Progress, and Writer's Block

So I’ve written 18 out of 21 days of the month so far, with varying degrees of success. Some nights I crawl to reach 500 words, while other nights I sprint past the 1,200-word mark and feel very handsome and accomplished. I have no idea what my total word count is at this point, because I foolishly forgot to mark where I started writing, so I’m just taking it day-by-day. I’m also learning that while word count is a handy barometer for progress, the words themselves aren’t made equal. I spent two hours writing one night last week, giggling all the while and feeling positively wonderful about the whole thing, only to find at the end that I had only managed a little over 600 words.

Overall, I’ve made some good progress this month. Until two nights ago, where I sat down to write and had nothing.

I stared at the screen with growing terror as the moments ticked by. I typed out a sentence, then deleted it. I looked back over what I had written the night before, hoping for a prompt of some sort, and came away empty-handed. I consulted my outline, and it might as well have been written in Greek.

It’s not that I don’t know where the story is going. I do. I was just incapable of actually telling it.

I think I sat there for almost 30 minutes, muttering under my breath and trying to collect my thoughts. I might have scratched out around 200 words before finally giving up with a frustrated flourish.

Writer’s block? Maybe. I could just be burnt out. I’m also brewing up a really nice head cold, which might be a factor in my brain’s sudden inability to communicate. On a somewhat related note, this sudden illness has also put a damper on my milestone goal of becoming a complete alcoholic by this time next year, since I don’t drink when sick.

Whatever the case may be, it was an incredibly frustrating experience, and I’d like for it to never happen again, thanks all the same. I managed to chisel out some words last night, and that was nice, but the going is slow; regaining the momentum has proven to be a rather difficult task.

Looking back at my work thus far, I also need more horror in my vampire book. Still trying to figure out how to fit this in.

Preview 2: A Slightly More Honest Preview

I was beginning to think that my alarm was, in fact, a sentient being, and sometime during its journey of digital self-discovery it realized that its sole purpose in existence was to cause me, personally, unending torment.

It’s not that it didn’t keep time. It did. It just did so in the most annoying manner possible, namely by waking me up every evening with an electronic wail that was something reminiscent of a banshee being humped by a Speak-and-Spell, a noise which cut through the fog of sleep like a Cadillac through a shopping mall, and which never failed to leave me disoriented and slightly panicked.

In an attempted truce, I had switched the alarm from “scraping a metal file across my inner ear” to “radio,” figuring that maybe Rachmaninoff would be a pleasant change of pace for us both. However, I made the mistake of underestimating this contraption’s undying hatred of me and all that I stand for. Instead of being gently lifted into consciousness in the arms of soothing strings and pleasant strands of piano, the hateful little bastard made it a point every day of falling ever-so-slightly out of tune, somehow managing to drop between three radio stations at once, mixing Beethoven's 7th Symphony with Mexican talk radio and alternative rock, interspersed with a healthy helping of static.

One evening, after discovering to my everlasting delight that the “Snooze” button no longer worked and that the radio could, in fact, beep and play several radio stations in concert, I finally snapped, slamming a fist through the its black plastic shell, ripping it out of the wall, and chucking it across the room, where it lay in offended silence.

I left it there for almost a week, isolated, devoid of sustenance, before checking to see if it still worked. No sooner had I plugged it in than crimson midnight flared angrily from its cracked digital face, and the little shit picked up right where it had left off, howling at me in Spanish and screaming at me in an octave that would have made a dog attempt suicide. I frantically began pushing buttons and toggling switches, eventually stumbling across the arcane combination which appeased the spiteful demon inside of it and lulling it into a temporary silence, lazily blinking the wrong time at me, smug in its victory despite its shattered edifice.

I taped it up and changed the time, but put it on the dresser across the room. I suppose I could have purchased a new clock. In fact, I really probably should have. But I had grown to have a sort of unhealthy respect for the little bastard, and began to redefine what I had originally classified as “the acts of Skynet Junior” as “quirks,” the same way a crazy old woman might call herself “eccentric” when anyone else would be calling Animal Control about her 70 cats.

And so it was that early Wednesday evening, the alarm howled a digital prayer for vengeance against all organics, and I lurched upright.

Preview — Prologue

Overdramatic prologue HOOOOOOOOO!

It was the summer of 1349, and London was dying.

A sweltering heat rolled through the city, and the wails of its sick and dying filled the night. Corpses crowded the narrow streets of the city, discarded like so much detritus, to be collected and burned or buried with their fellows. The stench of corruption filled every corner, every edifice, every breath, and all wept for those lost or ailing.

A man sat on the dirt floor of his home, cradling the cold body of his wife, watching flies dance across the eyes of his son. His sobs filled the empty space where laughter once resided. Orange light from the corpse fires filtered through the boards that sealed up the house, casting a hellish silhouette against the walls, and the smell of blood and vomit filled his nostrils. He didn’t care. He rocked silently back and forth, humming a song he had written for his darling when he had courted her, kissing her blackened fingers gently and promising her it would all be over soon.

A hand, white as alabaster, gently touched his shoulder.

“Poor, sweet man,” a woman's voice purred, dark a smoke. “Poor, lonely child.”

The man looked over his shoulder. The woman wore an elegant dress the color of the Thames in winter, and wore the face of a bird with dead, black eyes. He did not speak.

“You miss them, don't you?” she asked, caressing his cheek. He wept at her touch, burying his face in her hand that was cold as ice.

