The Dreaded "No Signal"

Photo from Pinterest expresses exactly how I feel without my internet.

There has been occasion; with the amount of time I spend on the internet, that I worry I’m addicted. Well, now it’s confirmed, I am truly and without a doubt, hooked on the internet. My modem quit on Saturday night and I have been cut off from the all things internet for almost four days.

 

That’s no internet and no E-mail, and no posting to my blog. To make matters worse, my phone line is connected to my modem, so no telephone. At least my cable worked so I still had television.

 

I felt lost. Since my move I haven’t gotten back into other hobbies, so no painting, knitting or such, and have depended entirely on my laptop for my amusement. And there I was; no Blogger Dashboard, no Pinterest, and no PGA Shot Tracker (that’s a story for another day).

 

Saturday night I did the movie marathon thing, and watched movies on my laptop. Using the laptop prevented me from opening my book for another round of editing. Even dedicated writers need a break.

 

Sunday, while the PGA Championship played in the background (part of that other story), I went back to editing, wanting to correct something I’d dismissed earlier from my friend’s list of comments. Sometimes I’m just too lazy to make that kind of complicated change, or, as I prefer to think of it, I need to let it stew until the solution comes to me.

 

Where I would normally have taken a break, checked my E-mail, scanned Pinterest, I played Solitaire. Finding Spider was not enough of a challenge; I switched to Free Cell and whiled away a number of hours playing games.

 

I had to go out on Sunday, since I had no phone to confirm plans with a friend for Monday. I used her phone to call my service provider and got an electronic message. They gave me something to try, which of course I couldn’t try until later, and when it didn’t work, I was still without a phone to call back.

 

Today I borrowed a neighbour’s phone, called the cable company, and got to speak to a real live person. When she couldn’t reboot, or whatever, from her location, I got the promise of a service call, for that very afternoon. Wow, was I impressed.

 

I was not going to have to drive the streets, searching for a signal or a site with free WIFI in order to complete my post.

 

I feel free, I feel connected, I feel wireless.

 

All is good and right with my world.

Writing and the Subconscious Mind

I think it’s funny how bits and pieces of my life, my memories, find their way into my writing.

 

In Book ONE, the main character, a young woman alone and feeling lost, finds her grandmother’s cookbook. It was more of a journal, recipes and anecdotes of family events. Memories.

A few years ago I started making scrapbook pages of my favourite recipes. I have the originals, but each of my grandchildren has a copy. There are photos of the kids baking with me, and notes about where a recipe came from, or when it was first served.

Kayla, Tia and Rianna, my baking buddies.

 

All the recipes are in a binder, in protective sleeves, the binder covers done with each child’s name and photo in true scrapbooking style.

 

 

The recipes were about thirty in number when my daughter and daughter-in-law presented me with a make work project.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two more grandchildren, born a month apart, had me scrambling back to Staples for more binders and a slew of photocopying.

 

I hope, when those kids are grown, they will enjoy the recipes, and remember their grandmother with love. Exactly the feelings my character had reading her grandmother’s journal. 

My father died suddenly in 1988. I think of him often, and have to laugh as memories of him find their way into my books.

Dad’s routine on a Sunday morning was simple, coffee, a cigarette, and the crossword puzzle. He had this small pencil, which he picked up at the golf course for marking his score card, and used it for the crossword.

I wasn’t so fussy, if I saw the unfinished crossword on the table, I’d grab a pen and fill in what I could, often having to scratch over a mistake. Those were tough puzzles.

My dad had a subtle way of telling you what he thought, without making it a big issue. Like when I was a teenager and I experimented with peroxide, leaving my normally dark hair streaked with orange. I didn’t get the expected parental lecture, what I got was a simple question. “How long will it take to grow out?”

So his annoyance, at my taking a pen to his crossword puzzle, was handled the same way. “Some might say it’s a sign of conceit to do a crossword in ink.” I used the pencil after that, but I used one with an eraser on the tip.

Is it any wonder when I had an elderly man and a young woman strike up a friendship, it was forged over filling in a crossword puzzle. I liked this concept so much; I made the crossword an ongoing part of Book FOUR.

My dad was fond of peanut butter, loved it on his toast in the mornings. My mother found a wooden plaque, cut in the shape of a slice of bread, with the following motto. “Man cannot live by bread alone, he must have peanut butter.” I remember it sat on the top of the stove in their place in Florida.

In Book SIX, I wanted two strangers to meet, and strived to make that meeting memorable. The woman is in the grocery store picking up supplies for the cottage, and stops in the aisle with all the peanut butter and jams.

She had recently lost her husband, her grief compounded when she learns he’d been having an affair. She looks at the peanut butter and has a flashback to better times, remembering when her husband gave her that same wooden plaque, a joking reference to her pregnancy craving for peanut butter.

The other character comes upon this teary woman and…well, you’d have to read the book.

