Good Things, Part II

We finally had enough money saved up and we bought a 13" Macbook Air.

I have never had a laptop before, and being able to carry around this awesome tiny machine seems like magic to me.  How did we ever get along without this?  It's so light, I think it really is made mostly of air.

Being me, I am doing obsessive research about what kind of case to get to carry it around.  After looking at skins, covers, sleeves, bags and backpacks, I think I've decided that I'm just going to go with buying a quilted padded zippered cover on Etsy.  I like the idea of getting something handmade and supporting a creative person, instead of giving business to a big impersonal electronics store.  I just need to find one that has a fabric that isn't so girly my husband would be embarrassed to carry it around - I might really like the one covered with tiny lavender butterflies and pink flowers, but I don't think he'd appreciate it on quite the same level.

Adam Carolla calls his computer his "magic porn box" and similarly I now think of this laptop as my "magic writing box".  I've installed Scrivener (my writing program, see it here) on it, and it really does seem positively magical that I can carry around this tiny thing and not only have my novel and my novel in progress, but all my research and notes and everything right there in my little hand.

Speaking of writing, I completely stopped all writing a few months ago.  I was just getting into my second novel, and I was having an extremely difficult time.  I needed a get-some-perspective break.  I also needed to stop beating myself up.  I did some reading (including the Hunger Games books, which I seriously cannot recommend highly enough, very fun to read) and did some thinking.

And now I can see that I was going the wrong direction with my work-in-progress.  I still really like the characters and the overall plot arc, but I was trying to take it the wrong way.  It's funny, I felt like if I think something is a good idea, then it is, I'm the writer and therefore what happens within my writing is all up to me.  But I can see now that the severe events I had planned were wrong for the relatively gentle tone of the book, and I now have a better idea of what the theme is.  I am probably going to scrap what little writing I did actually do, and start over, with a much clearer plan.

But not yet.  I think that my first novel was written somewhat fearfully, in that I kept hearing critical voices in my head that, despite my attempts to ignore them, still steered me in the wrong direction about several things, including the personality of the main character.  I wrote Megan fairly ditzy, and sweet, and a little naive, and I see now that if I put more of my own personality into her, it would be a lot more interesting.  I think she should be funnier, more sarcastic, and a little darker.  And even though the novel mostly takes place in her office, I really shied away from having too many scenes there, especially with other characters that she works with.

So here I go with My First Novel: The Second Draft.  Yay!

I've already re-written the first scene, and I am positive that it is much better now.  I am tremendously excited to get going with the other changes, and I can confidently say that the joy is now back in my writing.

And therefore, back in my life.  And holy crapmuffins, I could use some joy right about now.  Work remains horrifying.

Crystal Clear

Yeah, that didn't work.  On my journey to discover who I am as a writer, I can just go ahead and eliminate writing-by-the-seat-of-my-pants, without having any idea what's next. 

After writing the littlest bit, I was so lost and directionless that I had to stop to at least try to figure out who my main character was.  I did have an idea that seemed pretty good, possibly.  I thought about it for a few days, and started to get into the idea, even though a few nagging doubts plagued me.   I never know whether to listen to nagging doubts, and am pretty bad at distinguishing which ones are valid and which are neurotic and self-defeating.  Both kinds seem equally strident, frankly.

Knowing that I can trust my husband to give me his honest opinion, I explained my character(s) and the outline of the plot.  He listened carefully, and then pointed out that this was basically the exact same plot and virtually the same characters as my novel.

Well, crap.

Still, I thought about it for a couple of days.  What does he know, anyway?  Maybe my novel was just sort of a warm-up exercise, and this was the improved version I was meant to write.  Maybe with a few well-chosen changes this would be a completely different story, and worth writing.  I imagined various scenarios and tried to let the characters speak to me.

Nope, he was right.  The more I thought about it, the more I realized it was all surface and no depth.

As I mentioned, I have two other ideas floating around, and once again I tried focusing on them.  The first, a novel about a woman who murders someone, just kind of waved at me from the back corners of my mind, but wasn't interested in coming out yet.  The second, a young adult novel about a teenage lesbian living in a small town, just jumped right out at me and started yelling.  Sweet!  Oh, the terribly detailed character sketches and outline I'm going to make...  Joy  :)

I feel really excited about this one, and details are coming to me quickly.  And, at least for now, the self-defeating neurotic voices have shut the hell up.

The Suffering Means I Am A Real Writer, Right?

Writing is hard, and when it isn't bliss, it sucks a lot.

 

And the bliss is a depressingly low percentage.

 

So, I wrote the main chunk of my novel (the first 50,000 words) during NaNoWriMo, then took a break, then finished it (total of approx 75,000 words).  Since then I've been working on revising/editing, and halfway through I basically just got sick of it.  Two other ideas for new stories started blooming in the back of my mind, but I pushed them aside, determined to keep going on my  novel.

 

After suffering through trying to force myself to keep revising I have finally decided to move on to something else, for now.  I still like my novel and my characters and I feel weirdly like I am abandoning them, and I actually know what changes I want to make, it's just that I feel like I need to spend some time away from it.  I have completely lost perspective.

