...hell is this? (or The End)

I'm ending Or Alcoholism. I don't need it anymore, and it was for purely selfish reasons that I began it.

I know what I want now. I know what I'm doing, as much as anyone can know. I'm really, really happy.

Thanks. I didn't know who any of you were before I started this thing, and I have met some really cool, talented people who have given me good advice...and of course there was all that great cyber sex!

I am not going away. Novice Is Writing, just somewhere else, and it's going to be a lot less brain vomit, and a lot more structured pieces.

Hope to see you there, and if not, take care of yourself.

Insomnia...

again.

It's 2.30 in the morning, and Sam will be awake in four hours. I have to drive almost 2 hours to a bridal shower today and I am going to need my sleep!

Dammit.

Stories From Writing Class, Two

One of the students in my class was this petite 17 year old girl. She is about to begin her sophomore year at Emerson College in Boston. She has this shy emo-elf thing going on, she’s adorable.

She hadn’t written any fiction. She’s a poet. A former teacher of hers encouraged her to take the class.

This girl is so talented. Astoundingly talented for someone her age.

One of the first writing exercises was to write an entire story on a postcard. Hers was brilliant. In a few lines of text she had a story in prose that was lyrical and full of emotion.

If she’s the future of the arts in America, we are very lucky. I can’t wait to read her first book.

Best of luck to you, Hill.

Stories From Writing Class, One.

Some of the exercises were kind of rough. On my hand. We had to write for certain periods of time without the pen stopping. So many hand cramps, but the point was to write and write and write so that of all the stuff that came out, some of it would be the start of something good. Sounds kinda fluffy, but it worked.

I finally have an ending.

It's so cool how this came about, too. The first night we (the teacher and the six students) started talking about the very basic bits of a story. What does every story need?

"Conflict." I said. That's the first thing everyone thinks of. Every story needs a problem.

Prof asked "What does your character want?" The want, and the not having of it, is the conflict.

Also needed is a crisis. Some moment when the conflict is fought, admitted, exposed. The boiling point.

From there you draw your Conclusion.

I always thought that my problem with this story was the conclusion. I just couldn't draw it. The second night I looked at my notes and realized that I didn't have a real crisis, so that was why I didn't have any conclusion.

That night, I'm wandering the halls, scribbling away, when it hit me.

I had been wrong about the conflict the whole time.

I stopped in the hallway and leaned against the wall. Once I figured that out, everything came clearly.

I had my true conflict and already had my crisis. The conclusion started writing itself.

I got back into the classroom and was near tears, I was so overcome. Prof. was stunned when I told her I had the ending. She said with a laugh, that I didn’t have to come back on day 3 if I didn’t want to. Of course I did. I got to work on other pieces, and best of all, got some really good feedback on what I had so far.

Hate. Computers.

The iBook died again. I should have it back in 2 weeks, so check back then, if you want. I don't think I'll get much chance to sneak Husband's computer while he sleeps.

Quick note...the class was great and I have an ending!

Of all the writing I have done over my life, there are pieces that I have started and abandoned, pieces I have shortened, stretched out. I’ve given them all some kind of closure, finished or not.

There is one, though...

Flashback to my senior year of college, January term. I had an assignment for a class. We had to write ten lines of dialogue. The conversation had to have something to do with the Human Genome Project.

Ten lines. I wrote eight pages. One of the professors came up to me at the end of the class and asked if I wanted to finish it.

I did. Still do. Problem is, I am very stuck.

The dialogue was between a college student and her older brother. They were discussing two things. The brother’s work on the Human Genome Project, and their older sister’s recent, fourth miscarriage.

I have scenarios, conversations. I have the entire family.

I have no ending. No closure. I don’t know why I can’t drop it.

It may have to do with a feeling of unworthiness.

A great deal of the story has to do with Jessica (the older sister mentioned in my class assignment) slowly growing emotionally numb, while her husband walks around her as if she’s glass, ignoring his own grief.

I have never had a miscarriage. Thank God. My mother has. A very good friend of mine and her sister have each had two.

Maybe I feel like I shouldn’t be writing about this. How can I write about the pain if I haven’t experienced it?

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This upcoming Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday I’ll be taking a class called “Jump Start Your Fiction”. I am hoping it will help.

Why, yes he IS the cutest little boy in the world.