small goals

One of the reasons I stopped writing was that I stopped reading. My job is writing and reading in all kinds of fields except fiction. When I'm not working, I feel either (a) too tired to read, or (b) like I should be reading something for work. Over the past few years, I've found myself every now and then accidentally plunged into the middle of a novel. Every time it's magical. Every time I recall the nourishment and groundedness that good fiction gives me. As with so many good things in life, I promise myself I won't give it up again. Then a deadline hits, or we have a family crisis, or I get a nudge from one of my senior colleagues, telling me I should be working more on my research, and then all good intentions go out of the window.

It's really, really hard to write fiction without reading it, everyday. I've watched my writing change with the reading practices required by my work. It used to be obvious to me how to start a story. Now I can't really imagine it. Instead, all of my thoughts have footnotes. So, my goal for this spring is to read. Writing will come, maybe. But it won't come if I don't read. I'm setting the bar low: two chapters per day. Early in the morning, when I'm the only one awake, and before the caffeine hit tips me over into panic about everything else I'm supposed to be doing. Two chapters per day. And I'm going to log it here too, because that's what y'all are here for, and because I suck at being accountable to myself alone.

This morning: Octavia Butler, Wild Seed, chapters 3–4.

– Jess

Yes, when I had a regular day job, my lunch hour was great. Now I'm responsible for managing my time entirely. I can do 90% of my work in my pajamas if I want to. It's glorious. Somehow it makes it SO MUCH HARDER to take an actual lunch break.

Octavia Butler, Wild Seed, two more chapters. Now the book's getting sad ...

Still working on Butler's Wild Seed. Almost forgot my two chapter limit today, but managed to stop myself in time. I figure if I binge-read the rest of the book, it'll be a while before I feel like I can start a new one.

Speaking of which, I should probably choose a next book now. Any suggestions?

polishmuse said:

NK Jemison's Fifth Season!

Click to expand...

Ooh! Thank you!

Edit: ordered it!

Two chapters more, and I'm in the heart of the book. Tomorrow's going to be different, because it's the first morning I have to get up and out before 7. I'll have to figure out some change in the routine. Here's hoping that writing this out here will keep me accountable.

Finished the book yesterday! Still waiting for The Fifth Season to arrive. I have others I could start on today, but feeling a little upside-down and inside-out with my emotions today. On the plus-side, 500 words came out of nowhere yesterday and hit me over the side of the head. It's wonderful to have that feeling again. But then I got depressed.
Heigh-ho, more tomorrow,
– Jess

Carrie Fisher, Postcards from the Edge – I'm not sure if there are chapters, so the first 20 pages.

Carrie Fisher, Postcards from the Edge – finished part 2. Come on, Fifth Season, you have to arrive soon!

Took a couple of days out with family visiting, but I'm now back on track with Postcards from the Edge. And Fifth Season arrived!

I'm now trying to take a leaf out of the thread in Basic Writing Questions: What can I learn from these books about writing? I'm trying to read with an eye to how the author constructs each scene. Alas, the first thing that I notice is that my ability to meta-read lapses about five sentences in. A couple lines of dialogue and I completely forget ulterior motives.

Oh well. At least I'm enjoying myself.

A bit of a breakthrough here ... or maybe a break-down, but either way. I've been dipping in and out of Postcards from the Edge and struggling with day-job writing (like, going into my office everyday just to cry at my desk). Just about the only good thing going was that I'd finally got back into reading novels. I'm waiting to hear back on a job interview (the last in a series of rejections before next year's job market opens up in September) and have an immigration appointment coming up. There are some weird tensions at work. On Friday I hit rock bottom ... and sort of bounced. Which made a nice change.

I went out on Saturday and treated myself to a large moleskine journal, and I'm now working at putting in two hours of journaling every day. I haven't done this for years, mostly because it takes up so much time (like, three or four hours, by the time I've taken bathroom breaks, twitter breaks, and put on dinner, etc.), but it's already making me feel transformed. I had forgotten how soothing I find pen and ink. And having just spent a few weeks wandering fitfully around the tangle of my thoughts, I feel totally justified giving myself over each evening to putting them on paper. AND, I even found space yesterday to do some character sketches. One page tumbling thoughts. One page character sketch. One page misery. One page character sketch. One page what-are-we-having-for-dinner? ... you get the picture. It felt kind of like interval training.

Onward and upward. If I can build up some habits here, I might be back in a place where I'm reading fiction and journaling for a good third of the time I am awake each day. That's a complete 180 from where I've been the past few years. And maybe it will help keep me from crash-and-burn in the meantime.