You may be wondering what has happened to Rymor. Well it’s still going, sort of. I haven’t actually managed my 45mins most days but I have stuck to my commitments in terms of getting my SlingInk Eurofiction entries in, including one on Christmas Eve. There’s another one due in this Wednesday so I’ll probably update you with the stats and do a New Year’s Resolution style re-launch after that.
Just thought I’d let you know.
First week of Rymor. Like Lesamy my blog update has been delayed by the after-effects of handing the latest SlingInk story. Which I did almost exactly on time. i.e. very little time to spare.
It was an interesting week. I managed to do my 45 mins every day apart from Sunday, but then on Saturday I counted time reviewing others’ work. But I came out of the weekend swinging, mostly because I had to with task 6 deadline looming.
So what are the stats?
Well during week 1 proper (thu 4th-wed 10th Dec) I spent 470mins writing and wrote 4,935words. Almost 5 hours (293mins) of which was in the last two days. Overall (I started recording how much I was writing on 1st Dec) I’ve written for 605 mins and put down 7179 words. Of that roughly 3/4 has been on my Slingink story (458mins, 5760words)
Week 2 is looking less impressive so far. I’ve not written anything, aside these two blog posts, since Wed night.
as in Yet-Another-Made-Up-Word.
Rymor is my new project in the spirit of Lesamy. It’s paul-speak for “Write More”. I know I’ve tried in the past to come up with a consistent writing regime. I’ve had some success with it actually. Even with things being more sporadic the discipline of needing a story delivered every two weeks (for Slingink‘s Eurofiction competition) has kept me honest, more importantly it has kept me finishing things. (I’m beginning to think 90% of writing is holding your nerve long enough to finish the first draft.)
But even with all that I wanted to bring some of the rigour and consistency, some of the discipline and frankly, the results of Lesamy to my writing. Now I know there’s only so far I can take it. With Lesamy if you burn more calories than you eat you will lose weight. All you have to do is find a diet and exercise regimen that achieves that and stick to it. The process is simple the hard part is in keeping going. I’ve proved I can do that. With writing there’s something else. You not only have to keep going, be consistent, work hard, you also have to find and express good ideas, you have to be smart and, depending on subject matter, it helps to be funny. There’s no simple formula to learn to be smarter and funnier.
So I know that there’s only so far hard work will get you. But on the other hand, the work is an enabler. If you have any talent (and I’m beginning to believe maybe I have a modest amount) then it takes work to make the most of it. In a pep talk email for NaNoWriMo Philip Pullman said:
The question authors get asked more than any other is “Where do you get your ideas from?” … What I usually say is “I don’t know where they come from, but I know where they come to: they come to my desk, and if I’m not there, they go away again.”
So to the specifics. Rymor is simple. I will write for at least 45mins or 750words a day, every day. No varying it according to what day of the week it is. No days off. Every day is regular and consistent and habit-forming and that’s what I need.
Now when I say “no days off” I mean days when I’m at home. If I’m visiting friends or out all night straight from work then that’s ok. The main point is to not have a complicated weekly schedule.
Of course there will be days when I will work more than that – immediately before a deadline I imagine. That’s ok too – but Rymor defines the minimum.
The other part of Rymor, like Lesamy, is regular measurement. So every Wednesday from now on I’ll be posting a weekly word-count. I’ve worked out ways to count when I do a revision of an existing draft rather than writing from scratch. I’ve even done a basic spreadsheet. The idea is to see how much I’ve done and what I’ve done it on. I’ll probably have at least two or three things on the go at any one time. Lots of what I write, even now, is sort of brain-storming, mental clearing the throat stuff that never makes it directly into my stories but which seems to be necessary. Keeping track of all this I hope will be not only encouraging but will allow me to see where I’m spending my time and alternate so I don’t get bored or disillusioned with any one thing.
Anyway that’s the theory. I’ll let you know how I get on next Wednesday.
