Writing Idiosyncracies

I've given myself a deadline to finish my latest novel in May.
I have a two-week break from my daytime teaching job, so I figure that I have no excuse. Even if I take time to workout in the morning and keep the house running with cooking, laundry and cleaning, I should have plenty of time to write.
If I don't buckle down and write, then I need to find a full-time job and stop calling myself a writer.

One of my most prolific and happy times as a writer was when I would go to Caribou Coffee to write.
Since Caribou Coffee closed, I haven't regularly settled on a place to write, other than at home.
Home is full of distractions, my children come and go. They ask for help with things or wonder if I have time to make them coffee before they run out to work or class.
The cats beg for attention; the pile of laundry demands equal devotion. A dust bunny blowing across the floor hints at other tasks that need doing.

At Caribou, which closed in 2012, I'd listen to music, sip my mocha and write.
The coffee shop had high ceilings with duct work visible. Wood or concrete floors and cozy nooks, along with warm lighting all made Caribou a welcoming place to work.
Often, if I was there in the morning, I'd buy a pastry. It had a cream cheese filling and the pastry was flaky with large granules of sugar on top. Yum.
Just recently, I brought home some pastries from the grocery store. The inside was cherry, but the outside was that flaky crust with large granules of sugar. Just like the pastry that inspired me at Caribou.
Suddenly, I knew that if I could eat one of those pastries in the morning, I could write!
That first day, I put away the remaining pastries so one would be there in the morning for my writing.
When Spencer came in from a friend's house that night, I heard the cabinet doors opening and closing as he searched for his post-midnight snack.
The next morning, no pastries remained.
So I went for a run then, still sweaty, went to the grocery and bought a box of four more pastries.
As I ate one, I wrote.
Things were going well; I figured I'd follow the same plan the next morning. But when I got home from work that night, the pastries were gone again.
This morning before I went to the gym, I stopped at the grocery and bought another box of pastries, so that when I got home, I could do some writing. Since Spencer is still in bed (almost noon) the pastries remained, and I was able to eat one and made some good progress on my writing again.
Once Spencer is out of the house (he's going back to college for summer classes next week), I'm sure I'll be able to to keep pastries here and write each morning.
I may gain 20 pounds, but dammit I'm going to finish that book by the end of May.  

The Life I Want

This semester, my class load is much lighter due to cutbacks. At first, I spent a lot of time complaining and adding up how much less money I am going to make this year. I also wasted some time worrying about how to pay for college.
Just in time, I picked up The Power by Rhonda Byrne. She's also the author of The Secret and if  you've heard of that book, you know she doesn't have to worry about how to pay for anything. She has sold tens of millions of copies.

One of the things recommended by The Power is to live the life you dream of. For instance, if you want to have a job but you don't, set your alarm every morning lay out the clothes you would wear to work, etc.. If you are single and want to be in a relationship, start making room for that special person. Sleep on one side of the bed. Make room in your closet for his clothes, etc..
So, I examined my life and, overall, I am so fortunate. I have a husband who loves me. I'm healthy. I have a great family, great friends. The work and money thing are my biggest concerns.
The author encourages people to put their dream life out there, so I did. I'd like to make a living full time as a writer and to travel to France, maybe even live in France, once the kids are through with school.
I decided on the days when I don't have to go to work, to live my dream life.
I got up this morning and went for a run. I ran seven miles then stopped by the bus stop to chat with my husband while he waited for the bus.
My plan was to come home, shower and get busy writing. But Tucker had a late start today, so he was hanging around the house. Earl forgot his notebook, so even though he took the bus to save the earth, I had to drive the notebook downtown to him.
I didn't get around to writing until almost 10 a.m. I had Tucker drop me in our little downtown on his way to school. I walked to the coffee shop ready to claim my table and get busy. My friend Leah was working in the coffee shop, so I spent a bit of time chatting with her.
As I settled in my corner, another acquaintance came in and we talked for awhile too.
Finally, I got busy on my new novel Paris Runaway. I wrote about 3000 words today. Ideally, I'd like to write 5,000 words on these days off, but my future life needs to include friends too. So if I have a day where I write and drink coffee and talk to friends, that's definitely the future life I want.
Then I walked home, stopping to buy a baguette and a pastry treat for myself.
Walking home with my computer and a baguette protruding from my bag, I definitely could see myself leading this kind of life. But warmer, because the temperature was around 20 degrees. Flakes of snow began to fall as I continued home.
Once home, I sliced the Gouda and Port Salut cheese in our refrigerator and added some salami to big round crackers.
That was a lot for one person to eat, but after running seven miles this morning, if I don't eat enough, I get ravenous. Then I never feel full.
My goal this afternoon is to do some marketing for my other novels before I clean up the house and cook dinner for my husband and son.
Yes, I think this is the life I want to live. It's just tweaking the life I currently live, but throwing in France, plus writing full time would definitely be my dream.
How bout you? Can you start living the life you dream about?

