I opened the Ransom file last night and just started writing new stuff after the "Chapter One" heading. Then I reworked the first meeting to the this new beginning so that it is more of my "hook". A lot of the other background stuff is getting killed so that I can get right to more action stuff.

When I re-read what I had done last night, I didn't cringe too much so I guess I'll keep it for now.

The plan is just to get it out there and not worry about sending it through an agent. I can do that by going the fluff route. Which, I'm convincing myself, is fine by me. As long as it no longer lives in the bowels of my computer.

Not sure how much more I'll be able to fit in soon. My schedule has stuff everyday until Wednesday. That will be Veg for Me Day. I'll try to squeeze a bit of work in at night before then but may only post lump work.

I have been writing and rewriting the beginning of Godred so often that I think I am losing my perspective on it. I still feel I don't quite have down the voice, or the pacing, or *something* I can't quite put my finger on.

I want to work on LNR, but it is just not coming to me. Hannah is at a bday party this evening, so I think I will sit in our comfy chair and try to hammer out the missing section.

Wish me luck!

Hello to the lost land of the living.

There is no excuse as to my absence. None at all. Except for the fact that I have been having a mid-life crisis. Or a breakdown. Whatever terminology you favor is fine with me.

I know, you scoff. I'm too young you say. Well, there is that. But I'd rather classify the last several months into the mid-life thing so that I can pretend that I won't be going through all of this again in the future. You're only supposed to have one mid-life crisis per lifetime, right?

Don't tell me if I'm wrong.

Anyways.

While I've floated in a sea of lost goals, misplaced dreams, and wandering purpose, I have discovered I few unflattering truths about myself. The worst of which is that I'm selfish. Probably always have been. I can see it too. Can see how I've constantly sucked the attention for myself out of other people without returning my attention to them. To their lives, to their problems-good or bad.

I'm probably most at fault with my family. With my friends next in line. How I have managed to maintain any relationships throughout my life, I really don't know. What I also don't know is why no one has ever told me this before. It can't possibly be a secret to anyone who has spent anytime in my company.

For the life of me, though, I don't know if it's something I'm capable of changing. But I hope I can try.

Another truth. I'm lazy. Which goes soooo nicely with the selfish thing, don't you think? So with the lazy realization comes the fact that I like to veg out-mentally-for like a day or so at a time. I don't mind hard work. But I want a reward for it. Like only reading smutty romance books for a whole day while only taking breaks to pee and eat chocolate.

So we can extrapolate from my ramblings that I may have been indulging in the vegging out thing a little too much recently-which I could have rationalized as okay at some point if I had actually EARNED it, but since I hadn't...oh, well. We can also extrapolate that I fully intend, barring any wayward selfish and lazy tendencies, to begin a moderate foray back into my writing. Of course, I will have to schedule in some veg time.

But I will be happy to post whatever progress is made, or at least attempted. Well, maybe just thought about. Veg time may prove hard to surrender to this change.

There was some weirdness with school (see my other blog for details) that had me totally freaked out all day Wednesday. I got it sorted out, though, and Thursday I felt almost manically up. You will pee your pants when you hear, especially after all my recent moaning and carrying on, but I sat down and hand-wrote 6-1/2 pages on Godred. Six and a half pages! (Of course I had to mark out about half. *sigh*) Something has always felt off on this story, and I recently realized what it was. It should be in first person! I have a great fear of first person, but I think it is really making a big difference. I might change my mind when I read over it later, but for now, good thoughts.

My dear friend, WesTexGirl, was talking recently about how she sets priorities in her life, and that made me start thinking. I haven't made writing a priority in my life, and I'm not sure that I will be able to so for quite a while.

Let me back up. On my other blog, I just posted about my need for and love of lists. It has occurred to me since reading WesTexGirl's post that writing never makes it on my to-do list. It is not scheduled on my calendar. I do not go behind closed doors and tell my family not to knock for X number of minutes because I am writing. These things are all cluing me in that I am not making writing a priority.

