WriDay Prep - I

I do believe I forgot a crucial element from yesterday's "Write A Novel In A Day" post. The word count goal!

Where writing is in question, I am a proponent of small, but decisive, steps. As such, attempting 50,000 words in 24 hours at this point in my life is a goal too near insanity to even consider. And no, it is not merely the insanity which produces masterpieces, nor that insanity upon which the world heaps laudation, after it mocked and doubted and was subsequently proved false by whatever mad genius conceived the idea. No, this is the kind of madness that frightens and paralyzes, and if I am to make something of this Saturday's WriDay, I must set a goal that I will have some hope of reaching - for now.

When I have matured, I shall then consider 50k. But as I am presently fighting to free myself of a rut titled "250 ugly words or less per week and that rapturous number when I am not dispirited by my own writing", I would like to start with a number that I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I can reach if I but discipline myself. I once wrote near 20k in one day in 2006, and I was writing 12,000+ regularly in the first week of NaNoWriMo '06. "Don't," (so I said to myself) "give me that 'you can't even reach 5k in a day' rubbish."

"So what," you may be asking (and I am asking myself as well; I swore I'd written my WC goal, but glancing back, I discover I haven't), "then is your goal for May 3rd?"

"10,000, my luverly," I reply. "10k."

Story of choice? Playing at Angels. I'm taking today, between classes, to take every scrap of nonfiction that I have written on PaA over the months and compiling it into a single word document. This compilation and organization shall last until midnight, May 2nd (the maximum, of course; I probably be in bed and knocked out by 9:30). No outlining shall be allowed to occur following this date: there is only writing to be done.

"Planning to write is not writing. Outlining…researching…talking to people
about what you're doing, none of that is writing. Writing is writing."

E.L. Doctorow

And if an idea happens to leap out at me in the midst of writing and refuses to be written in prose, but insists upon outline form, then that idea shall get its wish, as well as the backburner on which to sleep and pass the days until I can find space for it, :)

It's amusing to realize that I've plotted out Playing at Angels so thoroughly that I could write a first draft from it. Only... I'm frightened to writing that first draft, that first scene, that first sentence.

Without a doubt, WriDay is for the win.

Wish me luck!

P. S. Writing quotes!

Failure Is Not In Falling, but In Not Rising Again

What would you do if you knew you could not fail?
Robert Schuller

I know precisely what I would do.

I would stop drawing up lists and outlines of all the stories I wish to one day to write; instead, I would write. One story after another, until I could fill a bookshelf with my work. I would punch holes through the margins and collect all my stories in a D-ring binder; I would bind some books and send others off to Lulu for publishing. I would present them all to my parents and tell them, "Your encouragement has not fallen on barren ground or rocky soil, but on the most fertile earth God has to offer."

If I knew I could not fail, I would participate in ever NoWriMo and Day the Internet has to offer and then some, and I would plumb the soul of my imagination and write out its contents. I could not care less if these works came before the public eye or not; as long as I fulfilled what was in me, lived as God meant me to live, expressed the genius He planted inside of me and lived an awakened, enlightened life, I could not be more euphoric.

If I knew I could not fail, I would not suppress ideas for stories with the fear that I was not good enough to translate them from my imagination to the page, or the fear that I would one day run dry of things to say, things to write, things to think. I would not scrimp and act the miser; I would be lavish with the brain God has given me.

If I knew I could not fail, I would stride with joy through this world, taking equally the good and the bad that came my way, because I would know within my heart of hearts that what I am is not bound to other people, but to myself and my thoughts and my actions. No man or woman can reject me and make me less of a human being in my own eyes; only I can do this to myself. I will walk in the knowledge that I can be, will be, am what God intended me to be.

Gandhi once said, "Be the change you want to see in the world." Allow me then to stitch this bit of wisdom upon my soul: allow me to be the change I want to see in my life. Let me express the person I wish to be - le me act as though that person has already come.

And she will come.

