What am I thinking about?
Absolutely nothing, I say to myself. There is nothing whatsoever that is running through my mind. I have no consciousness, no mindfulness, no subject matter, nor any specific emotion. My mind is a complete mass of unmovable, incomprehensible, nothingness. So, what now? Looking around, I see cars and trucks, buildings being built, older buildings being torn down. I can hear the sound of large machines thumping the ground as it packs it down in preparation for the laying of foundations. I can smell old diesel engines working hard while the warm, still air just sits around me and surrounds the city. The sky is clear, if you consider a slight haze to be clear. The wind is non-existent. In other words, it is business as usual. Yet, I sit here on this black vinyl-coasted park bench and table, laptop ready to take in whatever my imagination feeds it, and I ponder the existence of nothing. Nothing is the absence of anything, yet isn’t ‘nothing’ a ‘thing’ in of itself? If that’s the case, then there can be no ‘nothing’ since there is always something in the absence of anything. Let’s try this again: the absence of anything means that there isn’t anything to hang your hat on, to breathe, to eat, to see, smell, taste, or feel. There is literally nothing at all. But in order for humans to conceive of such a thing, it is called something; it is called ‘nothing’. But the term itself is a thing, and the concept of ‘nothing’ is a thing, therefore shouldn’t ‘nothing’ be a thing, and therefore not a true absence of anything? Take three: In ‘nothing’, there is no ‘thing’ there, literally. So, by definition, it cannot be a ‘thing’. The pure existence of nothing is not-existing. It doesn’t and cannot exist. It is a purely hypothetical concept because, as far as current science recognizes, everything has something, even at the smallest microscopic or even quantum level. So, nothing is an idea and not an actual ‘thing’, therefore ‘nothing’ doesn’t exist. I sit and read the previous passage and wonder the ultimate question: Why? As in, ‘Why did I write that?’ I am not a scientist, nor a physicist. I’m not an expert, nor student, of any particular science. The idea just popped into my head because, to be perfectly honest, I’m bored but yearn to write something. I can’t have a blank screen looking back at me because, as an amateur writer, I have to write whenever given the opportunity. There is a myriad of subjects that I can write on, but they just haven’t made themselves present to my current state of mind and, therefore, they are ‘nothing’ to me, thus the current topic. If I have nothing, then I have nothing to write, therefore I wrote about nothing. If the reader can wrap their minds on that, I pity them for these are the ramblings of a bored mind. A few minutes have passed by and there’s nothing new to report. I remain seated at the same place, watching the same buildings, experiencing the same weather patterns and sounds. Nothing has changed, other than the length and quantity of words on this piece of random subject matter. I do wonder, however, in the absence of ‘nothing’, does that mean that ‘something’ has to exist? There would be a ‘thing’ under either situation so wouldn’t ‘something’ also include ‘nothing’? Therefore, if “‘something’ wicked this way comes,” that could also mean nothing is coming, right? Nothing’s changed, I’m still bored and, if I’m right about this diagnosis, I’m probably a little nuts, too. But at least that’s something, right?
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Writing is a tedious process. It requires concentration, attention to detail, and an understanding of how words communicate with readers.
