My Wife is a Russian Spy

           I feel a bit dim-witted, an understatement.  I have been with my wife, Melissa, a/k/a sqlchick, for well over two decades.  You’d think anybody with a lick of wit would have figured her out long ago.  The question has always been, “What the fuck is she doing with him?”  I always say, “It’s my charm,” but those of you who know me.  Enough said.  Sexual prowess?  I’d like to think so.  Ha, you say to that.  Money?  No.  Body?  She’s not blind, is she?  Love answering my own question with a question.

            Sometimes it takes the insight of an outsider to solve a great mystery.  My friend Cornholio came for a visit and opened my eyes.  Sure, we might have been a bit toasted, and sure, there were some unrepeatable in print utterances from Corny, but he, Cornholio, of all people, figured it out.  You know, between “um buddas” he came up with the answer.  The only logical answer.

            Melissa a/k/a sqlchick a/k/a Natasha or Olga, or something like that, is a Russian spy.  What a perfect cover her handlers chose for her, hanging out with some washed-up-never-has-been in the Carolina woods.  Sure, she has that “consulting” job, but would it be hard to fool this dolt of a husband with a few clever ruses?  Hell no. Those speaking engagements?  Sure, just enough time for a clandestine meet with the dark mustachioed man.  And how about all those international types she hangs out with?  Sure, it’s a user group meeting.

            If that isn’t enough evidence, just look at the pale hue of her skin, so pale it must have never seen southern sun before we met.  She said she was from Omaha.  I think not.  Straight from the Siberian tundra, she must be, which explains why she hates to be cold, growing up on the tundra as she did, scrapping for a few kernels of corn, no, I got mixed up with that Omaha story again.  A nibble of caviar scrounged from the ice?  Shit, I have no idea what she ate in Siberia.  She has me so confused.  Probably all part of the plan, my confusion.

          It has all become so clear, in the midst of my confusion, but what to do next?  What are her plans for me once my relatively useless services are no longer needed?  So complicated.  Pray for me.

Pull Up Your Damned Pants

Maybe this entry will do nothing more than confirm that hard to come to grips with fact that I am a crotchety old bastard.  So why fight it, I am crotchety, clearly I am old as is evidenced by my crotchety old ass sitting in front of the screen at 3:40am this morning, and only old folks see the 3:00 hour on the front end of their day.  I use bastard in the description of myself only as an indictment on me, and not as an insult to my sweet mother, who was faithfully married to my father when I was conceived, or at least that’s what they tell me.  Hearsay only for me.  I wasn’t here yet.

Enough about me being old.  Riding along on Sharon Road West yesterday afternoon I passed by a young man with his pants down around his upper thighs.  His colorful boxer shorts on display for the world to see.  This ridiculous fashion trend seems to be growing here in Charlotte and has to stop. 

You may think this entry has some racial connotation, since this underwear showing thing seems to most frequently occur on young black fellas, but this has nothing to do with race.  I have seen the silly display of boxers on every hue of young man.  Now mind you, my dad used to show the whole waist band of his boxers and beyond while working in the yard when I was a kid, much to my sister’s and my delight, but he wasn’t doing it on purpose, or at least I don’t think so.  I never asked.

Enough is enough.  I don’t even know how they keep their damned pants up while walking on the bottoms and hanging completely below the ass, so no assistance in holding them up by the ass.  They must be pinning the pants to their thighs.

If this underwear on the outside thing was going to become a fashion statement why didn’t the girls adopt it instead of the boys?  Then we might have a fashion statement worth savoring.  Like I said above, this is not a race issue, but certainly a gender issue.  Come on ladies, show us your undies.  We want more than your tramp stamps.

Christ, if I keep writing shit like that I will be called a horny old bastard instead of a crotchety old bastard, or both.

Feng Shui or Procrastination?

            It was bugging hell out of me, the fridge needed a good cleaning and organization, a task I take zero pleasure in beyond the final result.  At the same time the fridge became priority one I pondered two unfinished scenes, scenes that have been driving me nuts.  So what I should be doing is plugging away on those two scenes while my wife drives back to Charlotte, but instead I’m emptying the fridge, one section at a time.  Empty, clean, reload, empty, clean, reload.  You know, absolutely mindless work.  That’s what I spent two hours doing, and now I have one scrubbed fridge, but the scenes that should be finished by now are not.  I did work today on some issues with the novel resulting from veering in unexpected directions.  Consistency issues have reared their ugly ass heads as the novel becomes more complex in my head, if not yet complex enough on the page.

