The Art of Fishing and Editing

It is right now one of the beautiful summer days that make you feel sunny inside yourself.  The sun is shining and there is no forecast of rain so it is bright and happy outside.  The breeze is just light enough to take off any hint of heat.  The temperature is not too hot, as it was a week ago, but cool enough to sit at a café and watch the people walk by and do a bit of writing.  Of course, I am actually at my desk at work and taking a much needed break for lunch instead. 

Many people have certain things they do to make summer very enjoyable.  Some people go camping on the beach, some people escape the heat and head to a cabin in the mountains, others may like to go for long bike rides in the evenings or even a leisurely stroll as the day is still sunny when you get home from work, not like the darkness of winter.  In Virginia and where I used to live, Wisconsin, many people enjoy fishing.  Now, I have never been a big lover of fishing.  I can count on one hand the number of times I have actually gone fishing and I can honestly say of those times not one of them was "ice" fishing. Brrrrrrrr! 

Recently, I was having a rough weekend and my son was extra chipper so I decided we should go for a drive through the country which is my favorite thing to do when I am having a rough day.  I need my trees or even mountains to re-energize me when those times hit.  I love to blast my music and roll my windows all the way down, obviously this is more of a summer thing to do, and then just enjoy the long country roads and the fields of green with large trees and flowers and smells.  Even the insects seem larger and louder and happier and you don't mind them as much as a visit from them into your home normally.  Although, now we are visiting their home and they probably feel about as happy as we are when they visit. 

Anyway, my son and I stopped at a local market to get a drink and stretch our legs.  Off to the side of the market was a little lake.  At the far edge of the lake was a Dad fishing with his son who was about eight years old.  I watched as they caught a fish and then threw it back.  As I started to walk away though the Dad caught one that must have passed some test because both the Dad and boy got excited and did not throw this fish back.  I, being a fishing novice, do not know the parameters and rules attached to throwing a fish back versus keeping it but I am sure some of it may be related to size.  I do know though that a few days later as I was editing Chapter Twenty for a final time I realized with editing there are times you want to keep something but it does not carry enough importance to the story so it has to be thrown back.

Editing can be a lot like fishing.  You throw out a line, hope to catch a big one but sometimes have to throw it back.  Then, instead of walking away, you throw out another line and try again until you have a finished product. I had waited a few weeks to edit chapter twenty so I had plenty of items I was throwing back but I was able to finish the edits and move on to chapter twenty one where I then went on to chapter twenty two and twenty three and now I have three chapters to edit.  Yikes, I may have to take a week off just to focus on the editing...maybe instead I will just go fishing.

The Writing Train Chugs Again!

I take the commuter train to work almost everyday.  It makes a long commute somewhat easier since I am not driving.  I often spend that time reading, sleeping, doing crossword puzzles or I take that opportunity to do my writing.  Sometimes it is hard to find the time throughout the day between working or doing errands or spending time with my son or just being lazy.  I love the train commute for writing.  Plus, if you look busy then usually people do not talk to you and you can have a little time in your invisible bubble.  That doesn't always happen, Friday I did end up sitting next to a talker, but usually you are pretty safe.

I bring up my commute because this morning I was watching as everyone got on the train.  Mornings are usually fun for people watching anyway because many people have not yet fully woken up or are struggling pre-caffeine.  I noticed this morning though, as I have in the past, that people are like herds of cattle.  They all migrate to the same seat each day.  One person is always in the lead and waits right at the door for them to open.  One person always stands in the back, letting everyone pass them, and of course grumbling under his breath that people are always in a rush and pushy and are rude.  There is that person that has to run each morning to catch the train as if it doesn't depart the same time each morning and just makes it on board as the doors are closing.  There is the older woman who sits up front and talks all morning to everyone around her about the latest gossip but holds her purse so tight to her chest as if she were afraid her own secrets would get revealed.  There are the younger men and women who do not take their eyes off their phones as they feel they must send that email out before 7 AM but in reality I imagine they are really playing a hot game of solitaire and just want to look important.

