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.

Why We Should Write

(from Murderati.com by Toni McGee Causey)

 

 

 

    Somewhere, there is a woman, sitting in a room, three days past a rape. Her bruises are turning purple and in a few more days, they're going to be that greenish hue of ghouls. She hasn't looked in a mirror, yet, but the swelling is starting to abate, and she can open her jaw without the execrable pain. The screaming is almost entirely in her head, now. The stitches hurting her remind her she's alive and she's not really sure why people keep telling her that, as if that's a good thing. She's not sure she wants to be. There's been just enough time to get past the initial shock, the stunned chaotic business of having lost any sense of strength in the face of the world. She has had just enough time to be processed, and there should be a stamp for her forehead: file # 56449A221. 

Oh, people have been caring. They have been very professionally caring. All of the people, scads of them. They have been very careful not to touch her or move too fast. Everyone is diligent about addressing her respectfully, using her name, always making sure she feels like an individual. She can see it, see in their eyes how she is now different. The opposite of the person on the other side of the desk, where there are things like strength and weapons and confidence. 

And right now, she is finally alone, though the moat around her has turned into an ocean, and the screaming, it just keeps on coming. For a few minutes, not having to deal with anyone else is good. A relief. But then there is the silence, and in the silence, it all happens again. She cannot close her eyes, because it's all happening. Again. She cannot talk to someone, because the screaming will break free. Or the tears. Either may kill her. 

She needs. Needs. To be somewhere else, other than here. Other than this thing she's become. Needs to be able to step outside of her skin for a little while. Maybe a long long time. 

She's going to go to her bookcase and pick up something. Maybe it's something where the woman kicks someone's ass. Maybe it's one where the good guy wins. Or the DA is brilliant. Or the girl comes of age and has confidence. Whatever it is, she gets to step outside of the bruises and the cuts and the broken bones for a little while. She gets to live a different ending. A different beginning. Have a safe place to be. And somehow, maybe, have a little hope that this thing, too, will pass. 

 

Write a story for her.

~*~

Somewhere, there is a man, sitting in a hospital room. His wife has cancer, and he's been there, every day, before and after work. Except now, he can be there full-time, since he's lost his job. He's spent days seeking help, trying to find a way to keep her there, to make sure she has the care she needs, when all of his benefits are gone. He's filled out more paperwork in this one week than he's done in a lifetime, and only barely understands half of what they've told him, if that. 

He'll try to get a second mortgage for the house. Sell off the second car, trade his in for something cheaper. The savings--such as it is, there's not much with two kids--is gone. The retirement will go next, and that might last a month, at this rate. They don't qualify yet for any sort of Medicare or help. His sister is at his house, boxing up stuff to sell. Doing it while the kids are at school, so they don't see.

The screaming is almost entirely in his head, now. The anger, the rage, the helplessness. His wife's asleep, and sleep is so rare with the pain she's in, he can't risk turning on the TV. She's been in too much pain for him to leave the room, though.

He's lost. He sees it in the eyes of the nurses, sees it in the eyes of the administrator. The woman running the accounts payable office.  He's become this other thing, this person he doesn't know, and right now, for a little while, he needs. Needs. To be somewhere else but here. Someone else but him.

He'll slump down in the God-awful chair they have in the room, punching a pillow that one of the orderlies found for him, and he'll crack open that favorite paperback he grabbed on his way out the house this morning. For a little while, he gets to be a hero. He gets to fight crime or solve problems, save the world or save the girl. For a little while, he gets to have hope.

Write a story for him.

~*~

A lot of people in the industry are scared right now--things look bleak. If you're pushing through NaNoWriMo or that draft on deadline or beginning a new project, you may be at that part of the process where you're feeling exhausted--or scared to begin. Writer fatigue and fear are hard to combat in the face of a lot of bad news, and especially hard to slug it out when it looks like the possibility of selling is dwindling to nothing.

And this, ironically, is when we need story the most.

Story-telling has been around for millennia for a reason--we need to connect. We need to both transport somewhere other than our own daily circumstances and to connect to others, to know that someone out there understands us. Understands our fears, our desires. We need to escape, without physically abandoning our family and friends. Stories do that. We need the hope, the connection, the dream. 

Write a story for us.