Going back to the list-making tangent, I realized that there are many other things I want and need to do, and most of them have some kind of deadline. I have 2 projects started that I fully intend to have done by xmas. I WILL finish my master's degree in two semesters. This semester I am taking 4 classes, 3 of which are definitely going to be ass-kickers. I will also be teaching 2 sessions of the same course topic (for a total of 3 hours in the classroom per week) and tutoring for another hour a week. Plus running a household and taking care of my child, blah blah family-cakes.

BUT, this does not mean that I am going to give up on writing or on this blog. It just means that I am no longer going to pull a hare-brained stunt like challenging myself to 100 words a day, because it's just not going to happen. Recently I have had a lot of mental activity on at least 4 of my stories, and I am trying to 1. sort out what I have, and 2. write down what comes out of it. That means I am getting a sentence here, or a phone conversation there, but I have to be satisfied with that. And I'm not dissatisfied at this point. I guess I will have to reset my priorities if it ever gets to the point where thinking and jotting just isn't enough.

Here is an article from 2002 in Salon about the bookselling and publishing businesses, and how the prices of books are determined, plus a little history about pricing. Even though it is 4 years old, it is still a useful read.

No new words. Don't ask.

I'm looking for more new links for the sidebar. Feel free to browse.

Date: 5 October 2006

New words: 109

Story: Godred

Words edited out: 3

Words in limbo: 37

Words left: 69

Comments: Ok, the end count wasn’t 100, but for my current intents and purposes, I am going to be satisfied with 109 on the page, pre-chopping.

Godred is also not a story that is going to be complete and marketable for a while, but that’s what I had, so that’s what I wrote. Maybe I can mentally direct myself toward working on LNR tonight.

Today I am feeling like a fraud.

I haven't been on any kind of schedule during the semester break, and today was even more schedule-free. John had to catch a commuter train to a near-by town to catch an Inter-City train (the fast bullet trains) to Berlin, except we were running a little behind, so I drove him to the nearby town with just a few minutes to spare. Unfortunately, I couldn't stick around to see if he made it, because I had to rush back home to pick Hannah up from school. So I am hoping my husband is now comfortably in Berlin, checked into his room and enjoying some dinner.

But this threw me off the hint of a schedule I had been working on to write my paper. Instead, I found myself going through all my Favorites and surfing blogs by agents, editors, and writers. And that is when I realized I am a fraud.

I think about writing, and yet I never do. And the only way to be a writer is to write. Duh!

When I first had the urge to write, I worried about getting ideas. Now I realize that it's not the ideas (as Miss Snark said: "Ideas are a dime a dozen, great ideas only slightly more expensive. Getting something down on paper is a lot harder than people think."), it's the sitting down and doing it (Neil Gaiman on writing:"This is how you do it: you sit down at the keyboard and you put one word after another until it's done. It's that easy, and that hard.").

So with that in mind, I have made a resolution. 100 words a day. Of fiction. Blogging, school, email--they do not add to the tally. 100 words is pitiful, really, but it is a goal, and that is something I have lacked for a while. Check back here for updates.

I don't know if Kee will decide to come back to us to report on her writing status. She is working part time now, but I know that she is actually working on a new novel, but I am not sure if it is *writing*-working, or *planning/plotting*-working, if you get the difference. Anyhow, I hope she decides to come back when she's ready.

I have a binder and a bookbag full of stories and story ideas, but up until now, only one of them has been a novel idea. I say up until now, because now there are *zero* novel ideas. That idea has been transformed into a short story, and I actually sat down and hand-wrote 3-1/2 pages on it this morning. I couldn't sleep last night, and I got to thinking about it, and I managed to flesh out quite a bit before I finally fell asleep. So Vale is now Valerie, and a medical thingie I was pestering people about a while back is going to go into the file for use some other time.

Yay me!

(And I am making some progress on my paper. It's not close to done, but at least it has a direction now.)