Sometimes I feel like a fool

           
Song I'm listening to right now: Set Fire to the Rain by Adele

        Sometimes I want to be an accomplished writer so badly I can feel the strain in my veins. Everyday, there is nothing like the high I get off reading an incredible article or blog post that excites me about some aspect of writing or publishing. I've become such a book blog junkie because of it. Ask me the states about book sales last March compared to last year at that time, I know it. Where to find book recommendations for gifts? I know. What did Kurt Vonnegut say about writing? I'll show you.

   I say all this not to brag because, frankly, it's common knowledge and there are millions of people more knowledgeable than I on anything I may think I know, but to wonder aloud if knowing all of these things actually helps or hinders when comes to the actual writing.

 Sometimes I sit down to write and feel like such a fool. As though this vast knowledge is sitting on my shoulder and suddenly Stephen King's voice rings out: "description begins in the writer's imagination, but should finish in the reader's!" Bah, I cross out the few lines that are too telling. I scratch around a bit more then a list unrolls of the Top Twenty Beginnings Every Agents Hates and there is mine, number eight. Cross out. And on and on. Sometimes I wonder if knowing too much kills imagination. Actually, I think it does.

     But there is the other side of it. Looking back on my old MSs and old drafts I am so glad there was reasoning that stopped me from continuing on in a vein that so did not work for that story. (Or, did I kill it before I had time to figure out what would have worked instead?)

      Sometimes I want to be an accomplished writer so badly it makes my head hurt. Sometimes I have to dig deep in order to keep persevering. Sometimes I need someone to remind me that I CAN write decently. Sometimes I wish there was something else out there-easier-that happened to be my life's passion, something other than writing. Sometimes I wish all these nap times I give up, the staying up late while everyone else is in bed, the weekends spent in the library writing instead of playing would automatically translate to luck that slips under my door and breathes life into my pages guaranteeing the success of my hard-won novel.

   But when it comes down to it, what matters most is the hard work I put into my novel. Then everything else will come into play. Maybe when I want it to, maybe later. Perhaps I've hindered myself by researching too much about the craft and maybe I've stuffed my brain with facts no one but a handful of others would be interested in knowing rather than absorbing the life experiences around me that would make my characters and situations better. But in the end I've got to believe that it will help me. That all these wrong turns where logic has dictated a better story has been for my betterment. That all these voices shouting out to me has helped and not hindered.  I guess it's what I will keep telling myself until I publish or take my stories to the grave. Hopefully the first, and maybe then YOU can tell me if I am found wanting despite what I think I know.

I hate Apartments

Tell me one good thing about them. Having a pool/workout community doesn't count because technically that has nothing to do with the living that goes on within in an apartment. (This is the biggest and perhaps only pro I can think of). And you might be thinking "I can call up maintenance anytime to fix something" to which I say, "define 'fix;".

    Normally I'm not a complaining bugger but today our water was shut off with no forewarn. All day. You never realize how much you need and use water on a consistent basis until you go to flush the loo and nothing happens. Or you go to wash your hands and nothing comes out. Or rinse a spoon. Or add water to your dinner recipe. Or come in from a hot morning at the pool ready for a cold drink of water and its been turned off and your 2-year old daughter guzzles down your last water bottle and you feel bad about wanting to yank it out of her small, innocent hands before she's done but your mouth shrivels as you watch the last drop disappear.* In our community email, it says it was an emergency water valve issue. But as I mentioned, I was at the pool this morning and overheard two maintenance workers talking about shutting off the water and it didn't sound like an emergency to me.

     Let me preference this rant by the fact that we have the weirdest neighbors that have only fueled my perseverance towards publishing and getting us out of here. Like the one across from us who will stomp out onto her porch and rant to the world about all her problems. Then she repeats the process about ten times slamming the door every time she goes back in. Oh, and she also likes to spray shaving cream at an imaginary Obama and any office manager that comes to tell her to stop.
   Needless to say, I'm pretty ready to move. Preferably to a house with 3+ acres. Because nothing ever goes wrong with your water or appliances in a house (hehe).

   The good thing out of living in an apartment in the middle of the desert with wacky neighbors and no water is that as mentioned it really has spurred me on to write more/better/faster/consistently. Whenever these things happen I always think "As soon as I publish I won't have to deal with this." As soon as I publish maybe we can move away from here...buy a house...I can finally decorate because we'll stay in one place...I can stock my pantry with tons of food so that I don't run out of powdered sugar and forget about it until I'm ready to frost my feel-better-about-no-water-situation chocolate cake and can find a 1/4 cup of powdered sugar (which any baker knows if about one individual serving of frosting. And even less if you were counting on drowning yourself in chocolate soothing). I can make more friends. I can have an awesome community of readers and book affecionados and we can chat about books 24/7. I can finally have something of success under my belt. I can finally look good with blonde highlights. I can shop at JCrew and their clothes will magically look great on one whose chest isn't as flat as a board and who has hips.

 Publishing will probably end world hunger.

Bring it on published novel. I'm ready for you.



*And you're 7 1/2 months pregnant which means you sustain yourself on water. Esp through a Nevada summer.