Mental Meanderings

Posting my morning 20

*Note: This morning I wasn't sure what to write so I did some free writing. It's practically a journal entry in itself and in the sense of saving time repeating myself I thought I might as well post it. *

I don’t know what to write but I still want to get my twenty minutes in so I’m going to free write for a little bit. I did a tarot reading last night in the hopes of clearing up my uncertainties. I got from it that now was a time of reflection rather than a time to move onto a new project. So I guess this works well for reflection.

The Dating Game is wrapping up. I’ve got lots of editing to do and I’ve got a number of people interested in reviewing when the time comes. I’m feeling insecure about it’s progress but the tarot reading I did based solely on that story gave me the impression that with careful editing I would have a book worthy of publication. I’m expecting to find something amateurish and rather lame when I begin the editing process although the parts that I reread weren’t too bad.

Now it’s time to find something new to put my twenty minutes to each morning. I’d like to write some shorter fiction. Get a grasp of short stories. My knowing where to end kind of tossed me at the end of The Dating Game and I have the same problem with shorter works. How do you select what story you’re going to tell and how do you know when the story has been told? The lives of our characters generally continue long past the story. Death is the only ending and in writing it’s generally death that is a beginning. You rarely leave a story on a death.

I’m doing well in the Poetry Raw I’m nervous because while I’ve been pleased with my trash talking I don’t want to come across as arrogant by any means. I certainly hope that what goes on in the forums doesn’t effect the judges ratings. I don’t think it will and my trash talk is good example of some of my poetic technique but it’s still a concern. My fingers are crossed and I’m waiting anxiously for the results.

Now, what story do I want to write about? Lets toss about some ideas. A while back I had an incredible dream. The fact of the dream has stayed with me and I wrote down the details of the dream so I have it to draw on. A girl, a live-in nanny, takes care of a large family. They live on the coast in a modern mansion of metallic grey stone suspended in part over the beach and shore.

During the night a storm, tsunami, hurricane, tidal wave etc. hits the house destroying much of it. The main character gathers the children as best she can, trying to keep them all safe. The parents of the children are home and are also trying to get all their kids to safety. Both parents die in the process along with a couple of the children. The girl makes it with about six of the children into a small closet-like room and they take cover there until the storm clears.

When the sun rises the house is torn to shreds. And adult is outside the door of the room with a baby in her arms. Both had drowned trying to get into the room. A great deal of the house has been washed away as it seems as if a miracle kept their tiny room safe.

I don’t know what happened from here. I get the impression that the girl attempts to adopt all the kids. She loves them. Earlier she had met a love interest. A great, friendly guy who comes back into her life after the storm also. They had both been outside, walking the bridges together when the storm arrived, they saw it coming. The bridges, it reminds me of Stargate: Atlantis. The whole city is a strange, modernistic structure suspended over water and consisting of covered and uncovered bridges and main buildings. Small apartments as apposed to larger rooms for living. This would make a good comparison for the setting I saw in the dream.

I did try to think about how I could turn this into a story or a novel but so far it’s a bunch of facts, a pile of turmoil/drama but not a story. A story needs a heart. Perhaps that’s what I should focus on. Finding out what the heart is of this story. Condense the idea into a single though. Overcoming adversity? No, somehow that doesn’t fit. What could it be that this dream was trying to share with me? What message does it want me to send to readers? Growing pains? Accepting responsibility? The obligations of love and caring? Dealing with loss and grief?

I’m not happy with any of these. I suppose it’s a part of what I need to reflect upon and ask for guidance. Undoubtably there was a reason that this dream features so highly and why I feel compelled to write about it. I just need to break it down into manageable bits. I need to find my theme and then I can consider getting an outline together. Once I have an outline I’ll be able to begin writing the story. It’s probably worthy of a novel but I’m not well read of genre’s other than romance and fantasy. I suppose it could fall into a sci-fi/fantasy genre. Yes, quite possibly. Mmmmm, so much to think about.