writing

If Only …

I’ve got the “wish I’d done more” blues. I got a satisfying chunk of work done on my book over the Christmas break, but now that I’m in the midst of lesson prep for my new semester, I wish I’d done more.

Nothing is going as smoothly as I hoped. The course I’ve been assigned to teach on-line isn’t anywhere to be found on my on-line resources and 3 emails later I still have no answers from the college powers that be. More emails are on the agenda today. Another course requires me to teach new accounting software in 6 weeks time (after the students have mastered the system manually) but I can’t access any of the training programs on the internet site. “Someone is working on it.”

I knew I would be busy this week, but I also expected to be spending some time on the book. Writing time has disappeared into the mess of frustrations that abound right now and that have slowed lesson prep to glacial speed. And today is Wednesday already. Needless to say, large portions of Thursday and Friday will be consumed by meetings. I can feel my blood pressure rising now.

Solution?

Take a hard look at the next 3 days and drag some writing time kicking and screaming out of the morass. It can and will be done. Yes, I’m a teacher, but I’m a writer, too. If I don’t honour that part of who I am, the teacher, let alone the mom, the wife and the person, won’t be worth much.

I’ll let you know how it works out.

A Resolution for All Occasions

I decided to keep things simple this year. Just one resolution to cover all the things I want to do in 2010. Something simple that I can pull out of my pocket and apply to whatever situation I find myself in and that will help me make the right decision.

My resolution is to be better to me.

That doesn’t mean I get to eat as much chocolate as I want and hire someone to clean the toilets. Though at the moment, they seem like good ideas. I spend a lot of time and energy putting things that are good for me (like taking a walk, or reading a book for 20 minutes, or de-stressing with my MP3 player and a crossword) to the bottom of my to-do list. This year, I’m going to be more selfish and put myself first more often.

And I’m not talking about anything complex or hugely time-consuming or expensive. I’m talking about being first in some simple things that will help me become healthier, fitter, less stressed, more productive and creative and maybe even a more balanced person. That’s a tall order for such a small resolution. But I’m ready to take it on and see where it goes. I want to look back at every day and make sure that I can see something that was accomplished for me that will move me toward my goals.

There’s always time in the day to get the work done, and if there isn’t, I make it–deadlines are met, lessons are prepped, household chores are done. I need to be that dedicated to me. As has been said before: If not now, when? If not me, who?

Yes, this year I will be better to me.

Time comes in small pieces

I was determined to work on the book today, and actually managed to make a little progress. Well, at least what I edited, reread and rewrote didn’t make me gag. And I added a little bit, too. I love the idea of having an entire solid unbroken chunk of time to work in, but that is not the reality of the days before Christmas at my house. I was lucky to get as much done as I did between rings of the kitchen timer and dashes down to the kitchen to see if my ingredients were ready for the next step of the assembly process.

Now, I suddenly have the house to myself and peace and quiet and I’m restless and can’t focus. When my writing time was broken into small pieces, it was easier to get something done. Now that time yawns ahead of me, the task I’m facing seems to have grown exponentially and is no longer inviting me to come and play.

This is my current writer’s mess. I understand it. It’s part of the unwinding process from a very hectic end of semester and several days of errand running and writing and rewriting to-do lists. My writing rhythm is like my life rhythm. Full of stops and starts and little things checked off of long lists.

It’s time to draw back the expectations. I did well this morning and into this afternoon. Now I have some peace, maybe I should just enjoy it and put the writing on the list for tomorrow. I’m still unwinding. I need the space and time to breathe, too. I’m not built to change gears so smoothly.

I’ll enjoy the quiet now.

First Draft Blues

Not every word needs to be a gem. Not in the first draft anyway. So why is it so hard to get the words on the page? I’ve got I’m-thinking-way-too-far-ahead-itis and it’s getting in the way of the writing.

I know exactly how I want my project to turn out, so I keep trying to get the work to a finished level on the first try. And I need to stop. I know if I keep on this road, I’m not going to even want to put fingers to keys and I’ll stop writing altogether.

