Uncovering Fossils

I’ve been MIA – again. It’s not that I haven’t been writing; to the contrary, I have been writing more than ever before. It’s just not making its way to the blog. Part of my “homework” for my writing workshop is to write every day for thirty minutes per day. The instructor calls this “workbook.”  We can write about whatever we want, or even nothing if words are fleeting. The deal is to write just for those thirty minutes and then stop. We can write again later, but that thirty minute period is finite. I think I understand the point of limiting it to thirty minutes.

Another parameter – we are supposed to write by hand. Many people were resistant to this idea, but I loved it. One of the biggest criticisms was that you can’t write as fast as you can type. People felt like they weren’t accomplishing as much because not as many words appeared on the pages. Another complaint – if I write something I want to use, then I have to type it up after I already hand-wrote it. Here are my thoughts on those issues. First, I do type much faster than I write. But I don’t think that’s the point of the exercise.  I don’t think how many words you get out matters. The point is just to be writing. I also find that when I create something on the computer, I am much more likely to try to edit while I’m trying to create. That get’s me no where. I might sit in front of the computer typing, deleting, and retyping the same sentence over and over in a thirty minute period. That’s not writing.

As far as having to still type up what you wrote – are you kidding me? This gives you an opportunity to review what you wrote, improve upon it, edit it. If you think you aren’t going to have to do some edits (regardless of the original method of creating) you are lying to yourself. I just recently started typing up some of the things I felt were decent enough to keep working on and I have found that the time between writing and typing gives me the opportunity to think things over. I can then effortlessly type things up and incorporate changes I already made mentally.

For me, my thoughts are more focused during the thirty minute period.  Then I have time to reflect on what I’ve written before deciding to scrap it or uncover the rest of the fossil. Which brings me to the title of this post. I recently finished reading Stephen King’s On Writing at the recommendation of my friend Karen over at The Rhythm Method. One of the things that resounded with me was his comparison between writing a story and uncovering a fossil. Much to my pleasure, Mr. King doesn’t put much stock in plotting out stories or worrying about where they are going (also to my pleasure, my writing instructor is of the same opinion). Rather, he explains that stories are like fossils that the writer has to carefully and delicately uncover from the ground. You don’t really know what you are going to find, and have to follow where the fossil takes you.

I love this. I hate outlines. I hate plots. I hate rigid structure. I always procrastinated when I had to create an outline for something I was writing in high school or college. What if the story took a turn I wasn’t expecting? What if dialogue just didn’t work after I wrote it out? Why did I have to be stuck with this plot structure lurking around in the background that I created only because I had to? When I write now, I don’t do any of those things, but there was a nagging voice telling me that I would never be able to write anything good without a plan, a plot, an outline! I ignored the voice, while also worrying that it was right. As I am now learning, it was wrong (whew!). I’m just writing where the stories take me. Sometimes I think I know where they will go, but most times I’m surprised myself. And I’m enjoying every minute of it, thirty minutes at a time.

Pins and Needles

I have really never been a very patient person, and I have been doing a lot of waiting lately. I’m not handling it all that well. I become obsessed with thinking about it, check my email incessantly, and grab my phone as soon as I get back to my office to see if anyone called. It’s unhealthy. I know. But I’m not likely to change.

The thing that has me the most nervous right now is the writing workshop I applied for. Yes, I finally made myself sit down and write a short story (this is why I have been MIA for so long – that and a mini-vacation). It was an insightful process. Honestly, I don’t know that I’ve ever written a work of fiction that was that long. I’m sure that I had creative writing assignments in my high school English classes, but I’m sure they weren’t almost 300o words (2,918 to be precise). I am fairly certain that I wrote no works of fiction when I was in college. As a business major I think I had to take freshman English and that was it. It never occurred to me to take a class outside of my major just because I might enjoy it (at least, one that all my friends weren’t taking also, like bass fishing…yeah, true story). So, to actually finish a story of such length is an accomplishment for me, and I am patting myself on the back.

Accomplishment that it may be, I still really want to get into the workshop! I keep wondering how many people applied. Did he get a flood of writing samples at the last minute? The application deadline was yesterday, and the professor emailed me and said he would get back to me in a day or so. I have been trying to define what constitutes “or so” since I got the email (see paragraph 1). But the course starts next Wednesday, so I don’t have that much longer to wait.

