Fun time is over, and now it’s time to really fucking write.

I need to have 10-15 pages of my TV spec script done by this Friday. That’s not a huge deal… three pages a day should cover it. But I also have to write 25 pages of movie by next Monday. So that’s like, three and a half pages of THAT a day.

So um, yup. I’m a writer now.

And writing is hard, man.

I was working on my movie script this afternoon, and it takes a lot out of me. Writing screenplay is harder than any other kind of writing I have done because there are so many issue of logistics and visualization to work out. In prose, you can be minimal-ish and only put in the important stuff and have things revolve around conversations without a lot of description.

But in a screenplay, I have to visualize everything. I don’t have to describe it all, but I have to have an idea of what things look like or I will get totally lost. What’s more is that things that are very simple in my head and would seem like no big deal on the screen turn out to be amazingly tricky to actually translate into words on a page.

Things should get at least a little better when I am done writing my Act 1 introduction to the characters, plot, and crime. It will be more dialogue based, which is great in two ways : one, I love writing dialogue, it is totally my thing, and two, dialogue fills up pages way faster than scene headings and action description.

I get the feeling the main part of my movie is going to be rather chatty.

Of course, it’s early days yet. Like I said before, the first part is always the worst part because you don’t have the mental muscles to do this new thing yet. And so the first part is always like basic training. It sucks, it hurts, it’s awful, you’ll wonder if you can make it…. but if you stick with it, you will get the muscles and conditioning to make things way easier from that point on.

So hopefully, all this visual and sequence thinking will come more easily to me once I have done it a bunch. It’s not like I am totally hating the writing at the moment. It feels pretty good to see my inner vision turn into script.

But it’s just so hard.

Luckily, I have tomorrow off, and I plan to spend every spare moment writing for as long as I can stand. I want to get ahead on my work so that sudden tragedy of the grand or petit kind can’t derail me and throw me to the wolves.

In this scenario, there are wolves near the train tracks.

And honestly, the whole thing has me so worried that writing like hell will be a form of therapy. This is how neuroses make the world go round. I suppose it would be awful nice if I could simply do what I am supposed to do with an open heart and a passionate devotion to my craft, but I am just plain not that kind of person.

Not yet, anyhow.

So I have to become neurotic about things in order to stay focused and motivated. I am terrified of falling behind or missing a deadline. And it’s that fear that will hound me into writing as much as I can until the goddamned things are done.

The first drafts, anyhow.

The only time I have to spend AFK tomorrow is when I go to therapy. That will be good for me, as usual. Might as well get therapy while I can. I realized that I have been so sluggish about looking into therapy options at school because I honestly don’t want to have to start over again with someone new. The idea of having to explain myself to a new person, no matter how well-meaning and nice, makes me feel tired jsut thinking about it. Doctor Costin knows me and gets me. Plus, he has survived the crucible of exposure to an unfiltered version of myself and still has to will to live, which is rare.

I can’t say he’s ever been exposed to the actual white hot plasma radioactive core of my soul. He’s only human, after all. It might be entirely irrational, but I can’t imagine anyone surviving exposure to the blinding devouring void deep within me. If anyone ever does gain access, it will be because I have decided that I want to risk everything for the tiny chance that someone could know the real, deep me and not run away screaming into the night.

I can’t see that decision coming from a healthy place. It would be more akin to nihilistic fatalism, which is often what passes for bravery in me. I don’t so much summon up the courage to do something as push myself past the point of fear where I just don’t give a shit any more and therefore I am willing to just throw myself into the lion pit just to get it over with at last.

It is as far from classic heroic courage as one can get, and yet it does have a certain strange nobility to it.

So the next couple of weeks should be a very Zen experience, which is a 70’s way of saying it will be extremely painful in a consciousness expanding way. I am eager to meet the person I will become after the burn in period. I think he will be, overall, a happier person.

But very, very tired.

Then, at the end of the month, there’s V-Con, the GVRD’s science fiction convention. I hope to be able to get far ahead enough on my writing so that I will be able to attend and not have to worry about writing while I am there.

Oh… and I should warn you, my loyal fans, that due to the heavy workload I now face, there might be days when I can’t spare the time or energy to blog. So this blog might become slightly less than daily on days when I spend all day in class then have to come home and grind out my five or six pages.

I really hope not, but I need to be realistic.

Just remember that no matter what, I love you all.

And I will talk to you nice people tomorrow.