I've been thinking about my writing process today. Berating myself at my lack of self discipline. I want to write but it's a total act of iron will for me to sit down and write for an hour every day. I mean, I do get stuff written, but only if I'm on on external kind of schedule. I really want to be able to get to the point where I can follow my own schedule, but how I do that is such a mystery to me. I'm driven but I guess I'm not driven enough.

In Stephen King's book on writing, he said he wrote about 10 pages a day and he's very regular about his writing. Joyce Carol Oates is the same way. She's totally self disciplined about her writing, writes about three books a year and has a full time job I think teaching at Princeton. Both have been writing since they were kids, so they're been writing for years. I've only been writing seriously for four years, which means I don't have the years of discipline and habits that they do. I wonder if I'll ever get this way.

I keep thinking I will one day, if I just work at it. But then another part of me just thinks I'm fighting this losing battle against my own laziness and inertia. When I do sit down to write, I really enjoy it. I read somewhere today that Joyce Carol Oates said writing is another way to tell yourself a story and I think it's true. When I write, I tell myself a story. So writing has never been a painful, pulling ideas out of thin air kind of thing for me. Writing for the most part has mostly been very enjoyable for me. But it's the discipline of doing it every day that I don't like and that's the painful, hard part; the forcing of myself to sit down and work. It's bad enough I have to do it at work to earn a paycheck, but it's another thing to do it at home when I could be doing all sorts of other things that are equally enjoyable and not such a pain.

But I have to break through this not writing every day barrier and I guess I'll keep reading and trying different techniques till I do.

I wanted to be alone today, so instead of inviting anyone to go see the Ansel Adams exhibit at Sonoma State University, I went by myself. Sometimes, I just like my own company. Sometimes, I just like to drive in my car, with the moon/sun roof open, and listen to tunes. I think it's some habit from high school I haven't lost. When I was 16 and had the family car, which instead of being thrown out it was given to me, I used to drive all around the island without going anywhere in particular. It was my favorite form of escape in high school. It still is.

Of course, now that I'm older and have money and am more cultured I guess, I drive to museums to look at art and then go outlet shopping and spend tons of money.

In the summertime, it's worth driving out of my neighborhood since I'm on the coast and it's always foggy. It's usually sunny everywhere except where I live, it seems. I love the fog but it can get depressing during the summer, when it's supposed to be warm.

I love Ansel Adams. Doesn't everybody? I was tempted to buy a poster of his or a matted picture, but I still haven't hung the pictures and poster I bought on a vacation seven years ago, so I stopped myself. Adams was such a brilliant photographer and he was self taught too. I loved what he said about art and that a photo should show the photographer's feelings about what he's seeing and not just reality. How do you take pictures like that? I wonder if you can apply the same principal to writing.

I suppose writing does have some kind of point of view if you're writing essays. But what about fiction? I'll have to think about this to see if Ansel Adams' theory fits my writing. My fictional characters do have their own particular point of view, but I don't think they necessarily show how I view the world or what I feel about the world But maybe they do. Or if they don't, they should.

Take my baseball story screenplay. I guess my main purpose in writing the story is to show that it's easy for a father and child to think they don't love each other. That events can be misinterpreted by both the father and son and then if you never talk about what's happening, your story about what happened becomes the truth of the situation. And they you go through life thinking that your point of view is how life really is. When in reality, you might have completely misinterpreted the situation. And then if you're unlucky, either the father or the child dies, then you realize too late, that you had it all wrong and there's no asking for forgiveness, because that person is dead. Then you spend your life in guilt and regret, for not talking, not speaking, not communicating and on your dying day, you say to yourself, if only I'd told so and so how I really feel and then you die with regret and guilt on your mind. Not a pleasant way to go, I think.

But my characters are lucky. I give them that second chance to rewrite their history so they don't die with longing and regret. And they are really lucky, because I think most people when they're about to die, have so much regret and guilt for things they did or didn't do. I hope I never die like this.

If I were to drop dead right now, there isn't really anything in my life that I seriously regret, have guilt about or wish I did or didn't do. But I've made it a point of not being miserable. Misery is not an option for me. Besides, being miserable is such bad karma. I mean, I think there are people who are walking around who are in their 30's and older still angry and hateful about what happened to them in high school. And I'm like why? Get over it! Everyone was miserable in high school. It's not like you were the only one. I think all that misery and hate is like bad energy and that if you don't get rid of it, it causes health problems when you're older.

