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Day one of my double class-close weekend down. Class closes are the last day of a series of classes, where we have to do all the state paperwork for the students, and they take their tests. I don't mind them, exactly—I'm the kind of person that sort of enjoys grading and boring data entry stuff—but they do require a lot of extra work, with potentially huge consequences for mistakes, which can be a struggle because there's no lessened expectation for everything else I'm expected to get done.
After tomorrow, I have Monday and Tuesday off, for my second Covid shot. I am so excited! I am so glad that I'll get to start ramping up to being protected, and have far less risk of becoming a vector. (Which has continually been my biggest fear - I don't want to get Covid either, but I absolutely would be horrified to be the reason someone else got sick.) Of course, even after my additional two weeks post-vax, I'll keep taking my precautions. I largely work with teens who are just too young to get vaxxed (yet, at least; hopefully some new research will find that the vaccines are safe for kids.) And even so, I know we aren't at the herd immunity point yet, and so I'll keep masking and distancing in public. But I'm excited to get to visit Taylor again, and to just in general start being able to do stuff again.
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Yesterday was the last day of Camp Nano. And I did it! I met my second goal of 40k for the month, finishing with a total of 41,422 words for the month!
The light blue line was my target for my original 25k goal. The darker line is my actual wordcount total for each day. :)
I probably won't keep up with the 1500 word/day pace. While it wasn't undoable, obviously, it did mean that sometimes I felt more pressure just to hit my word goal than I felt to make the words good, haha. That isn't a bad thing on a first draft, when just making the words happen is the most important part, but this is my rewrite. My intent is that each chapter only gets another fairly quick editing pass after this before posting, so I'm a little worried that maybe some of these sections should have gotten more attention, even if that had meant slower progress.
Even so, I'm really glad that I got so much of this draft done this month!
-
I've been a little frustrated at my writing pace, even as I've been for the most part pleased with my relatively steady progress.
But as happy as I am that I have been working on it... I also want to be *done.*
My first idea for the fic came about in July of last year, though I paused it while I worked on a fic challenge in August.
I spent September and October outlining it.
I spent November - January on the 69k rough draft.
I forced myself to take February off, so I could go back to it with fresh eyes.
And then I spent March and April so far working on draft 2.
If I finish the rough draft in May (which is my tentative goal), then I can start posting in June, and if I post one chapter a week, with roughly 20 chapters, that means I'll be done posting it in October. That means it will have been just over a year from the start of actually working on it to getting it completely posted.
To be honest, I realize that isn't actually a terrible amount of time for something the length of a short novel. To get from nothing to completed work (including chapter-by-chapter sharing) in about a year is... really pretty good, considering this is a hobby and not even something I'm putting 40 hours a week into.
And yet I'm frustrated that it takes me a YEAR to get a fic written.
Some thoughts on why, and trying to talk myself into feeling better about it:
- Internalized feelings that I shouldn't put so much time into "just" fanfic. This is something I actively fight against for other people: I am continually in awe of the amazing fic that people turn out, and will viciously defend fic as valuable, significant, and worthwhile work. But I have a hard time applying those thoughts to myself.
- Comparing my output to others. I follow some *astoundingly* prolific writers. (Both published and fan.) For the fan writers I'm thinking of, some of that is the fact that they post as they go, so they are posting pretty constantly. But they're posting a lot of oneshots, and while they have many ongoing fics they share, there can be weeks or months in between updates on each one. They ARE prolific, but I'm sitting amazed that they're writing thousands of words per week... when sometimes I'm writing thousands of words per week, too! I'm just not posting all of mine.
I *could* combat that to some extent by posting as I complete chapters, but... I'd much rather have a complete work before I post. I strongly prefer to have at least two complete drafts of a work (which I know is nothing compared to the tens of drafts that a lot of published writers do), to give me a chance to fix structural issues, or add subplots, or change things once I see the big picture of my fic, without retconning myself. It also means I'm not likely to leave a WIP unfinished, which is a worry if I post as I go and then lose interest.
- Fear of being ignored. Other than lightning-strike popularity (whether intentionally or accidentally writing the right ship at the right time for the right fandom incorporating the right tropes that takes off with the fandom) the most common way to have your stuff noticed seems to just be... being prolific, so people see your stuff often and maybe like it well enough to find your other stuff.
I have ZERO desire to be a BNF or anything like that... but I'd also like my stuff to get at least a little notice, y'know? I'm at a disadvantage, because I'm writing for a moderately large fandom, but for an OT3. It is very popular as OT3s go, but still not as big a ship as the main pairings for the fandom.
