Uncovering Fossils

I’ve been MIA – again. It’s not that I haven’t been writing; to the contrary, I have been writing more than ever before. It’s just not making its way to the blog. Part of my “homework” for my writing workshop is to write every day for thirty minutes per day. The instructor calls this “workbook.”  We can write about whatever we want, or even nothing if words are fleeting. The deal is to write just for those thirty minutes and then stop. We can write again later, but that thirty minute period is finite. I think I understand the point of limiting it to thirty minutes.

Another parameter – we are supposed to write by hand. Many people were resistant to this idea, but I loved it. One of the biggest criticisms was that you can’t write as fast as you can type. People felt like they weren’t accomplishing as much because not as many words appeared on the pages. Another complaint – if I write something I want to use, then I have to type it up after I already hand-wrote it. Here are my thoughts on those issues. First, I do type much faster than I write. But I don’t think that’s the point of the exercise.  I don’t think how many words you get out matters. The point is just to be writing. I also find that when I create something on the computer, I am much more likely to try to edit while I’m trying to create. That get’s me no where. I might sit in front of the computer typing, deleting, and retyping the same sentence over and over in a thirty minute period. That’s not writing.

As far as having to still type up what you wrote – are you kidding me? This gives you an opportunity to review what you wrote, improve upon it, edit it. If you think you aren’t going to have to do some edits (regardless of the original method of creating) you are lying to yourself. I just recently started typing up some of the things I felt were decent enough to keep working on and I have found that the time between writing and typing gives me the opportunity to think things over. I can then effortlessly type things up and incorporate changes I already made mentally.

For me, my thoughts are more focused during the thirty minute period.  Then I have time to reflect on what I’ve written before deciding to scrap it or uncover the rest of the fossil. Which brings me to the title of this post. I recently finished reading Stephen King’s On Writing at the recommendation of my friend Karen over at The Rhythm Method. One of the things that resounded with me was his comparison between writing a story and uncovering a fossil. Much to my pleasure, Mr. King doesn’t put much stock in plotting out stories or worrying about where they are going (also to my pleasure, my writing instructor is of the same opinion). Rather, he explains that stories are like fossils that the writer has to carefully and delicately uncover from the ground. You don’t really know what you are going to find, and have to follow where the fossil takes you.

I love this. I hate outlines. I hate plots. I hate rigid structure. I always procrastinated when I had to create an outline for something I was writing in high school or college. What if the story took a turn I wasn’t expecting? What if dialogue just didn’t work after I wrote it out? Why did I have to be stuck with this plot structure lurking around in the background that I created only because I had to? When I write now, I don’t do any of those things, but there was a nagging voice telling me that I would never be able to write anything good without a plan, a plot, an outline! I ignored the voice, while also worrying that it was right. As I am now learning, it was wrong (whew!). I’m just writing where the stories take me. Sometimes I think I know where they will go, but most times I’m surprised myself. And I’m enjoying every minute of it, thirty minutes at a time.