Scoring Four

Every day, there are things we have to do and things we want to do. I won't dwell on what I have to do every day because what fun is in that? Instead I'll share what I want to do. These are my Big Four, ranked according to how I wish they were prioritized:

1. Exercise
2. Writing
3. Guitar
4. Reading

But if I'm honest about how I spend my time, it works out more like this:

1. Exercise
2. Reading
3. Guitar
4. Writing

And reading is only ranking #2 because I'm including time spent surfing the net, which is actually cheating. What I mean for that to be is reading books. Either way, reading is effortless and entertaining, no matter what it is or where I do it, so it's easy for me to slide that toward the top and not even notice what I've done.

Guitar outranks writing because it's easier to notice improvement in my guitar playing than my writing. With dogs and kids they call that positive reinforcement and I guess the same is true for a hack guitarist. I can make a song recognizable in a few tries, but might work on a story idea for months before it takes form. The story I'm working on now is a year old and still reads to me like it was written by a third grader.

I want to score 4/4 every day and seldom do. If I don't do everything on my list, I feel like a slacker. Somewhere there's a balance I haven't found. Maybe I'll aim for two a day. Also, I try to squeeze these things in between 5:00-6:30 a.m. and 8:00-11:00 p.m. because that's when my kids are sleeping but I can make myself be awake (see Mom Guilt). It's hard to fit in hobbies during the times when my body would rather be in bed, and it's asking a heck of a lot to produce a coherent narrative during those hours.

Today I was attacking the treadmill, sweat pouring down my face, ready for the run to be finished. I've been there a thousand times before. On the treadmill, on the bike, a few miles from a finish line, whatever. I tell myself, "You can rest when it's over but right now there's work to do." It works. I'm very practiced at talking myself through physical endurance.

It doesn't work for writing. For one thing, there's no finish line. Even after a bazillion drafts, there's still something to improve. Also, at least marathons and triathlons always start out fun. At some point during the race I expect to get tired and at that point it becomes mind over body. Writing's only fun when I know what's supposed to happen in the scene. If I don't know what's coming next (and I usually don't), it's supremely frustrating and very scary. Most days I sit down to write, I feel like I've jumped in at Mile 20. I missed the fun part and I'm just suffering through The Wall. Self-doubt creeps in. Who am I to think I can write a story? I get discouraged and pick up the guitar. Maybe I see what people are doing on Facebook. I often check e-mail. Whatever I do, usually popcorn is involved.

Somehow I'll slide writing up to the #2 slot, but it might be easier if I got a bunch of free stuff in my race packet and went home with a cool-looking t-shirt.

I have a date with my WIP

Not that kind of whip.

I have a complicated relationship with my work in progress. We haven't spoken for months, but tonight we have a date and I'm determined to make amends.

I was about 12,000 words into a draft when I made the decision to scratch the cast. After spending years with the characters in my first book, starting a new book with characters I didn't know felt kind of like sitting down to dinner with a group of strangers. Awkward and forced. So I decided to keep the premise of my new book but start over with characters I knew well.

I sailed through the early pages of a new draft at a pretty good clip, all the way to about 24,000 words. A novel is typically about 70-80,000 words, so I was glad to reach the 1/4 mark of a rough first draft. I showed the early chapters to a writer friend and asked for some big muscle comments. That is to say, I wasn't worried about tight sentences and snappy dialogue just yet, I only wanted to know if the story was working. My friend suggested dropping the first three chapters. I knew he was right, but since I measure my self-worth by my word count, I promised myself to keep the words for now and cut them later. That began the nagging feeling that all was not right with the story. Our time together started to feel a little bit stilted.

Then Hurricane Ike blew through town. For two weeks, there was no power--no A/C, refrigerator, washing machine, vacuum cleaner, or computer. Grocers shelves were bare. Nobody had fuel. Trees and power lines blocked the roads, and everyone had damage to their homes. It wasn't the time to write. It was time to haul debris and rebuild. For over a month, I was disconnected from my story and slowly it started to fade.

Soon afterward, right before Christmas, I received the revision letter for my first novel. This was huge! The revisions got my full attention. We went through two rounds of revisions, and I told myself that as soon as that book was settled, I'd refocus on Book 2.

Somewhere in the middle of all that, Christmas happened. I redecorated one room and repainted another. I trained for and ran two marathons. Started guitar lessons. Agreed to help plan a 5K/10K fundraiser. Entertained house guests for three weeks. Blah, blah, blah. My point is, a lot was going on. My manuscript and I grew apart.

Right now, sitting here, I can't even remember what is going on in that book. Why are my characters so stressed out? Who got murdered in this book anyway?

It happened exactly the way Timothy Hallinan said it would:

Why do I think you should write every day?

The more time you spend with your story, the more real its world will be to you. If you spend three days away, it will be three times as difficult to get going again. If you spend a month away, you're practically going to have to start over. You want the momentum and the familiarity with the world of your book that only comes when you enter that world regularly.

Well, I'm ready to enter regularly again. Fun starts tonight at our Big Date. I'll tumble back down the rabbit hole, where my characters are waiting for me with all their problems and worries. I hope my reunion date with my WIP will be the start of a long, committed relationship.

But not too long. My goal is a first draft by the end of the year.