night session

Every table and couch and flat surface in the writing center is occupied, so we push outside, out of the stuffy rooms loud with the breath and voices of seven people and into the night air. It's full of the smells of waning summer, sweet dried grasses and dust. I eye the succulents and promise myself not to trip.

We huddle on metal chairs near an orange light and I begin to read, words I've seen a dozen times. My throat scratches and sometimes I bellow on accident as we walk through the world his words create. He twists his hair between thumb and finger as his eyes follow my voice down the page. I draw smiley faces next to the good parts because there have been hours of work and tutoring and it's 10 p.m. and smiley faces are the best I have.

At the end, there are smiley faces all over the paper and our faces too because this thing is so close to being done. We have fought through beginning-word-sludge and talked about how to go personal, really personal, how to find that thing that makes people want to read and keep reading.

I always feel like my ideas and suggestions come from a place of barrenness, that what I have to give is dust that blows away as I offer it. It is always a surprise when a student comes back with dust-made-clay-made-sculpture. A good surprise. Smiley face.

I walk back into the warm rooms. I am warm.

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Linking up with Heather of the EO, who asked us to just write freely, without expectations or overthinking or overclarifying. Come read writing straight from the heart-gut here.