chronicled & illustrated

I don’t know what the title of this post means in this context but maybe I can figure it out as I write it. That kind of process goes along with the writing I do each November.

One upon a time, many years ago, I went to an Al-Anon meeting. An exercise was done where we each picked numbers from a coffee can. The numbers were from 1 to 12 and when our time came, we were to talk about that step in the AA doctrine. I was familiar with the Twelve Steps but only in a cursory way. I was new to this program and had no expertise or practice in doing any of the steps with the possible exception of Step One. I did know that one thing: I felt powerless to control anyone else’s choices. So when my time came, I said,

I got 11. Since I don’t even know what Step 11 is, I guess I just have to look at this as a reminder that I need to do Step 1, twice as often.

The group seemed to like that quite well.

So that’s where the title of this Day 11 came from. Perhaps it does relate to writing. Each day, I sit down and know only that my job is to achieve my word count. Of course, I want to write a good story. Of course, I want it to be interesting and cohesive, and well-written. I want it to build and to have not only a good plot but also fascinating sub-plots. I want it to be insightful and fun and imaginative and surprising.

But if I fill my mind with all those wants, it fills ME with dread. I don’t know how to achieve all that at once on any given day. If I think of all that, I will not get my book written. That’s why I love NaNoWriMo so much. It gives me a daily deadline and a reason to forget all that FOR NOW.

So when I sit down to write each day, I know only one thing: that I have to write at least 1667 words. On most days, I write something that pleases me to some extent. It’s never perfect. Sometimes it is drivel and I know that it will never make the finished version, but that’s okay because I’ve kept going in a forward direction. At least it shows me where I don’t want to go!

In a way, that’s like taking the First Step over and over again. Sit down and write. Tomorrow, do that again. Soon, I’ll have enough material to call it a first draft.

We worry about Step Two when we get there.

It’s going well.

I’m staying on track with the word count. It’s a little scary because I have no cushion but maybe that will come in the loveliness that is (usually; if your lucky and good) Week 2.

What?
We’re already days into Week 2?
oh my.

Yesterday one of those moments we writers live for happened.

I was doing something else. Not writing. Not thinking about writing, though I guess my mind was wandering over the literal landscape of the novel-thus-far, and without warning, an IDEA came. Whew. So great. This idea is so perfectly good and unexpected. It gives me real, plot-driven reasons to continue what I’m doing and will tie this (the third) book into the histories of the first two with such symmetry and excellence that it has left me with the FEELING that I know what I’m doing after all.

HOORAY!!!

It’s all illusion of course (that I know what I’m doing), but we writers don’t care. We love illusion.

Must. Go. Write.

Isn’t 8 a lovely number?
I didn’t have time to write yesterday. I mean…I DID have time to write my novel; I didn’t have time to write my blog post.

That’s good, right?

November 8th is my husband’s birthday. We were out all afternoon with an EPIC Board Meeting—not a chore at all, but instead an enriching experience to be with such fine people!—and then to Youth Peer for some minor business and then to our Film Series where we watched a well-done film called Pierpoint-The Last Hangman (based on the life of Albert Pierpoint who was a hangman for the British government from 1933 to 1955). Then we came home where Barry fielded calls from his kids and step-kids and had cake and presents.

But before all that, I wrote.

I’m finding that 1700 or so words comes extremely easily. It’s that being behind scenario that makes the writing hard. I knew that of course, but I got behind so fast this year that I forgot what it was like to be able to do under 2,000 in a flash. Two thousand in fact, may be the best average daily word count for me. Sometimes it’s hard to get to 1000 but once past that, I’m into it and will easily go over the goal without knowing it. Makes sense, I suppose. Up hill is harder than down hill.

Ideas are flowing more smoothly. However, I did, lying in bed last night before drifting off, begin to worry a bit that there’s no plot. I guess that’s a late-night kind of thing. If the plot’s not taking hold, then I have control over that. But where I am now—in the middle of the beginning—it’s easy to feel lost in the multitude of words and not be able to know what the WHOLE is like. That’s okay. It’s November. Time to write, not to know.

Later~~~

And on the Seventh Day: YOU CAN’T REST!!!!!

I’ve only just begun today’s writing, but I wanted to post this NuancNanoTip because it’s one I believe in greatly and which I’ve already used this year to my advantage.

I went into this November with a setting, characters and a world in a mess. Several plot threads were obvious and necessary but each day when I tried writing about one of them, I would get stopped. It seemed boring to write and like it would be dull to read (those two things go together!) and one day I let it keep me from writing altogether. That’s a HUGE no-no! Some old tapes wound around in my head telling me that I had to write this as planned or I’d be somehow hurting my efforts. That not writing it was backing away from something hard—and therefore, necessary.

