Author: admin

This is the start of the new semester–first of 2020. The classes I am teaching offer me a chance to try new things and try to induct a new generation of students into the idea of creative writing. I am going to be focusing on Super heroes and the zeitgeist this semester–using that primary idea as a final project. How do we get there? Not entirely sure yet. I have few days left to figure that out.

I’m figuring a few things out, such as what to read and what I am really excited to be writing. Trudging away on the novel shows me that I am not really excited about the story, but I am going to keep trying. More changes to the protagonist are clearly required.

As for reading, I am really unclear on what I want to read. I’m in a lull. I’m presently listening to Daniel H. Wilson’s sequel to Crichton’s Andromeda Strain. I enjoy his style here and appreciate a good sci-fi adventure romp.

I feel like I need to be exploring more writing and more writers in general as part of this change to a more writing-centric life. I’m moving there… slowly…

Some Thoughts:

1. Giants have a new coach, but does that mean a new staff? Wondering what is going to happen with the coordinator positions. Specifically, what kind of Offense is gonna happen and what defense can we look forward to given that the team is built around a specific style of D and seems to lack the players to go in a different direction.
2. That seems to leave the Browns as the last organization to snap up a Patriots coach. I’d LOVE to see them grab Bellicheck…
3. Outside of that, I’m just chillin…

This is one of those dark days. I think we have all had them. This one feels particularly bad because there is both a physical and mental component to it that has me feeling quite unstable.

I’ve been hard at work on the 100 push ups a day and today my back gave out on me after the first 25. I knew something was wrong at 13, yet I persisted. As a result I am laid up in bed and unable to do more than sit up. I can hardly do that. I’ve also been feeling quite drained and mentally unprepared as a writer lately, so those two things have coalesced into one and turned my thoughts towards feeling flat out broken.

it becomes a snowball effect if you let it. I struggled in video games and blamed it on the other stuff. My vision feels blurry after all the watching and gaming that resulted from being laid up and now it all feels like one big Bad thing.

this is how the brain works. We build these causal relationships to make sense of the world I. Front of us, though there may be no relationship whatsoever. It is a form of mania to feel the universe is out to get you… even if it is.

alas, the truth of the matter is likely that I am extremely stressed out by a great number of things and as a result I have been unable to write effectively. The physical stuff likely derived from pushing my 40+ year old body like I am a 22 year old and not properly building up to anything I am trying to achieve. There is likely no relationship between these things save that they are all happening to me at the same time. Hard to have to go through it all at once but not a conspiracy or an end level event.

I’ll get through as I always do.. in time

It occurred to me as I was figuring out which number blog this is that it is a little over halfway through the year. 183 days of the 4th iteration of the rule. In fact as 2020 is a leap year (I’ve been informed) it may actually be the midway point. Yes, I’m ignoring that this blog year is not aligned to the moral years…

but on to the reflection.

I am watching the globes and thinking about how these actors I saw as a kid are all aging up and so am I. There ought to be a comfort in that but there isn’t because I don’t feel like I’ve done enough to feel comfortable in my life. In fact, I feel like today is the last day of vacation and my first real night before a job —a real working man life—since senior year of high school. It’s all felt like an extended vacation in a way. That could be Jitters or it could be real. Only time will tell.

Some Thoughts:

1. This year’s playoffs have been fantastic. Great wildcard stuff and next week we see the big guns and see if they actually hold up.
   

We are barely into the new year and already I’ve arrived at a place where I am not able to continue some of these resolutions. One in particular, actually. I’ve not been doing good at all on the writing. I find myself waiting until too late in the day to be effective and as a result the words are not coming. I quit tonight–refusing even to put forth the effort.

A least I’m still doing the 100 pushups.

My mental gymnastics on that one is, “lets make sure we are healthy enough to write another day” or at least play games and chill and soak up the last few days of the break. The prior statement is obviously an excuse. I’m full of those things lately and it weakens me in ways. It also feels like it leaves me open to manipulations, because when I make excuses for myself I start to feel bad about myself, opening the door to manipulation. At least one of my kids has a mind to take advantage of such things. He is quite the pusher.

I’ve gotten off track here, which is more evidence of the obvious. I’m drained. I don’t have any real excuse for being drained and don’t believe that I need one. It has been a long and satisfying few days and now I’m in need of a reset.

I need to get back to work mode.

Some Thoughts:

1. Being a dad can be really hard especially with an egocentric kid who really does believe the world spins on his thoughts. This is the only kid I have real concerns about being able to maintain a relationship with through the teenage years. When I was really too tired (both mentally and physically) to play a card game he tried to get me to justify why I was tired–step one towards getting his way and coercing me to play… or getting kicked out of the house for good.
2. Curious that any reference to sexual organs–at least the common names for said organs–is consider a slander. To ‘be a dick’ is a bad thing. Likewise, the feminine variety denotes weakness. How did this happen?

Only a few days into the new year and I am already regretting some of the promises I made to myself. Specifically, this 100 push ups a day has been taxing. I am sore and struggling to do the work. I have 40 left today and it is almost 7pm. This goes to show you that what is good for you doesn’t always feel that good in the moment or even for weeks after.

Beyond that promise I have been struggling to get back into the novel. I left it in a spot where I could easily pick it up and move forward, but the issue I’ve been encountering is the utter poopiness of the story itself. It is not good. I’m hopeful that subsequent drafts will improve that part of it, but for now it seems to not be worth the write. Yet I endure.

The story is simple and fairly straightforward, which I am starting to see as a limitation of my writing. It doesn’t have any deeper issues to unveil or surprises and the character himself feels rather one dimensional. I expect to work on that part of things in this next chapter.

