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Fay Gordon's avatar

“The truth that our cultures and even our souls thrive when they have access to the arts.” 👏👏👏 Loved all of your reading memories and omg Chippewa Falls! How did you remember that?? Amazing

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Melissa Kutsche's avatar

Who knows what other random details are lodged in this brain 😂

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Erin Strybis's avatar

Gah! I love this post and think it's especially cool that your RWWW draft played into it, too, since that course brought our writing group together. I also adore The Giver and your reflections on it. One artist whose songwriting has "helped stitch my heart together" is Joy Oladokun. Jay and I saw her live earlier this year and she was amazing.

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Melissa Kutsche's avatar

Yes, it was fun to revisit that piece after so long! I am fairly new to Joy Oladokun (I think you introduced me!) and this makes me want to listen to more.

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Callie R. Feyen's avatar

This is amazing, and my favorite part is, "While my ex-bff was roller skating to Coolio..."

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Melissa Kutsche's avatar

Thanks, Callie! I think we should bring back roller skating parties. :) (Also, I feel like telling you that the bones of this essay were first written years ago in Reading Well, Writing Well for my reading history. 💛)

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Kimberly Knowle - Zeller's avatar

Loved getting a glimpse into your reading life over the years!!

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Melissa Kutsche's avatar

Thanks, Kim! And thanks for the prompt to get me writing this month.

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Stacy Bronec's avatar

I loved The Giver as a kid, too!! Can't wait to read your future posts about midlife ladies!! :)

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Melissa Kutsche's avatar

I wrote this post after re-reading my Reading History from our Reading Well, Writing Well workshop all those years ago w/ Sonya and Callie. I remember many of us had similar favorites as kids (not surprising). Thanks for the support on my other project...time for me to get writing those posts, I guess, ha!

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Stacy Bronec's avatar

Oh gosh, I forgot about that workshop! That feels like forever ago!

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