o f a m ountainside before us. It was dow n
right distracting fo r city-girl m e to see w hat
those clouds w ere doing out on that m oun
tainside. F o rm in g . R eform ing. D rifting away
all w hole as if m anufactured and patented in
th e (JSA and assigned to beguile city folk
thousands o f m iles away.
T h e m iracle o f the clouds had com peti
tion , th o u g h . Tw o w om en read poetry. O ne
sang h er ow n songs. A nother read a piece on
alcoho lism w hich left m e speechless and
changed m y perception of m yself forever. A
C o ttage G rove artist was there. Som eone
w riting abo ut a black w om an “cowboy." And
others, all o f w hom had som ething to give, if
o nly an ear. I’d found paradise. B ack in the
city I had n't stum bled on this kind o f sharing
ever.
A nd it is, as Tangren pointed o u t the sup
portiveness that is so special. N o trashing or
beating a point to death. Just the sort of
positive reflection, with appropriate technical
pointers, that I feel should underlie all feminist
criticism . W e need to open doors for one
another, not close them . There is always
som ething good in a creative work. It m ay
take effort to identify it, but once acknow l
edg ed the creator has a road before her never
before considered. Som etim es, it’s the road
to self-fu lfillm en t In the early seventies, when
I was still struggling to write poetry, Judy
G rahn suggested I try prose. W ithin the next
ten years I’d com pleted m y first novel and m y
short stories w ere being w ell-received. A
place to be heard. A door opened. A road
taken.
T h e Southern O regon W om en W riters’
G ro up, according to Caroline O verm an in
h er introduction to Tee C orinne’s Picture
B o o k * began when poet M artha C ourtot led
a w orkshop a t the G rants Pass Art M useum in
1980. At her suggestion Hannah Blue Heron,
a w ildly creative ex-nun, ex-hippie and vete
ran o f the w o m en ’s land m o vem e n t and
Zarod, a frequent contributor to W om anspirit
organized the first W riters' G roup m eeting at
Ri verhouse o n the Applegate River in M urphy
th e follow ing February. T h e group decided to
m e e t every third w eek thereafter and has to
this day.
O riginally, the plan was fo r each participant
to bring her lunch. W hat has evolved is a
G o u rm et E ating Society w hich allows for
socializing around the potiuck table. There
have been all-bean days and all-dessert days,
b u t every lesbian has had her share o f those!
B efore and after the feast w om en from age
tw enty up through their sixties read from
journals, novels, autobiographies, cook
books: read poem s, book reviews, short
stories, erotica, m antras; perform or teach
songs to the chorus; play taped interviews;
show their crafts, photography, artwork;
share ideas for projects like a non-violent
training handbook. This is the real feast this
cultural one. And the m ix of w om en is as
broad as our talents. At the last m eeting, in a
large living room on a circle of chairs,
couches, benches and pillows, sat: lesbian
separatists, straight w om en, farm ers, profes
sors, kennel-ow ners, a therapist nuclear ac
tivists, artists, writers, poets, a phone co m
pany workers, grandm others, publishers.
I've been gratefully part of this G roup for
over a year now. Having a platform for first
drafts has been valuable to m e. But personal
testim ony is not all I can offer. T he G roup
speaks for itself in this partial list of what has
been, or is scheduled to be, published: sub
m issions to C om m on Lives/Lesbian Lives,
THE
T—SHIRT
PEOPLE
m usical, “T h e O ther Side of M adness" has
been perform ed all over western O regon.
T ee’s W omen W ho Loved Women. Tangren s
The A u tio b io g ra p h y o f D eborah C arr and
C aro line O verm an ’s The S ch o la r In H ot
P ursu it are all available in book form . And
th e re ’s m y own N aiad Press books, not a little
influenced by these w om en.
I am glad to be able to offer final proof,
here, th at O regon m anufactures m ore than
clouds. It m ay have even less m onetary value
than crop-nurturin g rain, but we grow Art
here, and nourish the artists form ing on
m ountainsides.
•C o rin n e , Tee. The S outhern O regon
W om en W riters ’ G roup G ourm et E ating
S o cie ty a n d C horus P icture B ook.
Pearlchild. O R. 1982. $8.0 0 p o s t pd.
to PO B 8 0 4 G rants Pass, O R 9 7 5 2 6 -0 0 6 9 .
co*op*er*a*tive/
la: itfe an adjective
b: ife a noun 2: it’s
something special
for60,000,000
people from T
coast to coast
Fbod
front
Open to A ll—
COOPERATIVE
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For:
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Business Publicity
hat something special
means 40,000 member-
owned cooperatives through
out the United States devoted
to serving their members and
communities in every way imag
inable.
For example, there are coop
eratives for electric and tele
phone service, housing, food,
furniture, insurance, farm mar
keting and farm supply, credit
unions and farm credit, health
and day care.
The cooperative way of con
ducting business has proven over
and over again to be both a
highly efficient and extremely
economical way to provide ser
vices and goods. That’s why co
ops come in every size and kind
and are found in the city, the
suburbs and rural America.
No matter whether you think
of cooperative as a noun or an
adjective, it means the same
thing — people working together
to meet common needs to benefit
their entire communities.
COOPERATIVES
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October — Co-op Month
# —I
JM tO ut. October 1986
S in iste r W isdom, Pleasures — Women Write
E roticca, Just O ut, Lesbian N uns: B reaking
S ilence. Eugene W om en ’s Press. H annah’s