I’ve been mesmerized by birds lately.
Each day on my way home from work I sit at the same stoplight, a busy intersection near a train track. Lately, between 5:15 and 5:30, there have been hundreds of birds there. I have no idea where they all come from. I sit in my car, listening to the click click click of my turn signal, and stare at them. Small, dark colored birds, I don’t know what kind, flying in swarms, flitting back and forth and up and down and close together and far apart and back and forth again in a pulsating motion, suspended in mid-air not unlike schools of fish in the ocean. They dance in groups, directed by some invisible choreographer, rising and falling as if on cue. They seem to know exactly how to move in order to keep from running into any of the other eight hundred flapping dancers.
Because of the recent time change, the sun is already starting to set during my drive home. The shimmering disc floats just above the horizon, casting a warm glow on the clouds, turning them into puffs of strawberry cotton candy strewn across the sky. The telephone lines reflect the fall sun as bright orange strings where the birds gather to rest. For one brief moment they all clamor to balance on the phone lines. They squeeze in, fill in the gaps, chattering noisily like a crowd. I start to wonder what it’s like to be a bird. What do they do all day? Is their entire life comprised of dancing and resting on telephone wires? What did they do before telephone wires? What must it have been like to be out for a walk, and come across a tree, full of birds that were chirping and hopping from branch to branch, buzzing with life like a beehive? The verse comes to mind about God caring enough to keep every bird fed, and how much more important we are to God than birds. I wonder if He has named each and every one of them.
Then, at some unseen signal, in one swift rippling motion they all lift up, fly away, disperse, filling the sky with small dark dots. The golden lines are suddenly vacant. I am no longer thinking of them as wires, but as empty places were birds used to rest. I wonder if they will all return, if ten minutes from now someone else will be sitting at the light and notice the birds all sitting there anxiously waiting for takeoff.
But then the light turns green and the car in front of me moves. I forget about the birds and focus on the traffic. I drive away, my turn signal silencing itself, leaving the road behind me, an empty place were I used to rest.
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
11.07.2012
11.02.2012
Narratives and Donald Miller
A few weeks ago, I was on my way to a friend’s wedding and stopped to get coffee. A few things you should know: 1) I’m not usually the kind of person who drinks coffee or 2) spends $4 on a small drink. But it was a chilly day, and I knew the ceremony was going to be outside, and I have recently become addicted to Salty Caramel Mochas because they’re amazing. I was a little early so I stopped at a shop on the edge of town and went inside to splurge on a tasty drink. As I was waiting for them to make it, I spotted a poster hanging on the community bulletin board with a photo of author Don Miller, which I thought was weird, because who hangs photos of authors up at Starbucks? I was super excited to see that not only would he would be speaking at a free event, but that it was at the church I’ve started attending in the area. I immediately used my phone to register online and put it on my calendar. Pretty sure the baristas thought I was weird, but oh well.
I decided to prepare for the evening by re-reading all of his books that I own. I forgot how much I loved his writings. I mean, I remembered that I liked them, obviously, but I forgot how great they were. Over the course of three books I wrote almost 20 pages of quotes and reflections in my journal. That’s crazy. But I feel like I learned so much that I want to read them again already, if that makes sense.
One of the things I like most about his books is his transparency in them. Not that he’s the Invisible Man or something, but that when he writes he talks about all his faults and frustrations and insights as if he’s sitting right there telling them to you. His books, along with those of Anne Lamott and others, inspired me to practice writing creative nonfiction in college. Between his books and Twitter and his blog I felt like he was a friend of mine already, if its possible to be friends with someone you haven’t met who has no idea who you are (also, that one time when my tweet was printed in Relevant he was on the cover, so now we’re both published writers and would obviously be friends in real life).
I went to the talk tonight, and it was great, just as I expected. I ran into some friends from college, there was some lovely worship time, and Don told stories about stories and talked about Jesus. People seemed surprised that he was funny, which made no sense to me because his books can be hilarious, and he was slightly awkward, as he’s always claimed to be, although in an endearing way not in a cringe-worthy kind of way. He was available for autographs and photos afterwards, but I didn’t stick around. I hung around the lobby for a little bit, trying to decide if I should, and started thinking:
And then I left. At the end of the day, autographs really don’t matter much to me. The guy from Ashland theological Seminary who introduced him said he hoped that we learned a lot from the event, and judging by my furiously written notes, I did. Who knew you could learn so much by buying a single cup of coffee?
I decided to prepare for the evening by re-reading all of his books that I own. I forgot how much I loved his writings. I mean, I remembered that I liked them, obviously, but I forgot how great they were. Over the course of three books I wrote almost 20 pages of quotes and reflections in my journal. That’s crazy. But I feel like I learned so much that I want to read them again already, if that makes sense.
