SOMETIMES SECRET WRITERS, Mystic Board, Psychics, tarot reading, free software, download, forum, Numerology, astrologer, daily horoscope, horoscope, Sun Signs, Zodiac, Divination, Chinese Zodiac, Zodiac, Reiki, Palmistry, Feng Shui, Vaastu Shastra, Runes, I

Posts: 2534 · Posted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 11:10 am

Sometimes Secret Writers
Hal Zina Bennett

In grade school, they tried to teach me to diagram sentences. I tried to figure out why you’d want to break up words that way. I never did learn to do it. I heard language flowing in my head, loved the way words made images, how they stirred up thoughts and feelings. Writing was magic. Reading was magic. Diagramming wasn’t.

Mrs. Hauk flunked me in English and said I’d never be a good student. She told me that in front of the whole class. Meanwhile I was writing my first novel. I wrote at night, under the covers with a flashlight. Everyone knew I was bad at English, so I had to write in secret. Sounds silly, but that was how my young mind put things together back then.

I read Jack London. I read John Steinbeck. I read William Faulkner. And I continued writing, secretly.

They passed me through high school, mostly to please my mother. She was a teacher. Everyone said I was a bad student.

After high school, I got a job in the construction trades. I liked working outside, away from stuffy classrooms. Six years after high school, I took a creative writing class at a community college. People liked my poetry, and I got some of it published. My writing teacher, Mr. Hill, urged me to go to college full-time and get a degree.

After considerable badgering from Mr. Hill, I agreed to take the college entrance exams. I flunked the grammar test and got put in bone-head English. Mr. Lautner’s first assignment was a big challenge. He told us to write on our favorite subject and turn it in the following week.

I asked how long it should be.

“As long as it takes to exhaust the subject,” he answered.

I wandered back to the coffee shop, dejected. Here was yet more proof that I was not college material. The assignment was way over my head. My favorite subject was the writer William Faulkner. I read all his novels. How would I ever exhaust this subject by the following week?

I had to try. I called in sick at my job and got out my books. The next week, I handed in my paper, neatly typed. Thirty-five pages, not including footnotes and bibliography. Title: “The Theme of Nature’s Power in Three Novels by William Faulkner.”

The following week Mr. Lautner returned our papers. Mine had a word I didn’t know scrawled at the top: “Plagiarism!” It also had a big F made by a marking pen. My classmates all had two- or three-page papers with A’s and B’s at the top. This college stuff was going to be even tougher than I thought!

I went to Mr. Lautner and asked him what plagiarism meant. He told me it meant I had copied the whole thing. I swore I hadn’t. After considerable begging, he told me to come to his office in two days and write a similar essay. On the appointed date, I wrote while he corrected papers and talked to his friends on the phone.

After awhile he asked to see what I’d written. He started reading. He tipped back his chair and swung his feet up on his desk. He nodded.

“This is good,” he said. “Damn good! How long have you been writing like this?”

“Since the sixth or seventh grade, I guess.”

“Let’s go have a beer,” he said. “I’ll buy.”

We went down to the local pub and shared a pitcher of brew. He wanted to know why I’d been assigned to bone-head English.

“I flunked the grammar test,” I said.

“You know, except for some comma splices and misspellings, your writing is excellent.” He fell silent. I waited expectantly.

“What bothers me,” he continued, “is that I wrote my master’s thesis on Faulkner’s novels. Only, your bone-head English paper was better than my thesis.” He laughed and shook his head.

That’s the day I thought maybe I was a writer, in spite of what Mrs. Hauk told me back in the sixth grade. Why I believed her all those years, I will never understand, but I think a lot of kids’ minds work that way. We get hurt and embarrassed by our early failures and forget to go back and take a second look at what we’re feeling. We get disconnected from who we really are and what we can do.

John Lautner and I kept in touch for several years, but I finally lost track of him. I’d like him to know what he did for me that day. He’d be happy to know I became a writer. Sometimes it’s nice to imagine that he read one or two of the twenty-plus books I’ve had published over the years.And maybe he even likes what I’ve had to say!

Posts: 2640 · Posted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 4:29 pm

Thank you for sharing.

In case you are curious about this writier, author...........
http://www.newworldlibrary.com/client/client_pages/authorbios/bios/bennet.cfm

Quote:

Hal Zina Bennet

Hal Zina Bennett is the author of 30 successful fiction and non-fiction books on creativity, health, shamanism, and personal development. He teaches seminars throughout the U.S. and has support groups for writers in four states. As a creativity and writing coach working with writers, literary agents, and publishers, he has helped over 200 other authors develop successful projects — including several New York Times best sellers and "Oprah" books.

His own book titles include Write from the Heart, Follow Your Bliss, Spirit Animals & the Wheel of Life, Spirit Circle (a novel), and Zuni Fetishes: Using Native American Objects for Meditation, Reflection, and Insight. His earliest success, The Well Body Book, with Mike Samuels, M.D., helped launch the self-help health movement and sold over a quarter-of-a-million copies in six languages.

Hal's extraordinary understanding of the creative process has won him an important place in both mainstream and independent publishing. He lives in a remote area in Northern California.

http://www.halzinabennett.com/ Homepage.