Introducing A. Manette Ansay, our first writer-in-residence

A. Manette Ansay, our first writer-in-residence. Photo by Jeff Goldberg

Earlier this year, Friends of Coal Creek had the tremendous luck to connect with A. Manette Ansay. Ansay recently moved to Colorado and was seeking ways to engage with the local landscape — just as we were seeking ways to celebrate the creek and introduce it to folks as something worth celebrating. What followed was a collaboration blending arts and nature into a program we’re calling writer-in-residence.

Here is a quick Q&A with Ansay, her background and goals for her residency with Friends of Coal Creek.

Friends of Coal Creek: Can you give a quick overview of your professional background?
A. Manette Ansay: Sure. I’m the author of six novels, including Vinegar Hill, which was an Oprah Book Club Selection, as well as a collection of short stories and a seriously outdated memoir. I’m also Professor Emerita at the University of Miami, where I directed the MFA program and taught courses in fiction, creative nonfiction and poetry. I retired in 2020 at the height of the Covid epidemic and moved to Colorado in 2021. Professionally, I’m still figuring out what I want the next step of my life to be, but I know that environmentalism will be a part of it. 

You moved to Colorado recently. How did you first encounter Coal Creek?
I was birding in a group led by Art Reisman, and he mentioned a fundraising event at The Muse in support of Friends of Coal Creek. At the time, I had just moved to Gunbarrel, and I hadn’t heard of either, so I figured these were two good reasons to show up! At the beginning of the event, [Friends of Coal Creek Director Casey Lyons] spoke about the feeling of being overwhelmed by everything going wrong in the world and your decision to focus on one concrete thing:  a 35 mile creek. That resonated with me because, post-Covid, I was absolutely paralyzed by a sense of not knowing where to start, what to do first. What you said shook me loose. And I discovered some fantastic new birding spots!

What does the creek symbolize for you?
That the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.  

How do natural spaces inspire creativity? What is the value of having natural spaces so close at hand?
Natural spaces inspire creativity because they create a break in the noise, a gap in the business and bustle. They are pause buttons on whatever sense of urgency happens to be tormenting us.  It isn’t that these urgencies aren’t important. It’s because they are important that we need to step outside of them, get perspective, take a breath, and it’s important that we teach our children to do the same. Having Coal Creek so close at hand means that this kind of pause is an accessible resource to multiple communities on a daily basis.

What do you hope to bring to the Coal Creek communities as a writer-in-residence?
I want to support the mission of FCC to “build community and support the beauty of the Coal Creek corridor.” To that end, I would like to run pop-up creative writing workshops in community spaces along the Coal Creek corridor in order to connect people of diverse ages, backgrounds and experiences with the natural world around us.  I would also like to develop an annual creative writing competition for high school writers that engages them with Coal Creek in unique and unexpected ways. 

How can writing better connect us to the natural world?
When we think about natural spaces, certain cliches spring into our heads–green grass, blue sky, sparkling water, floral scents. When we write, we set ourselves the task of true exploration and discovery. What do I see that no one else would see? What pulls at my attention and why? Is there a sound or smell that I did not expect, that the next person wouldn’t even notice? Annie Dillard puts it best: “Why do you never find anything written about that idiosyncratic thought you advert to, about your fascination with something no one else understands? Because it is up to you. There is something you find interesting, for a reason hard to explain. It is hard to explain because you have never read it on any page; there you begin. You were made and set here to give voice to this, your own astonishment."  Natural spaces are made of these unvoiced moments. Finding them, giving voice to them–in a poem, in a journal, in a story, in a social media post–connects us to a greater whole.