One of the things I like most about his books is his transparency in them. Not that he’s the Invisible Man or something, but that when he writes he talks about all his faults and frustrations and insights as if he’s sitting right there telling them to you. His books, along with those of Anne Lamott and others, inspired me to practice writing creative nonfiction in college. Between his books and Twitter and his blog I felt like he was a friend of mine already, if its possible to be friends with someone you haven’t met who has no idea who you are (also, that one time when my tweet was printed in Relevant he was on the cover, so now we’re both published writers and would obviously be friends in real life).
I went to the talk tonight, and it was great, just as I expected. I ran into some friends from college, there was some lovely worship time, and Don told stories about stories and talked about Jesus. People seemed surprised that he was funny, which made no sense to me because his books can be hilarious, and he was slightly awkward, as he’s always claimed to be, although in an endearing way not in a cringe-worthy kind of way. He was available for autographs and photos afterwards, but I didn’t stick around. I hung around the lobby for a little bit, trying to decide if I should, and started thinking:
- It must be incredibly exhausting to get up and talk in front of a crowd of people and then smile and shake hands with strangers for an hour or so. I’m glad I’m not a famous writer.
- How weird is it that we show people how great we think they are by asking them to write their name on our stuff? Shouldn’t we be bringing them gifts, rather than asking them to give us something?
- If I do get in that line, and wait twenty minutes, what will I say? I’m not good at meeting people. What if I get to the front of the line only to do something weird, like in Empire Records when that lady comes in for Rex Manning Day and sings him a line from his song and he looks around like he can’t believe his life has come to this? That would be horrible. And I bet Don Miller doesn’t even like that Rex Manning song.
And then I left. At the end of the day, autographs really don’t matter much to me. The guy from Ashland theological Seminary who introduced him said he hoped that we learned a lot from the event, and judging by my furiously written notes, I did. Who knew you could learn so much by buying a single cup of coffee?
10.29.2012
Top 5: NaNoWriMo 2012 Fears
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| Fake book cover I designed for my NaNoWriMo novel |
I don't know how all of this happened to come together at the same time, but it did. And now NaNoWriMo is only two days away (!!!), Hurricane Sandy is sending some rain and high winds our way, it's almost Halloween, and I have a lot to be scared about. Here are my biggest fears about NaNoWriMo 2012:
5. My gothic novel will turn into a sappy romance.
I'm not a sappy romance kind of person. I like chick flicks and Pride and Prejudice as much as the next girl, but will not deal with stuff like Christian historical romance or Nicholas Sparks novels. And yet somehow, the last couple of novels I've started outlining have turned into romances. I don't know why. One was about a female programmer who worked making video games and didn't realize the cute guy she grew up with was in love with her. Another was about a woman with such low self-esteem that she took to dating sad guys from dating sites to make herself feel better and fell for the guy she thought was a jerk for seeing through her ruse. An even earlier draft featured a young woman who wrote young adult mystery novels and tried not to love the annoying guy she worked with at the local newspaper. Maybe I should start writing chick flick screenplays or something.
4. My characters will evolve into stereotypes of famous characters.
I try very hard to create original characters with flaws and frustrations and all the rest. I give them hairstyles and back stories and favorite colors and name heir childhood pets. As I write them, though, I always have this fear that they are going to turn stereotypical. Like my heroine will become the "plucky female lead character who thinks she's unlovable" and my hero will turn into Heathcliff with a different name. We don't need another Heathcliff.
3. I won't be able to come up with a good ending.
I love the prep-work of writing a novel: the character profiling, researching the setting, getting the clothes and decor and season thought out. I love the noting and the listing and the outlining. Unfortunately, I'm not very good at the finishing. Those other stories I mentioned above? I have the first two-thirds of their plots completely fleshed out: chapter-by-chapter outlines, story arcs, even chapters written. But I couldn't figure out how to finish any of them. How does the programmer learn the guy loves her? How does the low-self-esteem girl get her self-esteem back? Does the writer get her novels published? I don't know! I have a great start on an idea for my 2012 book but have no idea what is causing the mysterious things to happen. If it ends up being a lighthouse keeper in a mask with a projector, you'll know I hit a brick wall.
2. The power will go out and I'll have to write (and count) all 50,000 words by hand.
I don't live on the east coast, but Columbus is still on the edge of the warning area for the effects of Hurricane Sandy (aka the "Frankenstorm") and we're bracing for the worst. People are buying up canned soup and batteries like it's Y2K. I'm just worried that if the power does happen to go out for a few days like when the derecho went through a few months ago, my laptop battery will soon die and I will be stuck doing things longhand. But if it does come to that, I have two new notebooks, a jar of peanut butter, and a whole bottle of wine in the fridge.