            Deep breath. I may not have been able to finish those scenes until I cleaned the filthy fridge.  Maybe Feng Shui is real for me and this sparkling organized fridge is what I needed.  Tomorrow I will be brilliant beyond measure.  I will get my juice (not prune) in the morning and marvel at the complete lack of milk, sauce, cheese, greens or any other rings or stains.  My brain will be on fire. 

Stupid.  I was fucking procrastinating.  Shit.

No more sex? What?

            On Valentine’s Day morning, at that special time, I took the Feb/Mar 2013 AARP Magazine for a read on the throne.  I know, my life has gone in the shitter.  Don't stop reading, please, sorry for that image.

            Included in the mag-for-the-aged, an article discussing what’s normal romantically (sexually) for 50+ year old people.  I won’t regurgitate the whole story to you, and anybody who reads this blog, if anybody other than my sweet wife does, is probably receiving that fine mag-for-the-aged in your own mail.  I know FB friends, I push these entries at you, and we are mostly past that half-century mark.

            If you already know me, then you are aware an article about old folks sex takes my brain off into my own little immature humor universe.  Not something I am proud of, but what can one do to de-sophomoritize (made that word up) one’s sense of humor after all these years.

            Here we go: 

1.      Interesting correlation? 48.9% of people in 21+ year relationship say they had to give up part of themselves to keep the relationship together; 49.6% get the sense that their partner has sex out of a sense of obligation; 59% of men and 56% of women say partner is not fulfilling all their needs.  33% of 50+ respondents rarely or never have sex anymore. 

More sex needed.  The AARP interviewer didn’t ask the question, but if they had, the honest men would admit they don’t care if their partner is doing it out of obligation, as long as they are doing it, because if they are doing it he is not giving up part of himself for the relationship, and all of his needs are fulfilled if he has more sex, or at least some sex. 

I understand some 50+ have physical issues preventing them from having sex, but not 33%.  Come on people, you aren’t dead yet.

2.      90% of men tell partner “I love you” regularly and only 58% of women. 

I am certain this is because we, men, more frequently do something or think something shitty that we have some kind of subconscious guilt about, so saying “I love you” is a form of saying “I am sorry.”

3.      Over half of couples together over ten years no longer hold hands. 

What in the hell is wrong with you old shits?  Unless the hand has turned into an ancient painful claw, hold it once in a while.  Intimacy can start there fellas.  Don’t underestimate the power of such a simple act.  Maybe you dumb-asses would get laid once in a while if you held her hand.  Holding her hand could change all of the percentages in the survey.  I know I am talking to men here, but for the women, you can get laid whether you hold our hand or not, so choose as you wish.

4.      Only 55% of men praise their partner’s appearance regularly.

You dumb old bastards, that’s why you’re not getting any sex. 

47% of women praise their partner’s appearance. 

That seems high to me. Why bother? They don’t have to offer any praise and we will still give them sex whenever they want it.  Stop wasting your breath ladies.

5.      Back to the sex frequency thing.  31% of 50+ couples have sex several times per week, 28% have sex a couple times a month and 8% have sex once a month.  I already mentioned those sorry bastards (33%) who are never getting it anymore. 

If the percentages are accurate, which is always questionable in a survey, but let’s assume those numbers are at least close, then why do 72% of the respondents say they would choose their current relationship again? 

They are lying, unless lots of 50+ folks are happy with no sex, no hand holding, no praise, no fulfillment, and having sex with somebody who doesn’t really want to, but is just throwing you a bone (pun intended). 

I suppose the truth of it is we just get lazy about romance.  Let’s turn that around out there.  Romance (sex) is not the only thing, but it is the most fun thing.  Don’t waste your life without it.

Penis Abuse

            This morning I was scanning the news and spotted a headline about some fella in Turkey who fancies himself a vampire, and is quite the blood drinker.  I couldn’t resist clicking on that one.  Come to find out he is a psycho, no surprise there, but one of his overwhelming life events, one that helped propel him to psychosis, was seeing a friend kill a man, then cut off the man’s head, and then cut off the man’s other head.  Well, enough of that article for me.  I get the willies about the cutting of a Willy.

