My uncle, who is both a writer and a retired writing teacher (and who has read several of my works-in-progress over the years) has commented on occasion that the voice in my work is consistent in such a way that it seems everything is done in one sitting.

I had never thought about it, but I think part of what makes that possible is ritual. During the summer when I have all day everyday it’s not so important; I just sit and write. Doing NaNoWriMo last month forced me to think about how to get into the zone so that the isolated hour here and two hours there could be most productive.

Music is one of the best writing rituals I’ve found. Whenever I work on a novel, I tend to pick one CD (or one artist now that itunes makes it easy to shuffle all of an artist’s work) for that project. In the past I’ve written to And then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out by Yo La Tengo, the hundred or so hours of Dead I’ve got, and Enigma’s MCMXC. For this project, I turned to ( ) by Sigur Rós.

When finding music for writing, I look for work that’s interesting musically, but that can also fade into the background. I like lots of instrumentals and open spaces and maybe even some drone.

Last month, I found ( ) to be perfect for an eerie science fiction piece set at a research base on Mars. Perhaps on some level Sigur Rós appealed because they’re from Iceland, a nation whose landscapes are closer to what exists on Mars than almost anywhere else on Earth. The music is also otherworldly, and the lyrics are not sung in English so they don’t become a distraction.

By listening to ( ) in my car on my way home from work, I found that I would already be in my writing zone by the time I got home. I would brew a cup of tea (another ritual) and sit down to write. While writing at my computer, I used itunes and so could go beyond ( ) to include Takk… and “Sevefn-g-englar,” the epic track from Vanilla Sky that turned me on to Sigur Rós in the first place.

I have an easier time getting started when I’ve pre-focused my mind on the drive home. When I sit down the words come easier, and I’m in the frame of mind for a particular story because I think my subconscious is already tuned to that story’s frequency.

I was finishing some revisions on another novel at the beginning of the month and I found I could easily switch focus between stories by changing the music from Sigur Rós to the Grateful Dead.

What (if anything) do you listen to when you write?

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Here’s a video of Sigur Rós performing “Sevefn-g-englar.” You have to love a guy who uses a bow to play his guitar. Enjoy.

I “won” NaNoWriMo, which means that I wrote 50,000 words during the month of November. To be precise, I wrote 50,364. The idea is to write a novel, but that 50K I wrote is more like two-thirds of a novel. A decent start, at any rate.

I figure I’ll finish the first draft in the next two weeks. It feels like it wants to be about 80,000 words or so, but we’ll see. Once that’s done I’ll let it cool for a few months before tackling revisions. Maybe they should call it National Novel Starting Month (NaNoStMo?) since all those first drafts are unlikely to be presentable.

The experience of participating in NaNoWriMo was an enlightening one. For years, I have convinced myself that I can only write novels during summer vacation because there just isn’t time during the school year. I found out I was wrong about that. I lied to myself! I can work on novels anytime, and I discovered some ways to bring focus to the small chunks of time in which I could write.

I used NaNoWriMo to try some new things too. I wrote in the first person, which I’ve only done in short stories, and I’m doing science fiction, which I’ve always wanted to try but hadn’t until now. The go-go-go pace of writing for this challenge doesn’t  leave much room for self-doubt so it’s a great time to try new things and experiment a little bit.

It’s been fun, and I like the characters and the story. I’m surprised by some of what has happened, but that’s part of what makes writing such a thrill.

I’m doing NaNoWriMo. That’s National Novel Writing Month. The idea is to write the first draft of a novel during the month of November. The draft should be 50,000 words.

I’ve never done NaNoWriMo before mainly because I’ve always assumed I can’t write a novel in a month during the school year.  I’ve written first drafts in a month, but only during the summer.

One of my teacher friends mentioned she was doing it and asked if anyone wanted to join her. At first I said no. 50K words in a month? While teaching? Impossible.

Then, I started to wonder if I could do it. I mean, I’ve written three first drafts already so this isn’t new. How does one begin a new writing project? Why, at the beginning, of course.

I’ve been reading Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird: Some instructions on Writing and Life (Anchor Books, 1994). In her chapter “Shitty First Drafts,” she uses the metaphor of driving at night to describe first drafts. We can only see as far down the road as the headlights reveal, but eventually we’ll come to a destination.

What’s that destination?

Last a week a character came to mind. A setting. That’s where I start a draft. Just write about the character and the place. Things will present themselves. This is the beautiful serendipity of fiction.

Sure, I will likely cut out most of the opening fourth of the book when I get to revisions, but that opening part is where characters are met and discoveries are made.

I started yesterday and wrote about 3,500 words. I like the narrator, and I like the premise. Toward the end of writing, another character walked up and whispered something in my protagonist’s ear. I was as surprised as him.

Doors begin to open and the world grows. I can’t wait to see what happens today.

That’s the excitement of first drafts. You just write what seems right at the time, taking the words as they come. Don’t worry about plot holes and inconsistencies. So what if your protagonist is 37 on one page and 42 on another. Fix it in post, as they say in the film biz.

That’s where I do research too. Since this is a sci-fi project, I’ll have a lot to do to create the verisimilitude I want, but for now, I intend to tell the story as it unfolds in front of me.

