Part 1 Confessions: Struggling with Writer’s Fear

April 1, 2014 / Ajmorse / 1 Comment

Something that I’ve been avoiding writing about for awhile now…

And that is about Fear…or, most importantly, about MY FEAR.

A writer’s fear. Yikes. A crippling phobia that leads to self doubt, blank pages and writer’s block. I am so worried about whether or not my writing will be good or not, and I don’t get anything written.

If you all remember, back in August, I purchased Writer’s Market 2014 with much excitement and enthusiasm, all with the intention of moving myself forward on the path of freelancing and writing as a way to make a living.

I thumped the gigantic book on my desk and then stared at it apprehensively for a few minutes. (No lie.) With a deep breath, I managed to page through the first few pages, and then I pushed it aside, opened up Pandora and started listening to something soothing. Query letters? Submissions? Deadlines? Limits?

Words that didn’t seem intimidating before were suddenly hitting me in the face. Where was my inhaler again? Where was this all coming from?

So, I thought. And I thought some more.

All these questions buzzed through my head: How do I make the submission process, editing and proof-reading work for me? What are my goals? Do I have any? What will bring me satisfaction? What do I want to write and where do I want to send it to?

Wait a minute, self. Slooww down.

I need to keep constantly reminding myself: everyone has their own way of dealing with something. As writers, we should remember that each of us has our own style and that can be applied in all that we do. No one is the same, embrace it!

Also the most important thing right now: Write, Write, Write! (<<<Something that I will keep reminding myself no matter what! How am I to succeed if I don’t try?)

In the next few days, I will be doing some of my own research to help counteract this weight on my shoulders, and on my chest. I will succeed as a writer. I just have to have the courage to face my own fears!

No April Fool’s jokes for me today, too much to do! Stay tuned for Part 2: My ways to Counteract Writer’s Fear!

Laundry, a menial chore – a nice journaling opportunity!

March 9, 2014March 10, 2014 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

Moved to a new place in the last few months, and the building we are living in doesn’t have laundry on site, so every week or so I must make that dreaded trip to the laundromat. I hate doing laundry, and I hate laundromats, but the last time I brought my journal along and it gave me this somewhat amusing (if a bit depressing) journal entry:

3/5/14

I hate the sound of a laundromat. The way everyone’s laundry bumps up and down and goes every which-way, it makes me feel like there’s a hovercraft nearby, the rinsing and the swooshing, the quick, jagged vibrating of a laundry load full of jeans. The heavy slosh of an empty washer only half-full, only half used.

The dryer doors that fly open in mid-spin on a whim, flinging out their contents…be free undies…be free towels…be free…

Then there is the final rinse, the final spin, the heavy drone of a washer that bids you to keep waiting, groans and shudders, waiting….waiting…wait. One final spin, a heavy moan and then it shudders. It’s done.

How disturbing that washing clothes sounds like sex on paper, but it’s not like that at all.

Doing laundry is not sexy. It is the un-sexed, the final hangnail, the equivalent of having a migraine with a piercing light shining down on you.

It is like finding a stain on your favorite t-shirt, drumming your steering wheel in long lines of traffic, a fly buzzing in your ear, diarrhea, a sink full of dirty dishes, an open wound, the stink and the squelch of feet stuck in cold mud.

It is that raw, open feeling of words not said, of empty spaces, of regrets that come flying back in crowds of laughing, boisterous people. It’s like realizing you’ve forgotten something very important, and that dread of forgotten assignments…a pop-quiz, a failed class, the feeling of social paranoia. It is that trapped, dizzying realization that no one is coming to rescue you – life really comes with disappointments, heart ache and hurts.

And no one is going to rescue you from the overwhelming joyless feeling of living sometimes. Sometimes, all you can do is feel lost in the hullabaloo of it. Sometimes all you can do is look around hopelessly at the blank, wide-eyed, too-beautiful people and hope that they won’t notice that you might smell like prey to their eyes, that you might be that one person that might make this second of their lives a little more entertaining.

