The final week when community reflection becomes self-recognition.. From thirty-five dreamers to the faithful few. We've made it. Six weeks ago, you weren't sure you could sustain daily writing through summer's chaos. Today, Jacqui is blowing past her 65,000-word goal, Sara is swimming in oceans and writing scenes, Jill is moving forward scene by scene, and I’m at 156,000 words with a character I adore about to die for the greater good of the story.
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 5: Hi all and it's down to Jill and I these days on the comment board, but I'm sure there are some of you still cruising past. So, I'm sending out a message in a bottle to all the challengers and to whatever ends summer has dispersed you.
How's it going?
Where are you in your writing?
Here, I wrote what's called a "through-line" chapter or better said, it wrote itself and I just played catch-up. That's how it goes when you surrender to the story and let it write you, vs. you writing it through the exhaustive use of summary, backstory, explaining and controlling. When you write in scene and you trust the images to pull you through, they do with glorious revelation. And that's what happened yesterday when I wrote Ch. 88, where Vincenzo's 18-year-old daughter finds him drunk and passed out in his office. She pulls him together with cures, water, coffee and shows him what she's been doing over these months that he's been wallowing--solved the problem that blighted his home tree (and oak he planted in the forest as a boy from the acorn from the home he and his sister had to run from).
Once it was done and I was thinking about the chapter, I saw it...through-line!! Here's the breakdown of where I began and how the oak "run's through" or I harken back to it with progression and escalation. This is also part of consecution, which I'll be teaching next year. Yay.
Age 7 - The Broken Beginning: The lightning-split oak at the ruined church, yet still offering sanctuary to creatures. The acorns he gathers before fleeing - seeds of hope in violence.
Age 8 - The Planting of Faith: One precious acorn remaining, planted on his birthday in his chosen home. "I want to put down roots." The leather pouch from Maria protecting it like a sacred relic.
Age 15 - The Pride of Achievement: Six meters tall, tended with "ceaseless hauling" and earthworms. "Straight up. Strong." His determination that "No ivy will drape, cling and choke these branches." The rejection of his father's neglect.
Courtship - The Blessing Tree: Using it for the mailbox, then kneeling in gratitude. "He's found." The spiritual awakening: "I was wrong about God."
Age 41 - The Diseased Shock: "Blackened wood and almost all the new leaves have dropped off." The tree reflecting his own spiritual crisis as secrets poison everything.
Age 43 - The Resurrection: Gioia's cure working, new growth appearing. "A second life, I suppose." His own readiness to be healed.
The progression is the ruined oak of his childhood (surviving by being broken open) to his own planted tree (thriving through care) to its poisoning (reflecting family secrets) to its healing (preparing him for heroic action)/ The tree literally grows up with him and mirrors his spiritual journey to this point of realization he's in right now...he's giving up too soon, he's turning inward while Grace flows outside him via his creation (his magnificent daughter). He now must stop feeling sorry for himself (yet another expression of his self-absorption) and enter Life or be doomed as a big man with a little heart.
Spoiler, he grows. He awakens. He enters life.
This is the true, geeking-out-joy of being a writer. Thanks for being with me. Let me know how you've been doing!
My story’s next chapters change in setting. From the island to back home.
I’m working on how to keep the story moving forward and keeping a realistic time line for the writer’s milestones. 1st draft to finding an agent, editor, publisher. Instead of a memoir maybe a book of essays makes more sense.
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 1: Welcome to our last week. I did the math and calculated 1500 wds a day in this challenge, or a total of 50,000 written while together (thus far). I added up the last run of chapters (30,000 wds remaining to work into this draft). I might not make it in the days alotted but I'll be working.
What about you? Where have you landed? What has yet to be achieved?
Congrats on the 50K words, Jennifer! I know you mentioned that you might not make it in these last few days, but still, that seems like quite a lot of good progress. I feel like it's always a good practice to set hard-to-reach goals.
On my end, I started to write again, but then everyone in the house came down with a cold. So I was fighting through a bit of brain fog while doing all the childcare, and am struggling through a scene that doesn't feel like it resonates with my own life anymore. Oh well, better get it all down somehow, regardless of how good it is or what mental state I'm in. Maybe that'll give me something I can work with later, at the very least.