Mocha Rewards

This morning, after a seven and a half mile run, I'm sitting on my front porch enjoying a final mocha. My running partner, Najah, and I decided that mochas will be my reward for finishing a certain number of words on my current writing project. 

I get no more mochas until I reach that 22,000 -word goal. Then 45,000 words, then 67,000 words, then finished.

It sounds like a lot, but I'm actually just deconstructing and reconstructing a book that I wrote before. I've decided to make some changes so a lot of the work will be cutting and pasting then writing other sections and editing everything together. I'm giving myself a time limit so I can try to solve that other problem I mentioned a few weeks ago -- cutbacks at my job. I've started applying for other, full-time jobs, but if I could bring in a little more income from my writing then I could continue to teach college as an adjunct and have time to write. If I get a full-time job, plus teach college, I'll never have time to write.

It seems silly that I need to motivate myself, but with free time and without set deadlines, I often just fritter it away. That's why Najah and I decided on the joint punishment/reward of mochas or no mochas. And she's going to be my motivator and task master. She'll text me encouragement, like a Nike app: "Way to go!" or "Keep it up!" But she's also willing to push me and scold me if I fall behind. 

So wish me luck that I move along quickly and get to my next mocha. 

The book I'm rewriting is I See London, I See France. Parts of the book are the same and some have changed: a mother of three young children has a fight with her husband and he walks out. She thinks about when she last felt vibrant and pins it down to a semester abroad in France. She wonders how life might have turned out differently if she'd married the Frenchman she had a crush on. She decides to sell the minivan and travel to Europe with the kids to see if she can rekindle that spark of life within herself, and maybe a romance too. 

Author Talk

A few months ago, Clay, a fellow teacher invited me to speak to his writer's group.
I agreed and didn't worry too much about it, until he included me in the email to the group. The email said they would schedule about an hour for me to talk.
Gulp.
Me? Talk for an hour about anything? Nothing?
I was suddenly nervous.
I emailed my author friends and asked them -- what do I talk about?
But I needn't have worried. The group was supportive, welcoming and curious.
It wasn't at all like me speaking to them or lecturing them. It felt more like a group discussion. During my part of the agenda, I brought up some points and everyone shared their thoughts on it. Sometimes the discussion veered off the road, but we generally got things back on track.
One thing I had planned to do was read from my novel, The Summer of France. Afterall, publishing the novel was got me an invitation to the group.
Although I talked about the novel, where the idea came from and how it evolved, I never actually read from it.
Have I told you that story?
My book started out with the idea of a couple escaping from their everyday life to run a bed and breakfast in Mackinac Island, Michigan. If you haven't visited Mackinac Island, you should. It's an island that's reachable by boat and doesn't allow cars. It's full of horses and carriages, along with bicycles. And it's famous for its fudge.
My husband and I even went to stay in a house that might be turned into a bed and breakfast. I was going to call the novel, Fudge Ho!
So that idea evolved into a novel about an Ohio woman, Fia, and her family who go to Provence, France to run a bed and breakfast for the Fia's great uncle. The great uncle married a Frenchwoman after World War II, but he is hiding from a war secret.
As you can tell, the idea changed quite a bit, but I'm thrilled with the results. If you haven't read it yet, I hope you will.
You can buy it in ebook form or paperback on Amazon. The Summer of France.
The discussion yesterday didn't focus only on my novel though. We tackled the tough subjects like the state of the publishing industry.
I left feeling invigorated and supported, plus the group bought five of my paperbacks that I'd taken along.
The next time I'm invited to speak, I'll definitely feel less anxious.

