This is going to be a strange story, but I promise I’ll try to make it amusing…but it’s about feet and how amusing can you really make feet anyway?
For the last few years…at least the last 8…I’ve fought with my feet. Seriously, with weapons fought with them. I’d walk around for a while, like say at the zoo…but there would come a time when my heart and mind were still willing but my feet started putting up a fuss.
They would fuss so badly that I would sit down every chance I got, and when I stood back up it would be agony.
I couldn’t keep up with anyone, because I was always on the lookout for the next seat I could slip into. I spent more time watching those silly videos in museums than you would care to count, not because I wanted to see them but because I was desperate to make my dogs stop howlin’.
Well, in a moment of utter defeat and demoralization Day finally convinced me to get some gel inserts (Dr. Scholl’s even!)…I didn’t think they would work. I think I may have even turned up my lip (or tried to but was in so much pain neither of us are sure where it came from). I slipped them into my shoes and haven’t looked back.
I walked around the zoo the other weekend for about 4 hours without stopping…I kept up with TWO 19 year old girls…THEY were the ones that said, “Ok, my feet are getting tired.”
Well, thinking about this foot thing got me thinking about the writing thing…I’d been looking so hard for that magic bullet, that THING that would make writing make sense and come easy that I had neglected to hear the very practical advice coming from many different quarters.
Do it until it makes sense.
Sometimes we have to get demoralized and give up before we will open up enough to realize there is no special pill that is going to make us a great writer. It’s all about work, and work includes working through things that make no sense. Work means banging away at it until you want to scream and hoping for the best. Work means not having fun but looking back on the completed project with pride. Work means get your butt in the chair and write. Write. Write. Write.
And do it till it makes sense.
Find your peace, and live it.
Renee
