Little things

I've been beating my head against the wall on some character turning points that are important to subplots in Crowmaker, with said subplots and their turning points being, in turn, the handful of seemingly small happenings which support and drive the main plot. And more specifically, the story's ending. I've been thinking consciously about them for some time now. I have notes inserted in the ms that say, essentially, "write this scene here (when you figure out what exactly it is)." This morning, in the time it took me to crawl out of bed and walk to the bathroom, the Muse handed me three of the most critical scenes I'd been looking for--I could see them with perfect clarity in my head, hear the character's voices as they spoke. Which is a great thing, when it happens, because I had no time to write anything down for them, and having them whole in your head like a memory instead of just something you made up, makes it much, much easier to remember and write down later. I had another such flash as I came in the door from dropping Michael off at school. I can't remember what it was about, now, but I'm hopeful that when I run across the "write this" note in the ms, it'll come back to me. If not, then maybe it wasn't as great a moment as I initially thought.

None of these scenes were big scenes. The core of what I "saw" will take a paragraph or two for each to get into writing. Then, of course, the scenes will need to be expanded to include other action that goes along with them. But the important bits are in those small moments--which is why I called them turning points. But those tiny moments can be what holds all that other word count together, that give them meaning and make a bunch of words into a story.

Michael had to write a letter for school, inviting his parents to all school mass tomorrow. He showed it to me last night, and we discovered that although it was his letter with his address in his handwriting, it was not his name signed at the bottom of the letter--although the name appears very much to be his handwriting, too. The name is unfamiliar to both of us--not someone in his class or anyone he's heard of in the other classes. (And it's a small school, so he knows pretty much everyone in all the classes.) He has no recollection of having written that name at the bottom of his letter. The only thing we can figure out is that maybe he was looking at something with that name on it when he was signing his letter, and he subconsciously wrote that name instead of his own. (Not farfetched. I have done this in both writing and speaking, much to the amusement of my children. "Put the dog on the dishwasher. Leash! Put the dog on the leash.") We laughed about it, he's going to show his teacher and see if she has a clue what happened, and that was that. But of course there was the writer-me in the back of my mind going, "What if it wasn't just a silly little thing? What if it turned out to be a big, scary thing? Under what circumstances would something weird but trivial like this turn out to be ominous in retrospect?" Which is, quite honestly, not a terrible seed for a story idea.

Joey is home sick today. So, on the ride home from school this morning, as I was recognizing my writerly instincts above and connecting them with my Muse pearls from earlier and thinking about turning points and not always recognizing them because they seem small at the time and how useful it is in fiction and how they make fiction seem more realistic, my subconscious popped helpfully in with, "What if it isn't just a little fever? What if it turns out to be ominous in retrospect?"

Not. Helpful. But painfully honest, because in any tragedy (or triumph) of life, you can look back and see the little turning points--the innocent-seeming symptom that heralded the beginning of a terrible sickness, the turning your back on a kid for "just one second" that 99% of the time never amounts to anything, the tiny exchange of mutual respect with your sometimes difficult mother-in-law that just seemed like a nice moment until she died a month later and it turned out to be the last meaningful thing that happened between you. Little things. Little things that turn out to be huge.

In other news, I wrote a very cranky blog entry in my mind yesterday, but writing it in my mind made me feel somewhat better, so I didn't post it. This morning, the WotF newsletter was in my mailbox, and lo and behold... an article covering very much the same topic. "If Only I Had the Time," by Kevin J. Anderson.

Apparently I'm not the only one who gets tired of hearing it. I don't have the time, either. Now more than I did in the past, when I did the largest part of learning how to write and slowly building my ability to write a story and get published, certainly. When I started really trying to make something of myself as a writer, I had two children, both still in diapers. My husband was not part of the parenting equation, since he was either at the office or on the road. For several months, during relocations, we didn't even live in the same state. I had no local family for backup. It was just me and the two little guys in towns we didn't know, trying to muddle through as best we could. In earlier writer bios, I stated that I wrote an hour a day, 5 minutes at a time. I was not exagerrating. I wrote longhand, in a steno notepad left on the kitchen counter where I could stop and scrawl down a few lines before moving on to the next "real" thing that needed done. I read how-to books during naptimes instead of sleeping. I crammed in all the things that I needed to learn and do to make stories and get them published, and it was hard work. I'm blessed now, yes, to have a block of hours during the weekdays. But even now, I still have other work to accomplish in those same hours. I put in somewhere between 40-60 hours a week on kids and housework. (Yes, I really do. I keep track.) I have to fend off the lure of online games and blogging (ahem) and chat rooms and Gtalk, and I put in another 15-20 hours a week at writing. It's still work. It's still HARD work. It requires me to set aside the time, to put in the hours, and to get it done instead of just talking about doing it. Is it sometimes wonderful? Oh, yeah. Do I do it because I love it, even when it's hard? You bet.

But I DO it. I make the time, and I put in the work. Can the people who spout "I could do that if I had the time" turn out stories and get them published and make me look like a rank amateur? Maybe they can. But until they've made the time and DONE it, every time they utter those words to me, it's a slap in the face--an utter lack of respect for and a complete dismissal of what I've accomplished and am still working to accomplish.