Writing Revisions

This morning, I am going through one of my novels changing it from present tense to past tense. I'm not sure why I wrote it in present tense. It just came out that way. But it was something that agents commented on. Things like, "Some readers aren't comfortable with 3rd person present tense." I always just moved on. Too bad, I thought.
Then recently it hit me. I could change it to past tense. And that's what I'm doing.
I'm only on page 51, so this may be a long, tedious process. This is the book about the two women who decide to hike the Appalachian Trail as the ultimate diet plan and as an escape from their almost-adult children who come home for the summer. The women use their time on the trail to figure out what their lives will look like without the day-to-day job of raising children.
As I'm making my way through though, I found this sentence which I liked and thought I'd share with you.

The trail snaked across the mountains, a mere comma in the middle of a sentence of unending trees.

Hope you find a gem in  your work today.

Mad

Today I'm feeling mad. Mad as in angry. Not mad as in crazy.
Two main reasons are making me mad:

Maybe I need a drink so I won't be so angry

1. Small town gossip. I know, I grew up in a small town, but not quite this small. So an after-prom party had alcohol and I got a call from one of the parents Sunday morning. Her oldest is a sophomore and she was apalled. I had to kind of talk her down. Then, somehow, I got the blame for telling people about alcohol at the party, which meant Tucker got blamed for telling me, which he didn't. All of those senior girls in their beautiful prom dresses (see the prom post from Saturday) blamed Tucker for ratting them out and Tucker had "the worst day ever." Parents who believe high school parties won't have alcohol are just naive.
2. Writing. I'm reading books that I keep putting down because they aren't very good, and then I can't believe that my books aren't published. What's the deal? I'm not saying my books are masterpieces, but I think I can give many of these books a run for their money.
A writing instructor at one of the colleges where I work is reading my novel. She has lovely things to say like, "I'm fully engaged" and "I can picture this." Then yesterday she says that to get published my manuscripts need to "have some bite," which I interpreted as snarky and sarcastic, or they have to be so intelligent that people bow down in amazement at how smart the author must be.
And I said, "Who wants to read books like that?"

Maybe I need to go to France with Grace and eat crepes

I'm writing escapist books with fun plots that deal with emotional issues most people face. Why? Because that's what I like to read.
So why are these things making me mad?
Well, a few weeks ago, I told Earl that I might be entering menopause so I'd be more irritable than usual. I was only using that as an excuse so that I could tell him to stop reading sections of the newspaper to me while I was trying to work.
Now that I'm feeling so mad about everything, I wonder if those words aren't true. Maybe everything gets under my skin because I'm starting menopause. Or maybe that's just my excuse du jour.
Show me that I'm not alone. Tell me what makes you mad?

NaNoWriMo Attempt

Well, today is the last day of November and I have to say that for a big chunk of November, I fell off the writing train.
NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month. It's an organized effort to get people to write 50,000 words of a novel. I've done it two times before successfully, and a few other times half-heartedly.
I started out strong, writing the required number of words each day to finish. Then I started getting distracted by work and basketball and swim team.
And somewhere in the middle of the month I slid into a funk. I decided I wasn't a writer any more and just gave up. Maybe it was the holiday blues. Maybe I was missing my daughter Grace who is in France instead of home.
So at 5:53 a.m., I have 24,243 words of my next novel. But yesterday at this time, I only had 18,108 words.
Who knows what can happen in a day?
To be fair to me though, I do have to work then I have a staff meeting and next I have to be at Tucker's swim meet. In between though, I'll write my boney fingers off.
Check in at the bar along the right side to see how far I get today.
And when I'm finished, even if I don't reach 50,000, I'll have a good chunk of a new novel started, because I'm a writer. There's no escaping it.

