Spring Madness

Today's Mood: Tired. T0day's Music: Random play. Today's Writing: IFFY. Today's Quote:

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Lately I don't feel much like a writer. I don't seem to be getting anywhere. Yesterday I put in capital letters, bright red font: STARTED 3RD PERSON HERE!!!!!!!! And then I wrote a paragraph in third person. Today I took out the capital letters in red font and rewrote the paragraph in first person.

What is my problem? Why is writing so hard? How will I know what is the right POV for this story? When will I stop asking questions?

Okay, sorry, had to slap myself there to end the madness. Does anyone else feel nuts this time of year? (another question, I know.) Maybe it's my job. Everybody is feeling the crunch and trying to jam in every last project before they run out of time. And I SWEAR that equipment--especially computers--always start flaking out once it hits April. It's like they know the end is near and no one in the tech. dept. wants to bother fixing them until summer, so they can glitch out all they want and stay safe from being re-ghosted. Of course, I might just chuck them out the window.....

I'm flaking out. I'm stretched too thin. I'm not writing enough. I can't think. I think too much. Aaaaaaaaaaaah!

So what is the fix? Anybody got any ideas on how to get through tough spots in their writing in only 25 minute writing increments a day? I just start to get to that zone and zing! Time's up.

And then there is the whole publishing thing. Still considering. You should hear something soon. Of course, since it has been over a year, soon has lost its glisten. If only I had an agent. Of course, to get an agent you have to query and query and query some more. And even that doesn't promise anything if you are a never before published writer. I guess I'd better call again. Sigh.

Maybe tomorrow.

Writing in between lives

Today's Mood: Slap-happy. Today's Music: Rob Thomas--Something To Be. Today's writing: reading (beg. to end) Free Lunch. I'm on page 131 and trying to pretend it is someone else's manuscript. Today's Quote:

Sometimes [writing] comes easily and perfectly. Sometimes it's like drilling
rock and blasting it out with charges. -Ernest Hemingway

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It is so hot in this library that I am dehydrating as we speak. The sweat is running down my backbone and front....whatever in rivers, not trickles. And I've got a sore throat from teaching--with one more class to go. I'm in my pilot's outfit--I am, after all, a pilot to other worlds here in the library--so that makes me extra hot (temperature wise anyway.)

I've been reading a lot in the last three days--and it's great except that I get so many ideas and characters swirling around in my head that it is hard to keep track of it all.

Writing Magic by Gail Carson Levine is absolutely excellent for teaching writing to kids--probably middle school thorough high school--because it is concrete, has good examples, and has interesting, exciting writing exercises. I read The Truth about Forever by Sarah Dessen (this was so awesome because it was first person-past tense and the majority of the conflict was internal--like Free Lunch.), Jinx by Meg Cabot (another good first person-past tense.), Quantum by... I forgot but a good Science Fiction (which is what IFFY is), Just in case Meg Rosoff (in which Kismet--or Fate--has a voice) , and Demonkeeper by Royce Buckingham.

My frustration right now is having a day job. I love it--what more proof do you need than the picture above?--but I would LOVE to have more time to write. And my second day job is loved as well--but is equally demanding. I have been getting up at 5:30 and going to bed at 12:00. Last night I got in bed before midnight, but then I remembered the tooth under Shanna's pillow, and I thought I'd better make sure the tooth fairy didn't forget to exchange it for money. When the tooth fairy went in her room, however, she was sleeping with her hands under the pillow on top of the plastic baggie with the tooth. The tooth fairy tried again in the morning--but couldn't find the baggie (which quite possibly slipped down between the bed and wall) and had just shoved the money under the pillow when Shanna woke up. The fairy assured Shanna in hushed mother-like tones that all was well and that she was just making sure Shanna was covered by blankets. Whew!

Does anyone else wish they had more time to just write? And think about writing? I don't even feel like I can think half the time. Maybe the perfect day job for a writer would be one that involved a repetitive, non-thinking task--like dishwasher or something. Of course...my job connects me with kids, and that's vital. Sigh. I just need to give up something. I can't go without showers because that is where my best ideas come. Maybe eating. If I give up any more sleep who knows what I'll say, do, or write!

Oh well, it's been a long, hot Friday and I'm going home. Take care and happy writing.

Blog reminders and schedules

Today's Mood: Pleased. Today's Music: Tori Amos. Today's Writing: Revising some details on character charts and profiles. Today's Quote:

Writing is way over-rated. Revise and edit until you're sweating bullets, until your tenth draft finally begins to read like an effortless first draft. Then cut it in half. -James V. Smith Jr. in The Writer's Little Helper

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In an optimistic hope that more people will visit the blog after the Glen Lake conference, I am posting "da rules"of the blog. The purpose of this blog is to be able to connect with other writers. When I post, I am seeking acknowledgment of me as a writer. I seek encouragement, answers to my questions, and sometimes a poke or two in order to remind me to write. It makes me feel more accountable when I know I'm going to have to put down Today's Writing.

There are very few rules--and they are not rules so much as how things work on the blog.
***One: remember that anyone can read this, so think of the blog more like debriefing and less like a small group. If you want someone to read your writing--put the question out and then hook up with whomever responds outside the blog (via email addresses provided in the PW Directory).
***Two: Anyone can comment, but if you want to be able to POST, you need to email me with your email address so I can put you on as an author. Don't send the email address over the blog. Posting means you can bring up your own topic for people to comment on--like having debriefers other than just me.

