12 Comments

Portrait of a Lady on Fire is one of my most favorite movies. And I’ve been feeling stuck on my current novel—this edition of my the newsletter is a help.

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Happy to help, Esmé! 💖

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Video games came up in a recent conversation about narrative POV, since I’m developing that class on perspective. I appreciate your point about eliminating what doesn’t feed your writing personally and that’s something you’ve long been saying!

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Thank you, Em. Just sharing my experiences! 🌟

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Dig Dug! Yeah! So, so satisfying. More recently, in addition to music and books, visual art feeds my writing a lot - leaves me floating in a mood that can sustain many pages. Also long critical articles on fiction of the past - something about what our artistic ancestors struggled with, the problems they were trying to solve, makes me write with more intention.

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Yes! Because we make the writing, we can fix any issue associated with it. ✨️

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Such good questions! Really jamming my brain. It’s hard to determine a difference between what feeds my life/self, and what feeds my art. Is there even a difference? Should there be? Hmm

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Maybe? Stay tuned lol

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Thank you for writing! The habits that are helping my writing are getting up before the rest of the family and trying to spend 20-30 minutes every day possible on my writing (before the family needs me) and reading anything and everything I can. I track all the stories and poems I read so that I can go back to them when I need to. And the habit of listening to podcasts and audiobooks helps so much. You might enjoy the novel Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. Lots of stuff about video games. :)

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Thank you for the recommendation, Erin! I'm glad you're identifying your positive habits. Private writing time is so important.

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I love The Anchor song and used to have it as my ring tone.

Daily on the hotel?! How did Maya Angelou afford a daily hotel? Or was this just periodically? I understand that Cheryl Strayed also does this and gets a cheap motel for a week and will binge write.

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You have done and continue to do so much, and always with a smile. Thanks for this recap of your gaming days during law school. My daughters are in that phase now... trying to find their way in life. I'm waiting for them to do what you did and not necessarily quit playing, but shift focus. They haven't yet realized how much time it takes them or what a commodity time is. It's a very social activity for them, though, with multi-player games and scheduled meet-ups with friends, so the practice has evolved since you were playing. It's become their primary point of contact with others socially.

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