When Procrastination Sets In...

My son is at camp for the whole week. It’s 2:00 on Monday afternoon. I’ve been looking forward to all the writing that would occur this week. I mean, I’ll be by myself during the day. Hours and hours to do nothing but write. I have a short story that is only a couple of thousand words from complete. I have critique group stuff to critique. I have manuscripts to get ready to send in to for the SCBWI Mid-South Fall Conference. I need to send out emails for the August SCBWI Evansville event with Margaret McMullen.
Instead, I am checking out Twitter and Facebook and the camp website. (They post new pics every day, and my son might be in one of them!) I did write a new poem to post on Twitter—a Fib about not getting writing done.

Wait
Stall
Put off
They call it
Procrastination.
Like this Fib; instead of writing.

Does that count as “writing?” Hmmm…technically, yes.
Now I’m even updating my blog! Wow, I’m really grasping at straws to put off the writing, huh?
The question is, why? I love to write. The last several weeks, I have been thinking, I’ll miss my son, but I can’t wait to work on my story. I wonder how many thousand words I’ll get written? Well, one day is almost down and the grand total is 14—from the Fib!
Maybe it’s because the sun is shining right outside the library window. Or maybe I expected to get so much done, that I am afraid I won’t meet my expectations. Maybe it’s because I have a new (used) car, and it’s so much fun to drive that I really just want to keep zooming around town running errands (something I normally hate to do).
Well, in the immortal words of every procrastinator…maybe tomorrow…
In the meantime, I would love to hear from other writers out there. What causes you to put off writing—the very thing you supposedly love to do? More importantly, what do you do about it? Post your best tips and stories to help us all get to work!
Thanks…and get busy!

Writers' Retreat Weekend!

I returned home yesterday from Stanford, Kentucky, where my online Mid-South SCBWI critique group met for a weekend of writing. We had not seen each other since last year's Mid-South Conference in September, which is where most of us met for the first time!

Beth arranged for us to stay in the Bishop House, a lovely 3-story home, so there was plenty of room for the five attendees to get away for some quiet writing time. We were often gathered around the dining room table, all with our laptops whirring! I also did a fair bit of writing on the front porch, where I am pictured at the left with Grace. For myself, I started a story from scratch this weekend and wrote 6,500 words. That felt pretty productive. It is a short story that I hope to continue on into a book, and I'm very excited about it. We also had nightly critique sessions where we read each other's work out loud then discussed. What a talented group.

Thanks to Beth, we spent a fair amount of time eating delicious food and walking around the small town of Stanford. I look forward to seeing all (I hope) of the Original Seven at this year's Mid-South Conference.

Articles for the Westside and BorderLines

Whew! Just finished my latest article for the Westside this afternoon, and I feel drained. Maybe it's because I put it off too long and had to suddenly get it all finished in the last two days. But finish it I did, another deadline successfully met. This article, which is a cover story scheduled for June 12th, was an article I suggested. It is about Bob of Bob's Gym, an Evansville business that has turned into an Evansville icon. Since I am at the west side location pretty faithfully, it was really cool to learn how Bob and his parents started the business 18 years ago in a much smaller west side building. Bob and his dad were a lot of fun to talk to, and everyone was very helpful. Since I am at the gym almost every day, I sure hope Bob and everyone there likes it!

The article was finished and submitted early this afternoon, but then the pictures had to be sent, always a lengthy process. But assuming I get no questions from my editor, I'm all done for now!

I have also posted a link to my latest non-Westside article. This one is in BorderLines, the newsletter for Mid-South SCBWI. I was pleased with it and hope everyone will take a look. Maybe now that article-writing is done (for now), I can do a little creative writing over the next couple of weeks...

The Story That Has to be Told

I've been reading Alan Gratz's Twitter comments about how many chapters/words he's gotten done on recent days, and it made me yearn for those days! I miss that. It was so exciting when I was working on my novel, adding word count. What a sense of accomplishment when I'd had a good day or a good week. There's nothing more tangible than that word count building and that feeling of building a story towards a culmination.

Now, though I need to do a lot on that same story, I yearn for that feeling of working towards something like word count. I've had several different story ideas, but I can't decided which one to work on, or even if I want to work on one of them. When I had the Everett on Everest idea, there was no doubt. I knew that would be a story that I would follow through till the end. I long for another of those ideas. I have never felt such accomplishment as when I was working on that book. That makes me think it will be someday be a big success. I have never worked so hard on something that I have written. There's a lot of work still do, and I have to get into that 'editing' mode, but I think it will be a really good book someday. Meanwhile, I'll be on the lookout for another one of those stories, one of those you just can't say no to, one of those that just has to be told.

New Poem!

I just wrote a new poem that I'm really pleased with. I guess it's a simplified form of a cadae. A cadae is based on the first five numbers in pi (3.1415). I think in a real cadae of five stanzas, the first stanza has 3 lines, the second 1 line, etc. Then they also have a set amount of syllables per line. Mine is simpler--five stanzas of five lines each with a syllable count per line of 3,1,4,1,5. I might have to submit this one--somewhere!

Deadline

Leaves beckon.
Come
Into the breeze.
Breathe
Deep this summer sun.

Blocked by time
And
This window pane.
Breathe
Instead cycled air.

Those leaves dance.
How
They undulate.
What?
Do they call or mock?

Yes, of course!
I
Want to join you!
I
Yearn and dream and need.

Computer
Hums.
Or so I think,
No
More there to hear it.

Some more Fibs

A Day in the Life

Words
Flow
Then STOP
How can I
Make them start again?
Repeat scene over and over.


How You Know You're Really a Writer

No
Books,
Byline,
Or readers.
No publication.
Would you still have to write it down?

My latest article came out last Friday in the Westside Courier, but I can't post the link because the new editor hasn't had a chance to learn how to put the articles online yet! Hopefully soon. I did get some great feedback on it, though. Kristi Scott, the subject, emailed me to say how thrilled she was with it, and several people stopped me at the gym to say how nice it was. That's always pleasant.

Last Saturday, I attended the Indiana SCBWI event in Carmel, Coffee Talk with Lara Anderson. Lara, who sent several years at Curtis Brown, was full of great information. In a relaxed and informal setting, Lara answered questions from the group of attendees. Her mother and successful author Rebecca Kai Dotlich also added her experience on some of the subjects. I received a paid critique from Lara on the first 50 pages of my YA book, and it was well-worth the $40 cost. I did not receive the glowing feedback that I had hoped, but what I did receive was a very detailed critique. She pointed out specific problems and offered suggestions and examples on what to do about them. I feel like she closely read my manuscript and definitely got my money's worth. It's the best critique I've ever received as far as content. Thank you, Lara!! It was also great to meet and see so many of the other IN-SCBWI members!

I sent out a new query this week (to Cricket) but have mostly been doing research on book packagers. It sounds like freelancing for a packager could have some benefits--experience and credentials, not to mention a little bit of money.

I also finished another of Margaret McMullan's Ya books, When I Crossed No-Bob. Just as in Cashay, I really cared for the main character, Addy in this case, and many of the supporting characters. Though a completely different story than Cashay, it was also similar in that she took another story which could have been so depressing and made it heart-warming and not at all depressing. I would recommend to anyone!