Well, I dunno. Today was supposed to be a bit of a landmark. I’d promised myself that I’d start in earnest in creating a new book. This time a novel about a fellow who gets stranded in a Dry Valley in Antarctica for a long and dark winter. What occurs during those months and his life after is the stuff of my imagination.
I’ve actually got the opening down as well as a few lines into the first chapter. I’ve keyed in a bit of a synopsis so I know where I might go. I’ve brushed up on the technical aspects of Scrivener, my marvellous writing program, downed two cups of coffee this morning, played around with email and checked out a couple of New Zealand penguin websites. Still I procrastinate, on this, the first dedicated day of “real effort.”
Now, as I sit in my cosy writing space, I’m faced with a little distraction. City trucks and diggers are lined up outside my window. The parade started early this morning and I really thought little of it until the street barricades went up. I live on a corner and a bus route. There’s a junior high down the street a bit which means there’s going to be traffic havoc this afternoon and for who knows how long.
I expressed my curiosity to a safety-jacketed, hard-hatted fellow out in the street. He confessed that he’s just a truck driver and is not totally privy to everything that will take place outside my driveway or, for that matter, how long.
So you can see my problem and how easily I’m distracted from my task. Trucks, backhoes, backup beepers and jack hammers now threaten to occupy the wee space on top of my head usually reserved for words, words and more words. Darn, I just had to take another peek outside. They’ve started. The hydraulic jackhammer is rat-tatting away in the middle of the street, punching holes into the pavement. Now I know it is definitely a water pipe job as there is a big blue square sprayed-painted on the road. That will mean mess at some point. There’s a teeny threat of snow tonight.
Maybe I’ll spin a few old vinyls to see if I can create a new distraction just so I can relax a bit and unpack a few brilliant thoughts.
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