Carol Ann
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Writing is like crossing a busy intersection with my eyes shut. The endeavor requires me to depend on more than just simple visual cues and the potential peril of every step requires the utmost vigilance. Yet, there is always this inexplicable excitement, nervousness, and even a rush of adrenaline that accompanies each new undertaking. Every sound, smell, and movement communicates something about the situation and with my senses heightened, I cautiously move forward. Will I succeed or veer off course? Is my pace appropriate? Will I trip and fall or will something hit me? And as my foot finally touches the curb, or my finger the print button, I hesitantly exhale with a sense of accomplishment. |
Carrie
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Writing is like traveling to a distant destination: I have some idea of where I'm going, but I don't know much about what I'll actually discover upon arriving, and, of course, I have to get there first. Sometimes I'm driving and armed with a map, and I make good time; more often, I take a less direct route, either by choice, taking in the scenery along the way, or by accident, given my wayward sense of direction. Travel acquires a certain rhythm: road, grass, cows, exit ramp; road, trees, cows, rest stop; road, grass, horses, country store...unless I get really lost. Then it's gas station, roadside, map, backtrack, map...and the occasional hitchhiker, preferably one with good map-reading skills! With a little effort and roadside assistance, I finally arrive at my final destination, frequently exhausted, sometimes exhilarated, and almost always relieved. |
Charles
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Writing is like passing a gallstone; painful to start, satisfying upon completion, and procrastination may only cause further infection.
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Chris
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Writing is like being the quarterback of a football team. When the center snaps the ball, there are a number of different things a quarterback can do: run it himself, pass, handoff, or do a flicker-flea. The same situation holds true in writing, where you have a number of different options available at the outset, but as with a winning touchdown pass or run, the choice you made seems to have been the most obvious. The trick is developing that instinct for making the right choices. In football, coaches and veteran teammates are there to guide the quarterback, while writers like me have the benefit of sage wisdom from our advisors, fellow graduate students, and the Writing Center. |
Gigi
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Writing is like rock climbing. As I approach a climbing site (or a writing project), I have a goal, some tools and tricks, some experience, some enthusiasm, some trepidation. I study the rock for a while, figuring out how to approach it, and as I climb, there's progress…and getting stuck and backtracking and rethinking (…and, I confess, some slipping and swearing and a bit of panic now and then). And there's always a belayer—a fellow climber who can offer feedback from a very different perspective. And when it's finished, there's immense relief and satisfaction at the top. |
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Heather
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Writing is like training a puppy dog. Every project is different, and sometimes learning experiences don't transfer from one situation to the next like you might think. The successes are exhilarating but the stumbling blocks can get very frustrating (especially when you are in the potty training phase…). The process is contingent and unique to each situation, although you can extract some general guidelines that, once discovered and implemented, can rapidly speed up the process and significantly improve the outcome. It's crucial to have at least one partner in crime, but preferably more ("it takes a village"?). In the end, however, success is a result of the intersecting factors of natural ability, effort, and effective practice, while recognizing that you are never really done. |
Jackie
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Writing is like cooking for one. It is entirely possible, when cooking for yourself, to come up with fabulous and tasty meals. It's also difficult—you can't exactly buy a quarter of an onion or half a can of tomatoes. So there are a couple of solutions. You can laboriously reduce the recipe, using fractions and calculators to figure out what 1/6 of two teaspoons is; you can guess and hope it turns out OK; or you can just make the whole thing. And for me, writing—at different times and in different contexts—takes on all three of these characteristics. Sometimes it's tedious, sometimes it's disastrous, and sometimes there's just too much to make sense of. There are often lots of steps and lots of ways to mess up, but almost always there's a way to fix it. But sometimes, everything ends up just right, and that's a pretty cool thing. |
Jennifer
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Writing is like making a new friend. When I first meet someone, I only know how to shake hands and make small talk about the weather; it's not until I have spent a lot of time with someone that I begin to feel that I really know her. As our relationship develops, we learn about each others' lives and pasts and ideas; in a sense, we change ourselves through the process of getting to know each other. The same is true of writing. Each time I start writing, I have to begin with the basics: outlines, sentences, paragraphs. After a few drafts, the structure emerges and I start to understand what I am trying to express.
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Kara
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Writing is like becoming one with the open road—you're in the right gear, you can see well ahead of you, and you have the confidence to manage whatever turns or obstacles the trip might deliver. But whether you're heading for the Indy 500 or for Grandma's over the river, developing driving mastery takes time and practice. First you've got to know how to operate the car (and decide whether it's an H3 or a scooter trip) and then learn ways to maneuver certain situations. Are the kids or your mother-in-law distracting you in the back seat? Is it foggy and you can only see five feet in front of you? How do you manage that jaywalker, or the trucker who's not looking behind her? The trick is to assess the situation the best you can and not let the potholes or the junk in your trunk keep you from ever driving again. After all, even the best stock car racer develops tire problems now and then—the key to winning the race is knowing when to make a pit stop. In fact, whether you know where you are going or not, driving (and writing) will take you places.