I’m a bit backed up with blog posts, which is odd considering I’m off work right now and (theoretically) have oodles of free time. I should be reviewing either Merlin ep 2 (more of the same as ep 1 really), the Chuck season 2 opener (spent too long re-establishing the premise) or The Man in the High Castle (what the hell was that about?). Also I watched The Island on TV the other night and felt like blogging (i.e. whinging) about how if they hadn’t tried to make a big dumb action movie they’d have made an only slightly dumb, if derivative, Sci Fi flick. Oh and there’s always Buffy Re-watch to get back to.
But instead of all that I’m going to talk about writing and my on-going love/hate relationship with it.
I’ve just signed up for two big writing commitments. The first is Slingink’s “Eurofiction” competition, which is a short story is due every two weeks for twenty weeks. Points are awarded and whoever has the highest total score at the end wins a prize (and much glory and bragging rights obviously). I actually entered a similar competition that’s just finishing – The Write Idea’s “Whitaker Prize” – however after I failed to enter in round 3 and 4 I just bailed on that.
Second commitment is NaNoWriMo. As you may have noticed I’ve changed my blog theme again, apologies for that I’ll try to stick with this one for a while. This is partly because I wanted one where I could add tabs across the top and have NaNoWriMo with links to my profile and progress etc.
So I am officially getting back on the writing horse and shouting “giddyup” in a nervous and slightly excited way.
Which brings me to my main topic. A new twist on the perennial “do I really hate writing and does that mean I’m destined not to be a writer?” question. As I sat at the keyboard last night, not typing, remembering how much I truly hate this part, the beginning part, the part where you think that every shred of imagination or trickle of inspiration has fled far far away – as I thought on this I was reminded of something I wrote in a forum at the beginning of this year:
What actually happened was that I started 10 minutes late, stared at the
challenge requirement for 10 minutes before coming up with the germ of
an idea. I then wrote for about an hour, producing 850 words of pure
drivel. That idea, that cute little, perfectly formed concept of my
imagination had become this crap on the page because I lack the skill to
put it into words, apparently.
I received some comforting words about turning a deaf ear to my inner critic, who to be fair is pretty fierce, but I think I’m developing a theory about the way I write. When I look at the most successful, and by that I mean the most well-received, pieces that I’ve written, they are either flashes or stories where I took the time to re-work them significantly after the initial draft. I recall I had to write a story-within-a-story piece for a challenge and I went through 3 versions of the inner story before I finally committed. I found it painful and difficult. Real work in fact.
Secondly almost always the first draft is complete crap. Not only that but my inner critic will scream at me that it’s not even worth finishing and I should just ditch it and start on something new. Sometimes I listen to this. I have a limited amount of time to give to writing and I’m not a fast writer. I wish I could sit down with an idea, toss off 1,000 words quickly and treat it as an experiment. I can do that but the 1,000 words may take a couple of days.
You see there are ways to overcome that initial block, that blankness of mind and page. I find simply writing what I’m thinking (complete with negative commentary) works for me. Each time I start anew I have the fresh fear that this time nothing really will come but it usually does. An idea, a bright shining little spark, lighting the way to the story as a whole. And for a brief moment I’m excited and engaged, if it’s a good idea, or at least charmed with the possibility enough to want to give it a try.
But I find that spark is usually a single flash. A moment’s illumination during which I need to memorize as much details as possible because once it’s gone I’ll be groping along in the dark relying solely on my recall of the features around me. And it’s at this point that the fear and doubt kick in. I wish I could simply get that first draft down on the computer whilst the light is still fading and the after images burned clearly on my retinas. If I could only do that then I would have something, a draft, something I can tweak, edit, re-write, even rip the guts out of and re-work structurally – but a place to start. But often I can’t get that far because the light of inspiration has long since died and I’ve allowed all the criticisms of the idea to come in. “It’s not that original/plausible/interesting/clever.”