I don't really have anything to conclude that with, but I AM going to try to keep a fair perspective. I may not be sharing prolifically, but I'm not slacking on what I'm working on!
After tomorrow, I have Monday and Tuesday off, for my second Covid shot. I am so excited! I am so glad that I'll get to start ramping up to being protected, and have far less risk of becoming a vector. (Which has continually been my biggest fear - I don't want to get Covid either, but I absolutely would be horrified to be the reason someone else got sick.) Of course, even after my additional two weeks post-vax, I'll keep taking my precautions. I largely work with teens who are just too young to get vaxxed (yet, at least; hopefully some new research will find that the vaccines are safe for kids.) And even so, I know we aren't at the herd immunity point yet, and so I'll keep masking and distancing in public. But I'm excited to get to visit Taylor again, and to just in general start being able to do stuff again.
-
Yesterday was the last day of Camp Nano. And I did it! I met my second goal of 40k for the month, finishing with a total of 41,422 words for the month!
The light blue line was my target for my original 25k goal. The darker line is my actual wordcount total for each day. :)
I probably won't keep up with the 1500 word/day pace. While it wasn't undoable, obviously, it did mean that sometimes I felt more pressure just to hit my word goal than I felt to make the words good, haha. That isn't a bad thing on a first draft, when just making the words happen is the most important part, but this is my rewrite. My intent is that each chapter only gets another fairly quick editing pass after this before posting, so I'm a little worried that maybe some of these sections should have gotten more attention, even if that had meant slower progress.
Even so, I'm really glad that I got so much of this draft done this month!
-
I've been a little frustrated at my writing pace, even as I've been for the most part pleased with my relatively steady progress.
But as happy as I am that I have been working on it... I also want to be *done.*
My first idea for the fic came about in July of last year, though I paused it while I worked on a fic challenge in August.
I spent September and October outlining it.
I spent November - January on the 69k rough draft.
I forced myself to take February off, so I could go back to it with fresh eyes.
And then I spent March and April so far working on draft 2.
If I finish the rough draft in May (which is my tentative goal), then I can start posting in June, and if I post one chapter a week, with roughly 20 chapters, that means I'll be done posting it in October. That means it will have been just over a year from the start of actually working on it to getting it completely posted.
To be honest, I realize that isn't actually a terrible amount of time for something the length of a short novel. To get from nothing to completed work (including chapter-by-chapter sharing) in about a year is... really pretty good, considering this is a hobby and not even something I'm putting 40 hours a week into.
And yet I'm frustrated that it takes me a YEAR to get a fic written.
Some thoughts on why, and trying to talk myself into feeling better about it:
- Internalized feelings that I shouldn't put so much time into "just" fanfic. This is something I actively fight against for other people: I am continually in awe of the amazing fic that people turn out, and will viciously defend fic as valuable, significant, and worthwhile work. But I have a hard time applying those thoughts to myself.
- Comparing my output to others. I follow some *astoundingly* prolific writers. (Both published and fan.) For the fan writers I'm thinking of, some of that is the fact that they post as they go, so they are posting pretty constantly. But they're posting a lot of oneshots, and while they have many ongoing fics they share, there can be weeks or months in between updates on each one. They ARE prolific, but I'm sitting amazed that they're writing thousands of words per week... when sometimes I'm writing thousands of words per week, too! I'm just not posting all of mine.
I *could* combat that to some extent by posting as I complete chapters, but... I'd much rather have a complete work before I post. I strongly prefer to have at least two complete drafts of a work (which I know is nothing compared to the tens of drafts that a lot of published writers do), to give me a chance to fix structural issues, or add subplots, or change things once I see the big picture of my fic, without retconning myself. It also means I'm not likely to leave a WIP unfinished, which is a worry if I post as I go and then lose interest.
- Fear of being ignored. Other than lightning-strike popularity (whether intentionally or accidentally writing the right ship at the right time for the right fandom incorporating the right tropes that takes off with the fandom) the most common way to have your stuff noticed seems to just be... being prolific, so people see your stuff often and maybe like it well enough to find your other stuff.
I have ZERO desire to be a BNF or anything like that... but I'd also like my stuff to get at least a little notice, y'know? I'm at a disadvantage, because I'm writing for a moderately large fandom, but for an OT3. It is very popular as OT3s go, but still not as big a ship as the main pairings for the fandom.
I don't really have anything to conclude that with, but I AM going to try to keep a fair perspective. I may not be sharing prolifically, but I'm not slacking on what I'm working on!
