Writing Samples

SAMPLE INTERVIEWS

To be published in upcoming St. Cloud Magazine, Winter 2016

S.C.A.R. DOLLS

By Linda Larson

High adrenaline. Smart strategizing. Sharp elbows. That’s all part of being a S.C.A.R. Doll roller derby team member.

What is roller derby? It’s a full contact sport with five skaters on two teams racing around a track.  The jammer tries to score while the four blockers try to help their jammer and block the opposing jammer. A full team is fourteen members, and the players rotate in and out as the game progresses. Points are made when the jammer “passes the hip” of an opposing team member.

S.C.A.R. Dolls refers to the league, which is divided into two home teams, the Gargoyle Brigade and the Pin-Up Prowlers. There’s also an away team that travels to Wisconsin, Iowa, North Dakota, and South Dakota.

I talked with Bruta, short for Artemisia Brutaleschi, known as Alicia Peters off the track. The women choose an alter ego once on the team, using clever word play in their names.  Other skaters include Shirley Temper, Dizzy Diamond, and Sybil Disobedience. Bruta tells me that roller derby is one of the few contact sports for women.  It’s both physically and mentally demanding. A team of hockey players played with them once and were exhausted. That’s because it’s like “chess with cement blocks thrown at you,” according to Bruta. The S.C.A.R. Dolls practice two times a week for three hours, working on cardio, strength, skills, and strategy.

More than a game

With this high impact sport, someone might think that the name S.C.A.R. stands for what’s left after a wound heals.  However, it stands for service, charity, athletic integrity, and responsibility. Their charity work includes promoting an American Red Cross blood drive in October 2015. Their team donated a portion of the September 2015 season opener tickets to American Cancer Society’s Making Strides Against Breast Cancer of Central Minnesota. Bruta tells me, “We believe in giving back to the community.” For them it’s more than writing a check.  For Making Strides, they’ve also participated in a walk, a breakfast, and a golf outing. These are some classy athletes.

Community is a big part of who the S.C.A.R. Dolls are. The women on this team are members of this community—for example, some of their day jobs include teacher, nurse, doula, student, and mother.  Another big part of their community are the fans. Fans are all ages.  And the fans are enthusiastic, greeting their favorite players after the game.

Devoted supporters

There’s an amazing connection between the non-profits, the fans, and the league. Fans of the S.C.A.R. Dolls support the non-profits and charity events they promote. The charity members usually become fans. And the S.C.A.R. Dolls love their fans.  Bruta says she enjoys talking with children, who ask for autographs after the games. The kids say “wearing helmets is cool.”

The restaurant D.B. Searles, a sponsor of the S.C.A.R. Dolls, hosts an after party for the team and fans. This is a chance to get the autograph of your favorite athlete.

Bruta says, “There are many sides to us…women are good at that.”  These are exceptional women—true athletes, intelligent thinkers, and generous community members.

The next S.C.A.R. Dolls event is February 27th at the River’s Edge Convention Center. Pre-sale tickets are $8 (available at Skatin' Place, Youth Shelter, and Granite City Comics and Games), at-the-door tickets are $12, and children under 10 are free. A portion will be donated to the Special Olympics. Doors open at 6 pm, and the action starts at 7 pm. 

Jane Roberts interview for St. Cloud Times newspaper, April 2009
by Linda Larson

Because I couldn’t get all the information into my column at the St. Cloud Times, I’ve included more of my interview from April 1 here.

Jane Roberts is the co-founder of 34 Million Friends of UNFPA (www.34 million friends.org) and has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005. She states, “When the world takes care of women, women take care of the world. And the world is doing a terrible job, and The United Nations Population Fund takes care of women.”

UNFPA gathers statistics, such as birth rates. In some countries the fertility rates or birth rates—the average number of births—are 5, 6 and even 7 per woman. “Where the fertility rates are the highest, women have the lowest status.”

Women are undervalued.

At the beginning of the interview, Jane Roberts showed us a notebook from Senegal which states, “Little girls have as much right to food and education as little boys.” This free notebook makes its way to families in order to promote the idea that girls are just as valuable as boys. “When there’s not enough food, the boy gets it. The girl eats the scraps…They are educated less…” In legal areas such as inheritance “they have no rights whatsoever.” In every way an accident of birth determines a life of hardship.

She gives me this statistic: “60 million missing women in Asia due to sex selective abortion, infanticide, and neglect of girl the child.” Because male children are favored, currently there are 126 men to 100 women.

