Tag Archives: writing

November 1, 2015 · 9:24 pm

NaNoWriMo Word Count: Zero

Hello and Happy NaNoWriMo!

Last year was the first time I attempted this great feat. I achieved a whopping 17,000 words. I was pretty disappointed in myself, to be honest. I really thought I could do this. I had a good idea for a book, and I was excited about it. So where did I falter? You know what? I don’t even remember. I just know I didn’t get it done. I finished the book much, much later.

So I’ve had some qualms about signing up this year. Do I really want to make this commitment and then let myself down? Haven’t I been just so completely busy already without piling another 50k words on top? But then again, I have another great idea for a book. Shouldn’t I just do it? But on the other hand, it’s already getting late in the evening and I haven’t had a chance to write a single word. That big zero at the top of the NaNoWriMo page is not just taunting me, but making outright fun of me.

Hulu has the old Bob Ross shows now. (Don’t worry, this is going somewhere.) I used to absolutely ADORE this show. I watched it all the time as a little kid. It turns out that Bob is just as hypnotic as he was back then. His soft, even voice makes it seem like even I could pick up a brush and a gigantic paint palette and create a beautiful scene of trees on the water. It’s just a bunch of simple little paint techniques that don’t seem like much of anything when you look at them individually, but when you stand back and put them together they make something beautiful.

Hmmm. That sounds like something familiar.

And Bob starts with a certain type of canvas, but he tells me I can use any kind of canvas I want. And I don’t have to paint the happy little trees right where he puts them; that’s completely up to me. And sometimes, he says we’re going to get a little crazy and put a few extra plants over here in the corner, and just see how they look. It’s all just whatever I want; no big deal.

Okay, Bob. I get it. I can paint my own beautiful scene with my words. They might not seem like much by themselves. I have to stand back and look at them all together. And it’s okay if I don’t have all of my decisions made ahead of time. I can throw in an extra scene here or there and just see where it takes me. No pressure. It’s all just whatever I want; no big deal.

Time to start writing!

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Filed under On Writing

Tagged as bob ross, inspiration, nanowrimo, word count, writing

July 17, 2015 · 4:38 pm

Home, a new short story by Ashley O’Melia

I’m very pleased to announce that my short story “Home” is featured on The Penmen Review today. Please go take a peek and let me know what you think!

http://penmenreview.com/ashleyomelia/

This story was inspired by very true events. I have to think my dear sweet Porkchop, without whom this story and this opportunity would not have been possible.

Summer Writing…or Lack Thereof

Hello. My name is Ashley O’Melia, and it has been at least three weeks since my last writing session. You know why? Summer break. Oh, it isn’t a break for me, not by a long shot. No, summer break means my kids are home all the time to ask for snacks, fight with each other, and basically keep me thoroughly distracted.

Don’t get me wrong. I love my kids and I love spending time with them. Cereal in the living room while we have a My Little Pony marathon on a Wednesday morning? Well, who could resist that? Spontaneously deciding to bake chocolate chip cookies on a Thursday afternoon? Heck yeah! But all of this means that my writing schedule has been thoroughly, utterly blown off course. And I NEED a schedule.

So after far too many days of floating along and promising myself I would do it tomorrow, I finally sat down at my computer this afternoon to write. I edited the first chapter of my most recent novel. I hated it. I attempted to write a funny and poignant blog post. It was humorless and pointless. I did some freewriting. I usually do this on my laptop because my brain can’t keep up with my typing speed. I didn’t even save it.

So here’s to another writing session tomorrow (hopefully). Here’s to finding the time to take for myself and write all the horrific drivel possible in the space of an hour, just to get it out of my system and dig back down to the good stuff. Here’s to that moment when my brain says, “Oh, so THAT’S what you wanted me to do? Okay, cool.” Here’s to recognizing and appreciating that moment when it happens, whether I’m at my desk, squashed under a pile of children on the couch, or hiding in the basement. Here’s to summer writing.