I'm right there with you writing-wise. I've been wrestling with a similar scene and am not sure how to approach it anymore. I feel like I've just been prodding at it for the last few weeks. I don't know if this is a symptom of something deeper with my novel or just a sign that right now, my head is elsewhere.
Oh, Kat! I'm sorry. It's always something. I highly recommend Lonicera Complex. Amazing and helpful for colds. https://www.simplehealthlb.com/product-page/lonicera-complex. So amazing. Garlic too. Garlic 6000 (I get that on Amazon). Might be overshare but mom's need to stick together.
I landed back home yesterday afternoon, after 12 days and 1,850 miles on the road, spending precious time with my daughter, and meeting my muse through painting, writing, and listening, alongside 25 creative women doing the same. I am feeling the miles and the mystery of this journey as I gently ground myself here, on this land, and in this house I’ve called home for the past 26 years. I embrace this transition time as I land and listen, and return to this challenge and the questions for the final week…….
The best part of the challenge for me has been knowing the dedicated few are still here, doing the work, writing in the midst of all your life stuff. It feels like a good tether I can pull myself back with to my writing. Thank you!
The most challenging aspect for me has been consistency (usual story)….. though, I do feel good about the work I’m doing, in my flighty, spiral kind of way. So, I give myself grace as I continue to pick up the pen, move forward, and reestablish daily time for writing on my calendar.
Prep plans: (your list works well for me)
Put my “Daily Practice” on the calendar.
“Trust the Process” - Yes! Check!
“Write from the Wanting” - I love this! I am “with it”, it is “fuel” for my art!
“Stay Close to Craft” - This is a very good reminder for me and inspiration to get back to the work of actually learning how to be a good writer.
I haven't had a ton of time to spend on substack lately, but I'm glad to hear you and all the other writers working through life and writing through it all, Tracy!
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 4: How can it be 9:51 and I'm finally sitting down? How??
🤷🏻♀️
This morning got away from me. Slept later than I wanted, had to deal with a questionable charge on my account (long wait on hold), got impatient, had to apologize (though talked to the nicest man, Mozart) who made me laugh and accepted my apology with grace. Finally settled, did my AM practices, stretched my achy bod, made bread, boiled garbanzos, made the dough for a fabulous shortbread that's gluten and sugar free, removed the little tents on my garden plants, shoo'd away the rabbits that are multiplying like crazy, prayed for hawks, wrote a TY letter to a friend and now, now, NOW I'm here and ready to go.
Whew!
Why does it feel like an obstacle course to get to the keyboard some days? And maybe that's the wrong question. As we've all been talking about these six weeks...this is just life. Persistence and perseverance are what we need to apply.
What was your maze today? Or did you buzz right to it?
This made me laugh. Rabbits ate all my green beans down to the numb. Weekends I try to read but even that is hard to squeeze in. Trying to decide the next one to read from the stack.
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 3: Well, I did it. I killed a character I absolutely adore named Maria. I knew she'd have to die (based on the revision before) but thought the story might change a bit to keep her alive. It changed enough that several others lived...so why not her? But okay...that is that. 😭Lots of tears and as Frost tells us, "No tears for the writer, no tears for the reader." So, a good day. Another time jump and that's it, I'm down the home stretch. Ten more chapters (maybe less).
This quote is with me right now, as I think about the work we do here at Blackbird's Flight School and "the mother ship" Blackbird Studio: The integrity of an artist lifts a man above the level of the world without delivering him from it." ~ Thomas Merton, Seventh Story Mountain
So true. We are in but not of.
This is a small moment from Vincenzo's perspective, just after older his sister, Maria, is stabbed by a solider. This is WWI Italy, 1916:
“You remember when we were young?” he says to Maria. “Remember running in the night? Remember how you made a cozy place for us by the stream? Next to that field of barley? Yes, of course you remember. You remember everything. Well, I have such a place for you now. A nice soft, safe place to rest.”
He takes the steps two at a time, careful, careful not to jostle her—an effortless climb. The limp forgotten. The gash on his head, too.
