This blog is coming out late today, as you can see. I wanted to spend some time on Saturday writing it; instead, I had an extra day of writing. With my Saturday session, I wrote 48 pages, 2 under my writing goal.
Now, I'm not beating myself up over 2 pages, but neither am I letting it slide. I know myself, shortcuts and slides will be my downfall. Let this blog and all those (2) of you who read it be my accountability.
The reason I fell short and needed an extra day of writing this week was that I took Thursday as a sick day. I slept off a migraine in the morning and went to the doctor in the afternoon. I wrote about two pages that day. I've been feeling sick the past couple weeks, and this is something that's happened to me a couple times before. It's like I'm in a car getting motion sick while sitting in my desk chair. Obviously, while writing, I do a lot of sitting in my desk chair and therefore a lot of getting sick. The doctor seems to have found the issue and I'm on yet more medication (I already have plenty for chronic migraines), and the meds are so far working.
Incidentally, illness is what cemented this project in my mind as a requirement for the summer. I'm not the healthiest person in the world. I have chronic migraines, get a cold at the slightest pressure or temperature change, and can injure myself in mind-blowingly astounding ways. But hospitals were never my thing. I had to go once for stitches when I was 8 and once for a panic attack and migraine when I was 19. In comparison to my brother who went to the hospital for a new injury sustained while doing something "daring" and stupid what seemed like every other week when we were kids, I was a pretty safe from hospital stays.
When I do get sick, I prefer not to go to see doctors. I know that a fever, nausea, and achiness are the flu and that I should take Tylenol, drink plenty of fluids, and sleep. I don't need to go to a doctor who will stick me with needles and tell me the exact same thing. Unless I need a note for missing classes. So, when I woke up one Tuesday morning in late April with the sudden urge to vomit up everything in my body, including my organs, and had a strangely high fever, I just assumed it was the flu - you know, one of those 24 hour stomach bugs that you used to feign having to get out of a test but still be able to go out on the weekend? I threw up and went back to bed, and my roommate went to classes, probably thinking my inferior gentile self couldn't handle the awesomeness that was our Seder food and especially wine from the night before.
But that night when she got home, she was a dutiful roommate and checked my temperature, it was 102.5. We went to the hospital. After a couple hours of waiting, some IV fluid, and a test or two, Rachel and I returned home with a diagnosed of flu and minor infection. Take Tylenol and a prescribed antibiotic. I spent the next day in bed, with my roommate and another friend dutifully watching over me, making sure I was taking the Tylenol that wasn't lowering my fever and drinking fluids that I was barely keeping down. I'd filled my hospital quota for the next decade; Rachel hadn't. After taking my temperature again that night (103.3), she dragged me out of bed - I could barely move my muscles were so sore - and got me back to the hospital. With explicit instructions from my mother for Rachel to glower at the hospital staff until I was given everything I could possibly need, I was treated like I was dying. As it turns out, I was. I spent the next few of days in the PCU and another couple in general care. At first I was too sick to really understand exactly how serious it all was. Then I was too doped.
I guess one of the morals of this story is to see a frikkin' doctor when you get sick, which I have taken to heart, as evidenced by my doctor's appointment on Thursday. But in terms of this project, I also learned another lesson from the experience:
On an intellectual level, at some point, I realized that this could have been it for me. It took a while for it to fully sink in. You know how people say that you should live life to its fullest because tomorrow you could get hit by a bus or something? When you actually get hit by that bus and survive, things come into a different perspective. I have 21 years of really fabulous test scores and GPAs. I wanted more. I get to live the rest of my life with the threat of a recurrence, but far more importantly, I get to live, and I am going to make my life worth that. Which means it's time to get serious about what actually matters to me.
That's what this summer, this project, is about.
Quote of the Week: Memory (Reminder: These are very rough drafts. Apologies.)