 

I feel:

• guilty
• like a failure for not following through to the end
• lazy for stopping work
• excited for the other ideas
• confused
• tense when I am not writing
• happy when I am
• hatred for myself for not writing more
• proud of myself for writing at all

The two other ideas are only partially fleshed out in my mind, and I don't want to start work on either one of them quite yet.  When I wrote my novel I thought about it for months beforehand, setting up a fairly detailed outline and doing extensive character sketches.  I had the plot pretty much completely mapped out, and it worked well for me.  I don't want to start on either of the other two until I know more about what's supposed to happen and who the characters are.

 

So this past weekend, after not writing or revising or anything for two months and getting more and more stressed and freaked out every day, I finally just started writing the first thing that popped into my head.  It feels disorienting to be writing aimlessly, but wonderful to be writing.  I know a lot of writers write everything that way, but I find the idea of having things planned out very comforting.  I'm not even sure what this is going to be, but so far I am liking it a lot.  It's kind of fun to be surprised.

 

:)

No, Seriously, I Really Am Thankful

For... 

• The internet.  I love reconnecting with old friends and staying connected with new friends on Facebook, I love the ease and convenience of this blog and the friends I've made though it.  I love watching tv shows on Hulu and movies on Netflix and videos of kittens on YouTube.  I love wasting time playing stupid games, and shopping for things I'll never buy, and doing research, and reading comics, and, obviously, looking at photos of naked people.

• My pumpkin pie recipe.  I found it years ago in a magazine ad for a graham cracker pie crust.  Not being any kind of a cook, I had no idea at the time that it was atypical, but apparently making a pumpkin pie using only a can of pumpkin, a can of sweetened condensed milk, some spices and a graham cracker crust is kind of different.  It is extremely easy and yummy, though, and it's what I'll be taking to two different family households tomorrow to celebrate Thanksgiving (both of which specifically requested "my" pumpkin pie).

• Florida, which is so nice and sunny and toasty warm (even this week, it is still in the low 80's), and I'm only an hour or two away from both the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico.  I love the humidity, I love the heat, I love the flat landscape that feels wide open, I love the plam trees, I love the little lizards running around everywhere and occasionally wiggling their tiny way into the space between our screens and our windows, then getting trapped and dying there. Okay, I do not love the tiny lizard carcass that has made one of our windows into its own personal graveyard.  Possibly I should take it out...  Ew, though.

• The library, without which I would not be able to read, well, basically any of the books that I go through. I only buy books when I really want to keep a book to read over and over (or reference repeatedly), and I still spend more money than I should.  I am additionally thankful for their delivery system, so I can just go on their website and request a book and have it brought right to my front door.  Sa-weet!

• My mother, who is one of the sweetest and kindest people I've ever known.  I talk to her every day at 8pm, after Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune are over, she calls me "honey" and every single night she's careful to ask me how Greg is doing.  She watches out for the other people in her retirement home, shares her daily newspaper with the man across the hall, and calls all our relatives on their birthdays.  She loves me and inspires me, and I love her right back.

• My sweetie-pants, who tells me he loves me every day, cuddles with me in the middle of the night if I have a nightmare, occasionally sends me sweet texts during my work day telling me how pretty I am or how much he's looking forward to seeing me after work, and not only supports me in my creative endeavors but is genuinely excited and enthusiastic (he even read my novel as I was writing it).  He makes my day to day life very comfortable and happy.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I Did It

I finished my novel!

I started thinking about it seriously last May (2009), making notes and character sketches and a vague plot outline.  I intended to start writing right away, but couldn't find the internal fortitude to take that intimidating first step.  Then I decided Nanowrimo would provide the butt-kicking that I required, and I started actually writing on November 1.  By November 30, I was 50,000 words in.

And apparently overwhelmed and burned out, because I basically couldn't write anything for months afterward, despite obsessing about the novel.  In June I finally got back to work, and now here I am, at just over 70,000 words, at THE END.

I am simultaneously really proud of myself, and excited to get going with editing/revising, and also extremely sad.  It's surprised me, but I've walked around for the past couple of days feeling positively bereft, and a little weepy.  These characters have been walking around in my head for over a year, and I miss them!

I've decided to skip Nanowrimo this year, even though I was looking forward to it and had already started planning a new novel, because I just can't stand the thought of pushing my current work in progress aside, even for a month.  I'm going to print out the whole thing -- first sentence to last sentence -- and start revising.

But, I did it!  I feel like I can now officially call myself a writer.  I'm a novelist.  Yay, me!

Shut The Front Door!

As George Constanza said on Seinfeld:  I'm bustin', baby!

Whatever was preventing me from writing (writer's block? going through a natural process?  bad karma coming back to bite me in the butt?) is gone, and I am now back at work on my novel.

All I can say is:  WHEW.  What a relief!

To celebrate, here is my favorite photo of me, ever.  I am the wee baby and my sister is holding me.  As you can guess from her hair and frosted lipstick, this is in 1966.  Her husband walked in the room with a camera and saw us smiling at each other.  Awww.  Wanting to capture the moment, he said HEY to get us to look over at him, but he startled us, and got this pic instead.  Which is possibly even better than some boring photo of a smiling baby, don't you think?

I love how the little bit of drool makes my lips look shiny like hers.  :)

Can you see the family resemblance?