Let It Snow

I know I didn't post last week and I don't have an excuse other than I've been working non-stop at two jobs and don't have a day off either of them until Christmas. The crazy thing is that I haven't even had the will to write, which I always find time for no matter what. This really isn't okay for me.

Anyways, it's snowing here today, which reminded me about a conversation with a co-worker. She's a college graduate with a degree in English and we both share this strange love of stories (so hard to believe, right?). Anyways, we were discussing the snowflake method of writing that's been all over the internet.

We've both read about it and, honestly, it's just a step-by-step instruction guide to what anyone who writes already knows. You start with a basic idea and you expand on that idea to turn it into something more than just a sentence. I really don't get how this person makes money off of the program that you could scratch out on a piece of paper.

I will give the "creator" of this method a pat on the back for making me think of this analogy. Something that writing and snowflakes have in common is that each is different. Just as each snowflake is different, each story idea is different. Sure, you have all of the ones about vampires and werewolves and unexpected love, but each has a special thing that makes it different. Where would we be without differences? We wouldn't have JK Rowling, which is how most of us met. We wouldn't have Stephen King or Shannon Hale or Eric Kripke (script writer but it's the same idea). We wouldn't have computers or telephones or all of these crazy inventions.

So before you give up on your story because it reminds you of something that's already out there, change it up. Make it your own. Give it something special that separates it from all the other books out there.

For my challenge of writing a journal, I'd just like to say one thing. Writing a journal in the point of view of a character is one thing, but writing for myself is something else entirely. I don't write journals that are paper and ink; those generally tend to turn into notebooks where I can sketch out story ideas. THIS is my journal. This is someplace where I can come to write down my thoughts and what's going on in my life.

Author: J.D Salinger