I watched all of this activity this morning and realized it is the same images I see as I get on the train most mornings and then I watched as each person went to the same seat they do every day as if they were assigned to them.  The type A personalities walk through the train to get to that one seat just because it is their normal seat.  The laid back person who proclaims their need for spontaneity and change...they still sit in the same seat each morning.  Even I will admit to sitting in the same seat each morning, seeing the same views, watching the same people perform the same tasks and actions.  But, this morning, I actually noticed it all.  I watched people as if I had not seen them before and saw more than just a woman typing out a furious email on her blackberry but rather someone who works hard in order to get ahead.  I watched the computer tech guy in his jeans and sandals try to stand off to the side and not be part of the large crowd.  I made sure to keep out of the way of the little middle aged man who oozed anxiety as he tried to be the first one on board the train.  I saw the older, disproportionate woman with the skinny, short legs and the ever expanding waistline stretch to get on board and then greet everyone around her with a big smile that made you forget her odd appearance and only her nice, grandmotherly face.  I remarked at the woman behind her to yelled out her hellos to everyone on board and settled in with the older woman's club to catch up on the latest gossip as she took out her knitting needles and yarn.

Then, I walked through the car and found the sit next to the window on the right and slid on the vinyl seats, put the arm rest down, took my ticket out to display, set my computer bag on the floor and then leaned back and gave a sigh as I settled back into the seat...my morning seat.  It does not have my name on it but it might as well. 

As I took out my paper after I made all these morning realizations, which is pretty good before coffee, I looked at my writing and recognized that I did not want my writing to feel the same that the reader loses some of the details in the mundane and mediocre.  We grow as a writer if you keep writing everyday but also if you challenge yourself.  The trick is how to do that.   I have not had much chance to write over the past couple months so as I looked down at my writing I felt as if I was rediscovering my characters and their lives and remembering old friends.  I was recalling the setting as if it were an old home that I was revisiting after being away for a long trip.  I was pulled back into the lives and the actions that were written before my little break.  Yet, I knew this was my chance to also look at my story with fresh eyes instead of trying to go back and write as I did before the break.  Instead of thinking I need to reread everything so that I can get it right, instead of trying to make the writing fit the same story, instead of getting mired down by what has already been written, I knew this was a chance to bring a fresh awareness.  Like a train that continues slowly and gathers speed, my story had been chugging along until I took a small break and now that I start writing again I do not want to go backwards but keep the story and the momentum moving forward and one way is to look at it with freshness of new possibilities and not backward with what has already happened. 

So, I start writing on the blank page in front of me excited to create new ideas and actions for my story. I knew that I wanted my story to make the reader feel comfortable but also to wake them up.  I want my writing to flow smooth and evenly but have waves of the unexpected to keep the readers engaged in the story and wanting more.  I am excited once again to be writing but also to bring a new life into the story.  So once again the same story, same characters and same action is chugging along but with a renewed feeling and insight.  I look up and I see the same woman coming towards me to sit in the seat next to me as she does every morning and I just give a smile and then get back to chugging along with my novel.

The Ground Hog Has Spoken

I think Spring may have actually arrived to the DC area.  Of course winter tried to show its hand one more time with a final and only snowfall of the cold weather season.  Two days after the snowy day though the weather warmed and I was awaken by birds singing outside my window and the green grass back again.  I am very ready for spring.  In fact, this year the groundhog did see his shadow and that spring was only six weeks away.  I do not often take the word of rodents.  I find them untrustworthy animals but I am very willing to believe this one.

Spring though also means that the busy season is upon me at my real job and it is harder to get time to write.  It also means that when I find time to write it helps rejuvenate me to continue doing my real job.  A word lover like myself may not find as much time to write and the story may not progress as fast as I wish but I love how the story has progressed.  When I think back to my original outline it was simple and helped me begin but the story has evolved.  The characters seem almost real to me.  I can dream about them as if they are real people.  When I began my outline they were just characters.  A part of the story and the plot.  As the story continued and I wrote about their characteristics and traits they became real.

