Writer Tips:
There are seasons to write and seasons not to write (7-25-08)
*Note This is a first draft and I want to post even though I don't have time to clean it up. So now you can see what writer's first drafts look like. Please forgive typos, run on sentences, and well the rest of the messes.
The quote from the Bible about Seasons is one of my favorites. And this week has proved to me once again that in our lives there are many different times and seasons.
And for me, this week, this is a season not to write.
The summer has been crazy and the past several weeks have been spent getting my daughter's new apartment cleaned, painted and then all her belongings moved in including new furniture (do you know if you buy furniture on line, it often comes unassembled--very fun!) put together and into place. We were done last Saturday afternoon. On Sunday my husband and I put our place back together since our daughter had been living with us, and during that time many of our things had been put in storage.
Monday was a quiet day. It was going to be a quiet week. I was going to write and write, and write, and read and read and read, and take nice long walks in the park listening to a book on Audible.
And Monday I did write. I got another chapter of my new novel for adults (working title BOW YOUR HEAD AND SAY YES), written. I took a long walk in the park and listened to part of a Joyce Carol Oates book. I'd never read her before, just as I have never read many well known authors and that is because so much of my early life was spent, um, well, reading the Bible and other church literature. Very fun. But that is a topic for another day!
Then the call came. That evening, around eight p.m. Do calls about death ever come at a good time?
My brother in law, a man that over the years I had struggled to understand, fought with, teased with and finally become very close friends with had died. He was found in his apartment alone, dead for two days. His daughter and my daughter and my daughter's partner, my sort of like son in law, took care of the police and removal of the body, while my husband and I hurriedly packed and drove in the middle of the night from NYC to Washington DC.
I was crying and sobbing and sad and felt so cheated. And over the days several days even, now as I have been busy cooking for relatives making sure the sad are at least drinking water, cleaning, hugging my nieces and nephew, the sad adult children of my brother in law and cuddling the innocent grandchildren who have no idea where Grandpa is (I want to tell them me either), I during all this, occasionally I would find a few quiet moments to think.
One of the stories that sticks with me from my MFA days at Vermont College was one told by a mentor of mine, a wonderful writer, and human being, Ellen Howard. She told me the story of a famous author, and I can't remember his name, it was a man, who had stopped at the mirror to look at himself in the foyer before entering his father's funeral. He took a good long look at himself, because he wanted to remember how grief looked, so he could describe it later.
So many poignant emotional things have happened this week. I have not written, but yet the writer in me has not stopped. It's taking mental notes and I know much of what I am experiencing right now will end up in my writing. I have seen my daughter and her partner reaching out, stretching beyond what we normally have strength for as humans to give compassion and help. I have seen hurt by some turn into meanness. I've had friends of mine reach out in the dearest, most tender ways. I've seen grief that has left has left my niece rubbing at her painful migraine while she made decisions no twenty-something daughter should have to make. I've hugged my other silent crying niece and as we stood not speaking bound together as one, words seemed like a frivolous expenditure I could not afford to use. I saw my big strong nephew come in from the plane, and before we hugged we looked at each other and I knew for him, and for all of them it was too much, way too close to the recent death of their mother. And I knew he was being stoic right then as he gave me his famous welcome half smile I have always loved, but probably like at his mother's funeral he would completely fall apart. I saw it all in his eyes, and he saw that I saw it.
I used to be so anal about my writing I tried to write EVERY SINGLE DAY no matter what was happening in my personal life. And guess what, it didn't take too long to realize the writing I wrote on days like I've had this week, was total crap. I had to pitch it. So now I don't write when life is too full for me to spare time for the writing. But I live the writer's life. I take mental notes and I have come to know that writing is so much more than sitting down with pen and ink, typewriter or computer. It's observing, it's feeling, its watching the human interaction, it's smelling the flowers on the way to the subway, it's so many many wonderful things. It's sadness, it's joy, it's life, it's death.
Write to your own Strengths (7-6-08)
I just read a great novel, and the writer is a professional actress. She could describe characters movements and non-verbal movements so well, I was frankly, well jealous. I thought I must start doing this. I must learn to write just like her. I must!
But then this voice, this tiny voice inside my head, the voice I trust to help me write my stories spoke. It said, stick to what you love, and what you do well and that will make the best story.
And so I began to think and ponder. I realized of course that some writers are great at dialog, others at descriptions, and other with the use of metaphors, and still more with the use of lyrical language, and the list goes on.
But not everyone is good at everything.
One thing I am okay at is setting. It's almost as important to me as one of my characters, yet I read books where the setting barely comes up, they lived in a neighborhood on the edge of town, the end, as far as setting and still it is a good book, still I enjoy what I have read. But for me, who is a very visual person, who is very swayed by the weather, the sun, the rain, the cold the greens of summer and the browns and grays of winters, setting is important. So my voice inside my head, that day, said use it. So I started to take stock of what comes easy to me, what I like to write about, what is important to me in a story. And after a while I began to feel okay about me as a writer. I don't have to have the insights of a professional actress to tell a good story. I just have to be good at the parts I am passionate about. Does that make sense?
