Wednesday, May 14, 2014

How I Write


photo credit: ad551 via photopin cc
A few months ago, I began to see invitations in my inbox to join a blog hop called, My Writing Process. My knee jerk response was to send an email back, and so I did,  “Thank you. I'm flattered, but no. Not able to. I have no writing process. But thank you for thinking that I do!” These invitations keep coming into my inbox, people who see me as someone who has a way to do things. And me, right away, making clear what only I can possibly know, that I don't.

But I'm on the internet. I'm on websites other than my own. I'm in several anthologies. I help to put on a show called Listen To Your Mother and I have toured as a main stage storyteller with the nationally acclaimed, The Moth.

Even when confronted with this evidence that attests that I do, I do write, I somewhere, somehow, say that I don't. Why do I sign myself off and am not even able to consider the word, 'writer'.
 
If  the measuring stick I hold is someone who gets paid for their words, than I do. I have been paid.
 
If to be a writer means people have sought you, that's true then, too.
 
If it's necessary to be published in tangible pages, than I have. 
 
What is it I think I need to have for me to say that I do write, and I am a writer, and that there is a process.

A mental picture and a physical space of my own, I think. But I don't have either. I use a keyboard attached to a monitor that doubles as a family TV that I turn on when my kids go to bed at night. There it is. My writing space. I have my notebooks, in my purse, my bag, my car, my lunch bag, my back pocket, my glove compartment, my kitchen counter, my coffee table, on top of my piano. That's my writing process. A manila folder where I keep torn out scraps of paper where I've scribbled ideas that I know will disappear with my day if I wait until the right place and time to write.

There never is a right time and place for me. I set no time aside, like writing sites advise me to. There is only the moment when it strikes, and I write at stop lights, or when waiting for my children, or in the middle of slicing vegetables for dinner. The thoughts that come into my head on their own, I can't explain the trigger, but I never say no to them. I worry about the order and assembling the pieces later. Later, but for the time being, this is my writing process. I never say no to the words, and when I sit quietly after saying yes, pulling everything together from what once was a scattering of ideas that resemble a murmuration of starlings before they swell together, it's the closest I have ever been to time both standing still and disappearing. 

This is my "How I Write". And to the people who think of me as being able to enlighten or inspire, I want to say thank you for encouraging me. I am, as I said before, humbled.
 
We are, writers. Especially when we don't see it ourselves.

In this blog tour of My Writing Process, we are to choose someone and invite them to post on their writing process. Please consider this post here my public invitation to you. Tell us your way of getting the words down and turning them into something...  and let me know of it, so I can stop by and encourage you, in whatever way that you work, that it does, indeed, make you a writer.
 
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21 comments:

  1. Last year for my birthday I told my husband I wanted a dedicated writing space. It has made SUCH a difference, in the way I view myself and how I approach my craft. It includes a small desk in our bedroom with a computer that is ALL mine. That's about it.

    I think there are many versions of this blog hop going around. I joined one as well. So, in case you are interested... http://www.thewriterrevived.com/2014/05/the-why-we-write-blog-tour.html

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    1. Does this help, Elizabeth? I really need to think about that....

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  2. Can I tell you how MUCH I love the way you addressed this blog hop?
    Just perfect. And I'm not surprised at all.

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    1. Julie, you are still winning at the internet... thank you.

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  3. heh i write at stoplights as well. though i do have a writing time set aside to clean up those thoughts while writing....

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    Replies
    1. Brian, do you have a schedule? I don't. I begin at 10PM, when the kids are in bed... and then, I keep going until I can't.

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  4. I did this hop a few weeks ago and I think I contradicted myself 17 times in 3 paragraphs. I write on the go, in bed, between bites, in drive thrus, in line to pick up my kids, at red lights, during conference calls, with a cat on my lap, a dog wanting to be, and in the bathroom.

    and sometimes it doesn't suck

    Thanks for telling me how the empress magic happens. I always assumed it was nobility, given by the Gods.

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  5. However and whenever you write, I'm just glad that you do. xo

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    Replies
    1. Right?!
      Alison is always right. But this time she's really, really right.

      Just write, Alexandra. For you and for us.

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  6. I dictate so many bits into my phone for when I have time, but I rarely find the time.
    I agree with Elizabeth that a dedicated space helps. A special desk in the dining room for me. And to avoid my delicious little people, getting up before dawn just to write helps. No email, no social media...dedicate the very first minutes of the day to the most important thing. Writing.
    Sometimes those mornings are my novel and sometimes they're paying gigs I don't really want to write. But it's all process. Blog, for me, comes at night only if I have anything left in me that *has* to come out.
    xoxo

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    Replies
    1. Order and a plan... it's got to help. xo

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  7. However you write, this was certainly well written.

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  8. It does help to have your own space. I have a converted desk used in a small shirt factory to use as my art table. But I have found that I create just as well with my watercolors in my lap in the evening, watching tv with the spouse. So for me the bottom line is to create, not where or how you create.

    And you definitely create.

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  9. Every fiber of your being is fully invested in being a writer. Whether you realize it or not. You have a following and people who stalk your pages because they hang on to your words. I don't think there has to be a formal process for getting the words out... because it is a gift and one that you clearly possess :)

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  10. Yes! You do have a process! And frankly (after all these years) I'm amazed that you didn't think you did. :-) I'm glad you've owned it.

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  11. You have multitudes going on but only a few are in the physical realm. Makes sense to me.

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  12. I always thought I had to have that writing space as well. Usually what happens is I write at the end of the day (In whatever space I can claim as my own) with emotions that are leftover and stale. What I want to do is write in the moments; when the wind is high, or the feelings are fresh, or when I'm laying supine on a beach somewhere sucking down another McDonald's milkshake .. and enjoying it. Because that's how "real" writers write - right?
    I don't have a process. Maybe if I did I would be able to find my space. My voice.

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  13. This is it, Jane: what we think we *should* look like and what our space should be like. We write, we learn, we grown... and as long as time disappears when I got lost in my words, it feels like magic to me. Thanks for coming by.

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  14. I write in my head all day long. It's finding the physical time, when I'm not too exhausted to bring it together into an actual piece of writing not a basic outline, that's an issue. But I don't aspire. I like to tell a story and if someone enjoys it, cool. And Jane! Jane's voice is amazing, she doesn't even need a process for that. How could she not know?

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  15. I don't usually write. I only write my to-do-list everyday. But I am starting to feel that writing helps you free your mine from problems. What I am really doing here is that I love reading what people's comments and how they do it. Because I do not really know how to write. So, this is how I write! Comment ME!

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  16. You know, I think I'm delusional. I have only been published - though often-ish - on a couple humor sites. I have never seen my words on paper that has been sanctioned by a publisher. I have never been published for monetary compensation, only "exposure". Yet, somehow - bum that I am - I have always thought of myself as a writer. I think I need an ice-cold shower, a scalding cup of coffee, or a therapist to pull me out of this delusion.

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