A story from Holly Thorpe

I will join Writing the Wild for a second year this fall (2026). My experience in the 2025-2026 cohort was invaluable — connecting me with writers, texts, practices, landscapes, and ideas that I may not have discovered on my own. Certainly, there were familiar faces. Writers I already deeply admired, like CMarie Fuhrman, spoke with our group, and while our reading was mostly new texts to me, some had been on my “to read” list for years. However, as an unpublished creative writer early in my career, I found the curriculum for the year to be expansive, giving me a far clearer picture of the creative writing and publishing landscape than I’d previously had. I also found the organizers, cohort members and guest teachers and speakers to be generous with their time and attention. I forged connections with writers that will last long after my time in the cohort has ended.

The magpie in me especially loved the mail delivery portion of this program — full of sensory delights and treasures to be incorporated into our writing practices. I never outgrew the new-school-year delight of a fresh notebook or learned to resist the siren song of fresh art supplies. I grew my library, and, because they are physical texts, was able to loan them to friends. As far as I know, a copy of Martin Marten is still circulating amongst friends of friends.

It felt a little ironic at first that writers focused on nature and spending time in the natural world would meet and work in an online space. However, the online format offered me access and flexibility that made the program possible for me. My disabilities make in-person conferences and workshops challenging to attend, but the online format of these gatherings allowed me to attend even on bad days. I attended some (many) of the Writing the Wild calls while laying in bed, usually on ice packs, with the lights off. To care for my body when I needed to, knowing that I would not be excluded or shamed, made it possible for me to show up in the most important ways.

The connections, supplies, and workshops (both those included in the program, and the a la carte events throughout the year I attended at a discount thanks to my cohort membership) were important to me and my growth, but the heart of the Writing the Wild program is the writer’s individual practice. In my application to the program my first year, I wrote that I was “reconstructing my identity around new pillars: play, community, and the natural world” and that I hoped the program could help me “focus on my craft.”

I admire my past self’s starry-eyed ambition, but rebuilding a life while you’re still living it is easier said than done. It’s easy to talk about “focusing on craft” when you are spending more time talking about writing than actually writing. While Writing the Wild offered me tools and community to improve my writing practice, the most valuable thing it gave me was the time to write. The time was, in many ways, always there, but the cohort helped me protect the time from the ever-creeping “busyness” that absorbs so many of my waking hours. Even when I could not (would not) make time to write during the rest of the week, I wrote during our cohort calls and during writing times with small groups. The only path toward becoming the writer I want to be is to write — and a program with built-in writing time and accountability is one of the best tools I have to help me write more often and more regularly.

Through the community and generosity of the program, I was able to write some good poems. I even began submitting poems, chapbooks and full-length manuscripts for publication again, after a long hiatus after grad school. I am focusing on my craft again. It won’t last forever. As life goes through its seasons of busy and slightly-less-busy, I will neglect to tend my craft again. I will play less, create less, write less. I join this year’s cohort knowing that I have a community of writers and thoughtfully designed tools to bring me back to the work of writing again and again.

Holly Thorpe
Washington-based writer
August 2026