Oly Writer

Reading Story by Robert McKee right now. Some great new insights I think will help The Year, one being the "controlling idea." McKee says, "A Controlling Idea may be expressed in a single sentce describing how and why life undergoes change from one condition of existence at the beginning to another at the end. The Controlling Idea has to two components: Value pluse Cause. It identifies thepositive or negative charge of the story’s critical value at the last act’s climax, and it identifies the chief reason that this value has changed to its final state. The sentence composed from these two elements, Value pluse Cause, express the core meaning of the story."

I thought about this nearly all day yesterday in relation to The Year and came up with this as the two possible Controlling Ideas of the story. 1) Positive charge: Forgiveness is achieved because Price can acknowledge his guilt and forgive himself. The only forgiveness we need to be happy is our own. 2) Negative charge: Forgiveness is denied because things in Price’s past are unforgivable. We need forgiveness and acceptance of others to be happy.

Thinking about this all day made me reflect on my life. Afterall, this story–though not autobiographical–draws significantly from my experience, coming straight out of my heart. Later in the evening, I started feeling very sad. I ended up crying for an hour, filled with feelings of failure, regret, and loneliness.

I feel so fortunate to have been free all my life to select from a myrid of choices, and basically live the life I choose. But looking back, I can’t help wonder if I’d be happier now if I’d made different choice. Perhaps not. There’s no way to know where they would’ve led. A different but same place. And the future? Had I known 20 years ago I’d be here where I am now–which is not a bad place–wouldn’t it have saved me a lot of worry and stress? I’ve never been, broke, hungry, and homeless. Never been more than a phone call away from a friend’s help. I keep needing to remind myself of that yeara of unemployment. I was so worried everyday. But at the end of the year, everything turned out okay. I remember wishing I’d known it’d all work out okay at the beginning of the year so I could’ve enjoyed it more. 

Dawned on me the other day that publishers had sent back "Max Survior" and "Indrani’s Fire" and I needed to get them circulating again. While I was working on that, I got to wondering if I could find a publisher to send UFR to without an agent. Turns out a BIG one, DAW, accepts complete manuscripts without agents. So, tomorrow I’m getting UFR printed and in the mail.  

Story Summary:

Price (primary character) must go to Alice, an ex-girlfriend (primary opposition) and get her forgiveness so he can return to Olympia and have a second chance, one final grasp at the kind of happiness he had 30 years ago (his goal). Plagued by a shameful past, Price must face down his dragons as he sets out to find Alice in Olympia’s community theater labyrinth. But can he find Alice, get her forgiveness, and find the happiness he’s looking for when Alice, the gadfly eccentric queen of Olympia’s theater scene and center of Price’s past social circle, hates Price and tries to rally all the old friends against him (Alice’s goal)?

Inciting Incident: While searching for a handgun in a storage unit, Price discovers a hypnotists report from 30 years ago he’d dismissed at the time and forgotten. Reluctantly he reads it. Something in the report upsets him. He mutters, “Alice,” stuffs the gun in his coat, and heads-out.

Initial Surface Problem: Price returns to Olympia to find Alice. But Alice has not met him at the appointed place and time. He sets out to find her. (He seeks happiness and a second chance in Alice’s forgiveness.)

Story Worthy Problem: Since childhood, Price has been in state of denial about hating his sister. He’s riddle with guilt and self-hatred. He believes only a very bad people would hate their sister (even though he has amble reasons). Subconsciously, he can’t understand why Alice loves him. He’s a bad person. So there must be something wrong with Alice. What kind of woman would love a man who hates his sister? He is such a loathsome person. However, Price can only find the peace and happiness he seeks by forgiving himself and accepting the fact that hating his sister doesn’t make him a bad person. 

Price fumbles a crumbly old box that breaks. A cascade of file folders fall out. He ignores them.

He spots a box, labeled, “Snug,” and rips it open. He pulss out a brown paper bag, and from it a handgun. He plops down on a short stack of boxes and holds the gun in his hand, staring at it. He sits and stares. His stare falls beyond his hand on a folder fallen among others on the floor, labeled with the name of a hypnotist. He stares at it blankly for a while, tries to ignore it, then, finally, reluctantly picks it up and opens it. At the top of the first page it reads, “Findings. March 3, 1982. Subject: Price Taylor. Age 32. Treatment for Nail Biting.”

Price reads the two page report. He blinks rapidly, mouth set in a hard line. His chin falls into his hand as he re-reads. Tears well in his eyes. After the third reading he lets the report drop from his hand and to the floor.

“Shit. Shit.” He rubs the sudden ache in the back of his neck.  

He sits for a long time. The sun is setting along a flat, heat simmering horizon. He puts the gun back in the bag, then in his pocket. He stands and stares at the last angry red glow of the sun as it sinks below the straight edge horizon. Buzzards circle in the distance.

