Remembory -- Jan. 23, 2010

I remember this place...I've been here before. It's been a long time ago, but I believe I've been here at some point in my past. I recognize o few of the sights and some of sounds seem familiar to me. What is new and different is this year, 2010. You may have heard some silly comments on how to pronounce 2010: 1) Is to say "Two thousand-Ten; or 2) Say, "Twenty-Ten." I've discovered that it changes nothing no matter how you decide to pronounce it but saying, "Twenty-Ten" seems to be the way I've adopted. Regardless of how you say it, I hope God brings blessing to you in 2010. (Hey! No one has mentioned saying, "Two-Zero-One-Zero." That's odd...) The goals I set for myself last year went the way of the bad neckties in, "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" the movie, to the dumpster. I've not given up on setting goals for myself but I think I will be a little less boisterous in talking about them because it causes no end to my embarrassment when I fail. I'd much rather work quietly in the background and then show the results later. Check out Helium.com. I just wrote my first article in a long time and the first for this year. I wrote it on the topic of "If God is Love Why is There Pain and Suffering?" I hope you will find it interesting. As always, I'd love any feedback. Well, so long for now!

A Wii Update – July 14, 2009

No, Wii is not a new toy in our home, just a play on words and  though Logan probably wouldn’t complain too much if it were a new toy for him.  No, this is just a quick writing update.

So far I have not met the goal I had for 2000 words a day starting July 1 but I have filled a few holes in the plot line and hopefully make things a little more three dimensional so I have not been idle.

I have been praying for God’s guidance and I think I’m learning some things from this “test” novel. It is not easy and with my short attention span it makes focusing on a thread of plot or sub-plot is not too good. This is maddening because on rare occasions I am able to focus, I have an awesome time! I wish I could do this more often.

Right now I’m toying with having Lon and Breia having to get a ride on a Trogan Slaver ship. This helped me add some tension on their trek from Majica and Raven’s Point on their way to the Isle of Bane. It has been a hoot and I love using my imagination! You can create anything with your imagination. What a gift from God!

At this point in time I have forty pages written. This is, of course, the rough draft and rough it is! I have had to immobilize my internal editor but he still strains to see over the fence and even lofts his criticisms from way back there! I did let him out for a few hours a week or so ago because I had to do some clean up because of a new revelation and had to remove the “old way” I had started. At some point you have to stop making changes but for now my novel is a hot bed of experimentation! (Is that cliché or what?)

That’s it! (I KNOW! Such a short post!)

 

Bye for now!

Various Updates – July 5, 2009

I know this is a bit out of character for me to post this close to my last post but now that I have actually been writing I feel I have some things to talk about.

I continue to bring my writing before the Lord and He keeps confirming that I should be doing this by the peace I have in my heart and the desire He has set in that place.  He has not; however, told me that I would ever be a best selling author or a selling author of any type but once I hit the “zone” I have a hard time stopping and I think about the story more and more often.  I have to say it is FUN! It taxes my brain and I have despaired once or twice but God has helped me over those hurdles. In one instant he has provided a good friend who enjoys the same genre of books I do so I have been able to explain what I want to do and he and I have talked through the issues. Twice now God has used him to help me past some sticky points. And then He uses the very imagination He has blessed me with. Sometimes to get past one of those pesky obstacles I have simply sat back and stared thinking through the possibilities and an idea forms. It has been great fun! Wouldn’t it be great to do this full time? At this point I have no religion in my story and I feel it is missing something so I would not be surprised if some type of religion pops up and gets woven into the story web, but I can’t say for sure!

The 2000 word\day mark I set for myself has not yet born the fruit I had hoped it would but I have run into more storyline problems than I had thought I had. This time has not been all wasted though! I have been able to work through some of the problems I had and I actually let my internal editor out for a little play time and he helped me to clean up some problem areas I had and redirect the plotline in the new direction. He had fun and he was so cute to watch! (I wish I had taken some pictures!) Anyway when I finally put him away I had most of my rough draft problems cleared up along with some of the confusion that was starting to creep in. It was looking like a big mess but it is all better now and I should be able to write at a faster rate, at least for a while.

I have completed thirty-six pages of rough draft as of this writing and I am not done yet tonight. Kim and I took a nice walk and I wanted to get another posting out but I would love to make the forty-page mark before I go to bed, I just don’t know if it’ll happen or not. On the plus side I am not overly tired right now. In fact, lately my mental faculties have been much better than they have in a long time. I am not smarter just seem to be able to use what I do have in a more effective manor. I praise God for this because I hate the fog I walked around in for the last 30 years! I am convinced it has to do with the fact that I have stopped drinking pop. I have no way to prove my theory but only to say that my mind’s functioning has improved since I have stopped drinking pop. (now if I could only cut back on the rest of the crap I intake!)

