Wow. It's been busy today.
First of all, I should alert the masses that Small Spiral Notebook is looking for some quality submissions of fiction, poetry and the like. Their reading period begins August 1, so hop to it.
Also, am I totally late in the game to notice the Radio feature on iTunes? Even though I have about 800 songs in my queue, I'm starting to get sick of them. So I clicked on the radio and I've heard, "Footloose," "Crazy" (The Britney Spears one) and "Big Time." I'm totally psyched. I know I'm a day late and a dollar short on this one, but whatever. Whoo ha.
It was too hot to run today and so I stayed in and worked on my screenplay project. Initially I didn't think I'd get all that much done since I wasn't feeling all that inspired. But after some deli coffee and a quick Pauline Dance Party to the soundtrack to A Chorus Line, I actually tore through a big chunk. As in, I added about ten pages, which is huge.
I left for work with a strange feeling of elation, as if this project had just moved from second to third gear. Before I felt as if I was just wood chopping, pushing out large chunks of plot and the most rudimentary forms of characters. Now I go through and fill in all the little cracks, making it read more like a story and less like little scenes that popped into my head at two in the morning. Granted the meat of this story was never mine to begin with, which was another source of slight anxiety. How do I, the little hack, do justice to a family's story that's already so rich with detail and drama on its own? True, some things had to be fictionalized just for the sake of dramatic pull. But all in all, I had to stick to the facts ma'am, which is a challenge unto itself.
For whatever reason, though, it seems to be coming together. Maybe it's the intravenous caffeine, maybe it's divine intervention or maybe I actually want to see this thing succeed. Not for my own ego, mind you. There have been many times when I've turned on my laptop and just stared at the words, waiting for the next ones to come, and they never did. And then, maybe about once every two weeks, the needed element has just come to me, sometimes while running, sometimes while staring off into space. Even better is when my partner in crime thinks what I've come up with is a great.
So. Yeah. I feel good about the writing. Our goal of getting this done by the end of August seems completely feasible. Then we'll have to deal with a whole other set of issues. For now, though, I'll settle for ten more pages, or another afternoon like today.
Okay. That was long.
"Love in an Elevator" just came on the iTunes radio. This thing is awesome!