Write A Novel In A Day

O for a life of sensations, rather than of thoughts!
John Keats

Let us take "sensations", in the quote above, for feelings other than the blast of wind across one's face during the leap from the plane, the jerk of the parachute opening; the lurch in one's stomach as the roller coaster gains the pinnacle of the track and rushes downward a second later; the pulsing adrenaline bleeding through one's veins, accompanies risk. Rather, let us take "sensations" to mean the softer, tamer emotions that stir the gut, such as the swell of enthusiasm that comes with taking up a challenge from some place dearly loved but nearly forgotten in a barrage of distraction.

Though I suppose "sensation" in both its forms was what Keats was speaking of when he spoke - or wrote - this quote. And it is I who must expand my horizons, and apply "sensation" to things I did not immediately consider applying the word to, rather than claim Keats's words are too narrow, and reiterate his meaning as if my speaking that meaning made it new.

But where do I go with all this?

I dropped by the NaNoWriMo forums yesterday, and had a good, long, much-needed laugh in the Nanoisms thread. Hasten onward to this morning: ZeldaUniverse was down - and as far as I know is still down, and so I visited NaNoWriFo (new acronym!) in ZU's stead (for I must have my daily dose of forum, musn't I? =/). I stumbled across the NaNoWriDay thread: "write like crazy for a day"; shoot for 50k words in 24 hours or set your own goal. I scrolled through the pages, and discovered the next NaNoWriDay was set for this Saturday.

The thought of participating in a WriDay challenge struck me of a sudden. What a challenge! To write a novel - or something more than 250 words - in a day (and to write it for myself, and not for school)! To press oneself to reach a goal that depends solely upon my own fortitude, discipline, and initiative - to be responsible for every moment of a story! The dream struck a cord in me; exhilaration thrilled through my spine like the brush of fingers across piano keys. This is something to do, something to shake me from my ennui. This is a goal that will produce something immediate - not a goal for November, or some November a year from now, but a goal for today. It gives everything I do from this day out a purpose: I do not outline merely to outline for the sake of some moment I only dimly envision, but I outline with this Saturday, and the challenge that awaits me, in mind.

... The moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too, all sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. ... Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now!

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I suppose my needing a topic on a forum to inspire me, rather than inspiring myself to write what needs to be written, is but example of my lacking discipline and other such lapses in character. One should not need to spend the days hunting inspiration, and take the initiative only at the word of another; the ideal states that one should move with the power of one's will and determination. I should be able to set my own goals and soar forth from there.

Ah - but I have not yet attained the ideal, and I'm not going to rue the fact I haven't. I'm taking whatever I can to reclaim the discipline I know is there (I wrote Vaya con Dios, for goodness sake! a novel both utterly illegible and utterly confused, and yet I wrote it, when my convetional wisdom would claim I could not - once the first plot hole yawned beneath Mencha and Amaranth's feet, I should have quit! But I didn't. And I know I don't have to give up on my novels again, =] ); and today I love working with the challenges someone else sets before me. I'll have the initiative to create my own challenges and stick to them in time, but until then, let us like what we can get, =)

No, let us love and create triumph with what we can get.

One of These Days Are None of These Days

I hate the refrain I've taught myself to live by: "One day I'm going to write a book. One day being in May (yes, so the month changes whenever I tell myself this, but I mean it this time around). I'll start in May and finish by November and my writer's block should be a bad memory by May. School will be over by then; I'll be able to write what's in my heart and not what's on the syllabus when May comes."

And in the meantime, I outline more stories than can be contained in one sane mind, so that when May rolls around, I can write without obstruction. Only outline a thing to death and it shall run like water from my imagination onto the computer screen. Only wait till May and outline.

The excuse is starting to hurt. Every time I utter it - or think such things as, "Ah! But I must write or I'll never write!" - I feel as though a match has been struck inside of me, and the fumes are sweeping through my frame, heralds of impending combustion.

Tenants

I suppose one might say the following are the themes around which my stories and my characters are built.

Never stray from the path; follow close the straight and narrow. Never look
back, for what has passed has passed; to look back now is to bring what has
finished into focus again. The focus is before you, not behind you. Never look
back.

This first was inspired by Neil Gaiman's poem Instructions - the simple rules one must follow to pass to and from fairy land without injury. This suits best Playing At Angels, for there are several rules Marcie must obey if she is to save her sister from the goblins.