            Same morning, different headline, about a woman burned to death in New Guinea for being a witch.  Absolutely horrendous torture and burning.  Horrible.  Anyway, I read the rest of the story.  Somewhere around Papua, New Guinea, a cannibal cult killed 7 witch doctors.  They then ate the victim’s brains and made soup from their penises because they believed they would receive supernatural powers from consuming such a meal.  I agree the penis has supernatural powers, but not as a soup ingredient.

            Now, I’m not thinking it’s going to catch on, this penis consumption, but I want to know who the dumbass was who first came up with:  “Hey, let’s make a nice penis minestrone out of that,” or “Let’s do grilled penis and lentil soup this time.”  Come on guys.  You may have spent your entire life in the jungle with no education, but that is no good reason to eat penis soup.

            I joke, but I’m as disgusted by the cruelty as any of you would be if you read those articles.  What in the hell is wrong with people?  What has always been wrong with us, going back to the early H. erectus age (pun intended), that we cannot stop brutalizing and killing each other?

From one of my favorite authors, who unimaginably is not appearing in my favorite books, an oversight I will soon correct, from his thought provoking and amusing novel, God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater.

“Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies-God damn it, you've got to be kind.”
― Kurt Vonnegut

                I am pretty sure, if we could still ask him, Kurt would agree, kindness to penises is included.

Death

            I have spent a great deal of my life doubting the existence of anything after death other than a long dirt nap, and I still wander around in doubt after watching my dad die.  I told him many times, as he was lying there reaching for another breath, that he was going to heaven, that he would be with Jesus, with God, peaceful and happy.  I don’t think he could understand me anymore, but I hope my hypocrisy can be forgiven.  I was hoping for him, and still do.

            My sadness for the passing of my dad has faded, mostly because his quality of life had dropped to a level nobody would allow their dogs to live with, and even if there is no afterlife, he is now at peace.  Little consolation for those who loved and miss him, but if we make ourselves think of him, and what he had become physically, instead of what we have lost, we should be thankful for his passing.

            That is easy for me to say with my wonderful life, my loving wife, great home, fun pup, adventures waiting around every turn.  The same cannot be said for my mom.  She has, for the past 64 plus years, woke up knowing her husband was there in the house with her.  She struggles to remember things as her grief continues to sap her energy, ability to sleep, desire to eat, and inclination to do anything other than lament what she has lost.  She and my dad had a marriage that does not seem to happen anymore, one in which both respect and love each other every day, without reservation.

            Inevitably death will take us all, but still we struggle with depression, anxiety, sleeplessness, and other ailments all while trying to recover from the loss of those we love.  Some people never recover.  I have no solutions to any of this except the age old cliche, “life goes on.”  But only for a little while.  And I guess that is the point.  We don’t have very long to hang out here, so may as well try to enjoy it.

Lazy People

            We all have our opinions about what constitutes a lazy human, and somehow, as is the human tendency, practice self-deluded denial of such derogatory monikers application to ourselves.  This is similar to the oh-so-obviously hillbilly dip shit looking around the room and declaring what a hillbilly crowd he finds himself in, while exasperatingly excluding himself from the designation.

            Admittedly, I am not the most energetic person, nor the most sloth-like (don’t really know how lazy a sloth actually is, and firmly believe many people are lazier than the proverbial lazy sloth). 

            Okay, so I read a bit about the sloth.  Apparently they eat hard-to-digest leaves as their main diet, so have these huge stomachs with multiple compartments and take up to a month to digest a meal.  The leaves they eat provide very little energy, so their metabolic rate runs slow.

            So here you have it.  Take those leaves the sloth spends its day gobbling up in the high jungle branches of Central and South America, and replace them with cheeseburgers, pizzas and beers snarfed down in bars by fat Americans, and you have the same creature.  Big bellied with a slow metabolism that loves to lie around.  Shit, half my friends are sloths, and they would argue that I am the slothiest of them all, sitting around making shit up while my wife works her ass off in a real job.

            In all seriousness, well, not really, since seriousness is not the topic of this entry, we all have to fight laziness to some extent.  I like to be moving so it is more likely for me to be lazy about my writing than about getting exercise.

