To Make a Long Story Short
Connemara Wish
Clammy breezes settles over me body as I lay under the rock. Wet grass under me, air frosty with fog a-risen. Dint know where I be. Huge, these rocks. I instinctively crave a piano. The pool of water is big as a lake; I see the post fence beside it and figger 'tis not the fence that is not the proper size.
Cautious, I crawl from under the rock. Why am I lookin' fer a piano in Connemara?
"Here you be!" a voice bellows, scarin' the be-jesus. A giant he is...but only to me. I have the urge to run, but gently he snatches me in his fist. I realize quick he's no giant. I'm a speck of a man only a foot tall...and itchin' to play the ivories.
He holds me up. "Thought I lost ya," he says. "Damn Leprechaun thought I wished for a twelve-inch pianist."
I used to overwrite. I'd explain and describe things to death. I got so tired of hearing from writers in a critique group to write more concisely that I started writing more concisely. Sort of.
A local alternative newspaper in town here started an annual contest called "Short Stories 101." They invited writers to write and submit a story in 101 words or less. So one year I tried it. It took me three hours to write a story in 101 words or less and by gum mine was 101 words. I submitted it, but it didn't win.
But I thought I would use the exercise to challenge myself to really think about every word. To choose carefully. To know what I want to say and say it without extraneous embellishment. Find a word that carries the weight of meaning to replace two, three or five words.
Connemara Wish I wrote today and it took me longer than if I'd written twice as many words. I gave myself a limit of 150 words. After my first draft, it was 196. I studied each word, each sentence, looked at where the story needed to be and where it was going. Snipped a word here; changed two words to a single word. And I got it down to 171. I looked at it. I liked it at 171 words. Ah! But the point was to exercise my skills at self-editing, word selection, phrasing, and deliberating on priorities.
Seventy-five minutes later, I got it to where it is now: 148 words. It's hard work making a long story short. But occasionally I will write these stories just for fun and exercise. They will be filed under Short-Shorts. Try it yourself and let me know how you do. Try not to exceed 150 words. If you find that's too difficult at first, make it 175 or 200. Treat the exercise like calisthenics but in reverse: work down to writing less.
As you know, I like pictures!! Good exercise too. Thanks for more advice on writing. I am enjoying it.
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I'd use more pictures, but this dumb Quick Blogcast template I use doesn't give me much versatility in placing the images. They are all automatically justified left, unless I expand them across the page, which usually makes them blurry or distorted. I can't place a picture in the center or right; I can't wrap around, frame or anything. It sucks. I bought this Web site program because it included a blogging element. I have it for two years. I might change to Wordpress, though. I've been reading your blog and Robert J's and I love the way you guys use images. Both of you are on my Blogroll.
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Writing on my blog, and a few others, time is what stops me from being brief. Also, due to the complexity of most of my topics, being too brief would leave many readers in the dark.
Would love any tips. BTW, the picture up top is a great shot of you.
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I didn't quite understand what you meant by "time is what stops me from being brief." That would mean you have a whole lot of time to keep writing and writing. Did you mean that you truncate your session of writing because you don't have time? That would make more sense.
I understand what you mean by "being too brief would leave many readers in the dark." But brevity should not be an obstacle to making your point and including all the necessary information. It just takes longer to do. This exercise actually helps you learn to give your writer's mind muscle memory...like in golf. The more you sharpen your eye and prioritize your points, the quicker you'll get at working towards concise writing. I think.
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If it takes an hour or two to write a 1,000 word post on an investment strategy, it would take at least another hour or two to bring to 750 words. That's the time squeeze to which I was referring.
My posting, like yours, is sandwiched around client conferences, meetings, etc.
The exercise? Absolutely gonna try it.
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Would you send me what you write...privately?
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