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NOTES

edited October 2013 in - Writing Tales
How can one keep up with the notes/ideas/flashes of inspiration - ‘those colourful wet stones on the beach’, as Steinbeck so beautifully expressed it?

I’ve been having a clear out * and came across some notes because they were written on separate sheets of coloured paper. They caught my eye. I liked what I read and thought I’d keep them - might use them. Trouble is I threw out books full of pencil written stuff. There just isn’t the time to read through all this stuff everyday or even once in a while. As it is I will put the notes I found [on the sheets of coloured paper] on a doc on the computer. Got loads there already. I read them now and then. I have about 150 sheets of typed notes actually on my desk. I read them now and then.

It’s hopeless! I think we really just have to hope that some magic will come out of our fingertips/pencil tip when we need it.

How do you folks manage this caretaking of ideas?

* I had to have a clear out. I had to keep moving stuff off my desk every time I wanted to use it. All the six drawers of the desk were full of..of.. Just stuff. Two of the drawers where I should keep socks and things were full of papers - notes, typed stuff, bills accounts invoices…
I haven’t got a shredder and investigation reveals that reliable one cost a lot and it still takes time…waiting for each batch of stuff to go through so I spent hours tearing everything up in strips. About 10 tightly packed carrier bags of ‘STUFF’ !

And guess what? My daughter was on the phone querying something I bought for her just over a year ago. I REMEMBER READING AND TEARING THAT ONE UP INTO NARROW STRIPS !

Comments

  • I turn them into stories.
  • Some initial ideas I've written down continue to ferment in my brain. Others I forget about.
    When I get to the end of a notebook I transfer the insights to my computer file.

    I keep important paperwork for five years- and receipts/guarantees with them- and only throw them away when the item is broken or no longer used.

    You can guarantee that if you throw something away that you actually look at and think do I need to keep this, nah, rip; it will need to be referred to within two weeks...
  • A friend of mine, moving from France back home, and also moving house there, managed to throw away his and his wife's driving licenses, car ownership documents and car insurance. This is not a Good Thing to Do.
    Whenever I find notes written months or years ago, I think, did I really write that? Some of this is really good! So how come it's still just a note somewhere?
    The problem is we can each only be one writer, but we have ideas enough for ten.
    One of the joys of handwritten mss is the ability to see how the writer's mind changed, and the story along with it. Now we can't do that, with computers; so maybe we should all keep all our notes, in case we become really famous, so that students of our work in years to come can study the bits that didn't make the final draft, or the notes from which we drew inspiration. Obviously we will all have to rent space in storage depots to keep all this stuff and not lose the key, and the pass code that's needed to access the locker. So then we'll all have to have key-cases to keep them safe. It's inescapable: at some point, on or in your desk, there will be Stuff.
  • Get a pair of these, Bill.

    http://www.amazon.co.uk/Scissors-Shredder-Destroy-Personal-Documents/dp/B00172BNGU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1383125966&sr=8-1&keywords=shredders+scissors

    Cheap as chips and still almost as fun as a shredder!
  • Open a document called NOTES.

    Add to it every time those odd bits of paper are too much for your wallet - or in my case, handbag.

    Read it whenever you hit the doldrums and cheer yourself up by realising that you have flashes of genius sometimes, even if it's not actually today. :)
  • [quote=bill]How do you folks manage this caretaking of ideas? [/quote]

    By keeping all my notebooks. Now, I'd better whisper this in case my OH hears me... I shipped lots of notebooks with me when we moved to Fiji... and I've shipped them, plus another 7 years-worth of notebooks back. If he knew, he'd kill me for carting my stuff around the planet. ;)
  • I know what you mean, Bill.
    Sometimes, I have a flash (of inspiration!) when I'm out and I have to scribble in fairy writing on the edge of a receipt. Then what do you do with it?

    I do now have several notebooks around the computer, one of which is compartmentalised and I try to record everything in there in the relevant sections - things to do, addresses, ideas, comps, plans.

    As I'm sure every one of us does, I also have all my writing in folders on the computer: Adult & Children, which is then sub-categorised into Books, Short Stories, Flash and Poetry. Within those I have more sub-sections (Humorous, Serious, etc, etc ) and I use tags a lot for line lengths, comps entered, etc, etc, etc.

    But I also have a folder called 'Ideas'. This is full of unrelated thoughts and ideas, phrases, metaphors, a story nugget... I highlight them once they have been used.

    You could always scan in any hand-written notes to save you writing it all up in one go.

    And, Bill, do buy a shredder! It really is so quick to shred documents. Don't save them up. Just do it as you go along.
  • You all make me think I should have kept them.
    I have changed to pen to write hand notes. I used to write furiously with a soft pencil, the soft graphite facilitated a quick and easy flow - almost a physical pleasure in itself. Problem is that pencil written notes fade.
    Like most of you I had that thought that I might become famous etc but I didn’t linger too long on that. I have left it far too late to take writing seriously and I don’t think I have the energy for any major work! ;-) Don’t think it matters.
    One or two of you suggested an ideas/notes file on computer - well yes, I do that. Also type up all those notes I made on bits of paper. I kept the odd things like serviettes and bits of menus and receipts.
    I found a serviette …
    ‘ She isn’t beautiful - not page 3 material - other women in the group more beautiful, more handsome - more obviously carnal [fleeting carnal fantasies]. So what is it exactly? Why is everything about her so suddenly momentous? [too much wine with the meal] - the tilt of her nose - the strand of hair she keeps flicking from her brow…’

