Total Words = 10,180

Title:  Listening for the Sound

July 16, 2001 - 1100 words

Still feeling under the weather today.  I think it's my arthritis acting up.  I did manage to break the 10K mark tonight.  The story is starting to move into an interesting direction that I look forward to exploring.  Some cool news tonight -- First, congratulations to Ron Collins, whose novelette won the Compuserve HOmer award!  Second, my story, The Spirit House (currently appearing in the anthology, Outside the Box) got a really good review in Tangent!  Haven't seen one of those in a long while.  Needless to say, it really made my day.

July 15, 2001 - 1020 words

Not feeling very well tonight.  Glad I managed at least 1K though.  I think I just need to go to bed early and get some decent sleep.  Still gotta finish shopping for my dad's birthday present.  He turns 72 on Wednesday, 7/18.  Ugh....I'm exhausted.  Gonna knock off early.  I'm almost at 10k.  Pathetic word count at this point, I know.  In the old days, I'd have had at least 2-3k a day.  Ah well, at least I'm persistent.  I may not succeed, but dammit, I'm persistent.  :)  Good night.

July 14, 2001 - 1020 words

The legend that is a central plot thread through this book took shape tonight.  Had to do some research on lighthouses tonight.  I needed to pinpoint the right locations and setup the players a bit, so that Cassidy will know where she's going from here.  I have a good idea, but I'm too tired to pursue it tonight.  Tomorrow will just have to do.

July 13, 2001 - 1125 words

A modest output tonight, but I left the section at a bit of a challenge point.  [Hit 7k though.  I'll feel more comfortable with this book when I'm over the 20K mark.]  It's a very intriguing point though, even if I'm not quite sure where it will go from there.  I just setup an important piece of the story that will manifest itself at the story's conclusion.  Between Isabel, my character from 1910 and Anna, my Native American character, I will soon setup a legend and a ghost story.  These plot threads will lead Cassidy to try and solve a mystery at a lighthouse, but in order to solve the mystery she has to confront the trauma of her friend's death and her near drowning.  I don't quite know yet how all of these things will fit together (or if they will), but that's where my brain's playing, so I'll keep stacking the chips on the table and see what happens.

July 12, 2001 - 1375 words

Doing much better tonight, too.  Had a sluggish start, but the story drew me in and carried itself to where it needed to be.  And I didn't get in its way or anything. :)  Cassidy has made friends with the Innkeeper and she's just found a job -- at the Espresso and Bead Shop run by a Native American woman.  Things are going well.  I have no bloody clue where this falls in my "outline."  I'm just letting go of the reins and seeing where it takes me.  I know the story.  It's been in my head for a very long time, but I just didn't know that until now.  This whole thing just feels good somehow.  The act of writing what I feel, what I see, what resonates in me -- no categories, no constraints, no boundaries, just the words, the undiluted, untempered words of my imagination is so incredibly freeing.  My internal critic tried to squash this dare right out of the box, but I turned off that boring radio program.  Hell, I laughed at it.  I'm writing what I want, how I want.  I feel this enormous sense of freedom.  All from throwing away one simple word:  Category.  I'm free!  And from the simple act of tossing the Marketing Hat back onto the hat rack.  From now on, I'm only going to wear my writer's hat at this keyboard.  This is my writing resolution for the year.  Yeah!!  Oh, man -- I Feel Like A Writer (sung to the tune of Shania Twain's "I Feel Like A Woman")  Okay...enough already -- g'night!

July 11, 2001 - 1035 words

A little better night at the keyboard.  No blue screens, no spilled Diet Cokes.  Everything went smoothly, but I'd have liked to have written more than this.  Hopefully, I will get more done this weekend.   And I think I hit my stride with the story tonight!  I'm terribly excited about that.  And a little surprised that it's taken me 4500 words to get warmed up.  I figured I'd be struggling about now.  :) 
An odd element cropped up in the story that wasn't ANYWHERE in my outline.  Something I hadn't even thought of really.  A Bed and Breakfast from circa 1910 has slipped into my story.  But it will tie in very well with a legend about the area (that I made up).  This little plot thread has grown out of some research I did on a 19th century hurricane and a stay in Port Townsend last year.  I never could make use of these little fascinating facts that have poked at me for a long time.  Heh, heh -- more proof that no research is ever wasted.  I can't wait to get into the ghost story portion of this book and another bizarre idea I had about letters from the dead.  The hardest part of this story was getting Cassidy to the Pacific Northwest.  Now, I can just let it all loose and see where it goes.  Woohoo!  Can't wait to see what happens tomorrow night.  G'night!

