Things to Report and Wonder

It’s a long time since I wrote a post for either of my blogs. In keeping up the ROW80 challenge, I’ve found my creative energy for “reporting my progress” has been close to nil. Certainly my desire to share has dwindled greatly over the years.

I always wanted my writing to be about the stories in my head, not about me. Lately… there’s been waaaay too much “Me” in the mix.

But today is a sort of special day, and a “two-for-one” at that. Today the Insecure Writers’ Support Group is celebrating 12 years of being there during the most trying times for our fellow writers. Woohooo! 🎉 🎉

And as always, for the monthly ISWG post, there is a question (always optional, but always there) for members to answer. Here is this month’s:

September 6 question: The IWSG celebrates 12 years today! When did you discover the IWSG, how do you connect, and how has it helped you?

To be honest, I don’t quite remember when I first learned about the ISWG. I think it was either through fellow ROWer Deniz Bevin or Alberta Ross and mostly because they were doing these Two-fer posts themselves. And, to be honest, I was a bit bummed to know that these writers I adored so much were “splitting their time and attention” to the writing challenge I felt mattered so much then.

Yeah… I was an idiot. Sorry.

Now I know better, I also recognize that in many ways, the ROW80 was not (and can never be) an ideal writing challenge. It demands commitment over a long term in a world of shorter and shorter deadlines, and it demands regular interaction and self-analysis in ways that don’t respond well to “I am so busy”.

I still think it’s a great idea (I’m still hosting it after all). But something about its format clearly isn’t serving the needs of its members well. Is it the number of check-ins, the blog format, the requirement of setting goals and committing to them over 80 days? I don’t know. I just know I was silly to worry about how my fellow writers were finding their inspiration and support… unless they weren’t finding any, in which case I would want to help however I could, even if it meant suggesting a group that I wasn’t involved with.

I’ve learned better.

But as this is something of an ISWG (and ROW80) post, what am I… insecure about as a writer these days (OH, the many things!)?

Well, I’m no longer insecure about the types of writing groups I’m in (sometimes I still feel insecure about the amount of work I’ve taken up to support those groups when it seems others aren’t as involved as I am, but… that is more a result of my volunteering/need-to-help obsession, not a writing issue. The cause of that (and the resulting perfectionism that also results from a feeling of “never doing quite enough”) can definitely be an issue for writers. Or anyone. I don’t know how to get past it, really. Telling myself I’m doing the best I can when I know I’ve had an off day/week/what-have-you either feels like a rationalization for failure or an allowance to take things easier afterward.

And yet, there really are those times when it seems impossible, There are definitely times when I feel so overwhelmed it really is all I can do. Or I know what is coming up, and I know I need to save energy for the storm to follow….

And when the words don’t seem to be coming, and I struggle to say anything…

Am I doing enough, even when I’m pulling out all the stops and the well seems dry?

I don’t know. I do know I’ve found writing new story almost impossible these days. I have been able to do critiques of other people’s work and I can do non-fiction work (like this) somewhat adequately. But there are no stories.

How I am able to call myself a writer when I don’t have the stories anymore?

Now… in the News?

August? Already?

If you’re like me at all, this year things seem to be just flying by. Some, of course, comes from just being that much busier (especially mentally) than I ever remember being. It seems there’s always something I need to keep track of, need to schedule, plan, do, sketch out, organize, save, report…

Oh, how I dread reporting.

It’s not much of a surprise, I guess, that I have become a bit of a “Reporting Rebel”. At least when it comes to online challenges (any variation on a “WriMo (Writing Month)” or even my beloved ROW80, I signup, state a goal, then immediately go into recluse mode. I have won (but technically lost) a huge number of WriMos in the past few years. The public accolades haven’t really mattered as much as the group energy, the process… the act of devoting some amount of time to my craft that isn’t taken up with anything more than the crazy people talking in my head. 😉

I do enjoy the comradery of some of these public platforms and events. The ROW80 and the ISWG both provide a real sense of connection (at least of the online variety) that keeps me coming back to them regularly. But… I’m only marginal at reporting for those as well (I manage the ROW80 blog and barely do personal check-ins, and I’ve joined and dropped the ISWG at least five times in the same number of years).

I think a bit of it comes down to a wish to be more productive… and presenteeism be damned (which, sadly, doesn’t seem to be going away) as well as a sense of “I don’t need another job” (which is one of the reasons I often delay in taking up a new “productivity tool“, since the learning curve as a job in itself, and making lists and checking off items is as well, especially when the end goal still feels so far away—or unfinishable, in the case of chores).

