Letters to a Young Writer: Don't Look Now!
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I've been a trifle absent lately, due to a myriad of things but most presently I've completely given in to laziness over a birthday weekend. My break from writing usually gives me nothing but ideas and plans and reflection. Hence; what would I say to myself, my now year older self to a ten-year younger version of myself, the self who didn't even realize her own writing dream, who thought of her scribbles and daydreams and notebooks full of loose leaf papers as nothing more than girlish dribble.
Dear Young Writer, I would say (In the tradition of Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet).
Dear Young Writer,
Don't look now but they're on to you.
Whether you realize it or not they're watching you, observing you, waiting for the right moment to clutch your shoulders in the dead of night and shake you into a terrifying new reality. They're the only ones who can.
You, with your nose trapped in your required reading because you actually enjoy it. You, with your fingers tapping desperately on that keyboard to save the fleeing thought from your mind. You, sitting at home on prom night and never wondering what you're missing.
They're on to you because you're vulnerable, because you're weak, because you've always lived in a world of "what-ifs" and "maybe-somedays" and that's when they sink their poison into your open arms.
You can try to run away from them, surround yourself with more acceptable interests like biology or philosophy (which honestly is often "them" with slightly better table manners), but then one day, you might find yourself with a fancy college degree and absolutely no direction and no job and friends who are all set on successful career paths and you'll break down and cry.
And there they will be, right beside you, smelling like the sweat of a thousand librarians, urging you to turn on a light, crawl into bed and open a book.
You might run from them once, but they were always waiting for you in the fringes and thank God for it. One day, they will save you. And you will step to yet another precipice and worry again and they will rise up and feed you with age old wisdom, of observations so true and simple, so plain and full, that you will find the strength to meet your new challenges.
And you will be so overwhelmed with gratitude that you will endeavor to champion their words and spirit in your own meager text and you will fail. But it's too late. You've been infected long ago and now with permission, the awful prose pours out of you. They could grimace at your failed stories and comic attempts at depth but instead they take your hand and allow you a place in their great chain.
So be strong, Young Writer and don't look now. Others are whispering about you and calling you strange. Don't worry too much about them. In twenty years they'll be buying your books and wondering how you came up with all those ideas.
Yours Always,
Kristen
Who is my "them" right now? A few months ago it was John Steinbeck (I came to him later in life), a few months before that it was Anne Lamott and F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Happy Tuesday, Folks!
Dear Young Writer, I would say (In the tradition of Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet).
Dear Young Writer,
Don't look now but they're on to you.
Whether you realize it or not they're watching you, observing you, waiting for the right moment to clutch your shoulders in the dead of night and shake you into a terrifying new reality. They're the only ones who can.
You, with your nose trapped in your required reading because you actually enjoy it. You, with your fingers tapping desperately on that keyboard to save the fleeing thought from your mind. You, sitting at home on prom night and never wondering what you're missing.
They're on to you because you're vulnerable, because you're weak, because you've always lived in a world of "what-ifs" and "maybe-somedays" and that's when they sink their poison into your open arms.
You can try to run away from them, surround yourself with more acceptable interests like biology or philosophy (which honestly is often "them" with slightly better table manners), but then one day, you might find yourself with a fancy college degree and absolutely no direction and no job and friends who are all set on successful career paths and you'll break down and cry.
And there they will be, right beside you, smelling like the sweat of a thousand librarians, urging you to turn on a light, crawl into bed and open a book.
You might run from them once, but they were always waiting for you in the fringes and thank God for it. One day, they will save you. And you will step to yet another precipice and worry again and they will rise up and feed you with age old wisdom, of observations so true and simple, so plain and full, that you will find the strength to meet your new challenges.
And you will be so overwhelmed with gratitude that you will endeavor to champion their words and spirit in your own meager text and you will fail. But it's too late. You've been infected long ago and now with permission, the awful prose pours out of you. They could grimace at your failed stories and comic attempts at depth but instead they take your hand and allow you a place in their great chain.
So be strong, Young Writer and don't look now. Others are whispering about you and calling you strange. Don't worry too much about them. In twenty years they'll be buying your books and wondering how you came up with all those ideas.
Yours Always,
Kristen
Who is my "them" right now? A few months ago it was John Steinbeck (I came to him later in life), a few months before that it was Anne Lamott and F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Happy Tuesday, Folks!
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Love this! I am sharing with Josh and Jordan! Your writing is incredible.
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