first draft 11/11/2009
I started reading this book about writing last week and already it has been enormously helpful in validating me as a writer because apparently the psychosis of having a brain that operates like a tangled web is a common trait of writers. I wish my counselor had told me that when on my first visit I said something along the lines of, "I'm not entirely sure why I'm here. I've got some stuff to unpack. My brain feels like a tangled web with pieces of debris stuck in it." Instead she told me to write about the web. I saw this movie a few years back called "The Waitress," with Keri Russell and it was a decent movie but I don't really want to talk about the movie, I want to talk about how Keri Russell's character would have fantasies about making pies. The Screen would flash instantly from real life to pie crusts filled and topped with all sorts of crazy combinations of fruit and sweets and it was apparently Keri Russell's character's way of coping with life to make pies. And she was awesome at making pies. People loved her pies. Anyway, I feel like I do that sometimes in life except instead of pies it is words. Words or sandwiches. I happen to make a mean sandwich. Most of the time it is words, though. I will space out in a situation in order to compose sentences and essays about what is going on in front of me. Sometimes all I need is to drive by some funny sign that plays on words and I can think of a hell of a lot to say about it and how it reminds me of something that ends up making for a pretty good story. My problem is that a lot of times I can not write things down as fluidly as they race through my mind so I end up spending a whole lot of time staring blankly at a computer screen, feeling like I want to take a nap. Writing can be really hard. Apparently this is normal for writers. Another thing this book talks about is writing shitty first drafts. I'm not trying to be daft, that is the name of one of the chapters. "Shitty first drafts." Anyway, I have read a lot about needing to write first (and second and third and so on) drafts but maybe it was they way this author talked about it because for what might be the first time in my life it seems like a good thing to do. Maybe it's because I feel like I finally have permission to write shitty stuff. Before I would spend a lot of that staring-in-front-of-the-computer time editing in my head like when I was in the seventh grade and I would get points taken off in math because I liked to do the work in my head instead of writing it all out. I don't know what it is. Maybe I have a problem with getting messy with the process or maybe I like to protect the work in progress like a secret. I really cannot say. What I am trying to say is that I know I said before that I would try to keep this blog tidy but I have changed my mind. Now I am going to let it get messy and I will publish some shitty stuff. A few people have read my blog for years and think I am a pretty good writer but they might start to change their minds before I post something really good again. But I think this will help. I will write more often and I will free myself in such a way that might let a few buried treasures of really good writing surface every now and then. CommentsThu, 12 Nov 2009 08:53:07 Ashley, Julia Sun, 15 Nov 2009 20:06:54 I really like this new blog. Keep on writing and I'll read whatever comes out :) Leave a Reply | ashleyb
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