The Writing Moment
I finished my writing session yesterday and headed off to shop with my wife.
Well, that’s the story. In truth, I continued writing in my head. I’d been editing the novel in progress. After finishing for the day, my mind stayed on tht treadmill. Sentences to add came to me as I studied cat food offerings, strolled along bulk offerings, selected green onions.
I made mental notes to myself. Remember this and that. Would it hold?
Settling in today, I remembered that I’d continue writing in my head. Were they still there?
Yes, they all returned. I pressed into the manuscript to make the changes. Even as I did, I reflected, would I really know if I remembered them all, or is that just another trick of mind?
That’s how writing often seems to be to me: a trick of the mind.
The Writing Moment
As I wrote and edited my novel-in-progress, or NIP, this week, a realization struck. I like to practice a ‘stream-of-consciousness’ style of plotting. And I like incorporating details about people and their lives, settings, and events.
My novel ends up with an unusual personality as I cater to those preferences. Starts as science fiction on a starship with a dragon in another dimension. Shifts to ‘literature’ and relationships between family members. Swings to sword and magic low fantasy. Then back to science fiction. All with threads of mystery, genetic engineering, time shifts, and sometimes thrillers.
I enjoy such mash-ups. Fun to read, great fun to write.
The Writing Moment
Scenes hang in my mind, waiting to be unfolded. A line or two or three is written. A pause to contemplate them is embraced. More lines come, get written. The growing new scene is reviewed, lightly edited. More lines come, more gets written.
Sometimes, the pause gets extended. I surf into news articles and others’ posts. Then a muse spears my attention and I jump back to the scene being written. Lines are added. They stack into paragraphs. Paragraphs stack into pages. I review what I wrote and lightly edit.
That scene is eventually done. The next one is considered and plotted in my head. I approach again. A line or two or three is written. So it goes.
Meanwhile, muses ambush me with a new concept. I’m reading a non-fiction article about glaciers. The concept harpoons my mind. I grin with delight and think, oh, wow, that would be fun. An opening scene begins unfolding.
I open up a new doc to capture the first lines. Scenes are written. They turn into chapters and branch into a structure’s glimmerings. I think, this will be my next project. I rummage around my brain for a title. A tentative one is hauled out. Rejected. Another bubbles up. Acceptable. More is realized and written. The working title is modified. The quick, sudden progress surprises me. This will definitely be fun to write. But first, the other novel in progress must be finished.
I close the document. Return to the work in progress. A line or two or three is written. I’m close to the end. Close to tying it all up and saying to myself, finished.
So it goes.
Michael Seidel, writer 