Falling Behind

I started the month with the intention of writing 50,000 words toward a new novel as part of NaNoWriMo. I did so well the first five days, writing 1700 words every day and documenting my progress along the side of my blog.
Then came the weekend when I needed to grade essays from four classes. So those took priority. Then when I had finished those by Tuesday, I had a book from the library that was only a two-week loan. I had two days to finish it, and I really liked the quarter of the novel I had read, so that took precedence.
I still have a bit of the novel to finish (it's a day late now but worth the dime)and I have another class of essays to read, but I'm going to hop back on this writing idea and see how much I can catch up in the next few days.
Technically, at 1700 words per day, I should be at 18,700 words by today. Instead, I'm at 8527 words. Just a little over 10,000 to write.
I'm sitting at Caribou Coffee with a skim berry white mocha and they're playing Christmas music.
I can do this.
Hope bout you?
Are you behind on any projects?

Nanowrimo -- Again

November is National Novel Writing Month aka Nanowrimo
The goal is to write 50,000 words in one month.
I'll be trying to write at least 1700 words per day in a sequel to my previous, as yet unsold novel, The Summer of France.
The working title for this one is Autumn in Aix only because of the alliteration. I'm sure I'll think of a better title later.
If you're doing Nanowrimo this month, make me a buddy. My writing name is PaulitaKincer (original, I know)

Day 1 -- 1782 words

Porch Work

I'm sitting on my front porch with my knees propped up on the wicker chair across from me working on my computer. The birds screech and warble. The breeze flicks through the trees, moving the branches.

I see trees and weeds growing in the clover that I should get up and cut, but I don't move from this spot.
A bird swoops across, letting the wind lift him from below before he settles in a tree. Then the wooden wind chimes clank a few times. The sun shines hot, but this place on the porch is shaded.
I have papers I could grade, but I'm taking the day off. I can get to those tomorrow. Today, I plan to work on revising my novel. I've revised (again) the first 50 pages. Today I will finish 50 more. Grace is reading it, looking for typos or missing information. When she finished the second 25-page section, she handed it back and said, "Do you have more? I really want to keep reading."
She may have only said that to make me feel better, but I hope she actually enjoys it, and like a book you don't want to put down, wants to read on.
So think of me on this Memorial Day Sunday, sitting on the porch, feeling the breeze sweep across and reading through my novel with the title revised (actually changed back to the first title) The Summer of France.
Hopefully, it will be coming soon to a bookstore near you. You'll be the first to know.

Crafting Villains

At the writing conference I attended a week ago, a psychologist spoke about creating villains.
Funny, cause I don't think of my novels as having villains, but every novel has something or someone the main character must struggle against. As Carolyn Kaufman began to explain how to give rise to the perfect villain, I realized that a number of characters in my latest novel might be villainous.
The perfect villain is someone who "pushes your hero's buttons," Kaufman explained.
I hadn't thought about that. I began to consider my current main character Fia, whose goal is to have a happy family. Her husband could be the villain as he opts for money over family. The Frenchman bad guys struggles to be free of a controlling family. Lots of family buttons being pushed. That makes me happy.
"The villain will personify the dark side of the hero," Kaufman explained. The villain must be the hero's shadow, that dark side. "Think of the things that you consider the darkest, most heinous. That's what is in your shadow," she said.
Kaufman went on to explain some hero/villain duos. Bilbo and Gollum. Luke and Darth Vader.
"A truly great villain personifies your hero's dark side and what your hero will become if he falls prey to that dark side of himself," Kaufman said.
I would add here Harry Potter and Voldemort. JK Rowling made it so clear throughout her books that the main differences between Harry and Voldemort were the choices that Harry made to do good rather than evil.
So the hero should be tempted to give up that important thing, to turn to the dark side, but resist.
Kaufman had a lot of great insights and tools in her book The Fiction Writer's Guide to Psychology and on her website at Archetypewriting.

Scary Painting

This morning, I am determined to rewrite the opening line of my novel. I packed up my computer and biked down to Caribou Coffee. This place has great writing memories for me. This is where I came early in the morning for weeks and weeks when I was writing my first novel, leaving the kids at home with Earl.
I felt sure I could make some real writing progress here.
The room has a warehouse feel in the open ceiling that shows the ductwork painted a redwood color, but the floor is wood and painted concrete and the furniture has a crafstman style -- wooden love seats with upholstered cushions, leather arm chairs and slick wood tables with straight backed wooden chairs.
Many of the tables are taken and even more of the outlets for plugging in computers are occupied. I spotted an open table and made a beeline for it. I set up my computer, even finding an available outlet. Once settled at the table, I looked up and nearly jumped away from the pastel drawing that is hung on the wall above me.
Caribou displays the artwork of various artists. Some of them have been whimsical, some of them beautiful. This one was just scary.
At first, I thought it was a painting of a sad clown. As I looked at it more, I realized it was supposed to be a woman with a hat.
Either way, it's definitely inhibiting my writing.
The placement of the lights didn't make for a clear picture, but I think you can get the idea.