That is how friendships in real life start.  A person becomes a friend once we learn about them and their character.  A writer becomes friends with their characters.  It makes it difficult when life gets in the way of writing though because it almost feels as if the characters call to have more of the story written.  Of course that just may be my mind saying, "I want to write, I want to write." 

I listened to a writer once describe how he would get lost from his own life when he became absorbed into the words of his written story and the characters that pursued his thoughts.  He also said to be a good writer it is necessary to think of your characters as real people whose story you are being forced to tell.  I have come to appreciate that writer's way of thinking.  For me the story is not just about loving words and ideas and the need to put them down and share with others but it is a love of the characters and a familiarization with them that makes them seem like true friends or family.  It may be because their characteristics are pulled from the writer's everyday life and people but really it is because they occupy the thoughts and spaces of a writer's mind until he has to put pen to paper and release them to the world.  What is then born is a story given to a reader who then grows along with the story and characters as they read.

So, the ground hog has said spring is right around the corner, and as I steal away for moments to write he can then maybe predict a story that is closer to reaching the end.

The Word of The Day is Interrobang

Today's word of the day is interrobang.  The definition of the word is, a printed punctuation mark that combines the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!).

I love looking up odd and obscure words.  I am one of those odd word nerds that likes to read the dictionary as if it is some interesting novel.  I think my favorite words are the ones that people can not just throw into normal conversation.  The words that the SAT tests love to use.  I am also impressed whenever someone has the ability to slip an obscure word into conversation and actually use it properly.  In fact, I used to have a friend who would compete with me for word points.  That does not mean we played "Words With Friends" together but rather every time one of us was able to use an "SAT' word as we called it, and use it properly, we would get points and a congratulatory, "Good SAT word" pat on the back.

As I am writing my novel though I could of course burrow into my head and pull out all the large, pedantic, obscure, ostentatious words that I know.  Yet, who would want to read that.  There are novels you read and either skip over the large words in hopes you will get a clue to their meaning further on or you sit with a dictionary close at hand and actually look up the obscure words.  Those novels take work and in my opinion act as a showcase to the author trying to either teach the reader or showboat and prove their intelligence by making sure the reader knows they are smarter.  Then there are the novels where the words flow like music and the story stays in their minds even after you finish reading.  Depending upon the type of novel you are desiring, reading a novel should be enjoyable and even if it teaches, should not make the reader feeling brain tired.

The novel should also take into consideration the social economics of a character.  It would be hard to visualize someone described as raised in an impoverished area who has had little to no education speak as if they were professors at a university.  Just as it would be difficult to visualize someone who has had advantages handed to them or earned speak as if they did had no formal training in their primary language. 

With all that being said, I opted to leave out some of the juicy big words that delight my heart in favor of words that seem to resemble more how I envision my characters would think and speak.  I also have utilized my thesaurus and dictionary in the process.  I love my red covered dictionary I received from my parents when I graduated 8th grade and have come to use it highly as I write my novel and my yellow covered thesaurus even more.  This has helped me discover synonyms and antonyms of the big, hairy, hard to understand words for the simple, enjoyable words.  I compare it to a big fancy dinner versus a bowl of cereal.  The mean may taste great but it takes a lot of work and hours to prepare whereas a bowl of cereal is simple and comforting and still fills you up all at the same time.

So instead of opting for the big SAT word which may get me points from the reader, I have instead decided to write with my characters in mind and with my readers in mind.  Can you believe it?!

Removing the Decorations Makes Life Breathable Again

Christmas is done.  I have put away all the decorations, stowed the tree away into the shed and closed up the trunk on all of my ornaments and nutcrackers.  I have stopped hearing the noel tunes on the radio like "The Twelve Days Before Christmas" which to me is the holiday version of "99 Bottles of Beer" that seems to go on forever.  When I walked into the room it was quiet and it looked so big.  The area seemed to have expanded in the blink of an ornament and now feels roomier and a bit emptier at the same time.  I made a large sigh though that the holidays were over.

