Inkshell’s Neighborhood

more snow? more fecking snow?

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Some days I have ideas ready and waiting in my head for this journal. Other days I keep finding reasons not to sit down and write. Today is one of the latter days. First my copy of Writer's Café has gone wonky, rendering its font size down to microscopic levels, and eating the last page I wrote in my journal there. I have dark laundry which needs to get done. Sunday I was writing about The Procrastinator, another of Jack Heffron's Enemies of Creativity. I thought it might make a good Associated Content article, but that subject is heavily covered and my bit doesn't bring a new angle or anything fresh to the topic.

The Procrastinator is another of Jack Heffron's "Enemies of Creativity". The Procrastinator comes up with all kinds of reasons why you shouldn't be writing. If you've never sat down to tackle a writing project, or even to start a regular writing regimen, you'll be amazed, absolutely astounded, at the volume of things that pop up that require your attention once you do. Even if you have no children and no unfinished work-related projects, the moment you decide to sit down and write, something, probably several somethings, will arise to draw you away. Here are a few of mine, just off the top of my head:

Tasks

• You'd better do the laundry if you want clean socks.
• What is the cat yowling about now?
• You should really be working on your data entry work. You're behind, you know.
• Just how long has it been since this room was vacuumed?

And on and on. Some of these are valid. Yes, the laundry needs done and so does the data entry work. I put them on a list and when I'm finished writing, I'll go and do them. The cat, as my Procrastinator and I both know, is insane, and prone to yowling for no readily apparent reason, so that's invalid. Annoying, but invalid. And the vacuuming can be scheduled for another day. If it's gone this long, it can go a bit longer.

Occasionally something that really is important comes up, in which case you'll probably have to set your writing aside. If your children are actively involved in setting your kitchen on fire, you probably ought to go check on that right now. But think about it, next time your Procrastinator comes up with a list of things you ought to be doing aside from writing. Write them down and think them over. How many can be deferred until later? Is it really necessary to get up from the keyboard and holler at the cat to shut up? She doesn't understand English anyway, and no one knows why she's yowling. Probably not even her.

The Procrastinator's goal is to keep you from writing. Whenever you postpone your writing, or, worse, get up during a writing session to do a task it suggests, you're handing it a victory. Your writing doesn't get done. Maybe your whole house is now sparkling clean, but that article you're supposed to be writing is no closer to completion.

Today I'm struggling with The Procrastinator. Aside from having gotten a bit of a late start (though not as late as yesterday), I've got that scatter field on my brain this morning. I need to do a stack of things, including phone calls, laundry (it never ends!) and creative projects such as working on an adventure for the Cat RPG and a scene and its associated plot on an online roleplaying game. I have no children, but these guys are like little kids, hanging onto my sleeves and tugging and whinging about how they need attention. And, as I'm sure any parent can attest to, this is not an environment conducive to getting work done.

It can be hard to relegate these guys to the background so I can get to writing. Unfortunately, when I feel the most creative, the scatter field seems to be at its highest setting. I almost ditched writing in here when I looked at one of Heffron's prompts which suggests making a map of the neighborhood you grew up in and plotting out places where important or memorable or interesting things happened. My inner artist wants to get busy with the sketching or paints or something today, I can feel it. That's wonderful, but right now I need to be writing. This afternoon I will need to be editing. Oh, editing, my nemesis. But that's a subject for another time.

*Special Note: Thanks to doomflower for inspiring me to grab up my Wacom graphics tablet and sketch out some doodly artwork for this and a successive blog post. It was too much of a pain to work with Windows and the scanner, and it turns out I can just draw with my tablet! Fantastico!

I found it on a card (blank inside).  Can't bear to actually send it to anyone, because then I won't have it any more.

Threeshipscard

1 comment

TILES!

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my tile guy has been hard at work...glad I got the kitchen cleared for his equipment.

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I'm up very  late today.  I slogged through my Morning Pages, doing half before breakfast and half after breakfast.  By the time I got to the end I was hauling out bits of memories from my childhood, little scraps of things I want to talk about in more depth later.  And I was cheered up immensely.  I don't know if it was the food in my belly or the tea and cookies, but the last three-quarters of a page in my Morning Pages book today is a lot more cheerful than the previous pages.  

Knowing my morning was kinda shot, I opened up Liferea and poked around in my blog feeds.  I love Gabi Campanario's art.  He's one of my inspirations and influences when I manage to get around to sketching, which I should do more often.  He did a sketch at a soccer game and I think it's a fantastic piece, even if it's only his travel sketchbook he uses to practise. His blog is here.

I also listened to the Writer's Almanac, which I don't do nearly enough.  It looks like I listened to January 3rd's episode, featuring a poem that is full of wonderful imagery and beautiful word use, "Cold Watercolor" by Wyatt Prunty.  I often sit still and close my eyes when I listen to poetry being read or classical music being performed live.  It allows my mind to better form images associated with what I'm hearing, to let the flow of words or music better dance across my brain and pick out whatever emotions, colours, or ideas they like.