Category: psycho writing

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avoidance post # 3

I should be writing.

Well, this counts, right? Thought I’d take a break from writing…to do more writing. Yeah. I’m weird that way. I just thought I’d share what Ive done in the last few hours.

  • wrote a caption for a picture of…a sock
  • created a new Pandora station (try Beny More if you want some AWESOME Cuban music)
  • wrote 3K words towards my remaining 20K (now 17K woohoo!)
  • made a tasty dinner of palomilla and rice (with lots of onions!)
  • folded some clothes (and put them away!)
  • made some tea (Earl Grey, with a tea kettle, not a replicator)

And finally, what prompted me to write this in the first place, I discovered that I have a racing stripe of gray hair right in the middle of my head. I know, weird, right?

Okay, look, I’m really fine with the salt and pepper thing I have going on. Really. I quit dying my hair years ago, and it has been at least one less thing I have to keep up with, so…whatever. Sure, every once in a while the cashier at Publix asks if I want the senior discount, but other than that I’ve never really thought too much about it.

Except now.

I have a gray racing strip in the middle of my head.

It starts right at my crown and if I brush my hair forward I look like Pepe Le Pew. Of course, I entertained myself by combing it in other directions. Because, you know, I’ve got those 17K words waiting for me.

Thought I’d share. Back to my regularly scheduled writing.

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brother, can you spare a word? or 36K?

The problem with NaNoWriMo is not the challenge of writing the 50,000 words (what? I didn’t really say that); it’s what writing 50,000 words does to my other writing. For starters, it’s a different  genre.  I’m so long-winded it’s probably a good fit for me … but right now I’m hitting that wall that comes in the second week.  Seasoned NaNoWriters say that getting past this hump is the hardest part, and then it’s smooth sailing.

Okay. Sure. Easier said than done.

Let me wallow in my little pity party a minute, and then I’ll get back to the novel. Because, you know, I’m gonna do it. I just thought I’d take a little break from it and use up some words on the ole blog – you know, where I got crazy and decided that I wasn’t going to die if I actually shared what I wrote every once in a while.

So the big challenge is the word count. Finding the words that count. Add up. Tell a story. Oh, you say, is that all?

Well, yes, that is all. That’s a lot. For writers, that’s what we have to work with, and most of us have this little love affair with words that maybe only we understand. But sometimes, there’s more than words – the stuff that’s abstract and floating around in our heads, our hearts, maybe our souls. Those are the things that we write about, but we need to find the words to articulate it first.

Sometimes, though, words are not enough. Or maybe, the right train of thought here is that words are not necessary. It’s okay to just feel it. Ha! And then, inevitably, write about it. But first we feel.

Let me tell you I’m feeling a lot right now. Scared is probably at the top of that list, followed by its best friend, insecure. I’m taking the GRE this Friday morning and applying for a doctoral program in English and Communications. This is just the beginning of the process, so I don’t have anything to add but a simple request for prayers. You decide what you want to pray about – I certainly don’t know.

Well, hold on. How about prayers that I remember the math I took THIRTY YEARS AGO. Sheesh, that’s a sobering number. Anyway, there you have it. You heard it here, first.  Suddenly my little experiment with 50,000 words isn’t so daunting, even if I did just give away 411 words.

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