The Trouble With First Lines

Almost two years ago, I decided to begin 168 Hours with these words: “Tuesday, July 14, 2009, was a good day.” It was a good day — though I had to cast around for a while to figure out how I wanted to get into the idea that lives are made up of hours, and how we choose to spend our hours determines the shape of our lives. That was a day I spent a high proportion of hours on things that mattered to me. That made it a good day.

I am still trying to figure out what the first line will be of All The Money In The World. I am most likely starting with the story — from one of the email lists I’m on — of a family that experienced a sudden acquisition of wealth. Many of us have long fantasized about what we’d do if only we had enough. But what if we did? Then what?

Anyway, I know it will come to me eventually, but this is always a frustrating part of the writing process. You can spend hours on mere sentences, while other whole chapters seem to merely take minutes. There is only so much efficiency to be had!

Though, speaking of which, I wanted to include a few links in this post (I’ll be on the road tomorrow and not posting):

• Over at Michelle Rafter’s WordCount blog, I have a guest post on 8 Painless Steps To Make Time To Write A Book. I’m not sure I’d say “painless,” but like anything, it can be done. Your first marathon is endless. The second is merely 26.2 miles.
• At BNET, I write about The Art Of Focus: Use Bits Of Time For Big Goals. I also write about 3 Reasons To Kick The TV Habit, and a post on getting out the door faster called It’s 7:45AM. Do You Know Where Your Cell Phone Is? I’m laughing about some of the comments on that one, since a few claim it is “too mommy.” Which is funny since I was accused on my What The Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast post of clearly not having small kids in my house. Guess you can’t please them all.