As I sit at my
desk, pondering how to begin this blog response, I find myself enduring the
same stresses that Anne Lamott so wonderfully describes (it took me four
attempts to accept the word arrangement of this first sentence). I empathize
with Lamott, for I, too, struggle with simply getting words down on paper.
Sometimes I will find myself judging my writing before it even lands on the
page. It is as if my mind is home to a strict filter that refuses to put subpar
text on a page, regardless of my wanting to embrace the “shitty first draft”.
Lamott
utilizes a comically sassy tone in order to make this piece of hers especially
relateable. She sheds a humorous light on the burdensome process of creating
good writing. She describes her expected first draft as “twice as long as it
should be, with a self-indulgent and boring beginning, stupefying descriptions
of the meal, lots of quotes from my black-humored friends that made them sound
more like the Manson girls than food lovers…” Lamott is wonderfully descriptive
with her word choice, making it easy to recognize this shitty first draft that
any writer is familiar with. She also includes additional details in writing of
this piece, causing many comedic sides, my favorite being “All right, one of
them does, but we do not like her very much”. Lamott’s voice is wonderfully
personable here, implying that we the reader would agree in the disliking of
the woman mentioned above.
I enjoyed
reading every observation Lamott illustrates in this piece of writing; it was
well structured, relatable, and humorous. She concludes her argument with a
quote from her friend: “the first draft is the down draft -- you just get it
down. The second draft is the up draft -- you fix it up. You try to say what
you have to say more accurately. And the third draft is the dental draft, where
you check every tooth, to see if it's loose or cramped or decayed, or even, God
help us, healthy.”
Question: How
many first drafts do you suppose Anne Lamott wrote of this piece?
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