Writersfest Baby!

When I have a writing workshop, I like to have people that are anthropologists and people who are poking around in other fields, I like to have them all in the same workshop, and not worry about genre.
— Sandra Cisneros

In workshops, writers are often told to read what is being written now, but if that is all you read, you are limiting yourself. You need to get a good overall sense of English literary history, so you can write out of that knowledge.
— Theodora Goss

The writing workshops and programs that are everywhere have encouraged writing. And if that produces more writing, it's also producing more readers of an elevated level. So all in all, a good thing.
— James Salter

After a three year break I’m back at the Kingston Writersfest. Four days of masterclasses and author stage events. Not to mention four days of living in a hotel with a room to myself and not having to cook or clean. ;-)

Once again I got a festival pass, but this year I came for all four days. Well, technically it was five, but there was only one masterclass on Wednesday so while it was included in the package, I didn’t think it was worth the price of another night in the hotel. But I did spring for one of the live stage events – a reading by fantasy author Guy Gavriel Kay.

Part of the fun of going to something like this is sharing, so in the next few weeks I’m going to share a few of the things I learned/wrote. We start with Life Lessons: Telling Your Story, presented by Armand Garnet Ruffo. In it we learned how to put more of ourselves in our writing.

“The rawness, the emotional response is what you want to get on the page.”
– William Faulkner

The only thing worth writing about is the human heart in conflict with itself, the tension that we have inside us. Memories are chaotic and visual, we remember what we see in snapshots. It is easier to remember trauma, heightened emotions. If you can feel it in the body, you’re on to something.

“Did it move you?” That’s the writing we go back to, that stands the test of time. Emotions and memories are connected, one leads to another. The tension and emotion is more important than the conflict it arose from. This is what we can explore. This tension is what draws the reader in and makes them want to keep reading.

Snapshots of memories are imbued with emotion. If we look at them like a string of pearls, one bleeds into another. It doesn’t need to be smooth and circular, but they’re all connected. With a snapshot you’re focusing on one memory at a time. You write dot by dot instead of all at once.

Everything begins with character, the character tells us to come along for the journey, it’s the driver for the plot. What are we interested in when we read? Character.

Exercise #1 – look through a backwards telescope to see the ring and narrow the focus on a single snapshot. Write as much detail about the snapshot as you can and then see where it leads you. Write it as a stream of consciousness.

The air was chilly, which is why I was wearing my snowsuit – the red one made of quilted nylon with a red pompom on the tip of the hood. There are women’s voices in the background, my mother and her friend Mrs. Carver. This was back in the day when children respected their elders, never calling them by first names or nicknames or honorary names. She was Mrs. Carver, wife of Red Carver, who was my father’s friend. Red and my father were in the army, stationed together here at Camp Borden. The Carvers had children as well, two sons, older than me, as old as my sisters. My closest sister was seven years older than me, making me the baby, or most likely the pest. Mrs. Carver sewed up little stuffed animals for a church bazaar and gave my sister a pink calico pony and me a pink calico dog. I really wanted the pony. Funny, I can remember those pink calico toys but I can’t remember if my mother aldo made anything for the bazaar. While the ladies talked, I toddled about the kitchen. “Be good” and “Don’t touch anything.” Be good was a refrain I’d hear time and again, until it was engraved in my heart. Being good was my default, seared into my soul along with “Good girls do this” or “Good girls don’t do that.” It shaped my life in ways I never realized until I was an adult looking back. “Good girls don’t fly off to foreign lands and take pictures” so I gave up my dream of becoming a photographer and never quite found anything to take its place.

Isolate a couple of snapshots from your memory. Write a detailed paragraph or two about them. Keep the snapshots narrow. What do you see? Grab these images and create something new. Take two of these snapshots and look for the cross-connections.

I invite you to give it a try yourself. What have you got to lose?

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

The good news is I brought the total words up again, the bad news is that it wasn’t extra words, just longer blog posts, same as last week

I’m actually surprised my words were up a bit. I guess the whole “making lists and prioritizing” thing works after all. I had a lot on the go last week, even before I came to Writersfest. And as much as I would have liked to write the installment of the Pond before I left, that didn’t happen, I wrote it here (and was only 10 minutes late posting it).