But… this is a Wednesday, so I guess I can call this a bit of a ROW80 Check-in/not-Check-in. Hopefully, except for my story writing (which I did manage some of this month), my progress speaks for itself, the blogs I committed to maintaining will be active, the people in my in-person groups know that I’m managing my commitments thre…

Basically… I hope that things are going well enough that reporting is superfluous.

This is also an ISWG post. The question of the month, should we choose to accept it, is:

August 2 question: Have you ever written something that afterwards you felt conflicted about? If so, did you let it stay how it was, take it out, or rewrite it?

Answer: Yep! Many times. Usually, I find that in the rewriting, I can make the piece stronger. But there is Release… I held back a lot of story ideas because my mother (who once it was written decided she no longer wanted to read science fiction or fantasy novels and so had “no interest in reading it”) had hounded me to write an emotionally uplifting story that didn’t deal too much with the dark side of human nature. Release is all about darker sides of life… but how my main character dealt with it, how others helped, how even when there are bad things, there are a lot of good things too.

But yeah, I finished the book in a version that I hoped would satisfy both my need to write that story and please my mother. (bad idea)

It’s a decision and a rewrite that I’ve been fighting myself to do for a long time. It’s hard to let go of the idea that I’d written it, that I used those words “The End”… and yet, even knowing that “a book is never really finished“, this is harder; it’s starting from scratch.

And, yes, I’m still conflicted.

PS: yes, I will be opening up the First Friday Photo again this week. It’ll be hosted on my nameblog, and can be accessed by clicking on this little froggie:

Not Much Really

I am not the best of bloggers. A large portion comes from the belief that “nothing in my life is that important it deserves sharing“. There’s also a bit of “the rare moments are too precious to scatter to the winds“.

There’s also a bit of “the world is full of over-sharing already, and I don’t think I need to add to the cacophony“. As a global culture, we bemoan our lack of privacy, the invasion of cameras everywhere, intrusive advertising and companies collecting data about all our interests and activities yet, too many of us would be the first to post a picture on a site such as Instagram or Tik Tok broadcasting our latest outing with friends or the movies we love best or…

But I’ve been reading Light the Dark by Joe Fassler recently. I’m finding it an interesting book because I love going deeper than the “why is someone doing” into the “why is someone doing it”, and the fact that it isn’t all “heavy hitters” (unlike the bemoaning review of one person on Amazon) actually makes it more enjoyable. The less known writers feel more like me… to me.

It’s a bit like why there was a huge rise in archaeology in Britain after the show Time Team first aired back in 1994. And why, by the end of 20 years, it had lost connection with its base and had to take a hiatus but never actually died off*. It started with just four shows, each responding to a local person’s letter about an odd structure or story about their property and “we’d like to know more about what it was like here long ago“. Everyday people, daily lives…and a tiny bit of shared existence for a moment of recognition.

The book is a bit like that for me. Three of the essays (Tom Perrotta, Ayana Mathis, and Leslie Jamison) so far make perfectly clear that these everyday, “normal” happenings, these utterly human and real stories of people matter. These are become our history. The famous people may get named, but what does a name mean when it’s ancient footprints on a beach or a concrete cast of someone who died in Pompeii?

In the end, it’s the common, the ordinary that connects us. Not the rare and unusual.

So maybe… just maybe there might be a reason to reconsider my blogging stance.

Well, maybe. For the moment, I’m here for my irregular ROW80 check-in. I can say I have been working on my story. I have ben writing. I have been gathering. I am getting things sorted and ready for that story bible (which has become a far bigger undertaking than expected). I’m figuring out how to fit it all together where I can. It’s a process.

I want to add one small Shout Out to a post Angela Ackerman did for the Writers In The Storm blog called Writers, are You Breaking the Cardinal Rule? I needed this, this reminder… even this … permission(?) to slow down and think a bit more about what I’m doing. I keep jumping in to help, to take up the slack, to appease, to just look productive instead of the day dreaming “lazy” kid I feel I still am.

And given our obsession with productivity in this country…. I’m not the only one.

It’s another “human” moment.

DigNation 2018 Q&A where I dared use the word ritual 😉

*_{Indeed, the series has returned to add new seasons and new digs recently due to crowdfunding. There have been two “DigNation” events of archaeology lovers (one in 2018 on Holy Island, one online in 2020)}