Category: Life

Good News, Bad News, and Trouble in Writing Town

I’ve got a thirty-minute break before my next parent-teacher conference, so I thought I’d use this time to do some writing. I know I won’t be able to get any meaningful creative writing done, sandwiched as this moment is between long and stressful blocks of trying to calm down nervous parents and stressed-out students. My stress levels are elevated today, too. Not a great place to be, mentally, when you want the ideas to flow. The doors of my imagination just can’t swing freely on their hinges at the moment.

Since I’m currently stress-blocked and don’t feel up to generating anything creative right now, I figured I’d use this time to sneak in a blog post and try to unpack a problem that has been dogging me of late.

Creative Constipation

Over the past week, forward progress on my WIP has slowed to a snail’s pace. I need to figure out what’s going on. What has changed? What can I do to unblock myself?

You know how everyone always says stuff like, “You can’t edit a blank page,” or “The first draft is supposed to be terrible?” Of course, you do, if you’re a writer. It’s inescapable, especially during the month of NaNoWriMo. I firmly buy into those clichéd tidbits of advice. If I had more time (hahaha) I’d needlepoint it onto a cushion and then sit on that cushion as I wrote.

However, something happened on the 15th that seems to have changed things and not for the better. We (being the folks in Lesley University’s MFA in Creative Writing Program) received our mentor pairings for next semester. Fourth semester students (like me) work on one thing and one thing only: our creative theses. Or, in layman’s terms, we’ll be trying to shine up a reasonable draft of a book. Up until last week, I was feeling pretty good about that. Looking forward to it, in fact.

Good News, Bad News

Then, we got our pairings. Good news: I got my first choice for a mentor. The esteemed Chris Lynch, author of Inexcusable, Little Blue Lies, and Angry Young Man, and others. I also got my first pick for my Thesis Reader: Jason Reynolds, author of Patina, When I Was the Greatest, and All American Boys among other books. To invoke Chandler Bing, “Could I be more excited?” Maybe, but it would be difficult.

Anyway, I got that news and fist-pumped the sky, did a dance of joy, and then froze. Oh, sugar-honey-iced-tea. Chris Lynch and Jason Reynolds are going to see my story. Turns out the good news is also the bad news.

Here’s what that sudden, stark realization felt like. Imagine you’re at the grocery store, heading back to your car carrying two extremely heavy and overpacked bags of foodstuffs, and you’re feeling stoked because you hit some sweet sales and managed to stock up for the week and then some. You’re crossing a busy throughway in the parking lot when the bags let go. All at once, the bottoms rip wide open and vomit your stuff all over the pavement. Cans are rolling everywhere. The milk carton is ruptured. A white puddle expands at your feet. Dented boxes, broken eggs, bruised apples racing away, and cars coming at you from both directions. What you thought of just moments ago as an awesome bundle of tasty treats now looks like an embarrassing heap of trash.

My “book” now feels like those groceries lying broken and hopeless and ugly on the pavement, and Mr. Lynch and Mr. Reynolds are the drivers who have to stop and get out of their slick cars to help me to scrape all my crap up off the ground. They know how to bag groceries. This would never happen to them. I’m a schmuck, and now they have to deal with my foolishness.

Perception versus Reality

I’m not saying that’s my actual situation. Maybe my “book” isn’t as big a mess as all that, but that’s how it feels right now.

I’ve got this thing, this rough draft, and it’s terrible in all the ways that I usually tell myself a first draft is allowed to be. But…

Two authors whom I respect (and, okay yes, idolize) are about to put eyes on it. All of a sudden it no longer feels okay for my rough draft to be messy. I want to turn my work-to-date over to Chris, have him read it, and then get an email from him expounding upon how wonderful it is and how excited he is to help me cut and polish this diamond of a story.

I want that, but I don’t have a rough diamond to give him. I’ve got a pile of ruined groceries hastily scraped up off the blacktop, possibly destined for the garbage. And he’s going to judge me!

He’s not going to judge me.

The man is amazing. So is Jason, who will read my “finished” product at the end of this semester and either give it the thumbs up (I pass) or thumbs down (I still pass, but let it be known that I am a talentless hack). Every student who has worked with these two men has sung their praises.

The point is, I no longer feel okay with my rough draft being terrible. In my desire to impress two incredible authors, I’d want it to be perfect, spotless, shiny. Glittering to the point of blinding in its utter fabulousness. Is that too much to ask?