I have been writing a lot since I’ve been here (today is the last day) but only during the masterclasses (well, and this blog post and Friday’s post). It might have been a different story had I left my new Lynsay Sands book at home. ;-)

NEW WORDS:
Blog Posts – 1,859+879+307+805=3,850
Poetry – 65 words (included in blog post)
Total = 3,850

Goals For Next Week:
Increase the words

EDITING:
Finished
I am done, done, done diddly done! Magical Mayhem is done. Now all I need is the cover, blurb, and tag line. Dare I hope that I’m able to have it finished for a Christmas release?

Goal For Next Week:
Dig out An Elemental Spirit and start the edits on that.

MARKETING:
No Marketing. Not even an attempt at marketing. Too much other stuff on the go.

Goal For Next Week:
Submit two flash stories and one poem.

TECH & TRAINING:
Well, no tech, per se. But I have been learning an awful lot here at Writersfest.

Goal For Next Week:
Check out the features of Dropbox.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
The Jisei wasn’t so much of a form as it was a type of poem. But I did write three entirely new examples for it and I’ve never done the Chinese Kanshi form before, so I’d say it’s close enough.

As far as an anthology goes . . . Yeah, again, it was a busy week and I just didn’t have time to get started on it.

Goal For Next Week:
New form to share. Start compiling the anthology

CRAFTING:
This is one of the things that took up so very much of my time early last week. Tuesday I had meeting with my stitchery group and it was time to make good on my promise to deliver items for the Christmas craft sale. What I made wasn’t hard – hand sewn felt stars and my traditional snowmen and penguins – but they were time consuming to make.

And I got to wear my hand embroidered blouse to the stitchery meeting – the ladies were all suitably impressed, which was not why I did it but it was a nice bonus.

And of course, because I don’t have enough to do, I signed up for an upcoming class on making felt poppies, presumably in time for Remembrance Day in November.

Goal For Next Week:
Work on the cancer afghan. Work on pansy pillowcases.

WHAT I’M READING:
The only book I read was After the Bite by Lynsay Sands, and that pretty much took up all my spare time during Friday and Saturday at Writersfest.

The Writersfest organizers had a book store set up and I may have bought one or two or five books by some of the participating authors. Can’t wait to start reading them.

Goal For Next Week:
At least start my list of books so I can update my Goodreads account!

GOAL REVIEW:

The extra words thing is hard to pin down because I although I have been doing quite a bit of writing during my masterclasses, it’s all hand written so it’s difficult to calculate. But I was on time with my posts, or almost on time. I was only 10 minutes late with my serial installment. But again, there were no late nights involved.

Just as well that I don’t have those pesky games on my laptop anymore because I wouldn’t have had time to play them. It was a really busy week, did I mention that?

I got a big chunk of my Christmas crafts done, and delivered, so that was a big weight off my mind. This is something that can be ongoing, but at a less frantic pace. I don’t think I’ll be making any more penguins or snowmen, but the felt stars, and maybe some gingerbread men, are something I can do while watching TV at night.

As much as I’ve enjoyed being here, I’m also looking forward to going home today and this week I can start working in my office.

Happy writing.

The Pond – Part 9

It had been several days and Izolda had yet to find the chance to slip away to return to the cave. For some reason, Olga seemed determined to keep her close to the village. Izolda would catch her watching her, an odd look in her eye. Was she suspicious about what really happened at the river?

And the few times she managed to escape Olga’s watchful eye, Matyei would follow her. She couldn’t take the chance of him finding out about the cave, he’d tattle to their father, so she’d steer clear of it. He was still the talk of the village, what more did he want? Finally, she confronted him.

“What do you want? Why do you keep following me?”

He seemed a little taken aback by her hostility. “I-I-nothing. But we never talk anymore or spend time together. Have I done something wrong?”

There was none of the softening in her like he’d expected. “No, there is nothing wrong. We are growing older and have different interests. Sometimes I need to be alone to think.”