Now I need to ignore the freaky woman peering down at my computer and try to write.
The drawing is for sale for $50 if anyone wants to buy it and get it off the wall so I can focus on my work again.

Does Publishing Still Mean Paper?

A recent blog post between two male authors discussed the future of publishing. One of those men had walked away from a big publishing house offer for half a million dollars. That's right, $500,000 -- for writing.
Barry Eisler, the author who left the big money on the table, has a successful series of books based on the character John Rain who is an assassin. So why did he walk away from such a lucrative offer? He decided to self-publish instead.
Gasps of horror. Self publishing is for losers, isn't it?
The conversation on the blog, listed at the bottom of my post, is long and involved, but the basics are that Eisler decided he would do better in the long run to keep the erights to his books and earn more money from them over time.
According to the discussion between Eisler and Joe Conrath, who self publishes, the big publishing houses are trying to hold off epublishing by charging a lot for ebooks. Ebooks, of course, cost very little for the publisher. Still, the author earns only 14.9 percent of the cost of that ebook. The seller, usually Amazon, takes 30 percent off the top. The publishing house gets 52.5 percent of the list price. On paper, the author gets 25 percent, but the agent and attorney get a cut too, bringing the total down to 14.9 percent. Authors can earn 70 percent of the purchase price if they self publish with very little overhead to get started. Conrath is selling 3000 ebooks per day.
In Conrath and Eisler's opinions, the publishing houses are holding onto their glory days, giving life support to the stiff spine and supple pages of books printed on paper, rather than embracing the new technology.
I love printed books, but I've been hankering for an ereader for a few months. I imagine being able to travel and carry only an ereader filled with lots of different books. I think I would also buy more books if they were priced around $5 rather than the $15 I spent for a paperback yesterday at Barnes & Noble.
One of the benefits of self publishing is that the author has total control over the cover and the title. Apparently some authors have been a little unhappy with the choices made by the publishing houses, like the cover for Eisler's book Connexion Fatale which featured an olive green garage door and security lights. Apparently he felt that did not convey the thriller that lay inside the cover.
Another benefit of self publishing is that the book can reach readers about a year earlier than it would going through a publishing house, each page printed, bound together, and sent to warehouses then bookstores.
Okay, so more money for the author, more control for the author, book in the hands of the readers sooner. All of these reasons seem like wins for the author.
But, what if everyone self publishes? How will readers decide which books are good and which are bad if we don't have the publishing houses as gatekeepers any more? Truthfully, bad books have always gotten published and good books have always gotten rejected. Readers may have to search a bit more, but once a book starts selling, other readers should follow.
I've always wanted to hold a book in my hands with my name on the front. Author Paulita Kincer. Maybe I won't get that chance as the industry changes. But even greater than the longing for a hardback or paperback, is the urge for readers to plunge into a story that I created, to love my characters, to hate my characters, to get to the end and sigh.
So, if given the chance to publish or epublish, I'll grab it and keep in mind the words of wisdom from Joe Conrath and Barry Eisler about authors earning royalties.
http://barryeisler.blogspot.com/

She Likes It!

