persistence.
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Writers Horoscope September 8: Be sure to celebrate your successes.
Even if it’s that chapter you finally finished yesterday, despite concerted efforts from a family member. If you finished it, that’s success.
Just don’t overdo it. A sugar-high can be an ugly thing.
Success is a journey, not a destination.
The doing is often more important than the outcome.
*Arthur Ashe*
A book I like on success and ‘getting stuff done’: The One Thing by Gary Keller. [No, I don’t always heed the advice, but it serves to get me back to the essentials.]
Image by Gratisography
What’s on my bookshelf? If You Can Talk, You Can Write
First of all, I love short chapters.
Thank you, Joel Saltzman, author of If You Can Talk, You Can Write [1993]—50 chapters squeezed into 190 pages.
And he practices what he preaches, as Saltzman might as well be playfully preaching to us over coffee in the kitchen.
Three of my preferred chapters:
- If You Don’t Know What to Say, Start Saying It
- Write About What Matters to You
- But It’s Not Even Close to Perfect
My favorite Saltzman quotes:
- “What’s needed is entitlement, the firm belief that ‘If it interests me, it interests others.’ “
- “All you have to do is learn to stop rejecting your thoughts and start writing them down.”
- “…you can adopt a much saner, more productive point of view: PROGRESS, NOT PERFECTION.”
Saltzman also weaves in short anecdotes, pop quizzes [Ten questions you can’t get wrong], and valuable quotes from other writers, including:
- “In every work of genius, we recognize our own rejected thoughts.” —Goethe
- “If the result of something I do is that someone feels 10 percent less crazy because they see someone else thinking what they’re thinking, then I provide a service.” —Albert Brooks
This is one of about a dozen books I would snag from my shelf in case a fire broke out at home. [If it wasn’t already been planted in my back seat box of writing stuff…]
What’s on my bookshelf? If You Can Talk, You Can Write
First of all, I love short chapters.
Thank you, Joel Saltzman, author of If You Can Talk, You Can Write [1993]—50 chapters squeezed into 190 pages.
And he practices what he preaches, as Saltzman might as well be playfully preaching to us over coffee in the kitchen.
Three of my preferred chapters:
- If You Don’t Know What to Say, Start Saying It
- Write About What Matters to You
- But It’s Not Even Close to Perfect
My favorite Saltzman quotes:
- “What’s needed is entitlement, the firm belief that ‘If it interests me, it interests others.’ “
- “All you have to do is learn to stop rejecting your thoughts and start writing them down.”
- “…you can adopt a much saner, more productive point of view: PROGRESS, NOT PERFECTION.”
Saltzman also weaves in short anecdotes, pop quizzes [Ten questions you can’t get wrong], and valuable quotes from other writers, including:
- “In every work of genius, we recognize our own rejected thoughts.” —Goethe
- “If the result of something I do is that someone feels 10 percent less crazy because they see someone else thinking what they’re thinking, then I provide a service.” —Albert Brooks
This is one of about a dozen books I would snag from my shelf in case a fire broke out at home. [If it wasn’t already been planted in my back seat box of writing stuff…]
Writers Horoscope September 7: A loved one will exploit your weaknesses.
This chapter is killing me!
A whine emanates from the other room. He knows…
A little he-and-I time wouldn’t hurt.
A deadly whimper-whine combination.
Stop right there! You know deep down once you leave that keyboard, there’s little chance you’re coming back, not even to turn things off.
Aim for a quick win, or at least a compromise. Set the timer for 20 minutes. You power through till the buzzer goes off and then Droopy-Eyed Ralph can get his walk.
Other anti-distraction tips:
http://published.com/magazine/how-to-create-distraction-free-writing-life
…and for those with family members who can’t read ‘Do Not Disturb’ signs and who claim to not understand clearly-stated boundaries: http://www.diyauthor.com/distraction-working-home-when-you-have-pets/ .
I should have been writing. Instead… [the sequel at 375 degrees].
The weather is cool enough to fire up the oven, so it’s time to roll out the crusts I made on Saturday.