“You never used to,” he said sullenly.

She did, but time to herself was easier to come by back then.

“You have our father’s regard now, is that not what you wished for?”

“I-I-I am not certain I am worthy of it,” he said. “I still cannot remember clearly what happened. And I don’t seem to be any more powerful in magic than I was before.”

“I have told everyone everything I saw,” Izolda said stiffly. Everyone who, if they knew the truth, would have been appalled instead of elated. “I witnessed only you vanquishing the Rusalka, not the means by which you did it.”

“Still, there is something tickling at the back of my mind. You have always had more magic than I, are you sure—”

“No!” Izolda held up a hand to stop his speech. “You are mistaken. I only appeared to have stronger magic because you were still learning. I am only a woman, and everyone knows a woman’s magic is weak.”

Matyei was like a hound with a bone, however. “But I don’t understand why I was able to banish the-the-creature and still cannot work any of the higher magics.”

Izolda shrugged. “Perhaps you over-reached with what magic you had and it needs to replenish itself. Or maybe,” she added snidely, “You burnt it out with that one spell.”

“What has happened to you, ‘Zolda?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You never used to be so mean.” He turned and finally left her alone.

She stared after him with a frown. Cultivating a closeness with him had seemed like a good idea at the time – especially since she’d hoped it would lead to her being able to learn magic through him. But now . . . if Matyei was able to see the changes in her, then so would others. She would need to be more careful.

Wasting no more of her precious time on it, carefully made her way to the cave, stopping every once in awhile to make sure she wasn’t being followed. Izolda breathed a sigh of relief when she stepped through her wards. There was no sign that anyone else had breached them, nor that anyone else had been near here.

This did not surprise her. She would have felt it if her wards had been breached, the spell would have lashed back to her. And the cave was not easy to find in the first place, unless you knew it was there. The entrance was narrow, more like a split in the rock, and leafy shrubs on either side partially obscured it.

There was a lantern hidden near the base of one of the shrubs and Izolda pulled it out and lit it, taking it with her as she entered the cave. Following the narrow passage, she came first to the main chamber, where she learned what magic Varnya was willing to share.

It was messy. There were clothes and rags piled up in the corner, rocks and sticks with leaves and pinecones scattered everywhere, and there was a stale smell to it. Two rickety chairs and a table sat to one side.

Further back was the area the witch had used as her sleeping area. Izolda’s lips tightened. She had never been this far back except for when she had come to break the comb. It was in even worse condition than the rest of the cave and there was a lingering undertone of rot to it.

Setting the lantern up on the shelf where the comb had been, she rolled up her sleeves. She had a lot of work ahead of her.

Jisei or Death Poem

When death was imminent, it was the custom of the ancient Chinese and Japanese to write a poem. If the person was unable to write on their own, Zen monks would write the poem for them. The earliest record of the Jisei was from 686, by Prince Otsu, son of Emperor Temmu. He wrote his when he was forced to commit sepaku (ritual suicide).

The Jisei is not so much a form in itself as a category for the subject. It was usually written in either the classic Chinese Kanshi form: four lines with a 5-7-5-7 syllable count; the Waka form: five lines with a 5-7-5-7-7 syllable count; or the Haiku: three lines with a 5-7-5 syllable count.

Death is never mentioned explicitly in a Jisei, so that the poet is able to think more about their life. Early poems used symbolism and imagery, later poems added images from nature. A Jisei can be dark or it can be hopeful but above all it’s meant to be an expression of the acceptance of death, and how the poet has spent their life.

I’m not sure if my examples can be considered true Jisei, as (to my knowledge) I’m not on the verge of death. And I can only hope that by writing them I’m not tempting fate.


