I’m on a trip downstate to visit a couple of interns at their sites, so I don’t think I will have time to write the next couple of days. I will bring my go-kit (iPad, keyboard, mouse, power supply) in case I get some time to write on the trip. I’d have to find something to write, as Google Maps and the interstate system (long story) have foiled my story idea.
Have fun!
I’m writing a short story based on the Hidden in Plain Sight books, about some characters I spend less time with. It takes place in Chicago, and I’m racking my brain to remember Chicago, which I remember as a disconnected series of commercial and residential areas.
I try to jog my memories (as inadequate as they are) by looking at maps — a Google map and a Chicago neighborhood map. I just reemerged from a two-hour reverie of putting names and places to various places I remember from over thirty years ago. The No Exit was in Rogers Park, which is almost Evanston. My boyfriend’s mother lived in North Austin, and his grandparents lived in Hermosa. I spent a spring break at a storefront loft in “unredeemed Bucktown”, as a friend of mine from (I believe) Lakeview. I remember a great Korean restaurant in Lincoln Square and had one of the most frightening experiences of my life in Lincoln Park.
Two hours later, I have gotten no closer to writing the story. I don’t even know where I’m going with the story. But I have sorted out a series of mental Polaroids that represent my memories. As these memories are thirty years old, I had buried those Polaroids in a closet I seldom go into.
What are you most excited about for the future?
I don’t get excited these days. I’m sixty and I’m on good medication for my bipolar, so elation is a thing of my past. Thank goodness, because elation is exhausting, and it usually precedes a big depression.
That doesn’t mean I don’t look forward to things. I have a mini-trip to Kansas City to visit interns this week, and I look forward to both KC barbecue and getting internship visits over with.
I will be doing a major disaster preparedness exercise in August at Disaster Disneyland (official name: New York State Preparedness Training Center) that I have to prep for. I am the moulage coordinator for the exercise, which means I turn volunteers into victims.
The beginning of the school year is coming up sooner than I’d like. I am looking forward to all the beginning of school activities and teaching some new classes.
I’m looking forward to publishing Kringle Through the Snow on October 1. And, if I don’t chicken out, publishing Reclaiming the Balance on Jan. 1. I need a writing retreat, and am about to drop the hint to my husband (when he reads this). That’s something else to look forward to.
So, nothing exciting, but I have a full calendar to look forward to.
Lately, I have been blogging in the morning before I write (or edit), intending to use it as a warm-up to those activities. So far, it has been working well.
One thing it yields is a daily blog, and my regular readership has increased from four people to ten. I’m not sure what it takes to get my readership up further. But I’ll take any improvement I can get, so thank you readers!
Another thing it yields is more reflection on writing as a discipline. This helps me to think of myself as a writer. It’s strange; I rarely think of myself as a writer, just as a person who has a habit of telling stories to myself. But saying “I write my blog as a ritual before I sit and edit” makes me feel like a writer.
But the biggest reason for the blogging ritual is that it warms up my mind for writing/editing. It signals to me I need to focus on words. Even the suggestions ProWritingAid makes to my writing help me warm up.
There are other ways I could warm up, but blogging efficiently yields a useful result. And you get to read it.
I’m just about to where I will put Carrying Light into a drawer to mellow for a while. I’m repairing immediately obvious problems, including cutting a subplot out that wasn’t adding anything and modifying some wordy expository stuff (telling, not showing) at the beginning. Today will be looking at continuity of the main relationship. I got so immersed in the book I don’t want to let it go. For a few weeks, it was my reality.
It’s time to pick up a new project. But what? I feel singularly uninspired. I have a book waiting for me, but no desire to write it. Richard (my husband) gave me an idea for a book but I definitely see no reason to write a book that feels like a contractual obligation in my series. I don’t write the next Kringle book until November; it’s my annual NaNoWriMo ritual.
Oh, but there’s another book I need to write … it’s in the Hidden in Plain Sight series, and it tells of why there are only about 300 Archetypes and thousands of different ethnicity groups in the world. (There should be Archetypes to represent most, if not all, of the groups.) This was revealed in a previous book with a lingering question. I’m not sure what to do with that book idea, because as momentous as the implications are, I don’t know how to get to the momentous part. The action goes fast and then there’s the revelation, and then there’s a lot of heaviness afterward. There’s a lot of feeling, but not a lot of there there. It could be a short story, but can a short story carry that much of the secret of the Archetypes? I think not.
