Thread by @kellybarnhill

I have one of the neighbor kids over at my house at present, working on his college essay. I've been doing this a lot lately (we have a gaggle of kids on the block who are all the same age, all grew up together, and are now all seniors) and every time it's the same:

They come in absolutely deer-in-headlights, either with nothing other than a handful of crumpled notes or an essay that they can't use because it's too long or just not understanding what this kind of writing is for or what it's supposed to do. I sit them down on the couch,

and then we have tea (the tea is essential, obviously). And then I make them put their laptop aside, we talk a little bit about life, or worries, or the world. We talk about memories. I have them tell me stories.

And then I hand them an old notebook, and I start lobbing writing prompts at them. I tell them that they don't have to worry about any of this - no one will see it. They just have to keep their pencil going for five minutes and then stop when the timer goes off.

I tell them to write about a memory, pretending that it's happening right this very second. I have them write about a choice they had to make as though it was happening right now. I have them write about food, or work, or the bus, or snow.

I tell them to tell me a story about a time they broke the rules, or tried something new, or built something with their friends. We talk about sense memory - how we experience the world with our whole body even though we don't always realize it. How memory lives in our skin.

I have them write jokes, treatises, manifestos. I have them make graphic essays. Comics. Yard signs. I have them make lists. We talk about verbs. We talk about how we know what we know. We talk about the permeable membrane between memory and imagination.

It's such a strange form of writing, for them, and most of them have never done anything like it before - writing in their own distinctive voice, writing about their own unique experiences, writing a story with themselves at the center.

One kid said, "But how can I write that? Doesn't it need to be *about* something?" And I say, "Yes. It is. It's about YOU. What you've written is a bunch of paragraphs about your grandma. And she's great! But what we need to focus on is YOU."

They've literally never done this before. It's outside of their experience. I have them write in the present tense. I use the word "immediate" a lot. We talk about writing as a three-dimensional experience. But mostly, I just have them write. Over and over. Quick and messy.

Invariably, there's a moment. They will have pages and pages of material. Memories. Moments. Thoughts. Arguments. Explanations. Seeing their point of view as something that belongs entirely to them. And then they see it. An arc. A beginning, middle and end. "Oh!" they say.

I tell them, "You are the world's leading expert on YOU. And that can be hard because you don't know yourself all that well. That's our job as human beings, to understand ourselves so we can understand the world. Other people might have insight and knowledge of you,

and sometimes they might even understand aspects of your self or personality or life that even you don't really know. But the only person who can possibly know the fundamental YOU-ness of you. So you get to write that with confidence and authority. You're the expert."

Anyway, the house is quiet now. The dining room table is covered with scraps of paper. And I have two kids typing away. It's a nice feeling.