Alyssa leaves tomorrow for a week at Chicago to get some evangelism training. It should be a very good experience for her and I hope the Lord will use it in her life. Please pray for her in those lines and for safety for their traveling.

Logan has one more week of baseball with the 8th grade team. There have been a lot of rainouts this year, it does not seem like we’ve had a full season but it has been enjoyable.

The Holy Spirit has been having me focus on the lives of Joseph and Daniel in my Bible study times. There are a lot of parallels and some cool lessons.  I will pass on more to you as I learn.

Well, I’m getting back to my other writing!

Keep your dreams alive and work hard. Lay your plans in God’s hands and He will help you!

Bye!

Writing Update –June 28, 2009

I am praising God write now! (You’ll understand the pun later!) I finally feel that I can use this blog for what I had originally planned to use it for:Writing updates! As I mentioned in my last post I am actually writing! Hands dirty, nose to the grindstone, writing! As of this moment I have completed, in rough draft (VERY rough!) close to 26 pages so far. I even experienced a phenomena that writers say is a good sign that you have some passion, I almost cried with one of the scenes I was writing. It was a scene where the twins lost almost everyone of their family members in a brutal attack by Trogan slavers. (These names won’t mean a thing to you unless you actually read the finished product) I could feel their grief as they remember. It is very cool! Very exciting!

God has blessed me with a good friend in Chris Watson. He and I like to hike together and my prayer is that when we walk together I can encourage him as much as he always encourages me, though I know that he encourages me way more than I encourage him.

We walked yesterday. We talked about a myriad of topics and it was simply a joyous time! I then brought up the subject of writing, and as always, God used this fellow to encourage my heart and free me to be used as God intended me to be use. These talks, though not specifically about my stories but, instead, about how God could use me and writing, has freed my mind and because of that I have been able to fill more gaps in my story and I introduced yet another character, (ALWAYS cool when a new and unexpected person joins the group!) who I am afraid is an unsavory type but necessary to fill in some holes. I do not like him at all, in fact I board on hatred. That is very cool! Not that I hate but that I hate my character! He is really evil though he appears to be, at first, an angel of light. He needs to be developed more but so far he is BAD and I do not like him!

I have also set myself some writing goals that are bigger than I am currently following but it is necessary if I really want to finish my story.

Starting July 1 I will begin writing 2000 words a day. Right now that is about an hour and half’s worth of work. This does vary but in general terms I can pump out about 10000 words every forty-five minutes.

With this goal in mind I intend to be done with the rough draft by Sept.1. I will then give myself a couple weeks off to let the whole thing simmer and then I will release the beast…my internal editor! This fellow is a nuisance when trying to bang out a rough draft but he is absolutely a welcome guest during the editing process. You see, when you are pounding out the rough draft you don’t need that turkey keeping you grounded, nagging you about every mistake, every slip of the grammar wheel and every spelling error, not to mention telling you what he thinks of the ideas themselves! No, what you need to do is lock that turkey up and soar with the eagles where freedom resides. Where you are free to put down on paper whatever comes to your head instinctively knowing it may not be the best…yet…but that soon enough you will take the time and, carefully working with your internal editor, fix the problems that as a free spirit, you did not care about.

With his help I will begin the burdensome task of editing. The first pass will be to fix obvious errors in spelling, grammar, and story flow. Once I feel good about the first draft, which I have until Dec. 1 to finish, I will, gulp!, recruit some folks to read what I have and start giving me feed back.

Then around the Jan. 1 timeframe I will take the ideas I have been given, (I will be reading it too and making changes I think are needed) I will take all the ideas start draft two.

About April 1 I hope to have draft two done and from there I am not sure what I will do…

If I receive a lot of genuinely positive feedback from draft one, I may send out draft two for a second reading. If that comes back favorably, I will seriously think of getting an agent and trying to publish the thing.

I want to clarify positive feedback. Family and friends can sometimes be so gracious that they are not willing to be honest lest it hurt my feelings. I want to say now that you CANNOT HURT MY FEELINGS!

If you choose to help me, though I do not want you to be mean spirited, I do want brutal honesty. I need brutal honesty to be able to make appropriate changes. If the plot is flat or boring, tell me. If the characters lack depth and you can’t tell me which character is talking without me actually writing, “Fred said”, or “Mary said”, then tell me. I can’t improve unless I have constructive criticism

On the other hand if you like the way something is working I would love to know that too!