“There, there,” she said, lifting his chin with her finger. “No need to cry, my sweet. It will all be over soon.”

“Are you Death?” he asked, eyes wet and hopeful, tears carving tracks through the grime on his face.

“Yes,” she said, “and no.”

She drew him in her frigid embrace, and he clung to her in desperation.

“Please,” he whispered. “Please...”

“Shhhh...” she caressed his matted hair. “No tears, my sweet. You will never have need to weep again.”

She sank her teeth into his neck, and he gasped in relief for the darkness that was drawing close.

© 2013 Steven Gaughran

Day 11: Workflow

After doing a quick word count, I realized that there is probably no way I am hitting the 50,000-word quota this month. Which is frustrating, but not unexpected. It also doesn't really mean much; I plan to keep writing nightly, knocking off a little bit at a time.

 

What is unexpected is that, despite my low nightly numbers, I'm actually capable of hammering out a fairly decent word count in the time I have. I'm also discovering a workflow that isn't bad, or rather it wouldn't be bad if I started at 8 or 9 in the morning, rather than 8 or 9 at night. The philosophy of "just fucking write, you hack!" has actually been really good for me, and for my self-esteem, since it appears I can still pull out some half-decent prose even when incredibly overtired. My wife's gentle reminders that I need to write have also been helpful, and are keeping me honest.

 

I'm also enjoying myself, which is nice. It isn't a chore, which is something I was afraid of. I was actually a little disappointed when I stopped last night, but my brain was threatening to punch its way out of my skull, which is rarely a good thing.

I also realized I really enjoy taking mundane things and talking about them in grandiose and dramatic fashions. Really fun!

 

Anyway, here's Steve's Current First-world Workflow

• Pour drink. Usually wine, though this week it's been orange juice since I've been fighting something off. Not sure what, but according to Google it's probably cancer.
• Sit down. This is actually more complicated than it sounds, due to my current PC setup.
• Get up again after realizing that I forgot to plug in my headphones, then sit back down.
• Check all social media (this helps to avoid getting distracted later).
• Turn on music loud enough to block out all external stimuli. Instrumental is preferred, so that I don't get distracted by lyrics. 
• Start writing. I've been writing linearly (that is, straight through the plot), though I'm going to start hopping around a bit more in the near future.
• Write for about an hour. This results in 500–1,000 words before I get tired/bored/distracted.

And that's how the "magic" happens, more or less. Some time this month I would like to take a full day for writing, and see what I can get done if I treat it like "work" instead of a "hobby."

 

I'll be posting a preview sometime soon-ish.

Weekend Update (Days 2 and 3)

Word Count — 1,310

Total Words — 2,349

Total Completion Percentage — 5%

I do all of my writing at night after my kids go to bed, since that’s when I actually have time. I was hoping to get some daytime writing in on the weekend, but only wound up able to squeeze in about an hour and a half at the library on Saturday.

I’ve been using Google Drive, since I’ve been switching between my desktop (PC) and laptop (aging Macbook) and find that a universal, cloud-based solution is more convenient than fucking around with a flash drive/converting files/etc. This was sort of problematic at the library, however, since their internet connection is spotty at best. It all worked out in the end, except for when my laptop decided in a fit of pique to blare music at top volume through both its speakers and my headset, causing me to scream in horrified agony while punching any and all available volume buttons and blanching under the baleful looks of the other patrons while my eardrums spurted blood.

So, yeah, it turns out that weekends aren’t particularly great times to write, either, since life still happens. And that’s okay.

Hypothesis: there are no perfect times to write, so get over it.

Plans for this week: set up a workstation in my garage to write from. My lovely wife already set one up for me, but it’s been neglected. I think I could have a fairly nice, secluded setup back there…

Thanks for reading.

This weekend’s writing was brought to you largely by the Dubstep station on Pandora Internet Radio.

Day 1 — A Slowish Start

Word Count — 1,039 words

Total Completion Percentage* — 3%

Friday nights are hard, usually because I’m dead tired from the work week. Also, I’ve been fighting off...something. But “Fighting Off Something: I Think I’m Getting Sick Again” could be the title of my autobiography, so whatever!

Anyway, progress was slow, but it was made. Some scenes are easy to write. They pop into your head already half formed, and all you need to do is fill in the blanks. Tonight’s scene is not like that. I should really learn to block these sorts of things out a bit better, instead of flying by the seat of my pants, but frankly that’s boring.

Not doing things because they are boring is something I need to work on if I’m going to grow as a writer. Sometimes, writing is just work, and you just need to fucking do it and get it over with. Sighing with a dainty hand draped across your sallow, fevered brow lamenting the departure of your Muse is a bullshit way of saying you don’t feel like doing whatever, and I suspect was an excuse invented by writers who would rather be doing opium/absinthe/whores than actually working.

Also made the mistake today of looking back at what I’ve been writing. That’s a sand trap, and make no mistake! Memo to self; don’t look back unless necessary until the first draft is complete, for the sake of your already tenuous grasp on sanity.

I need to increase my productivity if I’m going to hit my goal. Perhaps a more flushed-out outline will help with that?

That’s all for tonight. Thanks for reading.

*Assuming the NaNoWriMo goal of 50,000 words.

Tonight’s writing was brought to you by the following music:

• God Speed You! Black Emperor. (1999). Slow Riot for New Zero Kanada [MP3]. Toronto: The Gas Station.
• Darren Krob. (2011). Bastion Original Soundtrack [MP3].