Introducing, The Lagoon Live! 🎤🐬

Mark Your Calendar: The Last Sunday of Every Month

Feb 11, 2024

The original Lagoon Live Post is archived below the dividing line, but I’ve made some changes to this program as of summer of 2024.

Now, The Lagoon Live takes place on my Instagram Live on the last Sunday of the month. Times vary depending on my schedule. Follow @CharlotteDune on Instagram to join in. You can also request to join in on Instagram once the livestream has started.

Don’t want to contribute live in real-time? Send me an email or IG DM or leave a comment here or on my Instagram flagging it for the live and I’ll read it out loud.

XXXOOO

BEGIN ARCHIVED POST

Hello, and I hope you had a wonderful January. If you were following my Instagram Stories or reading my Substack Notes, you know I spent the last week in a remote location in Death Valley. This gave me a much-needed break and time to reflect and generate new writing and ideas.

Gosh, aren’t vacations the best? I hope you can take one too.😃

Me and my boo on our Death Valley vacation.

One idea that keeps poking my brain, which I also teased in this post, is a live variety show, an open mic.

Well…

Drumroll, please!

I’d like to introduce you to The Lagoon Live!

The Lagoon Live

The Lagoon Live is a community open-mic on Zoom, EVERY LAST SUNDAY OF THE MONTH AT 7 PM EST.

It’s free to all subscribers to the Lagoon and any guests you want to bring. I’ll also be inviting some folks to take the stage.

Think of it as a virtual pool party talent hour with a hot mic.

The first Lagoon Live will take place on Feb 25th at 7 pm EST.

I invite you to come and share your talents, passions, poems, arts, crafts, pets, or rants!

Guidelines

You can share in The Lagoon Live or just loiter and listen. I’ll be inviting some folks to read, but otherwise, I’ll be asking for people to raise their hands to contribute and I’ll be acting as the MC.

I’m not setting a length or time requirement for each set. Use your good judgment. Try not to bore people.

Like the Lagoon itself, there is no niche. Unless you bring something super hateful or violent, or something so next-level, extremely pornographic that I’m disturbed, pretty much anything goes.

Suggestions:

I recommend bringing material you want to test on a live audience, topics you struggle with, or adore, things you are super proud of, or things you want everyone to know about and enjoy.

Some ideas:

Read us your writing
Share about your favorite book
Share about your current projects
Talk about a movie
Read a poem you wrote
Read from your Substack or blog
Read someone else’s poem
Show us your art
Play us your music
A DJ set
Share a video with us
Share an article you think is worth group discussion
Bring us a problem to solve
Offer unsolicited advice
Tell dad jokes
Lead a prayer
Offer a meditation
Pull some tarot cards
Throat sing
Play your violin
Present a PowerPoint.
Channel spirits
Give everyone an assignment
Standup comedy
Improv
Pole dance

Honestly, you can do anything. Bring your dog or your rabbit or your cat or your hat.

Show us your favorite toy. Honestly, I miss kindergarten, so feel free to be playful as hell.

Twerk.

I want this to be a real community shit show! In a good way.

This will be 60-90 minutes.

You don’t need to let me know if you want to take the stage in advance, just arrive ready. At the beginning of the hang, I’ll tally up who is going to perform and put everyone in order, like a karaoke night at a bar.

Each month I’m also going to invite some people to read or perform in case everyone else wants to lurk.

Where to Find the Zoom Link

You’ll receive the Zoom link to everyone before the event and put it in the Substack app chat.

However, it will not be up on my Substack page, as this is for my subscribers and their guests, not rando visitors, so if you have emails turned off, you will need to check for it in the app chat.

Refer a friend

Why?

I want to get to know you better, and I want you to be able to get to know each other. I also want to practice live readings and MC’ing.

Presenting for an audience is a valuable skill for probably everyone. Come practice!

Furthermore, my local arts community is pretty small, so I like that Zoom offers a way to extend that community.

I’m also inspired by

The Cultural Futurist

, Kill Tony,

Smoke 'Em If You Got 'Em

, and The Key West Literary Seminar, all of which have regular community gatherings, readings, or open mics.

Cannonball!

This is an open-water event, a free stroke; it might sink or there may be sharks out there, but I still want to give it a float.

There are 700+ of us in this Lagoon, and who knows, your next-door neighbor might be here and you don’t even know!

I’m sure not everyone will come.

No one might come… I don’t know.

If we get a ton of folks requesting to perform, paid subs will get top priority and then it will be first come first serve.

For my Vipers and Infinity Dolphins

(Yes, I added an “Infinity ✨ 🐬 Dolphin” tier for my top-paid supporters of this Lagoon)

You get first dibs on performing and sharing. If you want to try out being the MC for one month, you can.

Taking Requests

I’m also taking story, poem, rant, or essay commission requests from my paid subscribers. I did my first one this week, a short story, and had such a blast writing it!

So, if you’re a paid subscriber, you can email me to request a story, poem, or essay topic for me to write about. You can request one per month. If this gets too crazy, I’ll change the parameters, but let’s see how it goes.

The commissioned piece can either be for you and only you, or it can be for me to share with the public.

Paid subscribers can also share guest pieces here, with my audience, so if you want to do that, also get in touch by email.

Now You

Does this sound fun?

If you are also on Substack, would you consider coming and sharing something from your Substack?

Is the last Sunday of the month at 7 PM a good or bad time for you?

Charlotte Dune's Lagoon

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