Show me that which is precious to me, and show me how this precious thing is
linked with yourself. Show me this, and you will have my love. Show me this, and
you will command my belief. You will be my logic, my reason, that thing which
fits what I know as truth as a man fits his soul. Only show me this
thing.

This next suits best Memories of Heaven, sequel to Playing At Angels - Marcie won her angels by chance in the previous story, lost them again, and must now obtain them by design.

My God is not religion, and my God is not dead. He is my safety and my strong
shield; He is my creator, and I am His creation. He is in me, just as He has
dwelled in my soul, though I have forgotten at times, and doubted at others. His
hand beckons me to the Garden once again, that place which sits in the heart and
waits for me to return and pass without fear by the angel with its flaming
sword. He is my living breath. His word is everywhere, in everything, and I will
find it if I only stop to look.

This last belongs to Mercedes Cavallero Cascon, one of my roleplaying characters gone the way of original fiction; she was the first character that came to mind when I was writing this. And one should always go with first instinct (or intuition), no? The principle works exceptionally well on standarized tests, =) But in a way, this third passage belongs to PaA's Marcie as well, for studying her angels and gaining them by design was but the first step in making them truly hers.

Imagine that you havened the basic principles of creating scenes - "Ah, yes, I will need a beginning, a middle, and an end... some goal to begin with, some conclusion - be it 'yes' or 'no' or 'yes, but...' or 'no, and furthermore...!' - to push my character into the next scene..." - imagine you have these rudiments and harness them to write a fair story.

For a while you are content. But it strikes you, suddenly, one day: you see your story laid out in front of you like a map of the world, and you can follow that story from the beginning to the end in one glance. You note each scene that will take your character from the initiating incident to the denounment; you realize, abruptly, how each scene impacts the plot, the character, how the plot is not merely a snapshot of action, but the chronicle of your character's change. It is as though your story gained a voice and told you how it will unfold, instructed you every detail. And suddenly the ending is not finally finishing this story but fulfillment - suddenly this story is not the product of inspiration but inspiration itself. It is something more than a story - it is a life. You feel it in your stomach, in your heart - it is not a story that sprang from your imagination but a history, a memory, that sprang from you yourself. It is the manifestation of what was always there. It is writing down the memories that were always inside your head.

That, in too many words, is how Marcie must truly make her angels her own.

In the creative state a man is taken out of himself. He lets dows as it
were a bucket into his subconscious, and draws up something which is normally
beyond his reach. He mixes this thing with his normal experiences and out of the
mixture he makes a work of art.

E. M. Forester (1876 - 1970)

Sweet Irony

It has always been my goal to catch the anniversary of this blog, to post some grandisonant message, some reflections upon life, liberty, and the pursuit of blog-keeping. Unfortunately, yesterday marked The Bluestocking Chronicles' third year, and I was too busy being vexed by Blogger to notice.

Ironic, that. Nothing but complaint for the day I'm always trying to - honestly - catch and commemorate.

So, then. Celebrations? ::throw confetti::

Farewell, My Patience

And Leonardo DaVinci once said:

Every now and then go away, have a little relaxation, for when you come back to your work, your judgement will be surer; since to remain constantly at work will cause you to lose power of judgement.... Go some distance away, because the work appears smaller, and more of it can be taken in at a glance, and a lack of harmony or proportion is more readily seen.

Never have truer words been spoken, and never have I been more eager to apply them. Blogger is dancing the Charleston upon my last nerves. I have been trying, for the last half hour, to put a welcome sign into the header. But Blogger is, of course, being damnably vexing: it will not allow me to put said banner into said header, for there is no such thing as proper alignment, no such thing as disposing of the blog title and description without wrecking havoc to the blog name. There are days when I seriously hate Blogger, and wonder why I put up with it. >>

But you know, I really shouldn't be toiling into the midnight hours on a blog, and watching Blogger eat up my patience like crows in a cornfield. It really is not worth it, :/

And is it just me, or has Thesaurus.com become quite suddenly useless?