1. I'll give up after about 300 words and my novel will never see the light of day.
This is my biggest fear because it's happened before. I've been trying to participate in NaNoWriMo for a couple of years now and it hasn't worked out. Last year I wasn't home much in November. The year before that I tried to write the dating site story and all I got was one scene and didn't know what else to write. This year is going to be different. I live alone. I don't have cable. I have told multiple people about my story idea and they are excited to read it. I'm going to do everything in my power to write all 50,000 words, despite Dune and Donald Miller and my birthday party. This book is going to happen!
Anyone participating in NaNoWriMo this year? What's your book about?
7.16.2012
Top 5: Words I Usually Misspell
As a former English major, I really should know better than to have bad grammar. The other day I used the wrong "to" in a text message and twice this afternoon I've typed "no" instead of "know." I don't know what's happening to me, maybe I need to take some remedial spelling tests or something? Despite my recent failure to communicate, there have always been some words that I consistently spell incorrectly (I'm sure everyone has a similar list, even if they don't like to admit it). These are the five words that I have to look up in the dictionary the most.
5. Misspell
Seriously, I had to look it up before I titled this post because I can never remember how many S's are in it. The worst part is that the reason I always misspell it is that I once read that it is a commonly confused word, and they explained that rather than compounding miss + spell into "missspell" or "miss-spell" it has one less S, as in "misunderstand." Therefore I always try to give it less S's and end up with "mispell," which means nothing.
4. Receipt
Who decided it was a good idea to put silent letters in words? Words like "aisle," "knife," "gnarl" and "chord" have too many consonants, to the bane of schoolchildren taking spelling tests worldwide. What good does putting that "g" on the front of "gnarl" do besides make it look cooler? It has absolutely no effect on the sound. And the word "receipt" is extra tricky, with a silent letter AND and "E" before an "I." That's just uncalled for.
3. Ridiculous
Sometimes I wish that English had a different letter for every single sound in our language. I know we would probably end up with 47 letters with weird accents and notations, but it sure would make pronunciation easier. I always try to spell this "rediculous" because I associate the "rid-" spelling with long i sounds like the word "ride." I propose we adopt the phonetic spellings that come after words in the dictionary and start using things like upside-down e's in everyday writing.
2. License
I don't know who made up this stupid word. It's probably Latin, which would explain the awkward spelling. For some reason it uses an "s" and a "c" to represent the same sound in the same word, just to make things more confusing. It typically takes me a couple of tries (lisence, licensce, licence) before I land on the right one. Can't we just call it a permit?
1.Recieved Received
Never fail, every single time I type that word I do it wrong. I know that "I" goes before "E" except after "C" - the phrase was drilled into me during elementary spelling lessons - but for the life of me I cannot remember it when I'm trying to write the word. Who made up that rule, anyway? I think that since my name (Wesleigh) is one of the "... and on certain occasions" that "E" can come before "I" I subconsciously believe that it is the correct way to arrange the letters. Or at least that's what I tell myself.
5. Misspell
Seriously, I had to look it up before I titled this post because I can never remember how many S's are in it. The worst part is that the reason I always misspell it is that I once read that it is a commonly confused word, and they explained that rather than compounding miss + spell into "missspell" or "miss-spell" it has one less S, as in "misunderstand." Therefore I always try to give it less S's and end up with "mispell," which means nothing.
4. Receipt
Who decided it was a good idea to put silent letters in words? Words like "aisle," "knife," "gnarl" and "chord" have too many consonants, to the bane of schoolchildren taking spelling tests worldwide. What good does putting that "g" on the front of "gnarl" do besides make it look cooler? It has absolutely no effect on the sound. And the word "receipt" is extra tricky, with a silent letter AND and "E" before an "I." That's just uncalled for.
3. Ridiculous
Sometimes I wish that English had a different letter for every single sound in our language. I know we would probably end up with 47 letters with weird accents and notations, but it sure would make pronunciation easier. I always try to spell this "rediculous" because I associate the "rid-" spelling with long i sounds like the word "ride." I propose we adopt the phonetic spellings that come after words in the dictionary and start using things like upside-down e's in everyday writing.
2. License
I don't know who made up this stupid word. It's probably Latin, which would explain the awkward spelling. For some reason it uses an "s" and a "c" to represent the same sound in the same word, just to make things more confusing. It typically takes me a couple of tries (lisence, licensce, licence) before I land on the right one. Can't we just call it a permit?
1.
