A New Year

Time to get serious about getting our stories written and out to our respective publishers.  I know mine would be beside herself if she knew my resolution was to get a certain number of pages done every day of 2013.  Well, that's my resolution, to get a certain number of pages done every day.  I'm just not telling how many.  Charles, I love your idea of getting into the "zone" to find the story; going into "The Idea Cave."  What a great visual.  And the thought that within that cave dwells the darkness and the light of both character and plot.  Look through the eyes of the character to see where that character takes you.  OR, find a plot idea (usually dark) and decide who you're going to put in there.  Always a question, does plot define character, or character, plot?  The book I'm writing now is totally character driven.  The one right after, totally plot driven.  Interesting how it doesn't really make a difference.  The STORY tells itself, no matter.  As a writer's teaching strategy, this opens every possibility you imagination will allow.  The scary thing about going into any cave, however, is encountering YOU.  Chris C

Flashmob Flash Mob - Ode an die Freude ( Ode to Joy ) Beethoven Symphony...

Mr. Crutcher,  I like The Idea Cave:   Cannot be clumb into, must be relaxated into. An easy breath, a drift-off into uncharted country, a determined lack of insight, waiting for the Godot of synapse sailing. Afloat in a soup of ideas that may or may not be directly related to the question ------ so she's broke, hungry, cold, on the streets of San Francisco, wishing she hadn't hitched here, wishing she wasn't so damn mad at her mom and dad, wishing she had a friend with a penthouse apartment and a craving for sushi ... what's she gonta do?  (If Mr. Crutcher can use gone with scarcely a raised eyeliner, gonta seems fair.)
I have vowed that I will not make her do something to serve my sense of plot. So I have to watch her. Feel how chilly it is when the wind off the bay caroms down the skyscraper walls and bounces off the sidewalk up the sleeves and into the neckline of her coat that is really just a heavy flannel shirt. I'm guessing she thought it would androgenize her, camouflage her attractiveness. And why hadn't she thought to pull some serious money out of her checking account, cash money, so she wouldn't be flashing a debit card like a lost kid on a field trip?
Well she can't stand on the corner of Taylor and Ellis waiting for the sun to sink under the ocean. So ... what's around here?  I know. Glide Memorial Chuch. I've sung and danced in those aisles in the seventies. But does she know? I don't think so. A smart, seventeen year-old  junior volleyball player from Yreka three hundred miles north up highway 5 ... nope, I don't see her realizing the valuable resource she's standing right beside. So? I see her start looking up and down the street for someone she thinks she can trust. Hard to tell. So she scans the buildings for stores and restaurants that might have a staff person she could relate to. Hard apples, I'm thinking, and I'm betting things may get worse.

The good thing about the Idea Cave is that though it can be dark, dank, and rank with old animal scat, it is absolutely brimming full of ideas, thoughts, memories, things we've read, things we've learned, things people have told us, pictures, movies, tee shirt sayings, flotsam and jetsam from our entire life just waiting for a good open question to play around with.
Face it, our relaxed brain is a goofball chock full of connections and associations it's never thought of before. Hoo baby. Ask it to look at a situation, take a comfortable breath, lean back, drop your agenda like a hot marmot, and enjoy the ride.   Or so I'm thinking.     Yourn,   Mr. PriceWeakly

Delighting in Writing

Welcome to what should probably be known as the Geezer Blog.  Charlie Price and I are here to demystify that most elusive of animals, The Writing Process.  We're going to take you down the dark, overgrown path into the cave Where We Get Our Ideas.  These are questions we're asked all the time, and that we ask ourselves all the time.  Creative writing is a hard subject to teach; creative anything is hard to teach because so much about creativity is instinctive.  But we gone give it a try.  Chris C

Greetings Earthpeople,  Do not be unduly alarmed. Mr. Crutcher and I seem to have entered a beautiful blue Gibsonian Universe. My thoughts are being translated into this idiosyncratic language. Blink lasers if my transmission is breaking up and you do not grok.
  - C CrutcherPrice Waterhouse