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Kids Teach the Darndest ThingsFrom the teacher who told me to banish my adverbs to the workshop colleague who suggested I'd fallen in love with dashes, I've received plenty of valuable writing advice. As far as process goes, however, my true mentor — though he doesn't know it — is my 3-year-old, Julian. Anytime I feel a piece getting away from me, I just watch him in secret for a while. Before long, I'm reminded of these 10 rules to take back to my keyboard. 1. Build towers one block at a time.Any writing project can seem daunting at the start. But when you divide the overall task into smaller steps — such as writing a certain number of words per day — things become more manageable. Whenever I write and feel that wall of pressure building, I'll put down my work and observe Julian playing. He methodically places one block atop another, adjusts them until the corners meet, sits back to assess his work, takes a contemplative breath or two, hums a tune. Only then will he select the next block for placement. The lesson? Sometimes it's OK to teporarily ignore the big picture.2. Use your imagination.When writing a new piece, I rarely know what's going to work ahead of time — so I have to be willing to experiment. For a toddler, pushing the envelope is second nature. When I ask Julian to brush his teeth and he says, "It's not a toothbrush, it's a dragon," I'm not surprised; I'm reminded of the importance of looking at things in fresh ways.3. Be open to new directions.Each of us has pushed forward on a manuscript even after realizing it's dead on the vine. The further we push, the worse things usually get. When Julian's toothbrush "dragon" stops brushing and starts roaming in search of prey, I can either embrace the playtime, or I can stubbornly try to get him to go back to brushing. Allowing new possibilities is always more effective — not to mention more fun.4. Ask "why."To write a great story, you have to know your characters. To achieve this intimacy, it's useful to follow the toddler's method of exhaustive inquiry. Walking along the street, Julian might say, "Daddy, why is that a bus?" After I explain that is has wheels and takes people from one place to another, he'll say, "Why isn't it a car?" When I tell him a car's smaller, he'll say, "Is a truck smaller?" When I cover this point, he'll ask, "Does an airplane have wheels?" "Sure," I'll answer, "underneath." "How come it's not a bus?" he'll respond. At that point, I'll take him home to draw pictures of every type of conveyance I can think of, explaining their respective features and characteristics until he can discern one from another.When I allow myself to write a story without first understanding the traits that make any given character different from every other, the story doesn't work. But when I force myself to ask "why," the result is always immeasurably better. 5. Keep it simple.Once, needing to replace a battery in one of Julian's toys, I had to use the edge of a sunscreen tube to loosen the screw holding the panel in place. "Do you know what ingenuity is, buddy?" I asked. "When one way of doing something doesn't work, and you find a different way, that's ingenuity. Daddy's using ingenuity to open your toy." Julian looked at me and said, "You should use a screwdriver."Whenever I find myself in overkill mode, I try to think back to this exchange. Am I overxplaining? Is there a better, more concise way to get my point across? It's always better to explain things simply, directly and, for God's sake, once. 6. Earn the cookie.You can often encourage a toddler's development by simply acknowledging his effort — a sticker for sleeping in a "big- boy bed," some M&M's for attempting to dress himself, a Popsicle for using teh potty. Using this technique for myself helps me produce. If I hit my intended number of pages in a day, I get not only the foot-long sub for dinner but also the chocolate chip cookies for dessert. If I come up with at least three pitches for that particular market by the date written in my calendar, I can rent the new release my wife and I have been wanting to see. The pages I generate may be awful and the pitches worse, but the point is I've done them.7. Get to the point.Even the most sparkling piece of writing will struggle to find an audience if it has no point. Julian reminds me of this every time he starts to recount one of his experiences, stammering his way through excitedly:"Daddy, I was at the park...we were playing on the slide...the red slide...Tyler was there...and when I went down the slide...and got to the...bottom of the slide..." Until he finally arrives at his destination: "That's when I scraped my knee." 8. Learn from others.Julian may be fully absorbed by a certain activity at the park, but if a group of 5-year-olds comes barreling in, he immediately turns his attention to them, enraptured. I respect this examination — he's observing those whose skills he hopes to emulate — and try to apply the same practice in my own career. So, even though I need to allot time to write, I also need to allot time to read. There will always be those who know more.9. Plunge in.When Julian gets an idea in his head — whether building a racetrack out of straws or counting each sidewlk crack between our house and the library — he's completely absorbed by it, unless something better comes along. Sometimes he achieves his original goal, sometimes he discovers a better alternative along the way, and sometimes he decides it just isn't practical and moves on.Whenever a new idea strikes me, I try to remember that diving in is almost always better than thinking about it too much, because the former is the only way to find out whether the idea will sink or swim. Sure, I might realize that what I envisioned as a short story will work better as a screenplay, or that my new gardening pitch is too similar to a feature in this month's Good Housekeeping. But, like Julian, at least I'm trying new ideas. 10. Allow do-overs.The ability to say, "This sentence isn't quite right there," or, "That paragraph seems overwrought," or, "I must've written this while possessed by the Demon of Putrid Writing" can produce exhilarating moments, because such admissions ultimately lead to crisper work. When I'm considering whether a story has what it takes, I go back to watching Julian and his blocks. When he isn't satisfied with one o fhis creations, he's as merciless as Attila the Hun, teaching the imprecise tower a lesson with a definitive sweep of his arm. Then he calmly gathers the blocks and dives into the project anew, aiming for nothing less than perfection. That's all the reminder I need.Writer's Digest |
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I.J. Schecter © I.J. Schecter 2003 |
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