Anthony Clifton

So the end of National Novel Writing Month 2009 has come. On the one hand, I feel a deep sense of sadness that I won’t be getting together with writers several nights a week to write, hang out and engage in general silliness. On the other hand, it’s a relief to get back to something like my normal routine.

This is my Day 24 video blog wherein I talk about reaching 50,000 words, my thoughts on the purpose and meaning of the 50,000 word goal itself and some opinions about using word count competition as a motivator for writing.

I had a lot of fun tonight doing the video live stream from my basement lair. I passed 41000 words tonight and am actually pleased with some of the elements of my story’s plot. I’m hoping to finish this weekend.

On tonight’s live stream, we had a visit from Tess The Christmas Miracle Cat:

and I talked about making your characters vivid when you write stories, about revealing them instead of just describing them:

This is my day 16 video blog entry for National Novel Writing Month 2009.  Tonight was very strange and chaotic, so much so that we ended up at a completely different venue for our write-in.  Aside from what I’ll discuss in the video blog entry, I feel compelled to mention that Hot Cup o Kryptonite has the most kick-ass hot chocolate in the world.  It was critical to my survival and well being after running around in the cold and rain.

Tonight’s write-in was at Cafe Milo in Ames, Iowa where our literary efforts were accompanied by a bluesy folk music band that, at times reminded me, in a vague way I can’t really explain, of one my favorite groups, Boa:

Bôa are a British alternative/indie band formed in London in 1993 by drummer Ed Herten. They are most widely known for the song “Duvet”, which was used as the theme song for the anime series Serial Experiments Lain. Because of this, they are popular among fans of that anime; they have also performed in a live concert at the anime convention Otakon in 2000.

As usual, having the company of live music helped my writing in a way that recorded music simply doesn’t.  It’s strange.  When I paint, there is certain music that I can listen to that will enhance the experience and heighten my sensitivity both to the image I’m painting as well as the physical and emotional experience of painting it.  Garbage, fronted by ultra-hawtie female vocalist Shirley Manson, is a favorite in this regard to the extent that I almost can’t paint without listening to them.  When I’m writing code, on the other hand, I find that I need something like techno dance music, anime theme songs, J-Pop or, on the opposite end of the rhythmic spectrum, something down-tempo like triphop in order to really keep clicking along.

But when I write, it’s completely different.  I’ve never been able to find any recorded music that does anything other than distract me from the process of formulating words and putting them down in some form worth reading by others.  Live music, on the other hand and especially if it’s very, very loud, seems to permeate my body, to overwhelm my physical senses in a manner that permits total focus on the writing process.  Sometime I really must try writing at a rave.  I’ll bet I come up with something so revolutionary that it will change the world forever.  Or not.  In either case, I’m certain to feel good doing it, get easily into a flow state and produce something unusual.

As for the write-in, I reached around 23,500 words tonight, enjoying the catharsis of writing in, pseudonymously, a woman who was extremely cruel to me a couple months ago.  I won’t say anything about her but suffice it to say that she bullied me in a manner that I simply cannot tolerate without finding some way to express my outrage, even if it is in a form that will never be seen by anyone but me.  The Demon, one of the protagonists of my novel The Demon’s Guide to Novel Writing, described a particularly vicious torment that would visited upon her.  It felt so good to get those feelings out of my mind and leave them, stripped of their power, in some fiction.

Returning home, I chose not to take I-35 back to Des Moines but, instead, to take a slower, darker route via Highway 69, the road that used to be the main connector between Ames and Des Moines before the interstate system was built.  Something called to me as I rolled down 30 toward the turn-off to 69, something about the vivid brightness of the stars and the rising half moon in the East.  Somewhere around halfway between Ames and Des Moines, I found a gravel road heading West and turned onto it, pulling over into a field when I found a spot where I could safely do so.

