Creative juices starting to simmer

I can feel it. Just below the surface of my mind, there's a story brewing.

I love that feeling. I don't quite know what it is yet. My subconscious is working on it, creating something, getting it ready for my conscious mind. Is it odd, that I recognize that? Any sort of story that I write, I come up with before I consciously work on it.

I'm hoping that I might figure out a better ending for "Partners"... I want to finish it so badly. I've re-written Act I, moving some things around, and I'm much happier with where intermission falls. However, while I know what needs to happen in Act II, I'm having a hard time getting there. I need a more defined ending than I had at first. In the first several drafts, the play ended with a rather... vague ending. The two MCs had been working on their problem, but it wasn't truly resolved. They basically said they would work on it. As much as I like that ending artistically, leaving it up to the audience to decide if they lived happily ever after or not, it's very unsatisfying to the audience. If you've just sat through an hour or two, investing some interest in these two characters, and you get a wishy-washy ending, you're going to be unhappy.

There's another story that I'm hoping is brewing: Meliora's story. If you want to browse back and look at the stories, I apologize - they're going to be removed in the next few days. I don't really like to remove blog posts, but I've reworked the stories I've already written, and I'm going to submit them to a magazine, but they require first e-publication rights and request that the work not be available anywhere else online. If I don't get accepted, the posts will go back up. Aside from the few bits I've written about Meliora, I want to write some more about her. I don't really have a full definition of what kind of a creature she is. I mean, she's definitely not a vampire, although she does have some vampiric traits. She works with fog in some way, and she feeds off of people, although not physically... I need to figure out just what she is. If she doesn't fit into any sort of already-established creature type, I'll need to define her more emphatically and name her type. I can't wait to work on that one!

Of course, it may be something else entirely! Maybe I'll just get back into blogging every day!

Censorship

I've been thinking a lot lately. Since last week's post, I've been thinking about my blog. I like writing in my blog. I like that my mom can keep tabs on my life, even though we're hundreds of miles apart. I like that my friends, as spread out as they are, can keep in touch with me with the occasional comment. My blog, while not overly personal, is still a personal thing. I haven't done any sort of marketing or advertising to spread my name around the internet, if only because I feel as if I haven't really done anything yet to deserve that. Someday, maybe, I'll use my blog as a professional communication venue. Until that time, however, it's just a personal blog. It's a Blogspot blog, for pete's sake! When I'm pseudo-famous enough to have a publicized blog, I'll shell out a couple of bucks for my own domain name. :)

In any case, I've been thinking, not only about the purpose of my blog, but about censorship. As a writer, the subject of censorship is a very sensitive one. I don't want anyone to tell me what I can or cannot write about. I spend my days working for other people, watching what I say, and how I act. When I write, I just want to write. I understand that, in some cases, it's necessary to have at least a modicum of censorship; as I mentioned, my mom reads my blog, so my posts always keep that in mind. Believe me, there are things that my mom doesn't want to know - I've watched her stick her fingers in her ears and say "LALALALALALA!" when a conversation takes a turn towards uncomfortable topics. (Sorry, Mom, but you're a great example here!) In that way, I censor myself. I went back to a post I wrote last week and deleted a sentence that was just tempting fate - I should know better than to brag about work that's not even done. In that way, I censor myself. More than once, I've got back and edited a post that was written in anger because I had time to cool down and think things through. In that way, I censor myself.

There's a difference, though, between censoring what I say because of who my intended audience is and censoring myself because of people who may venture past my blog out of the blue. I write towards my intended audience, or for myself. I don't write for EVERYONE. There is no way to be able to please everyone, and I've learned that the hard way. Believe me, it's not even worth it to try.

I went back and looked at the blog entry that's caused the kafuffle (yes, kafuffle - I like that word). For a few moments, I considered simply deleting it and removing the source of conflict, because I don't like conflict. Then I thought about it some more. The post was, in itself, not offensive. It, like many of my posts here, was about writing. I'm a writer, whether I'm published yet or not, and I like to think about my craft. I decided to leave it up, because it is not my responsibility to make everyone happy. If you make the choice to read my personal blog, you're going to have to deal with the fact that you're reading my personal opinions. If you are unhappy with anything that you see here, I am sorry that I couldn't please you. Perhaps some of the blogs I follow, listed in the right-hand sidebar, might be more to your liking. If you choose to never visit my blog again, I won't be upset. I probably won't ever know.

