Sometimes it's *NOT* meant to be
Here's a story I have to tell. (It's also titled "Up up and away!)
It starts on Monday. Monday morning I get up to right, hit the desk and find that... the work I did on Friday somehow got saved over when I was transferring it from one machine to another and it was totally gone. It'd been a hard scene to write (about 6 pages) and so I was predictably very upset. But after about 45 minutes, I figured out how to dig it up in Word's old automatic files and I found all the work.
Then... I start working on Monday's work but I'm not so into it. Never one to quit easily, I took a short break to stretch and come back and... as soon as I stand up the power cuts off in the house and the desktop (where I was working) goes off. It took me about an hour to find the right breaker to get the power for that room back on and then I had to call it a day to go to an appointment.
Now... some of you may know that our dog (see picture below) got hit by a car a few weeks ago. (Don't worry, I'm getting to the funny part.) It sucked. Big time. But she's OK--that's the good news. Except for the fact that she's wearing the cone (dreaded) and has a leg all wrapped up. Last night she kept us up literally half the night crying and barking about it. I got out of bed about 4 times. It was like having a little baby.
Then, this morning, she wakes me up early to do her things and then goes right to sleep as soon as we get home. So I sit down to write. One thing leads to another and after some frustrating time, she's back up and crying all over the house again, won't stop, won't leave me alone, and I still haven't gotten my 1,000 words for the day so I want to still write. BUT.
But I listen to my wife and take her to the park, printing out about five pages to edit and reread while we're there.
At the park, she's happy, rolls in the grass and we're both sitting, enjoying the sun. I'm working with a pen on my pages and getting a good amount of edits marked up. I write a few paragraphs and feel like I'm on a string that I should get writing down when I get home. That's when I set the papers and my notebook down and lean back to catch a breath and some sun.
Ha. Ever seen the movie "The Little Red Balloon?" Remember being a kid and letting a balloon go? In a second, my papers get picked up by a wind. It catches about three of them and blows them across the grass. I chase them down and watch as one gets picked up and swirled around in circles, rises up about 20 feet in the air. I get the others off the grass. Literally the last one climbs to 50 feet. It's a piece of paper!! And I watch it climb and carry, climb and carry, literally as it makes its way over the park and off toward an adjacent street. I get my notebook and find that the paper I'd written the new paragraphs on is still there but, guess what, the edited page is the one flying off. So I get the dog and we go after it.
I should mention that we live at the top of a hill. Anyway, it flew away--literally. I've never seen a piece of paper climb or carry like this one did. It went away like a bird and I could see it flip-flopping all the way in the distance as I walked down the street, looking up into the sky and wondering where--or if--it would come down. When I got to the end of the block, it was gone. Out of sight. Gone.
I went home. What else could I do? Fricking write?
What's the message here?
It starts on Monday. Monday morning I get up to right, hit the desk and find that... the work I did on Friday somehow got saved over when I was transferring it from one machine to another and it was totally gone. It'd been a hard scene to write (about 6 pages) and so I was predictably very upset. But after about 45 minutes, I figured out how to dig it up in Word's old automatic files and I found all the work.
Then... I start working on Monday's work but I'm not so into it. Never one to quit easily, I took a short break to stretch and come back and... as soon as I stand up the power cuts off in the house and the desktop (where I was working) goes off. It took me about an hour to find the right breaker to get the power for that room back on and then I had to call it a day to go to an appointment.
Now... some of you may know that our dog (see picture below) got hit by a car a few weeks ago. (Don't worry, I'm getting to the funny part.) It sucked. Big time. But she's OK--that's the good news. Except for the fact that she's wearing the cone (dreaded) and has a leg all wrapped up. Last night she kept us up literally half the night crying and barking about it. I got out of bed about 4 times. It was like having a little baby.
Then, this morning, she wakes me up early to do her things and then goes right to sleep as soon as we get home. So I sit down to write. One thing leads to another and after some frustrating time, she's back up and crying all over the house again, won't stop, won't leave me alone, and I still haven't gotten my 1,000 words for the day so I want to still write. BUT.
But I listen to my wife and take her to the park, printing out about five pages to edit and reread while we're there.
At the park, she's happy, rolls in the grass and we're both sitting, enjoying the sun. I'm working with a pen on my pages and getting a good amount of edits marked up. I write a few paragraphs and feel like I'm on a string that I should get writing down when I get home. That's when I set the papers and my notebook down and lean back to catch a breath and some sun.
Ha. Ever seen the movie "The Little Red Balloon?" Remember being a kid and letting a balloon go? In a second, my papers get picked up by a wind. It catches about three of them and blows them across the grass. I chase them down and watch as one gets picked up and swirled around in circles, rises up about 20 feet in the air. I get the others off the grass. Literally the last one climbs to 50 feet. It's a piece of paper!! And I watch it climb and carry, climb and carry, literally as it makes its way over the park and off toward an adjacent street. I get my notebook and find that the paper I'd written the new paragraphs on is still there but, guess what, the edited page is the one flying off. So I get the dog and we go after it.
I should mention that we live at the top of a hill. Anyway, it flew away--literally. I've never seen a piece of paper climb or carry like this one did. It went away like a bird and I could see it flip-flopping all the way in the distance as I walked down the street, looking up into the sky and wondering where--or if--it would come down. When I got to the end of the block, it was gone. Out of sight. Gone.
I went home. What else could I do? Fricking write?
What's the message here?
posted by Seth Harwood at 3:35 PM
3 Comments:
Either the writing gods wanted those words...or, yep, those gods must be crazy...I think you are being made to sacrifice for a certain hand that got a bullet through it...or maybe it was the kneecaps...write more words or Jack Go Sleepy 'Bye!
that's crazy!!! i was smoking on my balcony that day and a piece of paper floated down from the hill and landed in my coffee!!! at first i thought it might have been a poem i had thrown from my car while driving over the bay bridge a few days before...but then i started reading it and LO it was some strange detective story with handwritten edits everywhere...it was something about a guy who kept waking up (i assume from an enlarged prostate, but it wasnt clear). after further investigation i thought, "boy i'm glad this writer doesnt subscribe to the first thought best thought methodology!" and then i thought, this writer better ground his narrative and give his characters a bit more psychological heft or else more pages are just going to float away. and then i thought, perhaps writers shouldnt write until a full week after their team gets eliminated from the playoffs ;)
hee hee
nice comeback! you guys should totally come to the reading if you are free! we'll give you a holla at some point this weekend.
peace
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