Hello Charlotte -- after quite a lot of time off I am checking back into Substack a bit. My writing at times suffers from the symptoms you describe -- good to know I'm not special. Thanks for the ideas on how to get back on track. Hope you are well.
Mark! I was so excited to see your name in my inbox! I was thinking, could it be? And for real it is! So happy you are back. Things are good here (with the exception of the current political situation) and I hope they are with you, too. Look forward to seeing more of you.
While not a regular schedule, I have posted occasionally. It's a nice community so trying to figure out how to modestly engage again at least for a bit. If you remember, I used to write about my enjoyment of history reading. This is an alarming period and I hope we navigate without a lot of permanent damage. We will see. My best analogy to what is happening is this period is a bit like the dark period after the Civil War. We descended into the eventual failure of Reconstruction and an enormous battle over tariffs when we became very insular as a country. Interesting enough as we had another non-consecutive presidency with Grover Cleveland. The fight was all over tariffs and it very nearly destroyed our country. I hope we make it this time.
I was thinking about how so many of these apply to getting stuck in the middle of any creative project. Sometimes I write about a painting or a garment or a stage set to help me think through how I want to go about it all.
I was especially excited to learn the term “side writing!” This is a thing I’ve done since high school, but I didn’t know there was a name for it!
My Dad always smiled at how much I loved slant or half rhymes. If I put them together with side writing, I feel like I have the name of a big band: Slant Rhyme and the Sidewriters!
Also, I do a version of TK which involves riffing on the keyboard to make a long gobbledegook word. As you say, it frees me up to keep going and I smile when I see dfgjurghjyevbjgrhbhjif when I come back to edit!
I love the idea of writing about a project in a different creative genre. The reverse of that is how often I get ideas for writing when I'm stitching or knitting to drawing. It all goes together!
And it was only recently that I learned the term "side writing," too!
TK is my go to! I also love the all caps sentence, mine usually a variant of THE SOMEONE DOES SOMETHING BUT I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT OR WHY YET. The “yet” being the key. Also, fidget spinners for the win!
Hello Charlotte -- after quite a lot of time off I am checking back into Substack a bit. My writing at times suffers from the symptoms you describe -- good to know I'm not special. Thanks for the ideas on how to get back on track. Hope you are well.
Mark! I was so excited to see your name in my inbox! I was thinking, could it be? And for real it is! So happy you are back. Things are good here (with the exception of the current political situation) and I hope they are with you, too. Look forward to seeing more of you.
While not a regular schedule, I have posted occasionally. It's a nice community so trying to figure out how to modestly engage again at least for a bit. If you remember, I used to write about my enjoyment of history reading. This is an alarming period and I hope we navigate without a lot of permanent damage. We will see. My best analogy to what is happening is this period is a bit like the dark period after the Civil War. We descended into the eventual failure of Reconstruction and an enormous battle over tariffs when we became very insular as a country. Interesting enough as we had another non-consecutive presidency with Grover Cleveland. The fight was all over tariffs and it very nearly destroyed our country. I hope we make it this time.
I was thinking about how so many of these apply to getting stuck in the middle of any creative project. Sometimes I write about a painting or a garment or a stage set to help me think through how I want to go about it all.
I was especially excited to learn the term “side writing!” This is a thing I’ve done since high school, but I didn’t know there was a name for it!
My Dad always smiled at how much I loved slant or half rhymes. If I put them together with side writing, I feel like I have the name of a big band: Slant Rhyme and the Sidewriters!
Also, I do a version of TK which involves riffing on the keyboard to make a long gobbledegook word. As you say, it frees me up to keep going and I smile when I see dfgjurghjyevbjgrhbhjif when I come back to edit!
Thank you, Charlotte! Hugs!
I love the idea of writing about a project in a different creative genre. The reverse of that is how often I get ideas for writing when I'm stitching or knitting to drawing. It all goes together!
And it was only recently that I learned the term "side writing," too!
TK is my go to! I also love the all caps sentence, mine usually a variant of THE SOMEONE DOES SOMETHING BUT I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT OR WHY YET. The “yet” being the key. Also, fidget spinners for the win!
Yes the "yet" is the key. Gotta remind the brain of that!