Category: writing

Another Flying Dream

My first thought was, “Shit,” followed by my second thought, “Shit!”

Going backwards, I struggled to grab anything nearby, a futile effort because nothing was nearby. As I went backwards, I was turning my head, taking in my environment, and processing information. This led me to a realization that I was falling backwards.

The sky was dark. It wasn’t night darkness, but stormy darkness. My dream mind split between addressing what was happening now and worries about surviving, to a more intellectual approach that wanted to understand how I’d come to be falling backwards and where I was falling from.

The where part seemed visible as a dark gray castle on a high mountain crag. Some trick of light played with it because I also saw it as a rain-whipped white concrete building with tall, dark windows. The image duality confused me, but they reminded me of ivory tower and Gothic horror. The background for both were thick, charcoal clouds that promised prolonged and violent storming. I seemed to think or recall, my dream self didn’t know which, I’d been climbing, it’d been wet, and I’d slipped. When I did, I lost my grip and the wind blew me off the mountain.

Meanwhile, I was falling straight backward, going down. Knowing that behind (below) me was a steep, treacherous ravine filled with fir trees and boulders, I didn’t relish landing, because it was sure to be painful.

Then, I wasn’t falling down. I seemed to be hanging in the air on my back. I looked left and right, enjoying that. As I did, the wind picked me up and righted me, an action that spread a grin across my face. “Thank you,” I thought to whoever or whatever did that for me.

The weather had delivered on the promised deluge. Winds roared around me as lightning ripped the sky and lightning boomed in best Wagnerian manner. But I was cool with it, calm, but wet, and weirdly, grinning and happy. The dream ended.

I still grin as I remember it, because I looked so happy.

After awakening and cruising through morning routines while drinking coffee and mulling the dream, I thought, this represents the past and traditional ways of doing things (the dark castle), and the intellectual writing process (the ivory tower), and my usual fears of failing (falling), with efforts to reassure me not to worry (floating and then flying).

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The Heat

Now we come to the part of the novel that I say, “Huuuhhh?”

I’m editing and revising the fourth novel, An Undying Quest, in the Incomplete States series. I remember writing these chapters last December and January of this year. First, there were five chapters, which became ten, a reflection of the multiple POV. These chapters were being written in parallel in a mad heat of intensity. The muses were crazy and insistent during that time, and I sat back and typed as fast as I could.

Typing as fast as I can leads to a lot of stumbling over the keys, and a great deal of swearing as I miss a stroke, realize it and back up, muttering, “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” as I do. The chapters were interesting to edit in the first pass after writing them because sometimes the tense changed. In reflection of that, I came to see how I was sometimes doing method writing, imagining myself to be the character to take in their senses, know their thoughts, and act correctly. I wonder, in retrospect, how that writing process affects my relationships and interactions with others. It intrigues me, too, that I can’t remember what I wrote, but I remember writing and editing it.

The weave pattern of these chapters means they’re more challenging to read and edit. The twists give me pause. To track them, to ensure they’re correct and consistent, delivering the end of that stretch while staying true to the concept, arc, and ending, required me to drop back and create another document. The document’s contents are, “This happened here,” and, “That happened now.”

Yes, it’s tricky, but it delights me. That worries me that I’m not being objective.

Yes, it’s tricky.

Time to write edit like crazy, at least one more time.

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Final Words

The dyin’ man

in the dyin’ land

said with his dyin’ breath,

“Life is not a fantasy,

it’s always been a test.

“I’ve done some harm,

caused some alarm,

and failed more than one person.

“I had some dreams,

and made some schemes,

but never found my purpose.

“But now I lay me down to sleep, 

I’m about to close my eyes,

say what you will ’bout me,

I don’t care, I died.”

6

Impulse

I considered my plans for today last night.

It was about midnight. Today, from what I saw, would be part of a continuum, another day of editing and revising. While I’m happy to make progress and I enjoy what I do, sometimes I get tired of the unending routine. Sometimes I long for a break.

Then I brightened because, hey, I was beginning to edit the fourth and final book in the Incomplete States series.

While I’d been thinking these things, I’d been preparing to close down the computer for the day. Instead, I opened the file for the fourth book’s cover. I regarded and admired it for a while. I’d created covers for the four books as carrots, to make the books seem more tangible and remind me of my goals. With covers, the effort seems to have more promise. It seems more real.

Sitting down, I opened the book’s Word document and began reading and editing.

There wasn’t any plan behind this impulse. One chapter began two. Soon, without me noticing, it was one thirty in the morning. I’d read and edited six chapters. Short chapters, I’d worked through but forty pages. This is a six hundred page, one hundred fifty thousand word draft. There’s a lot more to go.

Despite complaints from my butt cheeks, eyes, neck, and hands, and a more sensible side reminding me that I need to sleep, I didn’t want to stop. I was enjoying what I was reading, and pleased that I’d written it. But prudence finally won.

Now, guess what? Time to write and edit like crazy, at least one more time. I think I may need more coffee.

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pump·kin

You ever write a word and stop to consider it, and then decide that it looks like it’s spelled wrong? But you then pull out a dictionary or go online and discover that it’s spelled correctly?

Happened to me with pumpkin this morning.

I think I need more coffee. Coffee knows how to spell everything.

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