Private Time While Writing – Behind The Scenes

Hi!

Today I’m working outside (out of the back of my truck, actually), enjoying the sunshine and listening to tunes. (Yes, this is a typical kinda writing workday for me.) But you wouldn’t know it unless I told you. Thank god for mobile technology and long-life batteries.

It’s not unusual to work from here; I do it a lot when travelling. In fact, I’ve written mostly on the go and posted from my yacht in Tin Can Bay when it rained for days and days. I posted while sailing across Moreton Bay, too.

During my travels over the land, I’ve continued to write. While I camped through the outback, NT, NSW, Qld, VIC, SA, TAS, and now in WA, I wrote. Mostly, the writing work was confined to the pages of an unseen novel, so no one saw most of what was being tapped into the keys. MySpace folded some time ago, so that ended the record of some of those posts that went out into the ethos back then. (It’s just as well because I wasn’t proud of some. The blackest posts were fueled by alcohol.)

But time heals, and cleaning up after oneself is what it’s all about. And so as the long road is nearing its end, some of my newer work is spilling out into places like Facebook and the greater reaches of the ‘net. SEETHINGS’ blog has its place at http://www.mfp.com.au/angelwanderer (now michaelformanwiting.com) and is doing well. A series of excerpts is slowly drawing people in and attracting the right kind of audience.

It can get awfully lonely as a writer. I get used to the silence and solitude, but they have drawbacks. Losing touch with reality is one of them. Trusting fewer and fewer people and having less time for their nonsense is another (maybe that comes with getting older, too). The world appears as a messy, unnecessarily noisy place too great to tackle. Sometimes I want to shut the door on it.

This has also made me a very private person, often only putting what I want out there on a stage in the form of some character. I come, do my work and then go away.

Despite acting being a very public thing to do, the stage is a safer place than life. It comes with a script and a character. The character is known and has its boundaries. It lives inside a box with known boundaries. It’s relaxing to leave the self behind and wear the skin of another for a couple of hours. Singing does the same thing for me. Music offers another great escape device. Songs are known. Their order is set. The song is just a map to follow. There’s no doubt. The outcome is guaranteed.

For those I’ve worked with in the past, I’m sure I appear guarded. That’s because I am. I don’t trust the words that leave my mouth. I feel uncomfortable talking about myself. I’m sure I look as though I’m hiding something. That’s because I am.

So I thought I’d post a few things out there I wouldn’t tell you face to face:

• The character (Mitchell) in SEETHINGS is loosely based on me. (with much fiction added)
• I use humour to cover sadness.
• I’ve fancied Tina Arena since I was a teen. (I met her recently!)
• I suffer from chronic depression.
• I’ve never believed in God.
• I learned ballroom dancing when I was a kid.
• Tennis is my favourite sport, but I won’t watch it on TV.
• I sometimes get obsessed with the smallest things.
• I’ve almost always dated older women.
• I have kept a small, personal notebook since I was 17. It contains words I wrote about a breakup, to remind myself of how I felt and never feel that way again.
• I’m an asthmatic.
• I once had my left ear pierced.
• I prefer talking about you rather than me.
• I lived in a long-term celibate marriage.

There you go. There are a few things I wouldn’t usually say in person or in posts like these.

That last one in the list is the basis of the SEETHINGS narrative. Because of its extraordinariness, it was worth writing about. But it wasn’t an easy premise on its own. I knew from the beginning that this topic doesn’t carry enough weight to hold a reader to the page. Many marriages lose that certain spark, so this story could be of any marriage, and, quite frankly, married stories are pretty dull if they go straight to storybook as they are. That’s where the creative part of writing comes in.

That’s why SEETHINGS took so long to write and get right.

Yes, it’s not about train robberies or scandals of the rich and famous. And its ‘happy ending’ is more like a ‘new beginning’ with an uncomfortableness that leaves the reader uneasy in their seat. But that’s how a story like this should end. Tomorrow is another day. The facade must remain in place to sustain stability.

If you think you’d like to take a peek inside it, the first 10 chapters are now on Goodreads for free.

If you read and enjoy what you see, please take the time to leave a review on the GR site. It’s easy and takes but a second. – Michael Forman

[This post was originally sent on 27th November 2013 and reposted again today]