Lisa Bullard

Green for Go

Traf­fic sig­nals don’t require a sin­gle word to send a clear mes­sage. Even small chil­dren can learn how to “read” them. Red reads “stop.” Green reads “go.” Yel­low reads either “slow down” or “speed up,” depend­ing on the “char­ac­ter” of the driver. Even young stu­dents can also “read” word­less pic­ture books. Because the art­work reveals its own nar­ra­tive, young read­ers can fol­low the action, inter­pret the char­ac­ters’ moti­va­tions, pre­dict out­comes, and intu­it the mood and emo­tions of the story.… more
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Lisa Bullard

License Plate 007

Story dialogue is charged with the large task of helping to tell the story: it reveals characterization, advances the plot, and provides action.
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Lisa Bullard

Next Exit: Adventure

Some­times just a town’s name is enough to entice you. Who could dri­ve past the exit for Last Chance, Ida­ho — or Hell, Michi­gan — or Hap­py­land, Okla­homa — with­out at least con­tem­plat­ing how your life might be changed if you took that unex­pect­ed detour? All on their own, names tell a sto­ry. That’s why I often do an online search to learn as much as I can about a char­ac­ter name that I’m con­sid­er­ing for my writ­ing — look­ing up eth­nic­i­ty, vari­a­tions, mean­ing — because many times, it opens up new insights into that char­ac­ter for me (or proves to be the wrong choice).… more
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Lisa Bullard

Swerving Over the Line

Dur­ing one of my vis­its to see my Alaba­ma brother’s fam­i­ly, we took a road trip to the Ave Maria Grot­to. That’s where a Bene­dic­tine Monk named Broth­er Joseph Zoet­tl built over 125 Mini-Me ver­sions of some of the great­est build­ings of the world. Artists are often inspired by some­one else’s mas­ter­pieces.  But in work­ing with young writ­ers, I’ve found that it’s easy to mis­tak­en­ly swerve over the cen­ter line from the safe­ty of inspi­ra­tion into the dan­ger of pla­gia­rism (or trade- mark infringe­ment).… more
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Lisa Bullard

Watch Where You’re Going

Rid­ing along with my dad was like going on a Mid­west­ern safari. Even while dri­ving, he had an amaz­ing knack for spot­ting crit­ters as they peeked out from behind trees, perched on phone poles, or slid along the roadside. He didn’t seem to pay any atten­tion to the makes of oth­er cars, or bill­board mes­sages, or what oth­er dri­vers were wear­ing.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Driving in the Dark

A while back I was at my par­ents’ lake cab­in with my extend­ed fam­i­ly. My brother’s teenagers had all brought along friends, and on Sat­ur­day we packed every­one who fell into the “thir­teen to fif­teen” age range off to the late movie. As the res­i­dent night owl, I vol­un­teered to pick up the kids when the movie was over so that the oth­er grown-ups could make it an ear­ly night.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Tunnel Vision

Dri­ving through a tun­nel effec­tive­ly nar­rows our field of vision. The walls and ceil­ing restrict our view to only that which is inside the tun­nel. It doesn’t mat­ter if there’s a moun­tain parked on top of the roof, or an ocean of water being held back by the walls: when we’re inside the tun­nel, those things are out­side our view.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Just Another Roadside Abstraction

For this week’s writ­ing road trip, I offer you texture. I aim for an abstract ele­ment of a real­is­tic sub­ject and use tex­ture to add inter­est and sug­gest depth. —a quote that to the best of my research abil­i­ties I find attrib­ut­able to artist Mar­garet Roseman. I liked the way the above quote spoke to how tex­ture can be used in visu­al art.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Destination

What ‘audience destination’ does the narrator intend? Who do you imagine will read your story?
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Lisa Bullard

Anti-Tailgating Measures

A few years ago, a coun­try high­way I reg­u­lar­ly dri­ve in the sum­mer became part of a pilot pro­gram to stop tail­gat­ing. Large white dots were paint­ed on the road, and new signs instruct dri­vers to keep a min­i­mum of two dots between them and the car they’re fol­low­ing. Rear-end col­li­sions are a dan­ger on this road­way, and the pro­gram hopes to encour­age dri­vers to leave enough room between cars so they can take cor­rec­tive action if some­thing goes wrong.… more
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Lisa Bullard

(E)motion Sickness

Most of my many school vis­its have been amaz­ing, pos­i­tive adven­tures (see my post titled “Trav­el­ing Like a Rock Star”). A few of my vis­its have fea­tured minor bumps in the road. And one school vis­it — thank good­ness, one only! — might be bet­ter described as a major traf­fic incident. It hap­pened when I was still a “new­bie” to school vis­its.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Focus Your Trip

