Sorry I missed you on Tuesday. I was thawing out.
The whole family was away on a ski trip that was awesome but very, very cold. How cold you ask?
Yeah, about a -24 on the top of the mountain. It was a mighty breezy gondola ride LOL! I felt like I was frozen half the weekend. Thank the stars for hot tubs. But, when I did get home, I was rather occupied. I had a long lost puppy to hug.
It was the first time the little fur baby stayed with someone else. He did great but once we had him back, there was lots of hugging going on. And don’t forget that when I arrived home, I had a whole different mountain to climb–Mt. Laundrious. I think I’m still out there on one of the permanent press peaks. Bleh!
But today, even though it was still cold, the kids went to school on time. There were no weather delays, which allowed me to do something fabulous called writing. *sigh* It was wonderful to have an UNINTERRUPTED chunk of time with my manuscript. I hammered out over a 1,000 words in a reasonable amount of time, but it isn’t the word count I’m writing about. (Although it makes me very happy.) Rather, what’s worthy of a blog post is the unexpected thing that happened…
BAM! One of my characters blindsided me right along with my MC.
We are both still reeling from the unexpected development. He did what??? I’m still baffled. I NEVER thought this character would do THAT. But he did. I knew it for absolute certain even though I don’t know exactly what that means for my MC at the moment. It has rattled my cage, but it also makes me content to be a pantster. The truth is that some days I panic, being a fly by the seat of my pants kind of a girl. When I hit a tough spot, I’m SURE if I could just outline, my life would be complete. COMPLETE!
But then a moment like today happens and I bask in my creative process. This development could have never come from an outline. At least not my outlines. Those are nuttier than an peanut factory. The simplest way I can explain the joy of this thing that happened, is to say that it’s a small moment of confirmation. It reminds me that I’m not really crazy–not THAT crazy anyway. *shrugs* I’m doing what I’m supposed to be doing, y’all.
And of course, tomorrow or maybe next week, I’ll be back to wishing I had a road map for a book, instead of just headlights, hope and instinct to guide my way. Traveling in the dark can be hard and even kind of scary, but that’s why I wrote this post. It’s to remind me that sometimes the best things happen when you aren’t looking.
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Don’t ever doubt you’re meant to be doing this- you’re a born story-teller! But I’m so happy you (and your character) had this breakthrough. Obviously freezing ski trips and warm puppy hugs work for you. 😉
LOVE YOU!!!!
I love it when my character’s hit me in the head with a shovel. So much better than screaming “will you friggin do something already!” At the computer screen;-) I can’t wait to hear/read this new MS *rubs hands, wiggles eyebrows* if it wasn’t you it might actually be a little on the creepy side. Lol <3
ROTFL!!!! I can’t wait for you to read it too! And lets get a date on the calendar!!!!
I agree that moments like these are why I continue to be a pantser. Planning takes the spark out for me. But one thing I find even more validating is that when you get THAT excited about a surprise, it means the character motivation is completely believable to support the surprise. I hope that makes sense. I always think things like, “Who knew I was smart enough to set up such cleverness?”
It’s a frickin awesome feeling and I’m happy to know you’re experiencing it today. Yay!