NaNoWriMo: Day 3

I don't have that feeling of, "YES," yet. At least not for all of it. I'm almost 4k words in and it feels a little like rollerskating on marbles. I feel awkward with dialogue and I'm still getting a sense for my characters. I'm being introduced to peripheral characters pretty quickly. I'm not sure who's important yet and who's not. I'm pretty sure that 2/3 of them are gonna end up dead by the end of reel 2 anyway.  I'm also still sick. The head cold has settled a wee bit in my chest. Not fun. I'm taking the night off. I need to re-center. Also, I've had way too much personal drama going on over the last few days. Shaking it off is like getting rid this upper respiratory infection. It's gonna take a little while. So, day three...meh. There's always tomorrow. Which I'm very hopeful about. Write on, WriMos, write on.

Out of the starting gate: NaNoWriMo '09

 Today is the first day of my first NaNoWriMo, (National Novel Writing Month. No, I didn't know about it either.) I'm pretty sure I babbled my way through a prologue of 1774 words, (after losing 600 words when I did something silly here.)  At least, through the graces of Paperclippe,  I found the awesome yWriter software. It's free and has lots of very useful tools that I will write more about when I've had a chance to thoroughly explore them. So far, it looks as though it will remove the need for handwritten notes. I'm trying to find a groove, but the basic point of doing NaNo in the first place, is to muscle my way through the process. Regardless of inspiration, regardless of how choppy some bits may be, or the bits I'll need to fill in later, if I can get the bones of this beast built, I'm halfway there. This is the short story I'm using as the springboard for the novel. (No, I'm not including it for NaNo.) I don't know how regularly I'll be blogging about it, but I wanted to get first impressions down. 

 

  It's weird. It's strange to look at word count as the priority. It feels almost unnatural not to obsess over the quality of the writing. It's exhilarating and enervating and yet... It's wonderful. I've made connections with people on an additional level, because they're also participating. It's an adventure worth having.  If nothing else, by the end of the month, I'll have pushed myself further in the realm of fiction-writing than I've ever dared to go. It's well worth the strangeness. 

So that is the first day. There will be many more. Some wonderful, some frustrating, some grindingly slow. One word at a time, one word right after the other. 30 days, 50k words. 

I'm giddy. 

NaNoWriMo prep, playlists and KITTENS!

If I could draw, I'd storyboard my novel rather than outline. The fundamentals of my writing process have always been a little bit of voodoo. I see a word, and it unlocks a door filled with images and sounds, tastes and smells. It's a little spooky at times, but it works. At least, it works with poetry. So far, the outlining is going ok. I've got a fair amount of the structure laid out, I've got a sketch, (figuratively speaking,) of my protagonist and I'm getting a sense of her partner. He's tricky, doesn't like to talk to me much. Shows me things, though. Kind of harrowing things, in fact. I'm covering 30+ years in this venture, I've got a little family tree going, even. That's one part of the puzzle. Do I think I'm going to end up with a fully finished, polished, ready-to-query novel at the end of November? Oh, HELL NAW, I don't. I'm hoping to have a well-constructed and fleshed-out first draft of one.

  Part of my process is music. It's an emotional shorthand, it's a mood-setting device. Music focuses me and calms me down. If I know what sort of music a character likes, it's an immediate in. A man that loves Depeche Mode and Nina Simone, drinking Glenmorangie 12 out of the bottle in the rain and covered in mud?   I can get to know that man. I have to. After I wrote about a page of rough notes on him, I realized that the music I was listening to, was NOT right. I made a playlist, 200 songs, all over the musical spectrum. It's a start. *mutters to self* "Yes, you really do need the fucking hard drive." Note: Take the change jar to coinstar and get amazon gift card towards hard drive.
I feel pretty solid so far. Weird and without a clue whether anything I'm doing is, "The right way," but I'm not so concerned about that. There's a fantastic group of writers who drifted together on twitter, and I'm lucky to count myself among them.

Now...KITTENS. Just one, actually. here's all the info, including a picture of my new kitten, Ani DiFranco. I'm gonna see what she's like, but I really like the name, so unless the kitten seems totally NOT an Ani, it'll stick. BTW, if you can, throw a couple of dollars Beth's way. Vet bills are insane. Give up a latte, for heaven's sake. Also, if you can support your local no-kill shelter. It could be as simple as picking up a big bag of cat or dog food the next time you're at Sam's Club or Costco or whatever, and taking it to them. Not only do the shelters need help, but a lot of people are having trouble making sure they can feed their pets. There are a lot of folks that would love to keep their pets, but are surrendering because their homes have been foreclosed on and they can't have them in apartments; some, are surrendered because their owner lost a job and UI isn't enough to take care of their family AND pet. So, supplies not only help the shelters, but help them help owners. Think about how you'd feel if it was you, ok?

