Is it possible

[hmmnmm]

Just want to make a public statement.
After nearly five months here, after posting stories, pulling them down, seeking advice, fumbling with everything, submitting new ideas, resubmitting former; after untold days and nights in anguish, I think I just wrote a half-decent work that is commonly called Stroke. I'm sure it is not a master - stroke piece. But it is the first time I have felt this way about a piece. It's like things finally fell together and it feels fantastic. I mean, I got the idea, sat down and in two hours I called it complete (it's short, but with a beginning, middle, ending, and no plot). As far as editing, I only did the most minimal, then went and submitted it. Probably has mechanical flaws - but the Feeling...the feeling is there that has been missing from other works... the first time after all these attempts that the feeling was there.
Is it just a fluke? Or does it just take time and work and then one moment you say, "Aha! I can do this!" and then you want to get to the next one.

No coercion for replies to this Thread. It was something that felt necessary to tell the world.

Thanks.

 

[BlackShanglan]

I think you're right. That is, whatever one's writing goals, practice moves one toward them. At first it's blurry, and it's difficult to tell what one is doing or whether it works, or what indeed is happening. Eventually it becomes more clear. I won't suggest that I've made great achievements in the world of literature, but I can see that my last two stories are clearly better than some of my early ones, and I did have that "Aha!" moment with the last one. I felt that I had really passed an important milestone. I think I'm right, as well - at least, I'm not the only one who thinks it an improvement on previous efforts. It's good to know that the effort pays off.

Shanglan

 

[CharleyH]

Fab, love

 

[hmmnmm]

Someone suggested trying first person narrative and i tried it and saw how it helped to keep the unfolding of events on track. Instead of an intimidating labor it was almost as if it wrote itself. Of course, time (one week nowadays?) will tell the results, but even if they are mediocre it feels like trying and trying to learn a musical instrument or a language and just not getting it, but then one day... ah! I played a song! A simple song, but a song!

 

[Belegon]

Congrats bro! It is a special feeling the first time it just flows like that....

 

[Rubyb]

Capturing the feeling is priceless.

Congratulations!

 

[Guest]

It's like things finally fell together and it feels fantastic. I mean, I got the idea, sat down and in two hours I called it complete (it's short, but with a beginning, middle, ending, and no plot).

You go! It's such a cool feeling when the story suddenly emerges. Personally, I think writing's as much about clearing the crap out of the way as anything else. Practice certainly helps, but when the story's there, the story's there.

 

[gotwood49]

...it was almost as if it wrote itself.

Every once in awhile a story comes together like that. When it happens, get it down, re-read it once for glaring errors, and get it submitted!

If it gets good comments, get yourself a bottle of wine and maybe an eclair, and celebrate...then give yourself some time before going on to the next one, because you'll definitely want to duplicate the first, and it ain't gonna happen...I know.

Of course, if it flops...

Hey, ain't many Shakespeares out here, are there?

(...myself, I always wanted to be e. e. cummings...)

Write on!!!

 

[Guest]

Every once in awhile a story comes together like that. When it happens, get it down, re-read it once for glaring errors, and get it submitted!

If it gets good comments, get yourself a bottle of wine and maybe an eclair, and celebrate...then give yourself some time before going on to the next one, because you'll definitely want to duplicate the first, and it ain't gonna happen...I know.

Of course, if it flops...

Hey, ain't many Shakespeares out here, are there?

(...myself, I always wanted to be e. e. cummings...)

Write on!!!

wine and eclair? ohmiword!
i always wanted to be dear abby...heloise at the very least... *heavy sigh*

 

[dr_mabeuse]

I still remember the first poem I ever wrote. I wanted to write poetry, I had friends who wrote poetry, but everytime I tried it was like trying to build a doghouse out of words.

Then one night it came to me. It was about emotion. Words and images carry emotion. That was something I knew, but hadn't known how to do before, and once it broke upon me, everything followed.

It's just like learning an instrument. You squawk and squeak and practice and can't seem to work the fucking thing, and then one day music comes out and you can't believe how easy it is.