We’re Our Own Worst Critics

Yes, as it turns out. Perfection is too much to ask, and my self-imposed, unattainable new expectations have bogged down my writing process. My muse has curled up in the fetal position at my feet beneath my desk. She’s utterly useless under pressure, I guess. Meanwhile, I am getting hung up on every single sentence I try to write. Is this description strong enough? Are these verbs punchy enough? Am I rambling? Should I cut this? Do I need to elaborate here? Why’s there so much dialogue in this scene? What the H am I doing?

That’s me, snail-crawling along, doubting EVERYTHING about my writing and my characters and my story. Whereas I normally can pump out a solid 1,500 to 2,000 words a day, I’m now down to less than 500.

Which I guess would be okay if it weren’t for the fact that I’m supposed to turn in 13,000 words of new material on December 1st in preparation for my January residency. I’ve only got 6,200 words so far, and that has taken me almost two weeks to generate. And it’s all rough draft quality work.

Sigh.

This really should be an IWSG post, because I am feeling more insecure about my writing than I have probably ever felt before in my entire life. It’s cool. It’ll pass. I’ve doubted myself before this, and I always get over it…

Eventually.

Until then, I’ll continue to plug along and hope that, with the help of an incredibly talented (and patient–dear Freya, please let them be patient) mentor and reader, some of my groceries will turn out to be salvageable. Because what else can to do? It’s part of being an aspiring writer, right? I either quit now, or I push through the doubt and continue to dribble the words onto the paper.

Okey-dokey. Break time’s over. Back to the day job.

Has anyone else had nearly paralyzing moments of doubt brought on by the prospect of having a legitimately talented author/agent/editor reading your stuff? Please, tell me I’m not the only one.

November 21, 2017
My MFA in Creative Writing Program Explained

If you hadn’t heard, I’m getting my MFA in creative writing at Lesley University.

This week, my third semester wraps itself up as I claw my way toward the finish line and a degree. Technically, I should have finished up last week, on Friday to be exact. Life doesn’t always work out the way we envision it, though. Since I started this blog as a way to document the madness (check out my About page for more on that), I thought I’d write a post that gives my take on the program.

Lesley University’s Low Residency MFA in Creative Writing Program Explained:

Each semester kicks off with an intense–and I do mean intense–nine-day on-campus residency in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The summer residency happens in June. The winter residency happens in January.

I live just up the way in Salem, so I commute on the train. During the residency, which kicks off at 9am each morning and doesn’t wrap up until 8pm each night, I attend interactive workshops taught by creative writing faculty from one of five concentrations (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Writing for Young People <– that’s my concentration, and Graphic Novels). I also attend seminar lectures from visiting guests such

Mr. Reynolds, an incredible writer and mentor in our program

as Jo Knowles,  M. T. Anderson, and Jason Reynolds (who also teaches in the program) just to name three whom I particularly enjoyed.

Not to mention all the wonderful social time that happens each evening after the day’s classes and lectures wrap up. I’ve met so many talented, funny, wonderful, and supportive people at the two residencies I’ve attended thus far. If I’m lucky, I’ll stay in touch with some of these fine folks for the rest of my life.

Prior to each residency, I write and submit two creative pieces, each about 6,500 words long. A designated faculty member and other students workshop both of them. I have to say, there are so many things that I have loved about this program, but the critique workshops are my favorite. Not only do I get to read about six pieces of creative writing by others and practice my skills as I give feedback on them, but I get to receive nuanced and thoughtful feedback from six people who are as passionate about writing as I am.

As the on-campus residency wraps up, I work with my mentor to build a study-plan for the rest of my semester that will play out long-distance via email and texting and Facebook messaging, etc. It’s a personalized study plan based on what I think are my strengths and weaknesses as a writer, what my mentor sees as my strengths and weaknesses, and what my writing goals are in general (to become a famous, globetrotting novelist! Ha ha. *sigh* Just let me dream, okay?)

Break-down of Semesters 1 & 2: In a Word, Busy.

I take three classes, though it feels in practice like I’m only taking two. I’ll just treat it like I’m dealing with two classes. For my “main” class, I work with my mentor. Over the course of the semester, I read craft books and novels and write reflective or analytical essays about them. At the same time, I work on my own creative stuff. I submit my essays and my creative writing four times (once a month), and each time I get an in-depth analysis back from my mentor on what I did well and what I need to work on. As if that’s not enough to keep me busy, there’s that pesky second class I mentioned.