In this quote, the healer Contierra from last week's quote is reflecting on the fulfilling 500 year life of an important man she's treating and her own memory of him. This was written on May 27th:
"Contierra tried to imagine him as young Cazchdani man named Abner at about her age, but she couldn’t. She could, however, picture him quite clearly as a bumbling sideshow magician at her hometown’s annual Summer Festival, as he had once posed for some reason she had never learned. She wondered if anyone else could – it was doubtful. She knew that in his lifetime, he had forged many important relationships, but having known him in that way made her feel special. That was how she met him."
Monday, May 30, 2011
Monday, May 23, 2011
Week One: An Exercise in Will Power
Total: 35 hours. (The following are approximates)
Writing Warm Ups: 4 hours, 45 minutes
Daily After-Writing Edits: 2 hours, 25 minutes
Enthusiastically Novel-Writing: 24 hours, 28 minutes
Staring at a Blinking Cursor: 2 hours, 13 minutes
Drooling, Staring off into Space, and Imagining Myself Enthusiastically Novel-Writing: 1 hour, 9 minutes
Writing Warm-Ups produced two letters (one mailed, one not), two poems, five short story beginnings, and two diary entries.
However, the Escaterra Project is about writing a novel. 58 pages, 16,986 words.
I've been talking about writing this novel for a long time. Years. Obviously, talking isn't writing, and for years, I have always found excuses to not write and instead think and plan and world-build. This summer, I've decided, will change all of that. From 9am to 5pm, but a lunch break at noon, Monday through Friday, I am working on The Escaterra Project, an effort to write the entire novel in the twelve weeks I have between junior and senior years of college. I can spend 35 hours on the computer every week without a problem. I could be a professional internet time-waster, but for 7 hours everyday, my internet is turned off, and the only program open on my laptop is a fresh Word Document. When I started on Monday, I was slightly terrified about how well it would work, "best laid plans" and all that. I powered through and above are the results.
Going into this summer, I had no intention of blogging. I've tried to start blogs before, but never got so much as 1 post done. By Thursday, I had made so many Facebook status updates about it that I decided I might as well try. I'll be updating at least weekly, sometime between Friday evening after 5pm and Monday morning before 9am. I'm not sure yet exactly what I'll be writing about beyond the general premise of documenting my writing process over the summer. I'll write a little about me; I'll write a little about my novel.
Now, for the little about my novel...
The working title is Prophecy. Because, oh hey, it involves a prophecy, as fantasy novels often do. Clever, right? Escaterra is the name of the world in which it takes place.
The Gods must choose their champions to save the world from certain destruction. They could select anyone to save the world from the apocalypse. They could choose Ariy'Ala'omand, the warrior prince of Hakatha already dedicated to the cause. Or Ashalana, the queen's friend and confidant, whose envious and corrupt rivals in court have her sent on a far off mission. Or the nameless woman of the secret band of exiled politcal adversaries and criminals who plans to lead them from their wilderness hide-out to rebellion at the city gates. Even the crazy old woman outside the walls of Souzarzum or the much-despised, apathetic Sorcerer could become saviors. But the Gods instead will choose a pirate, an apothecary and a recluse. They just don't know it yet.
In the coming weeks, I'll be filling you in on more (as it actually gets written).
Quote of the Week: Will Save (Note: apologies, these will be very rough. I will choose them for the theme, not because they are magnificent examples of prose.)
For those who don't know, I'm a huge fan of tabletop games. For those of you who don't know much about tabletop games, here's a lesson for you: Will Saves "reflect your resistance to mental influence" (PHB 3.5, 136). Someone trying to intimidate you? Roll a Will Save.
This past week has just been one major Will Save for me against the intimidation of the project I was taking on. So, here is an example of a successful Will Save I wrote on May 18th:
"Even if Contierra had access to a weapon, she wouldn’t know how to use it against them; she was terrified of all manner of beast, and had she a choice, Contierra would live a much more luxurious life in which she was required to do none of her own work. But Contierra ci’Mublim sáh’Hailiphusahabiro imci’Niha had defied her father and lord, had successfully stared down a land pirate twice in her life, had lived through the worst attack in the living memory of Hakathans, and had just willingly hung off cliff for three hours – a simple man with a crossbow was not all that intimidating."
