... classical guitar on the CD today ...
March 15, 1999
6:18 a.m.
The brain is a strange thing. A couple days ago, I mentionted an idea I woke up with, and the thousand words I wrote because of it. In that entry, I mentioned that there was no reason for this idea to come to me--that it was outside of everything else I was thinking or working on or even had concepts of working on.  Since then, however, I've been plugging away on the storyline (it's a fairly deep story). And two other outside ideas that have been tumbling through my brain for a little while have clicked into place. So I'm wondering if my sleeping brain was busy putting these ideas together for me, or not. Or if my subconscious is telling me this one piece by piece. All I know is that the three main characters have been kind of congealing for me over the past three days, little by little. I spend 20 minutes in front of the keyboard typing with feverish intensity, collecting everything they tell me. Then it all stops and I've got to get up and do something else. Then, as long as I'm not paying attention to them, one of the characters will come back and show me a little more of themselves. For example, yesterday I did a free writing exercise where I examined the high-level mechanics of the activity that drives the plot. Then I watched basketball and let my brain churn on what I had learned. This morning, I jumped directly into the one character that I really don't understand very well. I put 500-600 words down, ending in a new revelation that just makes so much sense. Where the heck did that come from? And why didn't I think of it sooner? But then it petered out, and now I'm jotting these notes down. But as I was writing this entry, my main character invaded my thoughts again. I went back tot he story and slipped in that new piece of information. It's really an interesting story to watch unfold around me, and to be honest, I'm wondering if I'm in control here or not. And people wonder why writers can be so danged psychotic? The best thing about this whole story (from my selfish point of view, anyway) is that I already have a title.   Anyway, I still have 25 miuntes or so to write, so I'm going back in! Have a great day.  Daily Persistence is © Ron Collins |
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"Every great advance in science has issued from a new audacity of imagination." John Dewey - Personallly, I would strike the "in science" from the above. Still, it works, don't you think? |
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