byjk

Thinking first one thing, then an opposing thought.

Has ai killed the joy of writing?

Who has told me I am a writer? Is there some big authority on this? I think, much like any other craft it isn’t necessarily how you are judged, or whether you are gifted, as much as how badly you want it and the willingness to work at and for it. Or for some of us, how we are unable to stop doing it. Is that the difference? Perhaps that it more true than we want to acknowledge. And wanting to write does not mean one person can and wants to write everything for all purposes. Myself, I love imagining stories. Fiction is my forte. Though, admittedly my blogs tend to be more about the writing of fiction, a way to clear my head and move my writing time into the story development and tweaking. 

How to write these fictional tales was at first troublesome. How did those favorite writers of mine get me, the reader to see the story in my mind? My early attempts were sad. Very one dimension, plain and boring. My characters had no depth. Called them paper dolls to an English instructor at community college. That was probably the first major crossing of this hobby and the idea of career. I  wanted to write something with more substantial than the dainty little thin story arc I asked him to read. 

Repeating the direction he gave me to others, for their benefit as much as my own, read. Find authors whose work you love. Study them, not for copying, but seeing the development of skill. Find early work, and start there. Read in chronological order their entire published works. Watch how their story telling as a whole and the various aspects of it develop over time. One side note is when and what story first captivated your interest. Then go back to before that book, reaching back to their beginning. Read all their work. See where their study and work mature and change over time. Or does it not? 

Also research their life. Like my most difficult course, analysis  their work with the knowledge of their life. Hate to admit it but what we experience and the breadth that we live does enrich our stories. Though there is something to be said in favor of honing in on particular types and settings. Some Writers become masters at one genre or type of story arc building, and characters. 

If I never become known for my fiction writing, but my encouragement and sharing of the process, as I know it, helps someone else build their own body of written work finding their own level of ‘success,’ then that will be enough for me. Whatever success means to you, that is what determines if the time spent is worth it. So far for me, it is. 

It's my 15 year anniversary on Tumblr 🥳

I wrote a review

Writing Struggles

Dec 6

To quote from The Writer’s Life: Insights from The Right to Write, page 11-

“Writing is about getting something down, not about thinking something up.” - Julia Cameron

That explains the majority of my writing struggles. Running across that quote was a blessing. Dictating to my creative side what must be written before inspiration strikes is muse abuse! Forcing myself to work with no inspiration, “thinking something up” has been a mental self beating.

How many of us commit self destructive patterns of pushing? Creativity takes time. Pushing forward after knowing the joy of “getting something down” is painful. I had never connected pushing myself to create as the negative it is until I read Cameron’s works.

Inspiration is joy. It craves to be on the page, in a perfect world, on every page. When I was working on a rough sketch, getting no where, I set it aside. Days later I returned to play with it coming from a different perspective. Keyword, playing. Playing with perspective increased my skill. The result was far better than I could have hoped.

No new inspiration? That is the time to take what has been put aside and play with it. Try a different perspective. Going back to look at something that has been waiting for an open mind to give it room to develop.

Creativity is a process and progress built on inspiration and seasoned with ability. Building every time you work, or play. The hardest part is accepting the work will be done, when it is done; inspiration comes when it comes.

Time is a commodity, but it is also a key element of inspiration. Respecting the time it takes for inspiration to form is hard to plan. It took trial and error learning to block out time for inspiration. I felt foolish. Consistent practice builds confidence. (Another Cameron observation shared in The Artist Way.) Granting myself time to practice, to play, and to wait for inspiration as well as what to do while waiting was ughly.

The bones of this post didn’t see the light of day for a few years because of guilt I had about pursuit of a creative field. The truth I found in Julia Cameron’s books gave me hope and a helping hand as I struggled through to find my own methods and tools for my writing work.

