I am a Writing God!!!

I am a very happy man today!

Not only am I heading for a week of camping tomorrow . . . but "Fish" is DONE!!

Oh yea! I plowed through yesterday and finished it out (I wanted it done before I left). It rounded out at a very nice 115,000 words. This is only the 1st draft of course and it will be longer after edits (I know, it's supposed to get shorter but mine never do!) I can now go camping without anything nagging at my brain. I'll put "Fish" in a drawer for a few months to stew and I'll move onto my "Clans" edits and start my next novel when I get return next week. (After dealing with the several hundred emergencies that will be waiting for me of course!) That makes the third (yea, baby!) completed novel I've done this year. That is a personal best for me and I hope (with a bit of luck!) to have number four under my belt before the end of '05!

It is so nice to actually finish novels instead of half-writing ten or twenty of them. It is very satisfying to know I can actually produce product for this industry on a reliable basis. (Now, if it's good product or not is another story . . .) For years I struggled with not being able to complete my books. In the last fifteen years I had -by my count- written one (1) complete novel (it sucked!), fifteen short stories (only one of which was published) and started (in some form or another) fourteen novels that I just dropped. Not a very impressive record is it?

So what changed? How did I get to the point where I'm writing every day and knocking out three novels (cumulative 400,000+ words)? A couple of things actually:

1. NaNoWriMo - I did it last year and found that ignoring outlines and plotting worked much better for me. I learned that I do much better if I let the story surprise me. I also learned that I can write every day if I really want to.

2. Holly Lisle and PBW - both these sites are very inspiring for a wannabe like me. They give invaluable advice and (more importantly) both these succesful pro's give you the honest details of what it takes to become a published author, with no bullshit or sugar coating. It ain't always pretty but they both give you the reality of what you're facing.

3. My part time job. (Didn't know I had one did ya?) I came to the realization that if I wanted to be a professional writer I actually had to treat my writing like a job. I've had part-time & second jobs all my life and I know how to push past burn out & exhaustion from the full time job to get the work done at #2 (Hey, when you've got a mortgage . . .) By treating writing as an actual job I have to: A) Show up for work and, B) Get the job done. Every day. Just like I would for any other job. Sounds stupid? Believe me, it's made all the difference.

4. This Blog. Having people following what I'm doing gives me a little extra incentive. You folks give me someone to be answerable to. I don't want to disappoint, or have you think I'm lazy! (Alright, we all know I am lazy but you get the point . . .)

The big surprise of all these things put together and all the long hours of work I've done is this: I love doing it. I've never said that about any other job in my life. Ever. If I can get to a point where this is how I make my living, I will be one very happy man indeed.

So, I will be away all next week and I won't be posting anything new until at least Aug. 1st. With that in mind, I decided to post something I'd written to keep you entertained while I'm away! (Don't you feel lucky?) It's really just a strange little scene that popped into my mind one day and I punched out in about five minutes but I kinda like it. Comments on the piece are welcome! Usual copyright/reproduction restrictions and all that good stuff apply here of course. Enjoye, and I'll see you on the 1st!

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No one ever invited Edgar Perks to lunch. He wasn’t quite sure why, but they never did. He’d sit in his cubicle all day, punching away at his keyboard, entering the latest accidental death statistics for the insurance charter matrix, and he’d smile and talk to his co-workers as they went by. They all smiled back and seemed friendly enough. He didn’t think they disliked him, not like they did Jenkins over in H.R. –Jenkins was an arrogant prick that rubbed everybody the wrong way- but the fact remained: no one ever asked Edgar to go to lunch. Groups of folks on their way out to pick up Burger King or heading for a sit down at the little Italian place on the corner would pass by his cubicle and they’d all nod, smile, maybe even say hi, but not one of them ever thought to say “Hey, Ed, wanna go for lunch?”

He’d sit there, waiting for someone –anyone- to ask him to go along, or even just to ask if he wanted something when they were ordering out, but they never did. Sometimes, he would sit there through his entire lunch hour, hoping one of his co-workers would notice him sitting there, looking forlorn and hungry, but nope, not even once. The oversight was so universal that Edgar had to assume there was something about himself that made the other folks at Unified Health Statistics ignore him every day at noon. He’d started searching for problems he might have, even made a list! Bad Breath? He started rinsing with Listerine three times a day and always popped a breath mint before he spoke to anyone. B.O.? He showered twice a day and always wore clean clothes. Dandruff, bad teeth, bad haircut? No, no, and no… he’d seen professionals about all those and he was sure that couldn’t be it. He’d even hired a professional shopper to buy clothes for him, thinking maybe it was that he was dressing like a dork and didn’t realize it. Even that hadn’t helped, and it had cost him a pretty penny! Professional shoppers were not easy to afford on the salary of a data entry clerk. Edgar had done everything he could conceive of to make himself palatable to his fellows, to correct any social or personal faux-pas that forced them to shun him during the all important lunch hour.

Still, he sat there alone, day in and day out, waiting until all his co-workers had gone to lunch before shuffling out of his cubicle and into the elevator for the eleven floor ride down to street level to go and find his own repast. He invariably ended up sitting alone at one of those horribly small two person tables at the fast food restaurant du jour he visited. He thought there were fewer things more depressing than sitting alone in a fast food restaurant. By definition, they were places for people who were in a hurry, people who had busy lives and relationships and couldn’t take the time for real meals. Edgar sat there, staring morosely at the crowds of young mothers with their squealing children and the groups of teenagers who were most likely ducking out of classes, and the occasional party of business people in suits who wolfed their food while discussing important meetings and mergers before rushing back into their frenzied lives.

Edgar sat there alone, slowly eating his food, sipping calmly at his fountain soda –which, in your better dives, came with free refills-, and watching the Lunch People, as he liked to call them, rushing through their meals. He was in no hurry. He had his whole lunch hour to kill and he had to fill the time by eating slowly because he had no one to talk to. He envied the Lunch People who could sit there and wolf down their food, then sit back and kill time, sipping the flat soda from their wax covered paper cups and chit chat with each other for the rest of their hour. Sometimes, when people sat close enough to him, Edgar would pretend to be part of their conversations, whispering answers to their questions in his mind and making friendly comments on their lives under his breath.

“I’m sure your mother will be just fine,” he’d whisper or: “Did her husband know she was cheating on him?”

He’d listen carefully for their answers, surprised at how often their companions would ask the same questions or make the same comments he did. He wasn’t socially inept; he knew how to participate in a conversation! So why then was he sitting there alone, day after day, getting his only non-work related human contact by eaves dropping on stranger’s conversations? The truth was, he just didn’t know. He didn’t know, but there was no escaping the single, dominant truth of his sad little life:

No one ever invited Edgar Perks to lunch.

Copyright by JA Coppinger, 2005