#improvingwriting

I’ve always been a story teller.

When I was a little boy, I often told stories, completely impromptu. I remember telling my parents about my first day of Kindergarten. I told my parents that we took a field trip to the Minnesota Zoo. My parents, obviously knowing that was not the case, continued to listen as I described the different animals I saw, I went on and on, riffing on that story, recalling the events of the day.

Another time, when I was in junior high school, I joined the speech team. My particular category was creative story telling. Given the previous example, you would think that I would have excelled in it. The truth is, I took time to write a story, build believable characters, and practiced that story for hours. Then, when it came to perform that piece, I found myself adlibbing in the middle of the story. I kept talking, even though I had no idea where I was going with my detour. It was exhilarating, though it was foolish as it probably cost me plenty of points in scoring.

A little known secret, is that many years ago, nearly ten if I am calculating correctly, I started trying to write the next great young adult novel. Think Harry Potter or maybe Alice in Wonderland. I got around 10,000 words in and stopped. People who have read what I wrote, really enjoyed it and asked me to continue writing it. I never have. This isn’t because I don’t know how to end my story, I have my ending. I even have milestones along the way. No, my problem is that while I have Point A, Point B, Point C, etc. I don’t have any idea how to get from one point to the next, until inspiration hits me. When that inspiration strikes, I often spew out paragraph after paragraph of details in that story. It doesn’t matter whether it was good or if it’s awful, what matters is that there were words where previously was only a blank computer screen and a blinking curser.

Where am I going with this ramble? Again, I’m not sure. I started out trying to come up with 500 words to start this adventure. I saw friends doing it, and decided, “Why not me?” I may do Twitter polls to see what people would like me to expound 500 words about. It really is a good exercise for those of us who wish to improve ourselves. The written word is extremely powerful. In today’s age it may be the most powerful tool around. So much good or so much damage is done with words every day. Perhaps I do need to try to sharpen my writing abilities, just in case I am forced to write an essay to save my life. Right now, I’m not so sure I would survive such an ordeal.

Thus, we begin a tale about improving my writing skills. This has been 500 words on writing 500 words.