I started taking an online writing class about the character-driven novel. I want to keep working on my writing and if I have to think about it, send emails about, analyze it, that keeps me working.
One of the first questions the teacher asked is "Why do you write?"
My response is "Why wouldn't I?"
Since I was a kid, I have kept notebooks filled with my writings. I would get up early on summer mornings, make a peanut butter sandwich and set off throughout the neighborhood looking for adventures that I could include in my writing.
This question forced me to think about the purpose of my writing.
I write because I love to tell stories. Truthfully though, it wouldn't be enough to simply write. I want two other things: I want to be paid for my writing and I want people to enjoy my writing. I want people to read my work in search of those little gems, those words that say precisely what the reader has felt.
Awhile ago, I gave a copy of my latest novel Ransoming Raphael to my friend Sheila. I can't remember when I gave it to her -- maybe last fall, maybe in January. Her life has been in a bit of turmoil as her daughter Bethany becomes an international model. In Ransoming Raphael, a woman travels to France to run her uncle's bed and breakfast and discovers his secret from World War II. While driving around in the backseat of a car in Paris, Sheila took out the manila folder that held the 295 pages of my novel and began to read.
She took pictures of bridges and buildings and flowers throughout the capital of France, and she read my novel. She emailed me when she was on page 104 to tell me she liked it.
Oh, how that made me heart soar. To have someone reading my work and enjoying it -- that feels so good.
Then today, early this morning, our time, she sent this message: "I'm a few pages from the end, I'm loving it btw."
Yippee! I felt like Sally Field at the Oscars. Approval is so energizing.
Within the hour she emailed again: "I like how everything ended up. Its perfect! I can see this as a movie, muy bien!"
Well, she's mixing up her languages, but what can you expect since she has been in both Italy and France within the week. The point is one person in the world has read my book and enjoyed it.
As I continue my online writing class, I'll tweak things in my novel and strengthen the characters and the words, but what motivates me even more is that eventually, more people will read my novel. Some will like it; some won't, but at least it will be on the shelf of a local bookstore for people to choose whether to pick it up or not. I feel sure of it.

Confidence

I had a conversation with the mother of a basketball team member the other day and she said something that stuck with me. I commented on the fact that the basketball team seemed to play better at the beginning of the season. She agreed and said that must mean the problem was in the players' heads rather than with their skills. By this, I'm assuming that she means the boys' confidence level.
Of course, it's hard to feel confident when the coach jerks you out of the game at the first mistake and screams at you, but that is a different blog post.
The confidence thing got me thinking about places where lack of self-assurance could be dogging me.
"What?" I can hear my husband asking, "when do you ever think you're wrong?" But being right and being confident are different things.
I began to wonder whether confidence affects my writing: not just my novel writing, but the letters that I send to agents asking them to sell my novels.
Do my query letters crawl into agents' offices begging for a scrap of attention? Should they instead stride in, throw back their shoulders and proclaim: "This is your lucky day!"
Writing is a lonely endeavor. No one looks at my work daily and suggests these parts are good, these parts need work. And then when a writer begins to send out work, the rejections hover, waiting to fall like dominoes in a line.
If a writer feels sure of herself at the beginning, those dominoes slowly collapsing, beat down the writer's self-assurance, til she looks up, holding out her manuscript and says "Please, sir, may I have another?" and the agent she dared to ask smacks that stack of pages out of her hand.
A friend at work, the very pessimitic, literary writer Jeff, admits that he feels like his friends in publishing are doing him a big favor when they read his work. He knows that the young turks who earn huge advances brim with confidence as they present their manuscripts, which may be no better and no worse than his own.
We need to act like we are doing those agents a favor when we permit them to look at our novels.
Of course, I've only added more of a burden to myself. Now I need to scour my query letter so that it not only sells my book, but sells myself as well.
It's either that or go to a hypnotist who can convince me to believe in myself more.
Wouldn't it be easier to just send the agents to the hypnotist and have the hypnotists persuade them that I'm the next Dan Brown or Barbara Kingsolver?
Maybe a hypnotizing query letter. I'd better work on that.
Photo from: http://www.hypnotizeyourselfhere.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/spiral4.jpg

