The Snapshot

Snapshots.

The word is appropriate. My dad, my wife, two of my sons, and myself enjoy photography. A photograph is different from a snapshot. A photograph uses light, subject, film speed, depth of field, foreground, color, subject, and perhaps even the shot tells a story. A snapshot is just that. Something looks good and the picture is just “snapped.”

So with all the enjoyment of photography it is ironic that a snapshot has become a cherished possession. Recently I was gathering up things from the office I would no longer be using. I picked up the snapshot. To anyone else it is just a picture. A picture of myself with my 18 year old son walking along the white sandy beach of Biloxi, Mississippi a year after Katrina took the town off the map. What makes the snapshot so special is two fold and taken together gives me solace.

It was the Saturday of Labor Day weekend, 2006. We hadn’t even planned on going to the beach that day. That morning my wife and I looked at each other and knew we had to get away. So we told the kids we were taking an old fashioned trip, no iPods, Gameboys, PSPs, or DVD players. We would take a trip to the coast with each other and have some fun. So we packed a lunch, loaded the children into the van and hit the road.

We were about 15 minutes into our trip when Kevin’s cell phone rang, or rather his ring tone sounded. It was work wanting to know if he could come in that day. He told them no. I told Kevin we could take the trip on Monday and he could go into work today but he declined. We were on our way.

It was a fun trip. We sang songs, laughed, ate lunch at Sonic because Kevin had a bunch of coupons and he liked eating there. The marquee said, “There are no hurricanes in heaven.” We laughed at that. Got to the beach and chased seagulls. My wife’s camera was passed around as Kevin, Lynda, and I took turns taking pictures of things that interested us. Jelly fish, sand dollars, bird footprints in the sand, a crab. The kids making the gulls fly. Lynda snapped a shot of Kevin and me walking up the beach.

The following Saturday Kevin was fatally injured in an auto accident and passed away from his injuries a few days later. So I look at the snapshot and remember the joy that was my son. A reminder of a trip that almost wasn’t and a captured moment that brings to mind a day of fun. The snapshot is the last picture of Kevin and me together. Solace comes from having no regrets and gratitude for my wife who captures the moments with her ever present camera.

Thoughts of that day bring back good memories. I don’t remember the stories we shared, or the jokes we laughed at. I remember a pleasant day where we rode in the car entertaining ourselves because we sang songs, laughed, and enjoyed a day together with no outside entertainment from DVD’s or electronic games or zoned out in personal space with iPod headphones on tuning out each other. We were all tuned into each other. The memory is special because it was the last trip we ever took with Kevin.

A simple snapshot, a cherished moment, a reminder to live each day by enjoying the moments as they come. Life is a series of moments that are strung together like popcorn on a child’s craft necklace. As I put the snapshot into my box of things to take from my office I smile at the memories and sigh in relief, glad we decided to get away for a day. My snapshot that reminds me, at least for that day, that I have no regrets.

-- Dean C. Rich January 2008

Note: Kevin passed away 5 years ago September 12th. He has been on my mind this last week, as anniversaries tend to do. I read The Dash on The Starving Novelist's blog (Wednesday, September 14, 2011 blog entry) and it reminded me of my late son, so I thought I'd share this. This is one reason I am so passionate about how I spend my time, and remembering what is really important in your life.

Routines

You may not think of this as time management tool, but I feel a good routine can really help with the time management world.

Several Years ago I started a new job. The fellow I was replacing spent two days teaching me everything that was going on and what needed to completed. Okay, deadlines.

What I found interesting was the last day we made a list of everything that needed to be done. Then he wrote out the work week, Monday thru Friday. Then we took the tasks and put them under different days. Once all the tasks had a day then we put them in a priority on the days.

Just like that I had a schedule of things that needed to be done and when. As I started working each week then things started to become a routine.

Once the routine started working, things were getting done and I was successful. Then when curves and things that upset the routine started I was able to take them in stride and take care of those issues, and still get the main tasks completed as well.

I am currently a General Manager, and I have found a rhythm to the store. Orders, schedules, deliveries, interviews, hiring, training, and other odds and ends. So I try to set up times and days things need to happen and make a routine. Now there are always interruptions, things don’t always go according to plan. Yet making a routine helps get things done and insures the important daily things make it to the completed/done section.

Writing is and can be very sporadic. How can you take creativity and put it into a routine? As I’ve talked with other writers some things are starting to become apparent. Self discipline, and a passion about getting their stories onto paper. (Okay perhaps paper is become cliché, but it has to be written in digital or written down, but words have to be put out in some form or another I just use paper as the metaphor to get the point across.) There are things that are common, research, writing, editing, revising, beta reading, and critiquing. So a routine can be built, how it is built is up to you. There are many roads to Chicago, how you get there is your affair.