Rant done. We now return you to your regularly scheduled cheerful person, who in turn is now going to take some of her own medicine and go WORK instead of blogging.

I could learn to love this job

One of the things I try to do on a semi-regular basis, as a writer, is to read. This is, of course, a commonly-mentioned "thing you should do," but sometimes, in the limited hours and burning desire to finish what I'm writing instead of taking time away to "just read," I let myself off the hook. So yesterday afternoon, I dragged out our stack of Cricket Magazine back issues and had Michael bookmark some of his favorite stories from them while I checked out some non-fiction articles I've been meaning to read.

The non-fiction articles were on the subject of plot structure. When I first started writing, I struggled, HARD, with plot structure. As in, it was a familiar phrase but it didn't really mean anything to me. What was it? How did I use it? I mean, yeah... rising action, climax, falling action, denouement, yadda yadda yadda. But it didn't MEAN anything to me. So I spent a lot of time reading about structure and how to use it to shape a story. Which means that, at this point, I am pretty well read on plot structure. And part of my process for writing any story is to sit down and sketch out a structure for that story, to make myself think the story through enough to find all the necessary bits and pieces that will make it a story and not just a collection of cool imagery and/or dialogue.

I hadn't done that yet for "The Blue Wall," not in any concrete form, partly because I was still waiting to see if the Muse had anything new to add to the mix. So of course, as I was reading the articles, which covered information I already know even if I don't think specifically about it in those terms, the Muse inspired me to scribble down a plot structure diagram for "The Blue Wall" based on a slightly-different paradigm than the one I normally use. (But also very similar to the one I use. We did a "new" one for Crowmaker, too, and found that it matched up very nicely to the structure I already have in place for it. Which perhaps means I'm on the right track there.) I didn't get the plot structure for "The Blue Wall" in its entirety, but it gave me enough that I could feel the Muse in the background fiddling with the pieces.

At which point I took the stack of Cricket Magazines Michael had bookmarked for me and sat on the back deck in the awesome mild weather and read through the stories he'd picked out. Not all of them are the types of stories I would choose to write, although some were. But in reading the stories other people have written, I get the chance to both consciously pick apart how they did it and to subconsciously absorb the rhythm and flavor and feel of the stories--and I think, sometimes, that the subconscious portion of that process is just as important if not more so.

I jotted down a few more points on my diagram for "The Blue Wall" last night, in the midst of doing other things. And this morning I went to it first and jotted down a few more things. I discovered that the physical location of the story is right, but that the time period was wrong. I did additional research to get a grip on the setting and to inspire some additional details. And the Muse smiled and handed me a couple of complete passages to add to the existing rough draft, including one that contains echoes of the entire story's theme and gave me shivers.

All in all, a good day at the office. If I could manage to make a living at this, I would never, ever need to retire.

Seeing rain

The sunshine came through today, as forecasted, but it took a while to soak in and rid me of the blah's. I accomplished not very much on Crowmaker, aside from fumbling back and forth between scenes on my screen and making some half-hearted notes about things I already know. I finally gave up, fed myself a bowl of ice cream, and took the rest of the day off. I think part of my problem is that I'm at that stage where I keep stumbling around in the stuff I've already written, moving scenes around and trying to figure out if they really go where they do and see what's missing, but I'm doing it on screen (the lazy way) instead of printing it all out and hacking it up with the red pen. Because I did the red pen with the first five chapters, and it went swimmingly. But then I got all confident because it was going well and stopped. So tomorrow, more printing out and red pen.

Received my renewal card for SCBWI this afternoon. When I added it to my bibliography page, I noticed that, hey... I've had a fair chunk of stories published. I even look like, you know... a real writer. With a professional designation and everything. Cool.

Joey borrowed my computer to print out some homework this afternoon. I had Crowmaker open in the background. When I came in to check on him, he had Crowmaker open, reading the first couple of paragraphs. "Looks good so far, Mom. I fixed a typo for you."

God love him.

Here It Goes Again

After the high days comes the inevitable downswing. I've come to expect them, and I've learned to deal with them, but they're still not exactly my favorite days. Clouds and a light, misty rain rolled in yesterday afternoon and have yet to leave, too, so I'm sure that's exacerbating things. I'm listening to upbeat music and consoling myself by dealing with more administrative/technical writing tasks instead of trying to force a creative mood, since I know that would only end badly. I have most of my point of view issues fixed now. (I'd written one partial draft of Crowmaker in first person and a second in third person; I finally picked one and am working on making everything third person.) I sorted out some confusion I'd created for myself regarding some plot elements, and even though I couldn't whip up the energy to write the new scenes required to clarify things, I did make the small fixes necessary to existing scenes. There's also an old scene I can tweak and bring back in. So there is work being done, even if it's not entirely new stuff.

There is no deadline, Lori. There is no rush. You're putting in the hours, you're making progress, and there is sunshine due tomorrow.

And on the bright side, when I forced myself to walk today even in the mist, I discovered that the cool, moist air seemed to have a great effect on my breathing issues. A cool mist humidifier may be in my future.

