Perpetual Ruminations

Friday

Things went better for writing yesterday, once everything came together. I was still having some trouble trying to get an idea for the story, but I pondered it while I made lunch and then some more while I checked Facebook to see what everyone was up to. I logged back in to WdC to look at some other entries, hoping that would motivate and help generate some ideas. It didn't, but it was still quite interesting.

I had an image of a person in a small boat, on the ocean, with a huge moon behind them. That was it, this time and it just seemed like a nice romantic prompt. At the same time, there was only the one person, who struck me as a male. Maybe love gone wrong? I came up with a few different ideas for a romance story, but nothing developed into a story. Then, I looked at it as I often do when I'm stuck, with questions. Who is that in the boat, why is he out there, what happened before he got here, and of course, what is going to happen next.

I toyed with an idea of a lonely person out on the water, in front of a Lover's Moon, wishing he had a lover. I developed it a bit further, when he comes in to shore, perhaps his wish comes true and there is his lover, also alone. I tried a few different variations, but again, it just didn't move me towards any development. It came all at once, as writing ideas often do, maybe he's not a lover, maybe he's out there thinking about love that's lost.

From this more details surfaced and soon I had a story to write. I didn't get it finished before Rhonda got home, but being the supportive partner she is, I wrote the rest of the story while she worked on dinner. Then I had the ending and called her over. It's become a custom for me to have her read the finished story, or I read it to her, depending on length. She tells me what she thinks of the story, then she checks off the week that I just completed on the white-board I have set up for the challenge.

Finally, I broke the habit I was getting into of writing the story at the very last minute, which is not good. Not only could something come up to prevent me from getting it done before the deadline, but it also adds more stress to the writing process. It's nice to know I can have a deadline and be running late, but still get a good story written. But, it started to be every week. I would get done on Saturday, then Sunday a new prompt would be given. I would look at the prompt sometime on Sunday, but after writing hard on Saturday, just couldn't get into creating another story that soon.

Now, I have a couple of days to relax and work on other things before the new prompt comes out, and should be able to look at it and have a fresh, clean mind to generate some ideas and get a story going.