As I’ve already said, I enjoy walking in the warm sunshine preferably by a wooded pond where I can enjoy the wildlife hanging out there. Most of the time, that means squirrels and lizards as far as the eye can see. Sometimes I’ll see an Egret or a Heron. Most days I’ll see Cormorants and Muscovy Ducks. The other day I startled a mama Wood Duck with her tiny ball of fluff duckling. Needless to say, they moved like greased lightening getting away from me. In fact, I saw more of their tail feathers than anything other part. I haven’t laughed so hard in a long time.
When I’m not enjoying the critters on those walks, I’m usually thinking about writing. What I’ve written in the past, what I’m working on now, and what I hope to write in the future. It’s such an integral part of me that I can leave the creative process for months, even years, when real life takes me away; but, I always come back. Sometimes I’m amazed at how much my writing and storytelling styles have changed over the years. Part of that has to do with how writing styles have changed over they years in general and part of it has to do with how much I’ve changed over the years. What hasn’t changed is the reality I have to write. Go through the creative process. I’m miserable if I don’t.
As I’ve already said, I recently rescued a cache of novels I thought were lost forever. That was the high point of the pandemic lock down for me. The other high points were spending most of my time with my Mom and those long walks in the sun. That phase is ending since I return to work tomorrow. While I’ll miss being home with my family as crazy as that sounds, the change is better for my writing. I tend to procrastinate and/or have writer’s block when I have too much time on my hands or too many interruptions. When I know I have this sliver of time and not a second more, I get the job done. I’ve had crazy writing times in the past where I’ve written 20,000 words in a handful of hours. The words were flowing faster than I could type and I type pretty fast when I have to.
Those hyper-productive moments are rare. Usually, I set a modest goal and a time limit if I’m working on a new novel. My go-to goal is 2000 words if I only have an hour or two to devote to my story. If I make it, great. If I don’t, I’ll do better next time. Crafting a believable story with engaging characters matters more to me than making some imaginary goal I set for myself. The take-away is writing should be fun, not frustrating, and sometimes the characters just aren’t talking. That’s when I usually find myself working on a couple of novels. If one isn’t talking, the other usually will.
The only time I found myself not able to write due to the stresses of real life, I wasn’t sure I’d ever write again. I hadn’t hit a lick at a snake where writing was concerned in over eight years. I wasn’t sure I ever would. However, I couldn’t imagine not being able to do what I loved best. The possibility was emotionally devastating. I had to do something to get back in the groove. To reawaken that fire.
About the time all hope was lost, my newest obsession came along. I fell in love with The Mentalist television show and discovered TM fanfic on fanfiction.net. I’d read fanfiction before so I knew it existed. I just hadn’t bothered reading anything in a very long time. Once I rediscovered that guilty pleasure, it wasn’t long before reading other people’s stories sparked me to write fanfic of my own.
I spent several years writing Mentalist stories on ff.net under the pen name Calladragon. Some of it was good. Some of it was nuts. All of it was fun to write. I won’t claim it was my best work. It wasn’t. My stories were raw. There were typos in spite of my best efforts at editing. I tended to see what was in my head over what was actually there.
Added to that, I honestly wasn’t interested in presenting polished work. I was interested in just getting something finished and up in the small amount of time I had to write. My ability to craft anything was just coming back and I didn’t want to lose it. While I haven’t written fanfiction in several years, it still thrills me to get the occasional Favorite/Follow or review in my email. As imperfect as they are, those stories are still my babies. I poured a lot of heart, sweat, and tears into every one.
While I wouldn’t post most of those stories in the state I wrote them today, I did what I needed to do back then. Today, I’d do like I do with my novels. I’d edit and edit and edit for weeks until I was satisfied I had done all that was humanly possible to catch the errors. Six or seven years ago, that wasn’t possible. I still have unfinished stories on that site I hope to finish eventually. One day I might return to that guilty pleasure. Right now, I won’t. I’m rewriting one old contemporary romance, completing a second contemporary romance, and outlining Been There, Done That Too so my plate is full. My heart is full. I’m doing what I love best…enough said.
This feels like a good place to stop so I will. I suspect my future posts will be about writing. As I’ve said several times, I tend to hop all over the place depending on what’s captured my interest at the moment. Until next time,
Calla
Tori Lennox Author 