But ah, I digress – laundry. That menial chore that reminds you that there are other hopeless people in the world around you. You may think that you smell like roses most of the time, but in the end of it…eventually, all your clothes smell like shit. And that’s enough to bring dread to anyone.

Yeah, I really hate laundry. One day, when I’m rich and famous, I’ll hire someone to do it for me. But for now, it keeps me with the realization, and reminds me that no one is perfect – myself included.

Inspiration in the dead of winter – the beauty of old things

January 1, 2014 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

It’s snowing here in upstate New York, (which isn’t surprising) and I’m ringing in the new year slightly hung over, but with a positive spirit. This is going to be the year that I’m going to get published! Doesn’t matter what, and doesn’t matter where or when, I will see my name in print in some form of publication and that’s that!

And despite the cold, the winter reminds me that a writer can find beauty in the most stagnant things. I often chaff at being cooped up inside and whine about the air that bites and dries the skin, but some days the sun does come out and you see the snow, white against the trees…

You notice the blue of a frozen lake or pond…find the joy in a bit of gurgling water in a creek…and you wonder why it always sounds louder when icicles are dripping nearby, as if the rest of the frozen woods are holding their breath…

The sun came out the other day and I was able to go out walking and took these pictures. In the ravine next to my house, there is an old junkyard. And where there is an old junkyard, you will find old things:

Like the hood off a 1950 green Buick that my father says he remembers having as a child.

I was inspired by an article I saw that showed the beauty of abandoned places, how old things feel haunting, have a sense of mystery, a story of their own to tell.

Walking in the woods, I often find inspiration in the beauty around me, the sights, the sounds, the fresh air and blue sky. (This might also be why I love fantasy novels so much.) But inspiration is all around us – even in the dead of winter! You just have to open your eyes and see it!

What inspires you? Share something if you got it! Any New Years resolutions anyone?

A kaleidoscope of Love – show your holiday spirit!

December 1, 2013December 1, 2013 / Ajmorse / 1 Comment

There’s been something on my mind lately and that is Love.

Art done on Paint; by AJM

What is it exactly?

A discussion in one of my college classes about love suggested that love can be varying. We were talking mostly about the love that you feel towards someone – how someone described as being in love as a sacrifice of themselves, to be so consumed by another person, you forget who you are.

To love someone is to put that other person before you, to care that they hurt, to want to make their passage in this world as easy as possible.

So, the question on my mind is: How do you know when it’s real?

Even as I write this, I find it ironic that every other song on my Pandora station has to do with love, or even has the word in the song. Love is everywhere. It is in the very fabric of our being; to find that place where we belong, where we are appreciated, where we are needed.

In my opinion, it is simple, really. We seek to define love to understand it. We give it different meanings and write different definitions for it. But real love shouldn’t need to be defined, it is only felt. Whether it makes sense or not, is beyond the point.

With real love we risk real heartbreak, but it is a sacrifice that everyone must accept to find where he or she truly belongs.

Me and my cat Milo, when he was a kitten. What a goofball!

On that note, I’ve decided to focus on something else this holiday season…and that is giving gifts to show the ones I love how truly thankful I am to be known by them, to love and be loved.

Every year I struggle with Christmas and the fact that it is so commercialized! (I blame the years I worked in retail. Thanksgiving is by far my favorite holiday!) I’d decided to do a few things to bring myself back into the holiday spirit and to focus on the love and selflessness that the holiday is meant to show:

make my own gifts this year; instead of focusing on buying, buying, buying
bake more!
cherish the memories, never miss a photo opportunity!
try more outdoor activities

What are you doing to get into the holiday spirit? Thoughts below if you got them!

Saturday Morning Food Post

February 16, 2013 / Ajmorse / 2 Comments

Saturday Morning yummyness of the day:

Strawberry-Vanilla pancakes garnished with whipped topping and sliced strawberries; with a side of fried egg with melted sharp cheddar cheese on top.

It’s important that writers have other creative hobbies, and I’ve decided making good food is mine!

What’s yours?

