ON WRITING . . .

         Or How I Write

            Write every day, I’ve been told. Write even when you don’t want to write. Just begin . . . one word at a time. I currently am working on my fourth novel. I’m not certain how it will end yet, or, indeed, how I’m going to get to the end. It will come though. At approximately 80,000 words, or just beyond, I’ll be finished.

“You don’t know how it will end?” I’ve been asked. “Don’t you have a plan, an outline?”

“No. No, I don’t.”

Writing for me is a curious process. Often (although not always) I begin with a title. For me, a title helps form a foundation. It sets my mind in motion and ideas begin to flutter in and out until one, or two, settles and I see a direction. That doesn’t mean I know specifically where I am going. You see, once I begin a novel, once I establish my main characters, something crazy happens. I lose control. As my characters take shape, as their personalities are fleshed out and evolve, they take over. Every person (and yes, they become real people to me) whom I create has an impact on where the story will go. Their personalities, motivations, ambitions, attitudes, and behaviors help build the story. My characters and I become a team, and we travel together, hell bent, on getting to the end.

A great deal of my writing is done pounding the keyboard of either my beloved Mac or the MacBook Pro I inherited from my son, Alex. I love to sit in the dining area in a cushy chair with my two German shepherds at my feet and strike the keys one after the other until, voila, I’ve written another one hundred, two hundred, one thousand words. Being in this space is ideal contentment for me.

Writing doesn’t always occur at a computer, though. I write while I’m cooking, while I’m walking my dogs, while I’m brushing my teeth, or while staring at a sunset. You see, once my characters have been developed, I think about them. What would Susan do in this instance? Would Chester act this way or that? And what is motivating Courtney to behave as she does? I wonder about my “team” and when I begin word processing again because I have thought about them, I am much clearer as to where the story will go.

During times when I’m not focused on my book, I write a blog, such as this one. This morning when I picked up the laptop and began to write, I false-started a few times before I decided to write about writing. I tried a blog about the absurdity of some words in our language, but that failed miserably. I attempted a poem, but that fell flat. (Poetry is difficult.) The fact is, however, that I love to write. Sometimes I want to make a point, so I write as though I were a columnist; other times I simply begin with one word – one word – or someone’s name and take off, ending with a creative piece, a product of my imagination.

So, I write. Every day I write. Composing can be so hard, so frustrating, actually infuriating when it doesn’t go well, but when it’s “clicking”, when the words flow as they have today with this blog, I am satisfied. It is then, for me, that the act of writing is a reward in itself.

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