Tools…
You need Tools to build things, whether it’s a book case, a bed, or a barn…you need tools for the job. You can’t hit a nail with your fist. Besides hurting like hell you won’t get anywhere execpt bloody and perhaps a visit to the emergency room.
Writing is the same way; certain tools are needed. For many who write I’m sure that comes as no surprise. Stephen King says he brings his whole tool box from the garage when he writes because he’ll never know what he’ll need.
For me, words are like gold when I write. When I’m writing, I’m constantly trying to find that perfect string of words, that when put together right, form a picture of a place, character, an emotion, or an action that grabs hold of the reader’s mind and puts them there right into the story.
Going back to Stephen King, I found that he is one of the masters at doing that. He is very good at looking at something in real life and flipping it to some analogous turn of phrase that you instantly connect to in your mind. I often seek to emulate writers like him and others. I have found one TOOL (method) gets me close to that type of good writing; being observant about what I see, hear, smell,touch,taste, and then following it up by cataloging that thought down somewhere….anywhere….the memo function on my phone, a notepad, dictation to the phone, a napkin, on my hand (yes I did that once) or even literally telling your signifcant other to remember “this” until I get home so I can jot it down.
Some thoughts strike like lighting about something you experience and you DON’T want to lose it. You may not use it in the current story you are working on but you will surely have need of it in the wee hours of the night when you are searching for that one turn of phrase that will bring it all home in that one paragraph that you are having sooooo much trouble putting to bed.
Words are not cheap so don’t let the gold coins dribble through a hole in your pants pocket to be lost and forgotten. It’s great to be able to go to a cache of magical words and phrases that you have saved up and rummage through it once in awhile and say, hey that would work in this part.
So keep the gold mine open and productive. I superemely HATE it when I forget something that was the coolest thing ever thought of on the face of this Earth.
Below are few of my ”golden” words you might say about every day observations in life. Some are direct form my own brain, some may be stolen you might say from family members, friends, or even strangers that I heard making their own unique observations that didn’t even know they were being original when they said them. Don’t worry it’s okay to steal phrases from others; some of the best words and phrases come from an author’s relationships with others (not talking plagerism of course). Let me know what your thoughts on the tools you use when writing:
Black and white striped sock
looked like the ribcage of a
rat lying in the gutter.
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Her skin hung on her bones like
a thin wrinkled suit on a hanger.
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I called them bumbies, half bum,half zombie
because of their slow shuffling jerky walk
down the street in their tattered dirty clothes
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Somehow I feel I ‘m framed like a picture,
Bounded and contained, my limits are set
at four corners, my face compressed
tight against the glass.
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I feel the sharpness of your eyes cut into
me keener than any blade could cut the thinnest
hair in half.
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Btw the way did you notice how I picked a Phillips’s Screwdriver for my tool in th title pic above…get it …because my name is Philip…he he he…..oh well..anyways..that’s my attempt at very obscure very subtle stupid humor…then I again it’s not very humorous if I feel like I have to point it out to you guys…:)
