Friday, August 31, 2007
would this count?
one, two, three, four, five, six . . .
Just kidding. I'm at The Attic now, but they're about to close up shop, so I'm going to go back home and finish my 830 words, but I'm going to make a quick stop at a grocery store for some beef jerky, because I'm quite sure I can't finish these last 830 words without beef jerky. If nothing else, that much is clear to me.
Just kidding. I'm at The Attic now, but they're about to close up shop, so I'm going to go back home and finish my 830 words, but I'm going to make a quick stop at a grocery store for some beef jerky, because I'm quite sure I can't finish these last 830 words without beef jerky. If nothing else, that much is clear to me.
okay, here comes a really long post
that is cumbersome and confusing at times, and yes, it reflects a desperation for words, but it also reflects what this month has taught me, so I'm going to share:
Only 2110 words to go, and that’s barely more than a normal day, that’s so tangible and manageable and reachable and able, that’s the theme, I’m able to meet that! I can’t wait to put this into a drawer, to forget about it, but not for good, don’t worry, but to put it away and let it breathe, and let myself breathe, and then to come back to it and to form this raw clay into a story, and I’ll need to expand, and I’ll need to refine, and I’ll need to take the raw clay and still form it in many places, but that’s so fitting since it’s really a story all about creation, all about taking clay and feeling its warm and sticky heft in your hands, between your fingers, but I don’t think this clay is meant to be baked and hardened, but yet to remain pliable, which of course means that a good rain could destroy its shape, but that’s the chance you take, and it’s not natural to create stone boys, but flesh boys who can move and perhaps melt with a good rain, and now I’m really just blabbering but the blabbering counts for words, and what’s the point of reaching a word count if I’m not really adding story, but I think I might push through a mental block if I can say that I finished 50,000 words, the rough draft of a novel, and I’ll be okay to admit that it’s really a rough, rough draft, but if someone says, “what do you write?” and I can say, “Oh, mostly short stories, and I’ve got some published in small literary magazines, but I just finished the rough, rough draft of my first novel,” and you see even to be able to say something like that changes the feel of the word “writer” when it rolls off my tongue and I use it to describe myself, and if I’ve written the rough, rough draft of a novel that’s serious business, and that’s commitment, and that’s dedication, and that’s purpose, and that’s passion, and that’s something that doesn’t allow yourself to go back to constant questioning and second guessing, and that’s something that doesn’t allow yourself to spend years and years on one story about a single stupid tomato or anything else, and it’s something that frees you up to send stories out and not pin all your hopes on this one or the next one, because you are going to keep creating, and you’ll have stories upon stories, and when you have so many children it doesn’t matter if you swallow one or lose one at the zoo, because there are always more to replace it, and you can always just get knocked up again, and then when I apply to grad school I will have a novel excerpt that I can send, maybe with some completed shorter stories, and I can say I wrote a novel in a month, and I want to be able to say I’ve just finished my first novel, so the long and short of it is, get those words however I can, because this rough, rough draft is only for me, and the mental effect that it will have is also only for me, and isn’t this all about pushing through, and growing as a writer, and growing as a person, and changing somehow, and if I hadn’t changed at all in this month then what was it for, and the way my fingers are freely going now is certainly change for me, but so is the way my fingers can just type what’s happening in my head, and right now that’s not story, no, but it’s also not being censored; I’m just typing what’s there, and this is the practice I need to type what’s there when it is story, and not think first how to put it into words and then send those words to my fingertips, but instead just to feel the feeling in my chest and the weight at the back of my head, like I am now, and just to trust my fingers to write it without needing my brain to translate.
Only 2110 words to go, and that’s barely more than a normal day, that’s so tangible and manageable and reachable and able, that’s the theme, I’m able to meet that! I can’t wait to put this into a drawer, to forget about it, but not for good, don’t worry, but to put it away and let it breathe, and let myself breathe, and then to come back to it and to form this raw clay into a story, and I’ll need to expand, and I’ll need to refine, and I’ll need to take the raw clay and still form it in many places, but that’s so fitting since it’s really a story all about creation, all about taking clay and feeling its warm and sticky heft in your hands, between your fingers, but I don’t think this clay is meant to be baked and hardened, but yet to remain pliable, which of course means that a good rain could destroy its shape, but that’s the chance you take, and it’s not natural to create stone boys, but flesh boys who can move and perhaps melt with a good rain, and now I’m really just blabbering but the blabbering counts for words, and what’s the point of reaching a word count if I’m not really adding story, but I think I might push through a mental block if I can say that I finished 50,000 words, the rough draft of a novel, and I’ll be okay to admit that it’s really a rough, rough draft, but if someone says, “what do you write?” and I can say, “Oh, mostly short stories, and I’ve got some published in small literary magazines, but I just finished the rough, rough draft of my first novel,” and you see even to be able to say something like that changes the feel of the word “writer” when it rolls off my tongue and I use it to describe myself, and if I’ve written the rough, rough draft of a novel that’s serious business, and that’s commitment, and that’s dedication, and that’s purpose, and that’s passion, and that’s something that doesn’t allow yourself to go back to constant questioning and second guessing, and that’s something that doesn’t allow yourself to spend years and years on one story about a single stupid tomato or anything else, and it’s something that frees you up to send stories out and not pin all your hopes on this one or the next one, because you are going to keep creating, and you’ll have stories upon stories, and when you have so many children it doesn’t matter if you swallow one or lose one at the zoo, because there are always more to replace it, and you can always just get knocked up again, and then when I apply to grad school I will have a novel excerpt that I can send, maybe with some completed shorter stories, and I can say I wrote a novel in a month, and I want to be able to say I’ve just finished my first novel, so the long and short of it is, get those words however I can, because this rough, rough draft is only for me, and the mental effect that it will have is also only for me, and isn’t this all about pushing through, and growing as a writer, and growing as a person, and changing somehow, and if I hadn’t changed at all in this month then what was it for, and the way my fingers are freely going now is certainly change for me, but so is the way my fingers can just type what’s happening in my head, and right now that’s not story, no, but it’s also not being censored; I’m just typing what’s there, and this is the practice I need to type what’s there when it is story, and not think first how to put it into words and then send those words to my fingertips, but instead just to feel the feeling in my chest and the weight at the back of my head, like I am now, and just to trust my fingers to write it without needing my brain to translate.