At the top of the landing, he adjusts her in his arms and continues down the hall, taking a sharp right into the room where his firstborn slept as a boy, child, and teen, and then a young man. The finest room in the house next to the master. A patio with French doors, vines of fragrant flowers outside, a good, wide view of the land, and the Belbo and the big church at the top of the hill. A king’s view.
Rosa lit all the lamps. Four in all, and now yanks the heavier covers off the bed, tosses them into a far corner, and drapes a light blanket over the end of the sheeted mattress. It’s like their bedroom every time a baby was born. Just the basics of sheets. Towels. A light blanket that would later be burned, soaked through with all the blood it had absorbed.
Yes. That’s what this is like. Not death. It’s birth. It’s a renewal. He’ll be renewed by this and Maria will, too, and they will go on long walks and talk until the words are done. She’ll tell him everything he never wanted to know, or hear, and unfurl the deepest secrets of her heart. She’ll tell him of the lost years they were apart, and he’ll do the same, sharing every detail of every year she wasn’t with him. He will tell her how grateful he is that she gave him such a life. He will apologize for his stupidity and his pride.
“You will be fine,” he says now, though, lowers her onto the exposed bottom sheet of the bed, and eases her head onto the pillow. With one hand, he keeps the towels pressed down and it’s a third good sign. The second batch are not soaked through.
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 2: Later to the game today. Sore hands, sore wrists. Tired. A sweeping literary novel with historic elements will do that to you. Got a "talking to" in morning prayer about "my will," vs. Higher will. Higher will is balanced, patient, tempered, wise. My will is a bit...erratic. 🤣 So, I decided to go with Higher today. AKA: Flow vs. force.
10:00 a.m. Making Coffee. ☕️A bit of breakfast 🍳 and putting my head down to work but I'm making myself stop at a reasonable juncture. Walking. Gardening. Catching up on necessary and important projects I'm neglecting.
I love that you are in the thick of it with us. I had similar thoughts of balance today too. I put my run off until it was too blasted hot. It’s ok to rearrange. I trust myself the writing will happen.
Week 6, Day 1: End of day for me, shutting down the office! Wrote for 2.5 hrs and almost 2.5 hrs of summer session. My eyes are doing cartwheels from looking at the computer screen. Just took a walk and saw a beautiful sunset over the Atlantic Ocean, turned around and watched the moonrise over Saint Jean de Luz. Thrilling. I can't complain about anything.
I am two and a half weeks into my self-imposed writing residency and feel good about how I set up the daily structure, realistic expectations, and pushed through on days when that was needed and rested when my body said 'Enough.'
I do have to say, I loved seeing my name mentioned many times in summing up the challenge. I felt seen and acknowledged (which is a huge issue with me). I feel a bit embarrassed telling how much it meant! But oh well, I did persevere. And I'm feeling good. I'm working on Draft 4 of first chapter/essay. Then by July 25, hope I have 3 Drafts 4s. I go back to Paris and will play for an entire weekend because I will have submitted them to the Writing Retreat by the given deadline!!!
Thank you to Jennifer and everyone who kept posting here. I love learning from others.
Best part of challenge - Pushing through excuses and juggling multiple projects. I have more focus now on the novel. This summer challenge helped me establish a routine of writing chapter by chapter for two hours 5 mornings a week. No more scattered writing on this and that. Focused on story for this time. One benefit to this is that I'm immersed in the story first thing in the morning, then the rest of the day ideas come to me. I make notes on my phone to use the next day.
The most challenging aspect - Starting the first word. I start by listening to the last scene (Word doc review feature). This helps me dive back into story.
My prep plans - Keep the morning routine on the novel. Read novels heavy on scene or related to my genre.
