Friday, December 08, 2006
Habit
A strange thing happened this morning. I bounced out of bed at 5am, got showered, dressed and made my coffee. I sat down and turned on the laptop at half past the hour and went immediately to my WIP folder. I double-clicked the Slick sub-folder and was about to open the manuscript when -
"Hold on Chas!" I said to myself. "Don't you remember?"
And I hadn't. It's not so much that I'd forgotten I had finished the first draft, it was just pure habit that I went through the routine and sat down to work on the manuscript, such as it has been a major part of my life these past five, heavy, consuming weeks.
Strangely, but not unexpectedly, I stared into the void. The deep, dark chasm where novel WIP's don't exist, where no major life consuming pieces of work survive, and where no writer wishes to find themselves. There is nothing but emptiness and blacker than black dark.
So! Onto other things, then. One of my GDR's for this month is to plan a new children's book. I really enjoyed doing Silly Poems for Wee People Vol.1 in April, and now I want to do Volume 2. I think I am being drawn to it now due to where my mind wants to go after having worked on a crime novel the past month. If I alternate kids projects with crime thrillers I reckon I would be a happy chappy for some time.
I worked on my Scotland's Treasure article for January, which includes two gig reviews I juts had to write about. The main section is all about Christmas and New Year in Edinburgh and I'm hoping to get pictures also.
My internal confusion over where to go with Hunting Jack continues, despite working through the synopsis again today. Yesterday Devon posted some thoughtful and interesting questions. I'm going to try and answer them here in an effort to a) understand my inability to decide and b) come to a decision. But not today - they' ve proved too thought provoking.
"Hold on Chas!" I said to myself. "Don't you remember?"
And I hadn't. It's not so much that I'd forgotten I had finished the first draft, it was just pure habit that I went through the routine and sat down to work on the manuscript, such as it has been a major part of my life these past five, heavy, consuming weeks.
Strangely, but not unexpectedly, I stared into the void. The deep, dark chasm where novel WIP's don't exist, where no major life consuming pieces of work survive, and where no writer wishes to find themselves. There is nothing but emptiness and blacker than black dark.
So! Onto other things, then. One of my GDR's for this month is to plan a new children's book. I really enjoyed doing Silly Poems for Wee People Vol.1 in April, and now I want to do Volume 2. I think I am being drawn to it now due to where my mind wants to go after having worked on a crime novel the past month. If I alternate kids projects with crime thrillers I reckon I would be a happy chappy for some time.
I worked on my Scotland's Treasure article for January, which includes two gig reviews I juts had to write about. The main section is all about Christmas and New Year in Edinburgh and I'm hoping to get pictures also.
My internal confusion over where to go with Hunting Jack continues, despite working through the synopsis again today. Yesterday Devon posted some thoughtful and interesting questions. I'm going to try and answer them here in an effort to a) understand my inability to decide and b) come to a decision. But not today - they' ve proved too thought provoking.
Colin 7:19 am