Walking On Alligators - Susan Shaughnessy

I bought this book of meditations for writers at Bookshop Santa Cruz more than ten years ago. It has earned its keep in the past decade, deserving of its space next to my keyboard. It is a small book with a lot of white space. I appreciate open space anywhere I can find it, in the world, in a poem, or in a book. And that is the strength of this guide - 200 pages with each containing a quote, a paragraph that ties the quote to the act of writing, and then an italicized goal. Anyone who feels unsteady or uninspired with their creative writing would enjoy this book.

An excerpt:

A writer uses a journal to try out the new step in front of the mirror. ~Mary Gordon

Do you have a journal? Perhaps you do, without knowing it. Odd slips of paper, letters, notes in margins of books - these may be your journal entries, as surely as if you wrote them in beautiful script in a leatherbound book.

You may be ready to move to a "real" journal. A real journal is any place you keep your thoughts and experimental ideas in a systematic way. It may be a looseleaf or spiral notebook, or a hardcover book. It may be a file on your computer. The common thread: Every entry should be dated.

A writer without a journal is like a high-wire artist working without a net. A journal will help you banish your worry about silting up your work with inappropriate outbursts and pressing, but irrelevant, thoughts. They go instead into your journal. And there they lie, waiting until a time when you revisit them and sift for gold.

Giving yourself a journal means giving yourself permission to practice and experiment. It means that you take your talent and its development seriously.

Today, I'll try out a few steps in front of the mirror.