Before my post here’s a note to remind me I have a goal these days. ROW80 GOAL: short by a few hundred words, but I have tomorrow! 🙂 Good luck to Sheri Larson, Margo Berendsen, and Susan Kaye Quinn on reaching their goals this week.
And now . . . .
It’s interesting how sometimes you’re trudging along, asking yourself, “What am I doing? Why?” And kapow, the answer is right there. It always was; you just didn’t pay attention.
Usually, those kinds of answers come from seeing or hearing something, and then connecting that to what’s been niggling at you. I had that happen yesterday and from two unrelated sources.
I’d just asked myself the “What . . .Why am I doing this?” questions when I joined a chat group called #ntchat (New Teacher Chat). Most of their exchanges were about sharing information among colleagues and how that influences teaching.
Boiing!
I remembered how much I shared with teachers both when I first started and when I became a mentor. A lot of influence going on all those years–a lot of learning. So I jumped into the chat fray with something like how much I loved learning, experimenting, teaching old things in new ways.
Boiing!
There is went again and LEARNING flashed in my brain. That was why I’d enjoyed teaching.
#ntchat ends at the same time #yalitchat begins, so being totally jazzed with chat already, I joined the second group. @gregpincus was hosting. His topic was Creating Opportunity–Your writing career: climb outside the box!
BOIING!
And there it was–the connection, the answer to:
“What am I doing? I’m trying to be a good writer.
“Why?” I love to learn.
Since I started writing YA fiction I’ve learned so much, and I continue to learn every time I try to put a new story down. In the next few weeks, on my Thursday posts, I’m going to share what I’ve learned. I hope you’ll join me and maybe share some of what you’ve learned as well. After all, I’m in that learning-how-to-write-stage– will always be there, will always be open to hearing what you have to teach me.
Next week: Marking your characters’ cultural and social backgrounds.