Knocked 33 pages of notes down to 19 yesterday. Had some good ideas along the way I feel tighten up the plot. 

Decided to review Edgerton’s chapter on the story-worthy problem in "Hooked." Started reading and decided, it’s such good advice, I wanted to scan it into a Word document I could annotate. I’m going to finish that today. I want to nail-down, unequivocally, what the story-worthy and initial surface problems are before I launch into the first draft. It’s going to be hard enough weaving the three stories together without it clear what these are.

My Heart in my thoughts much these last days since I found that beautiful, haunting Eurythmics song, a constant sound-track in my mind, reminding me how nice it feels to be In Love. I suspect there’s 99% chance this will not end happily for me, but, for now, it’s just good to feel love for someone. And what is hope if not 1%?

Work sporadically on the outline yesterday. Consolodated several separate files of notes into one. Going to work though the results today to clean it up. Get ready to finish the final outline this week. And since everyone else is taking Monday off, I’m going to work on the novel all day tomorrow.

I have a very good idea what this story is about now. I sat outside yesterday in the very beautiful afternoon, closed my eyes, and saw the novel running like a movie in my mind. My greatest fear, though, is I don’t have the talent to write the story I’m seeing. I’d love to do it as a movie. Maybe I will.  

Got off on the wrong foot yesterday morning. Irritated for taking that damn FB IQ test. Took it again to get a less embarrassing normal score, but that one wouldn’t publish. IQ tests are bullshit at my age. I’m obviously not a genius, just over educated. 

Didn’t make any progress on the story outline yesterday, and a little shakey getting started this morning. Emails going back and foreth with SSEA over priorities. 

Regardless, did get some work done. Wrote this little piece of dialogue:

Price turned to Alice. “Today made me think about how incredibly, impossibly, improbable it is for us to be standing here right now having this conversation.”

“What’d you mean?”

“All the decisions we’d made, big and small, all our lives, any one of which could’ve changed the course of events, and we’d be somewhere else right now. And not just our decisions, our parents’ decisions when we were growing up. One fateful decision, and we might be anywhere on this planet, or not at all.”

“Dead?”

“Never existed.  We exist—who we are—because a specific egg and specific sperm met. Any other egg or sperm and we wouldn’t exist right now. And all the decision our parents made that brought them together at that specific time for that specific sperm to fertilize that specific egg. And everyone one of the millions of specific matings that had to happen just as they did going back all the way to the beginning of life on the planet. And beyond that, all the things over billions of years that had to fall together just right for our solar system and planet to form as that did. It’s mind-boggling to think of all the things that had to happen, every decision that everyone one of our progenitors made going back to the beginning that had to happen exactly as they did in order for us to be here.” 

 This dialogue comes at the climax of the story. I’m thinking it encapsulates a basic theme of the story.

So, this is current "working" Story Summary:

Price (the main character) has come back to Olympia to see if it’s possible for find forgiveness, a second chance, and one final grasp at the kind of happiness he had 30 years ago (his goal). Hiding a shameful secret, Price must face down the dragons of his past as he sets out into Olympia’s community theater labyrinth to find Alice (primary opposition). But can he find the happiness he’s looking for when Alice, the gadfly eccentric queen of Olympia’s theater scene and center of Price’s past social circle, hates Price and tries to rally all the old friends against him (Alice’s goal)?

There are currently three stories being told. The primary one is in the present: Price’s search around Olympia for Alice. The second is the history of Price and Alice in Olympia’s community theater. The third is Price’s relationship with a sister, and how that ruined his relationship with Alice. 

I anticipate telling the second story about Alice and the community theater mostly in complete scenes in separate chapters with some instant flashbacks during the main storyline. But the third story will be told mostly in quick bursts of memory nested within Price remembering his relationship with Alice. In the present, he is piecing together how his relationship with his sister ruined his relationship with Alice.   

My fear is, I don’t have the writing talent to successfully (uniquely?) tell this story. 

I didn’t get the houseboat. It would’ve been fun, but, really, not very practical. I’m now moved into a big, new house out on Mud Bay with three other mature, working men. It feels much better than where I came from.

So, yesterday was my first day of somewhat "normal" routine. I got back to work for the Estuary Association after nearly two weeks. That’s no problem. I’ve already done four times the hours I’ve been paid for, and expect that will be the case by the end of this month.

For the first time since moving downtown, I got up earlier (though not as early as I will be soon) to work on "The Year I Began Biting My Nails." The plan is to sketch in an outline until June. Then on June 1, I’m going to nanowrimo a first draft in 30 days. Then from July to November I’m going to go through as many revisions as I can, with the goal of being ready for a final draft at the end of October. I’d like to do a first draft of a story I’m calling "Klaatu" during the next Nanowrimo in November. Klaatu will be Klaatu’s back story, and what happens when he leaves earth to return home.