What gets me is all these real memories end up in my writing without any plan. I wasn’t writing only to stop and think, what could I use from my life to make this work? After writing those segments, I’d sit back in surprise, shocked that those memories came so fluidly from my subconscious, and worked so well.

Thanks Dad, love you and miss you every day.

 

 

Book Number FOUR, A Human Interest Story

For book number FOUR, I wanted to write something outside the comfort of ‘write what you know. Not that I really know anything about murder, or being jilted, I wanted to write a story with more depth, more emotion…just more.

Something, I thought, about interpersonal relationships, and how the convoluted thinking of one person, can have ramifications for others, for years to come. A human interest story with strong characters the reader could connect with, enough to want to stay with them on their journey of discovery.

By the time I’d completed the first draft, it was more than 400 pages long, double spaced mind you, and over 100,000 words.

The research was intense; the topics personal, thought provoking and, at times, emotionally draining.

One of the problems with research is the potential to get side tracked. Time spent reading articles that may veer off topic, is not really time squandered, for you never know when that information might prove valuable.

It’s like You Tube. Somebody sends you a link to You Tube, and for the next hour you’re watching all these other videos selected from the ever changing side bar. Or Pinterest, that’s just as addictive. But I digress.

For this book my research centred on adoption, and World War II. Two subjects completely outside my personal knowledge or experience.

My focus was on adult adoptees, searching for their birth parents. I found sites that detailed the red tape involved in searching sealed files for adoption information, and support organizations offering aid and advice.

But the stories from adoptees, and birth families, gave a picture of how difficult, and often futile, their searches were, in a way the government rules, regulations and forms could not.

I talked to people with first hand experience in searching for a child given up for adoption. They all felt the same frustration, had all suffered through the ongoing bureaucracy and the endless waiting.

I wanted a character to have a war time experience that fit with my plot, and was at the same time credible and based in truth. I immersed myself in the war, reading books and articles, even watching old war movies.

I had dates of battles fought, the number of troops mobilized and of course, the casualties. All the statistics of war. What brought it all into focus for me was a site I came upon, copies of original letters, written by soldiers while serving overseas. Letters mailed home, reflecting the harsh situations endured, the fear of the unknown, the need to stay connected with loved ones.

Then I found a search site, written by family members who wanted to understand what their father, or grandfather, had endured in the war, what was so horrible they would never, ever, speak of it.

The list was long, details of military history were given, requesting any information about the service of their relative. Most requests were initiated after the Veteran’s death, out of respect for their feelings, I would imagine.

I was moved beyond words, and in those readings I found my fictitious old Vet, my Sam.

I used only a small amount of that research in my book, but all of it gave me a better understanding of my characters, so none of it was a wasted effort. I’ll keep all my notes, all the printouts, along with a list of reference books and sites, for you never know, I might need them again, for some other story.

I gave this manuscript to a friend from my writing group, told her it was too long, and she gave it back to me with pencil notations and a large number of yellow sticky notes for where I could ‘slice and dice’.

I appreciate the effort she went to, believe me, as I have spent the last five days going line by line, looking at her suggestions, making some changes, resisting others, and initiating revisions of my own.

So far, I’ve decreased the word count by almost 5000 words. I bolded sections she suggested could be deleted, sections I was too attached to for now, and will look at the next go round.

I once read a book in which the main character was a published writer. In the book he talked about the status of his novels, at any given time. There was the one he was currently writing, a second he had just finished that was in the edit phase and a third that he had recently published and was doing promotional work for.

Sounds complicated, doesn’t it? If that is a realistic representation of the publishing business, then I don’t feel quite so bad. I’ve been so inundated with editing and preparing to E publish, I haven’t written anything but a few short stories for the year…thus far.

There’s still November, National Novel Writing Month. More familiarly called NaNoWriMo, it’s a challenge to write 50,000 words in 30 days.

I have lots of time to come up with an idea.

 

 

Friends, Both Fictional and Real

When I started my first book four years ago, to say I knew nothing about writing, would be a gross understatement.

I remember sitting in the writing group, hearing the term ‘protagonist’ tossed about, and I had no idea what they were talking about. But I wanted to learn.

I made notes at every meeting. If anyone reading this knows me, they’d be shaking their head and saying ‘of course she made notes’. I wrote down any words I didn’t understand and looked them all up once I was home.

Given this lack of knowledge, what made me think I could write a book? I don’t know, but write a book I did.

I had my brother’s notes from his creative writing course, some ‘how to’ books and a copy of Writer’s Digest magazine. More importantly, I had an idea, and I had the drive, even if I was lacking in experience and confidence.

There was something else I had in my favour, or rather someone, my friend and neighbour. She suffered through the writing of that first book, word for word and page by page, right along side of me.

I wrote the first few chapters, printed them off and gave them to her to read. After, we sat down with a cup of tea and talked about what I had written. This became a routine, the sharing, the discussion, the tea, or sometimes, maybe a glass of wine. She was my sounding board, as she listened to my struggles with plot, characterization et cetera, with unwavering encouragement.

