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Writing is Looking Back and Moving Forward

Goodbye summer.

This week, I return to my day job after a summer-long hiatus. I don’t like change, so even a slight shake-up of routine sent me straight to my journal the other day.

As I scribbled down all my anxieties, I realized that the entry I wrote was all too similar to the one I wrote in May – when my day job ended and my summer promised two kids at home – all day – and absolutely no routine. The list from May to August differed in a few details, but the big question remained the same: When will I find time to write?

One thing’s for sure, I’m a consistent worrier.

It’s the endless plight of any writer with a day job or a mother writer with kids. What I’ve found though – in looking back on the last few months – is that as much as I worry about not having time to write, I still end up with a stack of essays and stories in the end. Too bad those essays or stories have little to do with the “big one.” I’ve tucked my novel draft and notes under my arm and carried them from room to room with me all summer. They even traveled with me on vacations. But, I’ve pushed through only a few more pages of that draft.

Still, I’ve been writing, even when time was tight. And, that’s better than not writing at all.

In considering my slow-moving novel, I thought of Jan O’Hara’s recent post on Writer Unboxed where she mentioned wise words from Donald Maass, heard at the RWA Nationals:

If possible, resist the push to rapid production. A good story well told means an audience willing to wait. Reward their loyalty with quality.

Maass’s words do little to ease my worries that I will oversleep tomorrow and show up late (or worse – unshowered) for first day back at work. But, his advice reminds me that writing is simply moving forward — inch by inch, page by page.

Looking back from May to August, I see small steps in progress and moments of synchronicity, when little burning bushes signaled that I can be (and am) a writer. In spite of tight schedules, posts were written, stories were submitted, and connections with other writers were made.

I can view my day job as a  burden that takes me away from writing (though that paycheck and health insurance lightens the load). Or, I can see it as an opportunity: new routines force me to schedule more succinct writing times.

I did it once; I can do it again.

What inspiration have you found in looking back on your writing?
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Wed’s Word Flash Fiction: Irene

Every Wednesday, on Writing Under Pressure, you’ll find a post based on Today’s Word (from Wordsmith.org). Past essays, poems, or flash fiction pieces can be found under Wednesday’s Word on the sidebar to the right.

Today’s word:

irenic. adjective. Promoting peace or conciliation.

Sometimes, it’s the etymology of a word that sparks an idea for a story; other times, it’s the picture that accompanies the definition.

From Greek eirene (peace). Eirene/Irene was the Greek personification of peace.

*****

Irene

Irene wasn’t always a peacekeeper. It wasn’t until she had her horde of children that she realized she had to learn to mediate or fall to pieces.

“Horde” seemed a bit harsh of a word, she thought, especially on the good days, when the hours sailed by smooth and they all said “please” and “thank you” and “can I have a turn when you’re done?”

But, today – all week, really – had not been smooth. Irene walked circles around the house, clearing up misunderstandings, working negotiations, and ceasing altercations in progress.

At six years old, Rosie was the oldest. But, today she regressed to a three year old. After breakfast, lunch, and dinner, Rose folded fast into a lump onto the floor. Each time, she refused to speak.

“Your words, Rosie,” Irene said, exasperated. “You’ve got to learn to speak up for yourself. I can’t help you unless I know what you need.”

Turns out, it was something about the way Margaret looked at her.

Michael and Michelle had no problem using their words. All day, they fought over who got more of anything and everything: oatmeal, crayons, and space on the couch. Irene did her best to ensure absolute equality between the two of them. She packed a measuring tape in the pocket of her khakis, along with a pad of paper and a pen, and measured and marked down exact numbers and inches.

Little George turned ugly when Irene least expected him to, so she kept a close eye on him. He’d go about playing in peace until Margaret walked by. Then, he’d dive at her with both arms, grab whatever toy she held, and break out in a serious tug of war.

“Little George!” Irene shoved her arm in the middle of a fight over a red-headed doll. “You don’t even like Strawberry Shortcake!” He let go of the doll long enough for Margaret to scurry down the hall.

Little George cried.

“Honey.” Irene put her arm around him. “Why would you want something you don’t even like?”

“Because, she has one and I don’t.”

That night, when Irene sat down to watch TV, the news flashed a photo of a UN soldier – his face haggard, his eyes flat, his shoulders slumped. Irene knew that look.

“I quit,” she told her husband when he finally made it home from work.

“Quit what?”

She was washing her face. She turned to him, her face covered with foam.

“This whole mommy business. I quit.”

He laughed. She didn’t.

Continue reading “Wed’s Word Flash Fiction: Irene”

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First Lines Propel the Story AND the Writer

“A good first line doesn’t invite the reader to read; it invites the writer to write.” — Antonya Nelson.

Antonya Nelson

In the September 2010 issue of The Writer magazine, Sarah Anne Johnson interviews Antonya Nelson about the art of writing fiction–short stories as well as novels. I love the interview with the insights offered by Nelson and the honesty in her answers. “I am plot-impaired…” she says when discussing her preference of short stories over novel writing. A response like that from a great author helps me accept my own flaws as a writer without giving up on the craft.

The whole interview offers much for me, a writer on the rise. But, Nelson’s answer, as quoted above, to a question about good openings in fiction impressed me the most. Often we hear that the first chapter, first paragraph, or first line of a story must capture the reader right away and drive the reader to turn the page. Nelson puts the focus of the first line back onto the writer when she suggests that a great opening gets the writer moving.

Many times when I sit down to write, a whole story unfolds based on one line that repeats itself in my mind until I concede to write it down. In one of my Wednesday’s Word flash pieces, Camaraderie, Whether You Want It or Not, it wasn’t the word of the day that sparked the story; it was the opening passage: I had only been gone for three weeks.

As Margaret Atwood said, “A word after a word after a word is power.” A great first line can inspire a second line and then a whole story.

When I took a class with Ariel Gore, one of the exercises she gave us, as a warm up to a weekly writing assignment, was to pull out our favorite book, choose a chapter, and use the first line from that chapter as the beginning of our quick write. My response to the exercise was based on the first line from a chapter in Wally Lamb’s She’s Come Undone:

In the wake of my self-disclosure about Ma and Jack — during the year or so that followed my discovery — Dr. Shaw and I turned over and studied who my mother really had been: a fragile woman, a victim in many ways — of her mother, her husband.

From that first line, I wrote my opening:

Dr. Shaw invited me to take a look at my mother, if only to take the heat off of me for a while.

The short piece that followed was later published in the anthology of quick writes that culminated from that class, On the Fly: Stories in Eight Minutes or Less.

The same experience happened in writing the first draft of my novel. The opening line came to me, and it was all I needed for the story to unfold.

What are some first lines that propelled you into a new story?

*****

Johnson, Sarah Anne. “A Gift for the Short Form” The Writer. September 2010: 17-20. Print.



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