When I met with Beverly, my workshop leader, for a one-on-one consultation about my writing, I said, “I have no idea how to make it better.”

Then Beverly did something I am so grateful for—she showed me how.

First she asked me to copy my chapter onto a separate Word document to preserve the original. Then she took my laptop and tinkered with the prose; trimmed words, altered syntax, and inserted comments in ALL CAPS for me to address. The changes were minor but they worked. They made my writing less standoffish.

For example:

Where I wrote: “He patted the bench indicating I was to sit beside him.”

She wrote: “He patted the bench inviting me to sit beside him.”

It is so simple, and yet conveys a great deal, especially when done repeatedly throughout a passage.

When I had arrived at Holy Cross Monastery for my second five-day writing workshop with Beverly Donofrio (Riding in Cars with Boys), I couldn’t stop my internal complaint motor.

My humid room under the eaves had poor ventilation and no view of the Hudson River. The only place to walk before breakfast was the highway with trucks rumbling scarily close. I felt trapped with no car. There was no way to get to good hiking trails.

In our first session, which came in the afternoon, I read my allotted five pages, from a book I have been working on for some years.

After my reading the room was silent.

"It sounds clinical," Beverly said.

"Sort of... analytical," chimed in another member of the group.

"Cardboard cut-out," said another.

What I'd written about was a true experience so the feedback felt personal: You are clinical. You are analytical. You are cardboard cut-out.

What they meant was I was missing from the scene I had described in so much detail. I'd left out emotions and feelings and opinions.

“I think you should think about why you write that way,” Beverly said.

Fighting tears, I thought why I write that way?

Because I’m a Midwesterner of Norwegian heritage?
Because Norwegian Midwesterners are not the emoting kind?
Because I don’t have the skills to do it better?

It didn’t occur to me to pray in the monastery but I cried that evening in my little monk’s room.

It was then that I had met Beverley alone and she showed me how, and hope bubbled up like my mood after drinking a double espresso.

The hope was still there the next morning, as I lifted the window sash and raised the screen for an unfettered view of the lawn.

I worked on that chapter with its dry clinical scene for two hours.

Exhausted by the effort of mining what I feel and felt, I stepped outside the monastery doors and spotted a young brother walking briskly up the driveway with snaking white iPod wires leading to each ear. I know an exercise walk when I see one. But where was he going? Surely not the busy highway? I hung back—then followed.

He walked up the driveway, skirted the highway, and angled down toward the monastic enclosure past a house with an interesting mansard roof and alongside the monastery's labyrinth. He was managing a vigorous walk on monastery grounds—no car needed.

Oh joy! If I weren’t still a transplanted Midwesterner of Norwegian heritage I might have chased him down, given him a hug, and sung “Hallelujah!” for showing me the way.