Never fail, every single time I type that word I do it wrong. I know that "I" goes before "E" except after "C" - the phrase was drilled into me during elementary spelling lessons - but for the life of me I cannot remember it when I'm trying to write the word. Who made up that rule, anyway? I think that since my name (Wesleigh) is one of the "... and on certain occasions" that "E" can come before "I" I subconsciously believe that it is the correct way to arrange the letters. Or at least that's what I tell myself.
6.18.2012
My Newest Project: Blessedly Peculiar
Just in case you don't follow my Twitter and Facebook updates, I'd like to introduce you to my newest endeavor: Blessedly Peculiar.
Blessedly Peculiar is a new blog that I've started featuring devotional writings and inspirational quotes aimed towards who I'm referring to as "unconventional Christians": believers who find inspiration in a wide variety of places, from summer blockbusters to classic literature. It's a way for me to get into the habit of reading and writing about my faith as well as a way to share the weird things I find inspirational with others. I'm updating three times a week, with a pop-culture-inspired devotion on Mondays, a short Bible study on Tuesdays, and a quote on Fridays. You can follow the project through Blogger, Tumblr, Twitter and Facebook for updates in whatever way you like best. Please check it out!
Blessedly Peculiar is a new blog that I've started featuring devotional writings and inspirational quotes aimed towards who I'm referring to as "unconventional Christians": believers who find inspiration in a wide variety of places, from summer blockbusters to classic literature. It's a way for me to get into the habit of reading and writing about my faith as well as a way to share the weird things I find inspirational with others. I'm updating three times a week, with a pop-culture-inspired devotion on Mondays, a short Bible study on Tuesdays, and a quote on Fridays. You can follow the project through Blogger, Tumblr, Twitter and Facebook for updates in whatever way you like best. Please check it out!
6.03.2012
Plus-Sized Heroines
I was poking around the Goodreads website today, adding some books to my “To Read” list, and saw an add for a new title by the author Liza Palmer. Palmer’s first novel, Conversations with the Fat Girl, is one of my favorites comfort reads about a plus-sized woman working a dead-end job, getting kicked out of her apartment, and watching her now-size-4 best friend have the perfect wedding. As a non-skinny person myself, I’m always glad to read about heroines who are normal sized instead of looking like underfed super models. (Seriously, there is nothing more annoying than reading the back of a book that sounds really good until you come across a line like “Can Amanda prove to the handsome doctor she is working alongside while tending to the poor in the Congo that despite her title as Miss Universe she’s more than just a pretty face, finally finding a man that loves her for her brains as well?” Come on, how many people can relate to that?) The page for Conversations showed some other novels like it, and after a few clicks I found myself at a list of 80 books with plus-sized heroines as recommended by other readers on the site.
I scanned through the list and found a few of my favorites (like Bridget Jones’ Diary and The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things) as well as a few that surprised me (Silence of the Lambs? Really?). I read through the descriptions of a few hoping to find some new treasures. What I realized as I read abstract after abstract was that while it was true that they all featured plus-sized heroines, the majority of them also featured heroines who were on diets in order to either a) like themselves or b) get a guy to like them.
Why is it that we can’t have normal-sized women without them having weight issues? In every novel I’ve read with a plus-sized leading lady, the woman was basically ashamed of her size and tended to eat her feelings. Bridget Jones judged bad days by how many sweets she’d eaten. Maggie in Conversations had a weakness for pink boxes from the local bakery. Even in The Earth… teenage heroine Virginia felt guilted into eating salads by the people who gave her evil looks when she stopped to get a slice of pizza at a NY street-cart. Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I read a book about a curvaceous lady who was happy with the way she looked.
Hollywood isn’t immune to this concept, either. I can only think of a handful of films where the woman didn’t have to go through an ultra-slimming transformation in order to land the guy. Besides the aforementioned Bridget Jones, the only things I can think of are Queen Latifah’s romantic comedies (like Last Holiday), the musical Hairspray (plump teenager girl snags the heartthrob!), and Shrek – which, although animated and about ogres, featured a princess whose true love preferred her plump rather than trim. I considered adding My Big Fat Greek Wedding to this list, but the bride had to have a complete makeover before her crush would make a move. (I do have to give props to Melissa McCarthy, the fabulous actress from Bridesmaids, Mike and Molly, and Gilmore Girls, for always playing a “woman who happens to be chubby” rather than a stereotypical “chubby woman”. You go, Melissa!)
If the average American woman is a size 12, then why aren’t we publishing books and making movies about women like the majority? We have no problem putting average guys like Kevin James in leading roles, but where are the average ladies? I mentioned this before in my post about the movie Marty, but I would love to see a movie, TV show, or novel about a curvy woman who not only is content with the way she looks but ends up with a handsome guy who loves her for who she is and what she looks like – no makeovers involved.
