Thursday, June 3, 2010

Freewrite


I loved these days. Mrs. Collins, would write the topic for our daily journal on the chalkboard every morning. My favorite days were Topic: Freewrite days. Her instructions were, “Write anything you want, anything that comes to your mind. If nothing comes to your mind write “I can’t think of anything to write” until you think of something to write about. Just write something. Remember, grammar doesn't matter when journaling. Don't think, just write. Now, I better not catch you sitting here for the next ten minutes looking around the room. All you have to do is write. GO!” So usually, I, being the A student I was, would start off something like this:

I can’t think of anything to say. I really don’t want to be writing right now because I can’t think of anything to write about. I wish this ten minutes would hurry up and pass because I cannot think of anything to write. I STILL can’t think of anything to write about, but she told me to write, therefore I am writing. Still writing

Impressive. I know. But then around the 8 ½ minute mark SOMETHING would finally come to my mind and the journal would actually get interesting. Wouldn’t you know Mrs. Collins would then say, “Time’s up. You can stop writing now. Let’s get started on our term paper.” Man. Why didn’t I enjoy what I had? I had MUCH rather write a freewrite as opposed to a stinkin’ term paper. But the task was over and we had to move on.

So, in honor of Christi Collins and Kim Haynes, the great English and AP English teachers of Baldwyn High, I am contributing this Freewrite Blog to them. Great teachers who taught me many things. (However, let’s hope they don’t read this blog often to find the run on sentences and jumbled up tenses…I never was great at staying in the same tense…present one minute, past the next…)

Here are the rules: I will set a timer for 5 minutes only. I will type until the buzzer goes off. Typing only things that come to my mind. I challenge you to try this activity. But if I was the betting type, which I am not, I would put an extra dollar that you end up freewrite typing or writing LOTS over 5 minutes. Here goes nothing. 10:37 p.m. Ready….Steady….GO!

The clock just ticked over to 10:37…let’s see 5 minutes from now what time does that mean I will have to start. I should have calculated that before I started this silly little task. However, today has been an eventful day, and a silly little task will help me to get worries off of my mind. 7 plus 5 more equals 12 which means I have to carry the 1 to the tens place and the time that I end this activity will be 42. Okay 10:42 is when I will stop typing. However, I can already feel it in my fingertips that I am not going to want to stop. I need to get a birthday present for Baby Estella tomorrow. 18-24 months. I would love to get her a little bow too. For her hair. I wish Hughes had more hair. But he is a boy and I guess it is okay. At least he isn’t a girl. I am very upset that the lady is backing out of the house contract. We were supposed to sign the contract tomorrow and our house would be SOLD. But instead we are SOL because she EMAILED us today that she isn’t going to sign. Great. Now we have emptied our home. The home that Kent proposed to me in. The home that we brought our son home to for the first time. The home…

It is 10:42! Stop. See. This was therapeutic for me. I could have kept on typing. But I said I would stop and I did. I challenge you to do the same. It is good for ya. Consider it a little cleaning out of the cobwebs in your mind.

Tune just came to mind…

FREE ya mind...(music music music)

the rest will follow...(music music music)

Don’t be so blind...(music music music)

You know you are singing along…

If you are still even reading along…

Enjoy your weekend!

Love

B

no pictures...just freewrite...scroll down for pictures

3 comments:

Leslie said...

Sorry about the house situation:( Don't worry your house is beautiful and there will be somebody that loves it just as much as you did!! Hughes Bday is coming up soon!! Can't believe he is almost a year old!!! I love the picture where he is playing in the dirt and you can see his teeth!! Too cute!!

Kosek Landing said...

I don't remember ever getting to freewrite, but I like the idea. I tried to write a story with Kate this morning, and she illustrated it. It was hilarious (at first) then completely frustrating. The story line changed at least 25 times, I felt like I was back at RES...focus, focus, focus.

elise said...

Brit,
You crack me up! I'm so bummed about the house:( however maybe we can get together before ya'll go! Sidenote: Hughes is HUGE and i had Archer some shorts made in that exact same fabric! Funny! they can be twins!