Perhaps the problem is that he still feels like a lot of my male antagonists do: A version of my younger self dealing with the kind of mental hurdles I felt I went through at that age and likely never got past. Perhaps the writing then is a catharsis and once I get through it I can move on to other things.

Perhaps.

Some Thoughts:

1. The keyboard really is a mess and limits my enjoyment of the typing experience. I will get used to this over time or I will research ways to fix it. Either or.
2. Fix it.

10pm and I am starting the writing process for the evening. This is far too late to begin writing. I am not at the top of my game and feel like any slight disturbance of the force will make this impossible. So this ten minutes is rife with very slow and methodically typed words which are likewise error filled and fairly useless.

Ten minutes and this is about all I can get.

Some Thoughts:

1. side note: spilled sticky drinks of some type on the keyboard and now the satisfying click of the keys is definitely NOT satisfying.
2. having tech issues with the network speed of the Disney network. Also having issues with the sound system that is making the entire experience less enjoyable. It feels like a rock in my shoe between the computer and the loft not being quite right.

I’ve never given much credence to the ‘first day of the rest of your life’ stuff, but here it feels like it applies–it matters. I am starting a new phase and I think that matters as well. Today I am determined to write, exercise, and just be a better human in general. I’m moving towards a greater sense of purpose and belonging and I am starting to behave like I am on the clock, as I in fact am on the clock.

We all are, but we rarely act like it. Each day matters, and I want to end each day by reflecting on what I did and realizing that what I did held value. I need to do something that matters each day (I need to stop the vagaries of something, but that is another post indeed).

So here on year one, day one the idea is for me to move forward with my plans and start to get everyone involved. I’ll start slow. I’ll make sure the kids all exercise a bit. I determined that if we lock into 40 pushups a day, we can move to 100 a day by the end of the year. In fact, I will make my personal challenge to move to 100 a day from day one, breaking it up in less and less sets over the course of a year. 40 is good for the littles though.

As for the writing, it is a big deal to fall into a novel. What often holds me back is not knowing a character well enough to slip into his mind and tell his story or the stories of the people around him. This one is the story of a kid who stopped a terrorist attack and paid a terrible price for that and of the people around him who treated him as a hero for a moment and then didn’t know how to treat him after. It is about the truth of their feelings coming out in times of panic and the truth of his path being illuminated.

It is also a cli-fi novella, so there’s that.

I know the character well enough now to get into the principle writing, but I cannot promise it will go well at first. There will be drafts, and maybe that is what I need for this sophomore effort of sorts.

Regardless of how it goes, this year is about the journey and this journey is one I’ve long been ready to make.

I’m dedicating myself to one prime resolution: I will write one hour a day on my novel until it is completed (and move on to the next once done). I am pledging 365 hours minimum to the craft. I need this pledge and I need to follow through the way I have followed through with the 10 minute rule. I have in me the capacity to tell great stories, but the effort has not been extensive. I have, in a phrase, wasted my talents. That can no longer stand.

Part of the new position is me moving more squarely into the life of a writer. I’ve decided to (largely) give up coaching. I won’t be at every practice. I won’t see every game my kids play. This is a major transition away from a certain kind of life, but it only has value if I am moving towards something great. I should not give up something that matters in order to fill the space with something that does not matter. Instead I ought to be using my time to be with the woman I love and the words I claim to love. I need to make good on the latter, because the claim is little more than that unless I actually put in the work.

So, I’m scolding myself here. I am showing myself to be a person who is not dedicated to the craft and, especially in the role I am in, I need to be dedicated to the craft. I turned down the opportunity to write some pieces over the next few months in an effort to gather myself and move boldly into this new phase. I need to have work product to show for that.

Therefore tomorrow begins a new day, a new year, and a new schedule for how I will be producing work and how long I will be spending time on the words daily. I must give myself over to that goal and complete it with all the energy and zeal of a man who has a time limit, because in the end I am exactly that man.

Some Thoughts:

1. Once the Shadowrun novel is done I want to turn my attentions back to fantasy. I think I have something good there as well. I believe that story I am creating has solid legs and a mythos that will resonate with readers. Most importantly, it is a story I want to tell. I want to learn about these characters and this world that has orbited into my writing soul.
2. I believe that, as a result of these desires, I am becoming bored of the video games I play. I cannot play all day and the time I do play grows less and less. I know there are other things that require my time and energy and I’ve made my peace with that.
3. The seeds are being planted for an amazing September.
4. No, I’m not ready to explain that here…

I wrote a complete post only to swipe my hand too quickly across the phone screen and watch ten minutes of writing vanish.

I spoke of upcoming changes in life and schedule. I talked about how the Giants are also changing. I said a great many things in ten minutes and then fat fingers rubbed it all away. It goes to serve as a reminder of how precarious words are even on this internet that seems to have a limitless memory.

even here there is much that is lost and much more that is forgotten.

So, it’s 5:24 away from the last game of the regular season and it is clear that I am about to lose the championship game. There is almost no mathematical path to victory for me, and as dissatisfied as I am by this reality it is more troubling that I’m more focused on this than I am on the upcoming playoffs.

This is a large part of why I quit the game. I started focusing on the numbers and not the action—the joy of the sport. I’m first and foremost a football fan and fantasy, while introducing me to new players and teams I would otherwise ignore, it forces my attention to raw numbers.

so, such is the way this goes now. I’m not really going to stop playing, so I am going to try and make my watching more about the skills. There’s benefit in that, because it makes me a better student of the game.