As with football, it’s all about forward progress and at the end of November, I’ll have a first draft to revise and craft into something good. Something beyond a “shitty first draft.”

Working title is A Fire to Be Lighted.

Wish me luck.

Now that I’ve finished (and revised and revised and revised) my novel A Short Time to Be There, I’m starting the process of putting together all the things I’ll need as I begin to query agents and publishers. Things like lists of promising agents and publishers, query letters, pitches, long synopsis, short synopsis, author bio in third person. All the fun stuff.

There’s a wealth of info to be found online including a number of blogging agents who give useful advice about how to do these things. One is Nathan Bransford, who is currently running his 3rd Sort-of-Annual Stupendously Ultimate First Paragraph Challenge. Simply post the first paragraph of any work-in-progress in the comments section of the contest post on his blog. So far, there are 1387 entries.

It’s a good exercise because it’s always good to be reminded of the importance of that first paragraph. I always tell my students not to sweat the first paragraph (on a first draft!) because you can always go back and fine-tune it. Or cut it altogether and have the piece start with the 2nd paragraph, which with student papers often works nicely.

I’ve played with A Short Time to Be There‘s first paragraph quite a bit over the past 3 years and will probably wind up fine-tuning it some more. The original 1st paragraph became the 1st paragraph of the 3rd chapter when I made some dramatic changes to the structure. Then it was cut altogether when I eliminated the 3rd chapter during a later round of revisions.

Here’s the first paragraph as it now stands, which is what I entered in Nathan’s contest. From A Short Time to Be There:

Chip clutched the armrests so hard his fingertips had gone numb twenty minutes earlier. He glanced at his knuckles, white and straining against the worn leather of the chair, and wondered if knuckles could burst. How many other condemned men had sat in this very chair while adrenaline and fear coursed through their veins like electricity? At least they hadn’t strapped him in. Yet. Perhaps they should have. He stared past the doctor and out the window at Houston’s shining towers and glass buildings that glittered bright against the May sky. His teeth ached from clenching them together, and he hoped the doctor wouldn’t notice his tightened jaw and throw a tetanus shot at him for good measure.

What do you think? Would you keep reading?

My poem “We Talk of Trains” and my photograph “Train in Round Rock” were published in the latest issue of ouroboros review. If you haven’t seen it, it’s a really classy poetry and art journal. You can read the magazine online or purchase a copy through the site’s bookstore. Whichever way you go, you’re in for a treat. I’m honored to have my work, which can be found on page 24, included with so many fine writers and artists.

Check it out. Go. Now.

Please visit Bolts of Silk. My poem “A Texas Highway in Springtime” was published there today.

Have a look around too. You’ll find lots of good stuff there.

Another one of my small stones is appearing at a handful of stones today: “Beet Stone.” Check it out.

It fits with this week’s “South Austin Chili,” though the beet was sliced for a different recipe, and the poem was written several months before the chili one.

Please visit Postal Poetry. My poetry postcard “time to leave” is appearing there today.

Have a look around too. There’s lots of great stuff over there.

Please visit a handful of stones. One of my small stones is appearing there today, which is a very cool thing, I think.

What is a small stone? Editor Fiona Robyn writes:

A small stone is a very short piece of writing that precisely captures a fully-engaged moment.

Look around while you’re there. There’s great stuff to be found.

I’ve been at this blogging business for 3 years now so I mark the day with a post linking back to my first one, which originally was, and still is, on Blogger with my original blue look and everything.

Thursday’s post on Zen and the Art of Blogging is probably a better reflection of the whole blogging experience so I won’t delve back into that today.

Mainly, I want to think about obligations and hobbies. Or how this blog tried to become a blogligation. It was the Weekend (and later Friday) Hound Bloggings, the Monday Movie Roundups, the Friday Random Tens, the Old Photo Fridays, the write ups of every book I read from the time I started this blog until I made a conscious decision to stop back in March of this year.

Each day, I had a to-do list and the only remedy seemed to be a to-don’t list. And so the hobby, which had been fun, became more of a chore. I posted because I had to, not necessarily because I wanted to.

The lesson here at three seems to be that unless you’re doing this for money, do it for fun. For me, obligations are not fun. It’s something I try to remember but sometimes forget. It’s why I think carefully about setting goals involving things I love.

I know several people who try to read x number of books per year. I could never do that. I would begin to feel I had to do what I originally wanted to do, thereby crossing the line from having hobbies to hobbies having me.

Perhaps that’s why this blog became more and more about birds over the past year. Birds are a reminder of freedom, and while their lives are full of their own have-tos and necessities, there is nothing about the act of birding that makes me feel I have to do anything. Or be anything. I suspect I enjoy birding for many of the same reasons fishermen fish. I may not see a single bird, but I never consider it a waste of time.

Birding and writing have a similar effect on me as well. When I am through for the day with either activity, I am always surprised by the time, how much of it has gone by. It is like waking from a dream, and I feel refreshed and at peace.

Back to the top, and I can see that this site was a hobby that became an obligation, but by stepping away from it for a while, and only using it to express another hobby, the obligation seems gone and now, at three, I’m back to one.