Every year the holidays are one of my busiest times of the year.  This year I also added to my list visiting my Dad.  He was having surgery and then had to stay in a rehabilitation facility until he was back on his feet.  That meant driving to visit him often.  Then there is work and all the end of the year items that need completing, the parties for the holidays, which I will admit here that I skipped most since my holiday spirit was a bit lower than normal, the buying of the gifts, decorating and making sure my son has an amazing Christmas.  With all that needed to be done I was almost exuberant once the tree was taken down and I could just sit on my couch and revel in the emptiness and cleanliness of my living room.  I knew this feeling would not last long with a twelve year old son who loves to fill in spaces with stuff and has not yet learned the skill of picking up after himself.  So for a moment it was quite nice and unchaotic in my living room.

When we are editing our work we sometimes have to think of it like removing the decorations after the holidays.  It is great to have all the frills around and the twinkling lights to make something look pretty and glossy.  We must remember though that they take up space and may not actually be what is needed in the room.  Sometimes have a bit more room in our writing is better.  As I read one writer put it, "cutting away the fat."  It is great eating that cake but carrying around the extra weight it gives you is not fun.  When we are writing it is great adding in all the details we could think of but then the reader sometimes feels weighted down and the room inside their head is all cluttered with decorations.  It would be better for both writer and reader to put away the decorations and put down that fatty slice of cake and let the air back into the story.

Sometimes taking out the excess words and descriptions helps keep the story flowing better.  It also can leave the reader feeling more active in the story.  They can get an image from what you are describing and they can create the comfortable picture in their head of a place or a person.  When we try to describe something in too great of detail all we do is take away the reader's chance for interacting with the story and filling their head with too many words.  Someone may imagine a character differently than you but if they feel like they are part of the story, even just by reading it, they will want to continue to find out what interesting action may still be ahead.

Over the past month I have been stuck in my own story.  I want to add in all this research that I have done and make it part of the story.  I made the realization though as I sat in my clean, airy living room that adding all that research seems like a great idea but it doesn't really add to the plot and the story line and I should take away some of those details and leave it up to the reader to create the atmosphere they envision without cluttering up that vision with too much of my own detail.  Once I made that realization I felt the pressure of adding in all those details in a creative way easier to do.

I finally remembered that this is a fictional story and not a researched thesis paper. My novel is to entertain and be interesting without turning the corner into dull, with no imagination and too much detail.  So I took down the decorations and removed some of the unnecessary historical items listed in Chapter 19 and made the chapter roomier and easier to read through without having to constantly sidestep a fact or step over an obvious detail.  I reminded myself that sometimes more is just more and not necessarily better and so now I can also focus more on the story I want to actually tell without getting weighted down by all the details. 

Christmas has ended even for my book and now it is time to start a new year with a less cluttered view of my living room and of my novel.  Happy 2013 all around.

Welcome Hurricane Sandy and Writing Time

We have a new visitor to the area and it is one of those visitors that stay too long and you never really wanted to visit in the first place.  Hurricane Sandy is here and rain is coming down hard enough that trains and metro have shut down and offices, including my own, are closed.  This visitor though has brought me gifts though.  I now have the gift of time to write.  I am so rarely bored because I instead go and do some writing.  That is one of the joys of being a writer.  Even when you are not writing you are probably thinking about your next storyline and the next motivations of your characters.  Hard to be in a state of ennui when your brain is contantly moving.

So since Sandy is visiting right now I am able to do some more writing and get some of these plots and motivations from inside my head down onto the paper.  That means that I have moved on and can announce that I am on chapter nineteen.  This is exciting to me because that means I only have about ten more chapters.  It is also exciting because I am coming to the cataylst of my story and the real action will start happening.  This action will introduce new, interesting characters.  When I say interesting that could mean bad and evil or good and heroic.  Those determinations will arise within the next chapters.  That is what makes writing fun and interesting.