I still look for that in stories: getting to that point where you're riding those emotions like a train on a track made of words. It's just like playing music. It feels so good.

hmmnmm's got one of the weirdest and most original minds in Lit. If he ever manages to bring it all together, I predict some truly strange and remarkable things.

 

[SeaCat]

How well I know the feeling you're talking about. I have two large looseleaf binders filled with stories I wrote a while back, but they always semed so stiff and contrived even to me. Hell the first story I submitted ehre felt that way to me. Then on the second I was writing and whoa, it all seemed to click. I was having fun writing that story.

That was my breakthrough. I realized I had been writing for the wrong reasons, I was writing for other people. When I started writing for myself it started being fun, and my stories impoved. (My spelling didn't though. )

Now when I sit down to write I have fun with it. I'm not saying it's easy, but it's fun. With every story I learn more about writing and how I want to write, so my stories keep improving, but I'm just writing for my enjoyment.

Congrats and don't ever lose the feeling.

Cat

Oh and by the by, I have to mirror Vella's sentiment. Wine and an Eclaire?

 

[hmmnmm]

You're all so wonderful.
But now I get nervouse because on looking at that pivotal piece in question (it's barely 1500 words) I already see where one paragraph should have been two or three, etc... and you know, I've dabbled with other writings where the tendency to wander and lift and float away is a bit more forgivable and for some humor it can work. But it's been a struggle to get out of that tendency for the purpose of erotica/porn. And trying a short piece in first person seems to have helped - a lot. Now, just in case anybody notices new stories by hmmnmm in next several days - those aren't what I'm talking about. They are older ones reworked - that editing down exercise.
And actually while the feeling was still fresh I went onto another I think is better than the one I was so happy about. The feeling seems to have petered out just a couple hours ago. But it at least feels POSSIBLE. And that's worth something.
There was more but I forget... maybe later.
You're all great. And you've been very patient and helpful.

 

[gauchecritic]

You think this feels good? Wait until next year, after you've written several hundred stories and accrued more H's than you can shake a red pencil at and then re-read this first one that was in the groove.

OK you'll see every single misplaced comma, every spelling mistake, every paragraph that should have been pulled out by the roots but you'll still have the feeling "I wrote that."

 

[carsonshepherd]

I still look for that in stories: getting to that point where you're riding those emotions like a train on a track made of words. It's just like playing music. It feels so good.

I love these words.

I wanted to play music... I wanted to be a virtuoso at something, completely lose myself in it. Writing is the closest I'll ever get. And like music it takes practice... eventually you learn where every note should go, how each flows into the other, without questioning it. You don't know how you know. You just know.

 

[hmmnmm]

You think this feels good? Wait until next year, after you've written several hundred stories and accrued more H's than you can shake a red pencil at and then re-read this first one that was in the groove.

OK you'll see every single misplaced comma, every spelling mistake, every paragraph that should have been pulled out by the roots but you'll still have the feeling "I wrote that."

I actually did have an H once. It was the one H among list of about seven or eight stories... I'd heard about these 1-bombers but never thought I would have to worry about them... but then after a coulpe weeks that one H plummeted over night - literally. I was like, "wow, thanks, man. Really sweet whoever you are."

There's two sides to the H issue which I will not go into here because it belongs elsewhere I think.
Thanks again...

 

[hmmnmm]

For what it's worth, the piece that started this thread is now up
http://english.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=198136
Being by now more or less ambivalent about H's I have still been amused and surprised that this one has been like a wavering gauge needle right on that line where it could go H or not. The funny thing about it, they put it in Lesbian category and I wrote it in first person. No big deal if nobody really checks this piece out (I think the better one is yet on pending status) but if you do, it's very short, shouldn't take much of your time. I know it is not High Literature. But if it at least begins to approach the stairway to effective stroke work, that's all I care to know for now. When/if I can get a handle on the stroke idea then there would be that sense of leeway. Something like that