Tag: #Writer

  • Process: Talking About a Story

    I fully admit that I am a superstitious/neurotic writer, and it’s annoying to everybody, especially me. I follow silly rules that have no logical basis with the belief that somehow adhering to these guidelines will guarantee success.

    Such as; I can’t reuse a character’s first name, I can’t work on fiction until I journal first, and the big one, don’t talk about details of a story until it’s finished, because if I were, then the story will never get finished. The last rule has been tricky when it comes to this blog, which leaves some of my posts so vague that they are incomprehensible.

    Last night, I broke the no talking rule with my wife. (Yes, I don’t even tell my wife about my work until it’s done.) And it needed to happen.

    The context here is that I have been working, on and off, for about a year, on a story based upon a person I used to work with, and who my wife also knows. I have told no one about this story, obviously, and this co-worker came up in conversation last night. As in, “Whatever happened to what’s their name?” We talked about the possible fate of this person, and why they were such a challenge to work with.

    And that’s when I was like, I should share this idea, and why I am curious to attempt to write a story about them. Also, I wanted feedback if it was a good idea.

    The jury is still out, as the wife pointed out everything that I knew was problematic about the story… so it needs still more work if it is ever to see the light of day.

    The bigger point here is that I still have several self imposed barriers that I need to break through. The “talking” rule is bullshit as what really does is try to protect me from any criticism. If I never share, then I can never be wrong.

    I still got a long way to go, but working on it.

  • Outlining: New Possibilities?

    I am working at staying productive for this month. I was able to blog, journal, and even got in some sketching time with the kid yesterday. It was a very creative day, more than normal for me. On the fiction front, I was able to spend a little time working on an outline for a novel that I have been kicking around for about two years.

    And working on the outline was rewarding, on a level that I didn’t know existed in me. I was working on character development, and trying to figure out how to build a foundation that these characters that they would either fight against or learn to accept. And as I worked on these characters in an outline form, a narrative theme started to reveal itself to me. The story is about three guys who form a band, and I always thought the theme was about learning follow your ambitions, even through failure. As I worked on the characters, I started to see that the theme was actually about being open to possibilities.

    Most of my good friends are following their dream, and some of them have been chasing it for twenty years, and to be honest, very few have achieved that ambition that set them out so long ago. But very few of them are angry and bitter about it. (I have met my fair share of bitter actors, so don’t get me wrong, I know that chasing a dream doesn’t equal happiness.) But what keeps my friends going? What keeps me going? Is it staying curious, and being open to new ideas and possibilities?

    I don’t know, but I want to explore it.

  • Merry Christmas, Thank You, and 2020

    Say everybody, I’m going to take the next few days off for the Christmas Holiday, and won’t be consistently back at it till the start of the New Year. So, I wanted to wish everyone out there in the writing/blogging world a Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and a general Happy Holidays.

    I also wanted to say thank you for following this little experiment of a blog. Since I started putting a forth a serious effort toward writing back at the end of July, I have doubled my followers, and grown in views, visitors and likes. Your support has been very encouraging, and reinforced that doing the work is worth it.

    As we all know, 2020 has been one of the strangest, most awful, and plain sad years ever. Since Thanksgiving, I have been trying hard to find some encouraging… anything to try and salvage my emotional well-being from the onslaught of this year. What I have come to see is that I should never take for granted my family, friends, and community I live in. How fragile this fabric is that connects us all together, yet how strong is our desire to be connected.

    Again, thank you readers, Happy Holidays, and if I don’t see you before, I’ll talk to you in 2021.

  • I Didn’t Write Today, But I Don’t Feel Bad

    That pretty much sums it up.

    Oh, and I had plans today as well. I had worked on the outline, and I was ready to start taking a second crack at working on the narrative. I even started thinking about the tone of the narrator, and the cadence he would have in his sentence structures, and use of receptive phrases. I was thinking about it, and gearin’ to go.

    And I won’t even say that the day went sideways. It just went, and I had to roll with it.

    First of all, the school had a two new assessment tests that they wanted my kid to take to see where she was on her reading and math skills. I know what assessment tests really mean, but for the kid it was just fun, and she enjoyed all the math stuff. In fact, for a kindergartener, I don’t know where she picked up what she knew about fractions! She’s not getting the math skills from me, that’s clear. Once she had finished the assessment, the app we were using offered some math games to play, which she ate up! And I sat next to her, encouraging her to keep going, and it was so exciting and heartwarming to see that spark of learning in her. That feeling that all the world can be discovered and understood. That horizons are being broadened.

    It through my schedule off for the rest of the day, but it was completely worth it.

  • Outlining a Story

    On Friday afternoon, during my brief writing time, I sat down and outlined a story that I have been trying to write for a couple of weeks. I have been speaking about my need to focus better during the short amount of time I have to write a day, and also the need to have an executable plan when I sit down and write. Hence, the outline.

    I was going to try and follow a simple Three Act structure; first act to establish characters, second to start plot, and third for the climax. (I’m a theatre guy, so I’m relying on what I know.) I also thought about the Joseph Campbell/Dan Harmon “Hero Cycle” structure, which is more about the emotional journey the hero takes. For that “cycle” to work, the hero needs to learn something by paying a heavy price, to return home changed.

    So, I’m trying something new with outlining, which is causing me to go outside of my comfort zone when it comes to creative writing. But, I also need to be honest with myself and admit that writing when the mood hits me has not lead to an inconsistent output of material. I also feel bit amateurish to make this admission; I mean, shouldn’t I know to do this? Well yes, I have known this information, but I didn’t want to admit to it. I didn’t want to admit that this is work, and could be unsexy, hard work.