We are the peanut gallery

Wednesday’s 4 Elements prompt became the epicenter of a strange little storm of collaboration in the comments. While it started with a simple (and blunt) observation, it ultimately became the transcript of a collaborative process in motion.

Jen and Kent sometimes have similar conversations via e-mail. But most of the time, all the back-and-forth and brainstorming are done verbally, and only the final outcome is recorded anywhere. This time we captured the whole thing, silly as it is.

That’s the kind of dynamic that makes writing with a partner so much fun. You can raise a concern, or ask a weird question, and there’s someone there to provide a response. Next time, it’ll probably be your turn to answer the weird question (probably with another question, even weirder).

To get all serious for a minute, something that we all struggle with is critical distance. It’s very hard to be objective about your own writing, unless you step away from it for so long that you don’t recognize it when you come back. Having a partner can help with that. Of course, it relies on both of you being able to speak frankly.

Kent now feels obligated to revisit that prompt and see if he can make it cohere this time.