Putting the words on the page was easy to do when I was writing NaNoWriMo. My self-editor was banished to the outer limits and I happily typed away at my story. Nothing was really at stake. I knew my NaNo story was unlikely to have a life after the month was over.

But this current project is different. I’m excited about it. I think about it every day. It’s consuming all my spare thinking time—well, what little there is among the holiday planning, finishing my teaching chores for the semester, and family. I have a goal to have it published by spring and I know it’s doable. (Yes, I’m self-publishing, but that’s another story.) In other words, this time I really care.

Okay. Enough. Right now, I’m giving myself a good mental kick in the pants to forget perfection and just get the words on the page. I’d love to hear your strategies or “been there, done thats” because I know what’s next is not going to be easy. But for now–

Kick. Ouch! Onward.

Filling the NaNo Void

Okay. NaNoWriMo has been over for almost two weeks now and how much writing are you doing? Are you writing every day? Or has your word count since November 30th dwindled to an embarrassingly low daily average?  If your daily writing pattern has changed back to a not-very-inspiring normal, I’m betting you are not alone. It’s hard to keep going when such a great incentive has run its course.

I have a solution, but here’s a little background first. I’m part of a small writers’ group that meets once a month and during July this year, we set ourselves a challenge of writing every day. We kept our personal goals to ourselves, but we let each other know by the end of the day (and sometimes very close to midnight) that we had reached our goals by sending an e-mail with the word “done” in the subject line. The idea came from an article that I read in a writers’ magazine. An author said that this is how her writing group works every day.

For the month of July we met our goals, did lots of writing, and enjoyed reaching our “dones.” However, in August most of us went back to our everything-else-is-more-important-than-writing modes and … well you can imagine the rest.

If you’re missing NaNoWriMo and would like an incentive to get some writing “done,” I’m proposing a Twitter hashtag #ididthewriting. You set your own writing goal. It may be as simple as just thinking about the book and doing some brainstorming. It might be 500 words a day until the chapter is done. And you are free to adapt the goal to your life and writing needs at the moment and to not tell anyone what it is.

The purpose is to give yourself a daily reminder that you are a writer and to honour that by doing something writerly every day. If  you’re not on Twitter, post a “done” comment on my blog page or on an email to me at wright underscore writer at hotmail dot com. Now’s the time to think about what you want to do with your writing life and join me at #ididthewriting.

When you stop writing, who loses?

How long can you stay away from writing? I might last a day or two, or even a week, but the days I’m not writing are not good days. And, I hate that it’s just not that hard to put other things in my life that, like the gas in Boyle’s experiment, expand to occupy all the space–and leave no room for the writing. But they do, and writing doesn’t just take a back seat; it doesn’t even get on the bus.

Because I’m a teacher, the temptation is to take papers to grade wherever I go so I’m busy during the various “waits” in my life. Why aren’t I holding a pen and paper instead and working on my story? The reality is that the marking will always be there and I will always make time for it because it has to be recorded and returned in a timely manner. Writing, on the other hand, has no demands on it. If it’s not done, the only person disappointed is me.

I’ve decided to stop being disappointed. If food will get cooked and groceries bought and laundry washed, then why aren’t my words being written? It’s as important to me as all those things—even more, since I’ve never felt my soul was particularly well fed by folding towels, choosing pears, or putting a pot roast in the oven (although I do enjoy the results.)

I think writers need their own Declaration of Independence; one that honours the pursuit of writing happiness and celebrates it. Here’s mine: I declare that writing is essential to my life and I will make time for it every day.

There, that feels better.

Writing and Nerve

For me, filling the page takes a lot of nerve—and I don’t think I’m alone. First I have to get past the shrill nasty voice that says, “How can you possibly think that you are capable of writing anything new or interesting about this subject?” I don’t like her very much, but she visits most days I sit down to write. I’m getting better at pushing her out of the way, but she generally gets her say before I do.

