Tag Archives: editing

Loafing with the Devil

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25cfab14a0876544_lazylionMotivation. Some days you have it, some days you don’t.

I would say that today is a don’t, except that, before beginning this post, I looked up the definition of motivation:

 n. the general desire or willingness of someone to do something.

Aha! That’s when I realized that my problem today is not a lack of motivation, desire, or willingness. On the contrary, I’m positively bursting at the seams with that. The problem, my friends, is with the “something” I have a general desire or willingness to do. Because today, instead of feeling motivated to put my butt-in-chair and write, I have an irresistible motivation to put ass-on-couch and watch reruns of Sons of Anarchy or The Voice until naptime rolls around. Surf, snooze, repeat as needed.  

I’ll say it again: Just because I’m not motivated to do anything productive today does not mean I’m unmotivated.

What’s that face for?

All right. You caught me. To be perfectly frank, I’m not exactly sure what that means, other than that I probably won’t be very productive, but it certainly does make me wonder what’s happened with my focus since my last post. (Obviously, I’m having no problem with my motivation to italicize today. Go figure.)

photo-75It could be lack of coffee, though I am, in fact, on cup #2. Hmm. Just looked at my cup, and noticed it has a really bad attitude problem. Could my cup be the culprit? Hold on; I’m going to go pour the dregs into my I Love Mondays cup and drink the rest of it ironically.

It could be that I’ve had another contractor in the house all week (This one’s ridiculously chatty and chipper; are you seriously whistling while you work? Who does that outside of Disney movies? How do you expect me to pretend you’re not here with all this friendliness?), one that, while still preventing me from doing laundry, has left my kitchen accessible, full of dirty dishes yet compellingly inviting.

Maybe it’s that, after weeks of sweating it, my grad school application was finally marked “Complete” this morning, and this is just the post-sweat cool-down. (Yes, folks, here we go again: 6 weeks of angsty waiting for the verdict of the review board. And yes, I will post about it. Again. Apologizing in advance.) Like how you need to rest after running a marathon? I wouldn’t know what that feels like, personally, but I’m guessing it’s similar enough to work metaphorically.

Writer’s block? Headache? Post-government shutdown hangover? Barometric pressure changes? Demonic—or angelic—possession? (My daughter did make me watch an episode of Supernatural with her yesterday when she was home sick…

SPN-Castiel-supernatural-8177301-500-313Castiel? Is that you? Are you sending out a message on angel radio that yes, yes, YES! I should just lie down on that couch and loaf all day, doing absolutely nothing productive, not just for my own good but for the good of all mankind? Hmph. You almost had me, but I’m guessing that’s more likely Satan, talking—you know, idle hands and all. But I digress. Plenty of motivation for that, apparently; hell, my whole day so far has been one big digression.)

Ugh. I got nuthin’. Not one single good reason for being motivated to do less than my best. Yeah, that’s right, you heard me: I have no excuse. (And this is what I looked like when I said that, too. We could be twins, I’m so NO-EXCUSEY. Whoa, all caps! Maybe there’s hope for today after all.)

Well, she sighed, I think we all know the best, perhaps the only cure for a lack of, or the wrong type of, motivation: Brute force—and more coffee. Hello, cup #3, help me get my butt back into my chair. Maybe I’ll catch a nap this afternoon? Shut up, Satan.

Too Busy to Blog?

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I learned a valuable lesson this week: I should have painters come to my house every day, like I did this week. It’s been the best thing that could’ve happened for my writing (and this in a week that includes a 3-hour coffee date with a new friend and an early school dismissal for my kids). Seriously, not being able to access the kitchen or the laundry room (you know I’m sobbing about that last bit) has forced me to practice the Butt-in-Chair philosophy I admire so much in more disciplined (and less frenetic) writers.

I whipped through several article drafts; completed two audio transcriptions; finished polishing my Purpose Letter for my grad school application; hammered out the rough draft of another post; and selected and collated the writing samples I need to submit along with my application. (I laughed out loud when I saw that the samples I had chosen added up to precisely the 40-page submission limit. Whee! I love it when things end up like that!)

Lesson learned: If you stop eating and worrying about wearing clean clothes, you can sure accomplish a lot in a day. Here endeth the lesson.

The cool part about pulling those writing samples is that some of them are things I haven’t looked back at for a while. After living and breathing Widow Woman, sitting down to try to narrow down a few key pages for my sample felt surreal. I mean, I know I wrote the darned thing, but when you don’t look at something for a long time, it no longer feels like it’s yours.

I included a short story I wrote, along with excerpts from my two novels-in-progress. The YA novel, The Water Bearers, is one I’m working on all the time, and it’s the one I just submitted to my new writers’ group for (a very helpful and insightful) critique, so I didn’t experience any out-of-body experiences looking that one over again. I’ve got some work to do to polish the sample, so it feels very now, very present. But my second novel, well, I haven’t looked at that one in almost six months, and I’d sort of forgotten how much I loved where it was going–I felt giddy going back to it, and can’t wait to get both my writing application and my first (technically, second) novel completed so I can get back to it again.