Writing is also a joy. It allows the mind to create, piece together thoughts and ideas into a semi-permanent form and share them with others. Writing takes effort. It is not a passive activity. It is something that requires the full attention of the writer, especially if the writer intends to be effective in what they are writing about. Writing fulfills. A successful writing period can give the author a sense of elation, a feeling of success. Creating something that others can enjoy is a gift. When writing works, it benefits both the writer and reader. My NaNoWriMo writing experience this past year was more tedious and draining than joyful and fulfilling. The novel I eventually came up with went through the usual stages of any long-form writing: enthusiastic start, self-doubt in the middle, and a mad rush to finish at the end. How professional writers feel after writing a long-form manuscript is something I’ve yet to know. I’m far from being a professional writer. However, I believe that self-doubt is something that lives within every writer as we question our plot points, our overall story line, our character development, and even our grammar choices. I sometimes wonder whether any author genuinely feels that they are ever really finished with a given manuscript. That said, I’m surprised with what I came out with. In previous years, I wrote without a clear idea in mind. At best, I would have an image in my head and then start writing from there. This lead to the very questionable choice of writing about oversized hairy rodents that can talk and wear robes. This year, I deliberately sketched out a very broad outline with a featured character pulled from one of my many unpublished short stories. With Max as the focus, I planned to intertwine several characters and plot points drafted from other unpublished and unfinished short stories I’ve written over the past few years. In a way, this was my attempt to finish all of those stories in one fell swoop. As I concocted this idea, I thought a bit about One Thousand and One Arabian Nights and the premise of Scheherazade delaying her death by telling stories, but not finishing them, every night. I don’t have that many stories, let alone ideas to work from, but I took that framework premise and outlined a scenario where the central character, Max, would be the focal point and also the cause for other characters’ consternation. I just wasn’t sure how to work in the telling of different stories yet, Sounds fascinating, right? The idea lasted for about one-third of the novel as I ran out of ideas on what to do. So, like any novice writer, I panicked, shifted gears, and used a different character from my unfinished pile of stories as the foil to Max’s plans. In this case, both Max and Crispian were both characters of dubious motives, but for one to succeed, the other had to fail. I have to admit that this summary sounds a hell of a lot more interesting than what I eventually wrote. The last piece was who was going to be my Scheherazade, and who would they be telling the stories to before we transitioned over to Crispian’s story? I created a new character, Beverly, who would be integral to determining Max’s or Crispian’s success. For fun, I made Beverly a novice writer who was in the middle of writing a novel. The magic of it all was that, in Max’s world, some writers can create real versions once they finish a manuscript. Beverly was one of the special people who had this ability, even though she wasn’t aware of it. If she finished, Crispian would win. If she failed, then Max would win. So, I decided that it was Max who would be telling as many stories as possible to delay Beverly’s completion of her written work. The consequence of Max losing would be something more ominous than just losing a job. Max became my Scheherazade. This is sounding like a really interesting story. Wish I wrote it. There were four additional characters I threw into this stew of stories and plots. Again, pulled from more of my half-finished character sketches. I did this mostly to add to the word count but also to show that mystical powers were involved in this world and that magic, in its many forms, exists whether we know it or not. These four characters comprised of two nineteenth century British detectives and two magicians from a fantasy world called Agarathea. I had both pairs enter Max world via a dimensional portal. Part of my problem with fleshing out the detective characters was that while I read and enjoyed detective stories, I really have no clue about how they think or act. In order to hide my weakness in this area, I limited their contribution to character interaction and engagement, dialog, new perspectives, and, did I mention, additional word count. In the end, Crispian loses because Max was successful in using these four characters to delay Beverly’s completion of her manuscript and, thus, thwarting Crispian’s plan to murder a massive number of people. Huzzah! The lesser of two evils wins. The result is a short novel, just a hair above the fifty-thousand word count, and a ‘win’ by NaNoWriMo standards. What happens next is another debacle: I’m terrible at editing and I wonder if this complicated story is worth putting in the effort to polish. The writing process itself was difficult: I definitely felt the strain of coming up with enough plot and character development to reach the end. Even now, six weeks after completion, I’m hesitant to crack open the file and read what I spewed forth onto my poor laptop’s screen. I did come up with the thought that perhaps I could pay a college student to do the painful editing work. You have to admit that it is an interesting idea. I have to ponder the pros and cons of that, though, and that will require a little more time. The thought did occur to me that this is could be an ingenious method of procrastination. This from the same mind that wrote this mess in the first place. The sum of it all is that I think I need more time before I rush in to the editing portion. In the meantime, I’m writing this little bit. Maybe this is my writing process: the way in which I develop and organize my thoughts before diving in fully? I sincerely hope that’s the case. Only time will tell. Happy New Year, everyone. |
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