Road trip Writing [BOOK BLOGRIMAGE DAY 2/30]
This challenge is exhausting! I'm on a 15 hour road trip to tulsa for the Seeds Conference hosted by Church on the move. I'm with great friends, but took some time to write. I am finding it mentally and emotionally draining to write. It's hard to know whether my content is good or not, but I am fighting the temptation to edit while writing.
What I'm learning:
- The key to to writing, is writing. Don't edit! Just write.
- Another key to writing is not getting distracted. Don't check tweets or Instagram!
Here's today's excerpt:
Everyone says they were awkward growing up. Between my scabbed over chapped lips, curly uni-brow, pink wind blazers and in ability to understand people’s jokes because I learned English from parents who didn’t speak it well, I’m pretty sure I have most people beat in levels of awkward. My parents hardly knew what to do with me—they yelled at me for a lot of things. One day, I rummaged through mummy’s (my mother) dresser and pulled out a pair of jeans. Alternative music started taking off in early 90’s Minnesota and I wanted to look like the coolest grunge rockers with their Doc Martins, Long hair, plaid shirts and jean shorts. In order for this to happen, I needed the jean shorts, or “jorts” as cool guys call them. My mom’s jean were typical 90’s mom jeans, tapered at the bottom, acid washed and pulled up past the belly button. Before anybody could stop me, I pulled out a pair of scissors and started cutting the full scaled jeans into jorts. Denim is hard to cut through with kid’s scissors, though I managed to get it all done. Putting the jorts on brought in feelings of self accomplishment, pride and pure exhilaration. The first thing to do, of course, would be getting on my BMX Haro bike, and riding around my neighborhood in order to show my friends how cool I looked. For sure, I’d be the “cock of the walk,” the envy of every kid, bully and anybody that might think “I should go back to my own country.” These jorts were my right of passage—one of many I used to gain people’s approval, fit in and not feel so awkward. Riding my bike around the block in my jorts brought various feelings, but one stood out in particular. I felt cool. Not cool in the way of good looks, confidence and likeability, though, I felt cool in the region of my jorts. Looking down, while riding my bike, I saw my jorts were cut so low that my butt cheeks touched directly to my cold plastic seat. And instead of creating jorts to make me look cool, I had created booty shorts that exposed my inner to upper thighs to the coolness of the wind and another laughing crowd. My mom wasn’t happy when she saw her jeans out of the dresser, and my butt hanging out of her jeans. Like I said, my parents often didn’t know what to do with their awkward child.
Please provide me feedback. It helps me so much.
For those you unfamiliar with this BLOGRIMAGE journey, click here.