I have to confess to being a bit muddled through this challenge. I usually am able to straddle a lot of different things pretty well. A few extra challenges arose this summer, and what a time it's been! The thing that I've liked the most about this challenge is the way you've been leading it, Jennifer, the tips and resources you provide, the way other authors have shared their struggles and victories, and the sense of community. I used to get up in the dark, make tea and do some of my own writing before starting my day-job, working in a quick walk with my dog before making the switch. I realized a while ago that I need to switch up that schedule, that sitting down right after sleeping all night is not the right thing for me physically. I need to move a round a lot more. I haven't quite found the right new schedule yet, but establishing a new routine that works for me is my aim for the next week or so. I walk the dog for at least 20 minutes and feed him before sitting down, but then I don't go right to my work. I get distracted by emails and other things. I need to sort that out, recommit to my own work. For my day job, I set a timer for 25 minutes of work, aiming to take a break for 7 minutes or so before digging back in. I often get so absorbed in what I'm doing that I ignore the timer. The days when I pay attention and stop working after 25 minutes go so much better. And I have so much more energy for doing things at the end of the day than on days when I work, work, work without much pause. Let's see ... diet's another thing. Jennifer, you've provided some good advice on that. I have to go back a re-read your posts. I planned to purchase some of the water you recommended, but haven't done so. It's so easy to put things off and then forget them. I have made some progress on a new book project. I meet with a writing buddy on Zoom every week, and before this challenge, it had become a strain to draft new scenes weekly. In years prior that was not the case. The weekly scenes are coming easier again, though I have a bunch of conflicting ideas about where the book is headed, so I expect I'll discard a lot of what I'm writing right now when I get more clarity about the project. I am not comfortable with so much about the book being up in the air. I guess I need to let go of control now and try to enjoy that.
Such richness in this post. TY Laura. "The thing that I've liked the most about this challenge is the way you've been leading it, Jennifer, the tips and resources you provide, the way other authors have shared their struggles and victories, and the sense of community. "
This is so true. It's a fine line, isn't it? We have to get to work but we also have to be realistic. A lot of challenges are all "RAH RAH" or split into factions or simply don't make sense. The through-line for me, is genuine care. I care about writers because I am one. I know you are all searching for the core of existence: TRUTH. And so, what can I do to help? What resources? Ideas? Experiences? Tools...can I share?
You're getting there. You are. Come join us for Bones in the fall. It's amazing. So inspiring. https://blackbirdstudiopdx.com/writing-classes/ (don't trust me. Let the others in the room, who've taken it, shout it out). Also, if you are paid here on BB Flight School you get 20% off. A heck of a deal. Get the water and shift the diet. You'll gain 10 years on your life.
His protocol on the h20: "I recommend you do it is by purchasing one (or more) cases of 25 parts per million (ppm) water at https://bit.ly/4es03hd. You mix one bottle (500mL) with 500mL of your regular drinking water. That produces a liter of water that is 87.5ppm deuterium. Keep in mind that normal drinking water is 150ppm deuterium. By lowering the deuterium content in the water of your body over time by drinking this water, you activate all the beneficial effects of DDW. After 2 months I suggest you switch to mixing 500mL of the 10ppm DDW with 500mL of your drinking water. That produces a liter of water that is about 75ppm.
Another option is to simply drink one bottle of the DDW daily without mixing it. The mixing just spreads the water out over the day more so could be more retained than if you drink it in a short period of time."
Week 6, Day 3: I'm feeling good, not stressed at all for my deadlines, at least at the moment. I have a Draft 3 to submit to Becky tomorrow. I've been working on a scene, getting as close as I can, to submit to Summer session, and I'm almost through my fourth revision of my first essay that I'm submitting July 25 to the Writing Retreat. I worked 3 hours this afternoon and, if my friend, who is visiting at the moment, isn't burned to a crisp, we're going to make a picnic dinner to eat on the beach.
I read a quote today from Laura Lippman, a writer I like, when she was asked 'How does a story start for you?' I think she took Bones on the sly.
Her answer: "A character and a situation and a lot of "what ifs" and what thens". My most recent book started with a first line: Mrs Blossom had never been upgraded in her life."
I read that book last month and loved it.
Have a fulfilling weekend all of you who are still writing here!!
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 5: Hi all and it's down to Jill and I these days on the comment board, but I'm sure there are some of you still cruising past. So, I'm sending out a message in a bottle to all the challengers and to whatever ends summer has dispersed you.
How's it going?
Where are you in your writing?