            Here is the worst of it, and I have done it, hate myself for it (at least as much as somebody who loves himself this much can hate himself), and I am driven nuts to distraction when I hear others doing it.  Don’t say things like, “it’s in my plans” or “it’s on the list” or “going to get to that” when you don’t honestly have a plan to do a fucking thing, but rather, you have a plan or list so you can say you have a plan or list, in some way believing the plan or list is an accomplishment. 

            I am trying not to lie to myself anymore, but instead, get some shit done every day, and keep moving.  Don’t sit on my ass on FB, reading about sports, or watching Sports Center when there are things to get done, including writing, reading, dog walking, cooking, cleaning, food shopping, and my personal favorite, laundry.

            This is clearly a suck up right here, especially since only one person ever reads this website, but my wife is way more apt to over deliver than under deliver, if the determining criteria is what she has promised.  She is a flippin’ work horse, as Tim liked to say, and for the entire time I have known her has worked harder than me and produced better work than me.  Guess I better keep her around as an example, oh, and so I can keep on eating like a sloth.

            Keep doing something for fucks sake, or you too may be a sloth.

Write Without Reservation

                I still don’t quite get this piece of advice, but I am sure the advice is wise, only a bit difficult to figure out what it means, rather than just, eventually, with enough practice, having it start to come naturally.  Write without reservation.  Well, it doesn’t mean “don’t write unless you have made dinner reservations.” 

                It seems I can spill out a bunch or words in a hurry, splattering them all over the place, as one of those throw a can of paint on the canvas painters might do and claim to have created art.  When I use that approach almost none of the splatters ends up saved from the cutting block, but a few gems, or at least costume jewelry emerges from the rubble. 

                Alternatively, I can sit and stew over every sentence, word choice (picking out that perfect verb), paragraph break, etc., burning up endless hours on a few pages, only to find it all a bit stiff and uninspiring.

                The balance is what I now seek.  I don’t like those 20 minute hand writing at the speed of sound sessions, cramping my damned hand into a claw, only to love a few words in the midst of it all.  I don’t have the patience to write like some of the great masters did, laboring over every word in their so difficult to write revised drafts world.

                I am finding a balance now, and have learned to let it go one day, knowing that the next day I will revise what I write that day.  I seem to be keeping more words and getting more words per week with this approach.

                I know, I know.  Just flippin’ write already!

North Carolina Writers' Network Fall Conference 2011

          We returned to Charlotte Sunday from the NCWN Fall Conf. in Asheville.  This was my first NCWN conference, but won’t be my last.  Melissa (wife) and Tessa (pup) made the trip with me so we could check out Asheville.  What a pretty little city, sitting there on the edge of the mountains.

                I attended four workshops:

1. Mystery 101 with Vicki Lane http://vickilanemysteries.com/.  I have not written a mystery, and don’t think I will write a true mystery, but a mystery as a subplot in many other genres.  Vicki got started writing late, but is now published multiple times and did a great job with her presentation and provided a useful handout.  I am going to have to read one of her books when I am in the mood to try something a little different than my usual read.
2. Getting Unstuck with Ellyn Backe http://ellynbache.com/.  This workshop provided the attendees with an opportunity to participate in writing exercises to help us with what do I write next blues.  Writing exercises were done that I will use from time to time if I get all blocked up, which is not usually my problem, although my writing has many problems.
3. Commercial Fiction and the Rule of Three with Randy Russell http://www.ghostfolk.com/.  Randy is fun, entertaining, informative and inspirational.  Thanks Randy, I think you will help me make the next step in my efforts to learn how to do this fiction writing thing, and maybe even sell something one of these days..  I was so impressed I bought an autographed copy of Randy’s most recent published YA book, Dead Rules.  I have only previewed the first few pages, but will write a review when I finish the book.
4. Listening to Your Characters with Abigail DeWitt http://www.abigaildewitt.com/.  Abigail is a disciple of Dorothea Brande’s timeless book on writing, Becoming a Writer, and free writing, the technique of letting yourself go on a prompt, for fifteen minutes, without a pause, writing as fast as you can, to find the gems hidden in our subconscious mind.  I have tried free writing in the past and forgot the value.  I don’t want to use free writing as my primary method of writing as suggested in this workshop, but I love it for brainstorming ideas and fleshing out characters, locations, etc.  Abigail has inspired a re-read of Becoming a Writer.

Thank you to the organizers, speakers, and attendees for making the event enjoyable.