Oh, well–looks like I’d better find something else for my painter to work on–maybe he can paint my office door shut.

Love being back to work. 🙂

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Rusty

photo-53That’s how I’m feeling today: rusty. I’m resuming so many activities now, things I’ve been doing for so many years (writing, back-to-school routines, friend-making) that they should seem familiar and easy, but they don’t. I feel like I’m bumbling and stumbling at every turn. But, as we all know, it’s just the first week of school, and once I get these rusty joints moving again, everything will move much more smoothly. (It doesn’t help that I just found out yesterday that I now need bifocals. If that doesn’t scream approaching middle-age, I’m not sure what does. And since I’ve been 27 for so long now, I’m not sure why this is happening to me. I mean, come on! I’ve been practically blind from nearsightedness and astigmatism since I was a kid; I guess I always just assumed that when I started to become farsighted, at some point, the two would have to meet in the middle and I’d wind up having 20/20 vision, but my optometrist tells me it doesn’t work that way. Nuts. Totally unfair.) Anyway, I may be rusty and blind and wearing cheaters over my glasses until my new lenses come in, but hey, I’m still moving, and that’s the point of today’s post, so let’s get on with it.

What have I been up to since my last post? Well, I joined a local writers’ group and have agreed to share some of my novel-in-progress for critique. That’s a little nerve-wracking, to say the least. I’ve never shown anyone a work that wasn’t at least finished, let alone shown a group of people I’ll be meeting for the first time when they critique it. Ah, well. Nothing like jumping right in feet first, is there? Can you say, “Cannonball!”?

I also discovered a local branch of the state writers’ conference and just signed up with them. I’m very excited to see they sponsor a huge writers’ conference in April, and have already marked my calendar. Creeeeeeaaaaak. What was that? Oh, I think that was one of those rusty joints I mentioned earlier; they’re groaning a lot from lack of use. Hmm…what else…I rediscovered my virtual book tour, which I began this spring and which is, apparently, still under way. (Thank God someone was paying attention, because I clearly wasn’t). It’s been fun this week, catching up on the reviews and interviews, though own my promotional activities around the tour are still pretty spotty, to say the least. In that light, here’s a link to one of my recent stops, an interview—Errrrrrrrkkkkkk. Oooo, there goes another joint.

I’ve also started researching grad schools–again. I know, I know. This again? Well, what can I say? It’s always bothered me that I’ve never finished my M.F.A., so I’m thinking maybe new state, new school, new chance for admission into a new program. I hate having unfinished business. I’ll keep you posted on that one–at least I don’t have to take the G.R.E. again–thank God for that.

I finally watched the video of my last appearance on “It’s A Woman’s World.” That brought back some great memories, and as soon as I can remember how I converted it from DVD to YouTube-uploadable format the last time, I’ll be sharing that with you, too, but if you missed some of the earlier ones, here’s a link. Snapcracklepop! Ouch, I think something just snapped in half! It’s amazing how fast you can lose momentum and turn into a rusted bag of bolts…let me see–what else? I’ve worked out some plot points on The Water Bearers (in case you don’t remember, that’s the working title of my second novel) and cleared up a couple of plot holes, which was probably a good thing to complete prior to sharing my work with my new writers’ group. If I can ever get past obsessively editing the first nine chapters, I’ll be in good shape to start writing the new ones.

So–I’m no longer whining (well, at least not as much, and most of that is my joints’ fault); in fact, I’m starting to feel pretty limber again, getting back into my writing groove. Boy, does it feel good. Glad you’re along for the ride!

 

 

Absence

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I’m back! Did you miss me?

Wait–you didn’t even notice I was gone? Well, that’s depressing.

For those of you who did notice, I didn’t actually go anywhere, except to work at my new full-time job (hence the gap between posts). I am now officially working at XXXXX, XXXXX-ing a number of XXXXX’s for several large XXXXX’s–it’s all very top-secret. Yeah. That sounds pretty exciting, doesn’t it? I’ll just let you fill in those blanks yourself (feel free to insert your own ideas here; they’re probably far more titillating than what I’m really doing).

But it’s a job, it’s flexible, and it’s close to home, so no horrendous commute this time around.  The only real downside (other than the fact that XXXXX-ing is about as stimulating as watching paint dry) is that I’ve returned to work just at the time that I need to be busting on getting the print edition of Widow Woman ready to go and I don’t have a lot of extra time to spend on it now. I should, in fact, be working on the proofing now, but I worry that if I go too long between posts, you  might forget about me and move on to some other crazy writer’s blog.