Here, I wrote what's called a "through-line" chapter or better said, it wrote itself and I just played catch-up. That's how it goes when you surrender to the story and let it write you, vs. you writing it through the exhaustive use of summary, backstory, explaining and controlling. When you write in scene and you trust the images to pull you through, they do with glorious revelation. And that's what happened yesterday when I wrote Ch. 88, where Vincenzo's 18-year-old daughter finds him drunk and passed out in his office. She pulls him together with cures, water, coffee and shows him what she's been doing over these months that he's been wallowing--solved the problem that blighted his home tree (and oak he planted in the forest as a boy from the acorn from the home he and his sister had to run from).
Once it was done and I was thinking about the chapter, I saw it...through-line!! Here's the breakdown of where I began and how the oak "run's through" or I harken back to it with progression and escalation. This is also part of consecution, which I'll be teaching next year. Yay.
Age 7 - The Broken Beginning: The lightning-split oak at the ruined church, yet still offering sanctuary to creatures. The acorns he gathers before fleeing - seeds of hope in violence.
Age 8 - The Planting of Faith: One precious acorn remaining, planted on his birthday in his chosen home. "I want to put down roots." The leather pouch from Maria protecting it like a sacred relic.
Age 15 - The Pride of Achievement: Six meters tall, tended with "ceaseless hauling" and earthworms. "Straight up. Strong." His determination that "No ivy will drape, cling and choke these branches." The rejection of his father's neglect.
Courtship - The Blessing Tree: Using it for the mailbox, then kneeling in gratitude. "He's found." The spiritual awakening: "I was wrong about God."
Age 41 - The Diseased Shock: "Blackened wood and almost all the new leaves have dropped off." The tree reflecting his own spiritual crisis as secrets poison everything.
Age 43 - The Resurrection: Gioia's cure working, new growth appearing. "A second life, I suppose." His own readiness to be healed.
The progression is the ruined oak of his childhood (surviving by being broken open) to his own planted tree (thriving through care) to its poisoning (reflecting family secrets) to its healing (preparing him for heroic action)/ The tree literally grows up with him and mirrors his spiritual journey to this point of realization he's in right now...he's giving up too soon, he's turning inward while Grace flows outside him via his creation (his magnificent daughter). He now must stop feeling sorry for himself (yet another expression of his self-absorption) and enter Life or be doomed as a big man with a little heart.
Spoiler, he grows. He awakens. He enters life.
This is the true, geeking-out-joy of being a writer. Thanks for being with me. Let me know how you've been doing!
My story’s next chapters change in setting. From the island to back home.
I’m working on how to keep the story moving forward and keeping a realistic time line for the writer’s milestones. 1st draft to finding an agent, editor, publisher. Instead of a memoir maybe a book of essays makes more sense.
I’ll just keep going for now.
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 1: Welcome to our last week. I did the math and calculated 1500 wds a day in this challenge, or a total of 50,000 written while together (thus far). I added up the last run of chapters (30,000 wds remaining to work into this draft). I might not make it in the days alotted but I'll be working.
What about you? Where have you landed? What has yet to be achieved?
Congrats on the 50K words, Jennifer! I know you mentioned that you might not make it in these last few days, but still, that seems like quite a lot of good progress. I feel like it's always a good practice to set hard-to-reach goals.
On my end, I started to write again, but then everyone in the house came down with a cold. So I was fighting through a bit of brain fog while doing all the childcare, and am struggling through a scene that doesn't feel like it resonates with my own life anymore. Oh well, better get it all down somehow, regardless of how good it is or what mental state I'm in. Maybe that'll give me something I can work with later, at the very least.
I hope you all feel better soon, Kat!
I'm right there with you writing-wise. I've been wrestling with a similar scene and am not sure how to approach it anymore. I feel like I've just been prodding at it for the last few weeks. I don't know if this is a symptom of something deeper with my novel or just a sign that right now, my head is elsewhere.
Me too, Kat. I set big goals and just keep moving forward.
Oh, Kat! I'm sorry. It's always something. I highly recommend Lonicera Complex. Amazing and helpful for colds. https://www.simplehealthlb.com/product-page/lonicera-complex. So amazing. Garlic too. Garlic 6000 (I get that on Amazon). Might be overshare but mom's need to stick together.
Hold steady.
