Hairballs of Genius

Still Excited


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I’m going to start out by saying that, even though it’s been over a year since I started writing Nerdgasm, I’ve never lost my excitement for it. I was talking to my pal, Becca Patterson, about it last night on a walk after our weekly write-in. (Yes, we’re still doing this, after more than two years of epicly awesome friendship!)

Normally, I bounce around a lot from one project to another. Normally, I have ten different projects going at any one time, and I spend time on all of those inside a week. Normally, I can’t concentrate on any one project for more than a day or two, often while switching back and forth between a few different ones each day anyway because a random idea for one of them pops up on me.

But with Nerdgasm, that’s hardly been the case. And yet it has been the case. There were times where I had to distract myself from the story so that I could cleanse my thoughts and clarify ideas.

At the beginning of March, I’d set the goal of having the first draft completed. But the month of March was a bit of an asshole to me, and I missed that deadline. I couldn’t concentrate on it. I’d stare at the blank page, or I’d stare at the scene, and not know where to start.

I’ve done a lot of brainstorming, and scenes that were previously completely unwritten now have goals and a reason to exist. Again. (In case you’re wondering, Becca thinks “again” is the single funniest word in the English language. I think I agree.)

Fortunately, we’re out of March now. I may have missed my goal deadline, but it won’t be long before this first draft is complete. I have a few more scenes I want to beef up. But then again, they might not need any more meat on their spindly bones than already exists. I will have this draft done. And then I’ll be begging my crit partners for critiques. Because that’s how this process works.

But here’s the thing. All this sounds annoying and frustrating and anger-inducing. It is. And none of it matters because I’m still excited about this project. Nerdgasm came to me on a whim, based off of one of Misty Carlisle’s characters. It was going to be a short story, but Judy and Max had so much more to tell. It pissed me off. But I was excited about their story.

Then came a world-change for this geeky couple. And as frustrating as it was switching out all references of the original world to references to the new world, I was still excited.

I still find occasional references when I do read-throughs of scenes before I buckle down and work on them. But I’m still excited about Nerdgasm.

And even with my publication date of Black Friday looming ever closer, and the panic that I won’t finish in time sets in, I’m still excited. It’s kept me pushing to finish this story. It’s kept me more focused on this story than any other story I’ve ever written. It’s not a super long story, but it’s long enough to tell the story it’s supposed to tell. And I’m still excited about it.

All the other projects that I keep abandoning and going back to? Am I really that excited about them? I don’t know. Even the Series that got Away doesn’t feel as exciting as it used to. But maybe that’s because it exploded and got too big, and the task of finishing/revising/editing all those stories got to be too much for me to handle, mentally.

Or it’s because it’s just a massive undertaking, and it’s going to take a while, and I lack the motivation at the moment to get going on it again. Whatever the reasoning, I’m just not that excited about it right now. Will I ever be again? I don’t know. It could be that I’m just more excited about Nerdgasm right now, and that’s what’s taking up all my focus.

I guess what I’m trying to say is… work on what you’re excited about working on. If you’re not excited about it… will your readers be excited?

All in the Name of Romance


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I know I normally have an author interview on the first and third Sunday of each month, and I promise, I won’t let you down, I’ve got an interview scheduled for tomorrow – I just couldn’t let one post over-shadow the other.

Today is a very special day. You see, seventy-two years ago, something magical happened.

On a California Naval base, by the power vested in the base chaplain, and witnessed by two close friends, my paternal grandparents were wed. Grandma wore a pale yellow skirt-suit and had a corsage of white carnations, while Grandpa wore his dress uniform.

There is little more romantic, in my mind because it’s part of my story, than my grandparents’ story. I don’t remember all of the details, but I do know that despite their differences, they made it work. For 65 years, they made it work. And they did it without raising their voices, without blow-out fights where someone came back, begging for forgiveness with an epic apology.

I have, in part, modeled the relationship my current MCs, Judy and Max, have on my grandparents because it was simple, sweet, and refreshing. It’s not to say that there weren’t stressors for my grandparents – Grandpa was in the Navy, they moved a lot the first few years, and they had four boys. Four. Yet their marriage survived for 65 amazing years.

And I never once heard them raise their voices with me and my brother – and we fought a lot, it could have easily happened – or with each other. In fact, I don’t even recall hearing them disagree on anything.

They never argued over religion, despite Grandpa being Lutheran and Grandma being Catholic. The thing is… it’s not that they never disagreed  – they did, and plenty. They talked about it like rational adults are supposed to do. They discussed their points and listened to each other.

And through it all, they were perfect for, and to, and with, each other. I miss them most this time of year – Grandma passed away on 1/7/2010, the day after my son was born, and Grandpa on 11/2/2010 – but in my children, I see traces of each of them, and in that, I have comfort. My daughter was given Grandma’s quirky little half-smile and generous personality, and my son has Grandpa’s eyebrow-lift and incredible ability to give bone-crushing, breath-stopping hugs. The hugs you never want to end, that you hold on to for just another second longer.

So here’s to the couple who always had a hug, and always wanted to hold on, for just one more second. I’m glad you’re still together, and when my time comes (hopefully not for a good long while yet), I’ll see you on the other side.

I love you, I miss you, and we’ll see each other again.

Story Journal: Clowning Around


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8/3/2015
Current Word Count: 628

This one is another one that I’m working on for the Bowman’s Inn anthologies, this one for the Winter volume. Here, we follow Luke, the rodeo clown who made an appearance in my Summer story, Perfect Ten, back to the Inn where he meets – for the second time – the blond bachelorette from the rodeo earlier the summer before. Stevie split with her fiancee after she caught him in bed with another man just days before the wedding. The pair bond over the top of Luke’s three-year-old daughter’s brunette head.