What I like best about routine is this: you can go to autopilot and things just get done. However, you must make a routine that works for you, be disciplined to make it work. Once it is working then things that must be done, do get done.

Take Care of Your Future Self – No One Else Will

This last weekend I had the opportunity to take a quick trip to visit my son, daughter-in-law, and my new grandson. Because of my time constraints with work, it was a down and back day trip. Thus a very early start, O’dark thirty. So I took the car and filled the tank. We packed what we eat for lunch. So the next morning we loaded up the family and took off. I didn’t have to stop and tank up, besides the gas station was not open yet. We were able to make our deadlines and had a great trip. One reason the trip went so well was due to some advanced preparations. My past self took care of my future self, as I like to think of it. No, I do not have a time machine; I do not control any time travel device. I’m very linier, just like the rest of us. I do try to think about what will happen later, and try to make arrangements to make things easier for myself later. I’ve made a commitment to this blog to have a tip on Thursdays. Typically, I am at work early Thursday mornings. Or I have to work late Wednesday night. Either way I do not have the opportunity to write a blog and post it Thursday. So I write the blog entry earlier in the week or, if I have time, I’ll write two or three posts, and then set them up to auto post. I meet my commitment to post weekly, and I am able to meet my other obligations. I try to do as much as I can before due dates, or put things in place for later use. I like routine where I can use routine. I change shoes and have hat, pen, and keys in the back of my car. I put them back when I am done. So when I get to work, hat, pen, shoes, and keys are ready. My old self puts things in place for my future self to use. Gas is in the car, instead of I’ll fill it tomorrow, I fill it now, so tomorrow I have a full tank. If I know I’ll have an early start the next day I try to lay out my clothes before I go to bed. I try to take care of my future self as much as I can. By doing these things, it helps me get other things done. I’ve tried to teach my children the same concept. I tell them, “Put your homework in your notebook, and put the notebook in the backpack now. Tomorrow when you are in class, you’ll open your notebook; and find the assignment is right there, ready to be turned in.” What can you do to help with your writing? Get research done, put the notes in one place. Keep your thesaurus, dictionary, and other things you need for your writing in one location. Then when you need an item, it is right there, ready for use. Take care of yourself, no one else will. If you can discipline yourself to do this, you will become more productive. With so many demands on us, anything we can do to give ourselves a bit of advantage helps. Finding the time to hammer out a few words, pages, or chapters is a challenge. So find those little things you can do to give yourself a leg up later on. You’ll find yourself thanking your past self for your foresight.

Thursday’s Time Tip: Color My World

I know, I’m borrowing Chicago’s song title, but it fits what I want to discuss today. The title, not the song.

So what do highlighters, crayons, sharpies, and outlook have in common? Lots of colors.

Several years ago I was having trouble balancing work life. (Currently having that same issue, but I am taking steps…) My boss, was also a mentor at that time. He asked to see my planner. I had it handy so I gave it to him. He opened it up and flipped through a few pages. I watched as he scanned page after page. He looked up from his study and said, “Where is a highlighter?”

“I don’t have one handy,” I replied.

He then explained to me that I should take the highlighter and mark out blocks of time that were just for me, or for the family. When I was setting dates and times for appointments don’t go into the highlighted areas. That was how to get a balance in life.

Then he said, “I just saved you $200.00. I learned that in a seminar and that was the cost of admission.”

Two hundred dollars to color your planner? Too easy. But then, why not?

So I started to block out times for myself. Block out times for the family. Block out times for work. I used different colors, but they were coded. When I started using outlook, it also had colors for different items. I could color code with it.

So, a simple tip for today. Color your world. Find your balance by blocking out times for events, and then discipline yourself to use those blocks for what you intended. There will be times when there will be interruptions, and plans go amiss, that is part of life. How you deal with them determines your character.

When and Why Moonshade Writes

I wanted to start to a huge thank you to Dean for inviting me to be a guest, and for writing a guest post on my own blog.

I met Dean through the Speculative Fiction forum on Agent Query Connect, where he is my attitude sensei. No matter what life hurls his way, I’ve never seen him react with anything less than grace and cheer, and I’m trying to incorporate that into my own life, bit by bit.

