Arting Like Rushing Waves
It was a calm day and the waves were barely even waves, they were more like little armies of foaming water racing toward the beach. The water was going in several different directions... the little waves running into each other, some washing back out into the ocean, others rushing forward. It was beautiful, intriguing, and somewhat confusing to me as to why there were waves coming in from at least three different directions. I stood there watching them for a few minutes, delighted at the spectacle.
I can relate to those multi-directional waves. It seems like every time I shut my eyes to try and go to sleep a whole slew of thoughts race at me from various places. These past few weeks, this last one especially, a whole new world of ideas has opened up for me regarding When Life Hands You Lymes. It's exciting. And scary. And I know will mean epics amount of work, so therefore rather daunting. Then I hit on an actual line that would work in the "revised" WLHYL and I feel that moment of thrilling happiness that happens when an artist is arting. (Totally proper to say "arting" by the way.)
I have never been so far into a book (twenty-six months of not-quite daily work) and then decided to do such a huge revamp. Do you know what I remembered though? These changes that I'm thinking about were actually in the original plans for WLHYL, but somewhere during the first draft they were pushed off to the side and forgotten about. It wasn't until I had beta readers who began to point out the issues that I remembered my plans from way back when and decided to reinstate them into the book. (It's a lot more complicated than it sounds, by the way.)
Today I have some travel time and a full battery on the laptop, so I'm planning on hitting it hard (the changes, not the laptop). I'll be doing all sorts of delightful things like writing out a plot line (yes, yes, I do already have one, but I need another one for the second plot that's going to be there), figuring out how many words need to be deleted, and lots of brainstorming. I also have thousands upon thousands of words to get rid of, whole scenes to add, and character development to work on. I wish I could reward myself with donuts, but I'll stick to listening to cool music instead.
* * * What about you? Can you relate to the whole "waves rushing at me from every direction" thing?
I can relate to those multi-directional waves. It seems like every time I shut my eyes to try and go to sleep a whole slew of thoughts race at me from various places. These past few weeks, this last one especially, a whole new world of ideas has opened up for me regarding When Life Hands You Lymes. It's exciting. And scary. And I know will mean epics amount of work, so therefore rather daunting. Then I hit on an actual line that would work in the "revised" WLHYL and I feel that moment of thrilling happiness that happens when an artist is arting. (Totally proper to say "arting" by the way.)
I have never been so far into a book (twenty-six months of not-quite daily work) and then decided to do such a huge revamp. Do you know what I remembered though? These changes that I'm thinking about were actually in the original plans for WLHYL, but somewhere during the first draft they were pushed off to the side and forgotten about. It wasn't until I had beta readers who began to point out the issues that I remembered my plans from way back when and decided to reinstate them into the book. (It's a lot more complicated than it sounds, by the way.)
Today I have some travel time and a full battery on the laptop, so I'm planning on hitting it hard (the changes, not the laptop). I'll be doing all sorts of delightful things like writing out a plot line (yes, yes, I do already have one, but I need another one for the second plot that's going to be there), figuring out how many words need to be deleted, and lots of brainstorming. I also have thousands upon thousands of words to get rid of, whole scenes to add, and character development to work on. I wish I could reward myself with donuts, but I'll stick to listening to cool music instead.
* * * What about you? Can you relate to the whole "waves rushing at me from every direction" thing?
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