Back in the habit

     Life. Who knew? The Beatles I guess. So almost two years ago I lost my job as an adjunct writing instructor. It wasn't that they were dissatisfied with my performance, but that they had run out of work for me to do. I was forced to find a new job. I was fortunate and found one a few months later and found myself moving in August 2010.
     I immediately stepped into orientation for my job as a full-time instructor at a community college. One of the deans of the college cited his plan from decades ago when he got hired: work as a teacher and do his artwork on the side. However, he soon began spending so much time on work that he never found time for his art, and he said that he never regretted it. At the time I thought that I would not become him. I would maintain my writing in spite of the pressures and demands of the job. I would be published! It was even encouraging to find that someone in my department had recently published a novel. I could find support for my goal. I would still be a writer.
      Now here it is almost three years since my last blog post and my writing habit has gone down the drain. I am determined to reverse this trend. This was motivated by several factors. The first was the roleplaying campaign my group was playing. I spent some time writing the summary that I thought I would novelize it. The first few chapters were well received by my gaming group and that gave me support to continue.
     The second motivation came while preparing for courses. This semester I decided to fall back on a technique from my adjunct days. The assignment guide. I used an old assignment guide as a format for the new ones I was preparing. In the process I came across this old assignment.

"DAILY WRITING
Due Monday, June 14th (Bring to Class)
100 points

To become better writers it is necessary that you write every day. For this class you are required to write a minimum of 200 new words every day, Monday-Saturday (including holidays)."

     I still believe that. If you want to succeed as a writer you must write every day (or as close to every day as is feasible). I believe it, but I haven't been doing it. I am going to change that and get back in the habit of daily writing. It shouldn't be too difficult: there is a lot of writing to do.
     The third motivation was New Years. It's a time to make a fresh start and I made a resolution to finish a novel this year and revise one. That's a stiff order if I don't spend time daily working on it. However, I believe it is possible and this blog is going to help me get there.

Moving On, Not Giving Up

A little over a week ago I got my second rejection for "A Reason for Evil." I truly believe the agent gave my novel as much consideration as any other project she receives. Her reply was probably a form letter she sends to everyone she rejects (I know that's how I would do it. I hate having to think up a good way to say something bad). Still, there was something in the letter that really made me consider. She said, "I'm just not enthusiastic enough about the premise of your story...." After reding this I realized that I wasn't enthusiastic about the premise of my story either. I was sending the novel out to agents to get practiced in doing so, but I didn't really expect the novel to get published. I don't really love the story. While the experience is good, and there is a chance the book could get picked up I've decided to stop sending the book out to agents. Why would I want them to publish something of mine that I don't love? It would be a waste of everyone's time. My first novel did a wonderful thing for me: It showed me I could write. It has served its purpose. Now it is time for it to be put into the file drawer while I work on more exciting tales. I'm not giving up on it. I'm just moving on to something better.

Losing Your Computer Hurts

So, I was regaining my writing habit (though I have yet to be as dedicated as I was at the beginning of 2009), when my laptop broke. It was nothing major, a loose jack, but the end result was that when the battery ran out it couldn't be recharged. So we sent it away for repair (free of charge do to blessed warranties). This effectively killed my writing habit. I had hoped to write while at work, but that time was dedicated to actually working, so that didn't happen (which I am sure makes the people who cut me checks happy).

During that time I did buy a brand new notebook. I have had a story in mind since about 2001. I tried to write in beginning in 2002 on several different occasions, but none of them panned out. I eventually gave it up to wait until I had written some other things. During this time I also re-conceptualized the book into a tv show and a movie, fleshing it out a little more, mostly in my mind. I decided that I would take the time without my laptop to rework this story even more, filling in the names of countries, people, religions. The new notebook is dedicated to this.

This is actually a change for me. I usually make stuff up as I go. However, having a reference guide for my world and having to invent nothing (or next to nothing) mid-writing is definitely appealing. I don't plan on starting this book anytime soon. I have received my laptop back and have too many other projects already started. However, it will be nice to know that when I am ready to write it, it will be ready to be written. Plus, by then, I'll have some more experience and it will be better than if I started writing it now.

Finding Ideas

For a while now I've been longing for an idea book, a place to write down my wonderful ideas. I've had notebooks, notepads, spare scraps of paper, and a whole lot more for the past ten years. Notebooks and pads always seemed to be used for whatever I need them for. They're also inconvenient to carry with me all the time which means I won't have them when I want them, and I'll have to hope I still remember my idea later when I get back to my notebook.

