{"id":5687,"date":"2013-10-29T22:44:18","date_gmt":"2013-10-29T22:44:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/?p=5687"},"modified":"2013-11-03T18:58:13","modified_gmt":"2013-11-03T18:58:13","slug":"guest-blog-joan-corwin-nancy-megan-corwin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/2013\/10\/guest-blog-joan-corwin-nancy-megan-corwin\/","title":{"rendered":"Guest Blog: Joan Corwin, Nancy Megan Corwin"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s guest blog is by sisters: Solace in So Many Words<\/em><\/strong> contributor Joan Corwin<\/strong> and Nancy Megan Corwin<\/strong> <\/a>who is a jewelry artist\/metalsmith from the Seattle area.<\/p>\n

Each year since 2004, Fac\u00e8r\u00e9\u00a0 Jewelry Art Gallery <\/strong>in Seattle puts on Signs of Life<\/em><\/strong>, a contemporary jewelry art show and companion jewelry art catalog\/literary journal. The show features work by nine artists. The catalog\/literary journal pairs these jewelry artists with ten writers in a unique publication.\u00a0 This project combines gallery-owner Karen Lorene\u2019s<\/strong> love of literature with her passion for jewelry art. Only 100 copies are printed. The Corwin sisters\u2019 works appeared in Signs of Life 2010<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

Fac\u00e8r\u00e9 Jewelry Art Gallery<\/strong> shows the work of jewelry artists as well as antique and vintage jewelry.\u00a0 Fac\u00e8r\u00e9 is located in the City Centre building at 1420 Fifth Avenue between Pike and Union in the heart of downtown Seattle<\/span>. \u00a0 If you have time, check out Fac\u00e8r\u00e9 \u2018s website<\/strong><\/a> and you\u2019ll find lots to keep you occupied. \u00a0The jewelry is beautiful and unique and Karen Lorene has put out other publications, such The ABeCeDarian<\/strong><\/em>, which features jewelry art corresponding to the letters of the alphabet, Dancing with Bear<\/strong><\/em>, \u00a0and Building a Business, Building a Life A Memoir and Workbook<\/em><\/strong> (you can read the first chapter in her blog).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Regeneration by Nancy Megan Corwin Brooch in sterling silver, copper, drusy quartz, gold leaf, pearls, fine silver, and 22k gold\/sterling bi-metal. 4 x 2.5"<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

At the Lake<\/strong><\/p>\n

A trill of voices, a hoot, a shriek, and, of course, a splash.\u00a0 Len strained to hear the children forty yards away on the bleached dock where they launched themselves into the lake in turns. He listened beyond the twittering birds, the incessant cicadas, the occasional jet plane, to catch a word or phrase. Sitting near enough to feel included, but safely out of the way of their antics, was his sweetly perfect five-year-old Emily. Knees to chest, she perched on the edge of the dock closest to the shore. She made such a tight little ball of pale flesh that from that distance, she looked like a pearl. He framed the image with his hands to keep it safe. But then she hopped down and ran into the shallow water to paddle briefly before returning to crouch near her older cousins.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey whispering yet?\u201d His bikini-clad wife Lily flopped into the Adirondack chair beside him, her shimmering blonde boy-cut sticking up crazily with bits of leaves from the overgrown lake trail. She\u2019d caught him leaning toward the children, squinting with the effort to eavesdrop. He blushed. \u201cYou only have to worry when they start whispering,\u201d she assured him, the laugh inhabiting her eyes.<\/p>\n

He sat back and felt his gut shift. A pot-belly over thin legs, white chest hairs he would have plucked, except that he was certain his wife would notice their absence and his vanity. He resisted the urge to button his shirt.<\/p>\n

Lily stretched her long legs and worked her feet into the sand. Desire warred with that slicing sense of age that assaulted him continually since Emily\u2019s cousins had joined them at the lake house.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just this . . .,\u201d\u00a0 Len began, thinking of the children again,\u00a0 \u201c. . . this . . . all ages mixed together, all the sexes . . . you<\/em> know.\u201d He heard himself puffing with indignation.<\/p>\n

What had possessed him to invite his wife\u2019s four nieces and nephews, the youngest ten and the oldest sixteen, to join them at his lake cabin that year? After only a few days, he thought he would never be calm again. He was at the mercy of these children, particularly Zack and Chlo\u00eb, newly \u2019tween-aged, who shared a sinister, sly-eyed contempt for everything but themselves, who snickered in a way that made him feel naked and soiled. He was acutely conscious of what these children must think of their middle-aged uncle with a wife fifteen years his junior. Acutely conscious of what they whispered, and where Emily was when they whispered it.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast night, Zack had them petrified with tales of Incas sacrificing virgins to the volcano god. I don\u2019t even know if that\u2019s true\u2014did they? He used that word, Lil\u2014\u2018virgins.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI see\u2014it\u2019s the virgin part, not the sacrificing, that bothers you.\u201d She reached behind her chair for her sun hat and crushed it onto her head, dousing the golden glow, but not his longing.<\/p>\n

\u201cEmily looked terrified!\u201d Right on cue, one of the older girls shrieked from the dock. They saw her disappear and watched as she surfaced in a surge of water to laugh and make threatening gestures at the boys who had pushed her.<\/p>\n

His daughter\u2019s small figure dropped from the dock and headed toward them. At this distance, her swimsuit was just a green dash across her bright little body. Her hair, usually a white-gold halo like her mother\u2019s, hung down in ropes that were dark with wet and looked too heavy for that tiny being. She swung her arms hard, and her stride was stiff with angry purpose.\u00a0\u00a0 As she drew closer, Len could see that she was pouting. She plopped down between them and tucked in her chin, tracing in the sand with her fingers. \u201cThey\u2019re telling stories. Scary ones.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lily took a towel from the pile at her feet and wrapped it around their daughter. Bundled like this, Emily was irresistible. Len stood and swept her up in his arms.<\/p>\n

