I was talking with an American friend who has completed an actual Creative Writing course (unlike me), and we shared pieces of our writing. She made a suggestion about phrasing and that’s when the question ‘How do you?’ appeared in my head.
I’m a stream of consciousness writer. Yes, there’s a plan. And yes, there are characters. But the words just come out onto (virtual) paper in the order they appear in my head.
Later, I’ll bump and jump backwards and rearrange them later and (because I’m a serial editor), change many things. Then there will be the read-through(s) and each one of those will create further edits (some minor, others severe and major).
My friend is more ordered, more organised. She seems to be capable of writing her first drafts in near-perfect form. Although I’m jealous of anyone who has this capability, I enjoy reading, re-reading, editing and re-editing. At the end of the process I feel as though I have my hands on something I worked on, something I put a lot of effort into writing.
Look, that’s my excuse for carrying on in this slightly disorganised and very inefficient manner, OK?