The second class is an interdisciplinary studies class, which means that since I’m in the

This is my final project for my first Interdisciplinary Class: The Artist’s Way. It’s supposed to be a collage representing my journey as a writer.

Writing For Young People concentration, I have to take something that ISN’T related to writing for young people. For my first semester, I took a class modeled after Julie Cameron’s Artist’s Way. I took a science fiction and fantasy class in my second semester that focused on the short story. This semester, I took a follow-up to the science fiction and fantasy class that focused on the novel.

For this second class, the I.S. class, I also have to read books, write reflective or analytical papers about them, and write my own creative stuff. All that stuff gets submitted four times per semester, too.

Sound like a lot? Yeah, it is.

It’s great, but it’s a lot. Cue the stress.

Ah, but that was just the first two semesters.

Semester 3: Odin, It Was Rough.

As I said, I’m wrapping up my third semester in this program. A week late, it’s true, but at least I’m finishing. Not everyone does. Third semester is notorious in this program for being insane.

In addition to managing all the work for my SFF novel-writing class (which has been off-the-hook outstanding, by the way), this is the semester when I had to write my big “craft essay.” Now, I want to pause here for a moment and say that the folks at Lesley really ought to call this our “Craft Thesis” since we aren’t allowed to graduate if we don’t write it.

This beast to which I am referring takes the place of reading a couple of books and write a 2-4 page reflective paper about them four times during the semester. Instead, we have to pick a craft topic of our own choosing, research the holy heck out of it, and write a 12-18 page paper on the topic.

What did I choose to research? Glad you asked. In an attempt to marry my two great loves

in life–biology and creative writing–I elected to write a research paper exploring the neuroscience behind writing that “hooks” readers.

Look at all those scientific articles about neuroscience and reading!

Sounds pretty rad, am I right?

It was, but don’t forget that while I was doing all that research [shudders at the thought of all that research], I was also writing and submitting about 24,000 words of my own creative writing spread out over four submission cycles.

Semester 4: The Future Looks Bright

I submitted my craft essay (they really should call that sucker a “Craft Thesis” to give it the psychological weight it deserves) last Monday and cheered. I’ll be submitting my last batch of creative stuff on Wednesday, and I am looking toward the horizon with a sense of optimism steeped, perhaps, in a bit of denial. It would be nice to get at least a couple of weeks of down time to catch my breath, but we just got the email with instructions on how to format or workshop pieces, which are due December 1st.

Yikes!

Fourth semester is the one in which I devote 100% of my attention on my “Creative Thesis.” This is the culminating creative project, the thing that showcases my supposed mastery of writing fiction (for young people, mind you). No pressure. No problem.

Did I mention that my right eye has been twitching for the past week? No kidding. It really has.

Books I’m reading to inform my creative thesis this semester.

Fourth semester will be great. I’ll have no I.S. class competing for my time and attention. I’ll have no analytical craft essays to write, big or small. It’ll just be me and my book and my mentor trying to help me make it not suck so bad. I’ll need to put together 100 to 150 polished pages of a YA novel that I and the program administrators won’t be embarrassed by. I think this is doable?

Technically, I already have 150 pages of my Creative Thesis written. As of last night, Scrivener informed me that I’ve got 159 pages, to be exact. The problem is… oh, there are so many problems. The biggest problem is that, from a structural standpoint, Under the Purple Sky is a hot mess. I attempted to tell a YA sci-fi survival story in the first person POV via two different timelines that weave together as readers experience the main character’s psychological ruin during a global disaster that wipes out 99% of the human species, and her tentative road to recovery three years later. Ugh.

I’ve got my work cut out for me. But, I remain hopeful. It will be nice to be able to focus on just one single project for a full semester, and if I play my cards right, I’ll walk away from all of this in July with a degree. I might even have a decent draft of a book, too. That, however, remains to be scene… er, seen. Ha, ha.

So, that’s what I’ve been up to this past year-and-a-half.

If you are curious about Lesley’s Creative Writing program, specifically their low residency program, feel free to ask in the comments. I’m a subject sample of n=1, but I’m happy to share my experiences thus far.

November 6, 2017
Life! Will You Just Chill Out Already?

Aaaaaaaaaarrrgh! Life, my good man, please! Will you just chill out already? I mean, criminiddly, I am trying to be a writer over here!

