ALAG visits the Halcyon garden last June

Following up on last week’s post on people with big vision and even bigger energy, here’s an essay I wrote called “For the Grrrls” for HER Nashville magazine about my friend Vali Forrister’s autobiographical writing camp for teen girls.

The fabulous program Vali created is called “Act Like a Grrrl,” and it’s been my great pleasure and privilege to participate in a small way over the past couple of years. 

This fall Vali took her “ALAG” program behind bars, applying her creative writing/performance model to a semester-long class at the Tennessee Prison for Women. The final performance, featuring personal essays written by TPW inmates, happens this Saturday night, and I’ll be sure and update you on how it goes. Based on previous performances I’ve seen Vali’s ALAG girls pull off, this one is sure to be an unforgettable and deeply moving experience. Tune in next week for an update.

And for all of you who are dying to give me a gift this December holiday, please feel free to donate to Act Like a Grrrl instead. 😉

To hear Vali and some of the girls talk about the “ALAG” experience, please listen to this Nashville Public Radio piece I produced in the summer of 2008 about the camp (along with several amazing “This I Believe” essays the girls wrote and recorded) at the WPLN archive.