``It's a lot of raw material," she said. From her first crush to career anxieties to her children's first words, and from life-altering moments such as births and deaths to simple trips to the grocery store, it was all there. But more than serving as a strongbox for memories, the journals were packed with useful dialogue, anecdotes, observations, deliberations -- the stuff of life.
``In a way, the diaries almost exist as this map of where I'm going as a writer," she said. ``So, a lot of things spring from them."
For instance, her piece ``This Byte," which she said is about ``an adult couple, cyber sex, betrayal, and the tooth fairy," grew in part out of diary entries about her children's notes to the tooth fairy.
``Bloom," a 10-minute play about a mother helping her son prepare for his prom, had a similar start. ``Just one paragraph about a dream I recorded became the germ for that whole play," she said. ``That happens a lot."
It also seems to work. After closing her practice, DuMar wrote nonfiction, and in 2001, she published ``Before You Forget: The Wisdom of Writing Diaries for Your Children" (Red Pail Press). But once the book was out, she turned to play writing as planned. In the five years since, she has created two one-hour dramas, 10 short pieces and one full-length play. Her works have been featured in national festivals, and recognized with awards, and a few published.
DuMar will be one of six playwrights and filmmakers featured in the Hovey Summer Arts Festival in Waltham over the next two weekends. And, again, a diary plays a role in her piece. Only this time it's at the center of the plot.
In ``What We Save," high school lovers Corrie ( LeighBerry of Groveland) and Lance ( Ted Batch of Somerville) meet at their 25th high school reunion, but with their spouses in tow. When Lance's wife plucks Corrie's old diary out of a dusty trunk, a long-kept secret is revealed.
``It's about expectation versus surprise . . . and it's about emotional consequences and how they play out over time," DuMar said. ``It has its comic moments, but there are some emotional conflicts at the center of this piece that really drive it."
