by Theresa Garee | Nov 10, 2023 | Blog, Write Now Columbus - Current Essay
Written By Kathryn Haueisen
Last week I had a moral dilemma. I won the Write Now Columbus complimentary Thurber
House ticket to see Henry Winkler being interviewed by Pulitzer-Prize-Winning Journalist
Connie Schultz at the Ohio State University Mershon Auditorium. This was a stop on his book
tour to promote his newly released, Being Henry: The Fonz . . . and Beyond. I was really looking
forward to the evening, in spite of the stuffy nose and annoying other symptoms that moved in
with me the day before the event. I was pretty sure it was a cold, likely the result of temperatures
rising and falling by 20 or more degrees every few hours. But what if it was COVID?
It would be socially irresponsible to attend the event if I had COVID, even with a mask. I
debated not testing, figuring ignorance would enable me to blissfully attend with a semi-clear
conscience. I could hear my parents’ disapproval of that option swirling around in my head,
chastising me from their graves. So, I tested. It was negative. Phew.
Wednesday, November 8, I, and my brother, along with an estimated 900 other Happy Days fans
of Fonzie enjoyed his interview with Schultz. I only knew Winkler from Happy Days and more
recently, some television commercials. I did not know he wrote children’s books. Nor did I know
he struggled with dyslexia issues and struggled to find himself after his role as the adolescent
with an attitude came to an end after eleven seasons. He credits his mental health therapist for
helping him create the post-Fonzie life he’s now enjoying.
Winkler was charming, witty, funny, and energetic. While seated across from one another,
Schultz would pitch him a question. He’d answer it, and then jump up to roam around the stage,
embellishing his answers with whatever crossed his kangaroo-like mind, hopping from one story
to the next. Then he’d sit down for the next question before repeating this pattern. Being 78 years
old hasn’t slowed him down much. He can still pull off the famous Fonzie persona with ease.
Thurber House pulled off an amazing event, with volunteers everywhere greeting and assisting.
My brother claimed his copy of Winkler’s book within a couple of minutes at a table stacked
high with Winkler’s books. We settled into the last two seats open near the back of the
auditorium, laughing and clapping away the next hour.
After the program the staff invited us to wait in line to take a photo with Winkler. The line was
already really long before we found the end of it. Though I was certain I was dealing with an
annoying cold and not COVID, I was ready to get home to more hot tea, honey, lemon, and cold
meds. We skipped the line, but I am grateful to Thurber House for providing this enchanting
evening. I shall remember it for years, along with a new book to read and old programs to watch.
by Theresa Garee | Jul 3, 2023
We are giving away one (1) ticket to a Thurber House event for the remaining summer events.
This winning ticket grants access to the event only, extras can be purchased prior to the event.
WNC Newsletter Subscribers only
Rules are in your newsletter delivered July 3rd.
by Theresa Garee | Jun 27, 2023
Emmy Award-Winning Journalist Allison Gilbert, in Conversation with Brooke Warner, Publisher of She Writes Press and Co-Host of Write-minded Podcast!
REGISTER HERE
ALLISON GILBERT
Allison Gilbert is an Emmy award-winning journalist, author, and producer. She began her career in television news, producing investigative and law-changing stories for CNN, MSNBC, and other outlets.
Allison is the host of Women Journalists of 9/11: Their Stories, a 20-part documentary series produced in collaboration with the National September 11 Memorial & Museum. For this, she interviewed Savannah Guthrie, Maggie Haberman, Dana Bash, Linda Wertheimer, and others. Allison is co-executive producer of the companion two-hour film that featured, among others, Tom Brokaw, Rehema Ellis, Ann Thompson, Scott Pelley, Byron Pitts, Ann Compton, and Cynthia McFadden. Allison is the official narrator of the 9/11 Memorial Museum’s historical exhibition audio tour, the only female journalist to be so honored.
Allison Gilbert writes regularly for The New York Times and other publications. On her blog, she features Q & A’s with some of the most notable names in our culture today, including Arianna Huffington, Jon Stewart, Henry Louis Gates Jr., Dani Shapiro, and Gretchen Rubin.
Allison is co-editor of Covering Catastrophe: Broadcast Journalists Report September 11 and author of Always Too Soon: Voices of Support for Those Who Have Lost Both Parents, Parentless Parents: How the Loss of Our Mothers and Fathers Impacts the Way We Raise Our Children, and Passed and Present: Keeping Memories of Loved Ones Alive.
BROOKE WARNER
Brooke Warner is Co-Host of the Write-minded podcast and publisher of She Writes Press and SparkPress. She is president of Warner Coaching Inc., and author of Write On, Sisters!, Green-light Your Book, What’s Your Book?, and three books on memoir. Brooke Warner is a TEDx speaker and the former Executive Editor of Seal Press. She currently sits on the boards of the Book Industry Study Group, the Bay Area Book Festival, and the National Association of Memoir Writers. She writes a monthly column for Publishers Weekly.
Main Program | 7:00-8:00 pm Eastern Time
Sit back, relax, and enjoy the program! You will have the opportunity to ask the author questions after the event.
by Theresa Garee | Jun 27, 2023
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Essayist and OSU Director of American Indian Studies Elissa Washuta is a member of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe. Her essay collection White Magic was selected as a finalist for the PEN/Open Book Award, longlisted for the PEN/Jean Stein Award, and named among the best books of 2021 by TIME, the New York Public Library, and NPR. She is the author of My Body Is a Book of Rules and Starvation Mode, and with Theresa Warburton, she co-edited the anthology Shapes of Native Nonfiction: Collected Essays by Contemporary Writers. Elissa’s honors include a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, a Creative Capital award, and the Artist Trust Arts Innovator Award. She is an associate professor at The Ohio State University, where she teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing.
‣ Picnic Social | 6:00-6:30 pm (Optional)
Enjoy a picnic dinner (ours or yours) and hang out on the lawn during this time frame (optional).
‣ Main Program | 6:30-7:30 pm
Sit back, relax, and enjoy the program! You will have the opportunity to ask the author questions after the event.
‣ Book Signing | 7:30 pm
Purchase books and get them signed by the author.
by Theresa Garee | Jun 27, 2023
REGISTER HERE
A ninth-generation Appalachian, Kari Gunter-Seymour is the Ohio Poet Laureate and the author of A Place So Deep Inside America It Can’t Be Seen, editor of I Thought I Heard a Cardinal Sing: Ohio’s Appalachian Voices, and founder and host of the seasonal performance series Spoken & Heard. Her poems have appeared in The New York Times, New Ohio Review, One, Rattle, and numerous other publications. Kari is a retired instructor in the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio University. She was selected to serve as a 2022 Dodge Poetry Festival Poet, and is an artist in residence at the Wexner Center for the Arts and a Pillars of Prosperity Fellow for the Foundation for Appalachian Ohio.
‣ Picnic Social | 6:00-6:30 pm (Optional)
Enjoy a picnic dinner (ours or yours) and hang out on the lawn during this time frame (optional).
‣ Main Program | 6:30-7:30 pm
Sit back, relax, and enjoy the program! You will have the opportunity to ask the author questions after the event.
‣ Book Signing | 7:30 pm
Purchase books and get them signed by the author.