MultiTasking

I am most productive early in the morning.
I have finished three novels by getting up early and writing. I exercise when I first get up, or else I simply never get around to it.
Usually, I only end up doing one or the other -- exercising or writing. I can't seem to find time to do both.
That's why, today, I began to multitask with my writing and exercising.
I set the alarm for 5:10, got up, got dressed, packed up my computer and headed out the door.
I walked to the coffee shop with my computer.
It that brilliant or what? Combining exercising and writing.
My plan was to write for an hour and fifteen minutes then to walk back home by the time the boys get up for school at 7.
The plan has some flaws, starting with the fact that I didn't get up when the alarm went off. I left the house at 5:32.
I walked along the street since many of the sidewalks remain covered with ice. The computer is a little heavier than I had anticipated. I threw it over my shoulder first, the strap crossing my chest like a bandoleer. Then when that started to pull on my back, I carried it by the handle, switching arms several times.
It's like a workout for my arms, I congratulated myself.
I wore my furry winter boots and as I reached the half-mile mark they began to rub on my right, little toe. I guess they aren't good walking boots.
Then as I passed the first two coffee shops on our main street, I noticed that they were both closed until 6. I began to get a little nervous.
Sure enough, when I arrived at Caribou, the sign said it opened at 6.
Luckily, I had worked up a sweat walking and the weather is a balmy 33 this morning, so I sat down at the outdoor tables and chairs that scrape metal on concrete at the slightest movement.
I was able to connect to the internet and sat surfing until the coffee guy with the wool stocking cap opened the front doors to welcome me in.
Now, with a light white berry in hand-- espresso, skim milk and raspberry syrup, I can get some real writing done.
Well, after I check my email and stare into the flickering fire a bit more.
This multitasking is a beautiful thing.

Blueberry Syrup and Coffee Kind of Day

Saturday was one of those Mom days. I got up early to make blueberry syrup -- tripled the recipe and poured it into the Crock Pot so it would stay warm for the basketball players' breakfast. We went to the school cafeteria at 9 to set up the waffle makers. We had six waffle makers and my friend Jane mixed up the batter with Bisquick. I know, I've never used a waffle mix. I just use flour, milk, eggs. She wanted to buy the mix so I acquiesced.
About 9:40, we started plugging in waffle makers to do test waffles before the boys got there at 10. I plugged three waffle makers into one outlet, three in another. Then I noticed the light on the power strip had gone out. We tried some other outlets but saw that the breaker had knocked them out too. We moved to another corner of the room, moving tables again. This time, we blew the circuit and the pop machines there gave a gurgle before they stopped working, the lights flickering out.
A shelf held two microwaves. We lugged those away and plugged the waffle makers into the dedicated circuit, after blowing one more outlet.
Finally, we were able to operate three waffle makers and fed the 25 boys who were very polite and claimed we had the best breakfast spread yet.
After cleaning up, I returned home long enough to eat a waffle before driving an hour away to a swim meet. The swim meet lasted six hours.
I drove the hour back, dropped Grace off at home, picked Tucker up from the bus, dropped him at home and went to a basketball game to watch Spencer.
See, a totally Mom day. Nothing was about me.
While I was at the swim meet for six hours, I started reading a new book -- one of those I keep in the car for just such occasions. The book is called The Various Flavors of Coffee by Anthony Capella.
The title was appropriate because Grace had purchased white mochas for both of us on the way to the swim meet. The mochas tasted sweet and thick with a hint of bitter espresso.
I started the book, wedged into a corner of the pool area, my eyes burning from the chlorine and my straight hair beginning to frizz in the humidity.
"Oh, I don't like this kind of narration," I commented to Grace as I read the first page. It begins with an Dickens-esque narration as "we" watch the character traipsing down the street.
The narration changed to first person in the next chapter and I began to find things that made me chuckle, so I read them to Grace.
Then I came to a section that made me fold down the page so I could find it again.
The main character, a foppish man who lives in London after flunking out of Oxford in the late 1800s, considers himself a poet. He meets a coffee merchant who wants the poet to help determine the language for describing coffee so he can standardize it.
In the coffee merchant's office, they have a discussion because the merchant has been unable to find any of the poet's work in the bookstores. The coffee trader explains:

"...A merchant is someone who trades. Ergo, if I do not trade, I am not a merchant."
"But a writer, by the same token, must therefore be someone who writes," I pointed out. "It is not strictly necessary to be read as well. Only desirable."

"What?" I squawked.
I read it to Grace and we cracked up.
That means I'm a writer. I don't have to be read to be a writer, but it is "only desirable."
So, the next time I question whether I'm a writer, remind me, all it takes to be a writer is writing.

