I have a writing hat.
As a writer, I have a routine, much like athletes have routines to put on their game face. For me, it involves putting on a beaten-up baseball cap.
It’s a white baseball cap. Says “Richmond Baseball” on it. It has a blue bill. The only significance to it is that I attended the University of Richmond, I love baseball, and from my fourth floor room in Moore Hall my final year there I could look down on Pitt Field and watch games in spring.
I’ve had this cap for ten years. It is dirty and stained beyond recognition. It used to be part of my standard convention gear, but I’ve started varying that up. Mostly because this cap looked so dingy.
It’s my writing hat.
I’ve washed it today. It came out of the washing machine looking not the worse for wear. The bill is intact. The stains, however, didn’t come out. That much is obvious.
It’s hanging on the clothesline, drying. We’ll see how this turns out. If it doesn’t turn out, I’ll order another from the University of Richmond Shop.
I’ll have to write without it today. If it were windier, if it weren’t so blooming hot, I might have walked down to the field and lofted my kite today. But it’s hot, and it’s not windy, and an attempt yesterday to fly the kite didn’t work. It went into the air, but it wouldn’t stay there. The wind was too variable.
I passed two thousand words yesterday total on the new novel project. I would have accomplished more, I think, but I spent time yesterday writing down scene ideas for later in the book. I have a rough outline on notebook paper, so I’m not flailing entirely in the dark.
And this morning I’ve had two insights into the novel’s protagonists. I know where one’s story begins and I see how that tracks to a scene about two-thirds of the way through the story. And now I know precisely what the other’s MacGuffin is; I knew that it was something, I knew knew the kind of thing that something was, but now I know what the something exactly is and why it’s so important. 😎
I also have a working title, but that’s for me to know. :h2g2:
For the nonce, however, I’m going to refer to it here as “THOD,” which is, yes, an acronym from the story, but not of the title. Because I’m 👿 like that.
Expect updates as circumstances warrant them. :cheers: