The sentence delight

There are few things in a writer's life more satisfying than composing a really good sentence.
The sentence is the starting point. And it is the clincher. And it connects everything in between.
We don't always remember entire passages, but we remember really good sentences:
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
"Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."
"You had me at hello."
I have written millions of sentences in my career - and I remember the best one I ever wrote. It was 25 years ago. I was hired to write a script for a video promoting Charlie Brown Daycare Center. The video was to be shown to parents who might choose Charlie Brown as a place for their children. The video was only about 10minutes long - so I had little time to get the message across. I wrote, "If there's any time more important than the time you spend with your kids, it's the time you don't."
You may not remember the best sentence you ever wrote - but you can do this: Read through whatever project you're working on now and see if you can identify at least one really good sentence. And then sit back and enjoy the satisfaction you'll feel.

Reminder to writers: Babe Ruth's dead

A pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team was making his first appearance in a Major League game. About 50,000 people watched as he took the mound. He wanted to be careful and not make any mistakes - and he was a little too careful. He walked the first two batters. His manager came out to talk to him and gave him a sage piece of advice. He said, "Babe Ruth's dead, son; throw strikes."
In other words, don't get too cutesy with what you're doing. Throw the ball over the plate.
The manager's advice is good for writers, too. Are we saying what we want to say or are our words missing the target just like the pitches were missing the plate.
Read over your work and remember: Babe Ruth's dead. Throw strikes.

Up drafts and down drafts

One of the "unfunnest" parts of writing for most of us is rewriting. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could sit down in front of our word processors and produce one masterpiece after another without any touch-ups?
"Touch-up" is an applicable term. Have you ever painted the walls of a room and then stepped back, looked at your work, and applied a roller or a brush stroke here or there to smooth it out? We should do the same thing with our writing, lest a reader chide us by saying, "you missed a spot."
Ann Lamott is the author of "Bird by Bird," one of the best books I have come across on the craft of writing. In it, she says almost all good writing starts with terrible first efforts. Wow. That sounds discouraging.
But not to worry, says Ann. You have to start somewhere. She says the first draft is the "down draft" - you have to get it down. The second draft is the "up draft" - you have to fix it up.
Don't fret. Consider it part of the process.

Stick the landing

When my kids were little, I occasionally would go into their bedrooms at night and tell them a bed-time story to help settle them down to go to sleep. I hardly ever read them a story. I would just make something up and they seemed to love it.
Sometimes, though, if it was past their bedtime, I would cut the story short and tell them good-night. One of my daughters would never let me get away with it.
"That was no story at all," she would say. Heck, I had told the story for 10 minutes. It just didn't have a good ending, that's all. But to her, it was "no story at all."
There is a lesson for all of us in this little anecdote. Stories must have an ending. That's much different than stories that just end. The reader has to feel fulfilled when the story is done or it will be "no story at all." Plan your endings. In fact, craft them.
If you've ever watched a gymnastics routine, you know how important it is for the athlete to "stick the landing." The same is true in writing.

You can't go wrong with this rule

I was once reading a novel that took place in Chicago and the author referred to Mayor Charles Daley instead of Richard Daley. Even though it was a work of fiction, I didn't trust the author from that point on.
Dorothy Garlock, the great historical fiction writer who lives in Iowa, once wrote a book with a Louisiana setting. She called a state police post in Louisiana to find out what color uniforms the officers wore. Now that's attention to detail.
No matter what you're writing, don't guess. As one literary agent told his author, "You've got to know in which direction the sun rises and sets and you have to get it right."
Here's the rule of writing that works every time: When in doubt, leave it out.