In all seriousness, though, I have not be getting words onto the paper of late, and it is starting to make me feel a little crazy. There has been a whole lot of family stuff going on over the last couple of weeks. Kid stuff. Supporting my creative spouse stuff. Parent stuff. Pile onto that all the scads of “extras” that my teaching gig has been throwing at me. Then, just to see what my max lift in life is, cue my third submission deadline on October 2nd (which I only partially met).

It was legitimately too much. I felt like the kid who stuffed one too many peeps into her mouth and was realizing that the gooey wad of yellow sweet stuff was blocking her airway. (By the way, I’ve never actually done the peep challenge. I’m not that dumb. I did the chubby bunny challenge.) So I asked for an extension on my craft essay, and my amazing mentor gave me an extra week. Phew! What a relief.

That’s the bubble. Bursting.

And then I looked at my calendar for that week and saw evening obligations for my teaching gig that were going to keep me on campus late into the evening for four of the five weekdays. And school play and scouting stuff for my kids. And PTO meetings (which I skipped). And my writer’s group meeting (which I also skipped and felt super crappy about). And non-negotiable visit to my MIL’s house. And a scout-sponsored camping trip this past weekend.

Yep. That week-long extension gave me just one additional functional writing day.

But I got the draft done and got it turned in on time. That did feel good. A weight lifted from my mind, and I thought, “All right! Now to get back to the fun stuff! Back to my story. Back to writing!”

And then I took a look at my calendar for this week. Science team meet on Tuesday eats up that evening. College Rec letters are due on Friday. I have 52 trimester one indicator grades and comments due on Monday. One of my kids has an imminent birthday coming up that we really should do something about, since, you know… parenting and stuff?

*sigh*

*glances wistfully at the Scrivener icon sitting neglected in a corner of the desktop.*

I’m sure I’ll get back to you one day, WIP.

October 11, 2017
Beating the Cold Season with Some Good Books!

Every September, I get back into the classroom and, within a month, I catch a cold. I blame my students. They get it first, and then they proceed to coat every surface they touch with their contagion. Last year, the virus took up residence deep in my chest and overstayed its welcome by about six weeks. It was vicious. Several of my colleagues and even a few of my students developed secondary pneumonia. Thankfully, my family and I live in a state of lightly controlled squalor, so we’ve got exposure theory on our side. Our immune systems are primed and ready for battle, but I’ve got a secret weapon in my battle against the common cold: books!

And yet, here I am, all hopped up on cold meds (this might be a very interesting post), holed up in bed while the rest of the fam shares hot-wings and watches the Patriots game on TV. Now that I think of it, perhaps there are some perks to catching the annual back-to-school cold.

Books (in all forms) Make Everything Better!

Just look at all those lovely books!

If you’re anything like me, your “to read” list grows faster than your “have read” list does. One of the original Twilight Zone episodes that haunts me the most is “Time Enough At Last,” starring Burgess Meredith as a guy who just wants to be left alone so he can read his books. I won’t spoil the episode because it’s available on Amazon Prime (you should watch it), but the ending is tragic in a way that only a bibliophile can fully grasp.

Audiobooks have become a staple in my life these days, too. I check them out from my library, and I buy them via Audible.com. Whenever I’m in the car or out for a walk, I’m listening to a book. My students helpfully showed me how to overclock the reading speed to 1.25x, which shaves about 2.5 hours off of a 10-hour book. It’s amazing.

That said, as great as listening to books can be, it’s not quite the same as reading them myself.

I am a slow reader. A pathetically slow reader. And, since I’ve started up the Masters in Creative Writing program at Lesley University, my reading speed has slowed even further. Now I find myself reading at two levels. I used to read for the simple pleasure of getting lost in the story. Now, I pay close attention to word choice, verbs, description, pacing, syntax, structure, flow, et cetera. In other words, I read with a writer’s eye, which slows me down.

My current bout with the rhinovirus isn’t nearly as bad as last year. Last year, I felt like I was dying. This year, I just feel like someone has stuffed my sinuses with a soggy loaf of bread. Not pleasant, but it could be worse. It didn’t stop me from getting out to Barnes & Noble yesterday for a YA book event where I grabbed myself a few ARCs to read… eventually… when I find the time. (That’s them in the photo at the top of this post.)

Here’s what I’m currently reading!

I might be guilty of exaggerating my misery slightly so that my spouse keeps the kids at bay, but I’m not completely faking. I am in bed with a sinus headache, and I do have to rest up so that I can make it through teaching my classes next week.

But really, I just want to snuggle in and cherish this rare opportunity to READ!

Books make everything better. Aren’t they great? Have you ever used books to get through something unpleasant, like cold season?

