My cappuccino, taken this morning on the outdoor patio of my local coffee house.
Yesterday, I was chatting with an online friend who also happens to be a writer. "Can I ask you a question?" she typed.
"Absolutely," I responded.
"Lately, I feel like I'm in a rut -- like my writing isn't going anywhere, and there's nothing special about my words. Do you ever feel like that?"
"All the damned time," was my immediate response. The truth is, lately I've been feeling exactly that way. I've been writing, but I haven't felt like I'm progressing. For the past month or so, I've been mulling around in my head what I needed to do to shake this sensation of being in the doldrums. And thankfully, I think I've come up with something.
About 5 years ago (almost to the day), I had the insane idea of writing a novel. It was insane because back then I was working as a lawyer, in a job that required me to be at an airport, or in an airplane or in a hotel constantly -- not exactly a lifestyle conducive to spending large blocks of time in front of a computer trying to be creative. Nevertheless, I started writing, and managed to get about 20 pages onto my hard drive. Then I stopped.
Recently, I revisited those pages. And while they were certainly adequate, I wouldn't describe them as riveting. Still, five years later, I think the premise of the novel is sound, and since now my time is more my own to manage, I thought perhaps I'd take a fresh stab at it.
So this morning, after dropping Alex off at her day school, I went to my neighbourhood coffee house with my laptop computer, pulled up a brand new Microsoft Word document, and started outlining the premise of the novel as if I were doing it for the very first time. At the most basic level, I spent about three hours imagining who my main characters were going to be, the conflicts they'd be facing, and brainstormed how these conflicts would be resolved. At the end of the session, I felt more invigorated than I've felt in a while. I might be onto something, I couldn't help thinking.
In about twelve days, I'll be 39 years old. As is my custom, I try to make New Year's Resolutions on my birthday (I think resolutions on birthdays are far more meaningful, don't you?). So, this year I believe my resolution will be:
I will have my novel written and ready to be shopped to publishers by my 40th birthday.
The reason I'm telling you this is because this forum, Chookooloonks, works wonders for keeping me focused. Last year, as part of NaNoWriMo, I vowed publicly to write a 50,000-word novel, and you guys kept me on track (the result was a steaming pile of dung, but hey, I completed it). Similarly, seven weeks ago I declared publicly here that I was going to start running -- and though I don't necessarily enjoy it, I am starting to appreciate it more, and I have no intention of quitting anytime soon. So I'm hoping that by letting you in on my writing plans, I'll feel more committed to staying on track.
In order to keep myself honest, however, I'm obviously going to have to give you periodic updates. However, I refuse to use the word-count method of NaNoWriMo -- while the exercise of just getting words on paper was invaluable, I found myself sacrificing quality for quantity, and I don't want to do that this time. Instead, how about if I occasionally share with you the last sentence I've written in my novel draft? In that way, you'll be able to see the progress (without actually reading the novel), and you'll find yourself intrigued! Captivated! Fascinated, even!
Or perhaps it'll just make me feel better.
In any event, that's the plan, Stan. I won't actually start writing until after my 39th birthday -- I want to spend the time between now and then really getting my outline down pat. After that, though, I'm counting on you to keep my nose to the grindstone.
And, as always, thanks.
