In the Company of Like Minded Others

 I am a contradiction. I complain about never having time alone in which to write, yet I do write in company. Most of the time, I rather like having a set meeting time and space. It does wonders to lend legitimacy to my endeavors in my family's eyes. If I want to write for an hour but there's no one else involved, my family are more inclined to interrupt. The instant I say I'm meeting so and so online to write for an hour, they back away, loathe to interrupt what their brains interpret as a 'meeting'. The cats are inconsiderate writing companions. They won't judge my facial expressions but they will judge me for paying attention to a keyboard and not them. Usually by walking on or crashing on said keyboard. Or paralyzing a typing hand because your hand makes the best pillow.

I currently have three groups running at any one time. One meets painfully early in the morning on Google chat. There's a brief good morning said, maybe a check in on how everyone is doing, and then we get to words for an hour. The other two are on Discord. One group is enormous and is for reporting purposes only. There's very little chatter. It's self-driven. Other people are out there writing at the same time you are, but you may never know who or interact with any of them. Though there are live write ins offered on YouTube for the next few weeks. They generally run in 30 minute sprints with a break. The mod is on camera guiding (and writing). That group emphasizes spending time in your story and focuses less on word counts. Sprints are available and certainly you can arrange to hang out with someone and write and chat. Competition is not my strong suit, however, and sprints offer mixed results at best. The other space is very personable and friendly and encouraging. We all make an effort to lift one another and celebrate any success.

The secret of my success in these spaces is that no one can see me. At no time am I on a camera for these meet ups. If there were a need to for me to be writing with my web cam on, I'd be locked out of focus. Yeah, I don't know why. I just know it's the case. I'm told to know myself and in this case being perceived while writing is bad. It's the core of my protests about needing to be alone to really dig deep and write. I prefer to pack up and leave the house to write because resting bitch face is my default. It goes really, really grim, though as I'm working on story conflict. I'm out here murdering people in fiction in some terrible and gruesome ways. I'm not going to be smiling while I do it. I have to be there in that scene as I write it. If you're around while I write it, you're going to see stuff in my face you do not want to see. I'm done and super impatient with my family freaking out and asking if I'm okay while I'm in the middle of a horrific scene or really tense conflict. Worse by far if I happen to be in the middle of a sex scene. Long way of saying that I am not in the least interested in being perceived by someone on the other end of a web connection while I write. I don't want that deep into their writing process and I do not want them all up in mine.

For me, there's inherent discipline in knowing that someone is waiting for me to check in and get started. On the days I'd just skip writing because I wasn't feeling it, having someone waiting for me drags me to the page regardless of my feelz. And that's a habit I want to encourage. Turn to the story no matter how I feel. That feels like a solid foundation.