September 24, 2017
I Teach, I Write, I Parent, I Busy!

Excuse me, Miss Granger? Could I borrow that time turner for a moment?

Yeah, Yeah, I know. We’re all busy. We all wear a lot of different hats in life. I teach, I write, and I parent. It doesn’t always happen in that particular order. Priorities shift daily. Time bleeds out of my as if I’ve severed some existential artery. Last night, I fell into bed at 9:00pm like a corpse. This morning I woke feeling not much livelier than an awkwardly reanimated corpse. Why in the name of Odin am I so tired?!

That was the question I had on my brain when I sat down to do my morning pages. [side note: I’m back at Julie Cameron’s self-guided course The Artist’s Way. Journaling daily in the mornings is part of the program]

…anyway, I just could not understand the level of fatigue plaguing me this morning after getting an amazing eight full hours of sound sleep last night. Is my thyroid slowing down? Am I developing a vitamin D deficiency (again)? Could low-grade depression triggered by the start of a new school year be the culprit? What? What am I missing?

So, I recapped this past week, I wrote everything out on paper. Once I saw it all, I was flabbergasted but had my answer. I am busy! Like, Hermione Granger with her time turner level busy.

Between lesson planning forward a few weeks (necessary to keep me from completely losing my mind) for three different high school science courses, scoring varsity volleyball games, prepping way too many solutions for a diffusion and osmosis lab, doing one-on-one check-in’s and phone calls with my new advisees and their parents, attending my bi-monthly meeting for the North Shore Writer’s Group, getting my eldest to Scouts, and meeting my Friday submission deadline for the Widgets & Wizards novel-writing class I’m taking as part of my graduate studies, I was in near constant motion. And, like a complete goober, I decided to start lightly restricting the ridiculous volumes of food I was shoving into my face so I might stand a chance of losing a bit of the weight I put on during my first year of grad school (you know, so I can fit back into my work clothes and not look obscene).

The start of a new school year always knocks me down for a few days. It’s the sudden shift in mental alertness that does it. This year, though, this year I feel like I’ve got a brutal case of jet lag mixed with seasonal allergies and a touch of the flu. And the load doesn’t look like it’s going to be lightening up any time soon. This coming week is even busier than last week was. Tonight it’s a PTO meeting. Tomorrow I’ll be back at the volleyball scoring table, and Thursday night I’ll be leaving the house at 7:00am and returning home from my teaching day at 9:00 pm thanks to it being “Parent’s Visiting Night.”

If I’m going to make my next submission deadline, I’m going to have to be on my organizational A-game. Part of that means MAKING TIME TO WRITE! Parenting might have to take a back seat to the teaching and writing this week. Thank Thor I’ve got a loving and supportive spouse who, because they’re a creative individual who went back to school to study their specific creative medium, understands and supports me and is willing to step in and pick up the slack when necessary. And this week it will be very, very necessary.

Last night, I added another 800+ words to my WIP. Today, I need to match that or do even better. I got a very encouraging note from my mentor this morning saying I’d nailed my MC’s voice in my last submission, so I’m feeling optimistic that I’m on the right track.

As for writing, [deep breath, cracks knuckles, swigs coffee], here we go.

What times in your year do things tend to pile up on you?

September 12, 2017
Chuang-Tzu, Things with Wings, and the Writer’s Life

At some point between 369 BCE and 286 BCE, western philosopher Zhuangzi (Chuang-tzu) wrote what is commonly known as The Butterfly Dream Parable. Here’s an excerpt:

“Once upon a time, I, Zhuangzi, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes a butterfly. I was conscious only of my happiness as a butterfly, unaware that I was Zhuangzi. Soon I awakened, and there I was, veritably myself again. Now I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man.”

The butterfly parable popped into my head today as I stood at my kitchen sink, gazing out at my back yard with unseeing eyes. This morning’s writing session was a darned good one. I’d written just over 1,200 new words and wrapped up a lengthy scene in one of my two current WIPs.

For weeks, I’ve been banging my head against this particular project. The first third of the story had its own set of wings. I mean, the story just flew out of my brain. It was great. Then… it stopped being great. I hit the dreaded “middle” of the plot, and mental quicksand sucked me down. What was the point? Where was it going? Ugh.

So, for weeks I ruminated and whined and avoided trying to write anything. The one scene I did write was absolute trash. I’m convinced it won’t survive the second draft. Frustrating? Oh, you bet.