So I think, for me, a major skill I need to learn is to holding on to the initial thought, that idea that got me started, for the duration of the task of writing, at least the first draft. Since my attention span seems to have a radioactive half-life that’s not particularly easy but it’s something I want to develop. Half the battle is turning off, drowning out, the inner critic but that is only half the battle. The other half is holding on to the idea. I think that’s why I’ve had more success with 250-word flashes where I can write the thing in an evening. I’ve also had some success with longer stories but where I was prepared to really work at maintaining the vision. I had to keep reminding myself what the story was about, even if I secretly doubted that that “what” was worth doing. I haven’t written a novel (yet) but I imagine that holding the thought for weeks and months will be one of the biggest challenges involved.
So anyway that’s what I’ve been thinking about. And it’s why I think NaNoWriMo will be very very good for me.
Which is blatantly untrue but it’s a riff on a song and it’s a title and I have a hard time coming up with titles. And it’s sorta, kinda true.
So this will be shorter than it could’ve been because I’ve already told you half of it and I’ve certainly already told you I shouldn’t be focussing on personal stuff.
I’ve discovered, slightly to my own surprise, that I like to write. My new year’s resolution of the new writing regime lasted until nearly the end of Feb. This may not sound great but given I’m usually chomping down on whatever tasty treat I’ve officially given up by lunchtime Jan 2 it was huge. Also, as I said, I am lazy. So I exceeded my own expectations and that’s always nice.
And I did so in both the amount of time I lasted, and in the fact that I actually finished stuff. Three, or was it four short stories, actually got to the point of ‘the end’. True they mostly sucked beyond belief, even after editting, but they were complete. Not outlines, not opening and closing paragraphs with a bit of dialogue, but actual ideas carried through to execution.
So when I realised, about a month ago, that I hadn’t really written for about a month, I didn’t panic. I didn’t castigate myself for having given up and tell myself that this proves I am not a real writer. No, I just thought, well obviously I should get back to it, and I probably will, and based on recent evidence, will probably have another, longer, more productive period. After all over the past five years, I’ve gone from barely acknowledging the dream, to fitful attempts, classes and groups to this latest five month stretch of pretty consistent writing (my NYR was committing to a specific timetable, but I’d re-started writing back in October).
Unfortunately this lack of panic allowed my natural laziness to take over and I slipped back into bad old ways. Until I realised this last weekend the following, that during the earlier part of this year I was
* writing regularly
* finishing stuff
* watching less TV, but looking forward to and possibly enjoying more what I was watching
* eating better and actually cooking
* not drinking too heavily
Some of that (cooking?) may seem unrelated, but discipline breeds discipline, so someone once told me, and it seems to be true.
Anyway since stopping, and particularly since feeling relaxed about stopping, I’d
* hardly written anything, not even this blog
* gone back to watching any old crap, sometimes spending an evening surfing channels, recordings and never settling on any one thing, leaving me feeling unsatisfied
* eating junk food
* drinking too much a bit too often
So overall, despite the fact that it was hard work, I was actually happier when I was writing regularly.
Why did I stop again?
…which is just my attempt at a title that captures a few topics, not a statement of intent.
Although it could be and it might not be such a bad idea. See, the thing I have feared has happened, as I think one of Job’s comforters said. That is, (re-)watching Buffy has become a bit of a chore because I feel like I can’t proceed until I’ve blogged about it. So we have…
1. Watching Buffy with M.
I went over to see M. the other week and took my Buffy S1 DVDs with me. We watched the first 4 episodes together. I was nervous about this for a couple of reasons.
First, four is a lot when I needed to remember what I wanted to say about them in my blog. However that’s not too much of a problem. I know the episodes well enough.
Second, I was nervous that M. wouldn’t like them. I was very aware of the problems with the episodes. Not that there are many but I’ve been in this situation before – the ‘fan’ wanting to share my love for something only to get a ‘mmm that’s nice’ polite response.
I needn’t have worried. I’d forgotten that long before she’d met me M. had been a regular Buffy watcher. Not a fan the way I was, but certainly a fan the way I began. Someone who basically liked the show and wanted to fill in the gaps in eps she hadn’t seen.