Making good food, a boost to healthy writing

January 19, 2013 / Ajmorse / 2 Comments

What’s for breakfast today? Or rather Brunch…(I never was a big breakfast eater.)

French toast with syrup, sprinkled with powdered sugar and orange slices. Yum!

Since I started this new job, I’ve been appreciating my weekends more and more, and lately it has become a Saturday morning ritual – where I’ve liked to make something special, something that I don’t normally get the time to make during the week.

My online creativity class emphasizes how important it is for a writer to have other hobbies and I agree! It’s refreshing, because it allows you to take a break from the pressure of writing, and all the anxieties that sometimes comes with it. (Writer’s block, time management, writer’s fear, etc.) Here’s how to start: find something that you find relaxing and fun and just do it!

Although I’m not the cook in the family, I like being creative and making food that looks and tastes good, well, what can be wrong with that? 🙂 This is my NEW hobby. What’s yours?

Happy Saturday everyone!

The House On Mango Street

November 11, 2012 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

Every writer has a moment where it all began. That point in their lives, where they were 10, or 14, or 42, where they realized that words can be something more than dots and slashes and letters on a page…that words can take you places.

For me it was a book called, The House on Mango Street, By Sandra Cisneros, which I read in eighth grade. The middle school that I attended had a new eighth grade teacher that year; a man from New York City named Mr. Van Dright. He was a bit unorthodox for an upstate New York school strict on curriculum and following the rules. He had long dark hair and grizzle on his face, who wore a leather jacket and drove a motorcycle when he wasn’t in school, who reminded us often how thankful we were to attend a school that was safe and clean with no metal detectors.

And although this unique teacher from the city was forced to resign before the following year, what I remember most about him was that he was an artist. He had that look in his eye of a person who had stories to tell. He showed me, although he probably doesn’t know it, (a very insecure and shy fourteen year old at the time,) that books and words could be something more, you just had to dream them.

“In English my name means hope. In Spanish it means too many letters. It means sadness, it means waiting. It is like the number nine. A muddy color. It is Mexican records my father plays on Sunday mornings when he is shaving, songs like sobbing.” (Cisneros,10)

This is from a passage in the book entitled, “My Name.” I remember him reading it to the class that day. What does that mean, he asked us. A name like the number nine?

Perhaps it was because I was obsessed with names. Wondering what it would be like if I had a different name – to separate myself from the ten other girls named Amanda in my school. (I really did graduate with about 5 of them.) Perhaps it’s because later on in the passage, the narrator goes on to describe her name, “as if the syllables were made out of tin and hurt the roof of your mouth.” (Cisneros, 11)

Up until that point in my life, I’d never given much thought into the meaning of words, how with a simple sentence you can describe your name as muddy and we know how you felt about whatever it is you were talking about.

My own writing as of lately, has become its own kind of muddy and I thought I’d take this time to go back and remember where it all began. How words can have inspiration just by how they sound in your mouth mixed around with a word or phrase that can have nuances of meaning. How something simple can change the way you think and view the world. Muddy. Muddy. Muddy.

Nothing was as clear to me as those words on those pages. I wanted to write muddy too.

In Medias Res Part 2 – Chicken and Rice Soup

October 24, 2012October 24, 2012 / Ajmorse / 2 Comments

Picture taken by my cousin, Mark. Watch out Mr. chicken…that’s a bull!

So, as emphasized in my last post, my creative writing teacher was big on the phrase “In medias res,” which means in the middle of things. She encouraged us with various prompts to start out our stories in the middle of the action and let the exposition flow through in the narrative.

I loved those prompts, so I thought I’d share one of my stories from that 15 minute exercise. I wrote all of it in that 15 minute journal session, and very little is changed from the original with the exception of added commas, and a few extra adjectives here and there. I’ve always meant to add more to the story, but it always seemed so neat leaving it the way it is.

I believe the prompt was something along the lines of “write a prompt of a family situation, made up or real and include a body part or some catastrophe. Start the narrative in the middle of the drama. Go!”

