My son asks about my super power.
I don't really think of it as a super power, just the ability to hit a deadline. I got too precious/ambitious with the first two books in the Taking series. Delivered late. First time in my writing career that I missed deadlines and I blew through them pretty hard. I delivered tight, well researched copy but weeks past the due date. That impacts all sorts of people: editors, copy editors, printers, fact checkers, marketing folk, publishers . . . the list is long. I'm a pleaser. It feels wrong to put all these people out.
So seven days from now I'm going to deliver Taking London.
This will not be without pressure. The beginning of a book is confusion and deep thoughts, wondering how to make all the facts into a story. The middle of a book is hopeless confusion. Just brutal. A desert wilderness. But the end is tying things together, adding a chapter, emphasizing a fact. And words. Always, the words. Many words I have not yet written.
The super power is the sudden ability to reign in my wandering mind and submit it to hyper focus.
Whether Survivor island or right here in my own backyard, I somehow go from five hundred words a day to several thousand with the flip of a mental switch. Not sure how that works. If I could summon that super power every single day, I'd be writing about ten more books a year.
I tell Calene this is the week I'm going to say no to everything. All functions of daily life must submit to the deadline. But there's track practice two mornings a week and every afternoon. The Tuesday morning therapy appointment. And the sudden stuff that blows up when I need it least: that coffee spilled on the laptop, my Rover and its sudden expensive oil leak, the woman poking her head over the wall as I step into our outdoor shower. Nothing says awkward like 6 a.m., nudity, cold rainfall immersion, the illusion of privacy, and a curious door-to-door leaflet distributor. I'm not sure what she saw. I hope she was impressed. But then, the water was very cold. I'm comfortable in my own skin.
All of these, of course, are sacrifices in the name of getting paid. Like my friend Sean Scott who runs his own shoe company, Steve the TV producer, and people everywhere who get a check for their labors just twice a year, "getting paid" is a very big deal. Say "getting paid" to a creative type and a solid fist bump is sure to follow. Creativity is commerce and crossing the finish line is a very big deal. Getting paid means funding the Defined Benefit, summer travel, cash flow, Springsteen tickets, and a break from those dreadful 3 a.m. wake-ups when the demons come out to play.
So this week is going to be intense. But I'm going to do it right. I'm enjoying every word (today's word: Luftstaffe!), every nuance, every research nugget that begs to find its way into the manuscript. I will do a few saunas at Perspire (more solitary nudity, although this time in an infra-red strip mall chamber), sleep intelligently, enjoy the super power.
And this: ask Calene for tight long hugs when I'm about to lose my shit. Because that moment will come this week. At least once. Probably more. Loving arms wrapped around a frantic, scared writer go a long way toward hitting a deadline.
It's a gift, this writing life. A super power.