Part of me feels like it is my responsibility to write stories and books with plus-sized leading ladies. Every storyline I come up with features an average-looking girl looking for, running from, or denying love. You know how writers say they have a story inside them that needs to be told? Maybe this is my story. Surely there are women and girls out there who would love to read about a heroine who looks just like them but doesn’t need to be on a diet to love herself. I know my sixteen-year-old-self would have appreciated it.
Princess Fiona photo courtesy of dreamworks.wikia.com
I scanned through the list and found a few of my favorites (like Bridget Jones’ Diary and The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things) as well as a few that surprised me (Silence of the Lambs? Really?). I read through the descriptions of a few hoping to find some new treasures. What I realized as I read abstract after abstract was that while it was true that they all featured plus-sized heroines, the majority of them also featured heroines who were on diets in order to either a) like themselves or b) get a guy to like them.
Why is it that we can’t have normal-sized women without them having weight issues? In every novel I’ve read with a plus-sized leading lady, the woman was basically ashamed of her size and tended to eat her feelings. Bridget Jones judged bad days by how many sweets she’d eaten. Maggie in Conversations had a weakness for pink boxes from the local bakery. Even in The Earth… teenage heroine Virginia felt guilted into eating salads by the people who gave her evil looks when she stopped to get a slice of pizza at a NY street-cart. Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I read a book about a curvaceous lady who was happy with the way she looked.
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| The only average-sized princess in movies happens to be green. |
If the average American woman is a size 12, then why aren’t we publishing books and making movies about women like the majority? We have no problem putting average guys like Kevin James in leading roles, but where are the average ladies? I mentioned this before in my post about the movie Marty, but I would love to see a movie, TV show, or novel about a curvy woman who not only is content with the way she looks but ends up with a handsome guy who loves her for who she is and what she looks like – no makeovers involved.
Part of me feels like it is my responsibility to write stories and books with plus-sized leading ladies. Every storyline I come up with features an average-looking girl looking for, running from, or denying love. You know how writers say they have a story inside them that needs to be told? Maybe this is my story. Surely there are women and girls out there who would love to read about a heroine who looks just like them but doesn’t need to be on a diet to love herself. I know my sixteen-year-old-self would have appreciated it.
Princess Fiona photo courtesy of dreamworks.wikia.com
4.29.2012
Blue Like Jazz
Anyway, I’ve been following the movie production via Don’s blog and Twitter, and have been excited to see how a memoir comprised of short essays could turn into a feature film. I had a hard time explaining the gist of the movie to the friends I went with – who had not read the book – even after watching the trailer. So we took the trek from Mansfield to Columbus to a theater where it was playing.
There were only about a dozen other people in the theater (not the entire cinema, just the one where Blue Like Jazz was being shown) which was kind of nice and sad at the same time. I was a bit worried that my friend’s wouldn’t like it, but the film turned out to be very good. I really enjoyed their choices in the adaptation – like Don’s mother’s affair, his friend being a lesbian, and other changes – and thought it told the story well. In my opinion, it showed a much closer to real-life view of what Christians deal with in world than the majority of Christian films. I have often found that movies paint a rose-colored version of life and I really enjoyed that the film included drinking, partying, cursing, the whole nine yards. It didn’t shy away from things just because it’s a “Christian” film.
I looked up some reviews and it seems like most people felt that the movie was too lukewarm and not hot or cold enough to make anyone happy. A cursory reading of a review from the New York Post shows that secular viewers found the film nice but dodging real questions of faith by pretending to be realistic. On the other end of the spectrum, Christianity Today said the movie was a “quirky and genuinely funny indie” but didn’t talk enough about Jesus and salvation and that the ending was somewhat unsatisfying.
Which, if you paid attention to the film, was the point. The title comes from Don’s realization that life, like jazz, doesn’t resolve cleanly – and that’s what makes jazz wonderful. So it makes sense that the movie doesn’t have a nicely-packaged ending. And in response to the New York Post, the point of the film wasn’t to answer all of religion’s questions, but to show Christians (and non-Christians) that life doesn’t become perfect because of faith. I thought it was excellent, enjoyable, and would definitely watch it again.
6.29.2011
Unicorns and glitter!
I just finished another post for my office's staff blog! Read "How to Write a Blog Post" here:
FrazierHeiby Staff Blog
And check out some of the other posts! There's some great stuff in our blog archives.
FrazierHeiby Staff Blog
And check out some of the other posts! There's some great stuff in our blog archives.
6.18.2011
What's the opposite of writer's block?