I cannot leave this entry behind without mentioning Asheville, NC.  People know of Ashville for the Biltmore Estate, but it offers much more, other than being a refuge for old hippy stoners.  Walking downtown is fun, lined with quirky shops, artsy shops, restaurants, chocolate and ice cream, along with street music, (we saw a guitar player singing Johnny Cash and saying it was Led Zep, or something equally silly, and a street accordion player, something we don’t see every day). 

Overall, great weekend for all of us!

WriteItNow 4

            I purchased WriteItNow 4 to help organize the new novel I’m working on.  Before WriteItNow, which was under $50.00, I used MS Word for my word processing and organization, or I should say for what little organization there was in my earlier efforts.

            So far so good for WriteItNow.  I used to have multiple docs open so I could keep track of things during the writing process, and now I just have one.  All of the characters can be developed as fully as I need, and the peripheral characters are there as well, just in case they become something more.  With nothing more than a click I can jump over to a character to check on a detail to make sure I stay consistent.  Past events and locations can just as easily be checked.

            There are sections, all in the same open doc., for chapters (broken into scenes), events, locations, notes and ideas.  The thesaurus is excellent.  There is a word counter for entire text, chapters, or individual scenes that also determines and displays reading level.

            The software includes graphs of character relationships and scenes, a section to keep track of references and finally a submissions section so you can keep track of where you have sent the piece.

            The software is intuitive to use, even for an at best average tech user like me.  There is more extensive creative writing software out there, but I don’t think you would get more for the buck for such a great organizational tool as this one.

            Keep writing, unlike my lame writing efforts so far in 2011.  Let’s close the year with a few decent sentences.

How to Use Your Time

               Alright, here it is, as much as I love my life, my wife, my family and friends, my dog, you know, I’m happy, and I’m getting the chance to write, a lifelong dream.  Still, I fight frustration over how to best use my time to get my writing career going which, unfortunately, requires much more than learning how to write fiction, a daunting task all by itself. 

                Should I be writing all the time? No, if I don’t create a platform (here I am trying to do that), research the markets, submit pieces to magazines and contests, work on query letters, start the outline for book two of a series of middle grade books; nobody has fallen over regarding the quality of book one.  Well, if I don’t do all those things I won’t have a writing career just the same as if I wasn’t writing a word of fiction.

                I started a new YA novel, futuristic, and am having a great time creating the world for the book, something I haven’t done before.  I have extensive character sketches prepared for the main characters, and abbreviated sketches of the other characters so I can add to the sketches as I go and update, revise, and more importantly, make notes regarding what has already been revealed in the book about a character so I can decide if I want to emphasize a trait, attitude, event, or whatever, from the characters background.

                I have started writing the first draft, but slow going so far because of running into things about the world of the future I haven’t decided yet.  It has been a blast and I would spend all my time on the new book if not for the desire to someday have somebody other than my family and friends read and enjoy something I write.  The key is still practicing writing, and reading a little bit of everything. 

                Okay, frustration vented.  Time to get back to writing, or maybe I should start a load of wash.



Writing Software

               I haven’t yet made an investment in writing software to help me move the creative process along without as much effort trying to find the perfect word to make a sentence musical, the perfect phrases to jar my melon into something creative when I’m stuck, and most of all, give me a better chance to occasionally create a great sentence, or even more unlikely, but still a goal, a great paragraph.

                I subscribe to The Writer Magazine.  I recently received an offer of MasterWriter 2.0 (MR2.0)  for $149.00.  MR2.0 demo puts a great compilation of words and phrases on display in an easy to use format.  Now I’m intrigued.  I know there have to be many such software programs out there, some better than others, but all seem like they would save me some time during revision and editing, as I try to find not just a word that will fit, but the word that fits best.

                It’s a bunch of rubbish that a writer shouldn’t use synonym finders and other sources for picking the right word.  We have all read reviews that accuse a writer of using a thesaurus while he writes, as if he has committed a crime.  Why in the world would any writer not use a thesaurus, along with any other tool at our disposal, to improve our word choices?  We don’t use reference material to find a word we don’t know, but to find a word we cannot think of.  If I don’t know a word I find in reference material I usually choose not to use the word just to make sure I don’t get confusing.  The goal of writing anything should be to be understood.

                I am going to investigate creative writing software further.  I use online synonym finders already, and I just compose in Word, but MR2.0’s demo has me sold that I have to do something soon about my writing tools.

