post 5/5) POST-TREE POST
a 5-post guide to Getting Started writing (i.e. hurdling the first “Post”, + then writing more, + posting more)
catching up? see
part 1) POST SOMETHING.
part 2) POST AGAIN QUICKLY.
part 3) POSTING LISTS TO JUMP-START YOUR FUTURE SELF.
post 4) POST-α-POST-Ω (all the steps in a writer’s dance with fear)
post 5) POST-TREE POST.
tl;dr. POST A POST WHEREUPON YOU PONDER YOUR WRITING PROCESS AND RELATIONSHIP WITH STRUCTURES AND SELF-REFERENCE POTENTIAL NEXT STRUCTURES OF/FOR FUTURE POSTS
My writing process is chaotic, instinctual, habitual, and non-linear. Sometimes I write in a stream of consciousness. Other times I can write a pat statement, point A to point Z where rounding the S curves is the greatest diversion. Oh, how I love those times!
Structure is essential. Structure is a decision which informs the content and the ending and which makes or breaks the piece. I have many orphaned soliloquies for whom I have not yet fitted to a structure, who I must thus keep sequestered in their files, dusty notebooks, and fast-going-obsolete word documents.
Structure is what turns a mad array* (too organised. Implies structure. Pool? Display? Heap?) of fragments of incoherence, witty thoughts, statements and observations into a piece of writing that can speak with grace and affect with force however subtle — a piece of writing, formed, that sits up and wrestles with minds and imaginations beyond the author’s, one which takes on a life of its own.
One of the most beautiful structures I have ever encountered was “A Roomful of Hovings” by John McPhee.
The structure of this 5-point piece is a hand, or underground buds, the starting of a tree. You can imagine thumb up, index pointing, that middle finger ({tongue out emoji}), the fourth finger raised, swiveling, in contemplation, and finally the pinky salute, as I down my afternoon tea in satisfaction.
Future posts, and my overall medium for Medium, may refer to the writing structure of a tree. Here I start, and the seedling grows.
I shall refer back, and refer forwards and upwards. I may obscure old words with new growths and seasons, or banish rotting branches (or even this old trunk) with the clean axe of Edit/Archive/Delete. I will seek to preserve the scars of my cuttings, trimmings, and occasional bonsai (re/)mediation.
I seek sunlight and sustenance and my root system is strong. I am eternally optimistic, curious, experimental. Some growths and stories will go rogue. My tree may subsume and consume and resume many species. My interests are polyamorous. As represented online, my tellings are as likely to represent forest floor debris as the naked new leaf. I will add and add and refer and edit. All you will see is the present day tree, and whatever further inferences are yours to make.
Onwards, with a roving raving bon-voyage-vive-les-rapides pen.
~kalina
Post-script-a-note-for-future-drafts. dear Kalina, what gets easier? what is still difficult? what new fears do you face? what did you not know you did not know? have you wished (I hope) you had had more often simply shrugged ‘c’est la vie’ and continued on?
{disclosure for mom — everything is fictional; my friends are imaginary; photos bear any resemblance to reality. I know not English nor do I fully understand this magical ride called life.}
