thewhitelily: (Default)
The White Lily ([personal profile] thewhitelily) wrote2007-06-11 09:29 pm
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Did you miss me?

At length, I’m back. :) Yay, me!

My apologies for the lengthy absence. I know that a lot of my friends have been going through rather big things in the last month or two, and I’m sorry I haven’t been around on MSN or commenting on LJ posts or on Orion to keep up with it. I’ve been going through my own, comparatively minor, crisis of confidence which has unfortunately made me a little too self involved to have any attention to spare for other people. I've still been reading everyone's journals, even if I haven't been able to work up the energy to reply, and my thoughts are with you all. Sorry once again.

So here’s the problem. I’m seriously excited about editing Return to Sender. I really want to, I know what I have to do, I know what I have to fix.

But I’ve been having a panic attack every time I even think about starting in on actually doing it. No, I’m not being dramatic. I’m talking tachycardia, hyperventilation, dizziness, nausea, and the rest of my body’s responses to being completely lily-livered. It doesn’t go away until I think about something else for a few minutes and manage to convince my stupid brain that I’m not going back to it.

What the hell is wrong with me?

Usually, I love editing – editing makes me feel like I’m flying, and I want to dance and yell and whoop as I make connections and improve bits and pieces. I need to get into this fic seriously – I want to get into this fic seriously – but... I just can’t make myself start.

I’m never, ever, ever showing anyone something before I’m ready to do so. Never again. Because the moment it crosses my mind that someone has read some bit of awfulness that I wrote, I find myself completely paralysed, unable to even think, because I keep remembering: OMG, someone’s read this!

But maybe that’s not the main problem. Maybe the main thing is the sheer enormity of it all. Maybe all I need is to take it one day at a time, one chapter at a time, just a few words on top of a few words. It’s worked for me before, hasn’t it?

As such, I’m announcing day one of Lily’s Serious Novel Editing Push. Otherwise known as E month, because L-SNEP is a terrible name for anything, and I’ve made a pact with my friend E that if I finish editing Return to Sender, she’ll write up three chapters of her PhD. Each chapter gets two passes – the first day a rough edit and major earthworks pass, and the second a fine polish pass. Then I’m moving on. One step at a time.

So there we go. Problem solved. Has anyone ever known me to bow out of a challenge? Yes, apart from all you people who have.

Chin up, Lily, and head down. Let’s get to work.

[identity profile] rchevalier.livejournal.com 2007-06-11 03:25 pm (UTC)(link)
:D Coolios. Love that feeling when things just work.

Yeah, pretty much. I'm not in any rush with it, really. I need to go read a pile of Wikipedia articles or something so I have a better idea of how

Basically, it's the idea that people go to colonize a planet, but someone beats them to it. Fairly well used. It's got a few twists in it, though. First, that they set out, but then their own civilization figured out a way to travel a lot faster and then colonized that planet before those people even arrived. (I'm figuring a fair time interval here.) Second, that in the intervening time the cultures have diverged enough that they don't get along so well. Third... um. I'll shut up now. :P Anyway, there's stuff that differentiates it clusters away from Khan.