How to Have A Process

it starts with having a very bad one

This week three different folks reached out to me to inquire about my writing process, which is unusual given that it’s a question no one has asked me in quite a long time. But this week, as I started a new job, and a new volunteer commitment, and scheduled a repeat training and repeat facilitation, as my life was maximally stuffed and I ate more meal replacement bars than meals… I got three inquiries.

Now it’s dark o’clock on Latte Eve. I’m huddled onto the port side of Mancy the Basecamp with my computer in my lap and the remainder of this afternoon’s tea working hard to the last drop. We’re up on our land beneath an approachingly full moon, after romantic fireside soup and grilled cheese. Several latte-worthy concepts swirled in my head as I drove yesterday from Greeley to Golden, and today as I went the back (long) way with less traffic from Golden to Breckenridge on the way to teach.

They’re all gone now - tucked in safely to a chamber of my mind that closes an hour after sunset, and so I’m left with another How To, because the gatekeeper is strict and I’m so close to slumberland.

How I Wish My Writing Process Worked
I would like to tell you that I write every single day, with tea and a typewriter, and a scratchpad full of notes. Maybe a jar filled with folded slips - whispers of ideas that have come at inopportune ‘non writing’ times. Before the sun rises, I’m scratching and banging away, clearing out the pipes from mediocre ideas and cobwebs and specters of ideas that aren’t mine.

I wish I had a solid draft a day, so that when Saturday rolled around I’d have six to choose from - one or more an obviously passable, jovial or lyrical or somber sort. I would dust it off Saturday morning, and scan through it once again after sorting the dinner dishes, and go to bed or settle in front of Call the Midwives at a reasonable hour.

This would also permit me - early in the process - to have a few… in the can… for weeks such as this, when I’m in the outskirts after teaching all day, hoping that my precarious single bar of cell service will take all these words from me to you.

How It Actually Works
I have a list problem.

I have lists here and there and everywhere - no romantic jar, no typewriter. My phone and my computer seem to share some lists, which does not help me nearly as much as I would like. My latte ideas are also noted on post-its, book margins, and the small pad of paper in my car that usually tracks miles and gallons of gas. More often I wonder who the hell wrote these ideas, which are often three or four words long with little coherence. Write three sentences! I admonish myself, but no. Cheese bang sarcophagus is the sort of valentine I unwrap.

There are many fallen drafts - not daily, but so many scraps and fragments and false starts litter my virtual notepad. Take Their Power one starts, and then saunters unceremoniusly into a grocery list.

Which - I’m also not sure has been acquired. Why is there an extra list? Why is my organized system so disorganized?