And even when I get past her and start to write, her little creepy cousin perches on my shoulder and whispers, “Are you sure?” every time I finish a paragraph. I don’t like her very much either. But she eventually shuts up as I get rolling and start to feel that I’m on the right track. It can be a long wait sometimes before the writing drowns out the voices, but when it does, I swear I even sit taller in my chair.

At the beginning of a project, I’m up and wandering away from the keyboard every 250 words or so, hoping, I suppose, that the voices will be gone when I get back. No such luck. But each time I sit back down, it’s a little easier and when everyone finally shuts up I can write for a long stretch without a break and begin to feel like a writer again.

My voices are their loudest and most persistent when I’m not regularly at the keyboard. And that’s been the state of my writing life lately. I’ve got out the calendar and once again carved out some daily writing time. If I tame the voices daily, their whining gets shut down until they don’t even bother to visit. Then the writing becomes a pleasure—still hard work and still second-guessed regularly—but a pleasure.

And I start today.

Explaining the new writing project

Hmmm. There are times I wish I’d stuck to my NaNoWriMo story and just left things alone. It was so much easier to say I was writing a romantic suspense novel about 2 people who are kidnapped by a bad guy, escape, and set out to rescue the bad guy’s next likely victims, while avoiding the police who want them for murder. Well, okay, it’s easy for me to explain.

So what am I writing? A hands-on writing guide for young writers. And that’s a lot harder to explain—even if I can get past the glazed oh-it-must-be-a-teacher-thing look. I finally figured out what my problem was.

When I talked about the romantic suspense novel, my friends got it because they were readers. They understood bad guys and murder and romance and how that all works. They could see the movie.

But my book is by a writer for writers, and that’s a lot harder to get excited about if you’re not a writer, too. I explain that my book is not for teachers; it’s for young writers, ages 12-18 who don’t care if they ever see a black-line master in their entire life. It’s for young writers who enjoy a sense of humour and some attitude. It’s for young writers who don’t want to brainstorm or create mind maps every time they sit down to write, because they have a great story in their heads already and they just want to write the damn thing, the best way they can. I’ve been around these kids for years and they’re amazing, creative, energetic, and can’t wait to tell their stories. They also want to be taken seriously as writers—not as students—and that’s what I want my book to do.

Whew! That feels better. Thanks for listening.

Stay tuned for more as I get this project into shape and embark on my experiment in self-publishing.

Now, back to the book.

A Short “Bliss” Moment

It was dark when I woke up this morning, so I rolled over all ready to go back to sleep. Six o’clock was just too early for a Saturday morning.

My book had other ideas.

A chapter walked in and said, “Get writing me, NOW, before you lose me.” So that’s what I did. Bleary-eyed I began clicking keys and by 7 AM, I was wide awake and feeling like the luckiest person in the world.

These are the “bliss” moments when everything comes together in one lovely, creative, exciting lump. Believe me, I know these moments are short lived. So I’ve learned to welcome them when they do arrive, unbidden and cold-handed on my warm back in the way-too-early morning.

Tomorrow will be an entirely different story; I’m enjoying now.

Deadlines and Passion

Yesterday I set a deadline for finishing my book. It’s one I have to stick to or two other goals that I have will not be accomplished. This deadline is unbreakable—and what a motivator it can be.

Is it the reason I woke up this morning thinking about “the book?” I don’t know, but this moment is important to me. There’s a point when I’m working on a writing project that it moves from being just an idea to being a passion. From now on this book will live in every spare moment I have to think about it. When I have any time to sit down, a pen will be in my hand so I can write a little more or plan a little more. This is the fun part and I’m going to enjoy every minute of it.

I will start arriving early to meet friends for coffee so I can scribble some more words toward my goal. I will make and constantly revise calendars to make sure that among all my other commitments, there is time to write. My days will become longer so that I can wake up early and write and stay up later and get the other jobs in my life done. There will be less TV and more MP3. And I will sing in the car on the way to work a lot more because all of this makes me happy.

 For me, this is the best part of my writing process. What’s the best part for you?

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