A song came up on my playlist today, an old 80s tune called Believe it or Not. It was originally the theme for a goofy-fun show called The Greatest American Hero. One of my favorite songs ever, it captures a feeling of soaring exuberance that, as a kid, I thought must be the peak of happiness in life.
Now, as an adult who gets to write everyday, it means something different. I hear it, and it feels like writing–especially the feeling of finishing a scene or a story that came out better than I could have expected (it’s something that starts to happen when you grow the ability to trust yourself and let your subsconscious take the story in unexpected directions). I look back over what I’ve read, and I hear that line: Who could it be?
Believe it or not, it’s just me.
A glorious thing–and a great song to hear as I’m looking out my writing office window at this sunset (click to enlarge).
So, here’s how the day shook out: Shift 1
Did a couple thousand words on the current nonfiction project, did some corporate admin, then broke for the afternoon to make breakfast and take the dog out onto the beach and lay down evil plans for the evening (all plans that extend my ambition for world domination are, by definition, evil, because evil is more fun).
Shift 2
Didn’t wind up doing second shift today. I had a migraine coming on (I’m prone to them, partly due to a neck injury in childhood), so I laid down for a couple hours to let the neck muscles loosen up.
Shift 3
Was groggy from the nap, and couldn’t track the words on the e-reader in the booth, so instead I worked on the Antithesis podcast instead. Wrote the new aftershow and story-so-far segments, did some QC on episode 9, then had a conference with someone who might be helping me whip the Antithesis series bible into shape,
Shift 4
Sat down to work on Book 3 with Wiseguy playing in the background. It’s one of the shows that had a strong influence in how I decided to approach the whole saga of Joss Kyle and all the people whose lives he disturbs. Easily Stephen J. Cannell’s most underrated show. Incredible storytelling, great depth of characterization, very chewy moral dilemmas–exactly my kind of thing.
So, here’s the Antithesis word count tallies for the day:
Starting word count for writing: 13,922
Final word count for the day: 15,344
15344 / 120000 words
jdsawyer
After a childhood in academia, J. Daniel Sawyer declared his independence by dropping out of high school and setting off on a series of adventures in the bowels of the film industry, the venture capital culture of silicon valley, surfing safaris, bohemians, burners, historians, theologians, adventurers, climbers, drug dealers, gangbangers, and inventors before his past finally caught up to him.
Trapped in a world bookended by one wall falling in Berlin and other walls going up around suburbia and along national borders throughout the world, he rediscovered his deep love of history and, with it, and obsession with predicting the future as it grew aggressively out of the past.
To date, this obsession has yielded over thirty books and innumerable short stories, the occasional short film, nearly a dozen podcasts stretching over a decade and a half, and a career creating novels and audiobooks exploring the world through the lens of his own peculiar madness, in the depths of his own private forest in a rural exile, where he uses the quiet to write, walk on the beach, and manage a production company that brings innovative stories to the ears of audiences across the world.
For news and free stories, sign up for his occasional newsletter. Or find his contact info, podcasts, and more on his home page at http://www.jdsawyer.net
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