If last weekend I was speedwriter, this weekend I seem to be turtlepoet. Every line must be just so. Every blessed word must be right before I can go on to the next. I started with a chapter that had 171 words, and after hours of fidgeting with things, I now have 282, counting two sentences that are just notes. Woo hoo. At this rate, it shall take approximately 357 days to create the 125 page manuscript I proposed.
I did try to leave the trouble chapter and move on to a later section; but everything seemed to depend on what had been said first. Here, I'd told myseld, "It's not a narrative. You can skip around without any problems." But when I tried, it didn't seem to work. I couldn't really work on the chapter about challenges when I hadn't written the chapter on theory that explained why the challenges are what they are. So go write the chapter on theory, but no. How can I write the theory until I've written the intro that leads to it. Where would I start?
See, turtlepoet. Every line must be perfect, polished verse, with the cadence of the angels. It's a miracle that I have 282 words really.
I did finish editing
Focus on First Lines: Increasing Comprehension through Prediction Strategies Friday. My manager told me that it sounds like I gave it a Heinemann book title for a name. I apologized. She said it was a compliment. The lesson introduces a lit course by asking students to make predictions based on the first lines of selected texts that they will read during the course (or unit). The author included first line handouts for American, Contemporary American, British, and World Lit.
I was sitting here editing, surrounded by piles of
my books, and I thought, Hey, why not a YA lit list. So I gathered all the books lying around me, took those that had great first sentences that I could use, and made an extra
handout for YA Lit. I couldn't use everything I might have wanted to. I was too chicken to use some lines—Like "Froggy Welsh the Fourth is trying to get up my shirt." And it's a one time per author kinda thing too; so I couldn't use both
Geography Club and
The Order of the Poison Oak. Both have nice first lines, from which you'd be hard-pressed to know exactly what the book is about really. You know emotions and metaphor but nothing about the specific plot. But that too seems like a place for a conversation—why would the author begin with a metaphorical description of the character's feelings?
I'm actually still reading
Poison Oak. I finished rereading
GC Friday night. It had been months since I read it, so I figured revisiting was in order before going to the next book. With my turtlepoet ways, it would probably have been better to just read today instead of writing 100 words. If only writing chapters were as easily as writing entries.