Writing Warm Ups: 4 hours, 45 minutes
Daily After-Writing Edits: 2 hours, 25 minutes
Enthusiastically Novel-Writing: 24 hours, 28 minutes
Staring at a Blinking Cursor: 2 hours, 13 minutes
Drooling, Staring off into Space, and Imagining Myself Enthusiastically Novel-Writing: 1 hour, 9 minutes
Writing Warm-Ups produced two letters (one mailed, one not), two poems, five short story beginnings, and two diary entries.
However, the Escaterra Project is about writing a novel. 58 pages, 16,986 words.
I've been talking about writing this novel for a long time. Years. Obviously, talking isn't writing, and for years, I have always found excuses to not write and instead think and plan and world-build. This summer, I've decided, will change all of that. From 9am to 5pm, but a lunch break at noon, Monday through Friday, I am working on The Escaterra Project, an effort to write the entire novel in the twelve weeks I have between junior and senior years of college. I can spend 35 hours on the computer every week without a problem. I could be a professional internet time-waster, but for 7 hours everyday, my internet is turned off, and the only program open on my laptop is a fresh Word Document. When I started on Monday, I was slightly terrified about how well it would work, "best laid plans" and all that. I powered through and above are the results.
Going into this summer, I had no intention of blogging. I've tried to start blogs before, but never got so much as 1 post done. By Thursday, I had made so many Facebook status updates about it that I decided I might as well try. I'll be updating at least weekly, sometime between Friday evening after 5pm and Monday morning before 9am. I'm not sure yet exactly what I'll be writing about beyond the general premise of documenting my writing process over the summer. I'll write a little about me; I'll write a little about my novel.
Now, for the little about my novel...
The working title is Prophecy. Because, oh hey, it involves a prophecy, as fantasy novels often do. Clever, right? Escaterra is the name of the world in which it takes place.
The Gods must choose their champions to save the world from certain destruction. They could select anyone to save the world from the apocalypse. They could choose Ariy'Ala'omand, the warrior prince of Hakatha already dedicated to the cause. Or Ashalana, the queen's friend and confidant, whose envious and corrupt rivals in court have her sent on a far off mission. Or the nameless woman of the secret band of exiled politcal adversaries and criminals who plans to lead them from their wilderness hide-out to rebellion at the city gates. Even the crazy old woman outside the walls of Souzarzum or the much-despised, apathetic Sorcerer could become saviors. But the Gods instead will choose a pirate, an apothecary and a recluse. They just don't know it yet.
In the coming weeks, I'll be filling you in on more (as it actually gets written).
Quote of the Week: Will Save (Note: apologies, these will be very rough. I will choose them for the theme, not because they are magnificent examples of prose.)
For those who don't know, I'm a huge fan of tabletop games. For those of you who don't know much about tabletop games, here's a lesson for you: Will Saves "reflect your resistance to mental influence" (PHB 3.5, 136). Someone trying to intimidate you? Roll a Will Save.
This past week has just been one major Will Save for me against the intimidation of the project I was taking on. So, here is an example of a successful Will Save I wrote on May 18th:
"Even if Contierra had access to a weapon, she wouldn’t know how to use it against them; she was terrified of all manner of beast, and had she a choice, Contierra would live a much more luxurious life in which she was required to do none of her own work. But Contierra ci’Mublim sáh’Hailiphusahabiro imci’Niha had defied her father and lord, had successfully stared down a land pirate twice in her life, had lived through the worst attack in the living memory of Hakathans, and had just willingly hung off cliff for three hours – a simple man with a crossbow was not all that intimidating."
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