Today’s post is number 51, a meaningful number if I want to be considered a mature blogger. Sounds old. Anyone who has been thinking about taking a memoir-writing course but is still on the fence: I need your warm body in my LCC DTC class tonight! A couple from last term’s essay class have had to drop out because of newly discovered cancer. Get well, Edythe!
OK, now for writing stuff. As this term begins I’ll be reminding writers to learn to write crap. So many think they must get a sentence, paragraph, opening chapter perfect before they can go on. This is exactly backwards. Give yourself permission to write a really bad first draft. Keep going even though your inner editor screams that it’s all drivel. Keep going anyway.
Writing Tip for Today: Open any book you admire. Read part of it that is exceptional for you. Now close the book and remind yourself that it didn’t start out this great. At one time, it was a draft. From now on, tell yourself you’re going to get it down (a draft) so you can later on, fix it up. There are two kinds of writing: Writing that works and writing that needs work.