July 10, 2001 - 750 words

Okay, this is becoming laughable!!  Just lost every single word I wrote tonight.  Damned software fragged itself and page faulted my computer.   GGGGGRRRRRRRR  To quote Charlie Brown, "AAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!"  Anyway, I retraced my steps and I'm now back where I started from.  Talk about bad karma--sheesh!  This is becoming the 500-words a day Dare.  Oh well, at least I'm writing.  And I will finish this book, come hell, highwater, and blue screens.  Tonight, Cassidy saw Elliot Bay and flashed back to her friend's drowning.  She almost drowned that day too and it's left her terrified of water, but she discovers that the handful of seaglass that belonged to her friend has an odd luminescence/calming quality about it.  Just can't take the fantasy out of this writer, I guess. :) .

July 9, 2001 - 525 words

Yeah, I'm sucking at this, but I don't care.  I may not finish this book in 30 days, but I will finish it.  Tonight, I got Cassidy off to the Pacific Northwest.  Hopefully, things will be a little quieter here this week, enough to let me get a decent word count.  We'll see.  For now, the plot is moving forward as a struggle for a foothold in this book.

July 8, 2001 - !@&$*#%(^&&

It just amazes me the obstacles that the writing gods have thrown at me this week.  gggggrrrrrr.  We had an incredible storm here yesterday.  So incredible that it knocked out the power until 11 pm last night.  Sigh.  Needless to say, in my sweltering, dark, overcrowded house (we had guests all this week), not a single word got written yesterday.

July 7, 2001 - 1000 words

11:30 pm - 500 words

A rather unimpressive start here.  I did manage 1K total today though.  This book is intensely personal, so at times, it's hard to touch some of the nerves that are bared in these early scenes.  I think I'll be okay once I get Cassidy in the car and off to the islands, but the inciting incident is one that I currently dealing with, so...it's tough.  I thought that the best way I could make sense of the losses I had this year was to write about them.  It's taken me five months to even consider writing about them, so diving into the deep end is tough right now.  I'll keep writing about it though.

1:30 pm - 500 words

Stole an hour to write a little more.  I should be able to get some more words in tonight, some more substantial progress, I hope.  I really need to make up a few words from yesterday.  Myia is much improved today, so hopefully there won't be anymore crises.

July 6, 2001 - 0 words

Yep, that's not a misprint.  No words at all tonight, but that's okay.  My brother Jeff really needed me tonight.  His dog was in severe pulmonary distress this afternoon (from congestive heart failure) and had to be rushed to the animal hospital.  Much chaos ensued, prescription problems at every turn.  About 10 pm tonight, my sister-in-law and I managed to get the right medications.  Myia is resting comfortably now and is just now starting to breathe a little easier.  I don't know how many days/ weeks/months/years she has left, but for the moment, she's doing better.  I knew this wasn't the best week to start this book, but at least I got it started.  If there are no traumas tomorrow, I should be able to fit in some writing time.  That's after I take my niece and nephew to see Cats and Dogs .  It's a crazy world out there, but without family, it'd be a lot scarier.  The writing challenge continues, but I won't let this derail me.  I *will* finish this book.

July 5, 2001 - 1250 words

Wow, I'm really rusty at this...told myself the story on paper then outlined the story.  After that, I got the opening scene going and it's starting off with a bang!  Cassidy, my main character, is already thrust into her inciting incident and she's struggling to survive it.  This incident is what sets her into motion on a new path.  I'm trying something a little different with this book.  First, I'm going to try marketing it in a different genre.  Why?  No reason really.  Just think the story may appeal to a larger audience and -- big surprise -- as an experiment.  Another experiment I'm conducting is to structure the book in six movements.  The book is a ghost story with magic and native american themes set -- ooh, another big surprise -- in the San Juan Islands.  The story's high concept is: 

Struggling to deal with the trauma of a friend's drowning and the lost dreams of her twenties, Cassidy runs away from her life.  She packs everything into her Subaru and heads for the quiet magic of the Pacific Northwest.  Guided by her insightful Native American employer (who runs a bead shop and espresso bar), a quirky New Age apartment manager, and a whalewatch charter captain, Cassidy confronts the past, rediscovers the present, and embraces the future.

I'm halfway through the inciting incident.  Cassidy has just survived the accident that killed her friend.  Now, the aftermath.  It's late though and I think this is all I'm going to get done tonight.  We've had company since I came home from Seattle, so stealing any writing time has been difficult.  I don't expect to get a lot done over the next five days, but hopefully after Monday, things will return to some semblance of normalacy.  Then I'll be able to devote my full attention to this story.