***(FYI, this is completely made up. Although I do have an uncle named Donald.)

Chicken and Rice Soup

So Uncle Donald dropped his teeth in the chicken and rice soup, and there they were grinning stupidly up at us, like they were about to start yammering about how maybe too salty the soup was or start shivering – chattering back and forth – yak, yak, yak, yak, yak.

We all stood around the pot of soup in silence, staring down at it. Me, Aunt Josie, Uncle Donald and Daryl, my brother. Uncle Donald’s toothless mouth wore a grim expression.

I thought that if we broke the silence that would be it, and the teeth would start talking back up at us. I felt a smile tug at the corner of my mouth, felt it want to yank up to one side and let out a large gurgley sort of laugh. Daryl caught my expression and coughed into his rough callused hand. He wore a black t-shirt, his jeans baggy like always. Aunt Josie went and got the tongs.

“Oh dear, oh dear,” she fretted and scooped the teeth out and set them down on a paper towel.

Uncle Donald cleared his throat. “Might want to want to wash them off, Josephine,” He said. He only used her full name when he was being real serious.

She had wandered into the kitchen and set the tongs in the sink. “The tongs?” she asked him.

“Not just the tongs,” coughed Daryl into his hand. Aunt Josie returned to the Dining room.

“Now, now,” she chided, although she wasn’t scolding. “These things happen.”

Uncle Donald got up with a grunt and took his teeth into the bathroom.

“Yeah, only in our family,” I said when Uncle Donald’s back had disappeared behind the bathroom door.

Daryl and I started laughing.

(In which it ends, and I’ve tried to add more but just can’t seem to get the same innocent frankness of the narrator. Who is a young girl about twelve or so named Charlie. Leave some thoughts below if you want to!)

I Am Me

October 20, 2012 / Ajmorse / 2 Comments

I’ve been in a bit of a down mood today and no matter what I tried, (TV, music, chocolate)…I couldn’t seem to get myself out of it. So, even though I didn’t want to, I went for a walk down the road.

My doctor always encouraged me to exercise…says that it “lightens the load” in more ways than one, and not just physically…

Cow in the field down the road from my house. Why they feel the need to stare at people walking past them, I have no idea.

Cows ogled me as I trudged past. In my peripheral vision, I noticed the trees a burnt red and orange. I look down at my feet and see a brown, and black fuzzy, wooly bear caterpillar, creeping its way across the rough surface of the road. Bugs flew up at my face. Bugs! In the middle of October. The sun was warm on my green sweater and on my matching green headband, the sharp, cool air biting at my cheeks, which are pink from the air that doesn’t want to make its way into my lungs.

I thought about why I was upset, thought about the scenery around me. Felt my mood like it was a physical being, felt it weigh me down in my chest. Inside, I wonder and agonized: Am I good enough? Why do I feel so worthless?

And while I’m wondering why the black and white cow in front of me keeps staring and staring, something prompts me to turn around and I’m greeted with this view:

No matter how grey you feel inside, there is beauty still. As emphasized by this beaten down tree in the field I was walking next to and the rainbow soaring above it.

I don’t know what made me turn around; divine intervention, an epiphany? But I’m glad I did. It felt like one of those moments where I was faced with the reality of my situation by the visuals around me. And as corny as it sounds, it felt like a promise.

“I will not abandon you. You are not alone.”

There is still beauty inside, even though I felt so crummy. And I hold that warmth inside of me and I am happy still. Partially because of my walk, partially because of the air that forced itself in and out of my lungs, partially because of the scenery; because I know I am alive, because of the sharp air that pinched my cheeks awake. But mostly because I know that I am beautiful.

Rainbow above the burnt, orange trees.

I am beautiful mentally, physically and all the other ways in between. I am a beautiful writer, poet, woman, child, daughter, comedic and friend.

And when you learn to love yourself, you learn to love everything around you. I am worthy. I am a friend.

I am…me. 🙂

A. J. Morse

Some fiction, some poetry, and a lot of writer's block.

Thoughts