Week 1: Getting Back into It

It gets easier. Every day it gets a little easier. But you gotta do it every day —that’s the hard part. But it does get easier Bojack Horseman

I made it to the end of the first week. It’s an uphill battle. In the snow. Both ways. But I’m doing it. I’ve managed to write every day, both for my own project and with the help of Tim Clare’s 100 Day Writing Challenge. Though Tim suggests only doing the exercises for the first week, I wanted to do a little more. I’m working on a new novel that maybe one day I’ll talk about on here. But not yet.

Each of the first 6 days of the Writing Challenge were something a bit unconventional in regards to what one might normally think of as a Writing Exercise. For 10 minutes each day thus far, the prompt has been to write a list of some kind, in an attempt to show that writing and creativity isn’t exclusive to starting at the beginning of a project and writing prose through to the end. Each day was a different list: names of people who don’t exist, things I love, fake book titles. The only rule is that I can’t censor myself. I can’t let that little voice take over, and tell me that what I’m writing is dumb, or cliche, or not good enough for the list. It’s just a list. No one’s ever going to see it. Well except for you I guess. But details, details.

One of the most challenging exercises of the week was writing a list of things “I” love, the operative I in the exercise being from the perspective of a fictional character that you discovered as the list progressed. I discovered that I was a Witch who loves her time alone, being powerful, her cat and her late mother.

Having some external push to remind me how much fun just playing in my imagination can be is probably the most useful part of this whole Challenge. Creativity almost seemed like something to be afraid of, something that could never live up to the lofty expectations I held for it instead of letting it be what it is: play. The more I lean into the fun and play of writing, the more I enjoy it while I’m doing it. And, by logical extension, the more I enjoy it, the more likely I am to keep doing it.

My favorite exercise by far was creating the list of random, yet specific, objects. I have absolutely no doubt that one or two of these items will be incorporated into a story in the future, or maybe they’ll have a story all their own. Only time will tell.

1. A hollowed out bible with a toy soldier inside

2. A wristwatch that has a 13th hour

3. A shoe with a hole in the bottom

4. A flower with two missing petals

5. A writing desk with four names carved into it, one of them is scratched out

6. A mug with a picture of a small dog on it

7. A shirt with a bullet hole in it

8. A small raven skull with crystal embedded within it

9. A chair, inside of which is hidden a bundle of letters

10. A space heater that nearly explodes each time it’s turned on

11. Four different socks, no two alike

12. A dresser drawer with two missing drawers

13. A tree with a bird’s nest inside of it, but no birds

14. A pair of broken glasses, only one lens has a prescription

15. a water bottle filled with a bright green liquid

16. A still beating heart, larger than a human heart

17. A scale model of the moon, with a building on it

18. A school book with a hidden message after the instructions to turn to various pages

19. A pencil without any led

20. A sweatshirt missing the string for the hood

21. A crystal, cracked and discolored

22. A laptop that wont turn to another page aside from a very specific Wikipedia entry

23. A lamppost that flickers, but each time it flickers the color changes

24. A car with a broken side mirror and a locked trunk

25. A record player that only plays records backwards

26. A piano with four missing keys

27. A rug with a stain that looks mysteriously like blood

28. A set of matching pajamas pants, but the shirt and the pants are two different sizes

29. A book written in a language no one understands but you

30. An outlet that constantly shocks anyone who tries to plug something into it

31. A britta water filter that turns water into wine

32. A piece of sea-glass with a name inscribed on it

33. An overturned tree with a family of possums living inside of it

34. A dog tag with a name that doesn’t sound like an earthly name

35. A brochure to a place that doesn’t exist, or at least doesn’t exist in this reality

36. A wheelchair with square wheels

37. A robot that can only put away three articles of clothing

38. A cell phone with only one phone number in it

39. A vinyl with a recording of your voice

40. A scrapbook with pictures of you when you thought you were alone

41. A notebook with diary entries you forgot you wrote, that slowly turns into someone else’s handwriting

As you can tell I started leaning on a pattern towards the end there.

Here are my stats for the week of January 1-7 2020:

Word Count: 8091

Best Day: January 3rd, 2081