Writer Wednesday – Pluggin’ Along

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Yes, for those more astute among you, today is not Wednesday.  That was yesterday.

This should maybe give you a clue as to my week, eh?

So.  Lessee.  Today’s topic is Writer Wednesday, wherein we share our ideas and thoughts about writing.  I wanted to post today to make the point that sometimes, when we drop a ball, just picking it up and throwing it anyway has merit.  There’s a lot to be said for pluggin’ along.

If you’re not familiar with the phrase, here’s a definition at the Free Dictionary.  Simply put, it means doing satisfactorily; but I also take it to mean plugging away like a slow but steady steamship, chugging up a river.  Just point the nose and let the engine run.

This has served me well in several large marathon-like projects, such as writing a novel or weight loss. Anything where we are prone to fall off the wagon and throw in the towel.  Rather than give up, just get up and keep going – even if you’re a day late.  Sometimes, winning the race isn’t about who gets there first.  It’s about getting up one more time than you fell down.

Emotion for the Masses

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It’s common knowledge that emotions show unconsciously in our body language.  In jurisdictions practicing wise policy, police officers and their ilk receive training to translate this instantly, enabling life saving reactions to armed suspects about to shoot – or not.  Human beings transmit these signals from our faces to our very feet depending upon the circumstance.

So ingrained, these reactions show even when there is no one present to read them.  I realized this in a unique way yesterday.  A mild skin irritation between my eyes would hurt whenever I made certain expressions, and this happened frequently while reading a newly purchased book.
This author drew me to experience the various highs and lows, the shock or joy or sorrow, right along with her characters.  That immersion, this ultimate escapism, is what draws me to fiction.  Hence I’m reminded why I enjoy writing.
I want to pull others out of their reality.  Heck, even when penning something private I gleefully submit myself to the sentiments and passions within the words.
These are, of course, the same reasons we listen to music and look at works of art.  I sincerely thank those who’ve moved humankind through the ages and look forward to what comes in the future.
Meanwhile, may you discover something today that transcends your spirit from the daily grind.  Or, perhaps you will craft it yourself!  Now, time to dust off my muse and get busy, right after I search out another book by this particular author (and leave praise of her craft while I’m at it).

–

Written into a Corner

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I have several stories that have never been completed.  As the title of this post suggests, I essentially wrote myself into a corner.  The problem returned to mind when I completed the following word game with my partner:

We ended up with this interesting corner-to-corner design but were unable to play all the tiles availed to us for the game.  I found it uniquely frustrating, as well as reminiscent of the backlog of tales languishing on my hard drive.  It even escapes me as to who won this round of the game.  I’d prefer to play to the bitter end, either ending up with unused tiles or leaving my partner with them, ultimately using every letter rather than hitting the “pass” button again and again.

So how do I work toward that goal in writing?  How do I complete these unfinished stories?  If I really don’t mind a bitter end as mentioned above rather than “happily ever after”, the sky’s the limit.  Right?

The first step is to quit beating myself up.  To look at the whole catalog and mark each unfinished title as a failure will only freeze my willingness to fix any of them.  Instead, I intend to pick one example and pinpoint what caused me to stop writing.

I know one of my weaknesses is in action sequences.  One story in particular comes to mind where the hero and heroine are about to meet their latest nemesis.  Then everything just stopped for fear I would only ruin what came before.

Perhaps it’s time to find help in that regard by seeking out writing exercises or even just reading a good action scene I admire.  The important thing is to try.  And for some months I’ve been too intimidated by the inner critic to begin.  I’ve been paralyzed from even reading these works in progress.

Maybe I should ignore what came before, thereby avoiding my inevitable edit mode, and pick up where things left off.  The results might bring a surprising success.

I hope you are not like me and aren’t letting anything hold your creativity back.  Let’s go make art!

–

Up in the Air

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I wanted to share with you some recent photographs I took while flying across the country to visit Rachel.  Many of the pictures don’t seem like pictures of land, more like textures or maybe even baked cookies on a sheet.  What do you see?

I am thinking of sending this one in to Southwest, actually.  I love the way it came out.  You can see the horizon-line starting the sunrise.  The sun is over the plane on the right, as though it’s over my shoulder.

I love this.  It looks like waves or something.

Somewhere between Colorado/Utah.  Looks like the moon.

Fuzzy horizon (actually think this goes with the first shot, just without the airplane wing).

I’ve always wondered, do the squares down there form by roads, or just natural contours of the land?

Clouds or landforms?

Clouds?  Snow?  Water?  All of the above?

This looks unlike land, to me; maybe a map?  Frosted cookies?