When students set out to revise, a whole lot of different things will all try to grab their attention at once. Encourage them to focus their attention on a few key things each time.
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Lisa Bullard

To Each Maker, Their Model

as often as I tell students that I prefer to wait until I can see the entire shape of a piece before I title it, there are always those who ask me—beg me, really—for permission to write their title first.
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Lisa Bullard

Writing around Roadblocks

I’ve tried to cre­ate a stim­u­lat­ing atmos­phere in my home office. Works of art by the illus­tra­tors of my pic­ture books adorn the walls. I have a Rain­bow Mak­er in the win­dow. There are bloom­ing plants and inspir­ing say­ings and a bas­ket of toys to play with. There are birds chirp­ing out­side the win­dow (even an occa­sion­al owl when I’m work­ing at mid­night).… more
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Lisa Bullard

Driving Miss Daisy

When I was a kid, one of my neigh­bor­hood gang’s favorite sum­mer games was to “play chauf­feur.” We’d jump on our bikes and gath­er for shoptalk at chauf­feur head­quar­ters (a.k.a. the mid­dle of our qui­et side street). Then we’d race off in dif­fer­ent direc­tions to pick up mem­bers of the envi­ably wealthy and pam­pered (yet of course imag­i­nary) fam­i­lies that uti­lized our dri­ving services.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Traveling Back Through Time

One of my favorite pieces of writing advice comes from author Faith Sullivan. I share it here for you to pass along to your students. When you are writing about a story’s setting, don’t leave the reader feeling like a distant observer.
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Drive-by

When I vis­it­ed Los Ange­les not long after the 1992 riots, a home-town writer told me a sto­ry that made me feel what it was like to live there in those uncer­tain times. His dri­ve home passed a large police sta­tion. He was always on alert as he drove by; every­one thought there could be more trou­ble at any time, and he assumed that a police sta­tion might be a key target.… more
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Writing Road Trip by Lisa Bullard | Bookology Magazine

Fitting in with the Locals

The way we talk can be a dead giveaway that we’re from elsewhere—Google the phrase “pop vs. soda,” and you’ll find color-coded maps that divide the country like election night results.
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Lisa Bullard

Driving After Dark

As an ele­men­tary school kid, my most vivid recur­rent dream fea­tured a road trip. In it, I’m in the driver’s seat, although it’s the car that’s in con­trol. My two-years-younger broth­er and our two best neigh­bor­hood friends are also along for the ride. We are on a straight stretch of the two-lane high­way that leads out of town, our head­lights pierc­ing the oth­er­wise intense dark­ness.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Driver’s Ed

It’s amaz­ing that I passed my driver’s test on the first try, since I can see now that I was a pret­ty bad dri­ver. But I was an excel­lent test-tak­er, and the State of Min­neso­ta sent me home with a score of 96 out of 100. Mere weeks lat­er I backed the fam­i­ly van into the mailbox. It’s not that my par­ents didn’t try their best to improve my dri­ving skills.… more
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Lisa Bullard

On the Lam

Encourage students to drive their imaginations like speeding getaway cars. Before you know it, their stories will be packed with the suspense and tension that conflicts provides.
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Lisa Bullard

What a Picture’s Worth

  When I was a kid, a vis­it from my Texas grand­par­ents guar­an­teed hori­zon-expand­ing experiences. For one thing, we were exposed to food choic­es not com­mon to our lit­tle house in Minnesota’s north woods. I’m not talk­ing about chili — my Tex­an father cooked that all the time. I’m talk­ing about Grand­ma drink­ing hot Dr. Pep­per instead of cof­fee.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Traveling Like a Rock Star

I may not have to fight off paparazzi like a movie star, but I’m still spy-worthy when my knickers are down. And roadies don’t load my car, but oftentimes I feel like a rock star before the day of a school visit is over.
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Lisa Bullard

The place I go back to…

There is a particular road trip that has become a summer ritual for me, a journey that takes me to another time as well as another place: going to The Lake.
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Lisa Bullard

Journeying Inside

A surefire revision tactic: reading something out loud ensures that students will hear mistakes they have never noticed before.
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Lisa Bullard

Moseying

My favorite road trips focus more on the dis­cov­er­ies the jour­ney holds than on rapid­ly reach­ing a des­ti­na­tion. You might call me a mosey­ing kind of person. Every fall, my mom and I load my nephews and niece into the car for one of my favorite mean­ders: a vis­it to the Min­neso­ta Land­scape Arbore­tum. In the years it has tak­en for the old­est of the kids to go from babies to tex­ting teenagers, we have per­fect­ed the art of stretch­ing the Arboretum’s Three-Mile Dri­ve into a sev­er­al hours’ ramble.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Secret Destination

