Its Time To Get Things Started

I kind of have a thing for The Muppets. So much so that I refer to my children in the online world by names of OG Muppets. Since I've already mentioned them a few times here on the blog, I figured some back story and an introduction was in order.

It all started way back in 2007 when I was expecting my first baby. His due date was leap day, and some gals from an online message board I had belonged to at the time took to calling him Kermit (leap day --> leap frog --> Kermit the frog is a natural progression of assumption, right? RIGHT?) and it just always stuck. Even IRL people got in on the action - to this day my own mother sometimes calls my son Kermie as a nickname.

Kermie is almost 4 (we're seriously counting the sleeps until his birthday over here), very bright, obsessed with playing online games on Nick Jr and PBS Kids, talks non-stop, lives for getting to build stuff with his daddy, and loves to read just as much as I do. He's also turning into a gifted fibber. Combine that with his smarts, and this one keeps me on my toes. I started this writing thing shortly after he was born, and his late night feedings were how I marked the end of my first NaNoWriMo writing nights.

Once we were expecting baby #2, it was a natural fit to choose another Muppet moniker. Fozzie was the first name to stick, even before we knew whether we were being blessed with another boy or a girl. Ironically, Fozzie is the PERFECT name for our second son. This kid is 2.5 years old and is Mr. Personality. He tells jokes ("Knock knock." "Who's there?" "Cockadoodle apple chicken BEER!"), is always laughing about something, staggers around everywhere with a cup of some kind of liquid in his hands just like a little frat boy, and is just generally very "look at me". He also has zero sense of self-preservation and screams allthedamntime. He will, in short, be the child we lay awake at night wondering if he's actually in his bed, or out on the prowl drinking Red Bull and everclear, knocking up girls, and TPing his principal's house.

My trouble-maker boys:

Sigh. I love them.

Finding a nickname for baby #3 turned out to be tricky. We knew we were having a girl, and girl Muppet names blow. Like, seriously. I'm not calling my girl Miss Piggy, and Janice just isn't fun. So, after much hemming and hawing, we settled on Beaker. He's an awesome character, and even though he's (presumably) a boy, the name works for our little babe.  Beaker is now 9 months old, has the most kissable chubby cheeks ever, eats cheese like it's going out of style, and lights up when her brothers pay attention to her. She also completely sucked the creative mojo out of me while I was pregnant with her, and I'm still struggling to get it back.

A rad hairdo, sassy clothes, and already planning to be a doctor. Is it any wonder I have a massive crush on this girl?

So, those are my babies. They are the joys of my life, and the primary culprits for my lack of time and energy to do anything, let alone write. Some day, some far away day, I will dedicate my first book to them. 

Show, don't tell

(What? Two posts in two days? Yeah, yeah, don't count on this ever again.)

So, yesterday I was killing a few minutes in the car while Fozzie and Beaker were napping while we were waiting for Kermie's playschool to let out. I had the radio tuned to the Oldies station and was once again musing about how offensive it is to me that they now consider 80s music to be the Oldies.  Anyways, on comes the delectable "Raspberry Beret" by Prince. I was smiling and dancing in my seat, singing (quietly) along with the lyrics when I was struck by how one small line summed up so much about the girl he's singing about.

"She walked in through the out door."

SUCH a perfect example of show don't tell in action. It told me a lot about the kind of girl she is, while simultaneously drawing me in to question and wonder to know more about her. It occurs to me that great songs are full of this kind of genius writing (or maybe it's just more obvious to me in this format). I can see why so many authors rely so heavily on their playlists while writing.

This is an aspect of writing I know I personally struggle with and need to work on considerably. Perhaps I need my own raspberry beret to help me retain that frame of mind while writing....

In which I chronicle my time-management failure

A wise man once asked, "Where does the time go when it's not around here?"