Kanshi

Behind me is the
long road that life has taken –
ups and downs and turns,
I look back with no regrets


Waka Form

Life’s no longer mine
and I come to the trail’s end
I hope it’s autumn
my favorite time of year
would be a good time to leave


Haiku

Like the autumn leaves
my concerns fall and scatter
wind take me away

Tug of War

That’s creativity in a nutshell. A messy tug-of-war with imagination to erase that feeling that nothing really matters anyway.
— Zoe Whittall

From my experience, the best advisors help in three ways: encourage you to look at the problem or opportunity from multiple angles; help you balance the tug of the short-term with important long-term priorities; and ask the tough questions you need to know to reach the best solution.
— Margo Georgiadis

Is there a word for the moment you win tug-of-war? When the weight gives, and all that extra rope comes hurtling towards you, how even though you've won, you still end up with muddy knees and burns on your hands? Is there a word for that? I wish there was.
— Sarah Kay

As you know, or should by now if you’re a regular reader of this blog, I’ve been struggling for a long time trying to juggle all of the things I’ve got going on in my life. And what I’ve finally realized is this. It comes down to two sides of my creative nature – the writer’s side, and the crafter’s side.

You’d think it would have been a little more obvious to me by now, but it wasn’t. See, the thing is, most people I know focus on one or the other. If they’re writers, they’re able to focus on their writing. While the crafters seem to spend all their free time crafting.

With me I feel a conflict. I’ve always been a crafter, although my crafting never consumed me. And I’ve always been a writer, but never to the exclusion of all else. Well, except during Nano. ;-) But lately, I’m feeling an internal tug-of-war between my crafting and my writing. How did this happen?

Some time during the last couple of years I started to become more active in my stitchery. Though I’ve always been a crafter, it’s something that’s always been sporadic. I’d be really enthusiastic in my crafts, and then my interest would wane for big blocks of time. But since joining the stitchery guild I’ve taken my crafting more seriously, just like I take my writing seriously.

Which leads me to my tug of war. When I’m working on a craft, I feel guilty because it’s time I could be using for writing. And when I’m working on my writing, I feel the urge to work on a craft. And I feel guilty for spending too much time on one or the other.

I have a whole list of writing projects I want to finish, with more waiting to be started. And I have a bunch of stitchery projects in various stages of being done, with plans to do more. I’d really like to get into fabric art. I’d really like to start a multi-volume science fiction series. Tug, tug, tug.

I don’t think the crafting is going to go away anytime soon, so I’m going to have to learn to reconcile the crafting with the writing or I’m going to drive myself crazy. So last week I made myself a list of all the things I wanted to get done, and then picked out the few things I needed to get done that week and prioritized them. It seemed to work out quite well.

Well, it did until I made writing a letter to my sister a priority. I haven’t written her since June (yes, I’m a bad sister) so it was long overdue. Fortunately, I keep a journal and I could refer to it to keep me on track. Unfortunately, it was more time consuming than I counted on, and the whole time I’m thinking I should be working on a Christmas craft for the upcoming Christmas sale, or I should be working on the next installment of the serial story. And I’m not finished yet.

But a new week is upon us, and that means a new list to prioritize. We’ll have to wait and see if it’s still working.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

The good news is I brought the total words up again, the bad news is that it wasn’t extra words, just longer blog posts. *sigh*

I started out the week with the assumption I’d get a couple of installments on the serial story done early, and maybe my poetry post done ahead of time, but this didn’t happen. And why didn’t it happen (you ask)? Because I got sucked into the hidden objects gaming universe.

Hidden object games are so much worse than solitaire or word games because they’re always changing, so you don’t get bored quite as easily. Oh, you can tell yourself, “just one more round,” but next thing you know it’s time to make supper.

The list I made and prioritized as to what needed to be done helped, but I still have to stay away from the games to do it.

NEW WORDS:
Blog Posts – 1,911+574+323+695=3,503
Poetry – 88 words (included in blog post) + 171 word poem for CPW
Total – 3,503+171=3,674

Goals For Next Week:
Try to keep up with my writing while I’m away.

EDITING:
31 pages
Be still my heart, there’s light at the end of that very long, dark tunnel. I have a handful of scenes I marked for rewriting, but for all intents and purposes, the edits on Magical Mayhem are done! That’s not to say the book is done, however. I still have the final polish, and the cover, blurb, and tag line. But still . . . woot!
Get the cover, blurb, and tag line figured out.

MARKETING:
No Marketing. Not even an attempt at marketing. Too much other stuff on the go.

