I is a writing freak
Is it a bad thing for my head to be so full of a story I'm writing that I actually start dreaming about it? Because I totally dreamed about Innocence Rewrite the other day. It was kinda nice, really; I hadn't had a Buffy dream in a while.
Actually, I've been dreaming a lot lately. It's bizarre. Usually I have dreams I remember in the morning maybe once or twice a month. Since summer started I've had them nearly every night. (And between the increased frequency and getting back into fandom more than I have been in a long while, it's brought a return of fandom dreams. In one of the ones where I was me, the Scoobies were all sleeping over in my room. In another, where I was Buffy, it was this weird BtVS/BJT crossover, just throwing characters together like I'd simply forgotten they came from different stories, and then a minute after I woke up, I went 'hey, wait, they don't go together!')
I've been doing crazy much writing lately. I'm amazed my brain isn't totally saturated with it. I just posted my 3rd chapter of Innocence Rewrite in less than a month. I've burned through two pocket notebooks in the same period - that's less than two months per notebook. I've written two BJT Trailers and written or finished maybe half a dozen little oneshots as well. And the plotbunnies keep cropping up, and the words keep pouring out. I don't know how I'm doing it, but I'm just grateful. It's so much nicer than the last few months of school, when I had almost complete writer's block and two poems were all I had to show for two whole months.
But I'm also kinda scared that I'll never be a real writer. This is my peak productivity, better than I've ever done before (except maybe a few times like the few days I was home during Spring Break this year, or the day I was frantically finishing up stories right before the fair deadline last summer, but those were only for a day or two, whereas I've been keeping this up for a month now). I just wrote my longest chapter ever, on Innocence Rewrite. It was a little over 5000 words. It took two weeks of writing every day to produce. I set myself a goal of writing a full handwritten page every day over the summer; I haven't missed a day yet, and I've about doubled that amount maybe half the days. This is a superhuman effort for me. And I see so many writers whose chapters are way longer than mine, and who update once a day, or at least once a week. I simply can't do that. I can't keep up.
Plus I'm way stressed. Whatever happened to summer is for relaxation? I'm uber-busy. Besides the writing, I'm taking a walk every day, working four days a week, biking across town from the office to the university three days a week, volunteering at the university museum three days a week, and taking Beginning Ballroom Dance at the university twice a week (Tuesdays and Thursdays, I do every single one of those things in the same day). And I've barely started working on my American Lit correspondence class, and I haven't touched my AP English and AP Gov summer reading yet.
One of the most panic-inducing things of the past few years happened to me on Wednesday. I stopped at the Farmer's Market for lunch, halfway on my bike ride between work and the uni, and realized my notebook was no longer in my pocket. I'm way possessive of my notebooks, and this one was almost full. I was doubly scared because I was afraid both of not being able to recover the writing that was in it, and someone else finding it and reading it because I think my writing stuff is really personal. I immediately doubled back, though, and by some miracle found it still lying on the sidewalk where it had fallen. And then I was really late getting to the mammals lab.
Other stuff going on: Took the SAT (again) last Saturday. Then biked to Value Village for a shopping spree. Bought shinies. Leaving for DC for a week tonight.
Actually, I've been dreaming a lot lately. It's bizarre. Usually I have dreams I remember in the morning maybe once or twice a month. Since summer started I've had them nearly every night. (And between the increased frequency and getting back into fandom more than I have been in a long while, it's brought a return of fandom dreams. In one of the ones where I was me, the Scoobies were all sleeping over in my room. In another, where I was Buffy, it was this weird BtVS/BJT crossover, just throwing characters together like I'd simply forgotten they came from different stories, and then a minute after I woke up, I went 'hey, wait, they don't go together!')
I've been doing crazy much writing lately. I'm amazed my brain isn't totally saturated with it. I just posted my 3rd chapter of Innocence Rewrite in less than a month. I've burned through two pocket notebooks in the same period - that's less than two months per notebook. I've written two BJT Trailers and written or finished maybe half a dozen little oneshots as well. And the plotbunnies keep cropping up, and the words keep pouring out. I don't know how I'm doing it, but I'm just grateful. It's so much nicer than the last few months of school, when I had almost complete writer's block and two poems were all I had to show for two whole months.
But I'm also kinda scared that I'll never be a real writer. This is my peak productivity, better than I've ever done before (except maybe a few times like the few days I was home during Spring Break this year, or the day I was frantically finishing up stories right before the fair deadline last summer, but those were only for a day or two, whereas I've been keeping this up for a month now). I just wrote my longest chapter ever, on Innocence Rewrite. It was a little over 5000 words. It took two weeks of writing every day to produce. I set myself a goal of writing a full handwritten page every day over the summer; I haven't missed a day yet, and I've about doubled that amount maybe half the days. This is a superhuman effort for me. And I see so many writers whose chapters are way longer than mine, and who update once a day, or at least once a week. I simply can't do that. I can't keep up.
Plus I'm way stressed. Whatever happened to summer is for relaxation? I'm uber-busy. Besides the writing, I'm taking a walk every day, working four days a week, biking across town from the office to the university three days a week, volunteering at the university museum three days a week, and taking Beginning Ballroom Dance at the university twice a week (Tuesdays and Thursdays, I do every single one of those things in the same day). And I've barely started working on my American Lit correspondence class, and I haven't touched my AP English and AP Gov summer reading yet.
One of the most panic-inducing things of the past few years happened to me on Wednesday. I stopped at the Farmer's Market for lunch, halfway on my bike ride between work and the uni, and realized my notebook was no longer in my pocket. I'm way possessive of my notebooks, and this one was almost full. I was doubly scared because I was afraid both of not being able to recover the writing that was in it, and someone else finding it and reading it because I think my writing stuff is really personal. I immediately doubled back, though, and by some miracle found it still lying on the sidewalk where it had fallen. And then I was really late getting to the mammals lab.
Other stuff going on: Took the SAT (again) last Saturday. Then biked to Value Village for a shopping spree. Bought shinies. Leaving for DC for a week tonight.