My French teacher, Brother Reinkens, would prefer I call it a ‘galette’–do you get the feeling I’m haunted by my high school years?…time out…my facial tics are back…….okay, the medication’s kicking in…I call this, not so simply, “If Picasso made a rustic apple-dotted-with-raspberries pie.”
This is the smaller, experimental cinnamon-with-vanilla crust, so you’re looking at a pastry with six-inch sides. I turned over the larger crust to my wife, who opted for those plums from the neighbors. That hummer is still baking.
However, here is the real reason to make extra pie crust–in this case, sour cream pie crust.
These food-like mutants of dubious origin will soon morph into strips of bubbling butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon.
Like this, for instance…
Finally, lest** you think barbarism reigns supreme in the kitchen, my wife dials things back with symmetry, order, even beauty [though don’t think I’m not reveling in the plentiful ooze on the right edge].
**My apologies for the snooty use of ‘lest’. Trying to make up for the ‘arson aftermath’ look of the pie crust strips, I’d say. [An aside: I really don’t get why Food Network hasn’t come calling for my descriptive flair. I think Ina Garten and her Hamptons crowd and I would hit it off quite well.]
Geez, the kitchen smells good. Time for an afternoon mug of Mayan Blend…
Writers Horoscope September 6: Be on guard against oversharing.
Writers Horoscope September 5: Get a leg up on your competition.
- Ask editors lots of questions.
- Read–with a reader’s eye and an editor’s eye–what the competition is writing.
- Hunker down with some ‘Best of…’ article collections.
- Make bulletin board material out of the ‘best of the best’.
And, don’t forget the one writer you should always be competing with: the previous version of you.
***
photo courtesy of Gratisography
Writers Horoscope September 4: Today, your persistence is mightily challenged.
You face-planted on your last foray into a new genre. Critics cared enough to send their very best…jeers, barbs, and insults. [Remember, writers, everything comes in threes.]
Trust that you will find your voice. Characters will come alive. Plots will write themselves. [Again with the threes?]
It’s time to hop back on and start pedaling. [After some reassembly.]
***
photo courtesy of Gratisography
I should have been writing. Instead…
First of all, I’m thankful my boss is so forgiving, so understanding, so
- interested in cooking as I am.
- accepting of the power of displacement activities. [i.e. baking, procrastination in the form of picking up apples from the backyard, watering the front yard heathers to stave off the 100 degree heat, baking some more, making poblano pesto, watching golf–a sure sign that I’ve completely succumbed to the lures of the passive life]
- open to writing tasks being mere suggestions in one’s life, not mandates.
Of course, I am he. [Yes, that’s grammatically correct and it sounds so wrong, so snooty, so…sophomore year English class.]
Well, anyway…[picture Brother McCarthy hovering, arms crossed, berating me for not getting to the point within the first 20 words]
I’ve pounded out my first 1000 words already, but I’m in debt from the two previous days of productive weenieness.
I blame my neighbors.
You see, no matter how misguided and unjust the practice, my boss is also firmly on-board with
Those nice folks dropped off a bag of fresh-picked plums and my wife [and co-boss] mentioned the word ‘galette’ and since I took French during my first two years of high school, I really had no choice.
And because I am extremely intuitive when it comes to baking, I concluded that I needed a crust.
No big deal. I like to try different crusts, but I would say any crust should work for you.one-and-a-half of these little hummers are sitting in the fridge–
I now have one-and-a-half of these little hummers [aka crusts] sitting in the fridge–all those gluten strands relaxing, all those fat/flour/butter globules [hardly prime terminology for cookbook authors] hydrating.
The half of a crust resulted from me thinking, ‘Hey, I have a half cube of butter, plenty of flour, plenty of salt, plenty of sugar, full-fat yogurt, and an adventurous spirit!’. Okay-yes, my inner monologues aren’t quite that formal, but I threw those together in proper proportions, fed that adventurous spirit by tossing in cinnamon and some vanilla, and well…
Will let you know how this all shakes out.
Word Inventions 