Week 6, Day 1
I landed back home yesterday afternoon, after 12 days and 1,850 miles on the road, spending precious time with my daughter, and meeting my muse through painting, writing, and listening, alongside 25 creative women doing the same. I am feeling the miles and the mystery of this journey as I gently ground myself here, on this land, and in this house I’ve called home for the past 26 years. I embrace this transition time as I land and listen, and return to this challenge and the questions for the final week…….
The best part of the challenge for me has been knowing the dedicated few are still here, doing the work, writing in the midst of all your life stuff. It feels like a good tether I can pull myself back with to my writing. Thank you!
The most challenging aspect for me has been consistency (usual story)….. though, I do feel good about the work I’m doing, in my flighty, spiral kind of way. So, I give myself grace as I continue to pick up the pen, move forward, and reestablish daily time for writing on my calendar.
Prep plans: (your list works well for me)
Put my “Daily Practice” on the calendar.
“Trust the Process” - Yes! Check!
“Write from the Wanting” - I love this! I am “with it”, it is “fuel” for my art!
“Stay Close to Craft” - This is a very good reminder for me and inspiration to get back to the work of actually learning how to be a good writer.
Your travel sounds amazing and inspiring. Like a 12 day artist date.
I haven't had a ton of time to spend on substack lately, but I'm glad to hear you and all the other writers working through life and writing through it all, Tracy!
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 4: How can it be 9:51 and I'm finally sitting down? How??
🤷🏻♀️
This morning got away from me. Slept later than I wanted, had to deal with a questionable charge on my account (long wait on hold), got impatient, had to apologize (though talked to the nicest man, Mozart) who made me laugh and accepted my apology with grace. Finally settled, did my AM practices, stretched my achy bod, made bread, boiled garbanzos, made the dough for a fabulous shortbread that's gluten and sugar free, removed the little tents on my garden plants, shoo'd away the rabbits that are multiplying like crazy, prayed for hawks, wrote a TY letter to a friend and now, now, NOW I'm here and ready to go.
Whew!
Why does it feel like an obstacle course to get to the keyboard some days? And maybe that's the wrong question. As we've all been talking about these six weeks...this is just life. Persistence and perseverance are what we need to apply.
What was your maze today? Or did you buzz right to it?
I’m looking forward to it.
This made me laugh. Rabbits ate all my green beans down to the numb. Weekends I try to read but even that is hard to squeeze in. Trying to decide the next one to read from the stack.
It's just us again, Jill! We're the last solider's standing!! TY for your perseverance and good humor. You will have a great year in Studio.
I’m looking forward to it.
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 3: Well, I did it. I killed a character I absolutely adore named Maria. I knew she'd have to die (based on the revision before) but thought the story might change a bit to keep her alive. It changed enough that several others lived...so why not her? But okay...that is that. 😭Lots of tears and as Frost tells us, "No tears for the writer, no tears for the reader." So, a good day. Another time jump and that's it, I'm down the home stretch. Ten more chapters (maybe less).
This quote is with me right now, as I think about the work we do here at Blackbird's Flight School and "the mother ship" Blackbird Studio: The integrity of an artist lifts a man above the level of the world without delivering him from it." ~ Thomas Merton, Seventh Story Mountain
So true. We are in but not of.
This is a small moment from Vincenzo's perspective, just after older his sister, Maria, is stabbed by a solider. This is WWI Italy, 1916:
“You remember when we were young?” he says to Maria. “Remember running in the night? Remember how you made a cozy place for us by the stream? Next to that field of barley? Yes, of course you remember. You remember everything. Well, I have such a place for you now. A nice soft, safe place to rest.”
He takes the steps two at a time, careful, careful not to jostle her—an effortless climb. The limp forgotten. The gash on his head, too.
At the top of the landing, he adjusts her in his arms and continues down the hall, taking a sharp right into the room where his firstborn slept as a boy, child, and teen, and then a young man. The finest room in the house next to the master. A patio with French doors, vines of fragrant flowers outside, a good, wide view of the land, and the Belbo and the big church at the top of the hill. A king’s view.
Rosa lit all the lamps. Four in all, and now yanks the heavier covers off the bed, tosses them into a far corner, and drapes a light blanket over the end of the sheeted mattress. It’s like their bedroom every time a baby was born. Just the basics of sheets. Towels. A light blanket that would later be burned, soaked through with all the blood it had absorbed.