Every couple of months, I get the itch to write. Not just book review blogs or status updates or journal entries, but real, honest-to-goodness storytelling. I start to sit around with an open notebook or a blank word processor file and hope to come up with something. Anything. I usually end up writing things like this, which are about writing rather than something actually creative. Or just making to-do lists.
I was excited to write for NaNoWriMo this past fall, but ended with utter and complete failure. I had an entire plot and character lineup, with charts inspired by J.K. Rowling's HP spreadsheets, for my novel - but I think I only wrote a dismal 140 words. I couldn't get any of my thoughts to translate to story. But now it's been about six months, and I'm starting to get that feeling where words well up inside you like tears on the brink of spilling. Any second now the dam will break, and I need to figure out how to put all that water to good use.
A "good use" that has been haunting me from sometime during college to the present is creative non-fiction. Maybe haunting isn't the right word; maybe it's more like persistently lingering in hopes of inspiring. I'm not sure anymore.
What I do know is that it's one of my favorite genres. Somehow I've accumulated nearly a dozen creative non-fiction books, ranging from Capote's classic In Cold Blood to modern favorites like Eggers' A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. And I love them all. They're honest and gritty and beautiful and true to life, for the most part. There are no perfect white picket fence towns, or flawless damsels in distress, or overexaggeratingly evil nemesis. It's real people doing real things and having real thoughts. Fantastic!
The only downside to creative non-fiction is that I am terrible at it. Mostly because - shocker! - my real life is boring. It's true. I read things, I bake things. It's not all that glamorous. Then the other day I read a post on Twitter about someone blogging their way through a book, and I thought, maybe I should try writing through an experience. Lots of people have done it - Elizabeth Gilbert wrote about an experience in Eat Pray Love (I finished it, blog is coming soon!), Julie Powell blogged her way through The Art of French Cooking, A.J. Jacobs lived biblically for a year and penned a book - heck, even Thoreau wrote Walden about his experiences on the pond way back in 1854.
So, here's my question to you: What should I write through? What would you be interested in reading my reaction to? You're already seeing my book reviews, but I'm fishing for something that requires more than one update a month. I want to force myself to think more and write more. Any suggestions?
Leave me some comments! I want to know what you're thinking.
I was excited to write for NaNoWriMo this past fall, but ended with utter and complete failure. I had an entire plot and character lineup, with charts inspired by J.K. Rowling's HP spreadsheets, for my novel - but I think I only wrote a dismal 140 words. I couldn't get any of my thoughts to translate to story. But now it's been about six months, and I'm starting to get that feeling where words well up inside you like tears on the brink of spilling. Any second now the dam will break, and I need to figure out how to put all that water to good use.
A "good use" that has been haunting me from sometime during college to the present is creative non-fiction. Maybe haunting isn't the right word; maybe it's more like persistently lingering in hopes of inspiring. I'm not sure anymore.
What I do know is that it's one of my favorite genres. Somehow I've accumulated nearly a dozen creative non-fiction books, ranging from Capote's classic In Cold Blood to modern favorites like Eggers' A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. And I love them all. They're honest and gritty and beautiful and true to life, for the most part. There are no perfect white picket fence towns, or flawless damsels in distress, or overexaggeratingly evil nemesis. It's real people doing real things and having real thoughts. Fantastic!
The only downside to creative non-fiction is that I am terrible at it. Mostly because - shocker! - my real life is boring. It's true. I read things, I bake things. It's not all that glamorous. Then the other day I read a post on Twitter about someone blogging their way through a book, and I thought, maybe I should try writing through an experience. Lots of people have done it - Elizabeth Gilbert wrote about an experience in Eat Pray Love (I finished it, blog is coming soon!), Julie Powell blogged her way through The Art of French Cooking, A.J. Jacobs lived biblically for a year and penned a book - heck, even Thoreau wrote Walden about his experiences on the pond way back in 1854.
So, here's my question to you: What should I write through? What would you be interested in reading my reaction to? You're already seeing my book reviews, but I'm fishing for something that requires more than one update a month. I want to force myself to think more and write more. Any suggestions?
Leave me some comments! I want to know what you're thinking.
4.18.2011
Kill Your Darlings
I'm on the blogging rotation at work, so every other month or so I have the opportunity to write and share an article that gets published on the FrazierHeiby staff blog. My most recent one is about a professor's advice to "kill your darlings" - you can visit our blog here. You may have to scroll down to find my article. Feel free to read through some of the other blog posts, too!
11.20.2010
Baby's Breath
The following is a short story that I recently wrote. It's still in its early stages and may need some editing.