Goal For Next Week:
Submit two flash stories and one poem.

TECH & TRAINING:
Nothing that relates to writing, but with the help of YouTube I did learn how to use the rolled hem presser foot on my sewing machine. Oh, man, does it ever make hemming a breeze! I only wish I’d known about these presser feet years ago. And I also consulted the book that came with the sewing machine and re-learned how to do button holes properly.

Goal For Next Week:
Check out the features of Dropbox.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
I really struggled with my example for the Virelai poetry form. But I got it done, and posted on time. And then I was going through my files I found I’d done a Virelai many years ago and the example I created back then was a tad better. Oh, well, it happens.

After spending so much time and effort, sweat and toil, on the Virelai, it was a pleasure to work on the poemwork assigned for this month’s poetry gathering. I could write whatever I wanted, as long as I stayed on topic. So I did.

As far as an anthology goes . . . I figure I’ll stick to traditional poems, that is, poems whose forms you can look up online. If that goes well, maybe I’ll do one with non-traditional forms next.

Goal For Next Week:
Find an easier form to share.

CRAFTING:
Well. The crafting didn’t go at all as planned last week. I really expected to get more done. No work on the pillow case. No work on the cancer blanket. No work on the Christmas crafts, although the granddaughter is coming over this afternoon to do some with me.

But I did get the alterations done to the sleeveless blouse and got the hand sewing done on it, and then I got the button holes and buttons put on it. I also put a new casing on the skirt and finished it up. My outfit is done!

Honestly, I have never taken so long on a single outfit in my life. Of course, I was doing a lot of other things at the same time – normally I’d take an entire day or two and just work at something until it was done – but still . . .

I also hemmed a pair of track pants for my mother-in-law and used my new rolled hem presser foot to hem some pajama pants for my father-in-law. Man, that thing is handy! And so easy to use, I wish I’d known about them years ago.

Goal For Next Week:
Work on Christmas crafts. Work on the cancer afghan. Work on pansy pillowcases.

WHAT I’M READING:
Honestly, I didn’t do much reading last week. I only read a couple of chapters of The Book Haters Book Club by Gretchen Anthony before I got distracted away from it. And then I read a few chapters of Hook, Line, and Sinker, by Tessa Bailey before realizing that although I liked what I read so far, it wasn’t what I wanted to read. So then I started reading Unnatural Creatures, which is an anthology of stories chosen by Neil Gaiman.

Goal For Next Week:
Suck it up and update my Goodreads account!

GOAL REVIEW:

My total word count was back up from last week’s, but the only real gain was the extra poem I wrote, and I wouldn’t have done that if I hadn’t had a poetry gathering to go to. I was late with this post last week, but all the others were up on time. I didn’t get as early a start on my serial installment as I would have liked, but I also didn’t have to stay up late to get it done so I’ll take that as a win.

After I got sucked into a third hidden objects game and wasted an entire day on them, I realized something drastic needed to be done. So I deleted the shortcuts off my desktop, uninstalled them from my programs, and even deleted the installation files from my downloads.

I really need to at least start a list of the books I’ve read, and then start updating my Goodreads account say, five books at a time. I’ve fallen so behind on keeping it up to date it isn’t even funny.

I got more stuff done after getting rid of the games – got my skirt and blouse finished, did the hemming that’s been hanging over my head, and finally got to put my sewing stuff away, at least for a while. But I made no progress on my Christmas crafts and I have another stitchery meeting this week. I’m hoping that with my granddaughter’s help today I’ll have at least a little something to show for my time.

So another up and down week for me, but the week ahead is going to be more writerly focused because it’s off to Writersfest 2022 – four days of lectures, seminars, and classes in beautiful Kingston, starting on Thursday.

Happy writing.

The Pond – Part 8

Izolda needed time to think, and plan. She needed to explore the witch’s cave. What she needed most was time to herself to adjust to these new-found powers that she could barely keep contained. Instead, from the moment she was within sight of the village she was being fussed over by her mother and several aunts. Maybe she’d done a little too good a job of changing her appearance to something more disheveled.