Yes. That’s what this is like. Not death. It’s birth. It’s a renewal. He’ll be renewed by this and Maria will, too, and they will go on long walks and talk until the words are done. She’ll tell him everything he never wanted to know, or hear, and unfurl the deepest secrets of her heart. She’ll tell him of the lost years they were apart, and he’ll do the same, sharing every detail of every year she wasn’t with him. He will tell her how grateful he is that she gave him such a life. He will apologize for his stupidity and his pride.
“You will be fine,” he says now, though, lowers her onto the exposed bottom sheet of the bed, and eases her head onto the pillow. With one hand, he keeps the towels pressed down and it’s a third good sign. The second batch are not soaked through.
I'm looking forward to reading your book!
It's so interesting how the story unfolds and changes for the writer. Like you said earlier, it's about making adjustments to the best laid plans.
🐦⬛ Week 6, Day 2: Later to the game today. Sore hands, sore wrists. Tired. A sweeping literary novel with historic elements will do that to you. Got a "talking to" in morning prayer about "my will," vs. Higher will. Higher will is balanced, patient, tempered, wise. My will is a bit...erratic. 🤣 So, I decided to go with Higher today. AKA: Flow vs. force.
10:00 a.m. Making Coffee. ☕️A bit of breakfast 🍳 and putting my head down to work but I'm making myself stop at a reasonable juncture. Walking. Gardening. Catching up on necessary and important projects I'm neglecting.
Balance
Patience
Temperance
Wisdom
Have a great writing day, all.
I love that you are in the thick of it with us. I had similar thoughts of balance today too. I put my run off until it was too blasted hot. It’s ok to rearrange. I trust myself the writing will happen.
I am, for sure, "in the thick of it." Rearranging is basically all we're doing, all day long. The best laid plans and all that...XO
Week 6, Day 1: End of day for me, shutting down the office! Wrote for 2.5 hrs and almost 2.5 hrs of summer session. My eyes are doing cartwheels from looking at the computer screen. Just took a walk and saw a beautiful sunset over the Atlantic Ocean, turned around and watched the moonrise over Saint Jean de Luz. Thrilling. I can't complain about anything.
I am two and a half weeks into my self-imposed writing residency and feel good about how I set up the daily structure, realistic expectations, and pushed through on days when that was needed and rested when my body said 'Enough.'
I do have to say, I loved seeing my name mentioned many times in summing up the challenge. I felt seen and acknowledged (which is a huge issue with me). I feel a bit embarrassed telling how much it meant! But oh well, I did persevere. And I'm feeling good. I'm working on Draft 4 of first chapter/essay. Then by July 25, hope I have 3 Drafts 4s. I go back to Paris and will play for an entire weekend because I will have submitted them to the Writing Retreat by the given deadline!!!
Thank you to Jennifer and everyone who kept posting here. I love learning from others.
So tomorrow, more on Draft 4 of Essay #1.
Bonne nuit toutes et tous.
Great images, Sara. Sun and moon and sea.
Best part of challenge - Pushing through excuses and juggling multiple projects. I have more focus now on the novel. This summer challenge helped me establish a routine of writing chapter by chapter for two hours 5 mornings a week. No more scattered writing on this and that. Focused on story for this time. One benefit to this is that I'm immersed in the story first thing in the morning, then the rest of the day ideas come to me. I make notes on my phone to use the next day.
The most challenging aspect - Starting the first word. I start by listening to the last scene (Word doc review feature). This helps me dive back into story.
My prep plans - Keep the morning routine on the novel. Read novels heavy on scene or related to my genre.
Thank you! This is clear and specific and very helpful to me!