And that's really about it. It doesn't have to be just about writing. Writers read, writers watch the Tigers.... And remember you don't have to have great profound things to say (although I'm sure you all do) when you comment on someone's post. You can just comment to let us know there are other writers out there writing.

Oh, and on a totally personal note: I set my alarm and got up at 7:30 to write this morning! Go me! Why it is so much harder for me to get out of bed here at home than it is at Glen Lake, I have no idea. But I need to do this. I need the scheduled time to write--otherwise it is never convenient. There are always too many other things to do.

Hope you are writing as well.

Writing Time

Today's Mood: Distracted. Today's Music: Coldplay--X&Y. Today's Writing: Climax of IFFY. Today's Quote:

It's not what you do once in a while. It's what you do day in and day out that makes the difference. -Jenny Craig

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Summer vacation officially starts today at 3:00 p.m.. So of course I am making a list of everything I need to do--before Glen Lake/ before summer is done. Somehow people have in their heads that I get most of my writing done in the summer. This is far from the truth. The lack of schedule (and the fact that I have two children and a house that has had many projects that have been put off because I don't have time during the school year) means I don't have a SET time to write.

I aim to fix that this summer.

I am sitting here thinking about setting my alarm every day for 7:15 and getting up to write before the kids get up. Or, I could write for four or five hours every Thursday and Friday. Which is better? Writing every day for an hour, or writing two days a week for four hours at a crack?

What is your writing schedule? Do you think it is important to have a schedule?

Dreaming Time

Today's Mood: Hurried. Today's Music: Ray LaMontagne--Till the sun turns black (my effort to slow down and relax) Today's Writing: Chapter 4 of IFFY (I know. Still. But it is going--which is better than a few days ago. Alas, however, it is going very SLOWLY) Today's Quote(s): (It's a twofer day)

The fisher droppeth his net in the stream, And a hundred streams are the same as one; And the maiden dreameth her love-lit dream; And what is it all, when all is done? The net of the fisher the burden breaks, And always the dreaming the dreamer wakes. Alice Cary

And so, his senses gradually wrapt In a half sleep, he dreams of better worlds,And dreaming hears thee still, O singing lark; That singest like an angel in the clouds. Samuel Taylor Coleridge

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I'm in serious need of some dreaming time. You know, the lay-in-the-sun, almost dozing but mind playing scenes in your writing like movies projected across your eyelids--that kind of dreaming time. Or maybe a long drive somewhere--without kids or spouse or anyone else, for that matter. Showers are great for dreaming time, but somewhere along the line I run out of hot water and then the dreaming becomes painful and nightmarish. Walking on the beach works for me. And soft days, walking in the rain (soft days are when it is warm and rainy). Biking is good. Swimming doesn't work so well because there is the drowning factor. I don't float. I sink. So dreaming and swimming--not so much. But hot tubbing's helpful. I would say wine (or Mike's Cranberry Hard Lemonade which I am particularly fond of), but then I go beyond dreaming to actual sleeping and that isn't productive (for writing. It is, however, very productive for developing patience with children who keep interrupting my dreaming and writing.)

The common theme appears to be time alone. Busy but not too busy. Relaxed but not sleeping. Not directed but still focused on what I'm writing.

Sigh. Maybe if I put my mp3 player on and turn up the volume I can count making dinner as dreaming time. Otherwise... Glen Lake is only 44 days away!

Balancing Act

Today's mood: high-strung. Music: Tori Amos--Tales of a Librarian. Writing: stared at chapter 16 for a half hour before deciding I need to read chapters 14 through 17 to see how I can fix the time problem. Quote:

Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light. -Dylan Thomas

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I'm in a quandary. Do I work my keister off trying to get the revisions done on this second MS in time for the Delacorte Press contest, or do I bag it and mess with the structure of the first MS to make it fit the page limit? Or should I skip both for that matter? What first looked like minor changes to the second MS has snowballed into some major rewriting--funny how that happens! But I so want to finish this revision while I'm immersed in it. I just don't have enough time!

I was talking with a co-worker about how to balance writing and life--you know, motherhood, job, cleaning the house enough to not have it declared condemned, even cooking well-balanced meals occasionally. Oh, and then of course this time of year you can add Christmas shopping, wrapping, and cleaning up the talcum powder that my four-year-old spread all over her carpet to make it look like snow. (We need snow for Christmas--that was her reasoning.) Top all that off with dealing with colds and the resulting crankiness, and it's enough to drive a sane woman mad--and I'm not totally sure I qualify for sane on a normal day!

Does everyone struggle this much to find a balance between writing and everything else? I'm starting to think I might just be neurotic. My sister told me I need to prioritize--decide what I really want to do and then make time for that. The problem is that I want to do it all. I want to be a good mom. I don't want to live in a total pit. I do want my kids to remember the joy and wonder of Christmas (okay, maybe not the snow part--but the rest) and I still want to write. Every day. Lots. How do I do that?

On my Christmas list I asked for more time. Do you think Santa will give it to me? So okay, my quote of the day. Dylan Thomas was exhorting his father to fight against dying. I'm way more shallow than that. I just rage, rage against the children waking in the night or against dirty laundry that's in sight, or against the dress that is now too tight, or against the children that do fight..... you get the picture. It's all about the struggle to balance life as a mom, woman, wife, human being--and the life of a writer.