Soon, muffin, soon.

Only eight more days. Eight days until the next show opens. Then only ten days until I'm done until October. Yes, October. I have the next three shows off. Granted, I've still got two major projects to work on at the theatre, but I'll only be going about once a week, instead of every night. I think it will be much more relaxed. No, I know it will be much more relaxed.

I'm looking forward to my free time. I've had very little of that since the beginning of the winter holiday season started. I did some travelling, but I've spent TONS of time at the theatre. On the bright side, I feel as if I have learned even more about directing, if only through more of a 'what NOT to do' approach.

More importantly, I'm looking forward to re-writing 'Partners.' I've got a pile of critiques sitting in my closet (literally), and a pile of ideas in my head. I'm going to get this thing done. It's going to be awesome. It's not there yet. I know it, and everyone who's read it knows it. But they've also all told me that it's going to be good, and I know that too. I can't wait.

Eight days.

Seriously?

Someone was directed to my blog, read an entry, and got offended. Or was told about my blog, misinterpreted content that they did not actually read, and got offended.

And I'm kind of frustrated about this.

I have tried very hard to make sure that, while however informative/entertaining/honest/whatever my post is, it's also considerate. I am on the Board of Directors of two separate organizations at this time, and I have also been a University instructor, so I am very well aware of the fact that anything I say or do may be held against me. That's why, when I was teaching, I stopped going out to the bars where students tended to hang out - I didn't want anyone to think I could possibly be construed as even considering doing anything inappropriate.

These days, I continue to pay attention to things like that. When I am sufficiently affected by something I see/hear to write about it, I'm careful about how I do so, especially when I know the people who are involved in whatever the thing is. I don't want to offend anyone, or put the Boards in a bad light, or come off looking like a jerk.

It's clear, though, that people will misinterpret all sorts of things, and there's nothing I can do about it. So what should I do? Should I stop expressing myself to avoid hurting the feelings of people who may or may not actually ever read my blog? That seems ridiculous. No, I'll continue on as I have been. If you're offended by what you see, then go read something else. I KNOW that I'm not the most interesting thing on the internet.

*crickets*

So yeah... I've been AFB for a while...

I don't expect that anyone particularly missed me, of course, but if you did, I'm sorry to have kept you waiting for my return! After a year of almost-continuous blogging, I found it very, VERY tempting to just stay away for a little while. And, of course, life got in the way, too. I've been back at the theatre, and that's kept me out until wee hours of the night (and by wee hours, I mean 10 - but that's pumpkin time when I have to work the next morning!). There's been some drama amongst my group of friends, so I've been listening a lot. There's been wonderful piles of Ted-and-Zoe goodness to keep me happy. There's been a puppy to cuddle in my [limited] spare time. There's been a trip to New Orleans!

So it's not as if I've just been slacking, really. I just haven't been blogging.

Part of it is that I'm not entirely sure what I want to write. I've been looking at submitting a story to Silver Blade, and I think that has made me really apprehensive about writing. If I think about it logically, that's really kind of ridiculous, because the story that I want to submit is finished. I wrote it, edited it, had people read it, tweaked it, and now it's sitting on my hard drive, waiting for me to figure out what to do next. Its success or failure is completely independent of any new writing that I might do, but I'm still almost paralyzed.

Another part of it is the need that I have to finish Partners. It's the play that I've been writing over the past two years, and I was really happy with it when I finished it. Then I gave it to someone else to read, and while he liked what was there, he told me that it wasn't enough to produce. I needed more. There were characters whose stories were unfinished. There were places where there needed to be more conflict and emotion. It felt unfinished to him. I really like and respect this person, and I took his comments to heart, especially because he was so enthusiastic about the whole thing. However, I'm not sure how to finish it now, because I had thought it was finished.

So right now, my writing isn't so much writing as it is thinking about and agonizing over writing. Or blogging to avoid other writing. Maybe I'll get over myself. Or maybe my head will explode and I won't have to worry about it.