I mean, it takes so much energy to be angry and to hate people. I don't think people or even one person is worth that much of my time and energy. Honestly! If I do hate someone, I try to get over it quickly. I need all my energy for me and my stuff and my habits and my goals. I'm sure as hell not going to waste it on hating someone I don't even care about and who I won't be thinking of on my death bed, unless of course, I'm on my death bed still hating them. And like the people I hate or the person I hate really gives a rat's ass that I hate them. I mean, they probably don't even remember who the hell I am. And here I am devoting a considerable amount of time and energy hating them when they don't even care. I mean who's the fool then. Hate is such stupid emotion. And it really is bad karma in more ways than one. And I repeat, no one is worth all that time and energy, no one!!!

I feel so restless today. I watch Pollock last night, because Jackson Pollock is one of my favorite painters. I think the movie captured how the great man painted and how revolutionary his painting was for his day. But boy, was he messed up in the head. The movie really showed what an mean drunk Pollock was. I mean, really mean and nasty, like a total Jekyll and Hyde kind of guy. It's too bad too because he only seemed to paint well when he was sober.

The last hour of the movie was really hard to watch because you had to watch this great artist destroy himself with his alcoholism. I mean, Pollock would drink and totally binge drink and end up, who knows how many days later, dirty and passed out in some alley. It's really sad because he died at age 44. Who know what other art ground he would have broken had he just been able to keep shit together?

I think I feel restless becaus I feel this incredible urge to shop. But every time I go shopping, I can't find anything I want to buy. Clothes look really boring to me and cheap looking. The things I really want I don't really want to spend the money on right now, like a new laptop.

All of a sudden, I have this major urge to buy a laptop. And not one of those sleeek new ones either, but a workshorse that I can take places that is 5 pounds and under. In my job in 1999/2000 I had an IBM laptop, which was such a workhorse. When I would bring the laptops on trips, I would totally abuse it and it would still work. I think I need a laptop that's veruy strong and won't crumble after lots of heavy use or being jostled around in my bag.

But I'm way too cheap and the most I think would spend is $700 or less. I saw a laptop at Costco for about $1,000 but I need to research the brand that was on sale. Ideally, I would like an IBM because, well I had one before and it worked for me. I had a Sony Vaio too but I hated the stupid mouse thing on it. The bottom of the Sony Vaio also would get really hot after two hours of battery use and it felt really flimsy. No, the IBM or maybe a Dell would work for me. I think the Costco laptop was a Compaq, but I haven't had any experience with this brand.

I don't know why I even need a laptop. My little baby laptop was great to travel with and I was able to log onto the Net without a problem. The laptop just seems attractive right now because I can't write screenplays on my baby laptop. I can't load screenwriting software unless it was built fo pocket word and no one makes software for pocket word. I can't import any macros to even write screenplays, because pocket word can't read the macros. But for eveyrthing else, like writing regular stories, the babY laptop can't be beat.

I'm think that if my company hands out the raises that were due this year in April, I'll have enought money to buy a really cheap one. If not, I'll have to wait for Christmas and hopefully laptop prices will have totally dropped by then.

I wanted to go see Reign of Fire today, but I have to go down to UPS to pick up my package. The company that I buy my vitamins decided to send my package by UPS instead of USPS, which is their normal procedure. I hate when companies switch carriers like that. It totally pissed me off because it's so much easeir fo rme to get packages via USPS then by UPS. Maybe I'll see Reign of Fire on Monday night instead.

What else? There was news on the radio that some plane was buzzing around the financial district today. How scary. I'm sure most people thought it was some crazy suicide bomber about to crash into the Transamerica pyramid or something. It turns out it was just someone taking pictures, but what kind of pictures is this guy taking. New places to bomb US?

I finally finished writing up my West Virginia trip journal. I had mostly scribbled notes in a little book to help me remember what I did and it was such a chore to go back to try to remember each day. I don't think I did a very good job, but at least I have a record of my trip. I've never kept such an extensive journal on a trip before. Most of my vacation trips just buzz by me and I never reflect or think about anything that happened to me. A trip journal is a good way to help me remember all the things I did or didn't do on vacation.

I never feel like I do enough on my vacation, but with trip I realized that I do tend to pack alot of things into my trips. If I had been travelling on my own, I would have packed more in, but since I was travelling with a friend, I coudn't impose my usual non stop on the go schedule.

I like travelling with friends since it's so much fun. But, I think I would like my next trip to be with a boyfriend. I don't know why. I just want my next trip to be with a boyfriend and I have a feeling, my wish will be fulfilled. At least, that's the plan.

My next trip though, I'm on my own. I'm off to LA in a couple of days to see the Andy Warhol exhibit. I've been wanting to take at triop to LA since last year summer and I'm finally doing it. I want to get used travelling to different cities to see art. That's what you have to do these days anyway. Most art exhibits don't travel like they used because of the expense and high insurance costs. If you want to see a good art show, you have to be willing to fly to it. I can see myself flying to New York or Boston just see art, maybe not now, but later. LA is close enough.