2 Comments

Filed under Family, On Writing, Parenting

Tagged as summer, writers block, writing

February 23, 2015 · 10:34 am

Dear Novel-in-Progress

Dear Novel-in-Progress,

I was thinking about you last night while I did the laundry, ate a snack cake, and watched a M*A*S*H marathon. I was thinking about how I should be working on you, but that I didn’t want to. I was thinking about how the last several times I sat down to work on you, I was so darn tired that I fell asleep over my keyboard. I hadn’t slept much, but part of me was worried that it was you, not me.

I was thinking about how hypocritical you are. Just when I start to get really worried that you’re super boring and could never be a good sequel, I tell a trusted friend about your plot and they tell me how exciting you are. I should be happy about this, but I feel betrayed. I mean, why do you have to wait until there’s someone else in the room to let your beauty shine forth? Don’t I count? The one who created you? Or is this one on me?

I was thinking about you this morning over breakfast. I have this horrible tendency to fall asleep over a good novel after the kids get on the school bus. The house is so quiet, and is so perfect for writing…or for catching up on sleep. I was thinking that today would be just like any other. I would sit down, read the last few paragraphs, and either fall asleep or just get angry. Angry at the idea that maybe I’m not going to get this done after all.

I’m thinking about you right now, and how happy I am with you. (Who’s hypocritical now, you ask?) The hour I set aside in the mornings just to spend time with you absolutely flew by. My characters made progress. And they weren’t boring. They were exciting! They did things that I hadn’t planned out for them when I’d laid out your outline lo these many months ago.

Sometimes it’s you, sometimes it’s me. Okay, it’s probably mostly me. But let’s have mornings like this more often.

Love and kisses,

Ashley

3 Comments

Filed under On Writing

Tagged as novel, novel in progress, sequel, writing

January 30, 2015 · 9:41 am

The Courage to Write

The last couple of months have not been very productive as far as writing goes. I started NaNoWriMo, confident I would “win” and have a rough draft of the sequel to The Wanderer’s Guide to Dragon Keeping by the end of the month. But then my kids traded around a stomach bug, we got a new puppy, Thanksgiving, blah blah blah. Of course then Christmas came along, which is basically a month-long excuse. Now that we’re rolling on through January, I’ve been struggling to reestablish and keep up with a good writing routine. I tell myself that I’ll have a writing session when the kids go to bed. I’ll write when my husband goes out to the garage to work on the Jeep. I’ll write in the morning, getting up early before anyone else does and making a pot of coffee.

But I don’t.

I can’t steal snippets of time here and there at random parts of the day and expect to get any decent work out of it. I can make all sorts of excuses for myself. I’m too tired. I’m just not feeling it. I shouldn’t force it. It’s a slow process to get the creative juices flowing again. My fingernails are too long. While there’s some truth in all of that, it’s not the real reason. The real reason is that I’m scared.

Any time I tell this to someone who has any occupation other than “writer,” they don’t seem to get it. “Oh, you’re a good writer. Just do it.” And that advice isn’t much different from what you’ll find on many writers groups and forums. You just have to get the rough draft done. Nobody has to see the first draft, so there’s no need to stress. We’ve all read that, but do we really listen? Is it really true? I mean, I see the first draft, and I’m the one that’s freaking out about it. Don’t I count? Do I need to be like Hemingway and just get drunk to make it happen? (This really wouldn’t be a good option for me, considering I usually fall asleep after one beer.)

And what causes all this? Do other people feel nervous about their jobs? And maybe this only applies to people who are doing what they love for a living. I say that because I didn’t feel nervous about previous jobs I had, at least not most of the time. Perhaps, subconsciously, there just wasn’t that much to lose. I could get another dead end job any day, right? If Diana Gabaldon can crank out an entire series of books that each ring in at over 800 pages, why can’t I commit to working on my novel for an hour?

