Well it’s midnight and I can’t sleep, so I figure I may as well blog and get it all off my chest. I’ll apologize now for anything that doesn’t make sense.
So I had an awesome chat with my amazing mentor for pitch wars Sunday morning. I swear, I feel so lucky to have Danielle as my mentor. Not only is she brilliant (and she is very brilliant), but she also likes Doctor Who and Merlin and all the right TV shows, and that’s just full of WIN in my book. But we’re here to talk writing, not TV. Not today anyway.
I’m laying in bed trying to go to sleep running through all the things Danielle and I discussed today about my story and directions I can take to make it even better. You know how that goes…every time you close your eyes a new idea pops in your head and you have to run through how that would play out and fit with the rest of the story. Yeah. No wonder writers tend to have sleepless nights. Anyway, amidst that I got to thinking about soccer.
Yep, Super Spawn is playing soccer. I am an official soccer mom and loving every bug-bitten, freezing cold, hard-bleacher-sitting minute of it. (And that was not intended sarcastically. I really am loving it.)
(And as a side note, I’m starting to feel like I could make a writing analogy out of any scenario. Maybe I’ll make it a game. We’ll see how many I can come up with this year. Ha. Feel free to tell me to shut up already.)
So soccer and writing. Fun stuff. When you’re playing soccer (or watching, as I am) the ball gets passed around a lot. It gets run up field and down field and out of bounds, all the while you’re trying to steer it in direction of your goal. You have that target and you know how to get it there, but making that dumb round bit of bouncy leather GET there, well, that’s the challenge. Then you’ve got people out there blocking and parrying your moves. Trying to knock you off course or even steal the ball right out from under you.
Nobody is in the wrong here. They have a goal too. It’s how the game is played. You kick to your teammate, they kick a bit off course, and before you know it the whistle is blowing and the ball is being thrown in the other direction. You’re scrambling to catch up and redirect it back toward that silly little goal with the ever-so-competent goalie.
It’s exhausting just talking about soccer. But really, how different is all that from writing a book? You write it, you get it beta’d, you edit it, and you kick it out there, hoping for the best. Then that defensive player smashes it halfway down the field and you’re backtracking, trying to scramble and pull the game together again.
The thing is, no matter how many times the goalie deflects you, no matter how many trips up field you have to make, as long as you’re playing, you’ve got a chance at bringing home the win.
As Super Spawn himself says, “Never, ever give up. If you keep trying then you’ll learn to do it.”
How did I raise such a wise little boy?
And as a treat for enduring yet another writing is like THIS post from me, here’s (rather cute) proof of my soccer mom status:
Super Spawn is the goalie here.
YES, I’M CRAZY. It’s okay. I like me this way.