The Commonplace Cloud

Nimbus II by Berndnaut Smilde

I love writing “by hand” (talk about a recursive phrase). I use my journals all the time, but I also use a grab bag of free services on the web to keep many of my “commonplace” notes.

Kelsey McKinney talks about how social sites like Pinterest are the descendants of commonplacing. Be sure to check out the article, which has pictures of commonplace books from one of my favorite places: the Harry Ransom Center! 

Saj Mathew over at The Millions talks about Tumblr as a Commonplace Book with a more in-depth look at the pros and cons of living in “an archival age.” As usual, I would argue with the hand-wringing tone of some of his concerns:  

“[W]e live in an archival age, in which memory has reached a point of near-irrelevance. With the right keyword, we can instantly recall any message, photo, or article instantly. That memory is never endangered by the specter of forgetting endangers memory more than ever.”

I think we go about our days remembering plenty, personal interactions and childhood experiences, for example. I would bet we keep a mental record of many more people, some we’ve only met on said social media. I don’t keep phone numbers in my long-term memory like I used to, but I have a collection of emails, web addresses and passwords. Our memory will change and adapt according to how we use it, but I hardly think it will wither away. It’s a surprisingly old argument, one that Socrates made against writing, as in writing by hand. David Malki over at Wondermark, points out that we wouldn’t even know about this opinion of his if someone (not Socrates of course) hadn’t written it down. 

But I digress! Social media sites can be a great way to commonplace. Actually, the ease of clipping, saving and sharing ideas, quotes and images has encouraged many people to commonplace without even knowing that it is a thing. Still, consciously using social sites to collect material for later use is a little different than using these media to curate your personal image for public consumption. Fortunately, as William S. Burroughs says:

“Everything is permitted.”

You can use these tools however you want. Here are some of the ways I commonplace on the cloud. 

I’m a highly visual person, so I use Pinterest to aggregate images for writing specific stories and for prompts. When I find an inspiring image on the web, I’ll pin it for later use. I follow other users who are busily collecting images that I find fascinating. It is also an excellent resource when searching for images on a particular topic. The open environment of sharing makes this a powerful tool of discovery both through searching and serendipity. I also use it for recipes. 

Evernote, while not exactly a social site, has the most diverse uses, and is really the core of my cloud commonplacing. It has powerful organizational tools like tagging, keyword searching and notebooks for sorting disparate information. I use it to collect quotes, notes, and research for this blog and for the fiction I write. I keep market research and copies of all my writing contracts here too. I have a list of books to read along with their local library call numbers. I’ll be adding a comprehensive index to all my journals here soon. Evernote works across all my devices so I can access or enter information at home, work, on my phone, or even my old iPod. 

I use Goodreads to keep track of the books I’ve read. I post very brief reviews/summaries, more to jog my own memory about the content of what I’ve read. That said I’m happy to socialize and meet people through these social tools.*

There are dozens of other places out there, Imagr, Instagram, Google+, Reddit, and new sites being built every day. Explore what they have to offer, but don't forget to consider the ways that you can best use them to your own purposes.

* Certainly, I have nothing against being social! I use Twitter sporadically for random thoughts and links, and Facebook mostly with people I’ve met in real life or know through writing. Of course the ease of socializing 24/7, is terribly dangerous to artistic productivity.

The Second Annual Belated Turkey of Gratitude

Still Life with Fruit and Ham, Jan Davidszoon de Heem, c.1649

Turns out the belatedness is part of the tradition. Since we here at Casa Schwarz are committed to not buying anything on Black Friday, this is one of the best days to be grateful.

30 things about writing and storytelling for which I am grateful.

