A Writing About Writing

Do you really enjoy your job?  I do.  Do you know why you enjoy (or not, as the case may be) said job?  I got to thinking about that today, and I've come up with a list of my favorite parts of writing.

• Diversity.  When blogging I get to write about . . . anything.  That's a pretty exciting thing for someone with the varied interests I have.  
• People.  I know, that sounds a little odd.  Writing, after all, is a pretty solitary endeavor.  HOWEVER, much of my writing is based on personal interviews, so I get to spend an hour or so with a new person every week (at least) and learn about them and their business.  The fact that most of my interviewees are farmers is even better, because farmers are generally some of the most interesting and "salt-of-the-earth" types you could hope to meet.  
• Creativity.  This again may sound strange as most of my writing is non-fiction.  What I have discovered as a profile writer, however, is that the story really isn't the story.  My perception of the story is the story.  I most noticed this doing a profile on my family's farm.  (Tougher than it might sound!)  I tried to approach both the interviewing and the writing like a stranger, and I found that there were angles to the story I wouldn't conceive of as a family member but I definitely did as an ignorant third person.  Fascinating.  Frightening.  Makes me wonder how many of my profiles are as accurate in spirit as they are in fact . . . !
• Accolades.  Let's face it: there is no Pulitzer Prize in my future.  No Nobel Prize for Literature.  Who am I kidding . . . even my local library didn't know where to file my first children's book.  (Juvenile nonfiction, by the way . . . a book about saws and what they do???  That was my vote, anyway!)  But there are times when I get a pat on the back from one of my article subjects, and that means a lot to me.  I do strive for accuracy and truthfulness, but it's nice when people like it as well.  
• Challenges.  I'm discovering that I'm a person who enjoys successfully tackling challenges.  I can whine a bit along the way, but I really do get a charge out of doing something new and doing it well.  Grant writing, profiles, technical writing/editing, children's lit, poetry . . . each one has it's own unique flavor, and I enjoy learning what each tastes like.  
• Therapy.  Some people process in pictures, some in color, some in movement . . . I process in words.  I do not understand something--a new idea, a feeling, an experience--until I have put it into words.  That can be dangerous when speaking, which is why those close to me are used to me saying dumb things, stopping, and then retracting it saying, "I don't think I really meant that.  I think I meant . . . "  Writing gives me a way to go through that process and then EDIT the final version, making me sound at least a little more intelligent than I do when talking!  
• Order.  I love the rules of writing, even when I break them.  I like the rhythm of poetry, even when I write free verse.  I like the structure of punctuation . . . yeah, there's no "even" for that one.  Just plain love punctuation.  Use it freely . . . only wish I could find more uses for brackets . . . more elegant to look at than parentheses with those awesome curves and points, but they are wasted on algebraic equations.  Ah, me . . . 
• The End.  Isn't it nice to have a phrase you just can't argue with?  A conclusion firmly stated with no room for extension?  (Unless they write a sequel . . . !)

I'm sure there are many other things, like the fact that I sit down to write for 10 minutes and realize that an hour has passed, but it is late, and I am tired.

The End.