Well, maybe not quite. Still, after six years my trusty laptop ain’t so trusty. It’s not failing completely, just lags for a stretch at unpredictable times. Right in the middle of a brainwave, no less.
So I spent most of this weekend troubleshooting the spinning beachball of death and it’s fixed–or as fixed as a six-year-old laptop can be. Even so, I look on every character I type with suspicion: will this be the last one before it freezes on me again?
Which is less than awesome as it’s my go-to tool for not only the book but pretty much everything else in my life. Additionally most of my research is on this chunk of plastic and metal; I seldom print anything out.
So how did this affect the Great Work? I didn’t get much writing time until yesterday. And I developed some contingency plans:
Save. As I work, hit ctl-S every ten minutes or so. Just in case.
Back up. Back up early and often. Think you’ve backed it up? Back it up again. Even when the screen was frozen my external drive worked. I’m making damn sure to do it more often than I have been!
Store offsite. Related to backup, my Zotero serves as a research holding area.
Speaking of research, remember that physical books exist And I do have some–not everything is a PDF of some academic article.
Write with pen and paper. Not optimal as my wrists don’t like it and I add to what’s in Scrivener but it’s better than nothing. At least I can spitball plot issues and get general notes down.
This whole “writing a book” thing has a steep learning curve. No matter how much I practice I might not see positive results for years. Even if I do the odds of being able to make a living at it are small. It sounds bleak and I suppose it can be – I can well understand why some people just quit.
Fortunately I have some prior experience stubbornly pursuing uncertain payoffs.
I’m a competitive fencer.
Competition photo. Guess which one I am.
I picked up a foil because I needed the exercise and I’ve always thought swords were cool. What started as a less-boring means of keeping in shape became a physical and mental passion, and over the past fifteen years I’ve earned a couple of ratings (kind of like belts in martial arts) and medals along the way.
Please note that “fifteen years” thing. Fencing is about keeping calm and acting correctly in a quickly changing, physically demanding situation. I am neither a natural athlete nor reliably cool-headed and it took every second of those fifteen years to get this far.
Interestingly, the longer I work on the book the more parallels I find between fencing and writing:
First efforts suck. Just as the first draft is dreck that needs editing, my first competitions were practice for competing: adapting to the noise, fighting down performance anxiety/”stage fright”. With each event I got a little more confident, and performed a little better.
Practice practice practice. As writers must write, so must fencers fence. Damn tiredness, sore feet, writer’s block, or whatever else. Feet on strip = butt in seat.
Massive amounts of persistence and patience are required. I competed for four years before getting my E rating and it took another three to get my D (the highest is A). I hope it won’t take me that long to get published. Even if it doesn’t it may still take years for my books to do well, but that’s ok, because:
I don’t have to be perfect to be good. I’ll never be an olympian but I’m not a bad fencer. I’m good enough to win national medals and keep my head above water with scary As and Bs. And while I’ll never be a J. K. Rowling, I hope to tell a story competently enough to entertain readers.
Ongoing education. Just as there is no mastery in writing, there is no endpoint at which someone becomes a perfect fencer. High rated fencers still have coaches and do drills and footwork. I expect to read books on craft, take classes, go to conferences, and the like long after I’m published. Speaking of which:
I can’t do it alone. Without supportive, enthusiastic club mates and a coach that prevents me giving in to my natural laziness I’d never have done this well! My writing is much the same: I need critique partners, beta readers, editors and other professionals I’m still discovering to make my book as good as it can be.
The result of 13 years of work.
In the next two weeks I’m in one local and one national competition, so wish me luck. If nothing else they’re good persistence/patience exercises I can fold into my writing discipline.
What about you? What “transferrable skills” do you bring to your own writing (or other creative pursuit)?
Lots of authors build collections of inspirational material. Music, pictures, objects, etc. help you “go there” and I am no different.
But I got so caught up in hammering out the first draft that I sort of…forgot. Or kidded myself. “Half this stuff doesn’t exist anymore anyway.” “I’ve got portraits, and that’s enough.” Well, no.
I was really just avoiding the astounding time-suck of Pinterest.
Because it would be so easy to play here all day to the exclusion of all else. Rudolfine Prague, Elizabethan everything, alchemical miscellanea, and all so pretty!
I’m pulling my head out to continue teeth-grinding, hair-tearing rewrites but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy my book research board. Let me know what you think and recommendations are always welcome!