Luckily, I find it pretty easy to ignore those kinds of mental lectures from the past.

I remembered several things. I remembered that it’s just a first draft. I remembered that if it’s hard to write, it might be because I need to change what I thought I was going to write and write something more interesting! That I might need to let it simmer a bit, find out more about what’s happening with all the characters and that there might be a twist-in-the-action I hadn’t thought of yet, that would let it be more fun to write and read.

So, I left in the partial muddle of a scene and skipped ahead to other things.

Surprising things have been coming from my fingertips; things I hadn’t planned but which are anything but boring to write. And just this morning, I’ve been able to re-approach the dastardly scene from a different angle. I feel so much better about it.
I was ready.

I have to get my cool back so I can write today.

I’ve been searching through my computer looking for files that are lost.

I’ve never been a tidy person. Try as I do, my actual paper files are not organized perfectly. I’m always behind on filing things and even I cannot remember whether I filed car insurance papers under “I” for insurance, “C” for car or “H” for Honda. But for all that, I can usually find things.

This morning I was searching for business cards I made in August or early September. I have a folder for these things. It’s labelled: EPIC/logos, letterheads, business cards. But they aren’t there. Sheesh! I can find other things I made at that time. But these are simply not where they are supposed to be. It’s so completely frustrating!

If I can’t rely on my computer to keep the things that I’ve filed in the place I tell it to file them, what the hell can a slightly disorganized person do?! I would ordinarily assume that I’d just wasn’t paying attention and that they’d gone into an alternate graphic folder but, no. I can’t find them. And it seems even more mysterious because there are five files, one for each Board member! How could five separate files disappear?

Sigh.

Anyway, I have to give up because I’m using all my writing time to search for files that aren’t essential right now. I just kept thinking that I’d find them, because I know they have to be there! Writing time is dwindling as I have a dentist appointment this afternoon. No end to the fun today!

Yesterday went pretty well. I continue to feel that I’m setting everything up and am not sure where the plot threads are, much less where they are going. But I seem to remember that this is First Week stuff. You have to get everyone in place and the backstory related without simply plopping it on the page in one huge dollop and you have to introduce the main characters and give them a setting that the reader can visualize. It’s not the most compelling part of writing a novel. That’s the problem. But that’s also the beauty of doing so much writing in a month. Get this set up (mostly) out of the way in a week rather than a YEAR at which point, most sane people would say, “Chuck this! It’s never going to go anywhere!”

I’m still slightly behind on word count and it doesn’t look promising that I’ll catch up today, but you never know.

Sorry for the missing computer folder rant. I needed it.

UPDATE:
The word count is now on track (though God Knows if the writing I did today is worth a single dnaldo (currency of the country Dnemz in the novel I’m writing).

And, more importantly, the files were found. They were in a back-up folder in the backcountry of my computer. I don’t how that happened but I found them not through any of the dozens of Searches I did but in Recent Files—though it was at least two months since I did them. Anyway, computer, it seems I owe you and apology. You kept my files and for that I’m grateful. That I can’t find them is, I admit, my fault, not yours. I’m sorry.

[edit: just found out these “tips” weren’t showing up properly on Internet Explorer. It didn’t matter previously because I had no visitors but now, suddenly, I do. Must spruce up the place. (wonder where THAT expression originated!) Anyway, this is unreadable I realize, but I had to reduce its size to keep the blog from looking so weird on IE. If you want to know what it says, first of all, Thank You for your interest! and secondly, clicking it will take you to flickr to see the original version. Cheers!]

I don’t know what’s going to happen today. Yesterday was a bust. I have excuses, but as it says above: don’t look back. I have the ability to write a LOT when I get going so I’m not worried—yet.

Today’s tip is an important one: begin where you feel a glimmer of inspiration (or at least, interest).

I seem to be hung up on one part of my story that isn’t feeling interesting to me. I realized this morning that I’ve been making certain assumptions about what is going to happen. But when I’ve started to write that plot line, I have internal resistance. Perhaps, I thought this morning on waking, that’s something I should trust rather than try to obliterate. Perhaps my assumptions are wrong. Perhaps if I write what seems interesting to me, I will work my way back to those plot threads that aren’t of interest at the moment or—more likely, I think—I’ll find a way to tell it that isn’t in my head yet.

Trusting oneself is an important aspect of writing. Otherwise you’re constantly in doubt and that makes it impossible to get the story down. If there’s a barrier to getting it done, you must work around it, dig under it, jump over it, ignore it, transport through it, but do not let it stop you from writing the rest of the story.