Standing near the water's edge he zips his jacket and burrows his hands deep in his pockets. The waves rush at the shore and crash loudly as if begging him to jump in. They don't seem to understand why he doesn't, and persistently continue, hoping this time will be different. It isn't.
Standing near the water's edge he zips his jacket and burrows his hands deep in his pockets. The waves rush at the shore and crash loudly as if begging him to jump in. They don't seem to understand why he doesn't, and persistently continue, hoping this time will be different. It isn't.
10.09.2010
NaNoWriMo
I am very excited for November this year. Not just because of my birthday, but because it's National Novel Writing Month!
Or NaNoWriMo, for short. I first heard about this from a fellow English major at school a few years ago and have wanted to participate ever since. The idea is to spend the entire month writing as much of an original novel as possible, with the goal of penning 50,000 words in 30 days. Unfortunately, while I was at school writing essays and designing projects, there was absolutely no free time to sit around and write a novel. Now that I've graduated and have a little more time on my hands I have decided that this is the year I will attempt my first novel.
Coming up with an idea for a story is always the hardest part for me as a writer. Once I have a plot and characters I know which direction they need to go, but getting to that point is the challenge. I haven't really written any fiction stories since the Creative Writing class I took in 2005 - everything I've done has been nonfiction or critical analysis. Or blog posts.
Which is where I found the concept for my novel! Looking back through the archives I found the one fictional thing I started, a scene I was inspired to write after seeing a commercial on late night television (which you can read here). The commercial was advertising some online dating site, and got me to thinking about how unequal things seem to be in the online dating world. In late night commercials especially, all the women going online to find a man are super attractive and scantily dressed. And the type of guys watching late night TV wishing they had a girlfriend probably aren't the cream of the crop. There has got to be a story there, right?
My thoughts exactly. So my novel is going to be about a woman named Suzanne who uses the guys who contact her through her online profile to get a free dinner and a boost of self-esteem before informing them that things aren't going to work out. I'm still fleshing out my characters and learning how they interact with each other, and then I'll start working out the outline for the chapters. I can't officially start writing until the early hours of November first, but until then I'll be doing as much research and brainstorming as I can. And if you happen to think of a great title, let me know! I haven't come up with one yet.
You can sign up or read more about NaNoWriMo at www.nanowrimo.org.
Or NaNoWriMo, for short. I first heard about this from a fellow English major at school a few years ago and have wanted to participate ever since. The idea is to spend the entire month writing as much of an original novel as possible, with the goal of penning 50,000 words in 30 days. Unfortunately, while I was at school writing essays and designing projects, there was absolutely no free time to sit around and write a novel. Now that I've graduated and have a little more time on my hands I have decided that this is the year I will attempt my first novel.
Coming up with an idea for a story is always the hardest part for me as a writer. Once I have a plot and characters I know which direction they need to go, but getting to that point is the challenge. I haven't really written any fiction stories since the Creative Writing class I took in 2005 - everything I've done has been nonfiction or critical analysis. Or blog posts.
Which is where I found the concept for my novel! Looking back through the archives I found the one fictional thing I started, a scene I was inspired to write after seeing a commercial on late night television (which you can read here). The commercial was advertising some online dating site, and got me to thinking about how unequal things seem to be in the online dating world. In late night commercials especially, all the women going online to find a man are super attractive and scantily dressed. And the type of guys watching late night TV wishing they had a girlfriend probably aren't the cream of the crop. There has got to be a story there, right?
My thoughts exactly. So my novel is going to be about a woman named Suzanne who uses the guys who contact her through her online profile to get a free dinner and a boost of self-esteem before informing them that things aren't going to work out. I'm still fleshing out my characters and learning how they interact with each other, and then I'll start working out the outline for the chapters. I can't officially start writing until the early hours of November first, but until then I'll be doing as much research and brainstorming as I can. And if you happen to think of a great title, let me know! I haven't come up with one yet.
You can sign up or read more about NaNoWriMo at www.nanowrimo.org.
7.06.2009
Experience
I was helping my parents with yardwork the other day when my father told me - yet again - that what we were doing was something I needed to write about. "This is definitely an experience," I said. "You don't know what an experience is yet," he told me. I wanted to argue, but as I thought about it, he's right. I'm only 22 years old, the most exciting things that have happened to me are a couple of school trips overseas. In his lifetime he's been married twice, gone through multiple jobs, raised three kids, lost his parents ... in comparison, my life is uneventful.
Many non-fictionists write about things they've done or places they've been, like the examples in Robert Root's book (The Nonfictionist's Guide: On Reading and Writing Creative Nonfiction) about the seafarer in Antarctica or seeing someone ready a copy of his novel on the subway. Root himself talked about all the writing he did while on a writer's wilderness retreat. I'm an average college student with a limited disposable income. I can't afford to go on excursions just to stimulate my writing. How can I compete with authors taking a year to go to Madrid or some other exotic destination and write about their observations?
