one of the truest phrases ever spoken.
I need a plan.
-- Casey on Sports Night Running news:
3 miles. I am still very sore from Sunday. Which is my only, and extremely lame, excuse for not going to the gym yesterday.
As I decide to get my act together and do my damn writing for the day, I notice my hard disk stands at exactly 666.6MB available.
Instead of figuring out whether this is significant, I open up Microsoft Word and eat some chocolate.
Yesterday Linda wrote me to say that she was having a late meeting at work and so couldn't make writing group. Gonzo also wrote to say that he couldn't make writing group either, so Aaron and I decided we would meet for coffee later this week.
Aaron and I talked for a while on the phone about our compatriots from USC and what they're doing now. And no matter what the rumors are, evidently no one from our class is having much success yet--the reason he knows this is that no one is talking about money. There is no money changing hands.
Not only is money a really great feel-good mechanism (particularly if you have one metric buttload of student loans), but it's the lone measure of seriousness in this town. If someone is serious about your work, they have to sink money into it. "Show me the money!" is the ultimate business cry, because otherwise it's all a lot of hot air.
He made me feel much better. I had told him about a rumor I'd heard, and I felt terrible because...well, I made a decision a few years ago that I was just going to be happy for people. It doesn't cost me anything, and it actually makes me feel better (as well as making the person who's having the success feel okay, which is tough enough in this society). I still have the envy demons, but I realize that they are my problem and I don't have to share them. This is not a zero-sum game; your success does not negate my chances.
When I hear about people I think are untalented getting success, something evil happens and I don't feel happy about it. I have no charity in my soul; I demand blood and vengeance and pillaging.
Aaron had heard the same rumor I had, and he had heard more besides. And what he hadn't heard was anything about money. There's no money changing hands. Without money, it's all hot air. (Aaron knows about this personally: he's had two scripts optioned, one without money and the other for not very much money, and neither seems like a very worthwhile deal.)
Oh. There's no money. Okay. Phew.
I'm not saying this is admirable on my part, okay? But it's the truth. And if I can't admit to the worse parts of my nature here, where can I?
Since writing group had gotten cancelled, I went to the Step Up meeting to find out what was what.
They're still disorganized--they'd lost all the new member forms from last meeting, so I had to fill out another one--but they said they've actually gone through all of the 350 scripts they got for the competition and will be announcing the winners this weekend. Hmm. Well, okay.
But the Filmmakers Lab in May is going on as scheduled, so I'm looking forward to that.
Novel Writing again tonight. There were two groups handing in writing tonight: the group handing in 5 page sections that would be read during class, and the group handing in 10 page sections that the rest of the class would take home to critique.
I was in Group 1.
I was, of course, the last one to go.
The first half of the class, about an hour, is spent in lecture--she talked about plot, character, and dialogue. Yes, I know: how could she spend so long on such trivial writing topics? (I'm being facetious--no, really? She doesn't need to spend a ton of time on these topics, because most of the people in the class have a clue.)
The second half of class we went over the four submissions, reading each silently and then a couple of students would make comments on each submission. The first one was very good--the start of a hip chick novel, written in a very strong voice. The second one also had great points--needed a bit of rearrangement, but it was a good beginning for a novel.
I once again come forward and admit to the evil parts of myself when I admit that I was happy to see that the third submission had problems. Not terrible problems, but a few. That will make my stuff look better, I thought. It's like the old rule of stand-up comedians--never follow a better comedian. Same principle.
Then we read mine, and people started making comments. A few things were too oblique, a couple of lines seemed out of place, more could be explicated about who was doing what to whom.
Whenever I get criticism, I write the comments on the back of the last page of my copy of a draft. Tonight, as I reached the bottom of the page, I suddenly realized that every single person in the class had commented on my pages. Part of that was because the teacher kept asking people to comment, and between each set of comments made more criticisms herself.
Despite experiencing my usual reaction to criticism, I retained enough of a clue to realize that hearing from everyone in the class was a pretty big compliment.
If only I knew what the next thing I was going to write was.
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Copyright 1999 Diane Patterson
Send comments and questions to diane@spies.com