So what did I think?
Welcome to the Hellmouth/The Harvest – this is where it really all started, for me. It was still cool, and I enjoyed as ever such favourite moments as Jesse’s line “I’m not ok on an epic scale” and Buffy’s ‘dawn’ gag on Luke. But what I really noticed was how trad horror-movie-esque the Master is. I mean I knew that he was and was so deliberately, he’s the scary organ music to Buffy’s energetic rock tune, but I guess I’d forgotten how much that’s true in the first couple of episodes. Even as soon as the next two it settles down a bit with the Master making jokes and such. 8/10
Witch – this was the episode I saw the promo for and decided not to continue watching Buffy (only to pick it up again much later). To this day I’m not really sure why except that for some reason I didn’t like the idea that the show was about things other than vampires! Of course now I love this ep because it’s got juicy Xander-Buffy-Willow triangularity in it. Aww so sweet. 8/10
Teacher’s Pet – I watched this with one eye on M. to see her groan at the monster (I mean giant praying mantis?) but she didn’t, she enjoyed it as I did. I like the opening dream sequence with Xander playing the hero. I like the teacher who dies and how he believes in Buffy. I like the fact the way that even though we are dealing with a giant praying mantis the actors sell the fear as real. That’s the thing about Buffy, it may make jokes, even self-referential ones, but it always attempts to play the emotional situation as real. 7/10
2. Time and Writing
So, at the start of the year I came up with this timetable for myself re: writing. How ‘m I doing? Well so far since I started (barely 3 weeks). I’ve missed one evening (an hour) and one full weekend (five hours). I’m certainly not planning to try to do the catching up thing since that way lies madness and sweaty palms. I was thinking that I might incorporate my failure into my plan – to my already generous time-off quotient. What I could do is have one weekend a month where I plan not to do my usual writing. Two hours on saturday and three on sunday is not a lot really and let it seems to take up most of my weekend by the time you factor in some procrastination and faffing around.
Plus my usual habit of not setting my alarm and getting up when I feel like it shortens my day. My day still ‘ends’ pretty much at midnight because that’s when I tend to call M. for an end-of-day chat. So one thing I’m considering is setting my alarm for something suitably late but not midday for the weekends.
Actually it was pretty predictable that I’d not be writing this weekend as I re-built (from a software point of view) my Mythtv box. Leading to
3. MythTV Multirec
There was probably no real need to wipe my system and re-install except well, I kind of enjoyed it. I also fondly imagine it gives me a ‘cleaner’ system somehow. Anyway I’ve installed a new version of Mythtv that supports multiple recordings from the same multiplex.
What’s that mean? Well the Freeview signal is split into different frequencies that carry a multiplex – a collection of channels. When you ‘tune in’ to a channel you actually tune in the multiplex and just record/display the channel you’re interested in. What the clever MythTV developers have done is make it possible to record one, some or all of the channels in a multiplex using a single tuner. In other words using my dual-tuner tv-card I can now record several channels at once (providing they’re on no more than two multiplexes). Earlier tonight I successfully recorded 6 programs at once.
Actually I rarely need this, at least in that way. I’ve been running a MythTV box with 2 tuners for over 9 months now and I very rarely need more than 2 tuners. The reason I like it, and the reason – other than the enjoyment of doing it – to install multirec is that I can record back to back programs on the same channel and have an overlap (finish recording prog1 5 mins late and start prog2 5 mins early) and only use one tuner. Sounds trivial but it’s not. I record Mastermind and University Challenge which are back to back on BBC2. Since occasionally there’s something on another channel I want to record, I set it so Mastermind finishes at 8:30 and U.C. starts at 8:30. But if the timing’s not exact then I end up with the end of Mastermind chopped off early and a little bit of it at the start of the U.C. recording. Which is annoying. It would be even more so if I intended to archive them to DVD.
