Snow Visitors

This post is Day 2 in the 2019 Slice of Life Challenge. Thanks to the Two Writing Teachers for bringing this community of writers together to share our writing in the month of March.

A few weeks ago, I jotted some thoughts down in my journal after waking up to fresh snow on the ground. Today, I hope to expand my brief notes to a longer moment in time. I wonder what I will learn about writing, reflection and revision.

In the early morning hours, I step softly from my bedroom to greet the day. The house is quiet for now, resting in the slow muffled breathing of my family. In the hush of the early moments of my day, I glance out through the window and notice the soft, white snow that has fallen during the night. It's pure white flakes have blanketed the yard and covered the brown grass of winter. I love the brightness of this new-fallen snow. I strive to stretch those early morning quiet moments as long as I can. The peace. The quiet. The white. The calm.

I glance across the yard to see two rabbits darting through the snow. They leave the footprints that clearly mark their early morning dance.

And so the day begins. I am ready. I have seen beauty and felt peace in the beginning of a new day.

This is what I learned about writing, reflection and revision:

1. There are small gems of writing in my writing notebook that are invitations to revisit a moment in time and expand. They are starting points for more writing.

2. When revising, word choice can be an entertaining way to discover more words and enrich the writing piece. I played with a few words and the thesaurus as I recrafted this moment in time.

3. Revising is an opportunity to rethink something you've written. I read these words and tried to take a step back and think about how I could make it better.

4. Writing is never finished. On another day, I would enjoy working with this piece a bit more. Maybe I would make it longer. Maybe I would arrange it into a poem.