The real truth, I think, is that I just want so badly for it to be good. And the excuses just make it that much easier to avoid the risk of failure. But now that we are well over the holidays and the kids are most definitely back in school, I can force myself to truly get my nose back to the grindstone instead of these little pretend sessions where I really just have my fingers hovering over the keyboard while I watch TV. Today marks the first week since November in which I have officially carved out an hour every day to write. TGIF!

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Filed under On Writing, Uncategorized

Tagged as rough draft, writing

December 9, 2014 · 8:53 am

“You’ll Never Make Any Money at That”

When I was in kindergarten, and even a little before that, I wanted to be a writer. Sometime over the next couple of years I decided I wanted to be a scientist. (What kind? I don’t know. But I think my kids are kind of a science experiment.) By the time I was at the end of my high school career, I had also considered becoming a psychologist, a professional computer geek, and an operating room tech. I thought psychology would be too disturbing, I’m terrified of blood, and I didn’t want to spend my whole life working at a computer, so those were all rejected pretty quickly. It was down to my first two loves: biology and English. Any time I made the mere mention of an English degree, whoever was bothering to listen instantly said, “Oh, but you’ll never make any money at that.” This was usually accompanied by a wave of the hand, as if this silly notion never really mattered and couldn’t have truly been an option anyway.

Fast forward a few (plus another few) years. I had earned my associate’s in biology right after high school, but I couldn’t afford to keep going. I never got a job in the field I had pursued. Other than building cabinets for my dad’s business, I did a short stint in retail and then fell face first into finance. As I lay in the miserable money muck, I realized something. I didn’t follow my dream, and I wasn’t making any money anyway. I worked long hours doing boring work in order to be able to just barely pay my bills. Despite what the corporate training videos told me, I knew there was no room to move up. I thought about going back to school, and this time really doing something with it. The reactions of my friends were familiar ones: “You’ll never make any money at that,” and “There aren’t any careers in that field, unless you want to teach, which you don’t want to do.” (Did they even ask me if I wanted to teach?)

Now in some ways I can’t blame them. When I was eighteen, I can see how anyone would jump at the chance to impart their wisdom on someone who is young and impressionable, or who at least appears to be so. Money makes the world go round, so everyone must need as much of it as they can get, right? And in some ways I can even understand those who doubted me this time around. I have kids to take care of, so it isn’t as though I can just run off to the Alaskan wilderness to write about the snow-capped mountains and crystal blue lakes.

But I did it anyway. (Not the Alaska part, though.) I’m back in school, working toward my Bachelor’s in Creative Writing. (gasp!) I’ve started a freelancing business. I’m home when my kids get on the bus in the morning, and I’m home when they get off the bus in the afternoon. I’m distracted constantly, I work strange hours sometimes just to get things done, and I don’t make much money. I joke about my ‘starving artist lifestyle.’ It took a long time, but I’ve finally earned my degree in happiness.

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Filed under On Writing, Uncategorized

Tagged as career choice, college, follow your dreams, writing

November 10, 2014 · 8:02 am

Sandwich Thoughts

Sometimes when I sit down for my writing time, it’s an amazing thing. A couple cups of coffee and an hour later I’ve cranked out over 1,000 words and I’m deliriously excited. Other times, the cursor just blinks blankly at me, mocking me for my lack of inspiration.

I wouldn’t be the first person to notice that great ideas come in the shower. I’ve noticed they also come while driving, grocery shopping, or even making a sandwich. I just wish I could get the words to flow as well during writing time as they do during anything else time. For instance, when I’m making lunch, the little obnoxious narrator in my head will say something along the lines of, “She stacked the lunch meat atop the smattering of mayonnaise in a delicious architecture.” The narrator jumps ship when I sit down at my computer, and when my character needs to have lunch, “She makes a sandwich.” Great.

Where’s your favorite place to have great thoughts?

