Tag: writingtips
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why writing is like air travel
I really like airports. Going through security doesn’t bother me. It’s kind of fun to hunt through the terminal for a chai latte. I find it satisfying to refill my water bottle at those little fountain things that are only at airports. I don’t mean airports are good places to hang out for no reason.…
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it’s not possible to make a mistake
There’s a scene in Kurt Vonnegut’s book Breakfast of Champions where John meets Mona, a woman from the fictional religious group the Bokononists. John acts shy at first, so Mona says, “It is not possible to make a mistake.” That’s the customary greeting given by all Bokononists when meeting a shy person, she tells him.…
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to reveal, or not to reveal?
“I don’t know whether I should write about my affair,” one of my memoir clients said recently. “Without it, the choices I made after don’t make sense. But I can’t imagine my ex-sister-in-law reading it…She might not forgive me.” This kind of dilemma comes up a lot with my memoir clients. They want to write…
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a beast in my soup
One afternoon I was having lunch with my friend Misha. We were gabbing about who-knows-what when she stopped and said, “There’s a beast in my soup.” I looked over and sure enough, swimming around her soup was a jade-green beetle. We erupted into giggles. “What is the other word?” she said, wiping a tear. She’s…
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a sharpened stake
I used to think writing was a solitary act. I wrote alone, brainstormed alone, edited alone. Only on very rare occasion did I let it out into the sunlight, did I invite someone in. Partly that’s because I was shy. I didn’t think anyone would want to read what I wrote. And showing someone your…
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anatomy of a story
One Thursday in 2017, my arm began to hurt. Instantly I assumed the worst: I must have torn something, probably during silks practice. I put on a sling and refused to lift even a pen. The pain worsened. So, days later, I called my chiropractor to book an appointment. “What does it feel like?” he…
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to be a toddler
When I first came to Peru three years ago, I found a community of language learners: some learning English, some learning Spanish. I was learning Spanish, armed with high school vocab and an impressive Duolingo streak (250 days!). Yet it was not past experience, nor commitment to an app, that indicated anyone’s success. Nor was…
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saws and other writing tools
“If you’ve never seen a saw, then a log looks like a miracle.” Think about that. If what you want feels impossible, it’s tempting to conclude that it is. But maybe… Maybe it just seems that way because you haven’t yet found the right tools. Maybe, to someone with the right tools, it’s in reach.…
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the scriptwriter’s secret
There’s a character in the book Aunt Julie and the Scriptwriter by Mario Vargas Llosa* who’s known for writing dozens of scripts a day. He writes constantly, and what he writes is good. So people ask him: How do you do it? What’s your secret? His answer: He poops a lot. !!! He says, “Un…
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twenty cat-cows
“Let’s go into cat-cows,” my yoga teacher said last Monday. “We’re going to do twenty.” (Me, silently: That’s way too many cat-cows.) “Don’t go to your full range of motion at first,” she went on. “Start small, and let each one expand a little more.” I felt called out, trying to arch my back as…
Kimberly Bunker, MFA 