More sugar-frosted brownies.  You can see those lines I mentioned above much more clearly in this image.  Map lines?  Aliens?  Roads?  Elephants?

I have always loved planes.  This is the back-end of the jets on the wing.

More mountains.  Haze in the air as the sun cuts across it.

Much less snow here.  Utah, methinks.  The plane wing is more shadowed, I think we changed direction and are headed a little more northwest.

Forest with the line of snow.

There’s just almost a rainbow in the right side of the picture.  Weird how the camera interacts with the double-pane glass of the airplane window.

Almost looks like clouds, but I think that’s actually snow.  Interesting, since the snow indicates elevation but the whole ground looks like it’s mountains of the same height.

This looks like meringue, no?

My knitting project with my notes.  (You know I had to get knitting in here SOMEwhere, right?)

This is me playing around with the “effects” on my phone.  This one is the vignette setting.

Looks like cloud froth, but is actually snow.

This looks like ocean waves, but is actually mountains, valleys, and some cloud formation.

This is the “negative” effect on my phone.  (Who knew negativity could look so cool, eh?)

More meringue.  Anyone getting hungry for pie?

What do you see?

—
“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”
– E.E. Cummings

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Publishers: Samhain Publishing | Torquere Press

Check out BURNING BRIGHT, available from Samhain Publishing.
Check out EMERALD FIRE, available from Torquere Books.
Check out “Taking a Chance“, part of the Charity Sips 2012 to benefit NOH8, available from Torquere Books.
Watch for COOK LIKE A WRITER, coming February 2013 from the Guerrilla Chicks.
Watch for TIGER TIGER, coming July, 2013, from Samhain Publishing.

Spot the difference

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This post is in response to Ways of Seeing.

#1 taken Saturday 19th early afternoon
#2 taken Sunday 20th 8.15am
#3 taken Sunday 20th 5.45pm

The request is for mundane photos, and these sure do fit. I decided on these because of some interesting photographic possibilities and that gorgeous Peppercorn tree is right opposite our driveway! 

Let me know what you see, if anything.  🙂

love,
Eaton

Creature Care

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Having finished evening pet care, busily scrubbing the sink until it shone, I came to realize that little time is spent on caring for myself.  It’s a common theme among peoples of all situations, but worth addressing.  After all, if we adults don’t care for ourselves, who will?

And the first to suffer is my inner artist.  That’s something any reader of Julia Cameron’s “The Artist’s Way” knows all too well to be a true shame.  All the same, I’ve succumbed to bad habits and failed to refuel my creative nature.  Time for that to change.

Never a fan of New Year’s resolutions, for goal setting should never revolve around the calendar, I do intend to change this behavior as soon as possible.  So why not now?  There are plenty of fun projects at my fingertips; just a few minutes of letting my inner kid play would do wonders.

First, of course, I need to feed the fish.  Oh, well, I hope you’ll join me in doing something fun today!

Ways of Seeing

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In college, one of our assigned books was Ways of Seeing by John Berger, based on a series of 30-minute films in the early 1970’s.  While I recommend the book, this isn’t a review of it.  Rather, the title is evokative of a state of mind.  It’s on my shelf in my line-of-site from where I do a lot of my writing, so it’s something that’s in the background of my consciousness and the words have become a phrase in the substrata of my mind.

The way we see is unique.  Each of us could look at the same scene and come away with different impressions and imagery of what we saw.  This is valuable and necessary.  We don’t have to believe it for it to be true; we just have to see.

Do you have a camera, even just the simple one in your phone?  (Granted, some of the smart phones out there have cameras that are anything but simple.)  Have you experimented with just shooting a picture series of what you look at every day?  Try this:

Tomorrow, as you go about your daily round, take pictures.  If you drive, pause and snap what you see out your windshield before you start driving.  If you walk or take transit, snap pictures of stuff you see every time you go on your route.  The more mundane, the better.  Like a detective, we are after data and facts, not art.

Do you dislike pictures of yourself?  Experiment by taking one picture of yourself every day this week.  Do not judge; just take the picture and record the date.  “This is what I looked like on Tuesday.”  Play with different expressions and poses.  If you find yourself with one particular expression a lot, make that expression (for example, the one you have on your face when the phone rings) and take a picture of yourself.  What do you look like with that expression?

If you don’t have a camera, there are several good, inexpensive models you can find here, here, and here.  See if you have a friend who would loan you theirs.  If you have an affiliation with a school, they sometimes have them available for loan.

The point here is to become acquainted with how we see the world.  A fun twist on this exercise is to do it at the same time as your kids and then compare notes.  See what you might learn about each other.  Be prepared – leave your expectations at the door.  When you open your eyes and look, you’ll never know what you might see.

Have fun!