Catching Idle Butterflies

Super frost � and other things.

1552/50,000

Luckily with writing, the word count always goes up – assuming I don’t succumb to the temptation to edit, that is! I still haven’t written much, but I did discover that my story is taking a surprising turn. At first, I wasn’t certain my original idea would develop into 50,000+ words, but now I’m beginning to think it will end up larger than that.

So now I really have to continue writing in order to discover where it will go from here. It’s hard to believe an author has no idea sometimes how a story will turn out, but if I am to remain true to the characters, I have to let them do what they are supposed to do, and that is not always what I want them to do. But that conflict is what makes me want to write, and in turn, I hope, make the reader want to read.

I do have a little quandary, however. I decided to take the Books and Such agent’s advice and take the premise of my sci-fi book and write it in today’s world. I also decided to use my novella idea instead, because I don’t see that one published anytime soon, if ever.

Well, these characters I created are, for a lack of a better word, naughty. I described some of that naughtiness, and I couldn’t help but wonder if I went too far. I fretted about it all last night.

It’s amazing what a good night’s sleep will do for my attitude.

I’ve decided not to worry about it now, just like I’m not going to go back and edit until the book is finished. The lovely thing about the written word on a word processor where no one can read it without my express permission is it can be changed, and only I will know what the original looked like.

Super Frost

Those of you who live in climates where freezing weather is common know what I’m talking about when I say Super Frost. Not all frosts adhering to a car’s windshield are alike. You never know when you step outside the door to start the car what awaits you.

Some frosts come off with no problem. With barely a push with a scraper, it slides off with nary a sound, sometimes curling up in tiny ribbons to be pushed away with a mere wave of the hand.

Sometimes it’s more like ice, but even then, with a good push of the scraper, it breaks off in tiny pieces.

Then there’s the Super Frost. It’s not that thick, giving you the initial impression it will come off easily.

The first scrape lets you know your impression is wrong. It slides across the frost, making it look worse than if you had let it alone. Sure you could give up at that point, step inside and let the defroster do all the work. Not me. Nope. My place of work is less than a mile from home, so I don’t give myself enough time to wait for my car to warm up. Plus, leaving my car to idle for ten minutes uses more gas than getting to work. And with gas prices as high as they are . . . a little exercise in the morning is something I’m willing to endure to save myself $2.

And exercise it is!

Being short makes scraping frost off the windshield difficult, because with my arms over my head, I can’t put any weight behind the scraper. I tried my fancy scraper that even extends for those hard to reach places, but the frost only scoffed at me. I could hear it laugh and say, “Wimp! You can’t beat me!”

Well, I have a brain, and that brain did me good today, even at the cost of my arms falling off from exhaustion. I refused to give in to the Super Frost!

I took my library card (yes you read that right) and with the corner of it, I managed to scrape away a clear swath ¼” wide and 3” long. And thus the war turned in my favor. Sure, it took much sweat and lots of tiny scrapes, but I won! I scraped just enough away from the driver’s and passenger side to see enough of the road I wouldn’t get into an accident. Grinning with pride, I jumped into my vehicle and headed to work.

The moment I arrived, the defroster had just completed its task, my windshield clear and pristine.