by Jamie Chavez | Dec 26, 2016 | Words & Language
I grew up the child of two Midwesterners of modest means, so I knew from an early age about pudding—it was that powder Mom mixed with milk on her old Kenmore mixer until it thickened, then put in the fridge to cool and thicken a little more. You know—like a soft...
by Jamie Chavez | Dec 5, 2016 | Words & Language
My siblings and I talk like Midwesterners, although none of us live there (or have ever lived there). Our mother was a Midwesterner: born and raised in Chicago. Daddy was also a Midwesterner, born/raised in St. Louis, although he had Southern roots: his mother was...
by Jamie Chavez | Aug 29, 2016 | Words & Language
Back in the early ’90s, I learned a new way of communicating. Communicate: to make known; to inform; to convey knowledge or information; to impart or transmit; to send information or messages sometimes back and forth; speak, gesticulate, or write to another to convey...
by Jamie Chavez | Aug 8, 2016 | The Writing Craft
Many years ago—long before my editing days—I was reading my hot-off-the-press copy of Pat Conroy’s The Prince of Tides. (Before lights out, in bed, where I still do my pleasure reading.) There was one paragraph (among many) that was so exquisite, so perfect, that I...
by Jamie Chavez | Apr 4, 2016 | Words & Language
A writer friend of mine posted a little meme* on Facebook the other day: Never make fun of someone if they mispronounce a word. It means they learned it by reading. I doubt there’s any data to support this but I feel the truth of it in my bones, having been a child...