• A Desert Writer!
It’s been almost four years now, since I started retreating monthly to the desert to write.
It all started when I was attending our annual three-day Board Retreat. It was suggested that I begin to write about my children’s ministry. I asked, “Why should I do that? The answer came, “Because you may get too old to remember, if you wait!” We all laughed, but they were serious.
The conversation, however, continued for some time. We talked about leaving a legacy of my life-time of children’s work. They were getting more serious about it, when someone said, “What will help you write?” There was this pregnant pause, and then it occurred to me to say, “I need to go somewhere, where all I do there, is write!” So one board member handed me a set of keys to his condo in Palm Springs and said, “You can go there to write!”
This is the view out the living room window. Nice huh? I think so!
So I began coming to Palm Springs to write. I came for just a day at first, not really sure what I could possibly write about. One day turned into two days and a night. I figured out some things to write about, and list began to grow. Then it became three days and two nights. Now it is often four days and three nights. My most is five days and nights.
I scheduled myself monthly for almost four years and I found that I still have plenty to write about. The list continues to grow and my writing is improving. It is getting much faster. I am actually having some fun with my writing now. I enjoy the challenge and the discipline of it. The volume of my writing is increasing with every monthly Writing Retreat, as I call them.
For me that hardest part of doing these Retreats is scheduling the trip. The most frustrating part of every Writing Retreat has become shutting the creative process off to go home. About the time I am productively cranking out the pages, it becomes time to pack it all up and drive the hundred mile trip home. So I now my creative writing has become a new habit, not just once a month. Now I try to write a little every day, even when I am not on a retreat. Yeah, for the laptop technology, I can write anywhere or anytime now. But I am still committed to the productive monthly retreats.
You might say, this is how I became a “Desert Writer.”
One Response to “• A Desert Writer!”
October 24th, 2007 at 4:18 pm
I found the link to your blog at kidologist.com. I just wanted to drop by and say welcome to the world of blogging. 🙂
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