But even as I say that I am reminded of Garrison Keillor's article in a recent issue of National Geographic. It was beautifully written and engaging, and was about county fairs of all things. If you're a good enough writer you can make anything exciting. Maybe if I tried I could even make my summer doing nothing exciting. I could talk about the fresh vegetables we char on the grill for dinner, the young deer flicking their tails in the backyard as they lick the salt block, or the sun beating down as we watch my niece's t-ball game. I can't imagine there is a lot of people who would want to read about all that, though.
Many non-fictionists write about things they've done or places they've been, like the examples in Robert Root's book (The Nonfictionist's Guide: On Reading and Writing Creative Nonfiction) about the seafarer in Antarctica or seeing someone ready a copy of his novel on the subway. Root himself talked about all the writing he did while on a writer's wilderness retreat. I'm an average college student with a limited disposable income. I can't afford to go on excursions just to stimulate my writing. How can I compete with authors taking a year to go to Madrid or some other exotic destination and write about their observations?
But even as I say that I am reminded of Garrison Keillor's article in a recent issue of National Geographic. It was beautifully written and engaging, and was about county fairs of all things. If you're a good enough writer you can make anything exciting. Maybe if I tried I could even make my summer doing nothing exciting. I could talk about the fresh vegetables we char on the grill for dinner, the young deer flicking their tails in the backyard as they lick the salt block, or the sun beating down as we watch my niece's t-ball game. I can't imagine there is a lot of people who would want to read about all that, though.
2.28.2008
Yeah Right
I started this blog hoping that I would start writing again. I told myself that I would post every day to get back into practice, or at least once a week. As it turns out, I don't have time for that. Or anything interesting to write about, for that matter. This week I have ... finished reading The Scarlet Letter and Wide Sargasso Sea for my English classes. Designed and pitched two logos for organizations on campus. Eaten an entire bag of Easter SweeTarts. So much for an exciting lifestyle.
The English Honors Society on campus is putting out a literary journal. I would love to publish something in it, but I haven't written anything of merit in a really long time. And it is really lame to publish something that you wrote two years ago for your creative writing class. I did design their logo, though. I guess that counts for something.
I guess I could work on a piece to put into the journal. Maybe a short story or an essay or even a rework blog entry on some interesting topic. It gives me a reason to get back to writing again. Remember back in junior high when they would ask you to make a story from three random elements drawn from a hat? You'd end up with something like a character who only dressed in yellow, a remote jungle, and a teacup and have to write a story about it. Those kinds of things always intrigued me, especially when you got to see how everyone else interpreted those three objects. I should try something like that again. How did that teacup get to that remote jungle, anyway?
2.19.2008
Theme Wanted. Inquire Within.
I really want to write a book.
I've always wanted to, actually. Ever since I was a kid and learned how to read, I wanted to create my own book. If you're reading this, then you probably haven't read my first entry about this, since posts are displayed newest to oldest. If you have read it, I am sorry to repeat myself.
It's just that lately, I have been having this nagging feeling that I need to be writing. Not that I should write again, not that it would be kind of nice to be working on a story again, but that I MUST WRITE. I've been taking notes on things unnecessarily, thinking of chapter titles, all sorts of ridiculous things that I have been using like rice cakes to curb my hunger to write.
The only problem is, I have absolutely no idea what to write about. I know that sounds like a cop-out, but it's true. I have discovered that fiction is not my strong point (i.e., my characters all turn out the same and my plots are lame. No one wants to read that.) and have decided to try my hand at non-fiction. I googled 'writing non fiction' to see what kind of stuff I came up with. Most of it was How to Publish Your Nonfiction and articles like that, but I did run across a few helpful hints from seasoned authors. For example, write frequently. Even if you don't feel like writing or have nothing to say, write anyway. That's a good idea, I guess. Hence this blog of me rambling about writing. Another tip suggested that as a writer you should specialize in something and write about that. Think about the things that you are interested in or that you have experienced or a truth that you have discovered and write about that. Unfortunately, I don't think I have anything worth writing about. I'm only in my early twenties, I come from a stable home in a nice town, there's not a whole lot of exciting events in my life. I'm not even out of college yet, I can't say that I am an expert in anything.
And yet, I feel as if my voice needs to be heard and my fingers itch to put words to paper. There has to be something about me that I can write about, something people could relate to and take inspiration from, something that needs to be heard. The hard part is going to be figuring out what that is.
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