There is nothing to distinguish a writer from someone who is not a writer. The difference between a successful writer and one who is not, is surely measurable, but the difference between someone who writes and someone who does not is only determined by the number of pages that writer has produced.

The inclination I have is to talk about writing. The actual act of producing usable pages almost falls to a secondary position. To achieve anything of worth, this is an unacceptable approach.

Even if there was no real purpose for a post like this, other than to move the dates to something more respectable, at least the act of writing showed a commitment on my part to put down words. It becomes one more day of reprieves from being a person who does not write.

This quote makes the point I made in 170 words far quicker and more articulately:

“Talk isn’t work. Work is when you have pages in the evening that you didn’t have in the morning.”  -Frederic Raphael

MLK’s Letter from a Birminham Jail is a given, but I also have to give much credit to the Letter on Corpulance… mostly because I love the word corpulance.

Now that letter writing is an increasingly dead art, I wonder if anyone will be able to muscle out a response from society with a well-worded and concise treatise outlining a social problem.

More likely, the art will be replaced with the viral video, wherein eloquence isn’t so much the goal, as cheap laughs or sideshow oddities that get you links.

Well, who am I to judge what’s the higher art, right?

Maybe aspiring writers are inclined to be procrastinators more than other types of people, like firefighters (that would be terrible wouldn’t it?)

New Year’s resolutions are great for me, becuase they don’t give me one month or so to set out for change, which I will prompty abandon. Oh no. New Year’s reminds me that the transition from one year to the next is no different from the transition from one day to the next, or the work day to the off hours day. Or writing time to nap time.

Any day can bring renewed commitment, should you really want it.

That’s where New Years comes in. It reminds me another year went by. It gives me a number to associate with achievements (for those of you keeping score at home, 2008 had 0 for me.) That lights the proverbial fire, which should get me to write again.

Hopefully this will mark a renewed effort at posting, since it is about time I do a little more of that. Try to ignore that the last post was two months ago… nothing to see here… move along.

These questions don’t really need hard and fast answers. No one likes being pigeonholed, after all. But that doesn’t mean a little guidance isn’t helpful.

I found this page that gives some good averages for different manuscripts. I wouldn’t buy into the idea that they are as set in stone as the author says, but they do give you a good rule of thumb.

Some take aways that come from it are that a short story is something that you can read in one setting. A novella might take a little more, but will still be too short to cover a lot of characters, and should instead be a really in depth view of a narrow topic.

Then there is writing for the internet. In that case, shorter is probably better, unless you can really hold the reader’s attention.

Since I’m not sure this post is doing that, I think I’ll leave it there.

A notebook is a writer's best friend

I have a poet friend who was told me once that ideas are ours only for so long. If we don’t use them, our muse takes them to someone else. Then we forget about them until we read them in another writer’s words.

Fortunately, we don’t need to lose our ideas to the aether. We just need to write them down, and preserve their freshness until we are ready to dash them onto the page.

Any aspiring writer should keep an idea file. Most can use a small notebook kept on hand at all times. For those moments of random beauty, irony or curiosity, you need to be able to jot them down for later exploration.

Keeping a long record of good ideas, interesting sightings or sayings that were overhead not only gives you material for when you can’t seem to come up with anything, but it builds your understanding of the world around you. The more nuanced your view, the more layered and original you’re writing will be.

Here are notes that I find in my notebook:

• Premises: I have ideas that seem like they would make great short stories all the time. Whether or not they can, that’s debatable. Doesn’t matter though, they’re lost if they don’t get written down so anything that seems interesting goes in here.

• What ifs? Sometimes conversations can raise interesting questions that are worth exploring in prose. Those “What Ifs?” make a lot of great stories. You probably have these conversations all the time (what if Aliens invaded earth just for our Boston creme pie? What if we elected a president that was nine feet tall and mostly made of steel?) so why not get some writing fodder out of it.

• Observations: Funny/interesting/ironic things creep up on us whether we’re eating or sitting at home watching the animals chase things that don’t need to be chased. Mundane, everyday observations get life through exploration. Writing is about giving life to a point of view, so seeing something worth infusing with meaning is always good for the notebook.

• Strange speaking conventions:People have unique ways of speaking -rhythms and cadences that sound so particular they resonate in your ear and brain. When you notice this, it’s great to note them for when you are writing dialog for your characters. Creating a unique voice for them is hard, but borrowing it from a real person isn’t!

• Imagery: You’ll know it when you’ll see it, and it will be incredible. Those glimmers of images will help you through tough sines or lack of inspiration.

Even if these notes don’t amount to work in and of themselves, they might fit nicely into another piece I’ve been working on, so it helps to review the notebook pretty often. In fact, an interesting idea file can be the greatest cure for a case of writer’s block.

I like using Moleskine notebooks because they are the right size and they look the part. Using such a stylized and traditional writer’s notebook makes me look the part so it’s sort of validating of my choices.

Of course it doesn’t need to be that fancy or historically pertinent. Any easily-carted notebook will do.

And of course the pen. You can never forget the pen.

I have found this to be my biggest obstacle. An idea really doesn’t count for much until it hits the paper. I can blame my hesitation on a lack of available time, incomplete ideas, my inner editor, a lack of exigency or deadlines…but really, maybe it’s just a lack of will.

So I’ve decided to turn to the old 90′s NIKE slogan, “Just do it.” When I hear that phrase I think of a conference room with a long shiny expensive wooden table surrounded by the CEO, CFO, secretaries, and really nervous marketing types trying to come up with a slogan that will make people want to hop into overpriced shoes, work out, and change their lives. And I picture an intern in the back holding two steaming cups of coffee waiting for a break in the intense discussion about the company slogan so he can hand the cups to their owners. And as the debate builds and his hands continue to burn, his sweaty face yells out, “JUST DO IT!” There is a complete silence, which makes the intern forget about the burning coffee. And in that classic Hollywood moment, the CEO breaks the silence with one word: “Brilliant!”

But back to my point…there is no fix for a writer’s inability to begin writing. It’s all in our heads. Maybe we shouldn’t start writing until we have something we have to say, something that can’t go unwritten. And I’m sure we all have something we really want to say.

If we don’t, then we have bigger problems than struggling to start the writing process.

It also encourages writers to write about writing. We wouldn’t subject ourselves to the imposing blank page or the trials of editing if writing weren’t a burning passion.

So it’s good to write in a community about that art, and all the pains that come along with it. Take it as an invocation, or an ode, or just venting. To share that love with other writers and hear what brings us all to this same place, well that’s good enough reason to start a blog about the one thing that keeps us up and frustrated.

Sure it’s a passion.

And since writing, unlike my characters, is a constant companion, I have endless ammunition to make me want to grind out some more carelessly structured sentences.

Here’s to hoping some have worth.