Slogging, slogging through the swampy slough
Hmmm...I'm having a bit of problem posting as my posting page seems to have gone wonky. So, this is a bit of a test. I'm not sure if I'm popping this into the correct teeny tiny box. If I manage it, I suppose I'll just have to make my posts in notepad and copy them into Live Journal.
Today I finally packaged up two stories to bundle off to magazines. One of the stories I wrote over ten years ago with the mistaken assumption that it would make a nice picture book. Actually, I still think it would, though it definitely needed some serious revision. The other is one I wrote last year in response to a writing prompt on the Writer's Retreat message board. It's a silly story but I fancied it (to use one of my favorite words from Doctor Who) so I cleaned it up a bit. I haven't been sending out enough things to magazines. Shame on me.
I'm still fighting a certain inertia but getting some submissions into the mail should help. Leastways, I hope so. I hit these horrible swampy inertia spots now and then and find them just painful to slog out of. But if I just wait for them to pass, they seem to settle in and set up house. That I simply cannot afford. Still, I detest these slogging slow times, and I love the racey fast bits.
One thing I've noticed is that when I'm in a racey fast bit, I have kaboodles of ideas popping up and trying to lure me away from the task at hand. The ideas just sound soooooo good and I see scenes and hear dialogue and they're just marvelous. Then when I finish the task...I nearly always tumble into a swamp. And the ideas then sound kinda stupid and I can't pull up the scenes with the same wit and enthusiasm. It's enough to make me feel like I've got loose cogs in the old noggin. Ya know?
Ah well...I reckon if writing was easy everyone would be doing it...oh, wait...everyone is these days, aren't they?
Today I finally packaged up two stories to bundle off to magazines. One of the stories I wrote over ten years ago with the mistaken assumption that it would make a nice picture book. Actually, I still think it would, though it definitely needed some serious revision. The other is one I wrote last year in response to a writing prompt on the Writer's Retreat message board. It's a silly story but I fancied it (to use one of my favorite words from Doctor Who) so I cleaned it up a bit. I haven't been sending out enough things to magazines. Shame on me.
I'm still fighting a certain inertia but getting some submissions into the mail should help. Leastways, I hope so. I hit these horrible swampy inertia spots now and then and find them just painful to slog out of. But if I just wait for them to pass, they seem to settle in and set up house. That I simply cannot afford. Still, I detest these slogging slow times, and I love the racey fast bits.
One thing I've noticed is that when I'm in a racey fast bit, I have kaboodles of ideas popping up and trying to lure me away from the task at hand. The ideas just sound soooooo good and I see scenes and hear dialogue and they're just marvelous. Then when I finish the task...I nearly always tumble into a swamp. And the ideas then sound kinda stupid and I can't pull up the scenes with the same wit and enthusiasm. It's enough to make me feel like I've got loose cogs in the old noggin. Ya know?
Ah well...I reckon if writing was easy everyone would be doing it...oh, wait...everyone is these days, aren't they?