OK, so it wasn't a wise man, but my favorite group of all time, the Barenaked Ladies. One thing you should know about me - everything in life can be related to lyrics from a BNL song. EVERYTHING. I even have a novel that was inspired by one of their songs. My love for this group (and especially Ed) borders on pathological. I once saw them in concert and I touched Ed's bum. I literally cried the day I learned Steven left the group. Far too many important events in my life relate to them and their music in some way. See? Pathological. It's pertinent you know and accept this about me now.

ANYWAYS.

(Disclosure: I know someone out there is reading this and thinking it, so I'll just point out now that yes, I am aware of the irony of me wasting yet even more precious writing time on a blog post when I could be working on the novel. In my defense, my daughter pooped herself awake at 5 am today and I've decided blogging will happen on those mornings where she has me up before the ass-crack of dawn.)

Where the eff does my time go? Specifically, my writing time. I wake up every day, full of honest intentions to finally get that heap of clean laundry on the floor folded and put away, the fridge cleaned out (I can't even begin to speculate on what that tupperware container of green goo once used to be), some QT with each one of my muppets, a couple of chapters of some book read, and some uninterrupted time with my WIP.

You've probably already surmised that none of this ever happens, or at least not all of it.

No, instead I usually flail my way through a handful of chores, running the muppets around town, counting to 10 to swallow my rage when one of them dumps the ginormous bin of Legos all over the floor AGAIN, obsessively checking Facebook and my email, watching re-runs of The Big Bang Theory, and staying up much too late sucked into whatever book has my attention.

Lots of those duties are necessities, but I'm aware that plenty of them are not. They're mindless diversions, and they steal my soul time.

The truth is, I just need to learn to unplug from all of those distractions so I can plug back into my story. Sounds simple enough. So why is it so hard to do? The internet is a timesuck of epic proportions, and I know better, so why do I let it lure me in every day?  Because I'm lazy (my disaster of a home is only one example of this). Because the internet is how I connect with grownups (I love my children dearly, but let's be honest, conversing with the under-4 set on the regular can sometimes be equivalent to waterboarding). Because I'm afraid (fear is a topic for a future post I'm working on).

There are obviously many, many writers who juggle life with small children and manage to be disciplined enough to get words on the page on a regular basis (one of the gals in my writer's group is one such goddess). I should probably read some of their blog posts telling me how they do it. This would, however, require me to drag my attention away from my latest spanking in online Scrabble, the always fun discussions on my online book club board, the most recent text from my friend Becca filled with delicious eye candy, the juicy plot point about to be revealed in the book on my nightstand, etc., etc. I'm anti-discipline personified, so this isn't exactly something easy for me to do.  But, I *want* to be a writer. More importantly, I want to be a *good* writer. A *published* writer. Those things won't happen if I don't buckle down.

:::heads off to open WIP but instead gets sidetracked by videos of BNL on youtube:::

What's The Story?

(And now I've got that Oasis song stuck in my head...)

So, here's the low down about the writing project I'm working on and usually will be referencing as my WIP (Work In Progress).

A few years back I was reading the fascinating NF book "Stiff" by Mary Roach for my online book club's monthly discussion, and a section about people who believed they began taking on new personality traits after receiving an organ transplant was the genesis for a plot bunny. I instantly wanted to write a story about a girl who becomes endowed with the empathic abilities of her donor after receiving a heart transplant. I'd been wanting to attempt YA SciFi with a mystery element, and this was the perfect vehicle to do that.

I began drafting this story during NaNoWriMo 2010. I wrote just over 52K that November, but the story was not complete. After NaNo I was forced to take a break from writing, finding that the endurance event known as the third trimester of pregnancy had completely sapped me of all my energy, both physical and creative.

The WIP lingered, untouched, for many months. Occasionally I would open the document, sometimes to re-read parts, sometimes just to stare at the blinking cursor, trying to will new words out onto the page. I constantly was thinking about my story, making mental notes about problems that needed fixing and whatnot, but no actual progress happened for months. OK, the truth is that nothing happened for a year.

