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On writing and me and where I go from here
Tue, Jan. 10th, 2017 10:26 pmI have been a writer my entire life. My first publication came in third grade, when the class published a newsletter. My audience was 30 kids and, possibly, their parents. I don't remember the specifics of the article, but I do remember one moment of editing, when my teacher changed the sentence, "Each student made up Indian names for themselves" to "Each student gave themselves Indian names." Factually speaking, her edit was incorrect, because we were never given guidelines or resources for finding actual native American names. We made them up, based on what we'd read in some book or seen in some movie. I remember it irked me. Yes, in third grade, I was capable of being irked. About being edited. Oh, the irony.
( Beneath the cut: some history )
The last couple of years, there's been almost no writing at all. What little I've tried has been almost painful. Rejection, somehow, has gotten harder to take rather than easier. And I just . . . just stopped. Except for occasional forays on Live Journal, there's been nothing. A lot of the lack of creativity has had to do with depression. As I’ve written about here before, for a while I was surrounded by people with cancer, which took me back to my core trauma (my mother’s death) and pretty much paralyzed all of my art—whether it was writing or making jewelry or photography or singing.
I began thinking recently that I really need to write again. Fiction feels hard right now; it feels sensitive and sore, too hot and painful to touch, like it’s a big part of the wounds of the summer and fall. So, I’m taking a page from Inigo Montoya (who took a page from Vizzini): When the job goes wrong, you go back to the beginning. I’ve pulled out my copy of A Poetry Handbook by Mary Oliver and started to read and take notes. I’ve also started to write each morning, a couple of pages of whatever comes. I’ve had a couple of ideas for poems. I’ve been looking over older work, wondering why I didn’t submit some of the pieces I’m seeing now with fresher eyes. I guess we’ll see what happens from here.
( Beneath the cut: some history )
The last couple of years, there's been almost no writing at all. What little I've tried has been almost painful. Rejection, somehow, has gotten harder to take rather than easier. And I just . . . just stopped. Except for occasional forays on Live Journal, there's been nothing. A lot of the lack of creativity has had to do with depression. As I’ve written about here before, for a while I was surrounded by people with cancer, which took me back to my core trauma (my mother’s death) and pretty much paralyzed all of my art—whether it was writing or making jewelry or photography or singing.
I began thinking recently that I really need to write again. Fiction feels hard right now; it feels sensitive and sore, too hot and painful to touch, like it’s a big part of the wounds of the summer and fall. So, I’m taking a page from Inigo Montoya (who took a page from Vizzini): When the job goes wrong, you go back to the beginning. I’ve pulled out my copy of A Poetry Handbook by Mary Oliver and started to read and take notes. I’ve also started to write each morning, a couple of pages of whatever comes. I’ve had a couple of ideas for poems. I’ve been looking over older work, wondering why I didn’t submit some of the pieces I’m seeing now with fresher eyes. I guess we’ll see what happens from here.