\u201cAre they?\u201d\u00a0 he exclaimed, willing to play the fool if it would tease her out of her sulk. \u201cBullies!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh, Len!\u201d\u00a0 Lily stood, too, and stroked the hair back from her daughter\u2019s eyes.<\/p>\n

But Len\u2019s buffoonery had its effect: Emily smiled. He put her down and cupped his hands around his mouth. \u201cScoundrels!\u201d he yelled at the others. The figures paused. One of the boys pointed to him and waved. \u201cHoodlums!\u201d shouted Len. He shook a fist. They capered and hallo-ed back, until the lake took their attention again.
\nEmily was giggling now.\u00a0 \u201cThey\u2019re funny\u2014mostly.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMostly funny and partly\u2014bullies.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cScowen<\/em>-drills.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHoodlums.\u201d<\/p>\n

Satisfied, Emily let the towel slide from her shoulders as she scampered back to join the line of children, dark hair and light glinting like nacre in the low sun, shadows stretching behind them now as they barreled to the end of the dock and jumped.<\/p>\n

Just then the sun struck the edge of the lake, and gold flared out across it, like foil, dazzling him, flashing over and over in the ripples the children made where they plunged.<\/p>\n

As the sun eased itself into extinction, the shining gathered itself inward toward the opposite shore, where a broken line of trees reached shadow arms, black stains in the deepening green tones of the lake, toward Len and his young wife and the now shivering children. One day, those nieces and nephews would be old and unsure. But not now. \u00a0His Emily would become an adolescent, then a teenager, and abandon herself to life without fear or thought. But not yet. One day, Lily might have had enough of her old man. One day, the shadows would have them for good and all.<\/p>\n

Tonight would be everything he could want.<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Joan Corwin, 2010<\/strong><\/p>\n


\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thanks to Karen Lorene<\/strong> for letting me reprint this from Signs of Life 2010<\/strong><\/em><\/a>. Thanks to Nancy Megan Corwin and Joan Corwin for sharing their work.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Nancy Megan Corwin<\/strong> <\/a>is a jeweler\/metalsmith, teacher and writer in the fields of contemporary and historic art metals. In 2009 Megan produced a process and gallery book on the techniques of chasing and repouss\u00e9, titled, Chasing and Repouss\u00e9: Methods Ancient and Modern<\/em>. She has an MFA in art metals from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and has taught in universities, colleges, and art centers for over 35 years. In 2009 Ornament Magazine<\/em> did a feature story on her work, including her studio practices. Her work is in private collections and in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, the State University of New Mexico Art Gallery at Las Cruces, and the Tacoma Art Museum, WA. She shows at Fac\u00e8r\u00e9 Jewelry Art Gallery in Seattle, WA.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Joan Corwin<\/strong> has a Ph.D. in English from Indiana University and has taught English and Victorian cultural history in Chicago-area colleges and universities.\u00a0 Her nonfiction publications include articles on the topic of her dissertation, the Victorian travel narrative.\u00a0 Her fiction has appeared in a number of literary journals, among them StoryQuarterly<\/em>, Sycamore Review<\/em>, Inkwell<\/em>, The Madison Review<\/em>, River Oak Review<\/em> and Roanoke Review<\/em>, as well as in the anthologies Solace in So Many Words<\/em> (Weighed Words, LLC) and Falling Backwards: Stories of Fathers and Daughters<\/em> (Hourglass Books).\u00a0 Honors include the Dana Portfolio Award, the Chris O\u2019Malley Prize in Fiction, the Tusculum Review<\/em> Fiction Prize and the Pearl<\/em> Short Story Award.\u00a0 Her short story \u201cHindsight\u201d was a winner in Chicago Public Radio\u2019s Stories on Stage Competition, and her prize-winning novella Safe Shall Be My Going<\/em> was published in the first annual Press 53 Open Awards Anthology<\/em>.\u00a0\u00a0 A member of three Chicago-area writers\u2019 groups, Joan is currently co-president of The Writers (of Glencoe), an organization with a 60-year history on the North Shore.\u00a0 Joan lives with her husband in Evanston, IL.\u00a0 She is at work on a novel set in West Texas, Oregon and Chicago.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s guest blog is by sisters: Solace in So Many Words contributor Joan Corwin and Nancy Megan Corwin who is a jewelry artist\/metalsmith from the Seattle area. Each year since 2004, Fac\u00e8r\u00e9\u00a0 Jewelry Art Gallery in Seattle puts on Signs of Life, a contemporary jewelry art show and companion jewelry art catalog\/literary journal. The show […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[18,1808,1810,12,1802,1804,233,1807,1801,1805,1803,1806,7,16,1809,32],"class_list":{"0":"post-5687","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-guest-posts","7":"tag-anthology","8":"tag-building-a-business-building-a-life","9":"tag-dancing-with-bear","10":"tag-ellen-wade-beals","11":"tag-facere-jewelry-and-gallery","12":"tag-jewelry-artist","13":"tag-joan-corwin","14":"tag-karen-lorene","15":"tag-nancy-megan-corwin","16":"tag-prose","17":"tag-seattle","18":"tag-signs-of-life","19":"tag-solace","20":"tag-solace-in-so-many-words","21":"tag-the-abecedarian","22":"tag-weighed-words","23":"entry","24":"has-post-thumbnail"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5687"}],"version-history":[{"count":34,"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5687\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5715,"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5687\/revisions\/5715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/solaceinabook.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}