Sunshine & Coffee

I started writing again yesterday. Let me backtrack a little bit.

I was in enrolled in school from the time I was five years old until I was thirty-one. That’s just over two and a half decades. During those twenty-six years, I had no choice but to write, whether it was stories for English class or papers for History or Social Studies. I was given a prompt of some kind, and then sent off to write a response. Even in college – undergrad and graduate school (both times) – I was told what was expected for an assignment and then I had to produce the work. I was never really on my own.

That said, I was a lot more creative during those two decades, especially during my English Bachelor’s and my Creative Writing Master’s degrees. I think it’s because I wrote something everyday, and that kept my hand and mind in the practice of creative writing. I think I started and restarted my novel eight times in that time span, but I never stopped writing.

Once I graduated last year (2023), however, it was like I’d stepped into the “Real World”. Orders kept coming in for my baking business (for which I am eternally grateful) and I worked full-time at my family’s restaurant. Keeping a house clean, getting a dog (and all of the responsibilities Dog Ownership entails), and spending time with my husband and family all seemed to take priority very suddenly, as though there were no longer any time for writing or creativity other than what was specifically required for my jobs. Writing came to a screeching halt and I’ve struggled for the eleven months 1) find any time to write and 2) find the inspiration or motivation to write. I came up with plan after plan with a personal coach, my friend named Mark, to help me overcome this roadblock, but try as I might, nothing seemed to work.

I began teaching at a local college this past September. Somehow, I was upgraded this semester to teach Creative Nonfiction, for which I am eternally grateful since it directly utilized my education. Not only am I able to use what I’ve learned throughout my undergrad and graduate programs, which would be a plus in and of itself, I am also writing everyday. I give a prompt for free-writing at the beginning of every class and give my students ten minutes to respond to the prompt. I spend the ten minutes writing my own response. Sometimes I share with the class and ask them to share, too, and other times it stays silent in my notebook. However, this practice of coming up with a prompt and then responding to the prompt has opened my creative pathways, I think. I was itching to get back to writing, but I didn’t know how.

I spent this past weekend with my best friend and writing partner. Amy and I met in Fall 2006, our freshman year of high school, and have been inseparable ever since (other than minor spats in our younger years and the fact that she is now living a state away). This Fall, we will have been friends for 18 years. That’s almost two decades. We celebrated by going to a Jesse McCartney concert in Albany, which is about halfway between our houses. Jesse McCartney is an artist I fell in love with in early 2006, and although Amy began our friendship making fun of me relentlessly for my infatuation with the guy, it was her idea to go to the concert. It was like the culmination of our 18 years of friendship. We spent the night in a hotel, and talked until about 1AM, and then went to a coffee shop the next morning and talked about everything and anything for 3 hours. Writing was one of the things we discussed, and as she is a published author, I feel like she put me on the right trajectory for my novel.

I sat down yesterday afternoon and let my brain spill forth using techniques penned by Ann Lamott in Bird by Bird. I wrote an entire chapter. And then, this morning, I wrote half of the next chapter.

It feels so good to write again. There is an instant calm that washes over me when I write, and I’m happy to have had that calm come back to me after almost a year of being without it.

I’d like to thank Mark and Amy for helping me find my way again.

I hope you, too, dear reader, find your calm.

Much love,

Kathryn