Writing Coach "experience" - An Exercise in Patience

If this were a required blog (which it isn't) and it had required posts (which it certainly would never) it's possible that this post would have been required some number of days ago. It's also possible that I would have been required to write a blog entry on my hypothetical experience as a writing coach attached to this blog on that potentially earlier day than just now. Fortunately for me (if you haven't noticed yet), this isn't a required blog, and as not such, there are no required deadlines. Unfortunately for me, however, is that my experience as a writing coach is all but entirely fictional and surrounded by my thoughts of what I think it might be like to be a writing coach. I'm getting to the point, stay with me. Over the past few months, I have sent emails to quite a few students that, at least to me, exist entirely on the internet to express my excitement to be working with them as their writing coach (a thing I'm sure for them is Definitely Not Required™). In those same few months, I have received 1 set of poems from one student on time, another set of poems from another student one month late, and an entirely blank page from a third student who I assume had problems with formatting. After all that experience, I can say without a doubt, I have learned a lot about writing and being a writing coach (this is one of those rare times I'm being serious again). Patience. At first I was eager to give feedback, then concerned that wires had gotten crossed, then worried that my intro letters came off sounding too different from how a writing coach should sound, and finally I realized that students involved with their writing (whether I or their teacher like it) will do so, to some extent, at their own pace. And they'll certainly share it with an internet stranger at their own pace, even if that pace is measured in negative speeds (this is a math joke).

Separate from my direct experience with students I was meant to coach in writing, I experienced some fun things. Plagiarism happens, and should be dealt with on a case by case basis. This entire blog post was copy and pasted from Reddit. Does my saying that make it not plagiarism? Case by case, friends. And there was a lot of reading about how to be a better writer (like this) and an effective writing coach. Work from most important stuff to least important stuff, be honest with feedback, work at the writer's pace, and so on. Also, I've never read Lord of the Flies, so thanks for indirectly avoiding asking me for feedback about that (although, I don't need to have read a book to tell if you used evidence from it effectively to support an argument). Anyway, dear audience, thank you for being patient even though this has no potential for being late. As your reward, here's a picture of a puppy.