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7 Comments

Filed under Food, On Writing

Tagged as inspiration, nanowrimo, writing

October 14, 2014 · 7:57 am

Dear Blog

Dear Blog,

Let me start off by saying how very truly sorry I am. I’ve neglected you. It’s been three weeks since you’ve seen a post. As I type that, I think, “Surely that can’t be right!” But it is; the date stamps don’t lie.

I’ve been so consumed with these classes that I’ve been taking, the massive amounts of homework the kids drag off the school bus every day, and harvesting a few fall crops out of the garden. Don’t forget that recent book release, my Girl Scout Daisy troop, and the fact that I’m trying to purge my house via eBay. It’s no excuse, I know. Just because my education, my children, and my garden are thriving on the vine of life doesn’t mean you can’t. There’s always room. I just need to be better at finding it.

I will say that I’ve carved some time out in the mornings that is purely for writing. The kids aren’t here, the house is quiet, and thanks to Sam’s Club I have a few pounds of coffee close at hand. Most of the books I’ve read about writing (cause you can never learn enough!) say that you have to train your creativity through a writing routine. I was doing really well with that for awhile, and it does work…As long as you stick with it. So I raise my coffee mug in salute to forming good writing habits instead of playing Farm Heroes Saga and watching old reruns of The Golden Girls when I have the house to myself.

So anyway, Blog, I just want you to know that I’m going to make a better effort. I know you are what inspires me to stay fresh with my writing. You are what allows me to take that really tiny writing idea and still get to use it, even if it doesn’t fit anywhere in a book. You are truly awesome. I look forward to being addicted to you once again.

Love and Hugs,

Ashley

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Signs You’re Addicted to Blogging

Even though I’ve always loved to write, it’s been a little over a year since I started blogging. It’s been an interesting roller coaster of writerly emotions so far. You know, you start out, get your page all set up and think “Now what the hell am I going to write about?” You get a few posts under your belt and realize, “Hey wait a minute. Is anyone ever actually going to read this shit?” This is swiftly (you hope) followed by getting your first follower and first “like” on a post and you think, “Holy crap someone actually read my shit!” It’s all down hill from there folks. You start hankering for likes and follows like a drunk needs his cheap beer, lurching along and pretending to be a functional part of society.

Are you a blogging addict? Here are some signs you just might be:

1. You find yourself saying things like, “Wow, that was so fun! I can’t wait to blog about it!”

2. You take a college level English composition class, with the thought that it will improve your blogging skills.

3. You think of a weekend getaway as an opportunity to catch up on your blogging.

4. Your spouse says things to you like, “You aren’t going to blog about this, are you?”

5. You take a picture of your adult beverage on girls’ night out so you can blog about it later. (Addiction is severe if you go ahead and do the blog from your phone.)

Proof of my addiction.

***

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Top Tips for Writing

It’s difficult to get all my work done sometimes. There are so many distractions. I need to be on my computer a significant part of the day if I’m actually going to have a successful freelancing business, but somehow I find myself outside weeding the garden or playing a rousing round of Go Fish with the kids. I’m getting a little better at focusing, though, so here are my

TOP TIPS FOR WRITING

6. Rig up some sort of system that will send you some nasty electric shocks every time you wander off to Facebook.

5. Encourage your spouse to play video games. Then you won’t feel guilty about not spending time with him/her. Plus he/she will lose track of just how much time you’ve spent on that computer today.

4. Wear a hoodie, so you can put snacks and candy in the pockets.

3. Wear earbuds. These will deter people who may try talking to you, as well as drown out the sound of the kids watching the same episode of Phineas and Ferb for the umpteenth time. Also very effective for pretending you didn’t hear, “Honey, what’s for dinner?”

2. Get super comfortable. My dad’s rule when I worked for him as a kid was to always get comfortable first, and I still abide by this. The more comfortable you are, the less likely you’ll be to get up and run just one more load of laundry.

1. Get a cat, and make sure it’s on your lap. This kind of goes along with “get super comfortable”, because when you have a cat on your lap you can’t get up. That’s the rule. Really. Just ask the cat.

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