U is for Undo

I'm hanging in there with the annual A-to-Z Blogging Challenge. For more information on the challenge and its creator visit:   http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com

If you're just tuning in to my A to Z postings, my theme is home renovation. We just renovated our house--a job that was supposed to last from four to six weeks.

We've spent a lot of money on our renovation. Unfortunately, we have less storage space (and more boo-boos) now than we did before Mr. Contractor got started. So, that being said, I have to admit that I'm not at a place--mentally/emotionally--where I really love what's been done. With the exception of the bookcases and my dining room, I'd UNDO much of what was done. I'm trying to be appreciative and thankful. Maybe later--once I've licked my wounds and forgotten the name of the contractor.

Is there anything you'd UNDO--that really can't be undone? How'd you deal with it? Share with me.

R is for Roughing it and Roughing it in!

I'm hanging in there with the annual A-to-Z Blogging Challenge. For more information on the challenge and its creator visit:   http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com.

Mr. Contractor made renovation sound so incredibly easy. Oh, yeah, easy for him. He could go home to a clean, organized house, while hubby and I holed up in the back bedroom, trapped like rats.

For months, we ate every meal out. It sounds like a woman’s dream to not cook but it gets old. Eating out is more fun when it's my choice—not mandatory.

As for clothes ... we couldn’t find a thing. Everything we owned was in boxes, piled in a stack on a bed, or in the middle of a floor. When Mr. Contractor was ready to demolish a particular room, we had to move all our piled up clothes to another room, one he’d finished. To date, I haven’t even found all my clothes because we still haven't unpacked boxes or organized our closets. Maybe my missing items ran off with my washroom doors!

While we were roughing it, Mr. Contractor was roughing it in. He built walls and tore some out. He had a good laugh about how my dining room had a weird opening that led into our den, and talked me into letting him enclose it. Do you think a contractor should make fun of his client's home?

I guess his enclosure actually made the den and the dining area seem larger--though it wasn't on my list of things to do. But neither were a few other things. Our little contractor took some liberties, and I'll tell you about one of them on S day.  See you then!

 

Is Your Story Structurally Sound? So What!

There’s always something to watch outside my hotel window when I come to Houston. Once I watched a window washer and thought about putting a heroine in such a job.  Yesterday, I watched the demolition of the 70 year old Young Men’s Christian Association. I always feel sad when I see old buildings torn down. (There was no good reason for this building to be torn down but there was a reason.) Lots of history floating through the air in the form of dust. Looking at this one, I wondered about all the lives touched inside those walls. What are their stories, their memories?

The YMCA served the city of Houston for 125 years—evolving and changing into what new generations needed. Built in the Italian Renaissance architectural style (according to their website), the building they’re demolishing had beautiful interior rock walls and painted beam ceilings. It had a dorm for 270 men, an assembly hall and 19 classrooms. There were two gyms and six handball courts, an indoor pool, and much more. Now, it’s time for a change and the new YMCA is built.

(I’m too sentimental, I guess. You'd think as much as we've moved around, I wouldn't have ties to anything, be nostalgic at all.)

Watching the wrecking crew strategically bump, swat and grab to bring the structure down, I thought about my novel. In my mind’s eye, I’m the person maneuvering that wrecking crane. Crashing, pulverizing all that back story and narrative and fluff—until it’s a distant memory —a sentence here and a thought there that only hints of conflict past and conflict to come.

There might be some beautiful ‘history’ in that back story but it doesn’t work.

That’s what rewriting is—changing, evolving, making the story stronger. We have to be like chefs—the right seasoning, sprinkled throughout the novel judiciously like Tony Chachere’s Creole Seasoning. We have to be like wrecking crews, aiming at and demolishing just the right spot so that we can rebuild with the talent of the finest construction worker. We have to be like architects, designing a story that’s perfect for readers at just the right time in their lives, something that will last for years to come in someone’s memory or on someone’s bookshelf.

The following quote spoke to me today:

. . . writing is like cooking is like painting is like sculpture is like music is like gardening is like tying flies is like carving is like making bread is like making wine is like singing is like dancing is like cooking is like writing . . . ~Ev Bishop

I agree. And a whole lot more.