Category — Inspiration

The Space Shuttle Challenger exploded this day in 1986. In a few years, my son will probably have to come home and ask us where we were when certain historical events happened. He and the kids in his class will not believe that their parents could remember exactly what they were doing last week let alone years and years ago.

I was in 7th grade and we were out of school that day because of snow. I was watching “The Price is Right” and putting my dishes in the sink after having a late breakfast of pancakes when the CBS Special Report flashed on. I watched TV all day after that.

I also remember one other part of that day.

Tonight is The State of the Union Address, which will most likely be another laundry list of things that won’t come to pass and one that few will remember. It’s difficult to remember the last SotU speech that actually had something both memorable and positive in it.

I do remember Reagan’s speech that day 21 years ago and that still-famous line:

We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and “slipped the surly bonds of Earth” to “touch the face of God.”

That speech was written by Peggy Noonan and certainly was a career-maker for her. As writers, we hope for even a single, inspired day like that. Regardless of what you think of Reagan, he knew how to deliver the words his speechwriters gave him.

The quoted pieces come from the poem “High Flight” by John Gillespie Magee, Jr. Magee died at the age of 19 in World War II. This is easily his most famous poem, though few outside the aviation world have ever heard of him.

Click the above link, scroll down, and read the entire poem. There’s a reason why it means something special to military aviators everywhere.

Continuing the tradition started by “It was a dark and stormy night,” the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest gives writers the chance to write (intentionally) the worst possible opening line of an imaginary novel.

You may spend countless hours at your desk believing your writing is the worst ever put down on paper or pixel. As long as this contest exists, you can rest assured that something out there is worse.

Here are the 2007 ‘winners’ along with more information about the contest.

It looks like entries for the 2008 contest are due April 15. Go intentionally write something bad and enter!

If you’re like me, you write better with music playing in the background. I generally opt for music that doesn’t require much of my attention but still serves to get my creative juices flowing. For me, classical, techno, piano, and movie scores typically work best. Music I’ve listened to so much that I have it memorized (like U2 or Union Station) works well, too.

While my iTunes library could play for weeks without repeating, I need some variety to get me moving sometimes. That’s why discovering Pandora was a revelation.

Their stable of “musician-analysts” have taken their musical expertise and created an endless catalog of “if you like this artist, I bet you’ll love this song from this similar artist” choices. You enter artists you like and Pandora’s engine creates “stations” for each.

Each station contains music they think matches the style of the artist you entered. And they are very good at getting this right. Many of the artists are ones I’ve never heard of, which is a brilliant way to broaden people’s musical horizons.

All this, and it’s free. After a few hours of music you’ll need to create a free account to keep listening, but that hardly seems an issue for what you get in return.

Due to the byzantine rules of music copyrights, you don’t get standard song controls like rewind and you can’t go back to the beginning of a song and listen again. If you like a song and want to buy it somewhere later, make a note of it. I’m sure that’s a major part of how Pandora funds itself. It’s great advertising for musicians whose music appears on your stations.

Learn more on their About Pandora page.

After you write for a while, you’ll read something you wrote months or years ago and think, “What on earth was I thinking?!”

If what you think is a total dog didn’t get any farther than a journal or a few paragraphs on your computer, hang on to it and don’t worry about it. Many times we have to write complete garbage to get to where the gold is. I still believe that no writing is ever wasted, even if you think you probably were wasted when you wrote it.

If your imagined dog got loose in the wild, either by being published or because a client paid you, taking it out of your portfolio or just letting it go are always options. Often what you wrote isn’t as bad as you think, though. Good writers are their own worst critics.

Right now I’m dealing with what I think is particularly frustrating. When you go to edit or rewrite the next version of something a client paid you for in the past and you fully believe it’s not worth the pixels that gave their lives for it in the first place, then you get really depressed. I’m rewriting a short software help library right now that makes me question my sanity from when we originally wrote it.

It’s challenging material to document, but it’s even worse when you wonder whether you should check yourself into the writers mental hospital for being the one who committed this stuff to the screen. It’s sad when the most important thing isn’t releasing the software but making sure this gets rewritten well and quickly so in case I’m struck dead by a car, this stuff won’t still be out there as part of my dubious life story.

Postscript – I did get over this, accepted it as a learned lesson, and plowed into a rewrite. Every passionate writer has to go through this progression of emotions. You go back to the page and work at it; you have no other choice. You’re a writer after all, and not going back to it is like giving up breathing.

Now, back to it!

I published a set of beliefs and statements on my web site that define much about who I am and what I believe about my work. Feel free to read the My Philosophy or Feel Good About Hiring Me sections.

I’m including a few more here. Maybe these are like the deleted scenes bonus section!

• Having a child has made me a better writer and designer. My son makes me pay attention to every little thing, and then name it 42 times. He’s wise beyond his years, too.
• Coffee makes the world a better place. Fair trade coffee makes it even better.
• The optimal temperature for writing and designing is about 74 degrees Fahrenheit. A slight northerly breeze helps.

People ask me how I manage working from home and being a stay-at-home parent. It’s not easy. I don’t really have a typical workday. The list below is more the good life stuff that flows in and through my work projects. Remembering them keeps me feeling good about how the chaos is working out these days.

• I walk to work, which consists of approximately eight steps. My carbon footprint is low. My web site is carbon neutral thanks to offsets.
• I take breaks by reading to my son and taking him out for a walk.
• I make an ongoing game out of trying to recycle everything in the house.
• I listen to Garrison Keillor every day and try to pass on a bit of his goodness to others.
• I don’t have a personal trainer.
• I can recite Dr. Seuss’s ABCs book by memory.
• I’m on pace to memorize a half-dozen Sandra Boynton books by year’s end. She may now be the torch-bearer for the Seussian tradition.

What are the little things that seep into your day that make you feel better about it?

Um, O-What-U? Oh Taco?

Otaku is my new favorite noun, and it isn’t even from English. I’ve yet to discover an equivalent word in our language. It’s powerful, it’s fundamental, and it even sounds beautiful.

The legendary science-fiction author William Gibson used the word otaku to mean “passionate obsessive”. If you have a profound passion for something, and you can’t imagine doing anything else except devoting your life to the full expression of this passion, then you have discovered what you are otaku about.

I am writing otaku. I may also be word otaku, information otaku, and language otaku, but you get the point. I am passionate about bringing words to life. Whether it’s a web site, letter, story, brochure, book, or a grocery list, I am writing otaku. Give me a pen and a pad of paper and all will be right with the world. Just check on me to make sure I eat regular meals.

Otaku was once a negative term that meant you were obsessive about something to the point of ignoring all the other people who occupy this Earth with you. If you’ve ever gotten so wrapped up in something you love doing that the rest of the world melts away, you may realize that this isn’t the worst thing someone can say about you. The world is realizing that celebrating a deep passion for something should be our aim. To be otaku is to find your purpose in this world.

The great theologian Frederich Buechner referred to your true vocation in life as where your deep gladness meets the world’s deep need. If you work in a cubicle and hate your job with the Boring Widget Company making a trivial product that a zillion other companies make but no one really needs, you probably haven’t found your true vocation. Don’t feel bad; you have a lot of company.

Two otaku working together – even if they love different things – is a powerful combination. My mission is to help people tell the world what they are otaku about. Not surprisingly, most people I work with are otaku about things other than writing. That’s why I love my work. I get to hear about what people love to do and then help them find the best ways to keep doing it successfully.

Now here’s the real question. What are you otaku about?