Banishing the Ego

I'm an advocate of the daily writing practice.  Each new sentence we write teaches us more about the art of language and its ability to transfer imagery from our minds to the imaginations of our readers.  Every paragraph is a lesson in connecting ideas to build a story.  Learning the craft is a never-ending, day-by-day endeavor.

Sometimes I show up, only to find my muse has taken the day off.  Those days are frustrating.  Still, I write on.

I've noticed something interesting during this journey.  The times I try to write something brilliant are the times I fail the most miserably.  It's almost as if the pressure I put on myself stifles my creativity.

It comes down to ego.

When I break it down in my mind, I realize my love for writing comes from the soul, but the desire to succeed with my writing is driven by the ego.  When you want something too much, it becomes an energy-sucking enterprise.  A kill-joy.  An abomination.

But how do you stoke the fires of self-motivation necessary to write every day, to push yourself and improve in your craft, without inviting the ego to the party?

For me, it takes constant self-surveillance.  My internal dialog includes a pep talk playing on an endless loop, reminding me to indulge in the art form, enjoy the daily process, write what I'd want to read.  It's okay that not every sentence is a masterpiece.

And sometimes, when I dismiss the ego, when I dive into the creative pool of my mind simply to enjoy its soothing waters, I tap into magic.

Do you find it challenging to strike a balance between pushing yourself and needing to succeed?

Juicy Words

I love juicy words.  That's how the language arts teachers at my kids' school describe high-impact words, the verbs and modifiers that lift your writing from mediocre to extraordinary.

I'm reading a book by Kenneth J. Harvey called The Town That Forgot How to Breathe.  Harvey is a juicy writer.  His instincts are sharp, and he chooses words that carry a lot of bang for their buck, and which sound good in the company of the other words in their sentence -- and yet, his writing is never self-indulgent verbiage.

For example, from the chapter I read last night:

"The shark rose high in the air as the crane swiveled toward the huge grey plastic container that lay on the back of a flatbed ...Gulls followed faithfully above the suspended shark, gliding weightlessly, as if attached by guide wires."

Swiveled is an action verb of distinct movement, easily invoking the intended imagery.  Instead of "truck," Harvey said flatbed, again guiding us to specific mental pictures.  And notice the alliteration in the second sentence:  gulls/gliding/guide; followed/faithfully; suspended/shark.  The [s] sound is further reinforced with consonance: gulls/weightlessly/as/wires.  And assonance enhanced the lyrical sound of the sentence with gull/above;  faithfully/weightlessly, and gliding/guide/wire.

The more experienced writer I become, the more I think with juicy words during the first draft.  However, it's not until the revision stage that I truly turn on the juice, searching out the lushest vocabulary with the highest impact and the poetic devices that will make my words sing.

Do you notice juicy words and poetic devices when you read?  Are you conscious about incorporating them when you write?

In Ten, Nine...

I leave for France in nine days, and counting.  I'm going to share a slice of my vacation adventures with you!

On June 17, the day before I leave, I will announce a contest for One Significant Moment at a Time followers, old and new.  The prize?  Something cool I pick up in France!  I'll be on the lookout for interesting, regional souvenirs, things that represent la France but which are impossible to buy here in the States.  Both my State-side and international follower-friends are eligible to win.  Be sure to check in on the 17th for full details!

I haven't written a word for my WiP in a couple weeks.  However, I have printed all the chapters and organized them in a ring binder, along with a copy of the outline and blank pages for notes.  After a little break from the project, I'll have fresh eyes when I read it over on the plane.  I won't be editing, but brainstorming ideas on how to make the story stronger and outlining future chapters.

My daily writing has taken on the form of entries for a two-week long creative writing contest at Writing.com.  The contest is called "15 For 15" and runs from June 3rd to June 17th (finishes up just in time for my trip!).  Each day for fifteen days the contest judge posts a photo prompt.  Contestants are challenged to write off-the-cuff for exactly fifteen minutes, producing a flash fiction piece, vignette, poem, song, letter, article, etc. based on the image.

Timed writing is a wonderful way to stretch my writing muscles, and believe me, fifteen minutes is not long when you're trying to get a cohesive piece of work finished. Once I've posted my daily entry, I love reading all the entries by the other contestants.  It's fascinating how many interesting and creative directions writers take with the identical prompt.  (Should you be interested, here is a link to my collection of entries.)

My writing goals have also included preparing a series of blog entries that I'll schedule to post on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays while I'm away.  Each post looks at a facet of French culture and discusses the most jarring differences with American life, which caused me culture shock when I lived there.  I'm having a blast writing them, and I hope you'll enjoy reading them.  And -- they will play into the contest I'm announcing on the 17th!

