Category Archives: Writing

Apology from the author to her protagonist

A Forest in Winter by Pieter Lodewijk Francisco Kluyver

A Forest in Winter by Pieter Lodewijk Francisco Kluyver

Look at you, standing faithfully on the page, ready, waiting for my least command. The smallest word from me will tell you what to do next, what to say and how to say it, in first person or third, sadly or with joy.

You would do anything for me, despite your pride: That was going to be your fatal flaw, in the third act, I had it all planned out.

But, unfortunately – I don’t quite know how to say this – I won’t be using you. No, listen, it’s not you, it’s me. I mean, you’re brilliant, really, even if I do say so myself. Your back-story alone is pure genius: Your tortured childhood, the unrequited love of your college days. You’re just great. If anything you’re too good for me. You deserve a writer who can make you famous – a Milton or a Homer.

Me, I’m only now discovering how bad I am. I mean, look at where you are now – in the Black Forest of Germany on a winter’s night. With a character like you, and a setting like that, a monkey could write something thrilling. I should have you tramping through the forest, feverish from a bayonet wound, Quixotically slashing at trees as you search for your battalion to warn them of an enemy attack. You’d love that, wouldn’t you? You’d be perfect for it.

Instead, I’ve spent the last two weeks hung up on describing the snow! Which I can’t do! I mean, I’m trying to write a dramatic novel here, and I keep ending up sounding like Dr. Seuss. The woods were old, the snow was cold… Or else I come up with something amazing only to realize that I’m pretty much quoting Robert Frost. I’m not kidding, this has happened twice: First with “lovely, dark and deep,” and then, a few days later, with “easy wind and downy flake.”

And then I start thinking, I will never be as good as Robert Frost, or anywhere close. I might as well sell my typewriter and use the money to order cable TV. Or maybe go on American Idol, I mean I’m bound to be a better singer than writer.

So I thought I should let you know. I’m sorry about all of this. I had a wonderful time with you, and I wish you all the best. I’ll always remember you the way you are now, stopping in the woods on a snowy evening.

Things I’ve been wrong about for most of my life, part two

Bewitched Park by Leonid Afremov

Bewitched Park by Leonid Afremov

Ever since I was very young I’ve felt this strange tension between feeling smart, creative, special and, at the same time weird, awkward, and out of place. The first thing made me feel happy and proud; the last three incredibly sad and even bitter. But all of them made me feel different. I moved through life pretty well, more or less, did well in school, went on to college and grad school, was in leadership roles in most areas of life. But I always felt like my true self, my real thoughts and feelings, were too weird and scary to share. I felt out of place all the time, even among friends, even when I was the leader or organizer of a group. I created a secret world inside myself and hid parts of myself there — the parts that I thought made me too strange and different, and kept me from fitting in.

But, somewhere, at some point, I started getting glimpses of a larger truth. I can’t remember when the first glimpse came — in high school or college, maybe? At some point I heard this quote by the Roman playwright Terence: “I am human, and nothing human is alien to me.” I wrote that in my journal and thought, yes. Nothing human is alien to me, and if that is true then maybe nothing in me is alien to my fellow humans. Maybe I am just human after all. No better or worse than the rest of the humans.

And I started noticing that I wasn’t the only one who felt different and alone. I began to think that maybe, actually, more people felt out of place than in. And if that were true, then maybe none of us were actually weird and different. Or maybe we were all weird and different, actually. Maybe I was weird and different, just like a lot of other people. And maybe that meant none of us needed to be alone.

I have so much more to say about this, but the sun is rising and I have to get ready for my day job soon. But today I wanted to tell you this: When I wrote the first part of this series, Things I’ve been wrong about my whole life, part one, I shared something from that secret part of myself. I had never felt more alone or more on the outside than during the time I wrote about in that essay. And something wild happened when I got brave and wrote about it and posted it on my little blog with my few dozen readers. People read it and said, “Me, too.” My friend Glennon Doyle Melton of Momastery read it and said, “Me, too,” and shared it with her followers on Facebook. And then, suddenly, hundreds and thousands of people came and read it, and said, “Me, too,” and shared it with their friends who said, “Me, too,” too.

When I felt most alone, when my thoughts and feelings seemed too intense and strange and even crazy — there were literally thousands of others feeling just like me. My deepest fears and struggles, the ones that made me feel so alone, turned out to be what I most had in common with my fellow humans. Maybe the same is true for you?

*****

Come find me on Facebook and let’s be weird and different together!

 

New Year’s resolutions

Tree climbing at Jamaica Pond

Tree climbing at Jamaica Pond

My new year’s resolution this year is to mostly keep doing what I’ve been doing, because I think I’m on the right track. I will not be dieting because diets make you fatter, and I will not be hitting the gym — though I would love to, actually — because I have a bunch of little chronic injuries at the moment. The one big thing I want to do next I’ve already signed up for: A writer’s workshop through The Frederick Buechner Center at Princeton Seminary. I am really excited about it. It’s the first time I’ve spent money on my writing, the first time I’ve been to a conference in seven years, and the first time I’ve been to a seminary in nine years. Don’t tell Gordon-Conwell that I’m cheating on them with Princeton.

But the things that I want to focus on next year are the same things that I’ve been focusing on this year. Nothing new or particularly ambitious. But they work for me.

1) Be the best nanny and editor I can — focus on being present and paying attention.
2) Write weekly (I can’t swing daily right now, but I’m getting good at weekly).
3) Do yoga and bike when I can.
4) Keep seeing friends and family in person as well as connecting online.
5) Eat mostly healthy food and resist equally the temptations to eat too much and too little.
6) Look for ways to connect with God, and don’t be discouraged when I can’t find Him in the same places I used to.

Do you have New Year’s resolutions? Do they represent big changes, small tweaks, or staying the course?