Sometimes, my efforts to write go well. Those moments are fleeting, so sweet and brief that I wonder if they are imagined. More often, or more memorable, is when the writing gets tough. I know I am not alone in feeling I have slid off the road into a ditch. And bloggers are especially adept at compiling quotations by genuine writers about their struggles. But this isn’t about not feeling alone. It’s about not feeling like I cannot write.
Years ago when we would occasionally drive to the next state to visit a sibling and his young family, I would return home on Sunday fully invigorated for the work week. On such visits, the conversations were flat and dull. There was some fun, but it often was about babies tipping over or watching the kids evacuate the TV room during the scary scenes of a Disney movie. I was as if I was parked facing uphill and could see a in my review mirror a gray and cold town that would engulf me if I rolled backward. The light would turn green, I’d pop the clutch, and accelerate so my stomach rose when I crested the hill.
My inspiration comes from a fear of the dank maw of mediocrity. When I encounter writing that is deft and delightful, I feel inadequate. For example, the sentence below made be chuckle out loud. And the awe it creates would debilitate me if I followed the maxim of reading a great deal for inspiration:
Each resident was required to tie his or her dog up in the yard until it barked itself cross-eyed, presumably to frighten off coyotes.
I am humbled by great writing such as this. In contrast, I feel primed to write because of exposure to counter-examples. My inspiration then is not to reach the expert level but to distance myself from the worst. My writing is stimulated by a drive to move away from the chaff and dross. Here have been my recent sources of inspiration.
First, campfire conversations do not need to be deep existential discussions. I appreciate a good fart joke as much as any boy. But re-enactments of scenes from multiple Will Farrell movies just isn’t quite the same. I just looked at this clip and discovered that the version I witnessed in the Minnesota wilderness had been rendered with astonishing accuracy: sequence, scene, script -- all of it. Similarly, reading someone else’s former doc student’s writing encourages me to write. The force-fit of a theory, the data that reads like random snatches of conversation, the unsubstantiated findings -- it all makes me shudder as a consumer. But it inspires me to show how writing might be done. Third, I read a grant proposal written by a guy whose last name was the same as that of the small Floridian business college. He had started his own college and named it after himself. And it was accredited. The grant was not badly written although not especially academic in style. But it was audacious in its conceptualization, especially in wanting to receive federal dollars to improve science literacy of business college students. Again: inspiring.
Finally, perhaps this very writing sample will incite others to write in ways that place a heavy, muddy boot on this crummy essay. To write well is more a matter of writing a little better than the next guy. It’s akin to doing well enough to not be eliminated in the first round. Most nations will not win the World Cup. To even be there is better than watching from home. Write back!
First, campfire conversations do not need to be deep existential discussions. I appreciate a good fart joke as much as any boy. But re-enactments of scenes from multiple Will Farrell movies just isn’t quite the same. I just looked at this clip and discovered that the version I witnessed in the Minnesota wilderness had been rendered with astonishing accuracy: sequence, scene, script -- all of it. Similarly, reading someone else’s former doc student’s writing encourages me to write. The force-fit of a theory, the data that reads like random snatches of conversation, the unsubstantiated findings -- it all makes me shudder as a consumer. But it inspires me to show how writing might be done. Third, I read a grant proposal written by a guy whose last name was the same as that of the small Floridian business college. He had started his own college and named it after himself. And it was accredited. The grant was not badly written although not especially academic in style. But it was audacious in its conceptualization, especially in wanting to receive federal dollars to improve science literacy of business college students. Again: inspiring.
Finally, perhaps this very writing sample will incite others to write in ways that place a heavy, muddy boot on this crummy essay. To write well is more a matter of writing a little better than the next guy. It’s akin to doing well enough to not be eliminated in the first round. Most nations will not win the World Cup. To even be there is better than watching from home. Write back!
