Musings & Thoughts for Tuesday, July 11, 2023, or: Summer Daze, Irony, and a Writer’s Concerns

Late Morning, Tuesday, July 11, 2023, Lithia, Florida

Greetings and salutations! It’s a warm summer day here in the Tampa Bay area; the current temperature is 82°F/28°C under sunny skies (the feels-like temperature is a bit warmer: 85°F/29°C). According to the forecast, it’s going to be a typical “mean season” day here. It’s going to be hot (no surprise), humid, and with a mix of sun and rain. The expected high for this second day of the workweek will be 90°F/31°C – it won’t be too much higher than that because of the cloud cover and rain we’re going to see around Hillsborough County.

I slept better last night; I have no idea what time I fell asleep, but at least I did not wake up at 2 AM or even 4 AM. I managed to rest until at least 6:25 AM, which for me is like “sleeping in.” And that’s fine; I stopped waking up after 7 AM regularly so long ago – probably when I started high school in 1980 – that if I ever sleep till 8 or 9 AM anywhere in the world, I’ll die of shock.

It’s Ironic

The irony of ironies.

When I decided long ago that I wanted to be a storyteller, I always imagined that I’d author action-adventure stories or military thrillers in the same vein as Tom Clancy, Larry Bond, and H.W. Coyle.  I never thought that my first novella would be the first installment in a duology in the coming-of-age/romance genre.

And yet…that’s what I ended up doing.

“Who woulda thunk it?”

Action This Day

My plan for today, obviously, is to work for several hours on Reunion: Coda (I’ve fiddled with Reunion: A Story enough. If there are any tiny formatting errors left, I’ll address them when I put out the planned omnibus hardcover I want to make at some point.), maybe get Scene Two, Chapter 10 going.

I have no idea why that scene is so problematic to write.

(Editor: Maybe because you don’t “do” outlines? Just a thought.)

I guess that spending so much time – an entire week – on fixing mistakes in Reunion took me out of the “world” I am creating for Reunion: Coda, but I believe that it was the right move to do. I am a firm believer that if you’re writing something – a book, a screenplay, or a “guest post” on a blog – and expect to get paid for it, you better make sure you’re giving it your best effort. I buy books, too, and there’s nothing more disappointing to me than buying one that is so riddled with errors that I feel the urge to copy-edit the entire thing.

As I write this, I’m still in an “OK, how the heck do I resolve Plot Problem X in a way that is entertaining, reasonably realistic, and emotionally satisfying?” mindset. And to get out of that mindset, I need to somehow transport myself back to that imaginary version of the world where Jim, Marty, Maddie, and Mark live. And for that to happen, I need to at least try to relax a bit.

So…I think that as soon as I post this on WordPress, I’ll go ahead and take a break, rest for a while, and then come back to my desk to work for a while.

Wish me luck!