I sat at the dining room table with my seven-year-old son, helping him complete a worksheet on reading comprehension. His task was to answer questions about the plot and details of one of Arnold Lobel’s Frog & Toad stories. 

Thinking of those answers came easy to him — he has loved books and movies since he was tiny. Every night, he helps me make up a story about characters based on his stuffed animals and favorite literary and film heroes. The result is that he has a good sense of how stories work. He would read a question, mull it over, then tell me what he thought. 

Yet, writing those answers down was hard work. I watched him labor, sounding out the syllables, placing his finger between each word to space them just so, shaping the letters. He worked through mistakes and frustration, using his eraser often and looking to me with his mouth pinched when he couldn’t spell a word he felt he should know. 

My role was to simply to help him hold onto his previously formed ideas while he struggled through the steps of constructing each sentence. If he got lost between one word and the next, I would repeat back to him what he had already figured out, what he had spoken to me moments before. I could see the larger shape when he could not.

He finished the worksheet, took it back to school, and earned a sticker for putting in extra effort. He was satisfied, motivated to do more optional worksheets for the rest of the Frog & Toad adventures. In other words, he’s tucked away that experience and has moved on.

But I am lingering still, thinking about how difficult it can be to write even when we know the story we want to tell. How hard it is to find the right words, to marshal them into the correct order. How challenging it is to stick with it when we begin to forget why we started to begin with.

Which is why I decided to start working with a writing coach and developmental editor to help me finish the latest (and, hopefully, the last) revision of my novel. She is talented and smart and has a brilliant eye for story. She is helping me rediscover the big picture as I roll up my sleeves and begin the scene-by-scene and sentence-by-sentence work. 

Sometimes that is what we need most, someone else to sit at the table with us, to hold space for the ideas we can only find inside ourselves, to repeat them back to us when we get lost.

An Update and a Request:

• Due to the demanding nature of the revision process for my novel, I have decided to start sending out my newsletter posts once a month instead of twice a month. I look forward to continuing to share my writing and my creative journey with you!
• A friend of mine was recently in a major car wreck near Laramie. She was seriously injured and is recovering, but she will not be able to return to her work as a horse trainer for some time. If you would like to help her and her family out during this difficult time, please visit their GoFundMe page. Thank you for considering!