Thursday, March 28, 2019

That special story

Over at YA Outside the Lines, we were asked to contemplate the question: How do you know if an idea is the one? Worth writing about? Worth making your next project?

I answered with a question that has helped me in the past: If you could only write one more story, what would it be? You can read more here.

Friday, March 8, 2019

For the record

I've been consolidating some old journals and for the past three years have been keeping a recent one, and what strikes me is how often a journal entry will cover something I've totally forgotten. Sometimes the entry sparks a memory--it is still there, though I haven't thought about it in years. Other times the memory stays lost. I might discover I went to a party on a certain night when I was 22, but still remember nothing about that party.

Writing captures so much that we might otherwise forget. I make a note today that the snowdrops are blooming now, a harbinger of spring--a small detail I'm sure I would never be able to date in the future without my journal. It's a choice, of course, what to record and what to leave out. Of all the moments I lived through today, I will capture only a few of them. I polished an essay, took a walk with a friend, noticed the snowdrops, ate a turkey sandwich. I don't know which of these details might matter to me in years to come, and we can't live entirely for the future anyway, can't preserve everything. 

So I write down the first things that come to mind--sometimes from world news, usually from my personal life. Sometimes major, sometimes trivial. I strew bread crumbs for my future self to follow. But it isn't only about the future. The act of jotting a few notes each day makes me pay closer attention to the present. It requires me to stop and observe, at least for a few minutes.