Brevity 83: Writing Between the Lines

The useful part

When I first started writing micro-fiction and personal essays, I chased the restrictive word count. Or rather, it chased me as I tried to fit as much of my story as possible onto the rapidly shrinking page. I edited myself as I wrote, but the piece fell apart as it hit the page—I hadn't yet done the work of uncovering the core of the story I wanted to tell.

How it works

• I followed tiny details as they appeared in my memory, unsure of where they were taking me, and came back to others when my intuition called me there.
• I'm not sure yet how the pieces will come together, but I trust that because the pieces are real and lived, my story is hidden somewhere within.
• It can be tempting to try to shed light on them all, overexplaining how they built on each other to make the final break so brutal.
• Her work has appeared in Marrow Magazine, Blue Lake Review, and The Nasiona, among others.
• Really, as with most things, it was running into the same issue over and over again that made me see I needed to loosen up a bit.

What to take from it

I sometimes have a hard time identifying the details that don't belong because each one feels so viscerally important. I try to make sure I'm not keeping them because I feel them, but because the story needs them. Like Liked by 1 person Reply brisklyf4d249cc95 says:

Example or evidence

• Your essay reminds me of the time my first writing coach said, "Think of your writing as an accordion." To this day, I do.
• Even now, as I write this, I'm letting myself drop musings in my Notes app about the ways I've written some of my favorite stories.
• I just have to figure out which pieces go together—and more importantly, which ones don't belong.
• A story shouldn't always be told that way, and in micro-essay, it often can't be.

Details worth keeping

I'd like to say this changed with my having a sudden realization. Like when I'm recounting a heartbreak and I know that this particular heartbreak is the culmination of so many smaller ones. A line like, "I pulled a Pyrex dish out of the refrigerator, the note with his name and a heart still taped to the lid," doesn't need to tell you to feel the heartbreak, it's already there.

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