I was invited to participate in the Writing Process Blog Tour by my friend
Trish Bittman. Her delightful writing is raw, funny and filled with details of motherhood that I sometimes want to forget. She is a freelance writer featured in many publications including Bainbridge Island Magazine, Inside Bainbridge, and Real Moms Guide at SheKnows.com. Trish is a writer, blogger, Social Media Guru as well as a wife and mom to three girls. She's a lover of martinis, dessert and 4-letter words and moved to Bainbridge Island after discovering it on the Internet. It turned out to be all she hoped for and more. Her blog is
3 Kids and a Breakdown. Take a peek into
Trish's writing process here.
I'm pretty giddy about being invited on this blog tour because of the amazing writers surrounding me. The point is to connect like-minded people with special interests, so if you've ever wondered how other writers do what they do, all their answers are here! Each writer tags up to three other writers answering the same four questions, so you can follow the links backward or forward to find some fascinating introspective. Please follow the link below to my tagged writer,
Sarah Sousa. I really think she's fabulous.
Here goes!
What are you working on?
Currently, I write a monthly piece for
Parentmap, about how self-portraiture has helped shift my perspective, especially when struggling with depression. I have found it very healing to put myself, instead of my kids in front of my camera lens. I love sharing this journey, one that used to consume me so secretly, with others.
I try my best to follow the good advice of my writing teacher and work for at least thirty minutes a day on my book. I am writing a vibrant and sensuous memoir about depression and how it has affected me as a mom and wife.
How does your work differ from others of its genre?
Although there is a memoir out there about everything and anything, I still feel there is more to say about depression as experienced by women. It took me a while to write honestly about it and other dark aspects of marriage and mothering, but once I started expressing the underbelly of my troubles, the more people responded to my words. I was trained as an artist and adore all things involving color and craft, therefore; my writing is rich with dream-like details.
Why do you write what you do?
"If there is a disjuncture between how women live and how they actually feel – which to me there is, in motherhood and marriage – I will feel entitled to attempt to articulate it." - Rachel Cusk
I write as a way to survive. I started my blog as a lifeline, a daily practice to stay focused on the beauty in my life when I was feeling really down. My writing began as a personal practice that focused only on the happy stuff. Now, it's a practice that keeps me honest, engaged and creative. The more I get to use my imagination to write honestly about a hard and secretive subject, the more fun life is.
How does your writing process work?
I begin by writing scenes because they lead me to what I really want to say. At least this is what I tell myself when I wonder what to write next. I love prompts and exercise which get me thinking about interesting ways to smell, touch and taste the words. I create little projects and deadlines in order to make progress on my book while trying to keep the self-criticism at bay. Once my kids are at school, I start pounding out the words. Since my little guy is only in pre-school twice a week, I cherish my six hours and never do housework at that time. It takes me a long time to write my pieces, and I hope to become more efficient (first I'll need to take some typing lessons.) Luckily, my husband believes in my writing time and understands my need to work versus cook or clean. Maybe someday, I can support us while he does the housework, he's so much better at it!
Because Trish Bittman is the one who shared these exact steps in the Creative Process, I will share them again here too. Now that I know these thoughts will occur every single time I sit down to write, I'm getting used to it.
1. This is awesome.
2. This is tricky.
3. This is shit.
4. I am shit.
5. This might be o.k.
6. This is awesome.
Okay, enough about me, now let me introduce you to the poet Sarah Sousa! I fell in love with her poetry based on the red-leather diary of forty-two-year-old pregnant and abused farmhouse wife Esther Small from 1896. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Massachusetts Review, Fugue, Passages North and Salt Hill Journal among others. Her first collection, Church of Needles, was published by Red Mountain Press in May 2014; her second collection, Split the Crow, will be published in late 2014 by Free Verse Editions (Parlor Press). She holds an MFA from Bennington College and lives in Western Massachusetts with her husband and two sons.
www.sarahasousa.com
