Writing (And A Little Gardening) Report September 27, 2020

3,900 words in slightly more than three hours.

That’s what I managed to achieve yesterday between 11am and 2:14 in the afternoon.

Of course, that was the actual typing part.

The creativity started before that.

Let’s take a little trip to see how this writer’s mind works.

Friday night an idea pops into my head, a little more than an image, not quite a premise.

No spoilers here, so let’s just say it’s a family situation where it makes sense if they’re all at the ice rink with skates on, or at home with none of them wearing ice skates, but it’s odd if they’re in their home and one of them is wearing ice skates.

Why would that one family member be the only one wearing ice skates in the house?

So that idea percolates in the back of my head Friday night.

Saturday morning Soon-ok and I are prepping our garden plot for the winter crops, and since spreading chicken manure isn’t the most mentally stimulating job on the planet, my mind wanders and I start thinking about the idea I had.

New ideas start presenting themselves, coalescing around the original idea like an accretion disc in space, bits and pieces clinging to one another.

Something is happening, something is forming, but I can’t quite make it out.

I try looking at it through the lens of various family dynamics and relationships, and no matter how I twist it and turn it, no matter what kind of filter I use it just doesn’t pop into focus…

…and then one particular, not-very-obvious familial relationship presents itself and suddenly that vast, swirling accretion disc composes of nothing but dust and pebbles and diffuse gases suddenly bursts into life as a brilliant star --

-- and I’m still stuck spreading manure.

So I keep the idea churning in my head as I till the manure into the soil, but when we go home I can’t rush right up to the computer because we’ve been spreading chicken manure, f’r cryin’ out loud, so I shower but then Soon-ok reminds me it’s my turn to make breakfast so I whip up some oatmeal and all the time the idea grows hotter and hotter and brighter and brighter…

I’m lousy company at breakfast.  I can tell from Soon-ok’s annoyed expression she’s seen this look on me before, and as soon as we’re finished and the dishes put away she says, “Go!  Write!” so I bolt up the stairs and start typing and the story comes rushing out in a blaze of fire and energy --

-- and three hours, fourteen minutes and 3,900 words later, it’s done.

So now I give it a week, get some feedback, polish and tweak a bit here and there, and send it out into the world.

I’ll keep you posted on its progress.

© Buzz Dixon