Christmas cookies and changes...

So here it is the week of Christmas and instead of having a warm cozy time of it with family and friends, I find myself banging my head against the keyboard of my computer with a major case of writer’s block with regards to the book. I’m considering skipping ahead and writing a chapter that is swirling in my head and then go back or forward from there and fill in the blanks. Then I get side tracked with Christmas “stuff” and lose sight of what I’m working on.

Then I get distracted thinking about editing and then changes in general. I find that the thing about changes is that it never stops. Everything is in constant flux. I’ve been going through some changes myself the last few weeks and months. I’ve been evaluating myself and my relationships, my beliefs, my life’s work and accomplishments and anything and everything that can be evaluated. That’s the problem with having an analytical mind, you analyze everything and everyone.

Socrates said the unexamined life is not worth living and I agree. If you don’t take the time to look at things and just run along on auto-pilot you miss out on the pleasures of living.

It has also been said that ignorance is bliss and I agree to this as well. What I don’t know about, I don’t worry about. A sort of “don’t worry, be happy” philosophy.

I know that these two things are at complete odds and yet they are both true in certain circumstances and in certain states of mind. I want to know and analyze and logic myself to death and yet I’d rather not know and worry myself to death.

Still here I am in this state of contemplation and it isn’t always a happy place to be. Sometimes when you closely look at your life, you find you aren’t as happy as you thought you were. Auto-pilot allows you to function and fool yourself into happiness. This place of mental funk is hard to shake off and you go about feeling lost in the “what-ifs” of your mind.

May be it’s a midlife crisis. Maybe it’s empty nest syndrome. I don’t know. I just know that I’m sometimes second guessing my life choices now and it is a path I’m almost afraid to go down for fear of where it will lead me. What if I decide I can live with my current choices and be happy?

Then again, maybe everyone needs to take the time to step back and re-examine themselves not in fear that they will only find regrets but so that they can see the accomplishments as well. We all have highs and lows in our lives things we have done and those we have left un-done. It reminds us that there are still things to accomplish and goals to reach.

Sigh, too much thinking and not enough Christmas cookies, I think.

Memories...

Oddly enough, I have been thinking about the time I spent at Butler High School lately. I was only there two years but like all events we experience, it impacted my life in good and bad ways.

I’ve never attended a high school reunion since most of my friends were not in my class but instead were members of all the classes before and after me. Hard to find the reunion that covers that group! (Someday I would love to meet up with all the drama and radio kids again though.)

At any rate due to my writing my Young Adult novel (which has a target audience of 12 – 18 year olds), I have been thinking about incidents in high school and the angst attached to them – the desire to fit in, the broken hearts, the need to appear cool, and all the trials and tribulations of school. Though the hairstyles and clothing has thankfully changed since my days in school the issues are the same for kids in school today.

And as I get older I realize that the issues in high school are the same today as an adult. The desire to be liked and fit in with co-workers and family, broken hearts with broken relationships, disappointments, the need to appear cool or acceptable to hire at a job interview, the need to persuade the board to like you and thus your ideas. The further I am removed from school, the closer I am back to that first day my sophomore year at Butler High hoping that I would be able to open my locker.

Angst is angst whether you are 14 or 43. I may have better coping skills now than I did then and I may have the ability to remove myself emotionally and see the big picture but the fear remains the same. At least I hope I have those skills now, some days the “locker” doesn’t open and I have to wonder at my emotional response. Regardless, it is all good fodder for the book.

The Writing Process

I’m beginning to think I am schizophrenic since I am hearing voices in my head. The voices are the characters in my novel. I feel like I know them so well that in any given situation I can tell you their responses. I can almost hear a tone and pitch of their voices but I definitely can hear their words.

I’ve noticed something else too. I hear music in the background for each of the characters. I’ll be listening to music and think “oh, Derek would like this song,” and Derek isn’t real. I know this but still the thought comes to mind.

Maybe immersion like this is necessary for me to commit to finishing this book since I’ve started so many books before and haven’t finished as their voices were lost to me along the way. The only way at this point that I’ll free myself from the “voices” is to finish.

My writing classes are a huge help too. The encouragement, the criticisms are the lifeblood of the process. They help me to refine and re-think the voyage along the way. I have completely changed my major challenge to my character as a result.

Another plus are my first readers. As I send them chapters they comment and refine my voices as well. Their encouragement (and demands that I finish and send them more to read!) is essential to the journey of writing.

At the end of this, I have to wonder, who is the real author? The person who types the words or the people who help refine the work? Perhaps it is necessarily a joint process.

Now if the voices will just quiet down enough to let me finish other things…