                Thanks for reading, and keep writing.

Character Checklists

              When I wrote my first novel all the way through to the end of a first draft I didn’t do any written character checklist/sketches before starting to write, and that was a mistake.  Not only does writing things out about main characters give you a chance to think about their attitudes about different things, socioeconomic upbringing, relationships with family/friends, etc., but the checklist later gives you a place to note things that happen during the novel to that character, or habits, etc., that come up while you write, making consistency much easier during the writing process, and leaving less chance for inconsistencies in your manuscript.  An inconsistency planted may not get pulled.

                I just started reading the Malcolm Gladwell book, blink, and have found some additions for my character checklists.  The book has nothing to do with character development for novelists, but is a terrific read.  Its subtitle is “The Power of thinking Without Thinking,” which is something I have been trying to do my entire life.  Thinking can be so exhausting. 

                Anyway, if you use a character checklist you may have some form of these 5 personality dimensions on your list already, but if not, I think these are going to be helpful to me.  The 5 personality dimensions discussed in blink on page 34 are:

1. Extraversion level;
2. Agreeableness;
3. Conscientiousness;
4. Emotional Stability;
5. Openness to new experiences.

                We all create characters from our experiences with people, both real and fictional, because all of our experiences jumble up in our heads.  A checklist makes you able to think about and make notes about what you want your protagonist, antagonist, and other main characters to be like going into the start of the novel, even though you know some of it will change as you write.  My habit is to add anything important to my character checklists each day when I stop writing for the day, and then go back every couple weeks, or when there is a lull in your creative ability, and read through all the checklists.

                I hope something here helps you.  Keep writing.

Procrastination

               I haven’t been blogging and haven’t been writing very much, or very well, lately.  There have been puppy duties eating up a chunk of my weekly hours, and I traveled to see my dad when he was ill, but in truth there is no legitimate reason for my recent lack of production other than good old fashioned procrastination.   Sure, I do most of the household chores, a more than fair arrangement in light of the fact that my wife, Melissa, a/k/a www.sqlchick.com, works long weeks to support our home as I stay home and try to become a writer.  Still, there are plenty of hours in the week for me to write, even if in smaller time increments.

                Identify the tasks you use for keyboard avoidance.  I can convince myself some laundry needs my attention when I have a difficult scene to write.  I even find myself emptying the dishwasher, as if it makes a damned bit of difference when during the day that gets done, when I’m still in the part of the day when I have some creative juice left in the tank (for me, from early morning until mid afternoon).

                I believe all writers must inherently be procrastinators to some degree because we love and hate writing, and when the hatred kicks in, such as when you have just written a page and are convinced it’s the worst drivel anybody has ever written, almost any mundane activity seems better than letting your brain go through any more torture.  Those are the moments, if we can work right through them, without gathering up the laundry, we will become more productive.  My wife said something to me recently, enlightening me to what I sometimes do, when she said: “You like doing laundry.”  No, but I do like it better than I like staring at an illuminated screen, wondering why I ever thought I could write anything anybody else would want to read.  Habitual self doubt is just one of the neurotic conditions we have to push through if we want to write.

               Don’t fool yourself into thinking you need to scrub the floor, clean toilets, fold laundry, switch out the dishes, drink beer with your buddies (one of my personal favorites), or whatever your device might be when it’s writing time, and the words are not finding their way onto the screen in the proper order.  I am evaluating all of my tasks, other than writing, to make them more efficient and scheduled, so they don’t interfere with my creative time (different for each of us).  The puppy will interfere with my best plans, that's what puppies do, but patience with her interruptions makes the transition back to writing easier.  We don’t get anything written if we don’t write, and write, and write.

                Well, it’s time for me to go do laundry.  Shit, forgot my own advice.

                Keep writing.

Beginnings

           I’m about to send my middle grade novel out to several of my friends who have children in the middle grade fiction age range.  This is a scary test because none of the kids know me at all, so they have no reason to lie and tell me the novel’s great.  I hope for harsh critique to help improve the piece, but at the same time, don’t we all want some praise?  It's strange, but I feel nervous about letting them down.

            I'm trying to improve the beginning before sending the novel out to four kids I hope to get, and keep, interested as they read the novel.  I have been unsatisfied with the beginning for months.  My wife, Melissa, just gave the piece another read, and said the novel got going for her after the first 12 pages.  That’s no damned good.  There isn’t an agent in the land who will get to page 3 if not gripped by page one and two.