When one’s emotions have been raked over the glowing coals of someone else’s decisions that directly affect their life and plans, some of us have a meltdown. If you are lucky, it isn’t a public scene. If you are really lucky, your apartment neighbors can’t hear you slam cabinet doors, curse the powers that be that just threw all your plans down a commercial grade garbage disposal under the force of a cafeteria water nozzle with enough pressure to remove the gum some high school student snuck in to chew during a third period exam and stuck in the utensil section of the lunch tray so that no human hand, nor standard issue muck-boot thick cafeteria-lady rubber glove can dislodge before being sent through the baking sterilization of the deafening industrial dishwasher that shoots out the cleaned trays in a tray of their own that has to set for ten minutes to cool before being removed and stacked by the muck-boot glove wearing cafeteria lady. 

It hurts. It is devastating when you miss your hermit hovel. When the operational tempo of your current abode goes against your own rhythm and flow. Well, it wasn’t so bad before, The Virus. Before you at least got to go to new places and experience new things. You had a reason to drag your ass out of bed at Oh Dark hundred and forget to wait for the coffee to cool, burning your tongue on five out of seven mornings a week, but never on the weekends because you can sleep without an alarm, or a text message or phone call waking you and that magical reason you are here to begin with who sleeps through them half the time, so you wake them after their phone wakes you. Though on their own, they never seem to miss a call when you aren’t there. Just like the children who you made sure were up, dressed and fed before school for twenty-seven years. 

This is your time. You had your children early, and now have the chance to pursue your “career.” Sure, you like any young and anxious soul, you make some missteps. Study and change your major a few times, eventually you land where you belong. Though because of your age, you feel the judge-y looks that you interpret to be criticism and disapproval in all those eyes and snarky comments from younger, older and even your very own age humans. You know there is the gossip of jealousy and pity. You aren’t that deaf, yet. 

You persevere and get the chance to “find yourself” and are excited that the opportunity to figure out what happened to your own voice in the middle of life after having been a responsible, mature adult.  When you aren’t trying to fit so much responsibility into  the twenty four hours that we all have to contend with. You get the opportunity to have very little responsibility, sleep in, . . . but you can’t. Because of tempo. And you see on the horizon, this thing, and it stops you in your tracks and stops you from exporting the world around you. It makes it so that the only voice you hear in your head is your own voice telling you that you missed out on studying. Missed out on practicing. And you are so far behind in what you are trying to do. Such a goober. 

So The Virus that ran roughshod over everyone’s plans for you became your opportunity to catch up on all those books you didn’t get to read. Do all the studying you need to succeed, if you can get it all done in the relative to you short time that everyone had to shelter in place. So you pushed hard. Not enough time in the day to dwell on concepts and let them sink in. You still feel stupid and old, and out of sync. People are so edgy and quick to jump to criticism now. Existing closer hate, well, maybe actual hate that instead of reaching out to ask questions, you feel it is safer to think about how, why and what to do next on your own. 

So you pull the plug on being social. You stop sharing your work. Work, as if what you do is worthing of the word work. You know it is but others just look at all the things they see wrong with it. Punctuation, grammar, spelling. You are very glad they aren’t your boss or teacher. You would have been fired or failed in the speed of an atrial fib beat. And you know that all your chosen adjectives are your darlings others want to kill but for the sake of being a pain in retribution to anyone who has ever hurt you, you make the choice to leave them because you are still so mad that your plans to return to your writing room that has been waiting for you to come back with your own voice after having lost it and wandered around trying to find it and out of petrified fear of never ever having it again, pushed yourself to read and take notes on most of the books you have read in the last ten years only to find the damn thing whisper screaming in your heart and soul, being the messenger, to reminding you that your plans to return to your favorite writing chair have been thwarted, again. 

Not in that exact moment, but in the moments that you lay tossing in the shared bed , turning over in your mind all the vile thoughts and feelings you can pounce upon the decider of your fate, while the reason you are in this situation to begin with is snoring on the couch in the other room. The moment when you find yourself again, because you can’t sleep. 

So you sit up and write out the words that are coming, crashing out of your brain, past your conscious faster than your inner voice can enunciate and down out through your fingers. Just like this. 

