Flying By the Seat Of My Pants

Once I was a few chapters into The First Kid on Mars, and starting to feel confident that I really was writing a book, I decided I needed to create a new Twitter account for my new life as a writer. And so I did. 

I started reading and engaging in conversations with writers about writing. I had no idea this community existed on the app, and I love it. 

One discussion keeps grabbing my attention each time I see it: the great planner vs. pantser debate. 

As I quickly came to understand it, planners make a detailed outline of their story before they start to write, and pantsers fly by the seat of their pants, making no plan at all. 

Like most of us, I'm somewhere in the middle. 

But I lean heavily towards flying. 

I started The First Kid on Mars with a couple of sentences that had been clanging around in my head for a couple of days:

Tuesday is going to be different, she thought to herself. After everything that happened today, it just has to be.

I had no idea who she was, or what had happened today, or why today is apparently Monday. I just wrote the next sentence, and then a few more, and then suddenly realized a few things: she was Abby, she had a big fight with her best friend today, and on Tuesday she and her family would start the adventure of moving to Mars. 

Then I started making plans - and now I've got lots of those. More on that later. 

But it all started with a couple of sentences and trusting myself to fly.