1. For poetry, which challenges, puzzles, and touches my soul. 
2. And for Poetry Off The Shelf, the little podcast that has introduced me to several new poets this year.
3. For my part-time job, which provides structure to my day, a little bread-and-butter money, and interesting coworkers with different experiences and opinions than my own.
4. For my first WorldCon! Four days in San Antonio immersed in everything science fiction and fantasy. I won't say more here, as I wrote three long posts starting with this one.
5. For Patrice Sarath, novelist extraordinaire, my WorldCon roomie, and early morning coffee house writing buddy.
6. For ArmadilloCon, my awesome local SciFi and Fantasy convention. When money is tight and family commitments abound, it's great to know that I can always make it to this cool hometown convention. 
7. For the Slugtribe Writers' Group. This open critique group has been a staple of my life since returning to writing. It's a perfect combination of regulars and random wild seeds and never fails to keep things interesting.
8. For the editors who've published my stories and worked with me to make them better. They are as passionate about writing as I am and they spend uncounted hours bringing stories to the world for a very small monetary return.
9. For the slush readers (and editors) who have rejected my stories, sometimes because they're not a good fit for their venue, but more importantly, because sometimes they need to be better.
10. Again, and every year, for my journal. What a glorious mess. Whenever I'm stuck on a story (i.e. the middle of every story), I run to my journal and flail around for page after page until I can see a way forward. 
11. For my husband who goes along with all my schemes and crazy dreams, like keeping chickens in the back yard, or pounding out story after story on my laptop. 
12. For my 12-year-old, who keeps me hip to what middle schoolers are into, and who still lets me read her bedtime stories (currently The Forgotten Beasts of Eld.)
13. For my 8-year-old who has introduced me to the world of My Little Pony as only someone from the target demographic can. 
14. For Invader Zim and Adventure Time, Red Dwarf and Monty Python's Flying Circus. Family favorite viewing for together time on the couch.
15. For Leo the dog. The pound puppy that the kids and hubby talked me into. When not laying at my feet while I write, he pesters me to get up off my butt and take him for a walk. Turns out that on foot and in the fresh air is an excellent place to work out story problems.
16. For the books I've read this year including, Jagannath, Saga, Engine Summer (finally), Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error, Oranges are Not the Only Fruit, and The Blue Fox to name a few.
    
17. My little laptop. Repository of my works in progress and window to the virtual world.
18. Scrivener. I'm using this writing software more and more, though I only know the tip of the iceberg as far as all the different bells and whistles 
19. For the library, saving me thousands of dollars on my 12-year-old's manga habit, providing for my eclectic research needs, and loaning me stacks of huge, expensive art and photography books for story inspiration.
20. For my virtual writers' communities where I can meet, commiserate and trade critiques with writers from around the world.
21. For the worlds that have presented themselves in the stories that have created. Fantastic and impossible places of terror, adventure, love and heartbreak. No airfare required.
22. For the characters who bud off some created world or concept and grow into unpredictable beings who turn the tables to surprise and delight me.
23. Pinterest! How did it take me so long to get onboard with this visual feast?
24. For the hour of writing time every morning between dropping my kids off to school and when I have to show up to work. Pure gold.
25. For drafts that are broken and difficult. These are the ones that have the most to teach me about storytelling.
26. For LePen felt tip markers in every color; they make my paper-and-pen revision look festive and fabulous.
    
27. For a good night's sleep, when I can get it, and for the strange and delightful dreams that arrive in  the morning just before I wake up. If not fodder for plots, certainly some subconscious images have found their way into my story settings.
28. For all the storytellers out there, gossips and tattle tellers, pundits and conspiracy theorists. 
29. For all the surprises, not a day goes by without one!
30. For all the stories nascent and invisible, waiting to be born. 

Update: Not Exaclty NaNoWriMo

I have to say I’m having a blast with my Not Exactly NaNoWriMo challenge. On November 1st I set out to write a brand new story idea every day for 30 days. So, every morning this month I'm spending about 30 minutes freewriting something brand new.

I'm working from verbal and visual prompts, notes for nascent ideas stashed in my journal. I also have a list of phrases that have caught my ear. Things that sound like great titles, but that I have no story for - yet. Ray Bradbury did something like this with lists.

