Some Thoughts on Writing

 

by Pa Rock

Fool with a Keyboard

A lady at last night's rehearsal for "The Shine from Dead Man's Bottom," a play which I wrote and which has its world premier tonight at the Paramount Theatre in Goldsboro, North Carolina, asked me about other things that I have written.  She had seen "Crimes in Desolation" which was performed by the same acting troupe here in Goldsboro at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base two years ago.  I told her that I had written a few other plays (three, actually) and one of those, a truck stop comedy, "Love Among the Armadillos," was performed twice, once by a community little theatre in Missouri and another time by the drama department of a community college, also in Missouri.

While I may have felt like the Neil Simon of southern Missouri for a brief time, it just never came to pass.  Real life always seemed to demand too much of my time.  (I do have one more play in the works - a sequel to "Crimes in Desolation," but the sand in my personal hourglass seems to be racing through faster and faster, so who knows what will eventually get finished.)

I did mention this blog to the lady that I was chatting with last night, but I warned her that I often wrote about politics and I am an unapologetic leftie.  (Never scoff at someone who is a blogger until you have sat down and tried to come up with original and interesting material six thousand mornings in a row!)

I also told her that I have been working on a novel, something I have never attempted before and an endeavor which is proving far more interesting that anything I ever envisioned.   I read something by Stephen King (a real novelist) once where he said that he often does not know where a novel is headed as he is writing it, and that his characters eventually lead him to the conclusion - and that is exactly the experience that I have been dealing with in my big typing effort.  I began with a general idea of the story I wanted to tell and where I envisioned it ultimately going, and I had several characters developed to begin telling the tale.  The more I wrote, the easier it seemed to be getting - almost to the point that it felt like "automatic" writing - but then - a hundred or so pages into the effort, I suddenly realized that the characters had hijacked my tale and were making it their own - taking the story in a direction that I never intended.

Now I am straddling two tales, trying to decide whether to reclaim my original thread, or go with the one that the characters want to tell, or weave something together from the two very distinct strands.  If I do manage to beat the clock and complete the effort, I'm not expecting any publisher to show up at my door demanding to publish the quirky tale (It's a "mystery" of sorts.), nor will I massage my ego by "self-publishing" with a vanity press, but I might release it in installments in this blog.  In fact, I am really liking that idea.

And, in my spare time, I am also working on three family history books, most of the material for which has already been published in this blog.

I'm Pa Rock.  I eat, sleep, mow, and type - and damned little else!