Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Dear Reader,

After looking back on all of my posts, I realize that I talked a lot about reading, but not much about writing. This is, after all, a blog about reading AND writing. So, without further ado, here it goes:\

I recently graduated from college with a four-year degree in secondary education to teach High School English. I have spent the last four months teaching, and while it has had its fair share of ups, I realize now that what I really want to teach is writing. Not academic writing, though I admit it does have a place in my repertoire. I want to teach creative writing. Before studying education for four years, I spent three years pursuing a degree in professional writing. Before that, I took a three-year creative writing course in high school. I am 30. I have been writing for a while.

But even though I have been writing for half of my life, I have never had a story published. Is it because I'm a bad writer? Is it because people don't want to read what I have to write? Have I been constantly rejected? No, no, and no. The truth is that I haven't put as much effort into it as I should have. I can say that life got in the way (which it did) or that I was busy in school (which I was), but the fact remains that I have been lazy.

There was an author, I don't remember his name, who once said that he writes novels because he doesn't have time to write short stories. The fact of the matter is that writing takes time. Not everybody can be Stephen King and bust out two novels a year. However, even Stephen King would probably say that writing takes time. First, you need an idea, which is the second hardest part of the writing process. This is immediately followed by the hardest part, getting started. That blank sheet of paper or blank computer screen is a constant reminder to writers that they have done nothing, that they are failures.

Once the first words are written, writers can breathe a little, but their jobs are not yet done. They have to fight the impulse to edit as they write. If you are constantly editing as you go, you are not likely to get past the third page. Your manuscript will never be perfect. Once you are finished with the whole thing, feel free to edit, but not before. This may be difficult, but one thing you should remember as you write is the advice of author Anne Lamott in her book about writing titled Bird by Bird: Write shitty first drafts. Just throw up on the page now and clean it up later.

I am forcing myself to do some more writing, so hopefully I will be on here more. Until then, Reader:

Speak freely. Write candidly. Read endlessly.

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