While the men made much of Matyei, who seemed somewhat bewildered by his newfound status as favored son, the women tended to Izolda. She was excused from her evening chores, the dirt washed from her face and arms by Olga herself, then she was wrapped in a blanket and given a place by the fire, a thick clay mug of herbal tea cradled in her hands.

“Do you hurt anywhere?” her mother asked, gently brushing the detritus from her hair.

Izolda shook her head, no.

“You are fortunate she only set a distancing spell on you,” Polina told her. “It could have been so much worse.”

“She was not likely to have been in any danger,” Anya said with a sniff.

The others, including Izolda, looked at her.

“It is well known that the Rusalka care only for men’s souls, not women’s.”

“Perhaps, perhaps not,” Polina retorted. “Bu the creature could have just as easily decided to kill her instead of banishing her.”

Izolda focused her attention on the mug in her hands and said nothing, but she couldn’t hold back a wince as her mother pulled at a knot in her hair.

“Still,” Olga said evenly, setting the comb aside. “It is not an experience to be taken lightly. Facing a Rusalka is enough to make even a grown man shake in his boots.”

The others murmured in agreement.

“I would not have thought he had it in him,” Izolda’s grandmother murmured.

“Who, mother?” Olga asked.

“The boy.”

They all looked over to where Andrei was telling everyone within earshot of how skilled his son was, and at such a tender age. Izolda had to bite the inside of her lip to keep from laughing at the perplexed expression on Matyei’s face.

“I would never have believed he could face a Rusalka and live.” Grandmother pointed her walking stick towards Izolda. “You witnessed the battle. He did banish it, did he not?”

Izolda thought quickly. “The creature banished me to the woods,” she said in a shaky voice. “But I know these woods well and it did not take me long to make my way back to the river. I did not see all that transpired, but I saw Matyei cast some kind of spell and the Rusalka turned to smoke.”

Her grandmother nodded in satisfaction.

“I, for one, would like to know what spell he used,” Anya said.

Olga agreed. “I can scarce believe he learned such from Andrei, but it will do no good to ask. Men guard their spells like jealous lovers.”

Izolda finished her tea and did not even have to feign weariness as she excused herself and made her way up to the corner of the loft where she slept.

But sleep was a long time coming. Her mind would not quiet. Thanks to the addition of Varnya’s power, hers now eclipsed even that of her father. What was she to do with all of it though? Certainly not live out her life as her mother had, hiding her true nature. What good was power if you could not use it?

Izolda did not know how, but she knew her future lay beyond the village of Likhvin. She had so many questions. Tomorrow she would go to the cave and begin her search for answers there. But she would have to be careful, very careful. The men would be easily fooled, but the other women would not.

Virelai Poetry Form

This poem comes to us from medieval France, and was often set to music. It’s one of the three fixed French forms, the other two being the ballade and the rondeau. It’s a kind of complicated form, with alternating rhymes and syllable counts.

The Virelai can have any number of nonets (9-line stanzas), but usually has at least three. It is syllabic with the syllable count being 5-5-2-5-5-2-5-5-2. It also rhymes, with the five syllable lines rhyming with each other, and the two syllable lines rhyming with each other.

Here’s the schematic:

xxxxa
xxxxa
xb
xxxxa
xxxxa
xb
xxxxa
xxxxa
xb

Now, in the second stanza, the first line picks up the rhyme from the last line of the first stanza and this continues as the rhyme for the five syllable lines of this verse. The two syllable lines get a new rhyme of their own. This pattern continues in the following verses. In other words, the end rhyme for the second verse would be bbcbbcbbc, the third verse would be ccdccdccd, and so forth.

I told you it was a little complicated. Honestly, after struggling with my example I want to go back to an unstructured form! The five syllable lines were bad enough, but the two syllable ones were a killer. Yikes!