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Katy
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Writing is like a jigsaw puzzle. I have some of the pieces in front of me, but others are definitely missing. I don't know exactly what the final product looks like but I have an idea that it's a landscape of some sort, with a detail in the foreground. Sometimes I make a lot of progress and the pieces just seem to fall together. Other days I may stare at all the scattered colors for hours without finding a single match. Then I am convinced that there are pieces missing so I spend time searching for them, under my desk and on my bookcases (even online!). I try various organization methods based on my impulses, grouping the puzzle pieces by color or shape. Although a structured approach helps, I also need to be creative and open to surprises!
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Kim
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For me, writing is like grocery-shopping. It's a familiar routine for which I have developed favorite strategies over time; yet each time, it's a new experience with new needs, products, and timing to negotiate. I like having a list, an often do, although I've learned that making the list is its own exercise. I usually need to brainstorm menus, review what's in the cupboards, and find out if my family's cereal and lunch box preferences have changed. With list in hand, I tuck my cloth bags in the cart and wander up and down the aisles filling the cart. I revise my menu as I see what vegetables look good, what's on sale, and what new ingredient I might like to experiment with this week. When there's no time for a list, I wing it with a strategic scan of the shelves and a "reminder" march up every aisle to help me think through what we need. While grocery shopping is a chore, once I'm cruising the aisles, tasting the free samples, I enjoy the process of making choices and imagining the cooking ahead. |
Margaret
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For me, writing is like working with clay. You can do some thinking beforehand about what you're going to make and what it'll look like—a bowl, a mug, a funny animal—or you can just jump in. Either way, once you sit down and start making your object, some weird, mysterious creative process happens, and you realize you don't have complete control. You don't know where it's leading you or what you'll end up with. And clay is really malleable, so you can do a lot of different things with it. Plus you can go back and work on it some more, pinching it here and adding a piece there, until you get it the way you want it. You can even ball it up and toss is away if you don't like it! |
Matt
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Writing is like kayaking down a river. At times it can be exhilarating and fun, with surprises around every corner. Other times the water is cold and uninviting—it can feel like the last thing you want to do. But, if you commit to doing it every day because it's good for you, even those tough trips down the river can be revealing. You wade in slowly and jump into the kayak. Sometimes the current moves you slowly, and sometimes you feel like you're barely in control. You get to a stopping point and take a break. Maybe you walk back up the riverbank and look at where you've just been. You may jump back in and do it again, and find that it feels completely different. No matter what, though, it takes you somewhere. And, the journey is sometimes more important than the destination... |
Rania
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Writing and dancing are twins. Dancing or writing alone in a room of one's own can be a joyful relaxation and a healthy exercise. Even when dancing with partners, the ease and the beauty of every move is sharpened with time, and a constant emulation of the experts. As your confidence grows and you acquire better skills and tricks, you become the professional dancer /writer who can accomplish the most intricate moves with ease and grace. The secret to this success is fueling the desire to write into your work to achieve a phenomenal dance with words. |
Rosalie
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Writing is like a slow and expensive construction project. The work in progrses is unfamiliar and unsightly, and every time you come across the site you have to take a new detour. Onlookers might ask what's taking so long. You might resent having to build a skyscraper where you would prefer to put a cabana. But if you want the ultimate product to be sound, then you proceed diligently and carefully. This analogy might suggest otherwise, but I actually enjoy writing. I also recommend symbolic construction boots and a metaphorical hard hat—whatever that means to you. |
Sarah H.
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For me, beginning to write something new is a bit like decorating an empty room in a house. First, I have to consider the dimensions of the room in deciding where the large furniture ought to go. How can I make sure the light comes in, and is there enough space for people to be comfortable? Do I need new furniture, and if so, what kind? Once I answer these questions, I can start to add smaller features—accent rugs, lamps, and pictures on the wall. Sometimes I'll have an "aha" moment and add something unexpected, and sometimes I will have to look and look for that knickknack that only I know is missing. It is only after everything is in place that I can really make decisions about what I see and whether I can call this room complete. |
Sarah D.
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Writing is like making a pie. It can have an intimidating reputation as something best left to the experts, but the truth is that anybody can do it. As you get more practice, techniques that seemed hard at first become more natural, and you become freer to notice how the individual pie is shaping up without obsessing over whether it will turn out perfect. And there's more room for creativity than you might think—although you might feel most comfortable at first sticking to the recipe, you can always choose different kinds of crust, fillings, flavorings, even different shapes—you can even go free-form instead of using a pie pan. In the end, you might not have a perfect pie, but that's ok—the truth is that no pie is perfect, and the odds are it will still taste good.
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Vicki
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Writing is like making a piece of pottery. I have all kinds of ideas about what I'd like to create, and I can spend hours daydreaming about what a beautiful bowl or plate or vase I'll have when I'm done—but at some point I have to sit down with a big, slimy lump of wet clay and get to work. Bending over the wheel can be tiring, and it's discouraging when an almost-finished piece collapses in a heap. After the basic form has dried, it's time for my favorite part—decorating and glazing it in preparation for the final firing. I have to remember to leave myself enough time to get the details just right—it may take several tries to make a good handle for a mug or find an appealing combination of glazes. The object I end up with may not match my vision perfectly, but it's usually functional, and sometimes it's even kind of pretty. |