Affirmations

I worked yesterday with another teacher who is also a writer. Jeff is more of a literary writer than I am. He's in his mid-30s, no kids, wife finishing her post graduate degree. He grew up in New York City and went to graduate school in England. He wears a tweed blazer and sometimes speaks with a slightly pretentious accent. We have some interesting conversations.
He finished his first novel after a year and a half of writing, and has been shopping it around, including to some agent friends. So far he has had no takers.
"Do you have some sort of daily affirmation to keep going?" he asked.
I recognized the look on his face. I had it once myself when sitting at a table at a writing conference with an older woman who told me she had written six novels. She hadn't sold any of them. I wondered why she kept writing, how she kept writing when she obviously wasn't going to sell a book. I felt like she was desperate. I felt superior.
Now, that woman is me. I've written three novels and haven't sold them. Am I that hopeful, oblivious woman now?
I don't have a daily affirmation that makes me send letters to agents trying to sell my novels.
I have had some positive feedback from professionals, including an agent who said "We're sure you'll sell this work."
Jeff's comments got me thinking about the positive support I get from my family.

Just the other morning, my mom called and said she was sending a check for some expensive sewer work at our house. I protested that Earl and I were grown ups and we would take care of it.
"You can pay us back when you sell your first novel," she said.
That comment didn't even register until I was talking to Jeff.
My mom didn't say "if you sell your novel." She said "when you sell." She has no doubt that I will succeed.
I wonder how many affirmations I receive from my family that slide past me. I'm going to try to be more aware of the support I receive and try to make them proud with my work, and eventually the sale of a book.
I can't wait to hold that book in my hand and give a copy to the people who believed in me.

Words, Words

One thing I promised I would work on this year is the craft of writing. At the library yesterday, I picked up a few books on editing. One of them is The First Five Pages by Noah Lukeman. I heard Lukeman speak several years ago at a Columbus writers' conference. I credit him with the success I've had sending query letters and receiving requests from agents. So I figured his tips could help me improve my novel as well.
Lukeman's book focuses on how to make the first five pages the best they can be so that agents will want to read more. Of course, if I need to make changes to the first five pages then I probably need to improve the other 295 pages.
Whomp.
That falls on me and seems an impossibly difficult task. Could it really be more difficult than writing the entire novel in the first place?
I decided to do a little work at a time. If I imagined refining every word today, on the first day of the year, I would probably give up.
Lukeman's book starts with explaining how to format a manuscript. I think I have mastered that so I moved on to the next section. That focuses on cutting down or choosing more precise adjectives and adverbs. Sometimes, more accurate nouns and verbs make the adjectives and adverbs unnecessary. The exercise at the end of the first chapter required me to take the first page of my novel and remove all of the adjectives and adverbs.
I had 26 adjectives and adverbs on the 407-word section that I edited. After working on if for awhile, the words seemed to swirl around my brain. I saved both versions and decided to put it away. I think I can make changes that will improve my writing.
My original sentence read: “Uncle Martin. What a surprise. How’s life in France?” I asked in a quiet voice meant to encourage him to lower his volume.
When I revised, I changed it, I removed the adjective "quiet" and tried replacing "asked in a quiet voice" with "murmured." Then I looked at it. I'm not sure that murmur describes the same thing as speaking in a quiet voice. If someone murmurs, is it too much like mumbling? So, even as I make changes, I'm questioning those revisions.
I'll give myself credit for my attempts and put the whole thing to bed -- for now.

Dreams

I wish I could describe that feeling. The nervousness and anticipation when I send out a letter to an agent. I have carefully honed the letter, hoping to sell the literary agent on my latest book. I try to be immune to the rejections and figure the right agent will see the potential.
I've probably sent only half a dozen query letters for my latest project, Ransoming Raphael. I peruse my list of top agents and choose one carefully like a rich chocolate.
An agent responds, "Send me x number of pages of your manuscript."
And my heart soars.
This one.
This could be the one.
This could be the book. This could be the agent. This could turn my world upside down.
I sit with my completed manuscript and scour it for misspellings, awkward wordings.
Then, like a baby bird perched on the edge of a nest, I send it out, hoping it will soar before it tumbles to the ground.
I push the send button; the pages cross the electronic divide arriving in an agent's inbox. Maybe the agent will open it right away. Maybe the agent will park it in a long cue behind manuscripts about vampires or pirates or the biography of the man who discovered calculators.
I hope she loves mine.
I hope she calls or emails and says, "More please."