Day Six - Opening Pages - And Cold Writing Days

Today is a normal writing day. And what I mean by that is that there are many distractions (children and spouses, bills to pay, things to clean, grocery shopping, etc.) and all of them seem much more vital and interesting than moving one word further on any of my writing projects.

That said, this is normal. Hot days - where you sit down on the way to brush your teeth and the next thing you know you're ten pages in and it's nearly noon - are rare. Most days are cold to lukewarm at best. But, pages do not write themselves and so you'd better get used to it.

Writing anything is always better than writing nothing. Even if what you write you end up throwing away, at least you went down a road you'll never have to travel again. You covered territory that will eventually help you discover your next parcel of solid writing. So, suck it up.

In my project I have finished the outline.

I broke out my treatment into 10 first act beats, 12 Act Two A beats, 12 Act 2B beats and 10 3rd act beats. I started by identifying the KEY BEATS which are highlighted in The Story Grid (see previous posts) and filled it out from there. The outline, like everything else, should be regarded as a tool. You are in control (for now) so act like it.

And then I faced the dreaded first scene. Not necessarily the opening scene - but any old scene you have the gumption to write. Of course, this takes place after you've created a title page and anything else you can think of to stave off starting.

So, I decided to write the opening scene for my first scene because it was the scene that helped me get into the story when I first imagined it. But I could not bring myself to write the "action" or description. Ironic because I've been tooling along on my novel at a healthy clip for weeks. (Action or description being the prose of a screenplay - you'd think I could handle a couple lines to get me into a scene... think again.) My mind is blank. My child is screaming. Facebook is calling through the DSL, "What is everyone else you know doing? Must be something way more interesting than this."

That first slugline just hung there in space, all alone. Lots of cursor hypnosis happening. Until finally, I decided to start with the dialogue - which led me to see what the characters were doing. Which led me to a scene I'm happy enough with the writing to move on to the next scene. And that's all there is to writing at this stage - moving on. I'm now four pages in. A good start. Next stop - inciting incident. Tomorrow I hope to get through roughly page 10-12 (inciting incident land.) Wish me luck.