Writing Life: interview with Preston Pouteaux

I interviewed Preston Pouteaux in preparation for his role as the keynote speaker for the InScribe Christian Writers' Fellowship fall conference at the end of September.

Preston and I met at Briercrest College, where I was teaching English Literature. He made a strong, positive impression as one of my students. Now he lives in Chestermere, Alberta, with his wife, two daughters, a golden retriever, and usually a few hives of bees. When I caught up with him for an interview, he was teaching at The Harbour at Riondell, BC, in their Headwaters Discipleship program, which he says is “all about faith formation and the arts. It’s all about the senses, and … hands-on learning … a beautiful project.”

“As a boy, I didn’t think I was a bearded man, nor that I’d be a writer. Along the way you discover who you are and what you’re excited about. I think we live in this beautiful tender time where we are able to share our hearts, our poetry, our language, our perspective with the world beyond us. ... I never thought that I would write one book, never mind two and a bunch of other things.

Preston spoke of our writing as nourishment, like a loaf of bread that we bake and then offer to share with others.

“The work of the pastor, the work of faith, I think the work of a writer, this is also manna in this sense: We have it for the day. Enjoy it now. Share it now. Nourish others around you now. One day those words on paper might make it to the back of a used bookstore and it might nourish somebody down the road, but by and large it is you who you bring forward into the world over and over again … all you’re doing is pulling some [bread] out of the oven in love and saying, ‘Hey, look at what I made. Do you want to enjoy it here along the way with me?’ … You’ll find that a lot of good friends want to.

“The goal here isn’t to publish for millions of people. Maybe not even for thousands or hundreds, but for those in your world that need to hear what you’re sharing.”

Resources:

• Preston's website: Plesion Studio

• Headwaters Discipleship, where Preston was teaching.

• Fall Writers Conference – InScribe Christian Writers' Fellowship