    [quote=Mrs Bear]One of the joys of handwritten mss is the ability to see how the writer's mind changed, and the story along with it. Now we can't do that, with computers; so maybe we should all keep all our note[/quote]
    Well, when I do get to work on a story I put the hand written notes - even if there are no previous notes I start writing by hand - I put all the scribbling and notes in a jumbled order on the doc. Then I devise a rough sequence and write a first very rough draft. Each draft are kept on the same document until the final [they are never really finished]. A finished story of a thousand words might have ten or fifteen pages. I can see how it has evolved, what I have changed, cut. If I change whole sections I cut and paste the whole section to the bottom of the doc in case I need it. Eventually a finished version will have a doc of its own and filed but all my workings right from bare notes is still there.

    What poor mortals we are ! Mozart e.g. was a giant. He wrote some of those huge works of his straight onto staves in ink without any crossings out or changes. Wow!
    [quote=Lizy] whenever you hit the doldrums and cheer yourself up by realising that you have flashes of genius sometimes[/quote]

    And

    [quote=Mrs Bear] I think, did I really write that? Some of this is really good![/quote]
    Yes I think we all have those moments and it does lift me up and reassures me that I can write [although the above isn’t necessarily I good example!]



    [quote=claudia] plus another 7 years-worth of notebooks back[/quote]

    Do you read them and how often and how long does it take? You must still be selective and there are prob notes there, brilliant ones, which you have forgotten about …

    Has anyone found little scraps of paper with writing on, obviously a note, and cant make sense of it…?
  • [quote=bill]Has anyone found little scraps of paper with writing on, obviously a note, and cant make sense of it…?[/quote]

    Only those ideas that came to me as I was having a bad hypo, so my writing eventually becomes nothing but bits of letters and can't be read. :)
  • I did write some awful drivel when I had a bad bout of cystitis -

    and I deleted the first two pages of a novel, though fortunately I had a hard copy.

    Some days I shouldn't be allowed anywhere near my computer.
    :)
  • [quote=Lizy]Some days I shouldn't be allowed anywhere near my computer.[/quote]
    Some days my computer shouldn't be allowed near me.
  • [quote=Mrs Bear]Lizy wrote: Some days I shouldn't be allowed anywhere near my computer. Some days my computer shouldn't be allowed near me.[/quote]

    Some days I shouldn't be allowed near me.
  • [quote=bill]Do you read them and how often and how long does it take? [/quote]

    I tend to dip in an out of old notebooks. If I find a real gem, I transfer it to my 'special' book - a small notebook that I travel with and only use for ultra special note-worthy notes.
    Then, of course, I have all my travel journal notebooks. They have the country and the travel dates written on the front of them so that I can find the one I want with relative ease.
    However, right now, all this stuff, bar my 'special' book, is sitting in boxes in a container and I won't get my hands on anything until we move to Ireland next year.
  • [quote=claudia]move to Ireland next year.[/quote]

    Does it take that long to get from Fiji to Ireland?
    Do you have to swim?
  • He he - several months by kayak - have to allow for paddling upstream through the Panama Canal. ;)
  • [quote=Lizy]Some days I shouldn't be allowed anywhere near my computer.[/quote]

    Wednesday was one of those days.
    I have just looked at my emails and seen - for the first time - an acknowledgement from an agent of a submission I sent.
    And . . . I can hardly bear to say it . . . I had made a typo.
    A semicolon instead of an L in the title of my novel.

    Blast and damnation!!

    I
  • It happens to us all, Lizy. I never send anything out but that I find a glaring error as soon as it's gone. It wasn't there before, I swear.
  • [quote=bill] ‘those colourful wet stones on the beach’, as Steinbeck so beautifully expressed it?[/quote]

    I've just found the actual quote [while adding to and reading through some transferred notes on pc ! ;-) ]

    '...“Maybe it’s like this, Max--you know how, when you are working on a long and ordered piece, all sorts of bright and lovely ideas and images intrude. They have no place in what you are writing, and so if you are young, you write them in a notebook for future use. And you never use them because they are sparkling and alive like colored pebbles on a wave-washed shore. It’s impossible not to fill your pockets with them. But when you get home, they are dry and colorless. I’d like to pin down a few while they are still wet.”...'
    John Steinbeck
  • I love that, Bill.

    I want to copy it and put it somewhere.
  • Thanks for giving us that quote, Bill. Our John knew what he was talking about.
  • I've pasted it onto my Goodreads Quote section - which I didn't know I had.
  • I keep starting 'new systems' and then I forget about them, loads of half-filled notebooks knocking around, loads of files started on the computer which I promptly forget about. Like you say Bill - when the bum finally gets on the chair I have to dream up some new 'magic' because the 'notes' seem transient.
  • during the clear out I found an old note book into which I would put books titles, books to get, adding to a reading list which expands/contracts/expands/contracts/expands expands expands etc. ;-) I am sure you all know what I mean. I found some titles I'd forgotten about and now that I have the internet I can chase them up, and find out more about them. I used to read all the reviews in order never to miss anything. A hopeless task!
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