Keep your fingers moving. Be specific. Lose control. Don’t think. Those four rules, or “rules”, are the basis of writing, according to Natalis Goldberg. (I keep trying to write Goldman, go figure.) Do not think about punctuation, spelling, or all that stuff. Just get it out.
I am most of the way through week one of the thing that will not be named. I have had two huge interruptions. One was being at the hospital for a nuclear based test. That started early, at 7:30 with no one else in the waiting room. It was a stress test. “Some people say they feel like they have run a marathon.” I did not feel that way. I got home, sat down, wrote 4700 words. Then I felt like I had done something, not a marathon, but it was something and I was tired.
The second time was when I was writing cancer memories. It was going slow. At breakfast, I was asked, “should we but up this tarp to protect the shed?” We needed to get the tarp onto the shed. A grapevine had its way with the roof, sending roots down through it. I looked up. It was a sunny day. Our forecast had been for rain. Rain all day. Rain all day every day for the next week. It was sunny now. “yes, we should.” and we did. We got the tarp on top of the shed. Then it was time to write and to write about things I really do not like remembering as vividly as 1 did this day. I looked up MOPP and the side effects and a “for 20 years there is a 20% chance…” When I was treated it had been in successful use for five years. This 20% over 20 years? That was still to be discovered. In fact, when I first heard about a 20% chance of developing a secondary cancer, it was over a 10 year span. But 1 found out about that side effect after they had just over 10 years. I did not know about the 20 year span until I was writing today. Lucky for me I did not get a secondary tumor. Now I am into different side effects.
I have kept my fingers moving, I do not think about spelling, too much, Specific? You can judge that. Lose control? I dunno. Do it, does I, do I lose control of my typewriter and let the keys do their thing? Ask it. I have kept up my pace. I still have enough stuff in my brain to type a single page or a part of a page after my 2,000+ words to keep to my goal.
—- MichaelRpdx :: h3k
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PS You can name it if you like. I am just tired of typing the mixed case word.