A Message In Audio

Selah says hello, =D

Transcript (or, what I was supposed to say in full):

Because posting by voice is the novel thing to do (especially on ZeldaUniverse, from which I lifted the idea without apology - thank you Anime_queen, Gdwarf), today's post shall be an audio recording. This is Selah Ex Animo, voice of the Bluestocking Chronicles. Welcome to my blog.

I've been making some changes to my corner of the blogsphere: new background, courtesy of deviantArt's NorwegianAngel; fresh colours - in keeping with the title; and a new banner, once I learn to design elaborate banners in Photoshop. I've also begun a list of Memorable Posts - located to the right side of the screen - and may even steal Euphoria's lovely idea of role-player's to do list. After all, imitation *is* the sincerest form of flattery.

Thanks for listening!

Whether or not my sister can actually be heard, despite what I said, is another matter all together. But I'd gone through fifty or so revisions, and both she and I were sick of hearing me repeat the same script over and over again; our dog gave her the distraction, and me the impromptu bits, that were our salvation. I sound perfectly silly when I read from a script; the impromptu interruptions serve my sanity well, =P

(By the by, click on "download", rather than on "stream" to hear the file. "Stream", according to the Tindeck FAQ, has been disabled.)

P.S. My little sister and I shall be singing, next post. xD But I shan't tell her that, or she'll be shy.

Speak for Me

One of my greatest sources of inspiration are the words of other people - quotations, adages, cliches - any word that speaks to me. These are words to encourage, to inspire, to enlighten; truth at its most concise, its most powerful. My peace of mind begs me to gather up these quotes and hold on to them like the pieces of heaven that they are.

Do not seek to be. Be.

Be the change you want to see in the world.

~Mahatma Gandhi

The world makes way for the man who knows where he is going.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Live as is you will die tomorrow, dream as if you will live forever.

~ James Dean

One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar.

~ Helen Keller

Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in getting up every time we do.

~ Confucius

"If we eat wrongly, no doctor can cure us; if we eat rightly, no doctor is needed."

~ Victor G. Rocine

“Don’t forget until too late that the business of life is no business, but living.”

~ B. C. Forbes

Do not let others create your world for you, for they will always create it too small.

~Edwin Louis Cole

To get thine ends, lay bashfulness aside; Who fears to ask, doth teach to be deny'd.

~ Robert Herrick

Sit down to write what you have thought, and not to think about what you shall write.

~ William Cobbett

Yesterday's the past, tomorrows's the future, today is a gift. That's why they call it the present.

~ Unknown

You've got to get up every morning with determination if you're going to go to bed with satisfaction.

~ George Horace Lorimer

Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you... as by the attitude you bring to life.

~ John Homer Mills

An optimist sees an opportunity in every calamity; a pessimist sees a calamity in every opportunity.

~ Sir Winston Churchil

Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.

~ Buddha

Obsolete (adj) No longer used by the timid. Said chiefly of words. A word which some lexicographer has marked obsolete is ever thereafter an object of dread and loathing to the fool writer, but if it is a good word and has no exact modern equivalent equally good, it is good enough for the good writer.

~ Ambrose Bierce

“We live in the midst of details that keep us running around in circles and never getting anywhere but tired, or that bring on nervous breakdowns and coronary thrombosis. The answer is not to take to the woods, but to find out what we really want to do and then cut out the details that fritter away what is most valuable in life. Live deep instead of fast.”

~ Henry Seidel Canby

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness concerning all acts of initiative and creation. There is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too, all sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen events, meetings and material assistance which no one could have dreamed would have come their way. Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now!

~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

How Quick Doth Swing the Mood!

Well! I had half a mind, but half a minute ago, to come storming into this blog to scream and rail upon the subject of computers, the premise being that "everyday is a reminder of why I hate them". Blank CDs and a profusion of error messages were to serve as an example of why I was on the verge of defenestrating both computer and monitor (also known as "heaving the objects of aggravation from a window, specifically, a second story window, that the collision might sound with a gratifying crash"). Why Roxio "Easy CD Creator" will not allow me to burn a pair of pictures in bitmap format onto a disk is beyond me. I've gone through three CDs, and each have thrown multiple errors in my face. I was quite ready to pitch a CD across the room.