With fervor she states, “Gender inequality, to me, is the moral issue of the age. I think it’s costing people and the planet.”

Jane Roberts speaks of the plight of young girls.

Usually once she can read, a girl is expected to quit her elementary level education and to take care of her siblings and household chores. Often she is married at the age of twelve, thirteen, or fourteen. The leading cause of death and disability for young women ages 15-19 is pregnancy. And for those who can read, the birth rate is lowered.

“Primary education is not enough,” Jane states. Jane has observed schools with students crowded at tables with benches, but no books, paper, or pencils. Rural education is of poor quality. To get students to attend school, a daily meal is the incentive.

Jane gives me this statistic: Two thirds of those who are illiterate are women. She thinks women need to be empowered at all levels of education.

Girls grow into young women.

“Educated women have educated, healthy families.” Jane continues, “When a girl has more education, particularly if she gets into the high school level…when she is married, she has fewer children, she keeps them healthy, and she sends them to school.”

Women take care of families, of course.

The number of children under the age of 5 who die is 9.2 million. Forty percent of those deaths occur in the first month. Women are not getting adequate nutrition and health care, so babies are born small and mothers cannot care for them.

“We have got it all backwards. Everybody will take care of children. People won’t take care of mothers.”

Jane Roberts is currently at work on a film called, “The Stories Women Tell.” In spring of 2009, she was working with film professionals on funding for the movie. (This movie is not funded by donations to 34 million friends.) She calls this project, “my legacy to the planet.”

I admire Jane Roberts’ focus and passion for this issue: “That’s my dream: worldwide grassroots support demanding that things change for women and girls of the world.”

Hopefully all this information gives us comfortable Americans a reason to pause…the human race cannot survive without women, after all.

SAMPLE EXCERPT FROM CREATIVE NON-FICTION WORK, "BETTER" 

by Linda Larson, 2015-2016

THE NEURODIVERGENT BRAIN: WHY DIFFERENT ISN’T WORSE

There’s a movement, brought about by the online connections across the physical earth and across social divides, to stop using the word “abnormal.” Being different is a good thing. The replacement word is “neuro-divergent.”

In the neuro-divergent world, all types of brains are considered equal. Divergent people call others “neuro-typical.” When I hear this term, I imagine a sour-faced schoolmarm, pinching the bridge of her nose and saying, “Well, that’s typical.” When I lurk in the background in the online conversations, I feel bad that I’m typical, that I don’t have an interesting perspective to add to their heart-felt stories.

Divergent people struggle with treatment options. A manic-depressive may enjoy the mania, so the medication that evens things out makes the world a little less interesting. However, the depression could be life-threatening. A schizophrenic may be worried about the weight gain that’s a side effect of the medication, but without the medication, daily life might be too much. Sometimes a person in the neuro-divergent community may support someone as they go off medication, but usually the support is there to experiment to find the right drug, the right treatment, the right counselor. No one, divergent or typical, wants to be in pain, physical or psychological.

Yet being divergent has its advantages. Temple Grandin has done excellent work with animals because of her ability to understand how they think, and she has done a lot for those diagnosed with autism by sharing her struggles honestly. Learning about her and how she’s been able to live an independent life has given me hope for our daughter. I’ll talk about Temple in a future chapter.

One thing this divergent/typical terminology doesn’t cover is that mental health is a continuum, much like physical health. Some people have more of it, some less. Also, mental health can improve and deteriorate, too. Good health alternates with bad health; illnesses come and go. As I write this, I suspect I have a sinus infection. I’m treating it at home with hot tea, lemon, and honey. If I don’t get better, I’ll go to the doctor. That’s a short term illness. For a long term illness, I suffer from migraines, but lifestyle changes and the right medication helps. My physical health isn’t perfect, but it’s pretty good.

My mental health isn’t perfect either. I love talking with people and getting to know them, but I do have shyness to the point of social anxiety in large groups of people I don’t know. I’d be an awful politician. But that makes me a great teacher because I know what to look for with students who feel uncomfortable and I know how to put them at ease. At one point, I plunged into a depression with severe physical symptoms after I was bullied at work. I was losing weight from severe stomach pains and couldn’t sleep at night--I had to quit my job to survive. Today as I write this I feel that my depressive symptoms are gone.

I’m not the only one on this scale—in fact, I’d argue that no one is 100 percent physically and mentally healthy. We’re imperfect humans in an imperfect world. (...continued...)