Then, someone posted something on Facebook about Mary Carroll Moor and the idea of writing “islands.” The general idea is to abandon the process of writing a story chronologically from scene to scene when you run up on writer’s block. That’s the moment, this person said, that one might benefit from writing whatever scene happens to bubble up into your mind without worrying about where it would fit into the story, or even whether it will end up being part of the finished product. It’s a form of discovery writing, I guess. Since I discovery-wrote that first smoking hot third of my WIP, I figured I’d give the island writing thing a try.

A few night’s ago, a flashbulb scene popped brightly into my brain, of my characters attempting a hairy river-crossing. The scene in my head was only a few seconds long, but it was incredibly vivid. For the past three days, I’ve been writing that scene. Today, it sprouted wings, caught an updraft, and took off. I disappeared into that scene completely.

When I returned to myself near midday, I felt a little hazy, like I was in that half-awake-half-asleep place. Which brings me to my moment at the kitchen sink and Chuang-tzu’s butterfly parable.

As I stared out into my back yard, it occurred to me that I have spent very little time in the outside world this summer. Sure, there have been a few days when I’ve set up camp at the teakwood table in the shade of our massive maple tree. Even then, though, I was elsewhere. I was inside my writing, my other world.

It can be easy for writers to disengage from the real world, to forget about it as they immerse themselves in their self-generated fictional worlds. On the one hand, it’s a wonderful feeling when the writing comes alive so vividly that you don’t want to leave it. On the other hand, my doctor informed me at my July physical that I have a vitamin-D deficiency.

My back yard is gorgeous. We’ve had a good amount of rain this summer, so the lawn has stayed green, and all of our flowers and fruit trees are lush and vibrant… and I’ve barely noticed any of it. Maybe I should take a moment to wake from my fictional world and spend some time in my non-fictional world.

So, I spent a bit of time outside today, and I took some pictures of all the beautiful things I’ve been missing. Here they are.

Have you had the experience of vanishing into your writing? Do you ever struggle to come back from that place? How do you balance your two worlds as a writer?

August 15, 2017
Life: It Happens to the Best of Us

It’s been my experience that a creative person’s goals–fragile, beautiful little things that they are–frequently crash headlong into the mercurial realities of life.

This morning, as I sit at my kitchen table to do my morning pages, I can’t help but catch sight of the wall calendar opposite me and notice that August 28th is a mere sixteen days away. Time appears to have sprung a leak this summer. Just a moment ago, it was June 16th, and I was attending the end-of-year faculty party.

Ah, summer vacation. The kids would be in camp all day. Hubby would be hard at work with his stuff down in his studio. I’d have two

A visual representation of my mental image of summer in all its leisurely, creativity-inspiring glory.

months crank out as much work for my graduate studies as possible. Heck, I might be able to knock off every third-semester assignment before the end of August when I had to return to my full-time job of teaching science to high-schoolers. The future looked bright.

Now, I have less than three weeks before I’m back in the classroom and my creative endeavors become relegated to a dimly lit, neglected corner of existence. What the heck?!

Scottish poet Robert Burns wrote in 1785, “The best laid schemes of Mice and Men go oft awry.” Isn’t that the truth?

Now, sitting here, faced with irrefutable evidence that yet another blissful summer of writing has snuck by me, shielded by the dust kicked up by the mocking chaos of reality, a couple of thoughts spring to mind.

First, I spend perhaps a bit too much time cursing J. K. Rowling for thinking up that damnable Time Turner from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Why, J. K.? Why did you have to tease me with that thing? I’ve never been good at math, but even if I were a genius with numbers I still wouldn’t be able to count all the times I’ve wished for things that don’t exist: the ability to fly, a non-evil and therefore helpful clone, a sable-coated prehensile tail… and now, I can add a time turner to that list. Garr!!

Additionally, I find myself thinking yet again of the first episode from the 1980’s reboot of the Twilight Zone. In “A Little Piece and Quiet” (directed by Wes Craven), a housewife with way too much stuff in her life and no time for herself digs up a necklace/amulet in her flower bed that gives her the power to stop time completely. It’s fantastic until nuclear war breaks out, and then it’s not fantastic anymore.

There she is, realizing that her fabulous discovery has just ruined her life.

