High school English, all over again.

Well, I got my first full fledged critical spanking.  I mean, no holds barred "You sucked balls" type stuff.  It was as crushing as one would think.  I never want to write again.  I suck.  I don't have a viable job and need to find something else to do for money and fulfillment.  Maybe I should get a license for hair or nails since I already work in a salon and spa.  Maybe I should get a student loan and go back to college for a degree in a field that will make me money.  Maybe I'm failing.  Well, definitely I'm failing.  I usually do.

But there was one sentence that caught my eye near the end of the critique.  Half of a sentence actually.  She said that I wrote an interesting story if only I would tell it well and not break every fiction writing rule in the book.

Huh.  

I can't tell you how much I don't want to write anymore.  It's difficult and time consuming and I find it to be extremely frustrating.  The other day I described it to Hubby as "Trying to grab a cloud and make a string out of it."  I don't always like doing it and often hate what I wrote anyway.

But what if I can tell a good story if I learn some discipline.  This critique reminds me of my high school English teacher.  I had previously written stuff that wowed every teacher.  All A's and sometimes teachers encouraging me to get it published.  I had some serious confidence in my writing skills because I liked what I wrote and had been told that it was good.  Then I started in this woman's class.  I forget her name but will always remember her very clearly because we hated each other.  My first year in her class she ripped my papers apart and always gave me Cs.  She said that I had good ideas but was sloppy, unorganized and had terrible grammar.  Poor structure, sentence fragments, run on sentences, terrible punctuation - you name it.  And this woman showed me no mercy.  God, I hated her!  

So why, you might ask, did I take her class a second time when I had the option of another teacher?  Because I knew she was right.  

By the end of that first year I got an A in that class.  Barely and after much extra credit work.  The second year I also got an A but with a better percentage.  We argued and fussed at each other and she often told me that she expected college level work and would take nothing less.  I thought that she hated me as much as I did her but I liked the challenge and could see that she made my work better.  (By the way, college English was a breeze thanks to her.) 

 At the last conference of the year my dad told her about my plans to be a nurse, which I did not follow up on.  According to my dad she got pretty upset, like angry upset, and said that she thought that I was supposed to be a writer.  It was the highest praise that I ever got from her and probably the most important to me of any that I ever received.  

So maybe this critique was her spirit yelling at me again.  Yelling that 15 years away from her has made me lazy and sloppy again and that if I want to be a writer I need to treat the writing with respect.  Respect for myself as a writer, for the reader and for the words that I use to tell my story.  

It's a great teacher that continues to teach 15 years after their last class with you.  But I'm still listening and am grateful for the lesson.