(no subject)
You can read about things all you want, but until you actually sit down and do a thing, you really aren't going to get it from just reading.
When I was a little kid, I lived on a farm, and every time it rained there was a particular ditch that would flood. The tile under the lane wasn't big enough so it would get blocked with debris. My brother and I used to poke sticks in to unblock it so that we could watch the water rush through.
Writing is kindof like that.
I've read all kinds of writing advice, most of which usually boiled down to this: "Write every day. Give yourself permission to write crap."
But I never could relax enough to just let myself write badly. I'd stop and stare at the page instead, wondering what I could write next. Then in search of inspiration I'd go back and look at what I'd written, and I'd start editing what I'd just written because it wasn't good enough. In the end I'd get frustrated and quit. Because I never got the crap out of the way.
Today I got stuck, and instead of staring at the page I just kept writing. I wrote crap. Pages and pages of crap. And after about an hour of poking at the story with a stick and just getting all the debris out of the way, the story started to flow again.
Oh. So that's what they meant!
I got the grass cut today, after what feels like a solid month of rain. My snowball bush is blooming! All the rain has it thinking it's spring. But we just had our first frost so that'll do it in.
I was not happy about having to navigate around stinky fish corpses and a deer carcass in the yard. My mother keeps trying to draw Stumpy the One-Legged Eagle back so she can take his picture. So far he's not taking the bait, although the turkey buzzards are having a field day.
I had something else I wanted to write down, but I can't remember now what that was...
Also, I still feel like I want to cry. Dear universe, please stop throwing roadblocks in my way, thank you so much.
When I was a little kid, I lived on a farm, and every time it rained there was a particular ditch that would flood. The tile under the lane wasn't big enough so it would get blocked with debris. My brother and I used to poke sticks in to unblock it so that we could watch the water rush through.
Writing is kindof like that.
I've read all kinds of writing advice, most of which usually boiled down to this: "Write every day. Give yourself permission to write crap."
But I never could relax enough to just let myself write badly. I'd stop and stare at the page instead, wondering what I could write next. Then in search of inspiration I'd go back and look at what I'd written, and I'd start editing what I'd just written because it wasn't good enough. In the end I'd get frustrated and quit. Because I never got the crap out of the way.
Today I got stuck, and instead of staring at the page I just kept writing. I wrote crap. Pages and pages of crap. And after about an hour of poking at the story with a stick and just getting all the debris out of the way, the story started to flow again.
Oh. So that's what they meant!
I got the grass cut today, after what feels like a solid month of rain. My snowball bush is blooming! All the rain has it thinking it's spring. But we just had our first frost so that'll do it in.
I was not happy about having to navigate around stinky fish corpses and a deer carcass in the yard. My mother keeps trying to draw Stumpy the One-Legged Eagle back so she can take his picture. So far he's not taking the bait, although the turkey buzzards are having a field day.
I had something else I wanted to write down, but I can't remember now what that was...
Also, I still feel like I want to cry. Dear universe, please stop throwing roadblocks in my way, thank you so much.