Monday, February 28, 2011

Grossness and how it relates to motherhood and writing

Grossness. It has a certain appeal, don't you think?

I mean, who doesn't at least appreciate the idea of Captain Underpants and the Big, Bad Battle of the Bionic Booger Boy? Especially if you are a boy, or the parent of a boy.

When my boy was learning to read, all I had to do was write a sentence with the word "poop" in it to trick him into enjoying it. Reading, that is. Not poop. Yep, anything gross was delightfully hilarious.

Delightful little bits of grossness have gradually been making their way into my writing. I didn't notice it so much until recently, after drafting my third picture book story that somehow involves a character doing and/or eating something foul.

So why now? It's not because I've finally realized grossness sells. If it were that, I would have written these three stories years ago. No, I think this just shows another way my children have impacted my writing. They've helped me re-realize that grossness really is funny!

Not that I'm going to volunteer to drink snot juice or anything like that any time soon.


5 comments:

  1. So true! Boys especially enjoy anything that's disgusting. One of the favourite nonfiction books in my room is The 100 Most Disgusting Things on the Planet :)

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  2. Your blog background is a bunch of fun! Grossness... yep. 'Tis a beautiful thing.

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  3. I love Captain Underpants. I actually bought those books before I had children!

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  4. Anonymous9:40 PM

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  5. Anonymous9:41 PM

    Same thing happened to me. I was kinda opposed to all things gross until I started having kids. Now it makes its way into my writing (and I like it.)

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