Write what you know

Once, I had set out to pen “the story”, with characters that one hates to love and loves to hate. A story that picks up momentum perched on a frozen riverbank inhaling the crisp winter air,and begins trundling down wooden stairs towards an overstuffed mailbox.

Yet every attempt turned up dry. Those words lacked “oomph”,and to some extent even believability. You know, the specific satisfying details that only experience provides. Came to the realization that my favorite pieces of writing were usually non-fiction,and even the fiction were imitating life, like art often does.

What does this have to do with anything? Everything! This is the core, the eureka moment saying that the secret to writing , to getting started is as simple as ‘what you know’. That worked well for me, I would like to believe. Beginning with brief pieces on my home town on an international blog, and regular practice came an ease with penning observations.

Tonight, I attempt to write my first post here at The Fishtank and share an experience of an aspiring author. What I know is the all too familiar feeling of short phrases and statements floating around that can be so much more if given attention. In between answering the door, and completing a report, the plain urge to drop everything and communicate with you. You! The ever present, two or two thousand, readers in cyberspace, the essential audience. There is the almost unbearable urgency to relay what has been eating away at me for minutes/weeks/months. That somehow once its written down,hopefully coherent and legible, a dialogue will be sparked.The consuming process of stringing together words that truthfully represent one’s particular mind-heart combination to complete strangers. Each time the submission is on its way,sheer excitement of receiving feedback takes over. This I know.

What became of the ’story’ you ask? Oh, it is there all right. No quitter, I have some moments to enact and react to before it hits the bookshelves. Until then, consider giving writing a try? You can begin with the comments section.

(first submitted at TheFishTank)