So where am I now? I’ve seen the first draft of the cover from my wonder of a designer, I’m at about Chapter 6 of the proofing, and still need to purchase my ISBN (but at least I finished my research into which one to get–is there any good reason for those things to be so complicated?). Why am I reproofing, you might ask? Well, if you read some of my earlier posts, you know that the e-book version turned up a number of “little darlings” that need to be fixed and I’m anxious to put out a cleaner 2nd edition (but don’t forget: those 1st edition bloopers will make for a valuable item, someday. Yes, that’s what I’m telling myself–it helps manage my anxiety).

Well, that’s where things stand now–still plugging away at it, though in fits and starts during lunch and coffee breaks instead of in 8-hour stretches. Nobody said it’d be easy–because if it were, fewer people would be crazy enough to do it, I guess.

I’ll keep you posted! In the meantime, feel free to check in with me on Twitter or Facebook–shorter posts and tweets may be all I can manage for the immediate future.   

 

 

Another Fork in the Road?

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Classy SporkMaybe this is another fork in the road, maybe it’ll be something else. Like chopsticks. Or a spork–I really like sporks.

Bottom line is, I’m starting a full-time editing job tomorrow: the Clark Kent to my Superman; the Peter Parker to my Spiderman; the Diana Prince to my Wonder Woman. I think it’s a good move, but as with any change, it comes with some nerves and maybe some weird tingling–that could just mean my foot’s asleep.

What it does mean, certainly, is less time to blog, so I’m going to resort to a rerun (sorry, folks, even Emmy winners do it) of my post from the week I started my last full-time position. The position may have changed, but the new-job angst remains the same.

Enjoy, and hopefully, I’ll have a real update later this week. Wish me luck!

[Originally posted April 19, 2012]

What? There’s a fork in the road? Better pick it up before someone gets hurt [rimshot].

Sorry, I couldn’t resist—I seriously hope bad puns are not an uncontrollable side effect of all the impending changes ahead this week. What changes, you ask? Patience, my friends, patience. Submission updates first:

I haven’t sent out any additional submissions since my last post—why will shortly become clear—but I did receive 1 ½ rejection letters. No, that’s not a typo. If you want to be perfectly literal about things, then it was really 2 rejections, but I’m a fiction writer—I don’t do literal very well.

The first rejection was pretty standard—“We don’t normally write form rejection letters because we want to give you a personal touch when we reject you and your sorry piece of work, but in your case, we’re making an exception. Thanks, but this is not for us.” Meh. I’ve read worse.

The second rejection, however, thrilled me right down to the ragged toes of my fuzzy fuschia slippers (that’s why I’m only counting it as half a rejection: no crying). First, it was from my “dream agent.” Second, my dream agent clearly has the patience of a saint, because she is still corresponding with me even after I queried her three times for this book. And third—and this is huge—one line after informing me that she still didn’t feel she was the right agent for this manuscript, she wrote that she would “happily read” other material I sent to her. “Happily read!” Woohoo! That’s a door left ajar if I ever saw one. On the other hand, maybe delusions are another side effect of change? Nah. I’m sticking with huge.

Never has a rejection letter left me feeling so euphoric—and then, immediately, so panicked. Yes, panicked, because clearly, now I really need to get crackin’. But…that’s not going to be as easy tomorrow as it was yesterday.

Remember those changes I mentioned before?  Well, in addition to working on my manuscript for the last few months, I’ve also been doing some Other Writing. Writing that included, among other things, resumes, job applications, and cover letters. And that writing, as it turns out, was the more successful of the bunch, because…

I’ve got a new job.

Yay!!!!

But…I’ve got a new job.

Waaaaa!

To say I have some mixed feelings is a classic understatement: I am so thrilled about my new position (associate editor for a trade magazine) that I haven’t been able to sleep since accepting the offer. It’s exactly the job I’ve been hoping to land during all these years of freelancing. But unlike my freelancing gigs, this new one is a full-time position, which means the hours I’ve been able to while away on my own writing will now be consumed by writing for someone else.

Don’t get me wrong, this is a good thing, really. It is. (And I’m not just saying that to avoid hate mail from desperate job seekers out there). It is a good thing (ew: first puns and now I’m channeling Martha Stewart) for me to enter the corporate world. After all, it’s been more than eleven years that I’ve been at home taking care of my family and freelancing. Eleven years—has it really been that long? Of course I’ve got some mixed feelings—it’s the end of an era.

And while we’re on the subject, oy, you want to talk mixed feelings? How about this response from my youngest child: “Mom, I don’t want you to work over the summer—I’ll miss you.” Ouch. A moment of silence, please, for the author to take a deep breath and compose herself.

Thank you. I think I can type again now.

So that’s my Fork in the Road: it’s big and it’s shiny, but it’s some got really sharp tines. And there it looms, smack dab in the middle of my road, turning me away from the path I was on and nudging me onto a strange new one, whispering smugly “You always knew this day would come, didn’t you?” Okay, that turned out a little more mixed than I intended. Ugh.

I’m happy! I’m happy! I’m happy! There—balance restored.

Well, we all know what they say about two roads diverging, don’t we. So–Here’s to my new, unexplored road—wish me luck!