As an update to my last post about my friend Tiran, his battle with AML, and the livestream he and his partner were hosting to raise money for the San Diego Blood Bank and the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society: the livestream was a huge success and I am so proud to have been a part of it. All told, the DJs who participated in the livestream raised $2600.00 to be split evenly between the two charities! Almost 1000 people tuned in – the support, both monetary and attendance, was so heartening.
I’m picking back up with the exercises from Ursula Le Guin’s book Steering the Craft. I’ve gone full circle on these: from dreading what to do when I run out of exercises to being ready to be done with them so I can move on to different posts! I will talk about writing goals before November and the whole rigamarole of Nanowrimo kicks into high gear.
Haiku Sunday – Success
“Success”
Achieving greatness
for the story envisioned,
not that expected.
Steve D
October Write Day: Non-Writing Progress
Well, autumn is officially here, and we’re into the final stretch for all goals 2020. September was a bit of a crazy month for me, mostly because of a couple work weeks with longer hours than usual. Continue reading “October Write Day: Non-Writing Progress”
We interrupt this writing post…
Normally I would be posting about October writing goals today, but September got a little hairy with unexpected events, so I have something I’ve got to talk about first…
At the beginning of September a dear friend of mine was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML). Tiran and I have been friends for over 25 years. We grew up together, went to college together and although our lives and careers took us different places all over the country, somehow we have ended up in the San Diego area together in the last couple years and it has been wonderful to reconnect.
Befitting the word “acute” in the name, the timeline of his illness went like this: I spoke with him one Sunday by phone and everything was fine – he was healthy, going to work the next day, and we had a good conversation – by the following Sunday, he called me to tell me he was in the ICU. He could barely breathe and his prognosis was dire. He was calling to say goodbye in case he was unable to have that conversation later. I was floored by how fast this leveled him and left him near death. It was another shock in a year of shocks. And we have 88 days left in 2020 for more to go wrong happen!
Haiku Sunday – Beach
“Beach”
Castles in the sand
destroyed immediately
by curious hands.
Steve D
Finding Inspiration and Running with It
Do you ever find something online that just sticks with you? It could be an article, a tweet, or just a meme. Maybe it was funny or heartwarming or even triggered a negative emotion, but something about it just wouldn’t let you go? Continue reading “Finding Inspiration and Running with It”
Exercise 8, part 2: Thin Ice
This is the last POV exercise in Steering the Craft – this time, I swear! In the previous two chapters, Ursula Le Guin cautions repeatedly against changing POV – either doing so too often, or without warning, or without a solid plan. The Chapter 8 exercises seem to be a case of her teaching you to recognize such ill-advised POV changes by making you do them on purpose. In part 1 of this exercise, she instructed us to change POV several times in a short piece, but to indicate somehow you were doing it. I chose to use line breaks and I think it worked out okay. In part 2, she has you change POV frequently and without warning.
Haiku Sunday – Weird
“Weird”
Noir and strange collage,
uncommon inspiration,
worthy of dreams.
Steve D
Haiku Wednesday – Overtime
“Overtime”
Odd hours and nights
just to keep up with myself.
Who’s paying for this?
Steve D
Exercise 8, Part 1: Changing Voices
Did I say last week “haven’t we had enough POV exercises?” – because I didn’t mean it. After going through Chapter 8, I’ve realized that Ursula Le Guin cares deeply about POV. Chapter 8 is basically an extension of Chapter 7 but deals exclusively with the idea of how to change POV characters safely and effectively within a story. My impression from Chapter 8 is that Le Guin is bearish on changing POV characters and takes a skeptical view on doing so. I felt slightly chastened reading this, since it is almost my favorite thing to do when writing fiction. Certainly in real life, you only get your own point of view, thus some of the fun of fiction is getting to experience the story from multiple narrators and POVs.
Le Guin says we can keep using the story from Exercise 7 – but I decided to come up with a new one – based on another true story. I was stuck in traffic one day when I realized the car in the lane next to me had a very unusual passenger sitting in the front seat…
Continue reading “Exercise 8, Part 1: Changing Voices”
Evening Satellite Publishing 