Happy first day of August! I don't know about you, but June and July whooped my ass & then some for tax, so I'm crossing all my appendages that August will bring with it a wave of positivity. So far it's started off on a pretty good note, which I'm hoping is an early sign of more good things to come. But one thing I've also learned is that the world is going to throw what it can at you—it's how you respond to it that matters. And moreover, if you have the opportunity to do something positive and take care of yourself along the way—do it. In honor of that I'm making sure I make the most out of these dog days of summer. I beat myself up a lot when I don't engage in personal creative endeavors, so to keep myself on my toes (or on my fingertips, which is more appropo), I'm going to force myself to get my creative juices flowing.
Working in an art environment I'm incredibly luck to work alongside some very talented artists and see their processes and work on a daily basis. One thing I always envy is the ability to do something artistic every day—any time there's a daily drawing challenge I'm inspired by my friends' artistic endeavors and wish I could do something of that caliber. So for the month of August I'm taking a page from their artbooks and imposing a 31-day writing challenge upon myself. But which one? Well, the answer to that is a little tricky; I'm going to create my own.
I've been doing a lot of cleaning and (unsuccessful) decluttering and I've come across a lot of old plays I've both read and written during my time as a Drama Studies minor in college. I always enjoyed the art of playwriting but have not utilized it at all since I graduated college (almost ten years ago—yikes). I don't often think to write a play when I have an idea, so this challenge will work to dust off my playwriting muscles.
But a play a day for 31 days is pretty challenging, so I'm combining three different writing challenges I've found to help out. First is 31 Plays in 31 Days—pretty self-explanatory. Next is a list of daily writing prompts courtesy of Writer's Write which I will use in conjunction with the prompts from the 31 Plays site. Last, and possibly the toughest, is 750 Words. I'll aim to have every play be (at least) 750 words. Every day.
Will I make it? We'll see. Will every play be good? Absolutely not. But so much of writing is the process of writing—flaws and all. And the only way to get better is to just keep going.
Wish me luck—and I'll be back soon with the first play of the month!
- Jamie
