Jeffrey Jacob the jet plane

I’m really digging the new digs.  Okay, not exactly new digs, but a total rearrangement of my writing space.  Studio.  The fold top desk, the hanging herons, the hot tamales dispenser… it works.

What I’m not digging is the realization that I do actually have to have an outline to write a coherent story of any length.  Apparently I’m not one of the .000003% who can fake it.  Fortunately, that realization came with an understanding of why I need to outline.

Random.  More specifically, to not be random.  I can write all day long adding things that “could be this or that.”  Without an outline I rarely deliver on the promise (potential) and I end up with just a bunch of things loosely drawn together by a main character or two.  Sort of like a J.J. Abrams TV show.

The brilliant script I’d reached Fade Out on just days ago proved it – my first reader went through it and said, “This is not what you said it would be.  And there are huge holes in it.”  She was right.  I’d strayed and skipped.  That’s fine if your name is Alice or Pollyanna, but not if you’re trying to write the next “Usual Suspects” or “Training Day.”

So I dove into my new outlining/organizing app and started working.  It’s a lot of work, working.  I realized how much I didn’t know about my story and characters.  So I looked for a distraction and found it in a contest.  I wrote 13 pages in a different story and said, “Hey – what do you think of this?”

She said, “I think you need to finish something.”  I do.  But not just finish, finish it well.  Those 13 pages were filled with promises, a bit of humor, and a story --- though not a complete story.  Except for the main character, it was just a lot of “he could be this, she could be that” and a few random events that moved the feeling along, but not a coherent plot.

That was the epiphany.  It’s not just about competent writing with a few hooks.  It’s about telling a story.  A story that must be told.  A story you absolutely want to hear/see/read.

So I’m outlining.  I’m plotting.  I’m tracking the rising and falling conflict of my subplots.  I’m “breaking” the story which is what I should have done before I ever typed fade in.

"The enjoyment of the pleasures of the moment without concern for the future."

Inspiration?  I’ll give you inspiration.

If there can be a snowstorm that shuts down Washington, D.C. in March, then anything at all can happen.  Carpe diem.  And make it yours.

I received an email suggesting that perhaps there should be a story today, considering the weather.  Here's my entry from 5 minute fiction last week -- a bit of flash based on the prompt, "tell about a first kiss."

It was 14 years ago this week.  I wore blue jeans and my black turtleneck.  (It was 14 years ago, remember.)  I’d been up all night, worried sick about you.  There was a man down the hall who kept coming to the door with the weirdest questions.  I finally told him to bugger off.  But I still couldn’t sleep.

The sun came up.  I don’t see colors so it didn’t look special.  But it felt special.  I knew it was the day we’d be together.  If everything went okay.

And it did.  You made it.  Everything was okay.  I held you and kissed your forehead and stared down the world already coming at you and I promised that nothing would ever happen to you.

Happy birthday little girl.  I love you.

"Not six, Seven!"

I've read a few articles over the last year that all speak to the importance of knowing the ending of your story before you start to write.  I read them, nodded sagely, and moved on.  Then I read a quote from an interview this week.

“I always write the last scene first.”

The very successful author went on to say, “Then I work my way backward from how I want the audience to feel when they get there.  But I always know my ending.”

Micheal Arndt wasn’t talking about “knowing where you’re going.”  He was talking about literally writing the last scene before anything else.  I don’t read the last page of a book unit I get to it.  This is not something I’m especially comfortable with.

But when I told my wife about it, she immediately said, “Yes!  That’s brilliant.”  (Actually, she didn’t use the word brilliant, but it’s what she meant.)  (Okay, that’s only sort of what she meant.)  What my wife really said was, “Yes!  That’s exactly you’re problem.  You get going just fine, stories that I want to hear, but then you sort of wander off and just stop.”

 

This is photo-shopped.  Mr. Monk would never have 11 utensils.

I am now trying to deal with the finality of working from my last scene.  Where do I want the audience to be?  Which of my characters will get them there?  It’s harder than it sounds.  Imagine Mr. Monk getting a ‘9’ tattooed on his body.  Or better yet, a ‘9.5’