Write Friday #4

Well, friends, I can't believe that January is nearly over. And good riddance! I don't know about you, but January is tough for me; too gloomy.

However: gloomy days seem MADE for writing. So in that way, January this year has been great!

Last week, I transcribed some notes that I took a couple of months ago in my journal, toward an essay that I want to write about my mother's parents (in the micro) and about aging and love in the fact of death and decay (in the macro). I also wrote 1200 words on the start of a different essay that looks at similar topics but in the context of long illness in younger people. Sounds chipper, huh?!?

But isn't that funny: in writing, we can go to any place in time, in our lives or the lives of others we know or imagine, and we can write in that place, be it difficult, tragic, silly or uplifting. I was amazed last week that I was overcome with emotion while drafting that essay, I was really back **in** some grief that I though I had moved through already--and yet, when I got up after two hours in the chair, I felt so happy: I had given myself time and a place to be in the WRITING of those emotions and experiences so fully that I felt rejuvenated, excited, and honored--even though I had spent the two hours with a box of tissues.

But I digress: this week (as in, today), the goal is: write another 1200 words on this essay and, now that I am starting to discern what it's about, also create a research plan. Also, I have the great luck to be reading next week to a poetry writing class at Sac City College, so I have to prepare for that, which means going to the poetry I've written in the last year and seeing what's good to read aloud, what will make food for good writerly conversation. Very fun.

What is your writing goal for this week? Or, and here's a twist--what's your goal about sharing your work with others this week?