Dragons, stitches, and writing
Finding the discipline to write daily
Writing daily is harder than I thought it would be. I knew it would be a challenge, but I was getting ready just now to turn in for the night and
“Oops, I haven’t written anything today!”
So, if you are one of those lovely people who are actually reading this every day (Hello Lovely People!), today our topic is going to be about how hard it is to write every day.
I am not a very consistent person. I’ve never exercised regularly. I don’t have any specific daily routines that are the exact same every day. In fact, when my life has required some sense of “everyday-ness,” I’ve not handled it very well.
When I was being hired at my last full-time employment many years ago, I said to the person who had the FINAL SAY in hiring me, “I’m not great about ‘office hours.’ I’m not a 9 to 5 kind of gal, but I work hard.” She said, “I don’t care when you get the work done. Just get it done.” In one of my early church jobs I was a youth minister and I made a sign to go on my office door that said, “Office Hours . . .” It was pretty and it had specific hours that I had decided I would be there in case anyone wanted to stop by and chat. Then, after I had left many pitiful voicemails for the pastor telling him that I wouldn’t be there at the time I had put on the sign, he replied, “You imposed those on yourself! I don’t care when you are here.”
It is good to know these things about yourself. It is even better when people are willing to work with you that way.
So, I knew it would be difficult to write daily simply because I’m not disciplined enough to do it. In fact, I came so close to just blowing it off just now, but then I remembered that there are people out there holding me accountable. (Thanks People!)
When I first starting writing, it was like the ideas were speeding through my mind. And, I still have a lot of stories I want to share, but they have slowed down a bit and I’ve got a long way to go! In case you are keeping up, we aren’t even a month in yet. That means eleven months to go. Yikes!
I wasn’t sure what to write about last night so I asked Hubby, “Give me a topic. Let’s do improv.” He said, “Dragons.” I wrote about Mama Bears.
I asked him again tonight. He said, “Stitches.”
“Stitches?” Really? So, I said, “Why did you think of stitches?” But, that isn’t part of the improvisation game. So, here is a little story . . . improv style . . .
The Dragon Who Got Stitches
Once upon a time there was a young dragon. You could tell they were young because they only had five circles on their tail. Babies have one. Adults end up with about fifteen when they are really old.
The dragon’s name was Tomi and they were quite the trickster. They loved to play jokes on others, but they didn’t have a lot friends. It wasn’t because they were a trickster. They were just a little weird and didn’t make friends easily.
One day a classmate played a trick on them. Yes, dragons go to school just like the rest of us. Dragons hate having to go to school just like the rest of us. Then, when they are older, they wish they could go back to a simpler time and be back in school again — just like the rest of us.
One day during recess, Tomi was playing on the playground. They had climbed into one of those large terracotta pipes that were strewn about. There were three of these very large terracotta pipes on the playground and all the dragons loved to hide in them. When the teacher called “Recess,” they would race to the pipes. Whoever got there first got to climb inside and pretend they had left the playground, disappeared from school entirely. Tomi would curl up inside the pipe and imagine all kinds of other worlds.
Tomi’s classmate, Vera, came along and said, “Look out Tomi! There is a spider in the pipe with you!”
Tomi was terrified of spiders. So, when Vera played this little trick on them, Tomi flew out of the pipe so fast that they scraped their head on the pipe on the way out.
Vera was just being a trickster too, but Tomi hurt their head so bad that they had to go to the Dragon Hospital and get three stitches across their head so that it could heal.
Vera felt so bad. Tomi understood. Tomi was such a trickster. They knew that sometimes when you play tricks on people, accidents happen.
That was the day that Vera and Tomi became Best Friends Forever. In fact, each of them has about twelve rings on their tails now and they are still friends to this day.
