Bumpy Sledding and Writing

Hope all of you had a very good Wednesday. Halfway through the work week and on the downhill slide to Friday. I often wish I had an extra day especially when I'm getting started on a new book. Of course I took today off to spend a snow day with a couple of my grandkids. We haven't had a lot of snow, just flurries spread out over several days that has kept a skiff of snow on the ground. My daughter-in-law said it was like we were in a giant snow globe that somebody kept turning over to make it snow. Anyway, the little snow we had is almost gone except in the shade, but with those plastic smooth bottomed sleds, you can still do some sledding even when the snow is disappearing. So we walked all over the farm looking for enough snow cover to take a ride downhill. The two and a half year old was quite happy to let me pull her down those hills and then back up. Needless to say, this gramma is dragging tonight after a lot of trips up and down. At least I was smart enough to pick very short hills. The nine year old just had fun sliding although he did admit that the frozen ground with only a bare skiff of snow made for some pretty bumpy sledding.

I'm feeling as if I'm having some "bumpy sledding" as I try to get my new story off the ground, but I'm hanging on and absorbing the bumps because I think the story is there. I just have to find the best way to tell it. So here are some quotes to encourage you if you're a writer and help you understand some of what writers struggle with if you're a reader.

• A writer and nothing else: a man alone in a room with the English language, trying to get human feelings right. --John K. Hutchens (A woman alone in a room, too. I do work much better when I'm alone.)
• Writing is no trouble: you just jot down ideas as they occur to you. The jotting is simplicity itself-it is the occurring which is difficult. -Stephen Leacock
• I think it's bad to talk about one's present work, for it spoils something at the root of the creative act. It discharges the tension. -Norman Mailer (I couldn't agree more. I simply cannot talk about my story in progress. One author I read suggested that if a writer tells her story, there's no need for her to write it.)
• Make 'em laugh; make 'em cry; make 'em wait. - Charles Reade

That last one is advice I want to follow. I think I'll write those words in red on my desk calendar where I can see it every day when I start writing. I'll put it right beside the Proverb about how laughter works good for us like a medicine. Hope you have good days and good nights along with much laughter and good stories.