Updated: Aug 17, 2023
Words to a story are like bricks to a house.
When you add words together, you create a story.
When you add people to a house, it becomes a home.
Updated: Aug 17, 2023
Ok, so today I got stuck... Yes, yes, I know. I've just made this website and started blogging about how to get 'unstuck' - you'd think I would know what to do?! Trouble is, I'm not very good at listening to myself. I've told you what I know, what I've learnt and how it's helped me on my writing journey so far (and hopefully it will help you), but in doing so I've distracted myself - of course! It was inevitable, wasn't it? Like a vicious circle of fate - you write about it, you think about it and... boom! Thoughts spiral away - and in my case boomerang right back to knock me sharp on the forehead. Now I've got a concussion myriad of pictures to deal with in my 'filing cabinet' brain. It's all neatly labelled in there, thank goodness. I can find most things by association, like a sort of human Google machine. So if you say 'garden centre' for example, I instantly see Margeret Meryll Roses, purple Hebes and a Bishop of LLandaff (he's a Dahlia ye'know). See? Weird, isn't it? But that's how my mind works - jumping about like a flea from one thought, idea, song lyric to the next. It's exhausting. I do get respite from the noise in my head at night so I can sleep - and indeed fall asleep quite quickly. Until the nightmares gallop in with their size 9 hobnail hoof-boots and I'm bolt upright and desperately needing to write stuff down.
At Uni, being up at 3am meant I was barfing Ruth and Sheila after a night out, or raiding the fridge for munchies. In the middle ages (ahem) I got up in the night for the children when they were babies and always managed to crash straight back to sleep again - somehow zombie like and often with no recollection of having got up at all (bit like the Uni nights). So how is it now, in middle age plus one (ahem, ahem) I've developed a built in alarm clock that digs like The Ace of Spades in my ears at the most ungodly hours and leaves me with a non-alcoholic hangover? Bewildered yet? There you go, you see - that's exactly how D-D-DISTRACTION happens. In a big, bold sneeze of capital letters; just - like - that. It's not all bad though - honest! If I manage to catch some of those pesky Ds sometimes I can actually read my own midnight handwriting the next day. If I hold the paper up to the light and squint.
So if your nightmares gallop, trot or canter into your dreams and they bother you, try to harness them and put them to work ploughing a sentence or two. You might even have enough for a story. Which might distract you from whatever it was you were supposed to be doing.
Now, where was I when that ramble began? Ah yes, about to begin...
Updated: Apr 17, 2021
9. Stories start with chapter one, right? Wrong!
5. What?? I hear you shout from the back. And you may well.
7, 8. Front, back, side, in out and shake it all about.
6. When the shadow from your pen hovers over an empty line - look around you.
14. Inspiration is everywhere. From the moment you wake up, look around you.
2. While you're making breakfast and pouring out coffee, look around you.
11. Whizzing to and from work on the train, look out the window
Use your senses. Ask yourself some questions:
What can you hear?
What can you see?
What can you smell?
What can you feel?
What can you taste?
Write it down. Make a list.
Ok, it's not a story yet... but it's a start. Just not the beginning!
But be warned! Those first ideas strike when you least expect them.
In the middle of the night, when you have no where to write them.
On the bus, just as you reach your stop.
As you open a secret Santa
Sat on the toilet - plenty of paper, but of no use of course!
Remember them, keep them safe for a rainy day when you have time to digest those early ramblings. Then choose one, close your eyes and imagine your dog running off with the toilet roll (a la Andrex) and watch those mental jottings unravel your mind.
Grab one quick though before those perforated sheets dishintergrate - or it won't be the only thing that's stuck.
So... where is the beginning, if it's not chapter one?
Prologue, index, title inscription... it could be anything you like.
Anywhere, any place, anytime (does that remind you of anything?)
Where does your story start? Right here! Right Now!
