Back to Normal
I won't mention becoming a morning person and you won't ask me about becoming a morning person. How does that sound? All I will say is that so far this experiment is a resounding failure.
I need to get back to revisions on JUST LIKE HEAVEN today. Last night I heard Mark and Kate talking talking talking in my head and I couldn't get them to shut up. (I sound like a lunatic, don't I? Welcome to the world of the working writer. Imaginary friends. Voices in your head. Just another day at the office!) As if that wasn't enough, Kate launched into a major conversation with Paul that launched me out of bed in search of a pen and paper. I used to sleep with a notebook and lighted pen on the nightstand so I could capture dreams. (Don't ask. I spent years logging my remembered dreams. I'm not quite sure why but it was an interesting peek into the scary, dark recesses of my brain.) Maybe it's time to dig up the old lighted pen and press it into service again.
So much of writing is not writing. I know that sounds like the Procrastinator's Creed but it's true. To use a food analogy, it's like making a pot of soup. You toss the ingredients in and they're still just carrots and rock-hard split peas and weepy onions and some water. Not terribly interesting in their separateness but let them hang together for awhile and in a few hours you have a great pot of split pea soup. (I'm simplifying the recipe. Don't try that at home without some spices, please!) Okay, so maybe the writing process needs to meld longer than a few hours but the process is the same. Sometimes when I'm dangerously stuck, I go upstairs and lie down on the bed with one of those sleep masks over my eyes and let my subconscious do the job. I'd like to tell you that I lie there intellectually alert and think deeply creative thoughts but I like you far too much for anything but the truth. Half the time I'm asleep within two minutes. And not a polite little naplike sleep either. Deep, half-dead, the real thing. And yet something invariably happens. I wake up (thank God) and the problem has either resolved itself or the pathway to a solution is brightly lit and clearly marked with road signs.
Unfortunately there are times when all you wake up with is a bad case of bed head but those are the chances you have to take in the name of getting the book written.
Today's scrapbook entry:
Embarrassing proof that I was indeed a raging Beatlemaniac when I was fourteen.
Barbara
I need to get back to revisions on JUST LIKE HEAVEN today. Last night I heard Mark and Kate talking talking talking in my head and I couldn't get them to shut up. (I sound like a lunatic, don't I? Welcome to the world of the working writer. Imaginary friends. Voices in your head. Just another day at the office!) As if that wasn't enough, Kate launched into a major conversation with Paul that launched me out of bed in search of a pen and paper. I used to sleep with a notebook and lighted pen on the nightstand so I could capture dreams. (Don't ask. I spent years logging my remembered dreams. I'm not quite sure why but it was an interesting peek into the scary, dark recesses of my brain.) Maybe it's time to dig up the old lighted pen and press it into service again.
So much of writing is not writing. I know that sounds like the Procrastinator's Creed but it's true. To use a food analogy, it's like making a pot of soup. You toss the ingredients in and they're still just carrots and rock-hard split peas and weepy onions and some water. Not terribly interesting in their separateness but let them hang together for awhile and in a few hours you have a great pot of split pea soup. (I'm simplifying the recipe. Don't try that at home without some spices, please!) Okay, so maybe the writing process needs to meld longer than a few hours but the process is the same. Sometimes when I'm dangerously stuck, I go upstairs and lie down on the bed with one of those sleep masks over my eyes and let my subconscious do the job. I'd like to tell you that I lie there intellectually alert and think deeply creative thoughts but I like you far too much for anything but the truth. Half the time I'm asleep within two minutes. And not a polite little naplike sleep either. Deep, half-dead, the real thing. And yet something invariably happens. I wake up (thank God) and the problem has either resolved itself or the pathway to a solution is brightly lit and clearly marked with road signs.
Unfortunately there are times when all you wake up with is a bad case of bed head but those are the chances you have to take in the name of getting the book written.
Today's scrapbook entry:
Embarrassing proof that I was indeed a raging Beatlemaniac when I was fourteen.Barbara
posted by Barbara Bretton | 9:03 AM
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