In my current project, I had planned a Midpoint where everything changes when the protagonist moves from being reactive and to being proactive. I’ve had several ideas for that moment, the first of which had been the baby dragon asking Hope to teach him how to read, which made Hope realize he wasn’t an animal, or a pet. He was as much a person as she was. After that, I bounced around a few times with other Midpoint ideas.

As an orphan child in a dystopian society, Hope’s survival is a daily struggle. She suffers anxiety, depression, and loneliness. She assumes she will always exist in daily despair. Every evening she cries. Furthermore, she dislikes change preferring her days to be predictable. After working so hard to learn what she needed to know to survive, and having built a decent existence for herself and the baby dragon, she didn’t want change to cause her to end up with less than what she had.

However, change in enviable. Two changes Hope faced were: She was growing and was no longer able to hide in the shadows, and the baby dragon she cared for was growing and would soon no longer fit in the lair where they hide. Their lives had to change, and Hope had to face that change.

Then, something happened that I had not planned. After Hope successfully moves the baby dragon to a new hiding place, the following words appeared on the page.

Yes, this change had been a good change, the right change. She embraced the change. For the first time in many nights, Hope didn’t cry. Hope smiled.

Oh my! Hope had changed in a way I had not anticipated. Hope no longer cries. She was truly becoming a new person beyond what I had planned. This magic writing moment brought me to tears, and it perfectly sets up the second half of the story.

Midpoints are powerful moments. I love Midpoints.

As I struggle with the world and my health, I seek moments of joy. Writing often provides that joy.

The last line of this scene was unplanned, spontaneous, and felt like a strike of lightning. I structure and plan extensively, but as I write the details, I discovery write. That’s when these lightning strike moments happen. I crave those moments of joy.

A fluffle of bramble bunnies poured into the cave. At first they wondered around randomly, but then gathered in a hollow in the cave wall just past the foyer. The mass of bodies roiled as they settled. When comfortable, they began nodding off.

Hope and Baby stared at their new lair mates.

Hope said, “Would you like to learn how to count?”

August was a bad month. I had a medical procedure that slowed me down and soured my mood, but I still worked on my story. This story means a lot to me. I want to finish it.

As I worked, I found I needed to add earlier in the story references to foreshadow dragon traits and instincts. Also, when I wrote the lines shown below, I realized I need to reimagine, and rewrite, the world’s flora and fauna to account for monsoon cycles. Brandon Sanderson’s The Stormlight Archive series is a good example of such worldbuilding.

I’m charging onward.

When Hope came to the forest, she saw something new: the animals were also doing everyone run around in a panic making their own preparations for monsoon. It had never occurred to her that the animals were attuned to monsoon cycles.

As I wrote, I discovered Hope needed to learn to draw. To support that, I tucked a few statements and paragraphs into key locations to show her being taught.

I plan extensively for most of my stories using mind-maps and outlines. Nevertheless, that planning doesn’t cover everything. The details are discovered as I write. That spontaneity and creativity often produces my favorite scenes. My plan’s structural foundation keeps the story on track as discoveries are made. If a discovery requires updating the plan, the plan is updated.

Little discoveries are a lot of fun. They add to the pleasure writing gives me. I hope they add to the pleasure readers feel when they read the story.

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When Hope finished her sketch, Mister Emery said, “That’s good. What is the creature?”

“It’s a dragon … like what’s in story books.”

“It looks like a real creature. I like how the wings are spread in a horaltic pose.”

“Baby doesn’t always do that. Normally, he keeps them closed, folded tight to his body, but that doesn’t look dramatic.”

He gave her a sideways glance. “Indeed.”

— Dragon Universe Hope (working title, work-in-progress)

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Follow Lester D. Crawford on Bluesky.

I’m still dealing with health issues, but I am making progress on this story. Each paragraph feels like a victory, each chapter a triumph.

Events are leading toward a triggering incident as change forces the main character to adapt her survival methods to meet her new circumstances.  She needs new skills, new knowledge, and a new attitude.

Working through my mind maps, outlines, and notes has been challenging.  I know what needs to happen, but I’m having to discover-write how it all fits together.

I am pleased with the results, so far.

In her sparring session, Hope showed her blocking, deflecting, and striking skill were rapidly improving, and she drubbed Mister Emery more than once, each time eliciting a “Good job, Mommy” from the baby dragon.

Although my health issues have yet to be resolved, I am back to make progress on the story, be it slow.

The current chapter is a pleasant moment in the story that brings a change in how the man character copes. But, hardship and turmoil is coming. The main character will be faced with persisting despite adversity, just like I am.

She had done it. She had moved Baby to a new hiding place, a place where he could stay hidden, stay secret, stay safe.

I was making progress on my story this month until a health issue cropped up. Now I’m broken. Until I get this resolved, I fear I won’t be very productive. I have pain and brain fog. Thinking is difficult.

I’ve noticed an interesting phenomenon, which I was aware of before, but had never really thought about. There is a sense of tunnel vision that enveloped me. I feel like the world has narrowed into a small space of suffering with the outside world dimmed away.

I hope to be through this soon so I can get back to work. The last word I added the story before this happened was “soap.”

The times being what they are with darkness descending, I’m struggling. My reading has moved towards cozy and light, or to rereads of things I found comforting. However, my writing has moved deeper into dystopia as I have to keep making things worse for my main character just to keep up with how bad things are in the real world.

An old adage says something to the effect: “Act One: Get the character up a tree. Act Two: Throw rocks at the character. Act Three: Get the character down.

I’m editing the first half of the story to add and improve foreshadowing and ensure the foreshadows are connected to what happens later. But more importantly, I’m make the rocks bigger and throwing them harder. My original description of the story world began to feel benign because if how dark the real world has become.

I believe I’m making the story better.

Current events have taken a toll on me, but also given me ideas for how to make the dystopian society in my current project more dystopian. I didn’t want that, but I will take advantage of it.

I’ve been weeding through my collection of notes and making edits. The story is better for it, but I admit writing dark scenes when I already feel darkness surrounding me, makes the darkness worse.

I’m at the halfway point where the direction of the story changes and the protagonist goes from passive to active. I’m hoping that brings light. I need more light.

Meanwhile, for the fun of it, I made a camera orbit animation (the camera rotates around the subject) of Hope and the dragon she calls Baby. (This is not AI. It is a 3D computer generated image known as CGI. I’ve been playing with CGI for 30 years.) The animation needs improvement, but I have other work to do.

I’m feeling better after spending time doing the self-care I needed after the fall of America’s civilization. I wrote a 100-word Christmas story and learned a new CGI tool to make an image of the main character and her dragon in my current project.

The Christmas story gave me a new theme. I am enthusiastically adding it to the story.  Also, the image helped me better visualize my characters and setting. While I paused, ideas kept pouring out. I collected them. Now I’m deciding what to use and how to use them.

I’m back to writing, and I think the story is getting better and better.