            In the draft I just finished I’ve finally eliminated what was a 3 page prologue, but not labeled as such.  For some reason it took me the past 3-4 drafts, each time trimming a little of the prologue, which was not doing enough to hook young readers.  I have agonized over the beginning, and finally gave up trying to save any of the prologue.  Some of the information will have to added someplace other than the beginning, as back story, but that’s better than bogging down the beginning.

            I've added one suspense event to the first 10 pages, but most improvement has been seen in deletions, thereby getting closer to page 12 where my wife says the novel begins for her.  I’m not sure how you learn to revise your own work well, other than, the more you practice the easier it is to spot passages that don’t belong.

            Many writing instructors have said we cannot allow ourselves to fall in love with our writing to the point of blinding us from our weaknesses.  The grueling exercise of revising and editing a piece enough to submit for publication is the only way I know to improve your ability to effectively see your own work.  It should only take a few more years of practice and I’ll be a star.  A joke.  I just hope to get better each day.

            Keep writing, or revising, or editing, or whatever part of the process you're in.  It’s the only way we get better.

Do I Need a Website/Blog

            As you know, since you are reading this, I decided I need a website.  At first, the thought of having my own website, when I’m still an unpublished author, seemed incredibly egotistical.  Who would want to read my drivel?  Maybe nobody, but it’s a certainty nobody will be reading what I’m writing before I’m published if I don’t have a web presence.  If you want an agent, and ultimately a publisher, to take you seriously as you try to become known as a writer, you better show them you’re serious about your career.

            What to write in your blog?  I decided I would write about my writing life and share what I learn along the way.  Am I an expert?  Not yet.  With each passing day, as I work at the craft, do I become more an expert?  Probably.  Are the books and articles I read and will recommend to you along the way written by experts?  Certainly.

            I also decided to blog about our experiences with our puppy, Tessa,in the Woof section of this website.  I’m not a dog whisperer, but I love dogs and have always felt a kindred relationship with dogs.  I also love to hike, so decided to include hiking experiences in Woof since finding new places to take Tessa for the vast amounts of exercise she needs is becoming a daily occupation.

            My wife, Melissa, built this site, but I think I would have been able to do so, even with my techineptitude (new word I just coined).  The task would have taken me ten times longer than my techie wife, but squarespace.com has tutorials to help those of us who aren't savvy is the digital world.

            I'm concurrently studying two books that will be helpful as you decide what you want to do to push your writing career forward.  Both are filled with useful and insightful information. 

Get Known before the Book Deal  Subtitle: Use Your Personal Strengths to Grow an Author Platform, by Christina Katz. 

The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published  Subtitle: How to Write It, Sell It, and Market It…Successfully, by Arielle Eckstut and David Henry Sterry.

            Along with blog writing hopefully enhancing and advancing your career as a writer, it’s also fun.  You get to write, which if you're a writer you can't get enough of anyway, and writing down what you are passionate about gives you a chance to think about what drives you.

            Keep writing!

What to Write Next

           I turned the manuscript over to my wife after 14 drafts of the middle grade novel I’ve been working on entitled A Way With Dogs, a woefully inadequate title, but nothing better has come to mind yet.  Melissa’s exceptionally busy with her career, but is making time for a light edit before I send a copy to several friends, some with middle grade kids.  I’ve sliced out 7,000 words, and have the novel down to about 48,000 words, what I believe to be a good length for the age group.  I love the story or wouldn’t have worked on it for so long, but the first 10 to 15 pages do not have enough “can’t stop reading,” even after all those drafts.  I hope one of my generous readers will have a suggestion to enhance the beginning. 

            I have a couple months to work on other things.  I have 2 short stories to edit, but have not written a first draft of even a short story in a couple months as I have tried to get the novel ready for reader distribution.  Our new puppy is also eating up many hours of my time per week, but those are fun and inspirational hours since I frequently feature dogs in my writing.

            I would like to write another middle grade or young adult, novel or novella, to get the first draft juices flowing again.  Writing a first draft is like a first date.  You never know how it’s going to turn out, but there is a level of excitement and trepidation throughout, never quite sure if satisfaction or disappointment will prevail.

