Writing Is Like Preparing Potatoes

I had a shocking revelation in Honors Geometry a few days ago.  Writing is a lot like preparing potatoes.  Sounds weird?  Allow me to explain.



1.   You pick up a sack of potatoes at the grocery store and bring them home.  Comparitively, you think up snatches of plot, intriguing concepts, cool character names, etc. throughout everyday life, then write the best of the ideas down or keep them within the recesses of your subconcious.

2.   When the time comes for dinner, you choose how to prepare your potatoes and pluck out the cream of the crop.  In your "writing persona", you need to start a new project, so you choose some ideas that could go well together, pick a genre, and mix everything together, perhaps in an outline, or otherwise a loose swarm in your mind.

3.   You plunge your knife into the first potato and realize that its not as perfect inside as you thought.  Some of your ideas crash and burn.  It's a looming evil for all.

4.   You have your potato wedges and decide to carve off the skin.  Your first draft is kind of depressing you.  Revisions can help you immensely.

5.   The skinned potato chunks look less than professional.  Even after a round of revisions, problems are sure to linger.

6.   You pull out a paring knife and fix up your potatoes.  Proofreading and a few more slight revisions take you from depressed to indifferent, or even happy.

7.   The oil is ready.  You plunk in those potatoes for thick-cut fries.  Bon appetit!  The market isn't getting any easier.  There goes your queries (or manuscripts).  Good luck!



 



Uncanny, isn't it.