Out on a Limb

I am terrible with making titles for these things.
Anyway!

I did start Mulan's story, in first person POV, and although my first part is rather short, I've gotten some great reviews from my friends. If you'd like to read it, go to the tab "My Stories" and there's a link. Also, the "What's New" tab is like a little mini diary for me, so if you ever want to see that, just click and enjoy.

Okay, housekeeping aside, I'm going to talk to you about my insecurity in writing. You know that feeling, while you're sitting there, that big, empty, blank page staring you in the face, that page that has the magical ability to wipe your mind of any confidence you felt, to make you second-guess your plot, or your character, or anything, really. What a lot of people don't realize is that it takes a lot of courage to write. You sometimes have to go out on a limb, a fragile limb, and just pick a plot point and run with it. If it works, great! You succeeded. If it doesn't work, if it's stupid, or jerky, or unrealistic, then that's okay too. Backspace and start over. It takes a lot of courage sometimes to admit that you didn't succeed, that you either need a fresh start or some help from a fellow author friend.
That makes me think a lot about life. Sometimes, you have to take the risk of failure. And that's one of the things that is most difficult for me. Sometimes it's hard to make friends, or try something new, or just strike up a conversation, because that fear of utterly crashing and burning is always present. Sometimes that risk pays off, sometimes it's just stupid, jerky, and uncomfortable.
Writing relates a lot to life in general. Last night with my family, we watched a movie called Her Alibi. It's about a man who writes mystery novels, and bases the detective, the main character, on himself. In the movie, he's experiencing writer's block, so he goes to the court room to get realistic ideas, when a murder case comes up. The accused is a beautiful woman that he falls in love with at first sight. Throughout the whole movie, he's trapped between thinking that she's an innocent woman and that she wants to murder him to seal her alibi, the alibi he gave her. Throughout the movie, he's working on a new novel. The plot of his book correlates to the events and feelings of his own experience with the woman he's provided with an alibi. The book ends up being a best seller, but while he's writing it, he has to keep missing deadlines, insisting that he doesn't know how it ends yet, because he doesn't know how his own story ends.
Sometimes it makes me consider how my story ends, because I don't know the plan for my life, I don't know the ending. Sometimes I wish that I did know, that my life is like the books I (attempt to) write, and that I know, if not every detail, at least the basic plot points in my life. But I don't. I just have to take what life throws at me.
That all goes back to that blank page staring you in the face. You have to take what your characters throw at you. Sometimes you don't need to plan, what you need is to really listen to those characters that live inside you. Sometimes you have to really consider what would the character do in the situation, and not what the character should do or what the character needs to do to make the ending like you want it. Sometimes you have to take the risk of changing the game plan.

Well, that's what I've got. Hope you enjoyed it, drop me a comment or two, and while you're add it share my blog to your circles, hmm?
Good luck with your metaphorical tree limbs,
~Mimi Gordon