This is happening! This is really happening and I give all the credit to God. He has orchestrated all the details for me to come this far. I do not want to sound like what I am doing is going to sell or even be good but I don’t care. I will say that again for clarity, I do NOT care! If I gain nothing else from this it will be experience so that maybe the next time I can create something saleable. I am excited about my story, I like it but if no one else does at least I will have experience under my belt and with that, like practicing any sport or musical instrument, I will improve. I already feel I have improved somewhat and the fear I used to have is gone right now. When fear leaves freedom moves in and then you can do wonderful things! What a great ride this has been and continues to be!

For now I press onward with the strength and freedom God has granted me! If you are out there and maybe fearful of stepping out in faith to accomplish what God has in store for you, don’t wait any longer! Take the leap! Jump! You will see that fear is only, as they say, a paper tiger, it looks real but it has no power over God and His enablement! You will see that, though the road may not be smooth or without certain pitfalls, the freedom you will ride on is, well, freeing!

(After all of that do you now understand my pun? LOL!)

Come and fly! God’s waiting for you. Trust Him!

Bye!

A Slight Hesitation – June 24, 2009

I almost hesitate to mention this because if you have been a follower of this blog for very long you will note that I can spin wild tales of me actually writing something…at least something more than a blog about writing. But now I am not only going to mention it I already have some momentum built up and, it appears to me, fuel to keep the train going.

In past attempts to write my first story (I REALLY hesitate to call what I am doing a novel) I got seven pages done and had no idea where to take it from there. I slogged around and jotted down an idea or two here or there and I even have attempted to motivate myself by telling you all that I WAS GOING TO WRITE! Nothing really worked. In fact, I almost talked myself out of writing because if I wasn’t going to work at it diligently, why do it all. I just could not let go though!

I have prayed about writing, at least a little, but nothing seemed to happen then I learned a definition of discipline that hit me square in the forehead (I noted it in a previous blog…there it is…just scroll down a little farther…There you go!) That has helped tremendously and I was amazed (dismayed??) that the book of Proverbs is plumb full of verses about the lazy man, the sluggard, the slothful man. If you use Chuck Swindoll’s method of personalizing scripture you get the following:

“The slothful Greg”, “The lazy Greg”, “The sluggard Greg”…Do you start to see a pattern? Me too and I did not like it. I think I’ve known it for a long time but was too proud or too ignorant (Mom always used to tell me not to say “Stupid”…Thanks, Mom!) but the Lord finally, in His eternally gracious and merciful way, helped me to face the truth. If I was ever going to accomplish anything I needed to work at it. An amazing revelation!

And then there were the two books on writing. I won’t say they changed my life because I’ve already waxed too melodramatic already but they were insightful and full of good, concise writing advice.  One was Stephen King’s “On Writing” ( I do not recommend this book because Mr.. King tends to allow vulgar language into the mix rather liberally…Be ye warned!) which came across to me as real, down to earth and actually showed some real examples. I stumbled over the language but the advice was sound.

The other book is by a guy named Chris Batey. Mr. Batey started a writing…challenge about ten years ago called NaNoWriMo or National Novel Writing Month (or at least something very close to that.) His challenge is to start writing every day beginning Nov.1 and ending Nov. 30 an in that time frame write a 50,000 word novel!  If you faithfully write every day in November this number equates to 1,667 per day that you need to write. Not really too hard actually until you realize you kinda need to have some sort of coherent story on the other side. It is a challenge I intend to take up this coming turkey month.

Anyway, from these two books I learned to start small, work every day, and shut off my internal editor. That pesky voice that hovers over my shoulder and tells me every mistake I make such as spelling, grammar, and spelling again; and likes to critic every sentence (If he even finds something he would consider a sentence!) and generally telling what a horrible example I’m setting for the writing world.

For those of you who are now completely lost or a at least felling a little dizzy, I have 1) Found a supply of discipline and am employing it to best of my abilities; 2) Writing 1000 words (sometimes more!) per day; and 3) I have evicted, temporarily because he will be needed to for the editing process, that blasted internal editor. (When you do this you really don’t care what you have written because you know you will go back at some point and edit. (It sounds like a long and tedious process to me too!)

Employing this set of tools for the last week and a half, I now have over 14, 000 words written which is roughly 15 pages. This count is five partial scenes out of over seventeen plus as I am writing I am finding all sorts of holes that will need to be filled and there have even been some surprise new characters that I never even knew existed before I started writing! It is so exciting! Each word I lay down is a new adventure and I hate the fact I have to break into my day for things like work when I have this adventure waiting for me at home! I have never been so exited about writing as I am now! Is it hard? Yes it is mentally taxing but I find a pleasure in it as maybe a runner feels when he or she gets that runner’s high. Dare I say I feel God’s pleasure when I am writing? I think I can! Do I think this is bragging? NO WAY! I think I am doing what God has designed me to do! And now that He has been helping me begin to overcome the things that I let hinder me I feel free! Free!

