Sometimes when you are writing, you disappear in your screen. I don’t quite know how to describe it, except that all else fades. You don’t look at the words on paper, you don’t look at your keyboard… The story just unfolds by itself and you stand by in awe to witness it.
Those days are magical… and very rare.
Most days it takes a lot of coffee, sweat, procrastination, tears and self-loathing to get anything done. Not to mention the amounts of hair you pull out, trying to find what you are looking for. Sometimes I worry I might go bald. I’m serious.
Today was one of those days where it seemed impossible to get into the zone. Writing was going decent enough; it just took so much effort and a continued racking of my brain that at some point I got actually worried I would fry my brains out of my skull. That the gooey stuff my mind is made of would drip out from out from behind my eyeballs onto my keyboard and forever render me incapable of going to the bathroom by myself. (Which is nice when you run out of toilet paper, but rather an uncomfortable hassle in all other cases.)
Usually, I put on classical music on these kind of days, except I was sitting in a coffee shop where they insisted on blasting terrible pop music from a Television (Word of advice: Don’t ever use your television as a speaker system. It’s a show of bad taste in more ways than you can imagine). So, while I was trying to listen to Bach’s excellent English Suites, Rihanna’s droning beats kept leaking through. And instead of focusing on the story in front of me, a part of my brain had to filter her crappy music out. This can be done of course, but not without also filtering out my own music. And it takes a ridiculous amount of energy and focus that I really needed for writing instead. In the end, I just gave in; turned off my music and let the sound of the coffee shop and Rihanna’s screeches fill my ears.
I wrote about 2000 words in the course of the day. This is a terrible rate, but given the fact that I am still outlining and making everything up from scratch… It is not too bad. The thing is, however… When I finally gave up, I felt like… well, imagine Zombie infestation taking over your grey matter. That’s what it felt like. I was basically turning into a drooling zombie behind a keyboard.
I walked home enjoying the quiet, when all of the sudden I noticed that Rihanna was stuck in my head. And the funny part is, that I don’t actually know the words to her song… But it was still there in my head going on and on about how she loves the way he lies… (Since I don’t really know the lyrics I have no context as to why this is… But isn’t that ALWAYS a very weird thing to say.) And I just couldn’t get rid of it… So I was a drooling zombie humming along to Rihanna simultanously screaming at myself to shut up.
And I wonder why people sometimes stare at me…
Now I am just sitting at home, trying to watch the first episode of the new season of Sherlock… Which features Miss Adler so it must be great.. I wouldn’t know because I am just too fried to follow it, and am instead googling for noise reducing headphones. So, when my first paycheck comes in I’m getting those bad boys…
Because if I don’t, I really do worry my brains might leak out through my nose (which is an image I’m just putting out there to gross you out!)
So, I’m gonna turn off Sherlock because that man deserves my full attention and I cannot give it to him right now… I am just going to take a bath… Listen to some music and turn in early. If I really was as cool as I like to be, I would go out for a run instead. But it’s cold and dark and I am lazy and tired.
My apologies for this pointless post about this wickedly cool gadget I’m going to buy… I wasn’t planning on writing it… But I’ve never one to suffer in silence. So when Rihanna’s droning on in my head, so help me God… I will do anything to get it stuck in you’re head as well… You’re welcome.
Here’s something that IS fun to read! It’s about Zombies. You’re welcome. Again.
London Express. 