July 12, 2007
Roadblocks on the I-70 (Days of Sweat)
Two things happened that put a kink in my progress, and I thought I’d talk about roadblocks. What happens when stuff happens.
First, I realized that even though I knew I had to change the ending of my Blaze, I hadn’t worked out the details of the change, thinking I could do that later in the process. I was wrong. I had to know everything now, and oops, I had no resolution to the mystery. My brain works in ways that really pisses me off sometimes. If I have something that’s unresolved, then I’m pretty much useless. Despite preparing everything in my space to write, I couldn’t. I HAD to know everything about the story. I’m one of those odd folks who can write like the wind as long as I know what I’m writing. It’s death for me to plot while writing. I just sit there and stare at the screen, and before you know it, I’m at Zappos buying another pair of shoes. So I did what I needed to do. I got my notebook and went through a bazillion possibilities, then when I was doing something completely unrelated, the answer hit. Tada! But my word count! Oh, my. But, that was okay because I could catch up today.
Only today I woke up to a headache the size of Baltimore. So bad, I couldn’t even see properly. Every movement hurt like hell, and while I consider myself a tough broad, the headache had me down for the count. I took a sinus pill and went back to bed. Ouch.
So I’m finally feeling better, but my glorious morning has gone. It’s now 100 degrees outside, the plants didn’t get watered, and I’m pretty cranky. I guess it’s time to write!
Yep, even when crappy things like headaches come up, the first priority is to write. I know, some people do write when they have headaches, bless their hearts, but I’m not one of them. Well, not this kind of headache at least. It used to be that when I was felled by a pain or a ache I’d write off the day. First half to feel better, second half to feel really better.
Now, no. Write. Get the pages in. Even though I’m a morning type gal, I’ll write until I have my page count. That’s ten. I know I can get it done because I’ve committed to the process.
I believe that every time we reach a roadblock and find a way to go around it, or over it, or under it, we have just put a mighty big block of solid commitment into our professional foundation. Every victory counts. Every time we do the thing that needs to be done, we’ve won, and that winning matters.
Roadblocks? They’re just an opportunity to get creative.
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Actually, that’s a very timely post for me. I just had my story go kaplooey when I realized I don’t really know enough about what’s going on. Apparently, the seat of my pants can’t write very well.
July 12th, 2007 at 9:36 pmLOL, Jason! Whenever I try to write with no plot, it always comes out as if it was written by an ass. :)
July 14th, 2007 at 8:26 am