After I finish writing my new thing, I'm free to revisit the previous day(s) work and further develop it. I've started to read over the earlier ones. I'm putting new thoughts in my journal, playing with the ideas and themes, working up outlines, so that I can draft the middles and ends and turn these fragments into stories. I'm aiming to keep most of these in the flash to short story range. I don't know how the revision process will plug into what I'm doing, but I'm determined not to worry about it this month.

I’m also taking this opportunity to learn a little more about Scrivener. I set up a Scrivener project with 30 folders, one for each day. Each folder has the writing from my initial session, any relevant pictures and a place for random ideas and fragments of an outline. 

I now have 14 story starts (I have a 0 story that I did on October 31). Each entry is about a thousand words. I've listed them below along with the prompts, and for some, a little snippet of what I’ve written. Some are working titles, other titles I think I'll keep.

0 The Window
From a combination of this picture of a woman and a child and an article about a memorial gate (see 12 below) that I got by clicking on Random Article in Wikipedia. I often use two or three disparate things to prompt my writing. This often helps me tap into the unexpected. Usually this works as stated. This time these two elements remained separate, and when I reread this one, I decided to excise the bits about the gate and use it as a prompt for day 12.

1 Frank Breech & Footling
This is a title that I’ve had floating around in my journal.

2 The Comfort of Busses
I’ve been riding the bus to work a lot lately.

3 The Sleeping City
A prompt from Storymatic: A runaway, a tourist, "where is everyone"?

4 The Thief and the Vintner
A prompt from Chaotic Shiny: A bottle, a thief, and a minor god.

5 The Reverse Pygmalion
From undeveloped idea from my journal.

6 A Time Travel Story
From notes copied into my journal from some article on the internet:

"Nothing is flat and solid. Everything is full of gaps and holes, crevases, wrinkles and voids. This is true of the physical world and true of time too, you just have to go VERY small."

 7 The Angel in the Kitchen 
The prompt, from the Brainstormer app, was: Fish out of water/angelic/construction zone) Here’s a sample:

“Do you have a housemate?”
“No. Are you looking?”
“No. No. It’s just - I have an angel living with me. He wasn’t there when they showed me the house but -
"Ah." He nodded, understanding. “Well, it won’t last forever.” Then he laughed at his own joke. “The roommate situation,” he clarified.
They’re refurbishing the barracks.”
“Angels live in barracks?”

8 A Bride for the Marsh

From a picture of a young Palestinian groom with his bride. I’ve finally started using Pinterest mostly to collect visual material (including story prompts) for writing. Click on the sidebar to follow my pins. Here’s another sample:

"A lilting giggle drifted out from behind the fine silk fabric that covered her, accompanied by a sharp movement of her head that he thought must mean no. The sound reminded him of water when it rushes through a narrow place, busy and contented at the same time."

9 I’ve Got To Go
From the io9 Concept Art Prompt. These are posted every Saturday on io9, and writers are encouraged to post their stories in the comments. This is still a fragment, so I didn't post it. The picture is a great start, now I'll work to write a story that stands without the visual.

10 In Time
The working title for an epistolary time travel story.

11 The Trumpet and the Ticket Taker
This is actually an old fragment. In the spirit of clearing the boards I have a couple story fragments that I plan to dump into this project. I pasted in what I had, then expanded on it with 30 minutes of freewriting. Here’s a bit:

The vulture hop-stepped to the raft, extended his wings and jumped on. The dull ache in my head was spreading through the rest of my body. I scrubbed my eyes to try to get my head on straight. When I looked back, a man in black jeans and a black tee-shirt stood on the raft, hands clasped behind his back. He was bald and ruddy, and watched me with a carney’s neutral expression that says, I know I look scary, but you really want to ride this ride.

12 The Wandering Gate
This one was an image that I’d written into story 0 that I split off into its own separate story. These two stories will be quite different from each other, I think.

13 Six Shades of True
This excellent title and my prompt was from today’s Daily Writing Tips post about the origins and connotations of the word true.

14 Time Delay
From an idea I've had floating around for a while about robots and humans working together to mine a distant moon, maybe Titan.

That's all for now. I'm looking forward to another two weeks of taking the daily plunge.