While leaving a comment over at Aunt B’s blog it occurred to me that what I do is not so much taking dictation as it is waterskiing. Wordskiing? How many times can I type the word “skiing” before it starts to look normal and not like a mistake?
After a certain point–sometimes 5 minutes, other times as much as 15–I stop writing the story and then just hold tightly to the rope while the story takes me in the direction it means to go. That’s the amazing thing about rough drafts; they are trips through the spaces in your brain you never thought to visit before.
I suppose this may be why I’m never ending anything properly. It doesn’t feel right to let go of the rope and fall back into the cold nothing of the lake while the boatload of characters and world goes speeding off without me.
Aunt B. unveiled her Author Website yesterday; it’s darling and wonderful. And I’m feeling like a bit of copycat because now I think maybe I should have an Author Website too. I never intended to do such a thing–as far as I’ve always been concerned, Mycropht.blogspot.com and Mycropht.wordpress.com were enough. But given that I think I may actually bite the bullet and start self-publishing to Kindle I think I ought to go whole hog and do Mycropht.com.
Yes, I know that my name is Katherine Coble and that should be the name on my books. And I know that my self-publishing “press” is going to be Group W Bench Press*. But “Mycropht” is who I am on the Internet. It’s been that way for 23 years and I don’t plan on changing that now.
Of course, my father would have a fit. He’s always said that picking out a business name before anything else is the surest sign of someone who isn’t taking her business seriously. He’s overseen more bankruptcies of cutely-named but inefficiently-run companies in his lifetime than I’ve had Rolos. That’s a lot. But I guess all my company plans to do is write stories and sell them for a dollar to people with Kindles. It’s not like we’re milling cotton or brewing coffee.
Isn’t this the most pointless and disjointed post? I confess, it’s the thing I wrote when I had only crumbs in the cupboard.
*like the name of my blog, I’ve had that company name picked out for 20 years. It’s just been waiting on a company. It didn’t feel right attaching it to my graphic design work. But I think it works perfectly for the crazy, misfit stories I plan to publish on my own.
When I think of mycropht, my mind does the shift back to f, and I only imagine quaint cottages in Scotland. And I wonder, does she have a quaint cottage, where her hunting dogs sleep by the hearth? I’m possibly the only Jill Domschot in the world, so I’ll keep that as my name if I ever decide to jump back into the waters of branding and publishing. A zen life where I don’t desire these things isn’t working out so well, but then I never expected it to. Signed, Eternal Pessimist
Katherine, I’d love to read some of your fiction! That’s exciting news about the possibility of an author website. I’m kind of like you in that I started blogging before I ever really considered branding. Now I’m working my way back to an author website.