Week 3!

 Treasured associates,

 We're already on Week 3 - how crazy! This week was probably my most productive so far. I made progress on the two goals I'm currently working towards: developing routine and editing the book. This week my dad and my schedules aligned pretty beautifully, and I've found my productive writing spot: my dad's office! We're writing for about 7 hours a day, which is awesome but tiring.

In terms of fun stories, I've got a couple! One is I felt my age this week - I wrote some of this book when I was 13, and at that age I was very good at writing in a 13 year old's voice. Now I find myself wondering - am I writing convincingly from that perspective, five years later? And my dad, a 53 year old man, cannot really provide the counsel I seek. So, we brought in a professional - my eighth grade sister, Lucy. She told us in no uncertain terms our slang is outdated - which, to her, is true, since the novel is set in 2014! But she also provided great insight into how mean 8th grade girls really are for our descriptions of friend groups - instead of saying anything mean to your face, they'll whisper and laugh about it when you ask what they said. Though this brought back horrible memories of the cruelty and angst of 8th grade, it also brought me back to a headspace to write the chapter about our main character's social standing more convincingly!

For routine this week, I spent my Thursday (now, my usual "try author's routine's days) in the life of Ernest Hemingway and Gertrude Stein. Hemingway wrote standing up, so I took the afternoon to try to write like that. Below is a picture of me standing at my computer! I didn't notice great variation in productivity when writing upright, but I did note my abysmal posture. So, maybe my viola playing will improve as a bonus effect of this?

Stein has a definitely weirder and more detailed routine. She didn't like tea, but was prescribed 3 cups a day. Unlike her, I LOVE tea, so I was all too happy to have an excuse to drink it today - 1 cup mint and 2 cups Earl Grey for any of my fans who are wondering :) Stein also liked to write around...cows? Here's an excerpt from a New Yorker article on her process:

"Miss Stein gets out and sits on a campstool with pencil and pad, and Miss Toklas fearlessly switches a cow into her line of vision. If the cow doesn't seem to fit in with Miss Stein's mood, the ladies get into the car and drive on to another cow. When the great lady has an inspiration, she writes quickly, for about fifteen minutes. But often she just sits there, looking at cows and not turning a wheel."

Well, I'm not in Vermont anymore, so I didn't have any cows readily available, but I did create my own! Here's my painting of a cow and my tea, both of which I wrote beside sitting on my patio:

That's all my adventures for this week, folks! Thanks for following along, and a big shout out to my C&C members, all of whom I miss dearly. Don't worry,  I'm still keeping Jed's ego in check in our absences :)

Lots of love,
Catie