Yay! I’m so glad
I have to confess to being a bit muddled through this challenge. I usually am able to straddle a lot of different things pretty well. A few extra challenges arose this summer, and what a time it's been! The thing that I've liked the most about this challenge is the way you've been leading it, Jennifer, the tips and resources you provide, the way other authors have shared their struggles and victories, and the sense of community. I used to get up in the dark, make tea and do some of my own writing before starting my day-job, working in a quick walk with my dog before making the switch. I realized a while ago that I need to switch up that schedule, that sitting down right after sleeping all night is not the right thing for me physically. I need to move a round a lot more. I haven't quite found the right new schedule yet, but establishing a new routine that works for me is my aim for the next week or so. I walk the dog for at least 20 minutes and feed him before sitting down, but then I don't go right to my work. I get distracted by emails and other things. I need to sort that out, recommit to my own work. For my day job, I set a timer for 25 minutes of work, aiming to take a break for 7 minutes or so before digging back in. I often get so absorbed in what I'm doing that I ignore the timer. The days when I pay attention and stop working after 25 minutes go so much better. And I have so much more energy for doing things at the end of the day than on days when I work, work, work without much pause. Let's see ... diet's another thing. Jennifer, you've provided some good advice on that. I have to go back a re-read your posts. I planned to purchase some of the water you recommended, but haven't done so. It's so easy to put things off and then forget them. I have made some progress on a new book project. I meet with a writing buddy on Zoom every week, and before this challenge, it had become a strain to draft new scenes weekly. In years prior that was not the case. The weekly scenes are coming easier again, though I have a bunch of conflicting ideas about where the book is headed, so I expect I'll discard a lot of what I'm writing right now when I get more clarity about the project. I am not comfortable with so much about the book being up in the air. I guess I need to let go of control now and try to enjoy that.
Such richness in this post. TY Laura. "The thing that I've liked the most about this challenge is the way you've been leading it, Jennifer, the tips and resources you provide, the way other authors have shared their struggles and victories, and the sense of community. "
This is so true. It's a fine line, isn't it? We have to get to work but we also have to be realistic. A lot of challenges are all "RAH RAH" or split into factions or simply don't make sense. The through-line for me, is genuine care. I care about writers because I am one. I know you are all searching for the core of existence: TRUTH. And so, what can I do to help? What resources? Ideas? Experiences? Tools...can I share?
You're getting there. You are. Come join us for Bones in the fall. It's amazing. So inspiring. https://blackbirdstudiopdx.com/writing-classes/ (don't trust me. Let the others in the room, who've taken it, shout it out). Also, if you are paid here on BB Flight School you get 20% off. A heck of a deal. Get the water and shift the diet. You'll gain 10 years on your life.
Thank you, Jennifer!
Brought this over from week 2: Elimination Diet: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/akcx43ft9g4armr1jku8i/Elimination_Diet.pdf?rlkey=ncee0gddcnl8zx9jjc4pg0bm9&dl=0
H2O Data: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/pharmacology/articles/10.3389/fphar.2024.1431204/full
His protocol on the h20: "I recommend you do it is by purchasing one (or more) cases of 25 parts per million (ppm) water at https://bit.ly/4es03hd. You mix one bottle (500mL) with 500mL of your regular drinking water. That produces a liter of water that is 87.5ppm deuterium. Keep in mind that normal drinking water is 150ppm deuterium. By lowering the deuterium content in the water of your body over time by drinking this water, you activate all the beneficial effects of DDW. After 2 months I suggest you switch to mixing 500mL of the 10ppm DDW with 500mL of your drinking water. That produces a liter of water that is about 75ppm.
Another option is to simply drink one bottle of the DDW daily without mixing it. The mixing just spreads the water out over the day more so could be more retained than if you drink it in a short period of time."
Just ordered some DDW. Step by step, things can change for the better.
Week 6, Day 3: I'm feeling good, not stressed at all for my deadlines, at least at the moment. I have a Draft 3 to submit to Becky tomorrow. I've been working on a scene, getting as close as I can, to submit to Summer session, and I'm almost through my fourth revision of my first essay that I'm submitting July 25 to the Writing Retreat. I worked 3 hours this afternoon and, if my friend, who is visiting at the moment, isn't burned to a crisp, we're going to make a picnic dinner to eat on the beach.
I read a quote today from Laura Lippman, a writer I like, when she was asked 'How does a story start for you?' I think she took Bones on the sly.
Her answer: "A character and a situation and a lot of "what ifs" and what thens". My most recent book started with a first line: Mrs Blossom had never been upgraded in her life."
I read that book last month and loved it.
Have a fulfilling weekend all of you who are still writing here!!