YouTube linkages related to the day:

That OK Go video.
Some version of Sugarland's "April Showers" (Because I have seen rain before. Haven't we all?)

Huh.

I spent most of the weekend working on household/family type stuff and wishing I had the time/ability to focus for writing instead. This morning, the alarm went off and my first urge was to shut it off and go back to sleep. "Ugh," I thought. "I don't feel like doing ANYTHING today." Being a responsible mother, I got out of bed anyhow and dragged myself through the morning, sadly noting along the way that I had not a creative urge stirring and that today would likely be a complete waste. Oh, woe is me. I cut myself a deal--sit through one hour of something writing-related, even if it was just doodling pretend notes to myself about "The Blue Wall."

So, yeah. Almost four hours of writing time in today, a really short, really bare bones draft of "The Blue Wall" (600+ words) and a full revision of my most recent "pigs from HELL" scene for Crowmaker, which included a depressing amount of cutting existing words followed by writing new words, but which turned out encouragingly well in the end. It's hard to tell since I cut all those words at the start, but I'd guess my total new word count for the day on both stories to be in the vicinity of 1,500 words.

Not bad for someone who really wanted to slap the snooze button on the entire day.

About four years ago, the boys and I sat down and picked two boys of similar ages to them to sponsor through Children International. Joey and Michael are both required to set aside certain amount of their weekly allowance to save for such things as buying Christmas gifts for other people and for the monthly sponsorship amount for "our other boys." We spent some time learning about the places Julio and Krishna came from, we read through their information that tells how they live, and we talked about how their lives are different from ours. I write to Julio and Krishna on a semi-regular basis (enough to let them know I'm a real person who cares about them, but not so often that they have to spend a ton of time writing obligatory return letters).

We got a letter over the weekend stating that Krishna's parents have decided to take him out of the sponsorship program. They didn't have details on why, but he's twelve now, and it's not hard to imagine that he can bring in more money working alongside his father and brothers than comes into the family through the sponsorship program. I don't know what that means for him. I don't know if he'll have the chance to continue any kind of schooling at all. I don't know what he thinks of the choice that was made for him, whether he's fine with it or not. I'm left feeling a little sad about it, but I suppose that's only because the situation of so many children all over the world was personalized for me. (Which is, of course, the entire point of the way Children International operates.) I'm left feeling remotely guilty that my life and my children's lives are so easy, relatively speaking, and blessed beyond belief that we have so much. We don't sleep on dirt floors or go hungry or have to haul water from blocks away. We have luxuries and leisure time in spades.

We'll be sponsoring another little boy in the same area. They sent his profile along with the letter about Krishna, there was no way I could say no to the smiling, hopeful face in that picture. Joey couldn't, either. But I've kept Krishna in my prayers (such as they are), and I hope that wherever his life leads him, he's safe and finds his measure of happiness.

Pigs from HELL

OK, no, this blog entry has nothing whatsoever to do with pigs. The reference is to a line I've been known to utter when leveling a character through Hellfire Peninsula in World of Warcraft. Those of you who play with me know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. WoW is fun. Getting to Hellfire Peninsula is fun. Those first couple of levels out there, however, let's face it--they can be pretty rough going. As in, you just think you're making progress and doing well and WHAM! Out of nowhere, demon pigs chewing on your ankles.

That's what today's writing has been like. The chapter I'm currently working on needed a LOT of reshaping and new scenes. It took me forever and half a red pen to work out, and then just when I thought I had progress, I had to sit down and make heads and tails from my notes and locate all the cut scenes in my scrap pile to paste in and type in new material and... Yeah.

PIGS FROM HELL!

The up side is, when you finish that last quest and move on to the next chapter... err... zone, you get to thumb your nose at the demon pigs and leave them behind you.

Of course, then there are the warp hunters. And the invisible wolves.

Why yes, I really should be working instead of blogging

Found while nosing around over on Grizz's blog:

Otherland MMO? Being a huge fan of Tad Williams' I can only say... Yeah, I'd probably give that a spin. As the reviewer points out, it's way too early to determine if anything will really come of this. But the concept is cool.

No word count updates yesterday, but I have been working. I have printed out what I have written for acts I & II and have been busily scribbling in the margins and on looseleaf paper to fill out missing threads and scenes. Two things will come of this: I will have lovely scribbly pages to bring to the desk and make the first two acts much better, and I will have a better idea about how the last act comes together. (I think I answered some of the most puzzling aspects of that Most Important Question, "And uh... how does this all work out at the end, again?")

So, progress, even if the progress wears red ink at the moment. And it's funny, I used to loathe red pen marks on my papers--it screamed at me about something I'd done wrong. I just this second realized that I no longer hate it. Now it's more like... jumping and yelling and showing me places I can make my story even better.

Yeah, I agree. I probably need to be more awake before I write blog entries.

In other news, "Wings" has visited F&SF and sent back another classic "Alas" note for my files. I have never been rejected more politely than I get rejected by these guys. I regrouped and sent the story to Strange Horizons last night.