The First of June - Thoughts

[elrhiarhodan]

Today is a strange day - I am unmoored from any kind of fannish obligations.

From April 22 to May 22, I did a meme here - Thirty Days of Song - that required some serious navel-gazing and a commitment for daily posting (Oh, Dreamwidth, will you ever implement a scheduled post function?). Additionally, I committed to the Merry Month of Masturbation (mmom), which is now over. Although I posted for 29 out of 31 days, I actually wrote 30 fics (I wrote the first one a day early), which is something of a success. I just didn't have it in me to beat off two more stroke fics.

So it's weird - I don't have anything I'm required (by my own self-imposed sense of completeness) to post today, and yet I feel compelled to do a bit of a wrap-up on MMOM.

Now, if you know me, I'm an all-in kind of person - bingos have to be blackouts, month-long challenges have to be done EVERY DAY. And of course, that kind of thinking can lead to epic failure. I have learned to manage the MMOM challenge by writing 300 word ficlets - and they have to be exactly three hundred words. Not 301 or 299. They have to be 300 words.

Also, while the fics can be interconnected (most of the stories this year were for a Hartwin series I called "Happily Married Spies"), the stories have to be complete, with a beginning, middle and end. That wasn't easy at it used to be, not when I've become accustomed to writing sprawling epics that don't get to the meat of the plot until I've passed the 15k mark.

All in all, I'm pleased with this year's results. Like most ficlets, they don't get a lot of hits or kudos or comments (although one ficlet I wrote for The Witcher got over a hundred kudos and I don't understand why), but I really don't write these for an audience. It's more that I write them to see if I can actually do the challenge (one year, I took the wordcount restriction off and managed all thirty-one fics and many of them were over 3k. I don't think I wrote anything for the next two months).

This year, I had additional motivation. I have been writing, but I haven't been publishing. I don't publish incomplete stories and I have about 500k worth of WiPs, some active, some not, and I wanted to get my name back out there. And more than that, I've been having some serious trouble with my writing - too many words spoiling the story-telling. Having the 300-word handcuffs really helped me pare down my writing style to what is essential.

It was a good exercise, but I'm glad it's done and happy that I'll be able to get back to the stories in progress - and the new ones percolating in my brain.

Since I didn't post the individual MMOM ficlets here on my journal (just on the MMOM community), here is a list of the stories below the cut, in case you're interested.


MMOM 2020 Fic List

Underpants - A Very Bad Man (The Flash)
Underpants Redux - The Little Thief (The Flash)
Skin - The Curse of Memory (The Witcher)
Fingers - For the Price of a Song (The Witcher)
Hands - Give Me Your Hand (Kingsman)
Neck - Just a Touch (Kingsman)
Old - The Finest of Wines (Kingsman)
New - A New Necklace (Kingsman)
Blue - Bruised (Kingsman)
Red - Every Good Boy Deserves Favor (Kingsman)
White - To Sleep Well At Night (Kingsman)
Silk - How Right Today May Be (Kingsman)
Velvet - Velvet Bonds (Kingsman)
Cotton - The Fabric of His Life (Kingsman)
Mouth - Your Mouth (gets me into trouble) (The Witcher)
Leather - Interior, Leather Bar (Kingsman)
Lips - The Sweetest Thing (Kingsman)
Book - Anything For You (Kingsman)
Movie - Dirty Movies, Kingsman Style (Kingsman)
Picture - Picture Perfect (Kingsman)
Bed - Endurance (Kingsman)
Bath - Inconsolable (Kingsman)
Beyond - The Summer Rain (Kingsman)
Dark - Conversations in the Dark (Kingsman)
Light - Morning Has Broken (Kingsman)
Dream - Sweet Dreams Are Made of These (Kingsman)
Whisper - Whispers of Memory (Kingsman)
Kiss - We Both Bruise Too Easily (Kingsman/White Collar)
Bite - You Hurt Me (I Love You) (Kingsman)
Navel - We Begin As We Mean To Go On (Kingsman)