Nothing you can do but you can learn how to be you
Hi, there.
So. A Hinge in the Air is finished...three chapters left to have betaed, edit and post, but it's complete. I finished unexpectedly Friday evening when smacky30 and smittywing agreed I didn't need a scene that I had planned on writing...so, I was sort of stunned to realize it was done.
This is wojelah's help-haiti fic. Because she is an exceptional writer and she gave money for this, I knew when I started I wanted this to be the best that I could possibly do and I also knew it was going to be longer than the 1,000 word minimum I had promised. I started it back in January...January 27, to be exact. Finished it (except for edits) June 25 (we won't talk about the fact it was technically due on February 15).
My second fanfic was around 35,000 words, Madrigal was in the 40,000 range. Hinge is a little over 89,000 words.
That's better than novel length. It took me just a smidge under five months.
In that five months:
I missed some birthdays
I ducked out on some social activities
I didn't connect as deeply with some friends
I might have missed the opportunity to help someone by being emotionally unavailable
I've neglected LJ
I neglected some chores and some "should" dos
But, also in that five months:
I held down a full time job where I regularly put in 50 hours a week
I commuted every work day to said job, taking between 90-120 minutes a day
My house was (still is) in chaos (the whole freakin' time)
I had some emotional upheaval as well
I went on two trips
I was emotionally available for my child
I functioned relatively normally and completed all of my "gotta" dos
While I wrote a motherfucking novel length story.
When Savannah was a baby/toddler, I wrote a mediocre Silhouette romance when I was a stay-at-home mom. It was rejected with a personal note saying, "Fix this, edit that, change this, send it back and we'll look at it again." I debated whether I wanted to fix something I was ashamed of when I wasn't good enough to even do it. Then my computer crashed and I lost it. It was around 80,000 words and it took me six weeks to write...but I had a lot more time on my hands.
I tried NaNoWriMo once. I crashed and burned spectacularly.
I think I used those two things to tell myself I couldn't write a novel, that I needed more time than I had. And, no, I'm not happy about all those things on that first list, those things I neglected, but...I wrote a novel. To be honest, I couldn't/wouldn't have done it without smittywing and smacky30 encouraging and bolstering me, but I did it.
So, now I know I can do it and I can't really use time as an excuse any more.
There's that old saying about all of us having one good novel inside of us. I think I have one...it's not a Silhouette or a Harlequin or fanfiction. It's a real novel.
And it scares the crap out of me.
And I just lost another excuse for not starting it. Or finishing it.
It's not going to happen right away. I've got the post-multi-chapter fic blues. And I need to catch up, you know, on life.
But now that the idea is thee, I probably won't be able to get away from it.
Is there something in your life that scares you? Something you think you might be able to do but, for whatever reason, you've never tried?
Also...Hi. Sorry I've been a sucky friend lately. What's going on? Catch me up.
So. A Hinge in the Air is finished...three chapters left to have betaed, edit and post, but it's complete. I finished unexpectedly Friday evening when smacky30 and smittywing agreed I didn't need a scene that I had planned on writing...so, I was sort of stunned to realize it was done.
This is wojelah's help-haiti fic. Because she is an exceptional writer and she gave money for this, I knew when I started I wanted this to be the best that I could possibly do and I also knew it was going to be longer than the 1,000 word minimum I had promised. I started it back in January...January 27, to be exact. Finished it (except for edits) June 25 (we won't talk about the fact it was technically due on February 15).
My second fanfic was around 35,000 words, Madrigal was in the 40,000 range. Hinge is a little over 89,000 words.
That's better than novel length. It took me just a smidge under five months.
In that five months:
I missed some birthdays
I ducked out on some social activities
I didn't connect as deeply with some friends
I might have missed the opportunity to help someone by being emotionally unavailable
I've neglected LJ
I neglected some chores and some "should" dos
But, also in that five months:
I held down a full time job where I regularly put in 50 hours a week
I commuted every work day to said job, taking between 90-120 minutes a day
My house was (still is) in chaos (the whole freakin' time)
I had some emotional upheaval as well
I went on two trips
I was emotionally available for my child
I functioned relatively normally and completed all of my "gotta" dos
While I wrote a motherfucking novel length story.
When Savannah was a baby/toddler, I wrote a mediocre Silhouette romance when I was a stay-at-home mom. It was rejected with a personal note saying, "Fix this, edit that, change this, send it back and we'll look at it again." I debated whether I wanted to fix something I was ashamed of when I wasn't good enough to even do it. Then my computer crashed and I lost it. It was around 80,000 words and it took me six weeks to write...but I had a lot more time on my hands.
I tried NaNoWriMo once. I crashed and burned spectacularly.
I think I used those two things to tell myself I couldn't write a novel, that I needed more time than I had. And, no, I'm not happy about all those things on that first list, those things I neglected, but...I wrote a novel. To be honest, I couldn't/wouldn't have done it without smittywing and smacky30 encouraging and bolstering me, but I did it.
So, now I know I can do it and I can't really use time as an excuse any more.
There's that old saying about all of us having one good novel inside of us. I think I have one...it's not a Silhouette or a Harlequin or fanfiction. It's a real novel.
And it scares the crap out of me.
And I just lost another excuse for not starting it. Or finishing it.
It's not going to happen right away. I've got the post-multi-chapter fic blues. And I need to catch up, you know, on life.
But now that the idea is thee, I probably won't be able to get away from it.
Is there something in your life that scares you? Something you think you might be able to do but, for whatever reason, you've never tried?
Also...Hi. Sorry I've been a sucky friend lately. What's going on? Catch me up.