How have you been tweaking your writing schedule to adjust to summer vacation plans?  Have you packed your journal yet? :D

A Flower by Any Name

We spent Sunday afternoon at the State Botanical Gardens in Athens, GA. It's a magical place and one of our favorite destinations when we want to kick back and relax.  The structure pictured here houses the tropical plants exhibit.  Surrounding it are winding paths through artistically designed gardens, some Japanese in theme, others fragrant with herbs or seasonal flowers.

As beautiful as the carefully planned gardens around the main building are, I still prefer the controlled chaos of the nature trails.  There are five miles of hiking trails that traverse forests, fields, and along one stretch, skirts the shore of the Middle Oconee River.  If those trails could talk, they'd tell you how much we laugh together on our spirited walks.

Yesterday, though, the sky threatened pop-up storm showers.  We packed a picnic, deciding that if it rained we'd eat lunch out and picnic at home for dinner. Gotta be flexible!

The rain held off for our meal, and afterwards we spread out a blanket under a tree, on the lawns of green space below the Tropical Conservatory.  Hubby had brought a book, which he used for a pillow as he stretched out for a nap.  The kids kicked off their sandals and explored the stream bed and flowers.  And I, of course, had my journal in hand.

I love making lists of plant names.  There seems to be a poem in every designation.  Here are a few I jotted down:

Pignut Hickory
Goat's Beard
Wake Robin
Foam Flower
Maiden Hair Tree
Paw Paw
Sea Holly
Cherry Queen Sage
Blue-eyed Grass
Bee Balm
Seaside Goldenrod
Snowcap Spiderwort

Are character names swirling around your head, too?  Ideas for stories and fodder for poetry abound in the botanical gardens.  Next time you visit one, be sure to have your journal with you!

Happy Monday!

Wading Along a Flooded Memory Lane

I'm supposed to be getting ready for our trip.  There are a lot of things to think about when you prepare to leave the country for three weeks.  Wardrobes and shoes need to be appraised, bills need to be scheduled for payment, camera and video memory sticks need to be purchased, airline guidelines need to be reviewed so we don't arrive at the airport and learn we have too many, too heavy bags.

But, I'm a procrastinator.

I do a little something each day, so I can hold my head high in the evening when hubby asks what I accomplished.  Yesterday though, when the kids wanted to spend time with me doing "something NOT boring," I decided to embark on  a project that's been long overdue -- and admittedly one I don't have time for right now.

For the fourteen years hubby and I have been married, we've taken photographs to archive our lives together.  Everyone does, right?  Our problem is we've always printed out the photos from film (until two years ago when we scored our first digital camera), enjoyed flipping through the pictures for a week or so, and then tossed the envelop into a royal blue footlocker that once served as a coffee table when we were newly weds, and now occupies a stretch of wall in my writing studio.  It barely closes.

The kids and I started in Target, where we optimistically purchased two photo binders holding a total of 600 pictures.  By late afternoon, it was clear to us that we'd need to make a return trip.

We looked through hundreds and hundreds of pictures, laughing at forgotten memories, oohing and ahhing over the glossy images of the kids' baby years, telling and retelling the stories of our lives.

Each photo is one significant moment in time.  Oh, the stories.

The pic at the top of this post was taken one month after Sidney was born.  She's snuggled in the carrier strapped to my chest.  Cody was a month shy of two years old.  We spent that day roaming the ruins of the chateau, dating from the 10th century, of Foix, which is a wonderful little city in the department of Ariège.  At the time, we lived outside Toulouse, and Foix was just a forty-five minute drive away.  It is considered the gateway to the beautiful Pyrenées Mountains, the natural southern border between France and Spain.  (Learn more about Foix HERE.)

This is a beautiful photo of Foix (thanks, Source).  In the photo of us, above, we were making our way down the cobblestoned path from the chateau to the city below.

Now that we have a digital camera, we're terrible about printing out pictures.  But once I have all these memories stored in their binders, I'm turning my sights on the memory sticks and computer hard drive.  Call me old-fashioned, but I like to hold books of photos in my hands, in a comfy chair looking out a sunny window, with a cup of fresh brewed coffee.  Memory lane loses some of its charm when I'm staring at a computer screen.

What about you?  Do you print photos or prefer storing them online?  Glass protected paper photo or digital frame?  Paper of plastic?

Used Books verses New -- A Dilemma?

