Today we are pleased to welcome Andrea Kidd as our Guest Blogger. We hope you will enjoy reading how she tackles her rewriting tasks.
I want to write. I love getting into a piece, scribbling down ideas as they are fresh. It’s exhilarating and energizes me for other tasks that are not so fun.
I have an article that is due – soon! The problem is that I have no idea what I want to write about. I long to be at that place where I have the idea and I am running with it, but right now I am stuck in the mud. I go to my desk and quickly scan ideas scratched hurriedly on the backs of envelopes because I didn’t have time to write about it just then. Next I lace up my walking shoes and ramble off down the road and along a trail. My mind wanders; I listen to squawking baby magpies, smell newly mown grass, and gaze at gathering storm clouds. As I stroll back home a writing idea floats to mind. The idea crystalizes into solid words. I try to memorize those specially chosen verbs and adjectives.
Sitting at the kitchen table, with a mug of freshly brewed coffee, I spill those words and many more onto sheets of scrap paper. (They will be tossed into the recycling bin later, so no need for perfection here!)
My spirit is lifted, I am happy to be alive and content to clean the bathroom and fix lunch.
Next day, I settle with my computer and type up those hastily written pages. No changes! No editing! But doubts unsettle me. Who is going to be interested in a piece about my coffee pot! That is so mundane! I make a definite decision to dump doubts aside. Words are typed, given a title, saved and filed. Job done!
The deadline for submission is coming closer, so I am motivated to take a second look at that rough draft.
The idea is sound, but it meanders, cluttered with unnecessary words. I prune and lop. Words, even a sentence or paragraph go into the compost pile to fertilize some other piece some other time. Now the idea has room to grow and become strong and healthy.
Only a few days to the deadline and I read through to see how my idea is growing now that it has had time and space to flourish. It is short, curt, chopped. The blunt ends jar the reader. And my reader deserves a strong idea that is flourishing with new growth with the potential of satisfying fruit and seeds that will propagate more growth when this piece dies a natural death.
Those verbs need refreshing water to spread into lush phrases that grow pictures in the reader’s mind. Nouns given a well-placed adjective stimulate the idea with vibrant life. The original idea is now taking on a pleasing shape, but that’s enough digging and watering and fertilizing for now!
A good piece of writing takes time to mature; it absorbs the nutrients necessary for a strong, lasting understanding in the writer’s mind. Only then does it become firm and strong, ready to share with readers.
Still there is other steps before it leaves my desk and is set free from me to fly and bear fruit in this world.
First I read through the piece, as if I were a reader reading it for the first time. Edit as needed.
Check all spelling, accuracy of facts, grammar and punctuation marks. Edit as needed.
Give it to a second reader or two. Edit as needed.
Send!
Andrea Kidd writes to open readers (including herself) to recognize Jesus walking by their side in the ordinary and extraordinary events of daily life. She contributes regularly to the High Country News published and distributed in the Foothills of Alberta and on Substack: andreakidd.substack.com
Sitting at the kitchen table, with a mug of freshly brewed coffee, I spill those words and many more onto sheets of scrap paper. (They will be tossed into the recycling bin later, so no need for perfection here!)
My spirit is lifted, I am happy to be alive and content to clean the bathroom and fix lunch.
Next day, I settle with my computer and type up those hastily written pages. No changes! No editing! But doubts unsettle me. Who is going to be interested in a piece about my coffee pot! That is so mundane! I make a definite decision to dump doubts aside. Words are typed, given a title, saved and filed. Job done!
The deadline for submission is coming closer, so I am motivated to take a second look at that rough draft.
The idea is sound, but it meanders, cluttered with unnecessary words. I prune and lop. Words, even a sentence or paragraph go into the compost pile to fertilize some other piece some other time. Now the idea has room to grow and become strong and healthy.
Only a few days to the deadline and I read through to see how my idea is growing now that it has had time and space to flourish. It is short, curt, chopped. The blunt ends jar the reader. And my reader deserves a strong idea that is flourishing with new growth with the potential of satisfying fruit and seeds that will propagate more growth when this piece dies a natural death.
Those verbs need refreshing water to spread into lush phrases that grow pictures in the reader’s mind. Nouns given a well-placed adjective stimulate the idea with vibrant life. The original idea is now taking on a pleasing shape, but that’s enough digging and watering and fertilizing for now!
A good piece of writing takes time to mature; it absorbs the nutrients necessary for a strong, lasting understanding in the writer’s mind. Only then does it become firm and strong, ready to share with readers.
Still there is other steps before it leaves my desk and is set free from me to fly and bear fruit in this world.
First I read through the piece, as if I were a reader reading it for the first time. Edit as needed.
Check all spelling, accuracy of facts, grammar and punctuation marks. Edit as needed.
Give it to a second reader or two. Edit as needed.
Send!
Photo credit: Image by StockSnap from Pixabay
Andrea Kidd writes to open readers (including herself) to recognize Jesus walking by their side in the ordinary and extraordinary events of daily life. She contributes regularly to the High Country News published and distributed in the Foothills of Alberta and on Substack: andreakidd.substack.com
thanks andrea!
ReplyDeleteThank you for your post, Andrea. I especially like "A good piece of writing takes time to mature." Blessings on you as you write.
ReplyDeleteI love the gardening of your rewriting process, Andrea. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteLove this post, Andrea. One of the things that brings me joy is that I can hear your voice so clearly as I read it. Like you are sitting in the chair beside me, having a conversation and a coffee. The gardening analogy is absolutely wonderful and the pruning and lopping bit is one of my favourite phrasing. Thanks, Andrea!
ReplyDeleteI so enjoyed the use of gardening imagery in your piece, Andrea. Especially liked these lines: "I prune and lop. Words, even a sentence or paragraph go into the compost pile to fertilize some other piece some other time." It so matches what we do when revising our work. I don't mind so much the pruning and lopping of beloved sentences or passages when they can be added to a growing compost pile and perhaps still used elsewhere. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteA lovely piece of writing, Andrea. Your gardening imagery is so applicable, and your obeservation of the following is so true: "A good piece of writing takes time to mature; it absorbs the nutrients necessary for a strong, lasting understanding in the writer’s mind."
ReplyDeleteThanks for being a guest blogger, Andrea. Love the line, "A good piece of writing takes time to mature; it absorbs the nutrients necessary for a strong, lasting understanding in the writer’s mind."
ReplyDelete