Roll up your sleeves and dig right in
Posted in Personal Responsibility, writing on Mar 20th, 2012
Not that I’m shutting the door on anything just yet, mind you. But the magazine article writing is going well. My first article in Texas Gardener comes out in the April/May issue. Look for it at stores near you. Fiction requires a pretty darn long stretch with no other commitments in it for me to accomplish [...]
I did an interview today. Don’t get me wrong, this is not my first rodeo. I’ve done loads of interviews, but this time, I’m getting paid. Reminds me of when royalty statements came with a check. It feels good to have income coming in. It is amazing how many writers I know who write for [...]
Posted in writing on Jan 16th, 2012
Despite an injury, I attended a Darcy Pattison revision workshop this weekend. It was outstanding. Near the beginning of the workshop, Darcy read us the Stages of Learning. First is Unconscious Incompetence: You don’t know that you don’t know. Second is Conscious Incompetence: You know that you don’t know. Third is Conscious Competence: You [...]
Posted in writing on Apr 21st, 2011
I shared a revised scene in critique group this week that got me thinking again about how to add sensory detail to writing. Here is the clip from the story: The crisp air of the late spring afternoon brushed my cheeks as I cued Callie for her left canter lead. Making a balanced turn at [...]
Posted in writing on Apr 5th, 2011
I have an affliction. I type the first three letters of a word and suddenly it goes sideways and I wind up with a word completely unlike that which I started out to use. (This is similar to, but not identical with the syndrome popularized on websites everywhere about the iPhone completion conundrum.) The worst [...]
I’m about to make Deb jealous again. I started my tomato seeds a few weeks ago and am about to stick the fledgling plants in the ground. Uh-huh. You heard me right. Second week in March. Tomatoes in the ground! You see I garden on the Gulf Coast where the sea breezes coming from 100 [...]
Posted in writing on Mar 14th, 2011
I attended the first ever Daddy’s Girl’s Weekend this past weekend in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. I cannot recall the last time I had that much fun but it was probably at a writer’s conference. (Although US Pony Club Annual Meetings are fun too! It was at times hilarious, rowdy, wacky, but always, always in good [...]
Posted in writing on Feb 28th, 2011
Writing a short story elicits the same panicked feeling that trying to turn my long-bed truck in a tight space engenders. Terror. Anger. Shortness of breath. The sudden urge to clasp my hand over my heart to stop the pressure. But just like parking the truck, it is possible when I expend the right amount of [...]
Posted in writing on Feb 25th, 2011
So you want to be a writer. Do you read? This may seem like a rhetorical question, but I’ve had students in my classes who have come in expecting to write a best-seller (and who expected me to teach them how to do this!) but who do not read. That’s right. They think they can [...]
Posted in writing on Feb 15th, 2011
I’ve been in revisionist country lately, so haven’t done much new writing. The best thing about all this is that I enjoy revising. It’s so much easier than doing the rough draft. I liken revision to working with clay on a potter’s wheel. Shaping, scraping away unwanted flaws, imprinting patterns, changing the shape of it [...]
