Mette Ivie Harrison's Blog, page 122

writing rituals

I admit it, I am OCD. I was describing to some friends recently various writing rituals I have gone through, and they realized that I was right.

When I first started writing, I had a goal of writing 10 pages a day. While this worked to some degree, it created some problems. The first one I noticed was that I tended to try to end chapters on the first line of a page, so that I could go to a new page to begin a chapter, go down half a page, and have written two pages with about ten lines.

So I...

Olympic thoughts

I find myself cheering for the "underdogs" or the "newcomers" at the Olympics rather than the veterans who are coming back to do it again, and I wonder why. Yes, there is something special about the story of the athlete who is a surprise success, or one who has overcome incredible odds. And maybe the announcers set us Americans up with certain stories because they know the appeal to the wider audience.

On the other hand, there is nothing like the difficulty of winning when you are the target...

horrible and wonderful

I saw two friends this weekend I had not seen in a while. One had suffered some pretty bad stuff in the last year or so. The other, well, had suffered some pretty bad stuff, too. But then, out of the blue, was rewarded with something completely wonderful and unexpected. The kind of thing that you never hope for because--how could you hope for something so unimaginably good?

I remembered then, that life is that way. I have had some unimaginably wonderful stuff happen to me, too, along wi...

geek status badge

At the local sf/f convention I went to this weekend, everyone got to wear tags in different colors, proclaiming their status as "attendees," "volunteers," "participants," "panelists," "guests," "special guests," and "guests of honor." I had a light blue tag, and was therefore a "guest." It was funny to hear a few people comment that they would be so happy when they had a light blue tag, too. And on the panels, it was pretty clear that the special guests were given deference by others on th...

birthdays

It is not my birthday. It is not close to my birthday. So I thought that I could post some thoughts on birthdays and on gifts without people feeling like I was hinting.

I am not fond of birthdays much. I think it comes from too many disappointing birthdays in childhood. I prefer to treat a birthday as any other day, and if others insist, then a birthday cake or birthday dinner is also acceptable. Phone calls from friends are welcome on that day, as on any other. I have no phobia about gro...

#4

I forgot one, which 15 reminded me of last night:

4. Eat real food.

Which means, not twinkies. I do like twinkies. Actually, mainly I like the convenience of twinkies. And I'm pretty sure that most Americans are the same way. We love packaged products that we can just eat without thinking about it, without having to prepare food. We invented TV dinners. And well, twinkies. And twinkies are cheap. Which, when you are feeding 7 with 4 hungry teens, is a very good thing.

But I try to make m...

3 rules for healthy living.

Sometimes people ask me how I stay so healthy. Sometimes people also tell me to shut up about how I stay so healthy. Depending on where you fall, you may decide not to read the rest of this post.

I have three general rules about being healthy.

1. Never go on a diet.

This may sound completely counter-intuitive. But let me explain. In high school, I vowed never to go on a diet. Not because I assumed I would be eternally thin. Because I had noticed that the people who went on diets tended to ...

when not to revise

It is hard to know sometimes whether or not you should do a revision requested by an editor or an agent. The general advice is never to change something that you don't agree with. I think that there have been a few exceptions to this in my career, but not many.

Here are some rules of thumb:

1. Revise when you feel a connection with the editor/agent, i.e. when everything they see makes a clear picture in your head of the new manuscript you will write and how much better it will be, and more wh...

learning to revise

In 1999, I got a call from an agent. A good agent. Who had actually read all of my book. And wanted me to revise it.

So excited I could hardly stand up straight, I sat and wrote notes about her questions. And then spent the next six weeks in a fever of revision, changing every single word except the title of that book. And sent it off to the agent.

Bad, bad move.

The agent called again to tell me what I already knew, that I had changed it too much, past recognition, and that the new manuscr...

ready to give up?

There have been a few moments in the last three years when I came home from a piano lesson ready to give it up. I tend to get very nervous playing for my teacher, and my daughter likes to point out that I am also sweaty afterward. Yes, I know that, thank you very much. But the worst is when I feel like what I am trying to do is impossible. Once I went and had spent the entire week working on the rhythm in two measures, and had practiced it completely wrong. And confused myself so badly t...