I suppose I could take a break. But it’s the middle of the summer, and I am ahead on my classes. I work on them in the morning, and then work on writing. The ritual helps me with my moods and with my productivity.
So what am I going to write? Toss me some ideas!
It’s an edgy time in the US, especially if you are part of the population that doesn’t want Trump to win. I don’t want Trump to win. The news is discouraging to Democrats, and many are urging Biden to drop out of the race, which would be a big setback for the Democratic Party — but so might staying in.
I can’t predict what will happen, but I can get anxious. And I am anxious about the political landscape. The United States usually muddles along even in bad times. I’m not sure how well we will muddle now.
How do I deal with my anxiety? I write a novel about the future economic and social collapse of the United States. That’s the book I’ve been working on, Carrying Light. Writing it has been a cathartic downer, to be honest. The collective Barn Swallows’ Dance has been holed up listening to the signs of a cataclysm from the radio as the tensions of their community boil over. They witness what happens when various factions pour gasoline on a million small fires.
Meanwhile, Barn Swallows’ Dance is facing their own crisis. They cannot be self-sufficient in an era of shipping disruptions and food shortages. They depend largely on purchases of wheat and legumes to feed the 65-person collective. To make things worse, their population is aging, and they have not found people to replace members lost by attrition. Because of their secrets, they cannot afford to let people in who cannot handle the world of Barn Swallows’ Dance. Only people who can accept preternatural members, a sentient garden, strange gifts among the populace, and a true story about the end of humanity can be trusted.
It’s a hell of a time to write this novel, which answers a question of “how bad can it get?” It can get much worse than at the moment, and my collective has to get through the darkness and out the other side. Writing this has not been an escape, but a weight upon my shoulders that never lets up.
Now that the main writing is done, I will look this over one more time and put it in a drawer to settle. And I will not write another book this heavy anytime soon.
I finished Carrying Light yesterday, promising myself I would put it in a figurative drawer for some time before going back to it. (By ‘figurative’, I mean putting it in a file on my computer labeled ‘drawer’.) Instead, I woke up this morning and with a burning desire to read through it and maybe do a preliminary edit. I literally (i.e. figuratively) jumped out of bed with the intent to edit.
I wonder if I’m just not ready to let this story go, or if I just want to work on something (anything!) and I don’t have a next project yet. But today I’ll sit (figuratively) with the current story.
I have finished the very rough draft of Carrying Light. Because of revelations I had while writing, some loose ends got fleshed out and worked on and rearranged. But this book will need lots of work.
Now I think I am going to cry. No real reason; this book put me through the wringer.
I have given up on my Big Audacious Goal for this year, which was having a booth at an author’s conference. I believe it the goal was too big and audacious for me, which is a hard thing to admit.
I have promoted my books at small appearances — a book fair in Maryville, MO, another in St. Joseph. I handle those fine because they’re small and local. A conference feels threatening to my somewhat introverted self. I see myself as an indie author, and I don’t enjoy comparing myself to people who get publishing contracts. This is my little hobby, as long as I’m still employed full-time in my day job.
Is the amount of sales and exposure worth a table fee and a conference visit? If Gateway Con in St. Louis was still operational, I’d say yes. That was a small and valuable conference that gave me a lot in return. I could sit a table there. A bigger conference, maybe not. I’ll be honest — I’m intimidated by ‘real authors’. I feel like an impostor in those settings.
I’m thinking of another Big Audacious Goal. In the middle of an indolent summer, none are coming to me. Little goals: Have my Loomly calendar (promotion) set up through January 1. (Done). Set up Kringle Through the Snow for October 1 publication. (Done). Prepare Reclaiming the Balance for January 1 publication (in process; still a bit chicken). Blog daily (so far, so good). Finish Carrying Light (almost done).
No Big Audacious Goals yet. Can anyone suggest one for a sleepy indie author?
It’s Monday, and I’m not feeling motivated. I spent the morning working on class-related work and got quite a bit done. I promised myself I would write on my book in the afternoon if I got my classwork done. Now it’s afternoon, I am two and a half chapters from done with this book, and I do not know where I’m going.
I’m procrastinating by reading Facebook, and by writing this (although I consider this more of a warmup than a procrastination.) What can I do to keep from procrastinating?
These are my go-tos for procrastination. See you in 15 minutes.
Words Like Me 