My Process, Continually Evolving

So, this past weekend I finished taking one of my creative nonfiction pieces from years ago and turning it into a fiction piece. The original piece was written in the first person, and so I am going to try this story two ways. I finished writing it as fiction, in the first person, and now I think I am going to set it aside for a day or two while I work on something else and then come back to it to edit and revise. That way, I can look at it with fresh eyes. Once I've done that, and I have the story just the way I like it and ready to be sent out, I am going to rewrite the story using the third person narrative. I am again going to set it aside for a day or two when I'm finished with it and then I will begin to work on editing and revising that version of it. Once I have a completed, ready-to-send-out version of first person and third person points of view, I am going to see which one I like better. Perhaps I'll let my husband read them, and one or two of my good friends read and have them let me know which version they like is better. After that I will make my final decision on which one is going to get sent out.

I've been writing stories for my own amusement since childhood, but it wasn't until my early 20's-and after learning about literary journals in my creative writing college courses- that I started to send my work out for consideration for publication. As one my expect, I was flooded with rejections. I was young and still trying to find my voice, but I think mostly, I was sending out pieces that were no where near ready for publication. I was so excited I would rush through a story, edit until it was just grammatically correct and then send it out to a bunch of journals; paying ones first-as I was working and going to school full time and trying to make rent. I would pretty much only work on one story at a time too. As soon as I was finished I would revise right away. I would even revise and edit as I went through writing the story. This might work for some writers, but for me it just spelled doom, leaving me with a piece that was just almost good enough.

I took a break from writing stories and sending out work for the last 4 or 5 years. I got married and immediately popped out 3 babies, but now that I am a little older and a little wiser, I've decided to start up writing again. When you have 3 kids rapid fire, life gets a little hectic. There were so many days where I just thought, why did I do this? But as my kids started to grow, things got easier and we settled into a routine. My oldest is in preschool, my middle child will hopefully be in preschool next year if he ever gets his stubborn ass on the potty (but those frustrations are for another post), and my youngest- my sweet baby girl- just turned one and a half.

So, there it is. I have two in diapers (hopefully my son will cooperate with potty training and be out of them soon) and one who is mature enough to entertain herself (girls mature so much faster than boys, I swear!). I have more time now to write and it's easier as well as they grow. Just yesterday while I was finishing my story, my oldest, Monkey (no that's not her real name!) was sitting with me at the table, practicing her upper and lowercase alphabet and her numbers (she is so proud she can count to 100), my son, Little Man, was sitting in the chair on the opposite side of me playing SuperMario on a handheld Nintendo, and my youngest, Sweet V, was sitting on the floor between her brother and I, playing with her baby Snow White doll.

It can be frustrating at times, and I'll be wishing it were quiet so I could focus harder on my writing, but it's time like that-when they are all gathered around me, smiling and laughing, talking with me, asking me questions about what I'm writing and them telling me what they are doing- that warms my heart and makes it all worth it.

I think these experiences-getting married, having children- has given me, not only so much more to write about, but a different perspective on life, and in turn has made my characters more realistic and relate-able. I also am forcing myself to slow down my process now. I realize that, while payment is nice, rushing to meet deadlines or writing stories for the sake of making a little extra cash for my family isn't going to cut it. I need to find a new approach. As I said earlier, I am going to take a break for a day or two and let my finished story sit, so that I can see it with fresh eyes. While I am waiting that day or two I am not going to sit back and do nothing, but rather go over a flash fiction story I wrote last week and do my revisions of that. After not seeing it for a week perhaps my editing and revision will be better. I can't worry about looming deadlines of literary journals right now, as I have done in the past. I need to work on my stories and really feel like they are ready to be published before I start checking deadlines and payments offered, because in the end, it's really all about having a story to tell.