Another Michael Said
Coupling
It’s been three joyous writing (and editing) days. Having one such day always energizes and intoxicates me. Returning to life’s normal routines and patterns afterward is deflating.
But then, coupling three days together feeds the highs, giving me a sensation of feeling invincible and omnipotent. It’s empowering but frightening because it must be kept in context for what it is.
That energy can’t help but spill over into other things. It stirs something that’s deeper and more primal in me. The short and long of it is that I’m accomplishing, creating something tangible from my mind’s energy and my physical exertion, and that is rewarding. I set a goal, and I’m working toward accomplishing that goal. When successful progress and its accompanying energy continues over three days, this sense parlays into a belief that I can do anything, because, hey, look how good the writing and editing is progressing. Woo-hoo.
Common sense helps ground me. Writing (and editing) and the rest of life aren’t the same. Thinking of this reminds me of some hotel chain’s commercials. They went along the lines of, “Let me operate.”
“You’re a doctor?”
“No, but I got a great night of rest.”
It’s all about how you feel, and the self-confidence that it stirs. I think the chain was Holiday Inn Express.
Meanwhile, however, some of my mind views all this with deep suspicion. “Maybe you’re fooling yourself,” at least one advisor whispers. “You’re probably not that good.”
It’s an amusing proposition because it demands that I hold two contrary ideas in mind, that I am that good, and that I’m not that good. Parts of my writing is probably amazing, and parts are probably crap. This is a draft, and I’m the writer, and I wrote it for me, so if I enjoy it as a reader, mission accomplished. It’s natural that others will dislike it, not get it, enjoy it or not, decide that it’s, “Okay,” (shudder), or love it. None of that’s within my control except that I wrote it for me, and I enjoy it.
Am I conning myself? You bet! But I think I’m also being realistic. I know, too, that I’ll probably encounter days when I feel sick about reading what I wrote because it needs a lot of work.
Accepting that I must stop now is a reluctant choice. I love the immersion of writing and editing my novels. I know myself, though, and my writing process, and its capricious nature. I know that going out on a high helps sustain progress because I feed off expectations created by past success. It at least makes it easier to get to the document the next day.
So, sadly, but joyously, time to stop writing editing like crazy, one more time.
SUCKS, In Caps
Decided to make a change in my novel in progress. This is Book Four, An Undying Quest, in the Incomplete Series.
I’m not certain but I overwrote the existing file without creating a backup. Worse, I’d decided to make this change without first backing up my work, violating my cardinal rule – backup, backup, backup, and save often.
Realizing my error immediately, I went into recovery mode. The results were depressing. No ASD files, no WKP files, or TMP files were found as a match for the initial version. No previous versions found. The file wasn’t found on One Drive.
Unbelievable. Three hundred fifty pages of the revised novel were lost.
Back to square two. I have the beta draft in its raw form. I’d started revising on October 18th, so it’s only a few weeks of work, and about half the novel.
Now I’ll walk and bash myself for being hasty and thoughtless, and take some deep breaths. It’s not the world’s end, or civilization’s end, or anything like that. It’s just a foolish setback. I’ll just need to reset myself, go back, and begin again, with some bitter lessons learned.
Done editing for today. Cheers
Surgery
Today’s editing was like surgery. I wrote Book Four, An Undying Quest, in a coffee-stoked and idea-infused blaze. Feeding me, the muses took me in different directions simultaneously. One over-arching arc was eventually uncovered as definitive. Excising paragraphs, merging, and clarifying the one great arc and staying true to the final concept and story involved a lot of reading, thinking, and revising.
Thank god for coffee. Terrific day of writing editing like crazy. Time to call it a day.
I might go get a doughnut.
Michael Seidel, writer 