There are times where the muse seems to slog along but it’s those times that discipline comes along and pushes me to the finish line! “Only 100 words?”; “Only 400 words?”; “Only ten more words to go!” “Only 990 words?” Other times its like I hit 1400 words and wonder where the time went! It’s great!

Whew! I see I’ve done it again! But that’s what happens when I let my mind go and my fingers fly!

Good bye for now!

Total Sickness – June 5, 2009

Before I get to today’s missive I need to get something off my chest.

Today, as noted above, is June 5. Friday, June 5th to be precise which means the end of another school year. This is not just any school year though but a year with a couple of milestones.

1) Alyssa is now officially a high school senior (YES THAT IS CORRECT! A HIGH SCHOOL SENIOR!); 2) Logan is officially in high school! I can’t believe it! the time has gone so fast, but here it is and I’m not sure our kitchen table can hold any more college information packets! WOW! Sigh…What will the next couple years bring?

I have had a first this week. I was home sick for four out of the last six days. Some sort of virus I think. Kim had a similar something two weeks ago so I’m sure it was the same thing I had.

I went to work Monday and yesterday but it was not fun (Monday was not bad but yesterday was a mistake.)

Anyway, sinuses, sore throat, plugged ear ducts, coughing, hacking, wheezing, jumping, reading, writing…Opps! Sorry. Got a bit carried away as usual. I think you get the idea though.

The odd part is that I usually do not get sick for this long, but it happened! I guess that’s what we have sick days for, isn’t it?

The other odd thing is that I read a 285 page almost in one sitting. I couldn’t put it down! The really unusual part is that the book was by Stephen King. I can’t say I’m a fan of King’s mostly because I do not enjoy the genre he writes in but I had heard so many good things about his book “On Writing” I thought I would give it a try.

I was blown away! It was a fluent read and for some reason I could not put it down. Kim picked it up for me at the library at 4:00 PM on Wednesday and I had240 pages read by bedtime with a fine supper thrown in the mix. I just finished it.

King had some interesting things to say on the craft and his writing style is wonderful. I am considering reading one of his book just to taste it on the fiction side. But be aware! If you decide to read this book understand that King is real. He says what he means and means what he says and because of that there is a LOT of profanity and I do not mean mild profanity either! If it is a “four letter” word, it is in the book! Yes, this does bother me and most of the time when I run into too much of that kind of language I will stop reading the book but King had so many good things to say I trained my eye to “ounce” over those words when I came to them.

(When I say “real” I do not mean to say that because he uses profanity he is any “realer” then you or I but he does not pull any punches. He says what he says.)

I felt as though what he had to say really resonated with my heart. I don’t know why but it really did.

I am not recommending it just because of all the “four letter” words but the book did have an effect on me.

I have also have began to actually write my new story. Right now I have a goal of 1000 words a day and since this is my second day of doing this I have two thousand words written. They are not good words yet but I have started moving forward.

I had hoped that once I started writing I could throw discipline out the window because creativity would have stepped in and carried the day but that is not the case. Once I start writing I do enjoy it but I still must discipline myself to do it each and every day. Two down…X more to go! ;-)

Good bye for now!

An Item or Two… May 26, 2009

I see from the calendar that I have once again delved deeply into the mines of laziness and have not posted since April 19th!

Well, now I have a couple things I would like to share.

First, I have been world building for my story. It has gone OK... I know I don’t sound excited but it really is fun. The more I think about the different scenes the more holes I see that need to be filled. There are a lot of questions to be answered and I am still uncertain about the ending. I have a couple of twists I have been toying with…:-)

Though I have spent at least a few minutes almost every day for the last month or so working on it I still feel that I have not dedicated myself to the process as I should have been doing. You’re right, it’s not too late but I still bemoan the fact that I could be much farther along than I am. It can be daunting at times if not down right overwhelming! But when I think of the possibilities I can soar with ideas. In fact, I am considering adding some scars from an ancient wizard-war that could add some intriguing twists…

Discipline:

This is an area that I have admittedly been somewhat thin on…I am so easily distracted for one thing. I really hate that!  Those times that God grants to me focus I fly and good things seem to happen but the other times this lack of focus is a real enemy!

I want to leave you with a saying from a gentleman who spoke at our church for our annual Spring Bible Conference. His name was Dr. Ron Sauer and he is a neat individual. He had a wonderful series with plenty to muse over but one particular saying I have come to memorize. In fact, I have made a special print copy and hung it in my cube.

It goes like this:

Discipline: Doing what needs to be done, when it needs to be done, in the manner it ought to be done, regardless of how I feel about it.

…