Hey, it’s the Twilight Zone. Nothing ever ends well in the Twilight Zone. That’s what I loved about it and still do. The thing is, I first saw that episode as a rerun when I was fifteen or sixteen. That was… a very long time ago, yet it’s still with me. A magical necklace that can stop time! Not unlike that half-alien chick from the TV show of the same era, “Out of This World” (which, in stark contrast to the Twilight Zone, was terrible) who could stop time by touching her fingers together. The time-stopping amulet was way better because of its mysterious and potentially sinister origins.

Anyway, I think about Hermione’s time turner and that doomed housewife’s time-stopping amulet all the time. If only…

Well, I’ve finished nursing my cup of coffee. The tea kettle just whistled to let me know the water’s hot and ready for my post-coffee cup of Constant Comment. The kids are awake and ravenously ready for breakfast. And the home-repair project that ate up my entire day yesterday sits waiting to be finished. If I’m to be honest with myself, this day is probably already spent, and I shouldn’t get my hopes up regarding being able to sneak in any creative writing. That said, you never know what might happen. I could be picking roofing nails out of the lawn and stumble across the uncovered corner of an ancient rune-encrusted box containing a mysterious golden amulet. Hey, a girl can dream, can’t she.

What do you dream about in the harried moments when life devours your creative goals and spits out their shattered little bones at your feet?

August 12, 2017
Finding Time to Write (or, My Endless Struggle)

I swear my kids want me to flunk out of grad school. They also might be psychic, because when I sit down at my desk to check email or indulge my Facebook addiction, they happily find quiet and unobtrusive ways to keep themselves occupied (okay, I have time management and procrastination issues). The moment my fingertips touch my keyboard for the purposes of doing some actual creative writing, the little demons arrive at the office door and demand my undivided attention. True, my six-year-old is my primary antagonist in this battle. My ten-year-old less so, but he is not an innocent bystander by any means.

Do I want to build with Legos? Do I want to play a board game? I’m bored. There’s nothing to do. I’m hungry. Can I get them something to eat? No? Well, then, let’s up the ante. How about a game of chess, Mommy? It’s educational, my youngest will point out to me in angelic tones. Do you know how hard it is to say no to a kindergartener pleading with you to play chess, for goodness sake?! You instantly feel like a terrible person for saying no to that one, and my evil little demon knows it.

If by some miracle, I manage to stay strong and say no to all of these requests, there’s always Plan B. Commence with Operation Escalation. They will begin to fight, loudly, about anything and everything. You’re on my side of the couch! I’m using that blanket! I was playing with that! You knocked that down/destroyed that on purpose! You’re cheating at this made-up game that has no rules! You’re punching too hard! The point of the argument is irrelevant, only that the battle escalates until one of them is injured and crying. Oh, yes, they are devious, diabolical strategists.

My husband does intervene on my behalf… sometimes. At other times, though, he retreats to his art studio in the basement and pretends not to hear what’s happening. I don’t begrudge him this. That’s a lie. I totally begrudge him this. In fact, I want to murder him in those moments, even though I simultaneously understand his reasons for it. The problem is that by the time I get home at close to six o’clock from a long day of teaching science to high schoolers, he’s already been on kid duty for three and a half hours, and our kids are human tornadoes in the afternoons. They’ve been pent up inside an elementary school classroom all day. Even the mile and a half walk home does little to vent their pressure-cooker energy. He can boot their butts out into the back yard on days when the weather permits it, but even then, he has to stay alert for sounds of outraged or injury-induced screaming. So, I get why he succumbs to the temptation to go “off-duty” when dinner is done, and the kitchen is cleaned up. That doesn’t mean I don’t mentally curse him to eternal damnation from my spot at my writing desk when I’m looking at a blank page, and my kids are screaming in the other room.

I want to yell at people when they lament that they can never “find the time” to write. Yeah? Well, neither can I. Why? Because it doesn’t exist. There is literally no time to write, no magical empty block with nothing going on where I can sit down with a steaming mug of cozy chamomile tea and put on some relaxing classical music and snuggle in my fluffy PJ’s and write. Nope. If I’m going to write, I must MAKE time to do it. I must set boundaries, barricade the door, and defend my selected hour like the violently seized territory it is. If I let my guard down, that time will be taken right back from me. There are 101 articles and blog posts that offer use struggling saps tips for carving out time in our busy lives for our writing. Here’s a good one from Writer’s Digest. I’ll let them tell you what to do, because (if you haven’t figured it out yet) I am a hot mess and shouldn’t be giving anyone suggestions on how to do anything.

