What a ride!

My first time traveling around to the Red Writing Hood bloggers was such an awesome experience.  I probably spent too many hours reading other people’s blogs today.  I think I want to manage that each week, but I know sometimes I won’t be able to.

It has been an inspiring kind of day.  I keep thinking about what I want to write next.  I keep thinking of things I have written & want to share them, maybe look at them with fresh eyes.  I’m not sure what it does to the rest of you, but this is what it did to me.

Before I finished reading, my kids were in full bicker.  One trying to get the controller away from the other because the other was doing something in the first one’s level.

“Hey, that’s MY game!  You can’t do that!”

“It’s mine, too, yes I CAN!”

Andy accidentally knocks her on the head with the nun chuck, she grabs the cord & tugs & I had it.  I yelled at both of them "Give me that!" (we all do it, I do it probably way too much, but damn it I was busy reading!!) and turned off the Wii, grounded them from playtime for the rest of the day.  Dew did his usual howl of demise (it really does sound like he’s dying) and Fluffy Fart just got mad.  Only a few moments later, they are both asking again to play.  Mere seconds later!

Luckily, I had just read from the last tab in my open browser & commented.  I was done, for now.

We all had a bite to eat and I started the dishes.  I saw On Writing open, face down on the half wall.  I wanted to read more.  I need to delve into another’s ideas of where it comes from & how to get it right.  I know there is no magic formula, but there is so much to learn.

I started to read in our recliner.  Maia is having her chocolate milk (a story all its own) and the Dewd wants to go outside, but he won‘t go out without Maia.  Maia puts on one of her favorite dvred specials - America’s Cutest Cat.  I almost deleted it yesterday & kinda wish I had.  I can only watch or hear something so many times.

She finished her chocolate milk & I decide to ask her about stories she’s written.  She’s written 3 that I’ve read & I want to reread them.  Maybe I have vicarious hopes for her, I don’t know.  I do know that I never thought of anything remotely related to writing when I was 6, at least not that I can remember.  2 of her stories she wrote when she was 6.

She gets them, I read them.  One of them jars me and I’m not sure why.  Maybe it’s the reference to the “black baby”.  That is what the story is - all about a “black baby”.  He’s a baby that can do everything, even stuff normal people can’t do.  & he’s even married and has a pet hamster named Rhino!  It's a full page, words on every line.

I tell her I like her creativity.  I also tell her that I didn’t even start writing until I was 8 or 9 or 10, or something.  I tell her that she has something special because I really think she does.

So both Andy & Maia now want to do some creative writing.  They both grab a notebook & pencils.  They both sit down to write.  Andy is distracted by the TV, so I tell him to turn it off.  He has a hard time trying to think of things.  He asks what a good name for a snake is.  I tell him that it can be any name he chooses.  It can be slither or slide, anything related to a snake, but I want him to think of his own.  He can even name it something like Foot!  There are no rules, write whatever you want.

"He can even name it pooh," Maia chides.

"Yep," I say, "anything he wants. But there's already a bear named Pooh!"

Maia has already shown me 2 things.  2 poems and she‘s still writing.  I really like the effortless time she spent writing them.  It encourages me & I encourage them.  I never thought to do this before, write with my kids, but I liked it.  The first thing she showed me was “pants on the ground, pants on the ground.  Lookin (without the g - I didn’t teach her that - must be an inherent knowledge or just having read things I've written) like a fool with your pants on the ground.”  It’s not her idea, but fun & funny.  The second thing she showed me was titled Candlestick.  This is her poem, as she wrote it at age 7:

Candlesticks
Are burning
Hot.  Flaming,
Flaming all around.

I’m perusing her notebooks right now & I find in super big letters she’s written on a full page

HEAR
MY
STOR
Y!!!

exactly like that.  I’m not sure when she wrote it, but I love it!!  I know she didn't write it today because it's in blue ink.

Should I get excited?  Maybe not, but I am.  I love that she loves to write.  In the 15 or so minutes we wrote together, she managed Candlestick, Butterflies, Magnets, Balls & Unicorns.  Neat little child poems.  This experience, this day, was probably one of the highlights of my year.