My Notepad

I’ve done it many times in the past. I read a book on writing. The author provides his or her secret strategy to becoming a better writer. Not surprisingly, this isn’t that much of a secret strategy at all. It boils down to reading and writing. You get the idea. Read more. Write more. So, I read more and I write more.

But every now and then they reveal a little more about where they gather their ideas from and these are the ones that most often are great strategies for improving one’s writing, but I ignore them again and again or put them off, saying I’m not willing to make that sort of commitment yet. Or, that’s the kind of thing you do when you are a successful writer. Bullocks. That’s the kind of thing you do if you want to write.

I remember in Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott spent a chapter writing about the index cards she carries around to write down those random, but often hilarious and priceless gems, that come to her throughout the day. These moments often strike when we are least prepared, meaning we aren’t sitting at a computer nor do we have a pen and paper out. And when these moments come to us and we have only our brain power to try to pin them down to the ground they often squirm away from us. To combat this problem Lamott carries a card with her wherever she goes. She also leaves stacks of them lying around the house. She quickly jots down a word or a phrase or writes the moment verbatim on the index card.

Lamott isn’t the only writer that I’ve heard of doing this, but she is the only one I can name right now. Bill Bryson comes to mind, but I’m not sure. Regardless, it’s a great idea and one I ignored for far too long. Not anymore. Instead of going with index cards I’ve opted for a memo book that is 3x5 inches. It’s a spiral bound book so I can easily write on both sides of the paper. There are 60 sheets. It cost me $.80.

I started writing in it on August 7.

I won’t stop.