so close i can taste it
or is that the apple juice i just finished? anyway, i've got 3300 words to go, and i've already done 3000 today. started out slower, but i just cranked out 950 words in 20 minutes with my eyes closed. it's still synopsis rather than narrative, or rather talking out the scene i see when i envision turning the miriam bathroom scene into narrative, but i'm going with it. i did get 1500 words of narrative of abandoned child in the belly of a whale, and no johnny depp sidetracks yet, so i'm happy with the narrative/nonnarrative ratio, all things considered. alright, back to work!
Arrggghhhhh!
I have a headache, I'm tired, and I'm whiney. Here's the piece of backstory that I'm working on turning into frontstory right now.
Anyway, Henry (who, don’t forget, is still really Abandoned Child) is slowly calcified inside the stomach of the whale. He feels first a briny crust between his toes and in the corners of his mouth. It gets harder each morning to rub the sleep out of his eyes, and his skin, which strangely didn’t prune and wrinkle inside the wet stomach of the whale, starts to feel rough and hard, sort of like the pits of the women fruit. The sounds of the whale when it communicates to other whales is sort of a lullaby that Abandoned Child can not only hear but feel down into the vibrations in his stomach, and so it’s not a totally frightening thing to be turning into stone. It somehow feels familiar and comforting.
Anyway, Henry (who, don’t forget, is still really Abandoned Child) is slowly calcified inside the stomach of the whale. He feels first a briny crust between his toes and in the corners of his mouth. It gets harder each morning to rub the sleep out of his eyes, and his skin, which strangely didn’t prune and wrinkle inside the wet stomach of the whale, starts to feel rough and hard, sort of like the pits of the women fruit. The sounds of the whale when it communicates to other whales is sort of a lullaby that Abandoned Child can not only hear but feel down into the vibrations in his stomach, and so it’s not a totally frightening thing to be turning into stone. It somehow feels familiar and comforting.
More Yarn-i-ness!
It's been a busy week in the non-yarn sense, so I haven't gotten as much knitting & crocheting done as I hoped. But I am about halfway finished with the final quarter of my Vegan Sari purse, so that should be getting sewed together real soon, then I can knit the handle and line it, so I can take it with me to The Clearing next Saturday. I'll post pix when all the pieces are complete and sewed into one.
I tried to work on my shrawl a bit every day. I've got about 15 inches done. You can barely see the first row with the eyelash crocheted in. The only problem is that the pattern said I could make the whole thing with 500 yds. of worsted and 500 yds. of mohair, plus assorted shorter quantities of novelty yarn. Maybe somebody could, but it turns out I
can't. I used up the first 250 yd. skein of the worsted at about 14 1/2 inches; I have to crochet t
o about 60 inches for it to cover my wingspan. I don't think I've done something wrong. When I hold it up my stitches, and the holes between them, look like the picture in the book. Maybe there's a typo and should read 1500 yds. of worsted, etc. It's not a real problem; I think it will be lovely and I'm definitely not frogging it to start over and try again. It's a shrawl, people, not a sock.
Remember last week when I was all panicky about not having enough
Vegan sari yarn to finish my purse so I frantically ordered more? And remember when I po
sted saying it had come but was so not the same color? Here is the proof: the picture on the left is the new yarn, the picture on the right is the old stuff. Not even close. It never occurred to me to ask them if they had green, red & yellow yarn. Ah, well, live and learn. I will have enough yarn to complete the purse with the original skeins, even if I have to make the handle a bit shorter than the pattern specifies, and now I'll have 400 g. of it to make something else. Or for someone else to make something of. Ann?
I tried to work on my shrawl a bit every day. I've got about 15 inches done. You can barely see the first row with the eyelash crocheted in. The only problem is that the pattern said I could make the whole thing with 500 yds. of worsted and 500 yds. of mohair, plus assorted shorter quantities of novelty yarn. Maybe somebody could, but it turns out I
can't. I used up the first 250 yd. skein of the worsted at about 14 1/2 inches; I have to crochet t
o about 60 inches for it to cover my wingspan. I don't think I've done something wrong. When I hold it up my stitches, and the holes between them, look like the picture in the book. Maybe there's a typo and should read 1500 yds. of worsted, etc. It's not a real problem; I think it will be lovely and I'm definitely not frogging it to start over and try again. It's a shrawl, people, not a sock.Remember last week when I was all panicky about not having enough
Vegan sari yarn to finish my purse so I frantically ordered more? And remember when I po
sted saying it had come but was so not the same color? Here is the proof: the picture on the left is the new yarn, the picture on the right is the old stuff. Not even close. It never occurred to me to ask them if they had green, red & yellow yarn. Ah, well, live and learn. I will have enough yarn to complete the purse with the original skeins, even if I have to make the handle a bit shorter than the pattern specifies, and now I'll have 400 g. of it to make something else. Or for someone else to make something of. Ann?
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