So if you are wondering how to make your voice stronger, your story sing like a heavenly anthem then maybe take a few minutes out to evaluate your strengths and weaknesses as a writer. I'm not saying forget about your weaknesses. I still need to describe my characters, even though I am so uncreative in that area that I tend to describe all of them as having bouncy red hair and freckles, I 've got to stretch my wings and find a few more ways to describe people, but that doesn't have to be where the heart of my story is, in the description of my characters. My characters can have some basic, hopefully unique descriptions and then more importantly I will show who they are through how they react to their setting. They can feel the chill in the air, the gray of the sky or the watch the hapy swaying of sunshiny daisies to help reflect their moods.
And I think when something really important happens in your story, then use your strengths to get the point across, if that's dialog use dialog, if it's metaphor, use that, for me, I'll probably say something like, Beckie was in a the middle of the woods on her walk, when she realized that she didn't have to be good at everything, she just had to be really good at the things she was already good at. And suddenly the pines smelt like Christmas, the birds chirping sounded like harps from heaven, and well you get it...right?
Put it in a story! (6-1-08)
Are you really mad about something? The war in Iraq? The treatment of women, especially in third world countries? Our dependence on fossil fuel? Or simply the way the guy in the SUV honked and almost ran over you when you were crossing the street in the cross walk when the light was green for you?
Those are all things I get mad about, and when something bad or mean happens to me, instead of continuing to fume inside, I think, now how can I use this in a story. So many little hurtful incidents that I have felt are now camouflaged into my writing. It gives me a feeling of being heard, it allows to me complain about the injustice, feel a sense of empowerment and I don't have to sue the person, or country or go to court.
One of my biggest angers lately is street harassment. I know it can happen to anyone, but I feel gays, lesbians and straight women are the main targets, and who do I think are the main harassers? Straight males. I have been the victim of street harassment since I reached puberty, and am still getting harassed at least once a week now, as a fifty year old woman in NYC. One of the worst comments happened not long ago when I was walking on a busy street and Manhattan, and some man saw me and said, "Mama, I would love to take those titties of yours home and give them some loving." I was outraged. But I did nothing. Most of us never do. And so it continues. But I am writing a novel about a teenage girl who is also a runner, and she gets harassed more than most because she's out there every day on the streets, alone, running. Writing this new novel, I found, helps me cope with my own feeling of having no voice or ability to stop this type of abuse. And when you write about the emotions that you have actually felt, even though you may disguise them in fiction, I find that my writing is strong, and my best kind of writing. So if you are angry or hurt, and don't know what to do with it, think of a way to use it in your fiction. It's free therapy and well a sort of pay back for the jerks who try to ruin our lives and makes authentic writing!
I have found a great website on Street Harassment, and they are looking for people to share their stories. It's a great way to get started on venting. I shared my story and I feel better and more empowered already!
So take those lemons in your life and make them into lemon aid or stories where you can make the bad people lose and the good people win. You'll be amazed how great it can make you feel!
Finally....a new Writer's Tip (5-9-08)
I've been ill for the last three months, and I've had a lot of time to think and to count my blessings. During that time I was too sick to read or to write. Now I'm back to doing both and it feels so good, like a warm bath when you're cold or the sun breaking through the rain clouds after a freezing down pour. And I'm also working with my trusted critique friends again. Yesterday I got off the phone with a dear friend who reads my work and I read hers. We can see a thing in each other's writing that we miss in our own writing. I sort of floated after the phone call yesterday realizing how much it means to me to have someone else look at my work, give it their honest opinion, and help me make the story in my heart come to completion on paper. And how fun it was to hear her say, "Oh Beckie, that is brilliant, that is exactly what my story needed. I would have never thought of that."
Finding people you can trust to rip apart your work and who trust enough to let you give your honest opinion is a careful choice for me now. There are many people willing to rewrite your story the way they want it or envision it to be, there are many people who will flatter you and say "it's so great," but I have found that there are only a few who will be honest, and brutal with kindness if necessary.
When I first started writing I wrote a draft of a little picture book. I sent it around to my family members and several of my friends and took every single person's input. Then after rewriting the story I sent it back to my brother, who also writes. He said, something's missing out of this version. It's like the heart of the story is gone. Do you have the original?"
I groaned inside. I had not saved the original. I just saved the story as I revised it every day. Hard as I tried I could never bring back that story. I had to put it away. But I learned an important lesson--too many chiefs ruin the stew. So now I always save copies of the first and other drafts, and I also have learned to limit the people I share my writing with and most importantly to trust my gut.
When someone gives me critique I listen, I don't argue, and I take notes. But then I ponder it, and mostly right away I know if I will take their input or not. Usually I have an ah-ha feeling. It's like I knew something was wrong with that part of the story, but I couldn't put my finger on it, and when I hear the solution, I know it and am so grateful and can't wait to go into the computer and do the rewrite. Other times if more than one person complains about the same area, but gives me a suggestion I don't like, or the suggestion doesn't give me the ah-ha feeling, I still analyze that part of the story. I try to see what is weak in that part, and even if I don't take their suggestion, I try to make my writing more clear in that area, so that the point I did want to make comes across more clearly.
I also let very few people see my writing. I have three or four trusted friends and my two daughters and husband. Over the course of the drafts of Converting Kate all of them saw drafts of my novel, but not all at the same time. And I didn't take all their advice. I trust my heart. I realize that only I really know the heart of my story. I keep tuned to that as I take in critique. I only take advice from my trusted readers that will help the heart of my story become stronger. If I am not true to this idea, holding strong to the heart of my story, I believe I will lose my own voice. My writing will become the echoes of many people, a patchwork story without heart, and worst of all it will lose its magic.