Let’s make a mess! — A Note from Kim

A table strewn with colourful writing supplies and a mug of tea.

Hello Fireflies! Kim here.

My mother taught me to hide my messes.

She felt that being messy was not something I should want to be. She wanted my bed to be made and my desk to be tidy.

But, the not-very-well-kept secret is that – I am messy.

Come to my house any day of the week and you’ll find dishes in the sink (and on various other surfaces), clothes next to my bed and piles of paper everywhere.

Now… if I know you’re coming to my house, that’s different. Then you’ll find a spotless, clutter-free home. Because that’s how my mother raised me, and it’s how her mother raised her, and without meaning to, it’s how I’m raising my children.

I’m not saying that tidying for guests is bad. Having people over is a great excuse to do some cleaning. But it’s also performative. And when we don’t see other people’s messes, we think they don’t have any, and we can start to think that we’re doing something wrong when we look around and see our mess.

This is what happens with writing, too.

When I’m reading a book and I’m enjoying every sentence, it makes me think, “I’m never going to write like that. Why even bother?”

But, just like a tidy ready-for-guests home, I haven’t seen what it looked like at the start.

When I first heard someone say “a messy first draft,” I didn’t know what that meant. I couldn’t even imagine it. Then, years ago, I heard an author at Word on the Street say that her first drafts were only dialogue and action.

My brain could hardly compute it. Just dialogue and action can be a draft? Then… what else can be a draft? I started dreaming: Can a first draft just be bullet points? How about sticky notes? Images? Emojis? Can we make our first draft with cartoons, intuition cards, or songs?

I brought it to the team at Firefly and we had a blast exploring first draft options and then trying them out. Now I’m ready to bring it to you.

This spring I’m launching a new one-day class called Making Messes.

It’s all about opening our minds to what a first draft can be, and then getting very messy as we create one. We’ll try out new things, draft in new and unexpected ways, and as always, learn more about ourselves as writers.

We’ll ask – what am I drawn to? What level of mess helps me tell the stories I want to tell? What would help my ideas come alive?

Of course, mess is different for everyone.

When I visit my best friend and she says, “excuse the mess,” and all I see is a laundry basket in the middle of the floor, I know that her idea of messy is waaaay different than mine. Everyone gets to have their own version of mess, in their homes and their drafts.

I love how Shannon Hale explains this:

“I’m writing a first draft and reminding myself that I’m simply shoveling sand into a box, so that later, I can build castles.”

There are so many stages and phases and parts to writing and one thing I know for sure — no matter what part it is, I’m going to enjoy it more if I’m not doing it on my own.

Happy to be in the mess with you!