 I did not have any intention of getting another pet. Not now, not anytime in the next 6 months. Losing Zoe, then Spike and knowing that Steppenwolf is not going to make it through another winter... It's a lot to take in one year. When the call went out on twitter, via @bethofalltrades, I re-tweeted and hoped for the best. My friend Jon, nudged and cajoled and irritated me to the point where I looked at the picture of this adorable kitten and couldn't imagine her not having a home. Beth's mom is from Pgh., and is visiting Beth in NY, and now Ani will be hitching a ride to me. Twitter power will not be denied. Saving one kitten at a time, sometimes one person at a time, if we're lucky. I bought Ani's first toy today, it's a squeeeshy sock w catnip, and a bell. The bell may be coming off, as it's on a long elasticized string. I'd prefer it if my kitten doesn't strangle herself. (Seriously, do they not think of these things?)

In other news, I had a total stress crack-up the other day. Weeks and weeks of stress at work, not to mention the underlying 24/7/365 stress of being the head of a household with a disabled parent. (She's got a sharp mind, but the body is in constant agony.) Let's just say that hours of sobbing ensued. I did feel better, which is good. It's like the, "Wall," that runners hit. If you can push through, you end up being in a decent state of mind. The limits of what I can control in the world became perfectly clear. For now.

 I'm hoping that the last quarter of the year starts to show a bit of a turnaround. A new year and a birthday coming up, a clean slate to paint and write and make into something completely amazing. I love fresh starts.
So, new novel, new playlist, new kitten, new year coming.
Things can always change, right?

Shaking the tree of the spirit: Acts of creation

Note: I recommend reading the previous post, and particularly clicking through the links and watching the video you'll find. (The second half, equally powerful is here.)
What do I want to say? Everything. I want to scrawl in abstracted, emotional hieroglyphs on the walls. I want to scream from the roof and show the world my battered and bloodied self and say, "I'm still here. I will not be as worthless as you want me to believe." I want to write furious reams of poetry and paint myself into the weave of the canvas. I want to be heard, I want to show you something that is not tidily packaged and pre-chewed pabulum. I want to tell the truth.

Sometimes, telling the truth is like pouring acid on an open wound.

Sometimes, forming the words feels like an alien act.

Those times are not now.
I always preface by saying, "I'm a poet. I'm not particularly prose-y. This is not my form." I've been rejecting the notion that I'm simply a storyteller. Foolishness.
BTW, if you don't feel incredibly moved and energized as an artist and human being after watching the videos... well, I don't know what to say.
So, last night: Epiphany. I've been dithering about with a sort-of trashy-kinky-angsty romance novel. Well...actually, dithering is exactly the right word. I published my first piece of fiction in January. The novel was meant to be an exercise, the fledgling testing the wings. Ultimately, I'm forced to admit that this is not an authentic effort. It was me, playing it safe. The precise reason I couldn't make myself write beyond the third chapter, is that it would be too safe. I couldn't get excited, I couldn't get my blood flowing to care about writing it.
That was then.
This is now.
That first piece of fiction, written with incredible constraints, sparked my imagination. In moving forward, I'm going back. There are stories in the world of that short story, that are whispering in my ear. I can see them. I can hear the whispers of voices demanding to be heard. I can see the gaunt and wasted bodies of the starving. I can hear the flood waters. I can taste the acrid dust of scorched cities.
There are lives waiting to be revealed on the page. Emma, Cassandra, Jamie and...the others. They haven't introduced themselves yet.
There is joy and agony and acceptance of grief. There is peace and contemplation, there is cataclysm.
There is a world to be explored.
The moment I knew it, I started to zing. A physical tingling of my skin. The kind of sensation I associate with absolute rightness in a situation.
I have no idea how NaNoWriMo is going to turn out. I know that I have to write this. It's necessary. It's not a choice. If I don't write it, I may as well lay down and die.
This is who I am. I'm a writer.


(Note: I began this blog last night, in the throes of my first truly organic experience as a writer of fiction. This afternoon, an interesting thought came up on twitter, from @Lifemapper," I am observing that so many artists associate their life's work with pain. It has to hurt to be authentic? What about true joy in creation? ") 


Much conversation among several of us, ensued. I'm not sure I approached it correctly. This dovetails with the beginning of the post, I promise. 




In my experience, blissfully happy people don't ask that many questions. 
Artists do. 
Questions don't lead to contentment. 
Questions lead to expression. 


The act and inspiration of creation is separate from the personality of the creator. Writing can be: release, exorcism, analysis, exuberant joy, bliss, and any other emotion. It can be hell, dredging up emotions and events from life and observation in order to communicate a character's experience authentically. 
It's just that...every artist I've ever known, has been damaged in some way.
Creating is how we put ourselves back together. 
It's how we let go, how we mend, how we reach out into the cosmos and ask to be seen, to be heard, to be known, to know.