Showing posts with label writing (process). Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing (process). Show all posts
The Clog
On this blog’s first anniversary in February 2010, I gave a State of the Blog report
— coining it “The Slog” by contraction due to technical problems and vandalism that had rendered dealing with Blam’s Blog more of a trudge than it should be.
The post was as much about why I hadn’t been writing, and why I’d resumed, as it
was about where the blog itself was headed. A couple of Mini-Slogs came along later
in the year, even if neither really had any more to say than did the usual periodic complaints about various gremlins (now their own blog label) that have kept me from being productive here. I’d hoped to have thoughts on the blog’s present and future when its second anniversary rolled around six months ago, but life — which, as John Lennon reminded us, is what happens while you’re busy making plans — got in the way, partly in the form of my grandfather’s passing. What follows is very like what I would have said this past February except that certain deadlines are now ever closer upon me, so many posts backed up in the pipeline, making the current state of the blog less a
slog and more of, well, a clog.
Words to the Wise
My grandfather always had a dictionary on his night table. I have one on my Apple laptop. His was a so-called “pocket” book almost as thick as it was wide; mine is virtual, an application represented by the icon below in the dock of programs and folders at the right of my computer screen.
The lure of Dictionary is strong. Enter a word, and it not only returns a definition
and usage from The New Oxford American Dictionary but synonyms from The Oxford American Writer’s Thesaurus and, if you’re connected to the Internet, a Wikipedia entry (or disambiguation page) as well. It’s a ridiculously quick and comprehensive research tool — as well as a microcosm of the paragon of potential procrastination that is the Web itself, since hyperlinks abound and the results list for any given word is often fascinating. I’m pretty disciplined about not following flights of fancy too far, although I admit to indulging spontaneous bouts of “Hey, I wonder...” entirely unrelated to what I’m working on, because suddenly the answer seems gravely important and if I don’t at least type the relevant word or phrase into Dictionary’s search field to read up on later then I might forget. Other people for whom frivolous research is considered fun will be able to relate. For the rest of you, well, I can’t really explain it if you don’t already understand.
Examples:
Ebert, &c.
Although The Oprah Winfrey Show isn’t usually my bag, I taped and caught up with
its pre-Oscars episode featuring Roger Ebert last week. Ebert and his wife, Chaz Hammel-Smith Ebert, visited to discuss his long battle with cancer and longer battle with that battle’s complications — and to debut a new computerized voice specifically designed for the now-mute Ebert using nearly 30 years of television appearances as reference.
When my health made it difficult for me to get out much and my finances were fairly literally nil (a set of circumstances that I can’t entirely relegate to the past tense) I frequented Borders. Sometimes I would arrange to meet friends there, it being a good destination for browsing on my part and theirs in case I was early, late, or unable to make it. Sometimes I would stop in for a respite among errands. Sometimes I would make it a destination unto itself, to soak in the social atmosphere and seasonal music
or decorations even if I wasn’t up to actual interaction; plus, of course, I enjoyed browsing the books.
As I said, I had no money to spare; I also had trouble reading. In my post “The Slog”
I wrote about how trouble concentrating made it hard to write. I had to all but re-learn how to read, as well, and if there was one thing that defined me in life more than writer it was reader. Short and simple nonfiction as in magazines was easiest, thankfully, so that I could keep up with news and reviews — the latter often, masochistically, purely for vicarious purposes.
The Slog
I bade you all welcome to this experiment one year ago.
Which makes now a good time to reflect on the State of the Blog. The contraction
of that phrase that gives this post its title is, unfortunately, a little too appropriate.
Please understand that I’m not trying to make the blog sound like a chore. Much about it is nothing but positive to me. It’s just that the glitches with Blogger have been terribly frustrating and serve to compound the natural frustration I had anticipated due to my own limitations these days. I’ll attempt to explain why, here, if only to get it off my chest; you’re welcome to move on to something more fun.
Neil Gaiman has said, “I don’t enjoy writing. I enjoy having written.” A (cursory) search online finds the quote attributed variously to him, Dorothy Parker, and Robert Louis Stevenson. Wherever it originated, I was surprised to hear it from Gaiman — as I’d be surprised to hear it from any writer. I love writing. I love jotting down notes, I love doing research, I love mulling over the proper word, I love picking apart and reassembling sentences and paragraphs, I love seeing how the whole article, interview, or story balances out. I love the entire writing process, fiction and nonfiction alike.
Drawing? That wears me down.