Sore Fingertips, Tired Head, Boyish Figure, and Learning the Definitive Rules of Writing

I have actually worn the tips of my fingers sore from trying to capture all the things I am putting into this 'memoir'. Literally. The tips of my fingers are actually tender from working the keyboard. I did not realize that could actually happen. I play guitar, so it's the softer skin around the callouses that has worn thinner and gotten sensitive.

Sometimes this work doesn't seem like a memoir. Sometimes I don't know what the hell it is.

The ideas are gushing out in avalanches and I don't even have time to write them all, let alone edit them all. Not that I know how to edit in the first place. I don't. And not that I care in the least. I have to have quantity. I have to have something to work with before I can set to work on it.

I've always been a rule breaker in just about everything I do. But I don't know what the rules are to begin with in writing. Which means that I don't know how to break them. I think I need to learn some more writing rules, so that I can decide if they need to be broken or not. Anyone got some good suggestions on where to learn some of the definitive rules of writing? Is there only one book that I need? Two books? Or will I need to read a whole box full of books? I want my 'memoir' (or whatever this thing is) to be lookin' good through and through. I ain't scared of hard work. But working hard alone is just stupid. I want to work hard and I want to work smart, too!

I start writing in the morning and go all day sometimes. My head is tired from all the pouring out. I like it. One idea, one memory, leads to another and another and another. It never ends. But it will end. I know that much.

Songs trigger memories, movies trigger memories, television programs trigger memories. It's crazy when I start to scour the Internet for more information. It is often quite surprising where it leads. Old addresses on Google Maps, places I used to live I had forgotten about! WOW! This is an amazing experience! Just when I think I am getting somewhere, somewhere else pops into view that I have to visit.

I am keeping an excellent diet and exercising a lot to keep myself in good tune for getting this job done. A side benefit is that I am looking really good. The ladies like it. And that's good, because I like the ladies.

I don't know where all this is going, but it sure is a good time getting there.

Gearing Up To Try My Hand At Some Editing

Maybe twenty-five years ago, I walked into a book store looking for information, i.e., books, articles, magazines -- whatever I could find -- on how to write.

I found "The Elements of Style" by Strunk & White right away. I still have my original copy, but it's back in the United States in storage. Won't do me much good here.

I went to Kindle a couple of weeks ago and found the original Strunk & White is free on Kindle and I uploaded it. It's good to be reading that book again. I love it.

I also love, "Woe Is I: The Grammarphobe's Guide To Better English In Plain English" by Patricia T. O' Conner.

I think that keeping things simple is key here. And that's just what these works do: they keep everything simple. I really like that!

Raison said:

Blackfish, what is your goal? Are you trying to write about your entire life, are you writing about a particular period, or are you writing about a particular theme? You have to have a goal to even begin to organize this.

Click to expand...

Everything changes slightly and shifts around a bit as I go, but some things are concrete. For example, many of the stories I am telling need to get written. They will definitely be used and will fit in certain places in the work.

A particular theme is misery and overcoming it against all odds. Sometimes overcoming odds is a great epic battle and sometimes it's about doing nothing but biding time and waiting, being patient. It's about growth and learning, contraction and expansion. It's about finding out that things were never what they seemed to be. And it's about everything you have ever learned in your life is a lie. It's about finding the truth no matter what the cost, because life isn't worth living without it.

Right now, the project consists mostly of pounding the keyboard and getting the mother-lode of the ideas down. It is a pouring out, an avalanche, a very rough recording and first draft and sketch.

No one would be interested enough in my life in particular. I am nobody. It will be nothing like an autobiography, with every little incident recorded. That would be nonsense. But what I have focused on and what I have explored is what it's all about. I have challenged every norm and custom I could find and found most of it to be nonsense. Much of it came as a big surprise to me to learn. I had no idea. I find these matters noteworthy. I am a whistle-blower, troublemaker, skeptic, warrior. Things are not what they seem.

Some stories and other tidbits and pieces are near completion by now and I need to start editing, polishing and finishing. I will decide where they will fit into the big picture later.

Part of the big picture is the open end. My way of life is the way of no way. Things change, people change, the landscape changes, the weather changes, everything changes, and we must adapt. I suppose part of the happy ending is that we, as human beings, can adapt, where other species cannot.

Life is just a big adventure. Nothing more. Nothing less.

I know, I'm starting to sound like some kind of Buddhist or something. I'm not. But life is a spiritual and intellectual adventure and inventure just the same. I had once thought that the meaning and purpose of life was somewhere outside of the self. And I lived my life accordingly. I have come to learn that is not the case; among many other things that I have learned. I want to share what I have found and what I have learned with others. I think that the more people contemplate and explore these things on their own, the better a place the world becomes, the more likely we are to draw better and more useful conclusions.

Even violence has a meaning and a purpose that is constructive and extremely valuable. There is a great deal of power in the negative. As we all know, consciously or not.

I'm the world's first Meditating Contemplating Anti-Theist Evangelical Monk! HA! HA! HA!