If I hadn’t made the trip myself, I don’t think I would believe how quick­ly you can trav­el from the curi­ous world of the Las Vegas Strip to what seems to be its dia­met­ri­cal oppo­site: the Red Rock Canyon Nation­al Con­ser­va­tion Area. Red Rock is com­posed of desert and rock for­ma­tions, the kind of place that inspired one web­site to urge vis­i­tors to leave news of their intend­ed des­ti­na­tion with a “respon­si­ble par­ty” before they jour­ney into its mysteries.… more
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Lisa Bullard

The Quest

My one vis­it to Hawaii might best be defined by an after­noon quest. I was there to say good­bye to my cousin, who was com­ing to the end of her bat­tle with can­cer. I dis­cov­ered she had devel­oped a sin­gu­lar ambi­tion: to find a pair of size 11 ruby slip­pers. She took great plea­sure in the thought of giv­ing them as a gag gift to a male col­league orig­i­nal­ly from Kansas.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Treasure Hunt

One of my favorite road-trip mem­o­ries is “mud-pud­dling” in west­ern North Car­oli­na. We had fol­lowed signs that lured us in with the promise of gem­stones prac­ti­cal­ly free for the tak­ing. The space we wan­dered into looked like a road­side pic­nic area, and seemed ide­al for the kind of lazy after­noon we had in mind. We each pur­chased buck­ets of dirt-cov­ered rocks for a small fee, and then claimed our places along
a bench in front of a trough of run­ning water.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Time Travel

When you tour Rome, you’re not always sure if you’re trav­el­ing in taxis or time machines. Down one street, you’re trans­port­ed back to around 2,000 years ago, watch­ing the Chris­tians take on the lions in the Forum. Head down anoth­er street, and you’re enrap­tured by one of Michelangelo’s Renais­sance mas­ter­pieces. Turn your head, and you see — the Gold­en Arches?… more
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Lisa Bullard

Roads Not Taken

My brother’s dri­ving direc­tions are full of “roads not taken.” He’ll say some­thing like, “Go about a mile and you’ll see Hamil­ton. Don’t turn there! You want the next street.” But with­out fail, I see Hamil­ton, remem­ber that it was part of his direc­tions, and turn before I’m sup­posed to. My father and I are equal­ly direc­tion­al­ly incom­pat­i­ble. He’ll recite a mys­ti­fy­ing suc­ces­sion of com­pass points to me.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Misdirected

Sev­er­al years ago a friend and I got lost dri­ving through New Orleans. Even­tu­al­ly we pulled over so I could ask a gas sta­tion atten­dant for directions. He rat­tled off a set of instruc­tions in a Cajun accent, end­ing with, “then take the Hoopalong.” I looked at my road map. No Hoopa­long. I asked him to point it out to me. His finger tapped a sec­tion of my map while he repeat­ed his direc­tions, this time with a hint of impa­tience.… more
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Road Food Re-Mix

Road Food Re-Mix

by Lisa Bullard I love seek­ing out odd­ball road food oppor­tu­ni­ties. In New Jer­sey: a Chi­nese-Ital­ian buf­fet where the spaghet­ti and lo mein rubbed shoul­ders like long-lost cousins. In Nashville: a Swedish-South­ern all-you-can-eat spread, with fried chick­en and pick­led her­ring vying for att‚ention. In New York City: a Greek-Mex­i­can café. Many of the world’s diverse taste temp­ta­tions are no longer exot­ic options to us.… more
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Return Visit

Return Visit

by Lisa Bullard San Fran­cis­co has an eerie qual­i­ty of rein­ven­tion that is unique to that city for me. When I make return vis­its to oth­er des­ti­na­tions, the visu­al “pieces” from each trip start to fit togeth­er like giant jig­saw puz­zles, and even­tu­al­ly I form an inte­grat­ed pic­ture of the whole place. But despite the num­ber of times I’ve vis­it­ed San Fran­cis­co, each new vis­it feels as if I’m see­ing some­place new: the city feels com­plete­ly remade to me.… more
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Lisa Bullard

Well-Traveled Paths

by Lisa Bullard I slip into auto-pilot when I’m dri­ving through over­ly famil­iar ter­ri­to­ry; I stop tak­ing in the same old land­marks. And then one day, there’s a stop sign where there’s nev­er been one before, and my eyes are re-opened to the pos­si­bil­i­ties around me. There are “sto­ry paths” like that too: fairy tales and oth­er nar­ra­tives that have grown so famil­iar we fail to notice the pow­er they hold unless we’re forced to take a fresh look.… more
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Biker

