After watching fireworks this weekend, a bunch of us walked around the yacht club to check out the other boats. One stood out in particular, a ginormous yacht complete with jacuzzi on her 2nd deck. It wasn't as much the jacuzzi (hello, my sweet) or the size of her that caught our attention as it was the lights shining through the water beneath her. That late at night, the lights attract all manner of life.
Sure enough, schools upon schools of tiny fish, crab, and shrimp were flitting about just beneath the surface. And just on the surface were twenty or thirty semi-translucent splotches. If I'm to be honest... it looked like discs of snot. "It" turned out to be "they" - something my Dad referred to as "potato jellyfish".
Digression: Okay, I have No clue why they're called potato jellyfish. I can't even find that reference anywhere on the web. My Dad's an ex surf-bum who grew up on the beach and calls all sorts of things by names I'll never figure out. They did sort of resemble flat little translucent potato chips... so Maybe I can see it? No. Not a clue. He's a strange one, sometimes, my Dad.
Anyhow. Two things were mentioned while we were watching these little flat globs seemingly float across the water: 1) If you disturb them, they glow green; and 2) if you try to pick one up, it completely falls apart and you're left with bits of slime.
That's right, it self-destructs. How about that?
Of course, in all this coolness... while the kids are ooh-ing and ahh-ing and wanting to poke at them to see them glow, all I could think was:
Those little jellyfish are my book. I poked and prodded and it glowed a pretty neon green. But then I tried to reel it in, capture it, and the whole damn thing fell apart. And now all I'm left with is a handful of slimy bits.
Leave it to me to find all that in a school of jellyfish.
All that to say, yes, the book I've been working on is dead, dead, dead. I'd like to say I have no clue what happened... but I do. It's kind of like picking up a book you've been hearing about. You're excited to read it. You send the kids out and settle in on the couch with a comfortable pillow and a tall glass of iced tea. And then twenty pages in you find yourself hurling that blasted book against the wall. Because. It. Sucks.
I can't even describe the suckitude this book has wrought over the past couple of weeks. And it wasn't even the normal first-draft-crap suck. It's like the entire plot took a deep breath... and then shot me the biggest raspberry it could muster. Finishing with an almighty Neener Neener. Psyche! Got ya!
So.
That's done. Now I'm cleaning up the remnants, stuffing them into a drawer, and then moving on. Some people would say it's a mistake to do that, that I should keep on keeping on. Plug away with those words. Fight through the suckitude. Meh.
The romance is dead and it's like that bad book --- why waste precious minutes, hours, days, MONTHS! of time on something that now? I can't even grasp the concept of what I was going for to begin with. I had something and then twiddled and twiddled and twiddled with the plot... until nothing was left but a character staring at me with a petulant look before rolling her eyes and saying, "Bored now."
But! I'm not staggering around like a drama-queen badly acting out an hour-long death scene so all is not lost. I have plot ideas bouncing around my head even as I type. Joy! I even spent a bit of time this evening plucking out a few of them and jotting down notes in my journal. There's one that is calling to me a little louder than the others. While I gauge its willingness to play, I think I'm going to head back to basics - writing in my journal and blogging - both of which I've been neglecting for a while now.
Sounds like a plan.
Sure enough, schools upon schools of tiny fish, crab, and shrimp were flitting about just beneath the surface. And just on the surface were twenty or thirty semi-translucent splotches. If I'm to be honest... it looked like discs of snot. "It" turned out to be "they" - something my Dad referred to as "potato jellyfish".
Digression: Okay, I have No clue why they're called potato jellyfish. I can't even find that reference anywhere on the web. My Dad's an ex surf-bum who grew up on the beach and calls all sorts of things by names I'll never figure out. They did sort of resemble flat little translucent potato chips... so Maybe I can see it? No. Not a clue. He's a strange one, sometimes, my Dad.
Anyhow. Two things were mentioned while we were watching these little flat globs seemingly float across the water: 1) If you disturb them, they glow green; and 2) if you try to pick one up, it completely falls apart and you're left with bits of slime.
That's right, it self-destructs. How about that?
Of course, in all this coolness... while the kids are ooh-ing and ahh-ing and wanting to poke at them to see them glow, all I could think was:
Those little jellyfish are my book. I poked and prodded and it glowed a pretty neon green. But then I tried to reel it in, capture it, and the whole damn thing fell apart. And now all I'm left with is a handful of slimy bits.
Leave it to me to find all that in a school of jellyfish.
All that to say, yes, the book I've been working on is dead, dead, dead. I'd like to say I have no clue what happened... but I do. It's kind of like picking up a book you've been hearing about. You're excited to read it. You send the kids out and settle in on the couch with a comfortable pillow and a tall glass of iced tea. And then twenty pages in you find yourself hurling that blasted book against the wall. Because. It. Sucks.
I can't even describe the suckitude this book has wrought over the past couple of weeks. And it wasn't even the normal first-draft-crap suck. It's like the entire plot took a deep breath... and then shot me the biggest raspberry it could muster. Finishing with an almighty Neener Neener. Psyche! Got ya!
So.
That's done. Now I'm cleaning up the remnants, stuffing them into a drawer, and then moving on. Some people would say it's a mistake to do that, that I should keep on keeping on. Plug away with those words. Fight through the suckitude. Meh.
The romance is dead and it's like that bad book --- why waste precious minutes, hours, days, MONTHS! of time on something that now? I can't even grasp the concept of what I was going for to begin with. I had something and then twiddled and twiddled and twiddled with the plot... until nothing was left but a character staring at me with a petulant look before rolling her eyes and saying, "Bored now."
But! I'm not staggering around like a drama-queen badly acting out an hour-long death scene so all is not lost. I have plot ideas bouncing around my head even as I type. Joy! I even spent a bit of time this evening plucking out a few of them and jotting down notes in my journal. There's one that is calling to me a little louder than the others. While I gauge its willingness to play, I think I'm going to head back to basics - writing in my journal and blogging - both of which I've been neglecting for a while now.
Sounds like a plan.
