Things We do

There are several things we do each day that we don't realize. When I first started writing, I wrote more or less like I talked. As I wrote more, I realized there were several useless words I used to fill space in writing. You know about word count, don't you?

Word count is how we know how long or short our novel will be. On some programs on your computer, you can set your word count. To think about writing 90,000 to 100,000 thousand words can blow your mind. It did mine in the beginning. Now I set a number of words I want to write each day to finish a novel in a certain length of time.

Word fillers are like it sounds, words to fill a page. When I first started writing, my favorite word was "that" and I used it often. As I began to re-read my written word, I realized it was unnecessary to put so many "that" in my work. So I began going back and eliminating them.

Do you watch people? I have always loved to. When I was small, back in the 40's and 50's, we would spend some Sunday afternoons driving to town and sitting in the car on the side of the street watching people. Even now when I am out, I still watch people. A ballgame is a wonderful place to watch people. Do you really notice what they are doing? You can get some good notes for your novel if you do.

Are you conscious of what you do at different times? When I am nervous or bored, I pick my cuticles on my fingernails. A bad habit I know, but I am trying to break myself of it. I don't like scary movies. When I am home and it gets to the scary part, I leave the room. My family knows what I'm doing and I do get kidded a lot. 

Notice what you do each day and why you do it. It will amaze you.