:: Saturday, February 22, 2003
I actually managed to clear CFFML down to under twenty messages for the first time since, um, October. Go me. ^^ Now, having managed to finish various other projects, I'm ready to attempt to get some actual writing done after dinner. *Gasp!* You may all faint from shock now.
Before I go off to try to do something creative, though, I felt I ought to address this. (It's the February 17 entry, in case it gets archived.) Honestly, Rae, if you write and you like to write and you aspire to improve your writing, that's good enough. ^_^ Writing, contrary to what some people might think, doesn't have to be an issue of preordained destiny or the hub of an ongoing psychodrama. It doesn't need to involve frothing and snarling and weeping and bleeding on the carpet; it certainly doesn't need to involve being psychologically messed up. Mostly it's just about showing up and doing the work, though a side-order of perceptiveness and an individual train of thought don't hurt. So don't think that you're less than other writers because they have Big Drama and you don't. (For what it's worth, my own life is almost alarmingly drama-free.)
It's also totally normal to feel that your work doesn't measure up. I'll let you in on a secret--I think most writers who have aspirations toward some writerly goal always feel as though they're falling short of it. That's how you learn and grow, by always chasing a standard that's just a little bit better than you are. I think if I ever feel totally satisfied with anything I've written, I'll give up writing and take up, oh, I don't know, painting or costuming, at least until I feel as though I've been out of the writing long enough to approach it with that beginner's spirit again. Once you stop growing and learning, you're on the way down into entropy.
Besides which, you're already much better than I was at fifteen. At fifteen, I was writing crappy Duran Duran fanfics--or rather, *trying* to write them, as I never got past chapter one. I'd share some with you, but mercifully the hands of time have stolen them all away. I was also writing rather awful pseudo-epic poetry about my invented mythology, a saga which included all my friends as Mary Sues, and myself as a Mary Sue magical horse. I kid you not. But your stuff is actually rather good. I especially liked "Stained in Red." ^_^
- 05:39 PM EST
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:: Thursday, February 20, 2003
In the category of Lines Spoken at Work that Sound Really Wrong out of Context (or even in Context):
"Let's not get into Krishna's ass."
(PS: No offense is intended to any deities, either living or between incarnations. Thank you; drive through.)
- 03:55 PM EST
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:: Monday, February 17, 2003
Complete and utter lack of progress on anything worth mentioning. Work has been kicking my butt. It's slowly getting better, though. Work, I mean, not my butt, although I suppose that must be getting better too. I spent most of today sitting on it and catching up with email, when I wasn't out shoveling snow or stomping around in it up to my knees for the sheer delight of it. Mmm, snow. You'd think I'd be inspired, but there isn't any snow in this Drift, unfortunately.
No wrath here, mainly because I haven't had the energy for it. Just kidding--you can take your time as far as I'm concerned. I've given up making definitive release statements anyway. Sorry, everyone.
My spirits are overall better than this would indicate. I'm not apathetic, I'm just resting. ^_^
- 09:33 PM EST
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:: Monday, February 10, 2003
And the prospect of Gluhen and Wolf's Rain (woof!) breaks like dawn after a very flat and uninspiring weekend. Eeee! Love much appreciated. ^_^ No hurry, though, of course. (You know something's just not right when one of the best parts of the weekend involves washing one's curtains. They came out nice and sparkly white, though.)
- 10:00 AM EST
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:: Saturday, February 8, 2003
Upon reflection, the other reason my weblog might sound like my fics is the sheer length of sentences. I swear, they've just been getting longer and longer. I was working on "Sakura" last night, and I ended up with one sentence that was 156 words long. (For comparison, the magazine I work for runs book reviews that are about 500-600 words--my one sentence was about a quarter of that total. ^^;;;) I'd thought it was just particular characters, but really it's all of them, at least the way I write them--this one was Seishirou POV, and he doesn't get breathless and emote-y the way that Subaru and Lan do, but he gets this kind of relentless momentum going that just doesn't stop. And he does lists, especially of the various appealing qualities of a certain green-eyed onmyouji. Fortunately I have finally gotten away from the steak. We're into actual dialogue now! Who'd've thought? With luck, the dialogue will go quickly and easily, and then there's just the groping and the dancing and the vaguely Taoist sex magic. Which reminds me--I need to do some research.