Pilgrimage

by Lisa Bullard Every year, thou­sands of bik­ers road trip to Stur­gis (South Dako­ta) to cel­e­brate their shared pas­sion for motor­cy­cles. For some of them, atten­dance is an eager­ly antic­i­pat­ed annu­al tra­di­tion that holds the same pow­er found in spir­i­tu­al rituals. One year my friend and I were caught unawares in the mid­dle of the expe­ri­ence. We had trav­eled to South Dako­ta with­out know­ing about the pil­grim­age of believ­ers, but as we came clos­er to our des­ti­na­tion, the grow­ing num­ber of bik­ers, thick as plagues of locusts at gas sta­tions, forced us to piece togeth­er the clues.… more
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Through the Woods

by Lisa Bullard A few years ago I decid­ed to vis­it a friend in North Car­oli­na over the hol­i­days, and the only way I could afford the air­fare was to fly on Christ­mas Day. I admit to a case of self pity as I set out, pic­tur­ing the rest of the world in their new paja­mas, open­ing presents and rev­el­ing in a hol­i­day feast, while I suf­fered the long lines, cramped seats, and oth­er indig­ni­ties that air trav­el offers What was I think­ing, leav­ing home for Christ­mas?… more
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Crossing the Border

by Lisa Bullard Once when flying back to the U.S. from Cana­da I met up with some zeal­ous bor­der con­trol agents. The cus­toms guy want­ed a detailed descrip­tion of what I’d purchased. I bought one of those sou­venir snow globes with a lit­tle Moun­tie inside,” I said. The guy thought a moment and then sad­ly shook his head. “Ma’am, if you’d played your cards right,  you could have tak­en home the real thing.”… more
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Packing List

by Lisa Bullard I gen­er­ate a flur­ry of lists for every road trip: A “bizarre attrac­tions to stop and see” list. A “things to tell the cat-sit­ter” list. A pack­ing list. I love lists. I love them so much I have a whole jour­nal full of dif­fer­ent sorts of lists — I write down every­thing from house­hold repairs to my buck­et list.… more
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Winter Roads

by Lisa Bullard Win­ters add the ele­ment of sur­prise to the Min­neso­ta dri­ving equa­tion. Mid-jour­ney, you can be sucked into one of the car-devour­ing pot­holes caused by my state’s rad­i­cal tem­per­a­ture changes. Or you can skid on a decep­tive slick of black ice, and end up strad­dling a snow bank. In those moments, you real­ize that your trip isn’t going to turn out as you thought it would.… more
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Home Away from Home

by Lisa Bullard I like to play a cer­tain game when I’m trav­el­ing. I pre­tend that the place I’m vis­it­ing is my home, and I imag­ine how my life would have been altered if I had in fact tak­en root in that oth­er environment. How would things be dif­fer­ent for me if my world swirled amidst New York City’s self-ful­fill­ing ener­gy?… more
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Plotting Your Route

by Lisa Bullard Using an “I’ll just see where the road takes me” approach has led me on all sorts of adven­tures. But it’s also meant I’ve arrived at mid­night and dis­cov­ered every hotel room in town is rent­ed to lumberjacks. I still don’t plan ahead for lum­ber­jack influx­es — I figure one of those per life­time is prob­a­bly my quo­ta — but that expe­ri­ence has forced me to rethink my approach a bit.… more
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Round Trip

by Lisa Bullard One of life’s great sat­is­fac­tions is return­ing home after a long jour­ney. We rejoice in the famil­iar clasp of our own bed, in the brac­ing taste of our home air. Every­thing seems com­fort­ing­ly the same, yet also fresh and remarkable. This is because, even if home has stayed the same, jour­ney­ing has changed us.… more
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East, or West?

by Lisa Bullard I think road-trip­ping togeth­er should be a require­ment for every cou­ple con­tem­plat­ing life part­ner­ship. There are few oth­er cir­cum­stances that allow you to so quick­ly learn about how some­one nav­i­gates through life. Would you rather plan the whole trip in advance, or just get in the car and dri­ve? Do you stop and ask for direc­tions, or go ahead and get lost?… more
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Are We There Yet?

by Lisa Bullard My Texas grand­par­ents  usu­al­ly made the long dri­ve to Min­neso­ta. But the sum­mer I was thir­teen, my par­ents piled me, my two younger broth­ers, and a bor­rowed boy cousin into the old sta­tion wag­on and head­ed us south. I escaped into the far back, prop­ping myself up on suit­cas­es and read­ing a thou­sand-page-long Civ­il War nov­el called House Divid­ed.more
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