We talked about the process of writing, almost as much as we talked about my story. I was an eager student, wanting to share everything I learned. And she loved education, her career having been spent in the public school system.

Midway through the book, I remember sitting at her place, as we rehashed the new chapters, talking about what Katie, my female 'protagonist', was up to.

I started to laugh. “Look at us,” I said. “We’re sitting here gossiping about this fictional character like she’s someone real, someone we know.”

We were invested in this young woman’s struggle, for she had become very real to us. For me as I wrote, and for her as she read, we were emotionally involved in her life, her heartbreak and her desire to start over, to find her place.

At that point in my life I was also trying to find my place, and needed something, some outlet to keep me busy and challenge my need to be creative.

For more than thirty years, I had been a dedicated nurse. A career I lost, suddenly, due to the worsening of my chronic illness.

Writing became my solace, it filled that void in my life the way nothing else could. As pain and fatigue are with me constantly, writing is something I can do even when I feel at my worst.

I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you, to my friend, Joyce. I don’t know if I would have finished that first book without your support.

That experience was unique, and was not to be repeated. I've gained confidence, and though we still discuss what I’m writing, I only give her a manuscript to read once the first draft is complete. She’s one of my regular readers now, and I prefer to have her feedback after she’s read the book at her own pace, instead of having it doled out in pieces.

She once told me she doesn’t read with the same sense of enjoyment as she did before. She reads with a more critical eye now, looking at the details and how the book has been written.

I think she’s reading more like a writer.

 

 

Friends, Feedback and a Final Revision

The completion of a novel, for the writer, is not ‘The End’ (play on words), it’s just the beginning…of a demanding cycle of rewrite/revise and endless editing. Many of the books and articles on writing will say, put it away, distance yourself, take the time so when you’re ready to start the revisions, you have a fresh outlook.

If you have trusted readers, this is the time to share, knowing full well that when you hand your manuscript to someone else to read, you’re asking for feedback, for suggestions to make the story better.

In the beginning, my readers were friends and family. The problem, most of these readers were not writers, and knew nothing of the writing process. They’re readers, and as such, know what they like, even if they don’t know why.

My first readers were my brother and his wife. As my brother was also a writer, he understood how fiction worked and gave me a lot of constructive feedback. His wife is an avid reader, with a sharp analytical mind. She gave me honest opinions of what worked, what didn’t, who she liked, and why.

My other readers at the time were friends, who were excellent at finding grammatical errors, misspellings, repeated words and such, but were terrible in giving plot and character feedback.

I say were, for as I’ve grown as a writer, they’ve grown as a reader, and I get more from them now than ‘It’s a nice story”.

My best reader, also an excellent editor, is an old friend, and fellow writer. We share excerpts back and forth, a sort of edit as you go kind of thing. As most of our sharing is done by E-mail, there’s an honesty in what we share that might not have been comfortable in a face to face discussion.

Sometimes I need to step back, from what might initially be taken as criticism, to give my emotions a chance to settle. I’m the first to admit that once I take the time and calmly think about what she had to say, I can see her point.

Her voice is in my head now as I write. I’m more aware of how I tend to change point of view in the middle of a scene, and how I need to break up long narratives with some dialogue.

A few times I’ve shied away from a difficult scene, and let the plot move forward in back story, instead of dialogue. She calls me on it every time. “You copped out” or “You missed an opportunity here” and I’ve gone back and done the rewrite. Sometimes I just needed a bit of distance, before the scene could be written. Distance and a kick in the ass.

Books ONE and TWO I never shared with anyone, other than friends and family. They were written and put away in the drawer. Now that I’ve pulled them out into the light, so to speak, my friend is giving me the benefit of her time and experience and I see some more editing in my future.

Book number THREE, was my murder story. I shared it with other writers in my writing group, and received some excellent feedback. I was told when a character’s behaviour didn’t seem realistic, and where I needed to beef up the action. This was Death by Drowning, and by the time I did the final revision, I was confident enough to self publish with Amazon, for Kindle.

I’ve made some sales, which is great, but more important…I finished a book, all the way from A to Z. From an idea, to a finished piece of writing that I can be proud of, and am confident enough to share with the reading public.

I’ve started too many projects, and left them unfinished.

Old manuscripts may be hidden away in a drawer, out of sight, but they are never out of mind. At least writing is easier to store, a simple flash drive will hold everything I’ve ever written and more.

I have too many canvases and framed works of art stored in the closet, taking up room and collecting dust. I’ve been at this so long, my friends and family have run out of available wall space.

What do you do with it all? It’s frustrating, this need to create, and having to deal with the ongoing accumulation of work.

And yet, as creative people, we have this need to have our work recognized, appreciated, and to feel that we’re growing as an artist, as a writer. We may be solitary in the completion of our work, but once it’s done, we need to share; the process, the struggles and the final triumph.

 

There’s an excitement in knowing that creation, whatever it may be, came from our hand, our imagination.

And isn’t that a hell of a thing?