Sometimes I literally leave. I pack up and head to the local library or to a coffee shop. That works, but it breeds resentment and strains marital relations, so I leave those trips to do-or-die deadline situations. More often, I will abandon my office space for my bedroom, which has a lock on the door and is upstairs from the chaos. I will put on my headphones and drown out all attempts at Plan B that may erupt below. My husband feels better because he knows that, should a genuine emergency occur, I am still close by. My children seem to be slowly adjusting to the fact that mom is in grad school and that grad school trumps their need for my undivided attention.

Maybe this will be good for all of us. My kids might finally learn how to self-sooth. My husband is learning the fine art of reheating leftovers (though let’s give credit where credit is due: he does 90% of the cooking already because I’m not so great at cooking things that are edible). Who knows? I might actually get my MFA in creative writing. I’ll let you know how it goes, but right now I’ve got some writing to do.

(I’ve been told that bloggers are supposed to end their posts with questions designed to jump-start a discussion in the comments thread. I’m pretty sure no one has stumbled across this secret little blog, but I may as well engage in best practice blogging, right? After all, when I’m a successful and famous YA author, I’ll probably have to keep an actual author’s blog where I can interact with my thousands of awesome fans… sigh. We have to dream, folks. Anyway, here’s the leading question(s): are you in a similar position as me? What things in your life vie for you time and pull you away from your writing? Are you able to resist? If so, what are your strategies? Do share!

August 9, 2017
Who am I and what’s this blog all about?

Hello world! Here is my very first post for this project. Yes, I’m calling my blog a project. Deal.

Let’s start with the second question. What’s the point of this blog? Ugh, you may be thinking. Yet another author’s blog, another blog about writing. Sort of, I guess. It’s definitely not an author’s blog, not yet anyway. Maybe that will become a part of it one day, if I am so lucky as to get something published. And this blog isn’t specifically about writing, though as a writer that is my primary lens.

You won’t be finding a bunch of sanctimonious writing tips, or click-baity crap about “secrets to writing great [x]” or “ten mistakes that will get your book turned down” or anything else like that. What the heck do I know about that stuff? I’m in no position to be giving tips to anyone, about anything. You might as well ask the pigeon to drive the bus. Besides, there are a gazillion websites and blogs and author’s pages out there that already give you that stuff. This is one I find particularly entertaining (though the language is definitely NOT kid friendly).

This blog is about creativity, about being a creative person. The up’s, the down’s, the genuine difficulties of trying to be a creative individual living in a consumption-focused world.

And, you should know that this blog is mostly for me. If that sounds selfish, too bad. It is selfish. Last summer, I started up a masters program at Lesley University in creative writing. My focus is on writing for young people, because I have kids and they are my target readers (now and in the future). I love them. They’re great. They drive me nuts.

After sixteen years of teaching high school science and writing fictional stories in my spare time as a hobby that I loved very much, I decided to jump the shark in my life and try to pursue creative writing more intentionally. I’m a novice writer, just like every writer is at the outset of their* writing career.

I’m jammed full of ambition and excitement and enthusiasm and ideas and nerves and anxieties and doubts and frustrations; I’m a hot mess. It’s great. It’s terrible. I’m sure it’s a familiar state of existence for anyone bold enough to live a creative life.

This is some scary stuff I’m trying to do right now–switch things up, climb out of my rut, do something new and different. Most of my family, friends, and colleagues don’t get it. Not really. Sure they smile to my face and nod politely. Some of them even refrain from asking backhandedly (or openly) discouraging questions. But I’m doing this anyway, and I thought it would be nifty to document this phase of my life via a blog that others might potentially stumble upon as they peruse the vast digital spaces of the internet.

Like I said, it’s tough trying to be a creative person. It can be intensely frustrating and difficult. Creativity is, on the whole, undervalued by pretty much everyone. But I identify myself as a creative person. My husband is a creative person, too. We support each other. That’s what creative people have to do. We have to support each other. So, maybe by putting my own experiences and thoughts and mental musings here, I can in some way offer support and affirmation and encouragement to other creative-minded individuals. You don’t have to be a writer. You could be a painter, a sculptor, a photographer, and woodworker, a glass blower, a potter, an oral storyteller, a teacher, a librarian, a musician, a composer. You name it; the list goes on. If you value art and the act of creation, I applaud you. Keep creating. We need you.

Now, as for that first question. Who am I? Well, you’ll have to read my blog posts to figure that out. Heck, I’m still not sure of the answer myself. For now, let’s just say that I’m a work in progress, a WIP if you will, and leave it at that.

July 26, 2017