I’m a college student, an aspiring professional storyteller, and the kind of writer that jump-ropes with that delicate line between sci-fi and fantasy. I’m also about as organized as the Sahara is wet, with a legendary talent for getting distracted. There’d be days when I set aside time for writing, and instead ended up using that time to catch up on a month of missed webcomics or Cracked articles, or I really needed to catch up with my buddies on the AQC chat room, or else a friend would walk into the room and start up a conversation. That’s one of the reasons I love Dean’s blog: it’s a cure for the common me. If anybody needs regular reminders on staying organized and on task, I do—though I still have a couple of tricks up my sleeve. I’ve gotten the first drafts down on two manuscripts, and I’ve got several others in various stages along the line. I’ve got a system, you see.

Growing up, my dad more or less made a living fixing and testing computers, and from the spare parts he made gaming computers for me and my siblings. All of them in the same corner of the basement so we could pretend to have quality family time while we played our games, and only one of them could connect to the internet. When my dad needed to run tests, the designated online computer was always the first to go.

During the day it was pretty hard to do anything that actually counted as writing. As entertaining as it is to watch two boys play Baldur’s Gate and Knights of the Old Republic, all those voices, explosions, screams and battle cries can get distracting, especially when you’re trying to write a steamy love scene between the elfin prince and the angsty American teenager (There are some amazingly talented thirteen-year-old writers in this world, and I’ll be the first to admit that I wasn’t one of them.)

One night, after years of suffering from insomnia, I finally got bored with staring at my ceiling and I went downstairs to the hub of computers. The internet computer had been stolen away so my dad could test a new firewall for a client. Nobody was awake to distract me. No extra voices, no screams, no battle cries. It was just me and Microsoft Word.

I clicked away at the keys as fast as my suddenly-unhindered mind could go, and I didn’t stop until I passed out on my keyboard. The next night I played video games with my brothers until they went to bed, and then the writing began anew, and I did the same the next night. I started volunteering at the school library during study hall, where I typed my heart out on the Library Assistant’s computer between bouts of actual work.

Once I got into the habit of writing, I got more-or-less addicted to it. I wrote because I had to, because I couldn’t sleep until I got that word/phrase/character/setting/scene on a page and out of my head. When I got married and moved out, that need didn’t go away. I couldn’t type in my bedroom without waking my husband, or in the living room without waking our resident couch surfer. So I piled up my dirty laundry in one corner of the closet, shut the door, and wrote until the scene/character/phrase got out of my system and I started nodding off again.

Sometimes I’ll write on the bus, or I’ll yank out my netbook during class and write down flashes of inspiration under the guise of taking notes. Those methods work, more or less, but I’ve found that the best way to write is to put yourself in a place where there are no distractions: where you can turn off the internet and the television, where people know not to talk to you until you’ve gotten your fix of the written word. I still find that my favorite time to write is in the middle of the night, when sleep-deprivation muffles your inhibitions and your pesky inner editor, and you’re free to write until you can’t see the letters on the screen anymore.

Granted, my system works best when you’ve got something nagging at your imagination, and sometimes you just don’t. Even worse, some days you just don’t want to write at all, and even the most heartfelt attempt turns out a steaming pile of blah. That’s when I turn to editing. Maybe it’s a short story I wrote for a friend’s blog post, maybe it’s the first draft of last year’s Nanowrimo project, maybe it’s that one piece that I’ve almost got polished to the point of not making me miserable. I go through it line by line, fixing the parts that sound wrong, rewriting the sections that sound like thirteen-year-old-me came back and attacked the keyboard while I was asleep. After the first dozen pages or so of editing I’ve finally got myself back in a literary groove, and maybe—just maybe—I can go back to writing again.

Thank you so much, Dean, for the opportunity to come here and share.

Monday’s Post Marathon Musing

For the last 12 weeks I’ve been participating in the Speculative Fiction Forum’s Summer Marathon over at AQC, it ran from early June to late August. The rules: post your work, no first drafts allowed. Critique one or two other peoples work. Post on Monday. Critiques start on Tuesday through Saturday. If your chapter got more yes votes than no votes you could post your next chapter the following week. If you received more no votes than yes votes, go back, fix things, and repost your chapter.

I think there was only one marathoner who was able to post 12 chapters. I may invite her to be a guest on my blog, but I digress.

I was able to post five chapters. To be fair I did sit out two weeks (not consecutive) to work on my chapters due to the no votes and I wanted to get a yes vote. I at least got a pass after I had to do reworks.

It was great to have peers evaluate my work. They found many things that needed work. (Obviously, with only five chapters in the marathon!)

The last week of the Marathon ended Saturday. Now it is over.

I’ll miss having critiques on my chapter each week.
I’ll miss reading and critiquing the other stories. There are several I really enjoyed. (I’ll have to contact those authors and volunteer to be a beta reader for them!)
I’ll miss posting a chapter.
I’ll miss all the banter about things in the forum.