- 11:52 AM EST
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:: Thursday, February 6, 2003
Should I blush, or is it mere synchronicity? ^_^ In any case, if I happen to be one of those people who sounds much same on my weblog as I do in fics, it's probably not surprising, considering that I edit my posts here with, if not the same amount of obsessiveness as my fics, at least a passing facsimile. Self-conscious kitty that I am, I can't help trying to *present* my words to their best effect, even in this supposedly informal forum. (Some women don't go out of the house without putting make-up on; I don't go out on the internet without my editor's hat and metaphorical red pen of death.) So while you will find real truth here, it wears the pretty mask of artifice and careful deliberation, always, because I'm just like that. Hey, we all have our issues. ^_^
I'm still stuck on the steak, or rather the sentence or two right after it, so I spent the train ride home rereading all the bits of fics that I've started over the last year and going, "Ooh, maybe I'll work on this," "Ooh, maybe I'll work on that," "Damn, *I* wrote that?" (or, in the case of the elemental Weiss story with the missing section, "Damn, I *wrote* that"), and in the end I ended up not working on anything. So now, continuing today's trend of uselessness, I've spent the last hour online waiting for people on the West Coast to get onto IRC, and I was going to use it to write an idle rambly thing about my various in-progress projects and the impulses behind my different types of fics and the fact that my WK daydream storylines tend to follow very specific patterns, but instead I started surfing weblogs and am now pining for Gluhen fansubs. Sadly, I'm going to have to wait until somebody releases it to VHS or disc--there's no way I'm downloading full episodes of anything on my 28K-on-a-good-day dialup. Blah. Wolf's Rain looks rather cool too, while I'm pining. Of course, I still haven't watched my fansubs of YnM. Man, am I behind the crest of the wave or what? Maybe I'm just getting old. I *feel* old today, because I just found out in TV Guide that Matthew Broderick is 40. *Matthew Broderick* is *40.* He doesn't look 40. *cries* But I digress. Artfully, of course. ^_^
It's probably just as well that I *don't* have ready access to digisubs, because I'd have a new obsession every week. I'm actually long overdue for a new obsession, which might be why I haven't gotten around to watching YnM yet--I fear the prospect of yet another brain-sucking, fic-demanding set of characters invading my mental territory and setting up house. It's bad enough trying to fend the WK boys off long enough to work on "Sakura"--although if I persist in being stuck in this spot, I *am* going to go back to one of the Weiss fics for a little while, just to keep the writing momentum going. I have to say, I'm a lot less stressed about making progress in "Sakura" now that I actually have something out in prereading. It's such a big relief to have gotten to that stage finally.
And you know, if I *did* have Gluhen, I'd probably end up having to revise all my mental storylines and possibly one or more of the fics-in-progress, so huge brain-sucking potential right there. I suppose I should *heart* my crappy phone lines after all.
And now it's after 10:30, so the West Coasters are probably online, but I need to get to bed because of work tomorrow. The fruitlessness continues. Oh, well--at least I updated some of my weblog links. ^_^
- 11:00 PM EST
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:: Monday, February 3, 2003
Finally broke through my mental block and got the dang Drift off to some prereaders. Does it suck? Not suck? Hopefully I'll know soon.
- 10:43 PM EST
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:: Sunday, February 2, 2003
My creative life at present may best be summed up by nursery rhyme.
Ahem.
*sings*
"The itsy-bitsy spider went up the water spout.
Down came the rain and washed the spider out.
Out came the sun and dried up all the rain
And the itsy-bitsy spider went up the spout again."
Currently on the way back up the spout. Your patience is appreciated.
- 09:19 PM EST
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