I happened into a used bookstore recently.  Across the threshold, I stepped away from sun-baked concrete and automobile exhaust, and into a cool world of aged dust and nostalgia.  Bookshelves ran along the perimeter walls from carpeted floor to stamped tin ceiling, and free-standing shelves created narrow aisles from the plate glass windows to the stockroom, presumably at the back.  A glance at my watch assured me I had time before the sitter would need relief, and into the shelves I wandered.

I left the store with only three purchases: a literary fiction novel, a romance novel, and a compilation of strange ghost-hunting cases.  I paid $6.70 (TOTAL!) plus tax.  The very next day, I read a post by Vicky Rocho at Rambles & Randomness in which she discussed secondhand book sales and their impact on authors and publishers.

She got me thinking.  Is it wrong to buy used books?  Should I spend my money on full price new books, thus supporting the publishing industry I so badly want to be a part of?  Just how much does the secondhand book business cut into profit margins for authors and publishers?

So I did a little investigating.

The newest of the books I bought that day was The Mistress, by Phillipe Tapon.  On the back cover is the publisher's price of $12.95.  A yellow price sticker next to it displayed the bookstore's selling price of $3.50.

The Mistress is not a recent book.  Its copyright date is 1999.  At BarnesandNoble.com, you can only purchase the digital, MP3 book for $14.95.  The story was the same at Borders.com, with audio cassette and CD available starting at $39.95.   At Amazon.com, there are 15 new, traditional book copies available, starting at $1.90 and 76 used copies, starting at $.01.

I don't know if Barnes and Noble or Borders would be able to order the paperback of The Mistress, but next time I'm in their stores I'll ask.  In any case, I don't think my purchase of this book has hurt Mr. Tapon or Penguin Books.  But what about if I'd bought a newer title, one still available on chain bookstore shelves?

I found an interesting New York Times article entitled, "Reading Between the Lines of Used Book Sales."  It ran July 28, 2005, so may be somewhat dated now.  However, author Hal R. Varian made the argument that, economically speaking, the secondhand book business did not significantly impact publishing industry sales.  His article explored Amazon.com and its new and used book sales statistics, and often waded into economic waters I couldn't easily follow.  In the end, though, he says, "...there are two distinct types of buyers: some purchase only new books, while others are quite happy to buy used books. As a result, the used market does not have a big impact in terms of lost sales in the new market."  He goes on to say, "Moreover, the presence of lower-priced books on the Amazon Web site, Mr. Bezos [the chief executive of Amazon.com, at the time] has noted, may lead customers to 'visit our site more frequently, which in turn leads to higher sales of new books.'"  (Read the whole article HERE.)

What do you think?  In an age where the traditional paper book is facing the possibility of extinction evolution, does buying used books feel wrong to you?  Should we be supporting the publishing houses, or building our libraries before the good stuff goes away?  

A Literary Nod

I wrote a Tuesday Teaser post a while back, highlighting an excerpt from a creative nonfiction story about my brief kidnapping by Central African rebels.  The story has been entered in a contest since the end of January.  I would link the excerpt here, but I removed it from the post because judging was still underway.

I learned yesterday that In the Face of Danger received an Honorable Mention in the 29th New Millennium Writings Contests, which had a deadline of January 31, 2010.

Whoo-hoo!

Edited and published by Don Williams, here's how the literary magazine introduces itself on its website:  Welcome to New Millennium Writings, a journal filled with vibrant imagery, word-craft and pure story-telling talent. NMW is a Winner of a Golden Press Card Award for Excellence.

And here are some accolades by industry insiders:

“I found this to be one of the most powerful literary experiences I've ever had. For anyone who gives a whit about writing or the human condition,New Millennium Writings should be required reading.” —Kane S. Latranz, Alibi


“Fiction, poetry, and nonfiction that will feed your soul.”—New Pages

“Best Reading for Spring, 2010.”—The Montserrat Review

“The works of the best new authors in fiction, non-fiction and poetry are stunningly presented in each volume.”—Direct Communications

“Highly recommended. NMW is one of our favorite journals.”—Winning Writers

New Millennium Writings has published regularly since 1996, in both the online format and in literary magazine-style bound "book," but in the past years their issues have gone down from biannual to one issue per year.  The first place award winners from the two contests this year will be published in the 2011 issue due out this winter, as well as some honorable mentions.

In the most recent issue, No. 19 (the cover graces this post), only three Nonfiction stories were published.
Going back to issue No. 18 (2008-9), there were six Nonfiction stories published.

Keep your fingers crossed that In the Face of Danger will be published in issue No. 20, coming in Winter 2011!

It's good to feel encouraged; this nod has certainly stoked my fires again.

What's fanned your writing flames lately?