Damn it all to hell. That was the moment of the break through. At least for this moment, past the grief and frustrated and self shame. Now you are doubly worried that the extra time will cause you to lose it as quickly as your found it. The anger passes and it is still there. Shaky, but there. How the hell do you hold on to that? That part of you that you missed, the emotional compass that in a split second makes you want to rant and rave and cuss, but also walk away from others so that you can let the words tumble out on their own here, where you can come back and read and make notes in a calm and sane mood. Perhaps edit and rewrite a few sentences, and change some order of them to make a much more concise on point piece that others can read while thinking, ‘oh, yeah, I know how she feels. I have felt that way, too.’

I am a fan of Elmore Leonard. Love his books, his scripts, and his writing advice. Mr. Leonard’s death saddened me; losing the possibility of ever meeting him, and the end of his beloved writing. Sigh. My sympathy to his family and friends.  (Mr. Leonard died in 2013). 

For those uninitiated in Leonard’s work, you might be aware of movies made from his stories such as Get Shorty, Jackie Brown, 3:10 to Yuma, and television such as the FX series, Justified and now Justified City Primeval. My favorite was the short lived television series - Maximum Bob, title character played by Beau Bridges. 

But what does that have to do with ‘Who is Wade?’

Well,  should you be an original Justified fan from 2010- 2015, or a more recent Hulu viewer of the series, remember Boyd Crowder? He was played by the resurrecting Walter Groggins (Mr. Groggins, I am so sorry for this.) Boyd was originally supposed to die in the pilot episode, but producer, Graham Yost, pulled for the character to be a continuing part of the drama originated and executive produced by Mr. Leonard. As a baddie goes, I love Mr. Crowder. 

Not to down play Mr. Olyphant’s portrayal of the center character of Justified, Raylan Givens. The synergy of all the right people at the right time and with the right material still holds up as great fiction work all the way around. This series was based on the Givens character in one of Leonard’s short stories, Fire in the Hole. 

Many fans, like me, were stunned to hear of a reboot after Mr. Leonard’s passing. Mixed feelings and questions on the latest mini series went through my mind and heart. Justified City Primeval did not disappoint. No longer in Kentucky, this series begins first in Florida and then taking a nod to Elmore Leonard’s novel City Primeval: High Noon in Detroit settled in for the ride up north before ending . . . well, don’t want to give that away. The series  was enjoyable right up to the end. Our hero Raylan and daughter Willa, played by real life father and daughter Olyphants was genius, great work Vivian! In the last episode the phone rings and the scene cuts to –––– Crowder in prison being led out by guards. 

In my home watching this I am screaming “CROWDER!”  And for the life of me, don’t know where the name WADE came from but I kept calling out “WADE CROWDER!” My heart knew this was wrong, but I was so engrossed with watching, that my brain couldn’t function beyond a mild awareness that Wade was not the character’s correct name. After calming down, and a quick search online, an apology was said to the ceiling correcting myself to the character Boyd Crowder (and to Mr. Groggins). 

 My definition of practice is doing something over and over again to gain skill and improve one’s ability. 

Repetitive, over and over. 

Sounds boring, right?

But, that is what most things require us to do.  

Pretty much every day. Sometimes more than once a day.  Most of the time more than one day a week. Practice requires frequently. 

Practice can be enjoyable or frustrating, even a mixture of both. Progress can be hard earned, coming in spurts. When improvement is seen by others, our motivation is usually increased. That little bit of praise makes it easy to enjoy the drudgery of practice. 

For some of us difficulty increases when we worry about getting it wrong, especially after receiving praise. Even worse is criticism that is out of balance with out ability. My daughter tells me wrong doesn’t exist in reality, that it is all just apart of the process. “Mom, don’t confuse mistakes with not reaching culmination. They are the path to culmination. They don’t prevent it.”  I love that. 

Whatever the creative outlet you have, practice. Don’t let the skipped stitches, that errant blob of paint, or a misspelled word stop the practice. 

There is also the joy of what you are doing, whether or not there is an end result that others deem tangible. The enjoyment of time spent creating is fulfilling and spirit lifting in and of itself. 

Practice. 

🥂