What I am taking away is a huge reality check. I entered the marathon thinking my work was stellar and ready for publication. Alas, that was not to be the case.

I received several good comments on the book. The story is sound. I learned as a writer, I have a lot of work to do. That is a hard pill to swallow. Yet, if I am to be successful, I must continue. The book will not be published if I give up.

I am guest blogging this week on Moonshade’s blog. I’ll edit this and put the link up when she posts, because I give some advice on this point in that blog post.

Suffice it to say story first. There will always be set backs in life. It is how we deal with those setbacks that will determine if we succeed and achieve our goals or if we throw in the towel and quit.

I learned a lot on how to be a better critique in the marathon. I learned that writing is tough. I knew it was, but I learned I’m not as good as I thought I was. That can change, with a lot of work. I want to see my work published, I’ll have to take what I learned and apply it. I may not be ready to query an agent yet, my work isn’t ready, yet. But it will be…

How I Organize My Day to Keep Writing Creative and Happening

Today I've invited Marsha Moore to be my guest and talk about how she manages her time.

I met Marsha on Twitter. I don't remember who followed who first, but I kept retweeting things she had to say. She would always thank me for retweeting as well. Between her tweets, and thank you's I was impressed. So I sent her a message asking if she would be interested in being a guest on my blog. She replied back that yes she would, but could she post on the 25th of August. I asked her near the start of July. So wow, that was cool, this gal is organized! As promised she delivered her post and links on Tuesday, and I've had a chance to set things up to run today. I've enjoyed working with Marsha, and she has some great things to share. So this is as much a treat for me as I hope it will be for all of you.

Take it away Marsha!


Lots of folks have told me I’m highly organized and the topic of time management is something I do enjoy. I was especially pleased when Dean asked me to be his guest and share my personal time management tips.

As a full-time writer, without any job organizing my day, hours can easily get lost or claimed by friends/family. Probably the most important thing I do to maintain my productivity is exercise. I exercise at least an hour six or more days a week. It keeps my mind alert and reduces stress from problems which inhibit my creativity. Also, my body is much more willing to sit at a keyboard after activity, almost glad for the rest break. I cycle an average of thirty miles per week, kayak for 90 minutes, attend yoga classes twice a week at a local studio, and do various other types of yoga at home on the other days. Most shake their heads in disbelief where I get such motivation. Truth is, I’ve had severe fibromyalgia for eleven years. We moved south to Tampa to alleviate much of the associated muscle pain. But for many years we had to remain in Ohio for family reasons, and my pain management changed from meds to total management with exercise. Simply, it gave me my life back. I accepted daily exercise as a way of life, and although virtually unnecessary now for pain control, I still find the other benefits extremely worthwhile.

After that constant, my daily schedule is all about fitting tasks into the best time slots. I’d love to exercise first thing in the morning, but that’s prime time for social media activity. I spend an hour or two with that, depending on what I need to promote, then I’m out the door. I also have obligations to care for my elderly mother, who lives nearby. She wears out early in the day, so evening time with her won’t work. Time with her fills mid-day, along with household chores and errands. Through the afternoon, between re-checking social media interactions, I do short writing work: editing; reviewing chapters for my crit group; writing blogs.

I find I need long spans of time to accomplish productive writing, so after dinner until bedtime is my prime writing time. I’m not one who can write anything useful in fifteen-minute spans of time. I like to submerge in my story and the lives of my characters. Fifteen-minute intervals don’t give me that “high” which I’ve become addicted to.

Reading happens last thing for an hour in bed. Many nights I wake up to find my Nook dutifully shut itself off.

One of my coolest time management tricks I just discovered is that I can read my Nook and knit at the same time. Floppy books make that multi-tasking impossible, but an e reader sits nice and still, requiring no hands. I’ve been squeezing out time to construct a couple costumes for DragonCon, coming up next week, and the tops require some knitting. In the process, I’ve been able to scratch a couple books off my TBR list.

As a beginning writer, it was difficult to find the correct rhythm for my day. I tried several different arrangements until this one stuck. I hope some of my tips help those still searching for what works.
Marsha A. Moore is a writer of fantasy romance. The magic of art and nature spark life into her writing. She is the author of the novel, TEARS ON A TRANQUIL LAKE, the first in a trilogy. Part two, TORTUGA TREASURE is contracted for release in January, 2012. Look for her first of an epic fantasy romance series, SEEKING A SCRIBE: ENCHANTED BOOKSTORE LEGENDS ONE, to be available late autumn.

Links to Marsha:

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