General: Thoughts on short story writing

They’re over before you have a chance to get bored with the writing. Or, bored with the reading.

Problem – they’re over before you want them to be. Or, need them to be.

I find short stories easier to write. It’s due to my natural urge to rush through the ending. Why I become bored I don’t understand. I feel the need to write and have a vivid imagination, but I always hit a point in which I find myself rushing. Maybe I need to plan more.

This is why short stories, so far, appear to work for me. I try to give as much as I can and still maintain the requirements of short writing.

Shorts allow for more formula writing. More point-form aspects of what is needed and mindful of the word count. Not as much fullness or spreading out of points.

But, it would be great to be able to write longer sections to a full novel – get to spend more time with these mind-friends of mine.

General: Balancing time

Once more time has gotten away from me. I’m late writing this and haven’t been present online in a week, maybe a little longer?

It’s not because I don’t want to connect with everyone. Not that I don’t care. Sometimes I think I care too much because I worry about not maintaining the demands I’ve put on myself.

That’s probably the same for most of us – self demands. We want to get so much done we forget why we started any of “this” in the first place.

People will tell us we don’t manage our time well. Go and make a to do list or a schedule. Juggle a little at a time. Touch something once and finish it then and there. Do their minds really work that way? Mine doesn’t.

I need a moment to slow and sit in the groove of what I’m trying to do. Putting any time limit just tosses me back into school mode and those blasted tests I would scramble through.

Even now I just remembered I need to set an alarm so I don’t forget something.

Balancing time – I keep trying, but sometimes I think it’s trying to balance me.

General: Are you where you expected to be

…the future’s not ours to see…written by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans, first published in 1956. I remember listening to Doris Day sing this song.

It never occurred to me to think into the future. To wonder what and where I wanted to be. To acknowledge that the future would one day be my present. Career? Marriage? Children? Family deaths. Nope, had no idea.

Naïve?

Stupid?

Unprepared?

Who is ever prepared? Life has a way of changing our plans. We change our minds, plans, thoughts. Hopefully for the better. You need to go with the flow and play the hand that comes your way.

Decide the person you can live with. No, not the person you want to be. The want isn’t always the strongest – most positive – choice. There’s another saying I’ve stumbled over – no matter where you go, there you’ll be. Everything you want to run from, leave behind, well, it will always be with you. It’s all in how you carry it.

How you take care of who you are. Acknowledge all aspects of you to yourself. No one else needs to know everything. Only if you care to share.

Sharing with someone can be the most positive choice. They can change what you have struggled to accept simply because they believe in you.

It’s true – it’s not the destination but the journey. The path only you can take.

General: Faces

We all want to be recognized. No one wants to be the unseen in the crowd. Well, maybe if you’re always seen you might like to be the faceless one every so often.

To stay in the shadows feels lost and alone. Unwanted. Neglected.

So why an earring for my face?

For the escape.

Haven’t you ever wanted to keep driving and drive away from your normal life? Get on a plane and go without anyone knowing? Drop the every day and start new?

I’m not saying my normal life is one I want to give up. Not for all the money in the world. But, it is fun to put on the earring face and not have to deal with my norm. A face to escape to…with.

Recently, I had to decide if I wanted to keep my second face or claim my own. A certain social media home claimed I wasn’t who I said I was. In order to prove this, I had to claim those friends I have on that site.

Hmm, was I proving I was real or that they are?

As you can tell, I obviously chose my earring face. Why?

Because that is still me. Just as my fears have their image, so does my erotic writer and they live with the woman who mothers most all she claims. One day the middle grade writer will show her face right alongside the nightmare making sleuth writer.

Our faces are all ours. The persona behind just differs.

Don’t forget to put your face on.

General: The blog posting about nothing

When the thinking won’t think. When the thoughts have flown the coop. When the blanks are…blank.

Yes, this is a posting about nothing.

It started as something then my memory kicked in and realized I had already talked about what I was starting to re-talk about. Great, time for a new idea. Fantastic, what new idea?

Staring at a blank page wasn’t helping. Staring at a blank computer screen really wasn’t helping, back to the blank paper. Sure, it wasn’t completely blank. I had started re-talking about that previously posted subject, those notes were now just crossed out.

Boredom.

Yes, I wrote the word boredom.

From that simple word came these 119 words. Okay, there’s more words after that count and I’m really not sure I want to go back and change the numbers.

What’s my point?

One word is all you need to start something. Go and start something.

General: How did Nano go?

Well, I typed more than I have ever done this year than previous years. I managed just over 30,000 and finished the first seasonal bundle of stories for December - March and started into April - August. Just needing to finish July and August for that bundle.

I’m happy with the volume I was able to produce, but must admit I didn’t turn off my internal editor. I found myself editing the lines during the typing process and making sure the storylines were making sense. Whether it was because I was working with my publisher to get these stories done or because I was writing under a different persona...maybe it was due to actually having a story idea or that they were short stories I was writing...I didn’t find my self-editing too distracting or argumentative.

I must admit writing one erotic story after another was starting to wear on me. I was getting a little tired of the genre and setting the flow of scene and story to match. I need to get back and finish, but life tossed in a surprise which tossed me out of the writing for a couple of days. I could have forced myself back in, but mentally I skipped out. The lack of reaching 50,000 was more mental-done-in than critical editor.

Will I attempt again next year? I don’t know. I enjoy the people in our region. I like the idea of the challenge, but I don’t think Nano is for me no matter the persona.

I have ideas for a set of short stories under my real name and because I’ve written as Theadora, I believe she’s shown me the method I need to use to get those written. In other words, by wearing a different persona, I’ve had my eyes open to lessons I thought I knew.

Who knows, depending on how the next eleven months go maybe I’ll attempt Nano under both my writing names. This year I’ve finally learned that I can prepare for Nano...semi-plotter now. I can reach the daily writing goals. Writing short stories eases the mental pressure. And my internal editor isn’t such an enemy after all.