~Words Matter~

People say the darndest things when they find out you write. They act as if it were some mystical or at least peculiar diversion from the norm. Sometimes, though, the revelation furnishes an opportunity.

We were having lunch with a group of my sister's friends, among them a young woman who volunteers transcribing Civil War letters, documents and memoranda for a National Park Service property. She had written a thirteen page protocol for transcriptors' usage and needed someone to proofread the draft. Would I mind?

I had some idea of the need for guidelines, having once transcribed a relative's recollections of growing up at the turn of the last century, the daughter of a Mississippi steamship captain. Her handwriting was challenging to say the least.

How to, for instance, show something hae been crossed out or written over? What to do when the writing is illegible? When words are left out? How much license may the transcriber take without altering the original meaning? How to show that a word has been invented? What if a document has been written once vertically and the paper turned for more writing horizontally? Consider that there are the margin notes, drawings, post scripts, corrections to be explained . . . You see the need for a standardized system.

Our friend's protocol required only a few suggestions, but reading it reminded me to appreciate those hardy souls dedicated to preserving and keeping historical records straight. It's tedious, brain draining work. Salute them.  

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Writers take note:

"Don't let success go to your head or failure go to your heart."

from a Mary Engelbreit calendar

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Accustomed as I am to hearing people say 'you' and 'y'all', it amuses me to hear 'yuh' and 'you guys.' Instead of 'yes' or 'mais yeah' where I live, here it's 'you betcha.' We're a long way from Alaska, but it makes me think of Sarah Palin.

As speech patterns vary, so do landscapes and architecture. I find the differences fascinating. Travel provides a great source of fodder for the writer. You can't beat airports and hotels for people-watching. The characters, the stories, the mysteries are all there for the imagining. 

You betcha.

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Besides  using the magic of "what if. . .?" there are other ways of incubating ideas. If you (heaven forbid) have writer's block or are finding excuses to keep you from your laptop, try one of these: Go to a coffee shop and eavesdrop. Make notes. Your parents told you that's rude, but never mind. Even if you don't get re-charged,  it will help you write dialogue that reads naturally.

Look for the odd thing that sets you thinking.  A New Orleans author is said to have taken inspiration from newspaper "fillers", those sometimes quirky tidbits that complete short columns.

I spotted a stranger two pews in front of me at the campus chapel and knew that's what my character Jacques looked like. In the same inexplicable way, I recognized Jacques' wife Adele at first sight of a George Rodrigue painting on a magazine cover. They have been real to me ever since.

If writing fiction, try getting a jump start by introducing a new character or bringing a minor one to the fore..

Find pictures that remind you of your characters or the setting of your piece and keep them in sight as you write. Make a blueprint of your characters' home, Draw a map of their neighborhood.

Observe. Listen. Be playful. Write.

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I have a friend who could make up a full blown romance novel during a ninety mile drive. Lucky those facile tale spinners who can roll out a story as if it were a spool of shiny ribbon waiting to be unfurled. Characters and crises fall to their pages in flurries of creation.

Tht doesn't happen for me. I'm one of the carvers, the kind who have to stare out the window until the story comes, let it hatch, then shift it, shape it, shave it. Not till I put it aside and the first fervor has cooled down can I return to it with a more objective eye. The irony is that some of the writing that felt so inspired (writers, beware) is, in the next day's light, dull, while some of the lines that seemed mundane have gained sparkle.

In the end I guess it isn't how you write but that you persevere.

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