So you think you can write?

Number of entries received for the 2007 InnermoonLit Award for Best Short-Short Story to date: 46

Maybe I’ve been watching too much reality TV, but the thought of people pursuing dreams for which they may exhibit little promise has been on my mind lately. Simon Cowell and Nigel Lithgoe might think it’s better to crush the dreams of the untalented so they can try their hands at some other pursuit, but I for one don’t want to discourage anyone from writing, and I’m thankful we don’t have to give our entrants face-to-face evaluations. If someone loves to sing or dance, what’s the harm in letting them enjoy it, even if they are terrible at it?

I feel this applies even more so to writing. When I was about 11, my grandmother told me that there are no writing prodigies. Kind of a sad thought for me at the time since I wanted to be instantly, innately great with none of that hard work and practice crap, but now I appreciate how right she was. You have to read good writing, put in lots of time writing, read bad writing, spend lots of time revising, then read, write, and revise still yet more, and on top of all of that, you have to experience life awhile to build up some material and try to figure out something worth saying about the human condition.

My point is, today’s terrible writer could be wonderful in ten years. Brian likes to paraphrase Natalie Goldberg, who said all our bad writing is fertilizer from which the good stuff later grows. Anyone who has ever written has written some stuff that's just plain no good. Besides, even if you never make a dime as a professional writer, it is a worthwhile skill to develop. Sooner or later, you are going to have to write something, be it a resume or a letter of complaint, and the more you write, the better writer you’ll be. So I say if writing is something you enjoy (or probably more accurately, something you feel compelled to do), keep doing it.