Clickety Clack

"...understanding was coming so fast it seemed to have bypassed thought."

-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

That seems to be the point I have reached in my story: the big plot is falling into place, and there is so much "clicking" with various details that it is starting to sound like a zipper. I am thinking a lot of these things out in my journal/daily pages, so I am going to have to go back and look them all up to put them in one document for handy reference once the last few details--like how this sucker is going to end!--have decided to make themselves known to me.

I can only assume that my subconscious mind is busily working away at this, aided and assisted by my daydreams while jogging, showering, and dishwashing. Once I have a good idea of where this thing is going, I'll be ready to buckle down and get some writing in--by which I mean the text of the actual story, not the 3-5 pages I am already writing in my journal each day by hand. It just seems that even when I am not working, the day goes by so fast. Before I know it, Hannah is home and needs my assistance with homework, which is something I am totally dedicated to doing (see my other blog for more info, if you need it). I think once I have reached that point, though, my daily pages will shrink down to my to-do list and more small details for my story, and I can follow them up with some writing on the story itself. Sort of like my daily exercise routine: I use the balance, aerobics, and Fit Plus games on Wii Fit to warm up for jogging (I'm up to 20 minutes = 4 km a day!). I'll use my journal to warm up for writing.

I know it sounds a little naive to talk about writing I plan to do in the future (as opposed to reporting on writing I am already accomplishing), but I have noticed that if I start to think about and plan for something in advance, it is much easier to do when I get to that point. John even made fun of me for demanding that he tell me about his heretofore vague travel plans for last weekend, since it was only for a day trip. But if he wants me--and more importantly, Hannah--to go along and be a pleasant companion, I need some time to adjust my mental picture of what my weekend is going to look like. Then I can ride along and be interested and enjoy myself. Same thing with writing (and working in general): I can't concentrate on writing without knowing where I am going, but once I've got that info, I can throw myself into writing and know I am going to enjoy it.

And that's how life goes...

I thought it was weird that dearest seestor just posted when I have been thinking about her so much. Those mental vibes don't let an ocean stand in their way!

While I have been twitchy over my very first story idea, I was plumb knocked out by a partial story that I had given up on a while back. It was in the "collecting dust" pile because I just couldn't go any further. It just stopped. Dead End. Then I started thinking about it after a convo with seestor about stories within stories. And BOOM the whole rest of the story came spilling out. I've got plot galore, baby. I know how it ends, I know why it ends. I am so happy.

So needless to say. I have been furiously working on getting major points into some kind of scene blocking so that I can realistically work on it in the small chunks of time I have available.

We'll see how it goes and keep it posted.

Shaking things up

If by "shaking" you mean "stirring very slowly without letting anything slosh up the sides".

But seriously, I have added writing daily pages to my morning routine, after coffee and CNN with John but before Wii Plus, and I find I am coming to depend on it. Not only as a place to jot down my daily to-do list (which then lets me forget about it long enough to think about other things), but also as a place in which to journal some of the things that I would rather not whine about on my regular blog and to "think out loud" about my work in progress.

I am between jobs at the moment, so I am trying to ensure that I spend more time on my writing, now that I have some extra time to spend, but it is sometimes hard switching gears. Free writing each morning seems to be helping with prising the words out of my brain, but there are still plot issues and a few other things that are unresolved and that I am spending lots of my "writing" time researching or thinking about, sometimes with the help of my journal--which, by the way, looks like this:



I splurged on it for myself, and John has been totally coveting it.

My writing time hasn't been in vain, though. I have had a lot of ideas that just went "click", and I knew they were exactly right for my story. Of course, I also had an idea that when followed to its logical conclusion made my story suddenly take a left turn and become a (political) thriller, which--no. That's just not going to happen.

Well, Hannah just walked in the door, so I must sign off for now.