Creativity

vaguely, in my mind
stray thoughts left behind
amass
some thoughts are unkind
some are less defined
like glass
all are unconfined
stories in my mind
en masse

deep in the morass
dreams may come to pass
tonight
such dreams oft surpass
the mind’s deep crevasse
of sight
and reason is bypassed
here at this impasse
tonight

flash, like a floodlight
pierce the brain, ignite
regret
for the things I write
under the moonlight
abet
thoughts, I cannot fight
this is my birthright
. . . forget

Sensory Deprivation

Our bodies have five senses: touch, smell, taste, sight, hearing. But not to be overlooked are the senses of our souls: intuition, peace, foresight, trust, empathy. The differences between people lie in their use of these senses; most people don't know anything about the inner senses while a few people rely on them just as they rely on their physical senses, and in fact probably even more.
― C. JoyBell C.

You must learn to heed your senses. Humans use but a tiny percentage of theirs. They barely look, they rarely listen, they never smell, and they think that they can only experience feelings through their skin. But they talk, oh, do they talk.
― Michael Scott

Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science.
— Edwin Powell Hubble

One of the things I hate about summer is having to have the house shut up to keep the cool air in and the hot air out. The fan in the air conditioning unit in our furnace is loud. I don’t hear the birds singing, or the wind rustling the leaves in the trees, or the rain drumming a symphony on the windows, or the bad-tempered rumble of thunder during a storm . . .

Of course the trade off is I also don’t have to try and breathe in the hot, sticky air, have the perspiration beading up on my skin, or hear the whine of insects buzzing around my head.

But I do enjoy the roses in my garden when they’re at the peak of their beauty, their fragrance wafting upwards, the cool dew from the grass on my bare feet, the sharp sweetness of a strawberry, warm from the sun.

Now I could have just said I hate having to keep the doors and windows closed because the air conditioning is so loud I miss the sounds of summer, but at least I don’t have to put up with the humidity or the bugs. But don’t you think I painted a better picture when I used my senses to describe my thoughts in more detail?

Sensory description is one of the greatest tools in the writer’s toolbox, but it’s one seldom used, which is a shame because appealing to your readers senses is an effective way of drawing them in and making them feel like part of the story.

“The smell of apples and cinnamon wafted its way through the house, drawing us to the kitchen where Mom was setting out slices of fresh from the oven pie, a chime ringing out each time she gently tapped the scoop on a plate to dislodge the already melting ice cream.”

“Mom made pie and we had a piece in the kitchen.”

Which sounds better to you? Which draws you in, reminding you of your own childhood maybe, making your mouth water for a slice of pie? Notice I didn’t describe the pie, just the smell of it and the sound of the ice cream scoop as it hit the plate. But it was enough to give you a picture of the pie. What if I used all five senses?

“The smell of apples and cinnamon wafted its way through the house, drawing us to the kitchen. There was Mom, pretty as a picture in her yellow dress, a white apron protecting it and a matching scarf covering her dark hair. She’d already cut into the pie, and the first pieces were sitting on the table, ice cream melting where it met the hot apple. She tapped the scoop against the last plate to dislodge the ice cream, a chime ringing out as though signalling us to sit down. I brushed my hand over the cool wood of the table as I slid into my seat beside my brother and we dug in. Hot pie and cold ice cream hit my tongue in a burst of sweetness I tried to savor as long as I could.”

Over the top, or just enough? It really depends on the context. While the first one is more appealing than the second, the third one would really only be appropriate if there was something important about that pie.

This is bringing us back to show and tell. Adding sensory details is a great way to take a scene from telling to showing. If you haven’t figured it out for yourself, the first and third paragraphs are showing, the second one is telling.

So try adding a little sensory detail to your writing and see what happens. Don’t just use sight and sound, use touch, taste, and smell as well. You’ll be surprised what a difference it makes.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

Well this is unexpected. I was 600 words down from last week. But then again, looking back I realize that when I did write it went pretty easily for a change, I had a couple of setbacks that kept me from getting more done than I would have liked to.

First of all, my ice pick headaches were back. An ice pick headache is a sharp, shooting pain in the head, like you’re being stabbed with an ice pick. They only last for a second or two, but they tend to come in clusters. In my case I was getting them off and on during the entire week.