Anyway I installed it, re-installed the complete machine in fact, with a new version of Linux and everything. A weekend suitably ‘wasted’.
That’s probably way more than you wanted to read, so until next Monday…
Well it’s been 5 days since I started my new regime, end of the first week as it were. I kept to my hour of writing on Wednesday and Thursday, did my two hours yesterday and today I managed… two also, not the three required. I’ve only done half an hour of reading and that was today.
I started this because I wanted to “get serious about my writing.” I’m forty, single and don’t have many interests or close friends – and whilst all that is fine in one way, I guess I felt like I want to do something of some significance other than sit on my couch and watch TV. Anyway when I started to “get serious”, which really started back in October when I re-joined AFO, I had the impression that the major hurdle I had to overcome was lack of discipline. I was moaning the other day, on AFO, about how I never know whether to give up on something that seems not very good, or continue working on it. One of the replies I got was “You’re not lazy you just have a harsh internal critic.” The later may be true (actually I think it is, I think that’s what this post will be about) but the former’s not. I am lazy. I know this about myself.
And if I was lazy back in the good old days of trying to have a daily “quiet time” how much more so when I have, in fact, sat on a couch and watch TV for seven years? No, there’s definitely a problem there and so I expected it to be tough. I wanted to make the effort though and so I was prepared, when the urge came on me to do something more relaxing, to stick it out and keep writing.
I wasn’t prepared for the other thing. How to describe it? This crippling sense of the pointlessness of what I’m doing, the absolute certainty that what I’m producing is rubbish, the feeling of being stuck not able to go forward and not willing to just give up. I know it won’t come across as strongly as I feel it, but it’s almost a sense of panic, or fear. I’m at the end of my first week and I’ve felt it twice so far.
Strangely enough, one of my self-assigned tasks for today was to work through the first chapter of Creative Writing and that had a section on just this with sections called ‘Postpone Perfection’ and ‘Avoid Writer’s Block’. The impression I was left with is that it is normal to feel very down on your own work but that the important thing is to stick with it and improve it when you edit/re-write. That I sort of knew (maybe not how strong the dislike could be). However the section on writer’s block talked about how it could happen even when you’re doing a lot of writing and it could happen to a previously successful writer. The scenario described was of a writer who put himself under pressure because of his wife’s expectations. The end of the section, and the chapter, talked about how the most creative people are those who do it for the intrinsic rewards not the extrinsic ones. In other words writing because you love writing not because it will get you money, fame, applause etc.
That’s a tough one for me. I know I can beat the laziness, it’s just a matter of training myself to do it, sticking to the schedule until it becomes habit. But do I like writing? There’s definitely a large part of me that’s hungry for the approval of others and sees writing as a way to get it. For years I’ve talked myself out of “getting serious” precisely because I believed that if I really loved writing for the sake of writing I’d’ve done a lot more of it by now.
So do I like writing? And do I like it enough?
Well there have definitely been moments where I’ve come up with a phrase, or an idea that I like. And in fact all the things I’ve written that I “hated” I actually really like the idea – but I want the prose on paper to generate the same images I have in my head and it just doesn’t. But that’s fixable. I can improve something that already exists if I have something to work on. Stone soup sort of.
I think part of the problem is I’ve psyched myself out. Precisely because I’ve made it this big deal, this thing I’m doing in 2008, it’s become, well, a big deal. I need to enjoy it more. But I’m not going to quit, not yet. Tonight I confess, half an hour into my second one-and-a-half hour session I gave up. I compromised and read for half an hour instead.
I comfort myself with this: back in my evangelical days, on the way back from a conference I was moaning to a car-full of friends that I didn’t seem to feel the same passion that others felt about God, Christianity etc, and that it frustrated me because I knew I should. When I finally let someone else get a word in, my good friend Kate said, “Have you ever thought that maybe you are passionate, you just don’t show it the way others do? Surely the very fact that you’re frustrated shows you’re passion?”
Maybe my passion for writing is like that.