Enter NaNoWriMo 2011. I desperately wanted to participate, having done so for the past 3 years. But, I couldn't in good conscience begin drafting a new story when that other one was dangling out there, unfinished and still full of promise. Despite a year away from that novel, I still loved it, still wanted to fix it, still wanted to finish its story.

I became a NaNo Rebel - I decided to use NaNo 2011 to finish the draft of my novel. This past November I finally dug back into the story, slashed and hacked out sections that needed to go, and drafted the remainder of the story. Between the deleting and the new writing, I added roughly 25K to the novel. It is by no means complete, but it has a beginning, a middle, and an end. (This is where I admit that this is actually a huge accomplishment for me - seeing one of my attempts at a novel through the drafting of the entire main story arc.)

So, what's the plan? Basically, a LOT of revising and still quite a bit of drafting. The mystery element needs tweaking to raise the stakes, the swoony boy (there should ALWAYS be a swoony boy, right?) needs his character development moved out of my brain and onto the page, the logistics of my protagonist's new abilities needs fleshing out (pun intended), and some plot points necessary for potential sequel development need to be sprinkled throughout. Lots of work yet to do, I'm afraid.

Only, I'm not just afraid (fear will be a future topic I'll write about), I'm excited. More than a year after putting the first words of this story on the page, I still feel a compulsion to finish this. To tell this story. And to do it well. My passion for this story has sustained me through long droughts of inactivity, but I always knew I'd come back and finish it.

So, that's my story (morning glory)...

New Year - New Blog!

It's that time of year again, the time when everyone looks ahead with hope, shaking off the yuckies from the old year and making grand plans for changes for the new. That can only mean one thing - RESOLUTIONS!

I'll admit, I'm one of *those* people who make resolutions (is it just me, or is it all the rage these days to be anti-resolutions?). In truth, I'm really more about goals since they're resolutions prettied up with the makeup of being measurable and having a deadline.

I believe intentions have more power once they are written, so, without further ado, my goals for 2012:

1. Begin my blog.

• Do I get any kind of bonus points for achieving my very first goal of the year? No? Moving on then...

2.  Contribute to my blog at least 2-3 times weekly.

• Topics will range from things that are actually writing-related, updates on my progress as I work on my current project, random drabbles I compose, and probably a semi-decent amount of blathering about my children. And introspection. You've been warned. 

3.  Finish the first draft of my novel by February 29, 2012 (yay for Leap Year!!).

• I'll post more details about what I'm working on at a future date.
• The manuscript will be at a done-enough stage where I can send it out to critique partners for some initial feedback.

4.  Compile a list of dream agents to eventually query by March 31, 2012.

• I'm imagining this will be a bit of a tricky task for me since the truth is that I'm fairly oblivious at this point about the ins and outs of the publishing world, so I've got a learning curve ahead of me. This journey will be shared along the way for sure.

5.  Edit and revise novel to completion by June 30, 2012.

• This one is dependent on feedback from the CPs. If the novel is a truly hot mess with no redeeming value, look for this goal to get a massive revision, if not shelved completely.

6.  Send novel out to agents by July 22, 2012.

• You're thinking to yourself, "Gee, Rheana, that's kind of a random date you have set there!" The reason for that date is that's my birthday. I'm feeling a little anxious about turning (gulp) 35 this year, so I've decided my gift to myself will be the gift of accomplishment - having one novel ready to query. 

7.  Remain active in my online writer's group while reaching out to make some local writing contacts.

• I'm two-parts shy and one-part anti-social, so this one will be tough for me, hence the lack of a deadline. I'd like very much to become more active in the writing community, both online as well as in real life. Checking out a NaNoWriMo write-in or attending a Lighthouse (a local writer's resource) event or workshop will count as achievement for this goal. 

So, I think that's it. I'm sure I've forgotten something really important. That happens a lot when you have tiny children who Hoover the brain power right out of you. I obviously have more personal-related goals (eat better, drink more water, pay off some debts, blah ditty blah blah), but those are, well, boring. 

What are your writing-related resolutions?