The problems with scraps of paper is obvious.

so, I needed an idea book and I finally got one! It's a leather bound book that is no larger than my hand. The inside pages are grid paper, but that doesn't bother me. It has a ribbon book mark to keep my current place, and an elastic band to keep it closed. It fits nicely in my pocket and it is now one of three must have items when I leave the house, along with my keys and wallet.

The greatest feature of this little book is that it works! It write down ideas and I get more ideas. I'm usually not a fan of writing things down (it weakens the memory), but spending brain power remembering an idea for months (or years) until I can put it into effect is taxing. Now I write down the ideas as they occur to me and I have brain power to spare creating new ones.

It's almost like a dream journal. If you write down what you dream, you'll soon find it easier to remember your dreams. If I write down my ideas, I get more of them.

Maybe someday you'll see the results of the book.

Keeping on Track

It's important for me as a writer to stick with it. The longer breaks I take between writing on a book, the harder it is for me to find the voice of the book again. I hate missing a day. I usually penalize myself by writing twice as much the next day. Unfortunately, being sick also has an effect. It makes the mind sluggish, dull, lifeless. I'm not against writing when I'm sick, but it often drains the motivation so that I don't write.

I won't say that I've been sick for a week now, because I'm not sure that I have. I do know that I haven't felt well (on and off) for a week now. My writing has suffered as a result. Today I am getting back on the horse. It is time to recover my novel.

I need to keep writing so I have something worth updating soon.

Getting an education

I had a teacher once, Ph.D. in psychology, who told me that the undergraduate program in psychology didn't effectively prepare students for graduate work and future careers in the field. They are constantly changing the undergraduate program to make that statement less true. At the time, he believed that the English program did more to prepare psychology students for future study (granted psychology students would still need to take a few core courses).

I can see his point. English majors read a lot of books. Books about people. Then what do they do? They write papers about the books about people. They analyze them. They try and guess their motives, understand the significance of a character's actions, find the symbolism that must lurk in all things. (I used to believe that symbolism wasn't in everything. I have since corrected that belief to: symbolism isn't purposefully in everything, but good writing will have symbols throughout. They tie the prose together).

It's a great training ground for future clinicians. You don't even have to worry about confidentiality clauses. English majors as clinicians.

It made me ponder the other day, and I realized that maybe my career training (two degrees in psychology) has better prepared me to write fiction than it has to be a psychologist. I have studied how people learn, how people are motivated, how they think. I've learned about humans as social animals, humans with disorders, humans as individuals. Psychology, the study of what makes a human human.

It could mean that I can write better characters, whose actions and inactions are more realistic. I can write about what people will do in situations, because I understand the psychology of what people do in various situations.

At the same time...do I really need a degree to be able to do that? I've lived for almost three decades among humans, only 1/5th of that getting my degrees. It seems that sheer experience more than anything would qualify me to be able to write about the idiosyncrasies of man.

Who knows...but it is something consider: If you want to be a writer, study psychology.

A Matter of Pacing

I was writing this last week when I encountered a serious problem. The story was happening too fast. I had reached a big point 35 pages into the first draft. Now let me clarify: big events early on are okay, but only if they are the right event. Not this event. This event meant I was on pace to end the book at 75-80 pages. That's pretty bad for a book that is supposed to hit 200 pages.

Pacing is a pretty important element in books, and one that the reader notices, but doesn't think about. Each event is given the appropriate amount of time to develop. That way big events have the impact, and little events don't drag on, boring us to tears.

Good pacing doesn't mean a book is a page-turner either. I've found some books that were enjoyable to read, but also easy to put down. The pacing was good, but not necessarily compelling. And that's fine.

Anyway, I'm just pontificating. Pacing isn't something you can plan correctly. You just have to know. Did I get here to fast? Did I get here to slow? So when I got to one of my big events at page 35 I knew the pacing was all off. It came too fast for anyone to care. I had no time for the characters to develop. I had to put on the breaks. I went back and put in a new "Chapter 2", pushing back all my other chapters. This added several pages to the story and I have a new "Chapter 4" waiting in the works as well, which will push the event farther back.

The way I have it planned now is that the event will hit at about page 60 instead of page 35. That puts me on pace for a book that's going closer to 130-150 pages. That's still shorter than my goal, but it's much closer to what I want it to be.