I Write Like Me.

Sometimes I wish I could write like Tolkien. 

I wish I could describe with long, detailed, and eloquent sentences the way the trees outside my second-floor bedroom window dance and shiver just outside my lacy white translucent curtains, sometimes whispering, sometimes shouting at one another, and at me; for you see, they always know just when I am most vulnerable, and they are--most often--like tall, spindly friends: kindly when they beat out a rhythm on my roof in time with the pelts of the wind or rain during a midnight storm, watching over me like protective neighbors, yet always finding the voice to shout me awake the following gray, dreary morning, and even asking--at times--how long has it been since I wrote any of these thoughts down somewhere? Perhaps I would be best-served to go eat a second breakfast, sit down with a pipe, and write down my every last adventure.

Sometimes I wish I could write like Shakespeare.

In wonder wouldst thou marvel at my verse;
The careful meter beauty on the page;
Your eyes would firstly drink and quench their thirst,
Then find a banquet spread; and in the deft,
Unhappy, hardened ears of scholars all
And babes that cry for want of tender words
Alike, a symphony would burst of rare
And long-lost fullness sweet and mild with ne'er
The singlest word nor metaphor amiss.

Sometimes I wish I could write like Rachel Held Evans.

My thoughts, words, and musings on life and faith would always manage, somehow, to be impeccably timed, gracious, and wouldn't let you look away from your computer screen before you smiled at least once.

My words would be able to supernaturally reach through cyberspace to thousands of readers and somehow hug each and every one of them.

They would let you know that you are not alone. That you never have been.
That you are precious.
That you matter.
And that your journey is neither small nor irrelevant.

I don't think I've ever wanted to write like Ernest Hemingway.

My sentences would be short. They would always be straightforward. Fewer words mean less frivolity. I would not give you much to work with. You would have to fill in a lot for yourself. 

I might tell you I liked something. I would not tell you about it. I would not tell you why I liked it. I would write about doing things. I would not write about thinking or feeling things. Under no circumstances would I use contractions. This would be difficult.

Sometimes I wish I could write like Rachel Corrie. 

I would make lists of things that wouldn't make much sense to anyone beyond my own brain--perhaps of things I want most.
Or memories.
Or people I'd like to meet.

And they would all be in lower case letters, nestled unceremoniously between paragraphs of ever-intentional run-on sentences and sometimes looking like a strange poem, belly-dancing down the page, beckoning with the most unlikely, jagged, jack-in-the-box metaphors that you will have to puzzle at for a week or two, or maybe a year, before they click, all having to do with

nature
a broken-down car
my beautifully heartbreaking back-alley-dark-curls-and-almond-honey love affairs
the one million and five things that i could do. and be. and find.
my mom
fantasies i dream up to make a fraction of sense of the skewed way i look at things
places i've been
questions that are too big to be spoken out loud so i write them as loudly as i can
salmon
and maps.

The poetry would weave silently, unnoticeably into literal descriptions until my stream-of-consciousness would always be just on the verge of sparkling clarity, but never quite. And my forward investigation of life would never shy away from the things that are hardest to put into words. In fact, I would continually realize that those are the things most worth writing about.

But I don't write like any of them. 

Sometimes I'll read back through something I've written and I'll wish I'd used more metaphors or adjectives or made it sound more poetic or that it was more worthwhile. But (surprise, surprise!), I write like me. And then I think, all things considered, that's pretty okay too.