My stream is back-flashing to high school. I remember talking with my buddy, Bob, about a new Moody Blues song, “Nights In White Satin”. I already knew the song and was puzzling about how I knew this song so well already. I told Bob that I was certain it was an old song. Later, on the radio, they mentioned that the song had been originally released in 1967, but didn’t chart well in the U.S., but had been released again in 1972, the year Bob and I were talking. I felt absurdly validated and pleased that I’d accurately remembered the song had come out several years before.
Floofscape
Floofscape (floofinition) – the landscape (or roomscape), as seen by a housepet.
In use: “To the typical housefloof, three factors determine how the floofscape is seen. One, I can sleep there, there, there, there (and that one is especially good when the sun is coming in through a window in the winter). Two, that space is mine, that space is mine, that space is theirs (or so they claim). Three, they keep telling me to get off that space, but I shall persevere.”
Suddenly —
Suddenly, it seems, I’ve completed editing and revising the second book, Entangled States. Suddenly, it’s time to begin editing and revising the third book of the Incomplete States series, Six (with Seven).
You’d think it wouldn’t seem sudden. I work in MS Word. I have the navigation panel open. I always knew what chapter and page I was on, and how much remained. It all seems sudden because I was underwater in the process. Finding no more to edit and revise, I surface and suddenly, there I am, done with another, ready to begin the next.
It’s an amazing feeling of joy and satisfaction. Suddenly, the sunshine seems brighter, the sky is bluer, and the future seems brighter.
Time to end another day of writing editing like crazy.
Findings
Editing and revising the second book, Entangled LEREs, is about ninety percent completed. I’ve come to a challenging chicane where the disparate stories and characters are brought together to race into a new direction, which is where the third book, Six (with Seven) begins.
I find that as I edit the beta draft, creating the first draft — something other humans can read and comprehend, rather than streaks of coherency marred by stretches of babble — that I refine my quest about what I want from the story. In the beginning was a concept. Characters jumped out. Ideas jumped in. Arcs were spun. Lives and plots were developed and explored.
Now I’ve sharpened my understanding of what I wrote from the morass of thoughts, energy, and application that we call fiction writing, and I crystallize goals about what I’m exploring, and think, this is what I want to do with this book, and this is what I want to do with this series. As I’m just reaching the series midpoint, that might change again. Unlike other times that I thought things about the series and books and documented them in Epiphany.doc to help me understand, I understand enough that I’m not impelled to write this up. Incomplete States is moving from imagination-ware to a concrete state. Its becoming tangible. Recording isn’t required.
Time to write edit like crazy, at least one more time.
Life Song
Your life’s song flows through you, notes and chords struck by your routines and emotions. Sometimes, though, in your life of bent notes and thundering crescendos of cymbals and drums, you hunt different notes, just for a day, something to hear so that you can appreciate your life’s song more when you resume it, like maybe a piano concerto.
It’s like an interlude.
Floofscotch
Floofscotch (floofinition) – a game played among housepets. The simple rules dictate that when one housepet finds a sleeping space, another housepet must find and sleep in it the next day, forcing the first housepet to find another space. The game is most popular among cats. There is no scoring nor end.
In use: “Papi had found a pleasant space under a bush by the spigot outside the back door, but Boo claimed it the next day, forcing Papi to displace Quinn under the elephant leaf tree. Quinn countered by moving to Boo’s favorite space on the mat in front of the pet door.”
Saturday’s Theme Music
This song, “Out of My League” by Fitz and the Tantrums (2013) reminds me of early 1980s techno-pop. I like its rhythm and peppiness. Although lacking screaming guitars, it’s jaunty, and acts like a musical mood enhancer.
Listen, and see if it has the same effect on you.
Flooftocracy
Flooftocracy (floofinition) – a housepet (such as a cat) ruling with unlimited authority.
In use: “The flooftocracy’s nature, that the cat was only answerable to itself, meant that the people’s efforts to limit power often failed.”
