Life is interesting, isn’t it? We set our goals and aim much higher than our arms can reach so that we’ll do the absolute best we can, but still manage to feel disappointed when we can’t reach.
It’s so difficult to head off unexpected writing delays.
Looking at this whole process, a little part of me has to die with laughter. There was a point I thought my book would be out in March. We’re steadily creeping out… July, August, September… At this rate, I might have the book out by my 26th birthday.
My college laptop, a 2010 MacBook Pro, died. One day I turned it on and the mouse glitched. “Okay,” I thought, “This makes the computer impossible to use, but what if I disable the trackpad and use a real mouse?”
Mission failure. My laptop used to be slow but became practically non-functioning. It took two hours to attempt to send two email attachments. I actually gave up and found a way to send them on my tablet instead. Fortunately I was able to save a few documents but have yet to attempt to retrieve the rest.
This put a halt in editing for a couple of weeks. I needed to decide what I wanted to purchase as a replacement (I opted for one of the various models of the MSI 62VR 7RF Apache Pro laptops).
I also had some traveling to do and have been keeping very busy. I haven’t touched one word in about three weeks. I may work on getting going again this weekend – this time, on a much faster machine.
How much progress have I missed out on because I was using a slow device?
In the meantime, my book cover designer, Jamie Noble, completed the front cover:
The detail on this is extraordinary. I’m so excited that I get to feature this as the artwork for my first book.
Luckily for me, Jamie is a patient guy and works a lot with writers who have hiccups like mine, and will wait for me to finish up editing so that I can get him an exact page number for the spine.
Yes – you need an exact page number for the spine. Not, “Oh, 330-350.” Exact.
In addition to all of the summer’s fun unpredictability, my car has been to the mechanic three times (after being reliable for years), my dog is sick, and I might be moving to another town.
Push, push, push!
I read an interesting book over the weekend called Resisting Happiness. I'm not religious in the slightest, but the book was free, and I found myself interested in some of Matthew Kelly's messages. The book mentioned something about the world’s greatest artists and what they could have accomplished but didn’t because of a lack of will.
I relate to that. On another note, what no one talks about is what great people don’t accomplish because they don’t own a time machine. There are so many things we have to do and sacrifice in order to get ahead - these aside from whatever tasks will help us accomplish our dreams.
How much time do you waste standing in line at the grocery store, paying necessary bills, cleaning? I wish I could stop time so that I could float around three stores to find the perfect shoes that I will wear once for a wedding, but I can’t. I wish I could cancel the clock and take a nap after working long shifts so I can feel refreshed between 9 and 10 PM when I’m most imaginative, but that is when I need to go to bed for real. Or at least try to. There’s no getting around life’s necessities.
I should have purchased a laptop a long time ago when the MacBook started acting up. With the various issues I experienced, the editing process was slow. I could’ve reached my goals much faster if not for my hesitance to buy a new computer. This was one of those unexpected writing delays that I should have prepared for. I’m very lucky that I was smart enough to save copies of my book outside of my hard drive.
Always save your work in multiple places!
I’m thankful that those around me understand that it isn’t a lack of will preventing me from getting things done. Life happens. I can sympathize with authors who have families and full-time jobs and struggle to meet deadlines, especially ones set forth by traditional publishers.
I don’t have concrete deadlines, but I can assure you, when I’m finished, it’s going to be worth it.
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