Writing, for me, has become like a difficult trigonometry problem – though I barely managed Algebra 1. I am completely flummoxed by my idiocy and yet the only way to combat it is to keep working on it.
I read all the books I can afford on the subject. I read several writing blogs. I talk to other writer friends. I study the examples and try to follow them. I do the writing exercises, step-by-step, use the formulas in the books (though purportedly the examples and page numbers given are not formulas – rather templates for beginners – whatever -- semantics). I outline as best I can – I watch movies, I read screenplays and yet, though I think I get some of it – I still fail at test time when I have to do the problem myself. As in math, when presented with the problem, though I know the patterns and formulas I should follow, suddenly the problem looks different. At test time, I don’t know how to use the numbers, or the information. I don’t know how to plug it into the formula. It just looks different. My story, my problem, doesn’t seem to work – and I don’t know how to make it fit.
I read the example. I get the example. I just don’t get it when I try it.
And I don’t care how many times I’m shown, or how frustrated the teacher gets. I will look at it, get it within that one given problem or two, then when it is my turn to do it – I’m missing one step, I forget the decimal, or to label the problem. I do it wrong. The test comes back, and the teacher has scratched through with red ink all my mistakes. Blistering red and bloody, my test shows how much I still do not understand. I’ve failed. Again. I look at the corrections to see where I went wrong – and there is the formula again. It looks so simple – how did I miss it?
But I keep showing up. I go to the after school room filled with the Work-Study tutors who help folks like me on a first come, first serve basis. Sometimes I get the guy who speaks like a computer – but his information doesn’t work for my brain, and other times I’ll get the gal who can explain it at my low-rent level. Little tiny bells go off. Tiny little sparks of comprehension. Slowly, pieces at a time, I start to understand.
Test time again. I still fail, but there are fewer red marks. I am closer.
Math, unlike writing, was forced upon me. The desire to do it was only that I needed to satisfy the requirement. Forced or not, I succeeded in my math class and moved on. Writing, on the other hand is my choice. I want to do it. I need to do it. The desire, though, does not guarantee success -- otherwise I would have been a successful actress. I know how hard I must work for it. Becoming discouraged is just part of the process. I have to believe the day will come for me as a writer that I finally see how to work the problem on my own. I will finally see the steps I missed. I will finally remember that dot, that turning point, that twist, that step, that thing that eludes me. I will finally label it correctly, and it will seem so easy, clear and how did I not get that before?
Ugg.
