And then everything got hard

That’s what she said. There, now it’s out of the way.

This screenplay writing experience is very different. The comic book was huge and it flowed. I may not have known right away that it was going to end up being 415 pages (which is good; that would have been intimidating), but still, it kind of wrote itself, and even if there were parts that I had to dig deeper for, there was still a lot of flow where I would have days that I wrote 10 to 15 pages easily.

With Family Blood, that eight pages on the first day was my most productive day to date. Sunday night I wrote half a page. I am at 71 pages now and I keep needing to change things.

Now, I knew that it should be short. The standard is 120 pages (or minutes), but you can have shorter movies and for an action film 90 minutes can be completely respectable, or you risk getting bloated. I thought this one should probably come in at between 95 and 105. I don’t know if I can get there. I still really only have one major action scene to do, and it is not going to be 19 pages.

Adding more deaths isn’t necessarily as helpful as you would think. I realized that I did need to add some, so I threw in two hikers who explore the wrong cave, and that really only added a page and a half. It was not completely gratuitous, because it demonstrated some things that had not previously been seen about the vampires, and it totally traumatized Sarah, so that scene works, but obviously if I keep throwing in more extras just to kill them, not all of those scenes could possibly be justifiable.

I have to admit that working on it kind of makes me want to go for an all-out hordes of vampires killing lots of people story, but that would not fit in this story, and ultimately I would really only do it if there was another story that was compelling where that scenario would work. Seriously, I thought it was time to write about zombies, and I do have zombie ideas, but they are three incompatible ideas, and until one of them wins, or I realize they are compatible in a way I had not seen, or something like that happens, then it is a no-go.

Also, I thought I was going to start drawing for the comic book. (I wrote that on the 15^th.) That doesn’t even go into how I was wrong about how the blogging was going to go, or that all of the books I was reading were really slow going too. Also, my sisters and I had been in a good exercise routine, and then scheduling issues and an injury threw that off.

The first thing that happened was that I found out that I can’t draw at all. Well, that’s kind of harsh. Even though I expected over the course of the project that my drawing would improve, and I would probably end up wanting to redo the first couple of books, I found that I did not even like what I was doing enough to start.

I decided that what I was going to do there was to start using the comic books I have as models so that I could get the hang of drawing again. I mean, I used to be better at this. Apparently it is not like riding a bike. I’m not even sure that riding a bike is like riding a bike. Anyway, for this one, I need to get in some practice where there is no emotional cost to me, and I can try different styles. Yes, as I have learned from that one arc in the ComicCon movie, to really be good you need to draw from your head and not from pictures, but I think drawing from pictures is a reasonable intermediate step.

At this point I anticipate starting the actual drawings for the comic in the spring, but again, I am wrong about everything. I thought I was going to start copying those characters right away, and then I realized something else I need to do that also involves drawing, and it involves reviving an old project. I don’t want to write too much about that one right now, but I hope to have it online around December 15^th. I will need to resolve some more technical issues for that as well.

So, I was going to be drawing, and editing, and blogging about politics, but the blogging about politics was not flowing, and the drawings were awful, and I hadn’t really gotten started on the editing at all. It’s not just that nothing was going as expected—frankly, I’m kind of getting used to that. It’s more that suddenly everything was a struggle, and it had been going so well before!

So right now I am working on something that is hard, and it is frustrating, but is still satisfying. This is a temporary thing. I have already started reading a new book that is going faster (after finishing another slow one), I think now that I am back to writing about creative things that blogging will feel better, and well, the drawing is just going to take time. At the same time, there are things happening that are so much fun, and most of my shows are going on hiatus so I will have more time there. We are adapting our workout routine.

I feel like this last bit of time has been about pacing. I remember when I would come home, and blog, and then write fifteen pages in the comic book, I would be like “Who is this girl? I’ve never been that productive before.”

There were a few different factors there. One is that I think there has been a progression. First it was writing to Aaron, and needing to be conscientious about that, but also constantly looking for content so I would have something to write. Then it was getting back into the blogging, and being consistent with it. Right now, I may only write a few lines at a time in the new screenplay, but I write in it every day.

The other thing is that I really have given up on the computer games. I still want to play them. Especially when I am struggling, the temptation is there. There can be that quick fix of the game, before I get into the frustration of trying to coordinate the moves of eight people when only two of them can die and one needs to be incapacitated and one needs to be injured seriously but not fatally, and where you should never really have anyone just standing around and it is all happening too quickly. However, there is no quick fix from the game, because then I just keep wanting more, and I really cannot handle it. It’s ridiculous, but it would be more ridiculous to not acknowledge it and let it keep stealing my time. Anyway, dealing with that addiction has been an important part of my productivity.

It has also been a lesson about pacing though. No matter how much I have improved as a writer, it will not always be easy. Actually, it would appear that no matter how good I get in any one aspect of my life, those gains cannot be assumed to be permanent, and then the point becomes to keep going.

Early morning walks becoming nasty due to winter setting in? What about aerobics videos indoors? No ideas to make it impossible for Sarah to escape but possible for her to be rescued? Okay, let’s rework the dialogue in that other scene, and worry about the captivity issues tomorrow. Can’t manage more than a few pages at a time in this book? Well, it’s still a few pages. I’m still going to finish it.

It’s nice to know what euphoria feels like. It is more essential to know what struggling feels like and not surrender to it.