            My son has suggested a serial ghost story so to stimulate my imagination I’m reading North Carolina ghost stories and legends.  I don’t quite have the story I want to tell yet, but every story I read is adding to the subconscious creation that somehow happens in storytelling.  I’m starting to think about ghosts as I fall into sleep, when I wake in the morning, and as I daydream between daily tasks.  I know the story is coming.  Until then I’ll keep reading.

            Keep Writing.

Writing the First Draft

            How writers go about writing first drafts varies so greatly that all you can do is experiment until you find what works for you.  We have all read about those who prepare extensive outlines, those who do not outline at all, and those who prepare a sketchy outline to guide them through the first draft. 

            During my two years writing fiction I have written two complete first drafts of short novels, and worked my way 30,000 words into another novel before I abandoned the project because it was on the road to nowhere.  I don’t like to outline, but do prepare fairly extensive character descriptions regarding the main characters before I begin writing the first draft.  Until I know the characters it’s hard to figure what they might do in the circumstances I place them in.  You do get to know your characters as you write the story, but I like to spend some time mulling the characters before starting a draft of a novel or short story.  While I write the first draft, at the end of writing for the day, I update the character description so I can more easily remain consistent throughout the novel.  It’s easier to go back to notes than to scan pages of the novel when your mind clicks in with the warning that you have just written an inconsistency.

            I also like to have a notes document going while I write the first draft, updated daily to maintain consistency.  It’s much easier to refer back to your notes doc than to have to skim 50 pages of the draft trying to remember what you wrote a few days earlier.

            The books that inspired me to get started writing, and to complete a first, first draft (a suspense novel I have not yet gone back to edit) may be of some help to you if you haven’t yet made yourself write that novel that’s been bouncing around in your head for years.

            This Year You Write Your Novel by Walter Mosley.  This is a 105 page book that concisely outlines steps that make writing a first draft possible even for those of us who have for years been wannabe writers, and doesn't even take very long.  If you can dedicate yourself to getting 750 to 1000 words per day written, which is not daunting at all once you get going, you will have a first draft done in 3 months.

            On Writing by Stephen King.  I loved both the autobiographical aspects of this book which describe, sometimes in disturbing detail, the human difficulties Stephen King has faced during his writing career and how he overcame them.  Also, the book provides a great deal of advice about the craft of writing a novel, including Stephen King’s technique for getting started writing a novel. 

            Becoming a Writer by Dorothea Brande.  The original copyright on this terrific little inspirational guide is 1934, but the guidance included in its pages is timeless.  There are many books on writing out there, but few have stood the test of time like this gem.

Reading Aloud for Revision

            Here I am trying to get through draft 14 of a middle grade novel I’ve been working on for more than a year.  My progress has slowed to a crawl since we picked up our new puppy, Tessa, a Border Collie mix, on 12/27/10.  She is a joy to watch grow, but a time eater, as well as a puppy kibble eater, of great ability.  Thankfully, she is sleeping next to me as I type this.

            My working title for the middle grade novel is “She Has Hands.”  The story is about a 14 year old girl, Delaney McCormack, who can telepathically communicate with dogs.  She has been communicating with her dog, Griffin, as well as neighborhood dogs, for a couple of years, but due to her parents’ over-the-top reaction when she told them she could hear Griffin in her head, she has mostly kept her ability to herself.

            A family trip to Mexico results in Delaney meeting a group of dogs.  She teams with the dogs in an attempt to rescue a ten year old kidnap victim from drug smugglers.  Her efforts result in Delaney becoming quite unpopular with some powerful and evil people.

            This is not my first attempt at writing a novel, but will be the first I revise and edit to conclusion. 

            Draft 14 is my read aloud draft.  In reading how-to books about writing fiction, the best of which I will highlight in the writing section of this website, I have frequently been advised to read aloud at some point during revision.  I should have taken the advice to heart in an earlier draft.  I am finding many necessary revisions I didn’t notice until I heard the words.  Don’t make my mistake.  Write your first draft, do a couple revision runs through to pull the writing above first draft roughness, and then read it aloud.  There is nothing better for bringing into focus the sections of your piece that still need work.

            Lucky for me, no matter how great of a mess I've made of a sentence or paragraph, my puppy isn't critical of my reading, nor will your dog or cat mind your occasional lack of eloquence.  Go ahead, perform your writing for your pet, and hear what's not quite right.

            Keep writing!