Medical science doesn’t really have a handle on what causes them. It might have something to do with the way the brain controls pain, or due to nerves, blood vessels, or muscles in the head and neck. But the bottom line is, there’s really nothing they can do to treat it. Funny how a stabbing pain in the head can distract you from focusing on your writing though.

And . . . I cannot tell a lie. I was seduced by Facebook to click on a link for a hidden objects game. I have a weakness for hidden objects and I may have spent more time that I should have playing one. Make that two.

And the final nail in my productivity coffin was the amount of time I spent on crafting concerns. Back in the spring I committed to producing some items for the craft sale my guild is having in December and I’ve been pretty slack on it. So I spent a lot of time going through craft stuff and deciding what crafts I’m going to be doing.

NEW WORDS:
Blog Posts – 1,483+645+259+656=3,043
Poetry – 64 (included in blog post)

Total words: 3,043

Goals For Next Week:
Try write words other than blog posts.

EDITING:
3 pages
Bah, humbug! I only made it down to my office once last week, and it wasn’t for long. See above talk about the ice pick headaches. I have to say, it was a little disappointing, especially since I’m so close to being finished. But the good news is, I know what I want on the cover, I just need to find the right pictures.
Step up the editing pace on Magical Mayhem.

MARKETING:
*sigh* No Marketing.

Goal For Next Week:
Submit two flash stories and one poem.

TECH & TRAINING:
Nope. Nothing to report here, either.

Goal For Next Week:
Check out the features of Dropbox.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
Last week’s form was the Seguidilla. This was a little bit more complicated than the forms I’ve been doing lately, but it serves me right for whining about how unstructured the previous form was.

I gave no thoughts to the anthology.

Goal For Next Week:
Find a new form to share and give some more thought to the anthology.

CRAFTING:
I had to re-stamp parts of my pillowcase because the first stamping didn’t take really well. I didn’t want to cut up the transfer, so I traced it onto parchment and then went over it with a transfer pencil, THEN I was able to cut it apart and iron it onto only the places that needed it. And after all of that I actually worked on it a bit at the stitchery guild meeting.

Friday afternoon I helped set up our display at the Port Hope Fair, and then Saturday morning I was one of the two bodies manning the table – answering questions about our group and the pieces on display, and trying to recruit new members. I ended up being there much longer than I expected, but I kept busy working on some of my Christmas crafts.

And I got a few more rows done on the cancer blanket, so all in all it was a good week for crafts.

Goal For Next Week:
Work on Christmas crafts. Work on the cancer afghan. Get the alterations done to the sleeveless blouse and finish the skirt.

WHAT I’M READING:
Still haven’t updated my Goodreads account, unfortunately it’s just not high on my priority list.

Finished reading Small Town Big Magic by Hazel Beck. I enjoyed this book, right up until I got to the end. The author wrapped things up nicely but then she ruined it all with a final paragraph that turned it into an unnecessary cliff hanger. The way the story ended, we already knew there was going to be more books in the series. But by adding that cliff-hanger she kind of beat us over the head with it and I, for one, refuse to fall for her clickbait tactics. I will not be buying the next book in the series.

I also read Before the Coffee Gets Cold, by Toshikazu Kawaguchi, which was a somewhat odd, but engaging novel with four linked stories taking place in a small café. And I’m a few pages in on The Book Haters Book Club by Gretchen Anthony – too soon to know if I’m going to like it or not.

Goal For Next Week:
Suck it up and update my Goodreads account!

GOAL REVIEW:

My total word count was down from last week’s, which shouldn’t have surprised me considering all the other stuff I had going on. I was late with Monday’s post, but all the others were done on time. And I actually got my serial installment ready early.

I hang my head in shame over the amount of time I spent on those two hidden object games. But I’m at the point in them that they’re getting kind of tedious because collecting items in the game to advance is slow going, and I refuse to pay for what I need.

Did a little more reading than I have been, and my choice of books is a little broader, but I still haven’t updated my Goodreads account. Didn’t get the alterations done on the blouse, but I did get the seams ripped out in preparation. And over all, I spent more time on crafts than I’ve been doing.

So when all is said and done it was probably more of a down week than up, but I still just keep going.

Happy writing.