But then I dropped by deviantArt and discovered a note that will change the aesthetic course of Prose Epiphanies/Something Phenomenal/The Bluestocking Chronicles forever.

And now I'm happy again, xD The computer shall live to see another day.

I Would Walk to the Earth's End...

... just for the joy of it.

I love walking.

It's a release from cars, from driving - not that I can yet drive on my own, but what time I've spent behind the wheel is a scar on my memory, an activity I dread having to take up now that the weather is warm enough to do so again. And so, to purge the sickness and apprehension the thought of driving evokes in me, I walk.

I walk for mostly the exercise, down a stretch of road near my house, but in recent weeks, I've taken to walking to work and picking up groceries on the occasion. My next goal is to walk to school. The only problem there is the lack of walking paths. It's galling, but I'm determined.

Every other week, I walk to the library and clean out a part of its collection of books-on-tape; I listen to stories and lectures while while I walk about town. Just to walk and listen and feel the sunlight spilling over me, to sometimes pause and remove my headphones and listen to the ravens cawing from their perches, or watch the geese sauntering across the sidewalk to some field yellow with winter and peppered with the green shots of spring, is the pinnacle of earthly delight. Walking inspires me to write - the cold, clear air with a touch of rain in its scent, the sun on the lake, the leaves flitting over the pavement - I want to soak it in, to write it all down, to preserve the outside just as I saw it, smelled it, tasted it.

Having just started college, I can say with all certainty that walking relieves my stress better than any breathing exercise I might perform in the cramp staleness of a house, or the interior of a car.

When I first started walking - especially when I began to walk with the purpose of getting to work or buying a carton of eggs and block of cheese from the local grocery - I felt a bit awkward. Walking always seemed like the last resort, an activity society has been salvaged from, a step backward. But I've stopped fretting over whether walking agrees with social propriety or not. It does me a world of good, and I'm anxious to walk, to bicycle, to move through town without a car. That's a large step from my feelings of last year upon the subject. Walking, for me, is liberation. I am not about to give it up for the sake of strange looks thrown at me from passing cars, xD

~ a post on ZU of which I am inordinately proud, despite several instances of questionable grammar

Giga Jiggly--!

... puff?

::shudders:: This video of Jigglypuff gone wrong (on the one and only Super Smash Brothers Brawl) gives me the chills. I always found her (its?) final smash rather dull, but this glitch turns boring into an abomination.

Do I sound very serious and dogmatic in that final sentence? It's written all in fun. xD But I speak truly when I say that I find Giga Jigglypuff a bit distressing: the glitch inflates her past the realm of reason and propriety. Jigglypuff is not supposed to get that big. The horror of it all prostrates me.

=P

Happy April Fools! (pointless post warning)

It's always good to make note of the day, even if I haven't much to comment on in regards to it.

And behold, an entire month skipped. Missed posts up the creek! Of that, I have nothing to say. I could take the time to blame school or the Internet, or walking or reading or crocheting or - but I shall desist with the litany and merely sum up all these things as, "A whole list of possible distractions" - however, I won't. A lack of motive is suspect, as well as a lack of memory.

I felt I should post something, to make up for my March absence, and to rest my brain from the "auto-generation of school-friendly and quite frankly bland essays". But something turns out to be "pointless", so maybe I should stop now.

Though...

• I'm planning to wage war on Something Phenomenal's banner in a few days, so that's a bit on news. White text on green is the definition of dull, :<

• I'll need to make a list of all those fantasy books that I shall love now and forevermore, a list I can later refer to when I become a world-renowned novelist and am being interviewed on the Oprah Winfrey show, alongside Christopher Paolini and George R. R. Martin, xD (I'm not apologizing for my dreams! Despite the "xD" face!)

• I'm going to start posting fiction again. So I can get into the darned habit of writing it.

• I must needs complain about school or implode from the pressure. (That won't be a fun sight, even to one as self-deprecating as myself, O.o)

• Evanesced needs to get an account at ZeldaUniverse.net. It is necessary to the well-being of our communication, :3

Okay, I'll really stop now, xD