Week Two - Rough Spots

Monday, June 14, 2004

Today marked the first really nasty incident. A story was being critiqued and one person was pretty harsh with words. This person kept the harshness going until Suzy put her foot down and stopped it cold. She said that critiquing is fine and honesty is fine, but we're not here to be harsh and enough is enough. The person apologized, the author of the story accepted the apology and eventually everything was okay. It was a little uncomfortable for a few minutes, but I think we all know where the line is now. I seriously doubt anything like that will happen again.

My story “His Greatest Performance” was critiqued next. Some good, some bad. I got some good ideas, but I really beat myself up over parts of it. There were too many problems in the story that I should have caught. I really felt depressed about it for awhile, but I realize that I had an inflated opinion of the story to begin with.

I got to my room and focused on the positives, thinking about all the progress I made to get here. There's just no room for getting down on yourself and thinking negatively. I am still learning and I have to keep reminding myself of that. Everyone is at a different level and if my stuff was ready to be published right now, I’d be published right now. This is a learning experience and I’m a growing writer. I’m a good writer, but I still have so much more to learn. There’s no disgrace in that and I shouldn’t make myself feel bad about it. I should be thankful that we all have great professional instructors and great people who are reading with a critical, yet helpful eye. The best cure is to get busy writing, which I’m about to do right now.