I’ve decided, though, that I’ll be OK if I don’t get in. Writing the story lit a fire under me. I wasn’t 100% in love with what I wrote, but as a first attempt, I’m pretty proud of it. The writing process itself was kind of a rush. I don’t want to stop. I’ve already started thinking about other ideas for short stories. I’ll keep you posted on how it all turns out!

Stuck

I have been feeling a bit stuck lately. I’m not sure what my next step should be. After the huge let-down of not getting that job, I have been a bit crabby and depressed. I have been spending more time at work because I need to make up for July’s below-average billables (this was not because I was not working – rather, the law clerks were getting all of the new projects and I literally had nothing to do. Hard to earn any money when you are paid by hour you bill). I did create a website for my photography business, but what I really want to focus on is writing a short story.

One of the colleges in town is offering a creative writing workshop for members of the community. You don’t have to be a student of the university and anyone can apply. A professor teaches the workshop, you are given assignments, and it’s only $200. However, the course is limited to 15 students and you have to apply by submitting a writing sample. While the requirements are “no more than 15 pages”, I know that I probably need only 3000-5000 words. I keep telling myself it should be easy to do, yet I can’t make myself sit down and try writing. I can’t even think of a good idea to write about.

The applications are due September 15. I had hoped to get something started this weekend, but here we are at the close of Sunday and I haven’t even opened my word processing program. I did, however, manage to bill 7.9 hours. Something seems a bit off there, don’t you think?

View From My Windows

A Short Story Told From My Neighbor’s Perspective

It is around 7:00 am.  She awakes without an alarm as she does every morning.  This shouldn’t come as a surprise.  She is ninety-three years old and has awoken on more mornings than most.  It is snowing again.  This has been a terrible winter, and the new neighbors all but destroyed the safe harbor for the squirrels and chipmunks that frequent her yard.

She gets dressed, puts on her coat, hat and mittens, and calls to her small dog, Maggie.  She looks out the window to see if Maggie II is out yet.  She likes Maggie II well enough, but she’s very loud and excitable.  Very similar to that big white dog that lives behind the new neighbors.  Maggie is not very fond of Maggie II.  She doesn’t understand why she barks so much.

There is no sign of Maggie II.  She begins to gather up the food for the birds and squirrels.  She crumbles the old bread from yesterday, and looks through the waste from yesterday’s meals, fishing out the rind of her orange.  She carefully shuffles out the door and over to the bench by the garage.  She places the bread on the bench and tosses the orange rind behind the garage.  She scoops out birdseed from the bin next to the garage and fills the feeders.  She looks up in the trees, searching for any sign of raccoons.  She just doesn’t understand why the possums and raccoons keep coming around and getting into her attic, even after the new neighbors destroyed all of her bushes that provided them access.

She walks back to the house, peering into the neighbors’ yard.  It’s hard to see what’s going on over there with the tall fence they put up.  There was nothing wrong with the chain link fence.  It allowed them to see each other better, at least once you pressed your face through all of the over growth.

Maggie II came bursting out of the dog door just before she reached the door.  Apparently the neighbors slept in this morning.  Hello, Maggie II, she says.  She used to generously provide Maggie II with dog biscuits.  Tried to put a little meat on  her bones.  The neighbor lady came out one morning and told her she had to stop.  Maggie II needed to lose weight.  She wondered what uneducated vet they were going to.  Definitely not the one she recommended to them when they first moved in.

She shuffled back inside, and into the kitchen.  She looked out the window and saw the woman out there with her camera again.  What could she possibly be taking pictures of?  She thought again how weird that was.  Although, the woman is weird – always changing jobs, always running – weird.

She wondered if they would bother to shovel the snow off the sidewalk this time around.  She watched them finally clear off the ice yesterday, but apparently they did it only because they were expecting company.  Some people arrived in an SUV around 7:00 and hadn’t left by the time she went to bed.  It also appeared as if they were trying to “save” the parking spot in front of their house so the strange man who always parks in front of their house couldn’t park there.  She wondered about the state trooper that used to stop by their house.  They said they were friends with him, but she hadn’t seen any trooper cars in quite some time.

She walked to her living room, called to the dog, and settled down on the couch.  She turned on the tv and adjusted her position so that she had a better view of the front walk.  Once she was comfortable, she was ready for another day of watching the neighborhood.  Little did she know how very much she had in common with Maggie II.