While the high school essay format would often remove points for perceived tangents, life is full of them. You're looking for a restaurant you heard about on TripAdvisor, but it's closed for good, and dejectedly you end up in a little hole in the wall with the best clams casino ever. You decide to try sports in middle school in hopes of attracting girls – you don't, but find a surprising joy in being on the wrestling team and being tougher than the bullies who used to give you trouble. You seek to write an elegy, and cannot stop shouting in praise. A month into the pandemic, having more time to write than I'd had in years, and yet suffering from writer's block, I gave myself a simple assignment – write 3 pages a day on something that interests me, and one of the main rules was when the tangent comes, let it, and keep running with that. We'll learn from that method, as well as a poem by Ross Gay, as well as each other. The workshop lends itself to be applied to all genres.

Jason H.S. Nadelbaum is a multi-genre writer with an MFA in poetry. He's worked in alternative theater, standup comedy, spoken word, and now mainly writes humorous literary fiction. He currently teaches for Philly Young Playwrights and other organizations throughout the city. He lives in Philadelphia with his wife, Glynnis, their 3 amazing cats, and their 5 bookshelves. They are expecting another bookshelf in the not so distant future.