Often our stories and characters take on a life all their own and what you predicted or outlined in the beginning has evolved into something truly real and a surprise even to the writer.  The final surprise of course will be the ending but I will discuss that in another blog post soon since I am starting to think of the ending.  It is a bit like seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and getting closer but not being there quite yet.

Well, Sandy is still visiting and I thank her for the extra time to write but she can leave anytime now.  I really do not mind. Since I still have a visitor I am off to hunker down into my warm, dry home with a pen contantly in my hand to finish chapter nineteen.

Beware of the Big Black Hole

I just realized how long it has been since I have been able to jot down a few thoughts in my blog.  I can not say I have been overly busy.  Although, I did finish another chapter.  I am rocking and rolling now into uncharted territory that is for sure.  I can say though that the past month has been full of drama and stress and sometimes those are roadblocks to creativity. As I have discovered this past month, once you start putting up those roadblocks it takes a while to get through to the other side again.

Many of you may understand this if you live in the Washington, DC area especially.  The city is always under construction.  My beautiful morning walk is turning cold but that isn't the worst part of my walk anymore.  It is the construction that is going on.  There are sidewalks blocked off so you have to walk in the road.  The beautiful scenery is instead a giant hole and dirt where there used to be grass. And, to make matters worse, there does not seem to be an end date in sight.  Instead it just keeps moving locations and blocking the path.

That is exactly what has to be overcome when you are writing a novel often times.  It is easy to say you are too tired or too busy or you just want to relax and play "Words With Friends" instead.  In this modern age there are so many distractions to latch onto that it is easy to come up with a reason not to continue on course as planned.  I was very focused over the past month but it was mostly a focus on being a vegetable instead of a writer.  I relaxed more but got less done.

That is not to say relaxing is a bad thing to do.  In fact, it can work to your advantage sometimes when you step away and give yourself a break.  Once you return you have a fully operational brain again that is moving fast and thinking clearer instead of the one that was clogged down with too many ideas and responsibilities.  The problem arises when relaxing becomes a full time pastime and everything else like writing becomes a memory or an excuse.  As I like to call it, "The Black Hole Excuse."  The idea of something becomes so big it is like it fell into a black hole.  Much like my son's idea of taking out the trash regularly.  We end up hating a chore that may only take a small amount of time or can even be enjoyable because we have turned it into a giant black hole.

I have moved onto a new section of my book and I am now in a different time period and a different country.  I have to do more research and be a bit more creative with word choice.  I normally enjoy this greatly.  I love words and have often been teases for reading the dictionary or thesaurus for fun.  I love learning new words or big words or obscure words.  Yet, over the past month my trepidation has turned into a black hole and I took on too much of the story in my head that I could not jot it down on paper.  There it sat for a couple weeks.  I still thought of my story line and the characters but it became like the monster under your bed, something so much bigger than it really was.

As a kid I could not sleep with the closet door open because then the monsters inside would escape.  Well, I sat down finally and opened that door and no monsters escaped.  My closet was just my closet.  I put that same memory into play again. 

It happened out of necessity.  One evening I was commuting home from work on the train and ran into a set of unfortunate events.  I had made it almost home and was overjoyed since it was another long day and I was ready to just sit and relax.  I did do a lot of sitting but I did not make it home as planned.  They found a bag of body parts on my train and five hours later I was able to finally make it home.  Of course that was after a train ride, a bus ride and a very nice gentleman finally driving me to my final destination.  I do not do well when I have to sit and do nothing for long periods of time.  After exhausting the distraction of a crossword puzzle I finally took out my writing that I carry around everywhere.  This sitting and waiting finally gave me the chance I needed to write. 

Writing is just what I did too.  I broke the seal on the big black hole and was once again able to just focus on the one event or action or thought my characters were having at that point in the novel.  That black hole got smaller and smaller until I realized I had finished another chapter.  I also finally made it home from the impossible train ride. I once again realized that writing is a solace for me through tough times and boredom.  That big black hole has been defeated.  As the cowboy used to say, "I ride again."  Or, in my case, "I write again."