When I was out in the garden with my students yesterday on a Wonder Walk, they were quick to point out the watermelon ripening. Of course I had to take a photo–knowing that it would feature in my writing and thinking in a few days.

Today I spent the bulk of my day in a math inservice instead of celebrating the National Day on Writing with my students. I hurried home after work to tune into the Write Time livestream that featured Write Out ambassador, Grant Snider (of Poetry Comics fame). As I listened to Grant talk about the importance of his notebook and the need to capture snippets of ideas before they floated away, I realized that I use my camera as a notebook. I capture glimpses of experiences and when I look at them, stories and poems unspool. I found myself thinking about the watermelon as a metaphor for why I write. And while I’m not sure it totally works, ideas emerged.

When Grant talked about how in comics the images need to add something beyond the words, I started scribbling my images, going beyond the watermelon growing in the garden. I started trimming my words, responding to my drawings. You can see from this rough first effort that I started with a watermelon image and then realized that it wasn’t my first image. (I did redraw the entire poetry comic–but haven’t yet taken the time to add color and finalize it–and maybe I won’t get there at all). The process was what mattered most.

Writing lets me:

Soak up and soak in

Shadowed and in sun

Swelling, ripening, evolving

Feast on the words

Review, reflect, rethink

Let thoughts ignite

#whyiwrite #writeout #writewherewestand #watermelon

So, why do you write? What processes help you get words onto the page? Why does it matter?