Derailment
Apparently, the book was coming along a little too well because the writing gods must have decided I needed a gut check and threw a pair of massive curve balls my way.
Last Monday I was in my groove. I wrote my 3000 words. Good words too. Words I was proud of. The story felt like it was finally shaping up. I had a clear picture of where I wanted the next few scenes to go. Then Tuesday came and everything ground to a screeching halt. I got a text from our nanny. She was feeling a little under the weather. Nothing serious, just a little sniffly but she didn’t want to take the chance of passing anything to the girls. No problem. I didn’t want that either and one of the perks of being an author is that I can adjust my schedule to take unexpected days off. If nothing else, the girls and I would just have a fun couple of days to ourselves. Then the nanny’s sniffles became the flu. No more writing that week. (I tried but the girls seem to have a sixth sense for when I open my laptop.)
On Monday the nanny was fully recovered and I was eager to get back to my writing chair and start typing. I’d lost a little of my momentum but I knew I’d get it back after a day or two. It wasn’t my most productive day, but the words weren’t bad. There were even a few in there that I was sure would stick around to the final draft.
Now it’s today… and all the words from yesterday are nowhere to be found in my document. Or in the backup folder.
Needless to say I am distraught. Everything from yesterday will have to be rewritten. And to top it off, I spent my precious time that I have the nanny for trying to recover the old words rather than adding more.
Hope your week is going better than mine 😉
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Responses to “Derailment”
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One day at a time! The fact you’re getting anything productive done while having two littles is already a huge accomplishment. Hang in there!
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Take heart! I’ve found often when this has happened to me that I write to replace is better! I taught Intro to Theatre for the first time last fall, and the curriculum asks them to write a short play. I wanted to use a play I’d written years ago but couldn’t even find a paper copy, so I rewrote it, and it is funnier and more complex than the original. I know that will happen for you, too.
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That definitely sucks and I’m sorry that happened to you. I wish for a bit of extra beauty in your day so it inspires ideas that turn into chapters. I hope everyone is well and blessings to all.
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Look at it this way…maybe what you write next will be better than the original, and you’ll end up not needing to revise anything further down the line. It’s a funny old world😉🤗
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This happened to me with my dissertation… I was like 70k words in and I’d just kept the doc open for like a month (saving frequently), and then one day I closed it to restart and give my computer a break. Upon restarting, the file was just gone. No backup, no file, it didn’t even appear in my recently opened/closed documents. I couldn’t even find the like residue temporary file when I went digging in my system. After panic and tears over months of research lost, I found the file had somehow become uploaded to the cloud, which at the same time deleted the local copy? Had to download it, and, if I recall, there was some word-loss, but not much 😅
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I’m glad your nanny has recovered. And I’m so sorry about all that work disappearing into the digital black hole! I hope you are able to get back into your writing groove quickly, for you and, selfishly, for me as I am EAGERLY awaiting your next release!!
Your post reminded me of when I was in grad school. I lost my thesis THREE times!! The hard drive failed. I got a new one, and I didn’t bother to back up the new writing elsewhere because it’s not going to happen again, right? WRONG! The third time, the laptop just died and couldn’t be saved. (I’m not a tech person, and I don’t remember the reason I was given.) By the end of the digital drama, I had my thesis backed up on three flash drives (in case one or more failed – lesson FINALLY learned LOL), an external hard drive, my website, and my father’s website. I’m happy to say, after rewriting my thesis completely from scratch four times, I got that sucker submitted and graduated!
Happy writing, and thank you SO MUCH for sharing your stories! I really enjoy your work!! -
Rooting for you.
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That was my worst fear in college! Luckily it never happened to me but I had a friend loose a 30 page paper once. Hope you’re able to get back on track as painlessly as possible!
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