Tools of the trade. That’s what they were talking about on NPR the other day. What sort of brushes and canvases a painter prefers. The brand of scissors a stylist uses. And then they spoke of writers and how the tool of a writer have changed – from pen and paper to Scrivener and Microsoft Word – and I thought “Yeah, that’s not the tool of a writer.”

The tools of a writer are the words.

They’re the ammunition.

Occasionally, I start to feel like I’m using the same words over and over. I get stuck on one, and it might fit, but someone else would work better. That’s when I have to reach out, go read something out of my ordinary.

It’s amazing the words you can find in other people’s toolboxes.

This is why writers have to read so much. You can run out of words and then you’re just repeating yourself. It makes the story dry up, makes it hard to write.

I don’t think anyone ever thinks about the words. My writers’ group, we talk about plot and characters and research and sugar addictions and lots and lots of Supernatural, but we never talk about the words, how they’re used, when they’re used up.

But hasn’t there been a time when you’ve sat and agonized, racking your brain for exactly the right word. How when you find the word it feels like lightening has struck. I bet I’m not the only writer who reads the dictionary and sighs through the pages, thinking, “oh, I love that one”.

A friend of mine used to pick a word for the year, instead of making a resolution. I can never pick just one – my mind changes a thousand times a day and I’m never quite sure who I am, where I’m going – but I like the idea of words as banner, a word to shape your life around.

There’s so much going on lately. Nano is kicking my ass.

I need to read more.