Writing Journey: Journal Entry 7

February 17, 2021

Day 135, Week 19

• Words: 96,320
• Chapters: 44
• Point in Book (Save the Cat!): THE END
• Ego Size: Chia seed
• Emotional State: Anti-Climatic Exhaustion

Today my book is done. My first too long, changed halfway full rough first draft is officially done. It’s a total mess and has multiple layers of fixes to be done on it, but it’s done. And I should be excited or exhilarated or something, and I’m not. I’m just a little bit tired. Ok, a lot tired.

Yesterday, I was remembering a time when I was in high school. My sophomore year (15-16 for non-Americans), I had PE for my first class of the day. And I took it every day for the full year so that I wouldn’t have to for the rest of my time in high school (it was a feature). This particular memory is of aerobics class.

Now, aerobics class in the late ’80s was all about high impact cardio. Jumps and constant movement to get you into shape and that’s exactly what this class did – at 7:15 am in the freaking morning. One of the instructor’s favorite songs to make us jump around to was Billy Joel’s, We Didn’t Start the Fire. That song is almost 5 minutes long and the evil drill sergeant of an instructor would stand in the front of the mat and yell at us the whole time. “Get those knees up, Caswell!” I can still hear to this day. For five minutes. I don’t hate that song, but I should.

What does aerobics in the frosty late 1980s have to do with my book? I’m in this program. Write your book in 16 weeks and get it published 6 months later. This is the last week of the 16 weeks. I’ve been cranking out words for 16 (+2) solid weeks while also reading and development editing my student writers’ books this entire time. As its the last week, this is the week all of the writers really churn out the work and I’m buried in chapter and tiny stories and freak out phone calls.

As a result, I’m tired. Really tired. I’m not over my book – not at all. But the thought of rewriting the entire thing, of redoing Act 1, since I’m throwing out my current version in favor of Act 2, of adding in all of the little layers – world-building, subthemes, hints and breadcrumbs – over the next 3-4 weeks just makes me want to face plant. And I still have to film my video, but that’ll wait until I get the tripod that’s on the way.

And thus, the anti-climatic finishing of my book. If I had the time, I wouldn’t touch it for a few weeks. But I don’t. I have to keep ‘er movin’, as Charlie Berens (comic from my hometown) would say. And that’s alright. I am Gen X after all. The resilient generation that just gets our shit done. So I will.

But I won’t like it.