Then, with all the cars lights off, I leaned against the trunk and gazed up at the stars.  Orion was climbing up in the East, it’s nebula visible even without averted vision.  The half moon rose to it’s left, its glow so bright I could see my shadow on the gravel despite there being no street lights or houses nearby.  The orange sky glow of Des Moines obscured the sky to the South but in the Southwest, Cygnus was dropping toward the North horizon, circling beneath the pole, and straight up, near the Zenith, Cassiopeia hung from the Milky Way, glittering in a cosmic M that reminded me of my nights spent photographing it during college astronomy labs.

I’m not sure how long I watched the stars but, as always, they gave me a deep sense of connection.  It’s hard for me to see them at night without feeling that I and the entire Earth around me are not separate things watching them but are, indeed, part of them.  We like to think of ourselves as being on the Earth looking up into space.  However, despite standing on this rocky mass, we are just as much floating in space as the farthest star.  We just happen to be doing it near the bottom of a planet’s gravity well.

Standing in the dark looking up, I can viscerally feel the interconnection of all things and, somehow, this makes me feel simultaneously more connected with all the people of whom I am aware whether they are good and bad.  We are all like stars and planets, whirling around each other in a dance that has rules and rhythms that can be understood if only we take the time to study them closely enough.

All the stars are unique, each with it’s own particular history and attributes.  Some, like ours, may nurture life and others may have destroyed the life, whether through instability or simply not lasting long enough, that was struggling on their nearby orbiting planets.  They are all beautiful, however, and have the potential to do both good and bad under the right circumstances.

Likewise are people.  Standing under the stars, looking up at their various colors and brightnesses, reminds me that people too come in infinite varieties and, no matter our estimation of their character or judgment of their choices, each has within them a spark, however bright or dim, of beauty, of goodness and of the divine.

I had a great time last night at the write-in at Borders Books & Music in West Des Moines, Iowa. We had a smaller crowd than previous write-ins, probably due to it being a Friday but we had far more people participate than in previous years.

I did have one hiccup involving the live streaming of the write-in. On Thursday, it seemed that I would have to discontinue the live streamed video for legal reasons. I was under the impression that any time you video tape someone, you have to receive a waiver from them. However, that does not necessarily apply in places where no privacy can be expected, like a public place or a place where video taping is already occurring such as a retail store. It turns out that you can simply notify people of the videotaping by placing signs in the area the camera covers informing them that they are being recorded. As for the retail store, as long as no products or customers are shown on the video, it is acceptable to record an event taking place there. So, thankfully, I’m able to continue the live streaming. It’s been surprising to me how popular it is, many writers using it as a way to participate in write-ins, to feel a sense of camraderie, while writing at home or at smaller venues. I used to do some video production a few years ago and even had a huge editing suite in my basement but got out of it when I started doing more painting and drawing. Now I’m getting interested in it again but, fortunately, the equipment is now far less expensive and much smaller.

Last night I broke 20,000 words which is the fastest I’ve ever reached that point in five years of doing NaNoWriMo. It’s been fun so far but my novel has gone in a very unexpected direction, as I’ll discuss in my video blog:

I’m sorry I missed my Day 3 posting.  I actually recorded a video for it but was very unhappy with it and lacked adequate time to re-record it.  A recap of Day 3 is that the Central Iowa region folks gathered at a cool little coffee shop on Fleur Drive in Des Moines called Hot Cup o Kryptonite.  As you might have guessed, they also have a nice selection of comic books.  I was horrified, however, by the lack of manga and the consequent lack of magical school girls, giant robots and demon slayers.  About 20 writers arrived and completed two 30 minute writing sprints and one 20 minute sprint with a collective total of around 40,000 words.  I had a great time and a productive one, increasing my word count to around 12,000 words.  Also, I made a new friend, Shawna, and had a great conversation with her about all kinds of topics dear to my heart: the evilness of corporations, the wonderfulness of cats and the occasional scariness of human nature.

Tonight, the write-in was at an unnamed book store in Ames, Iowa. Around 25-30 people showed up, writers both from Ames and Des Moines, and we were very productive, producing something like 60,000 words collectively.

Aside from that, here are the rest of my thoughts about this evening and about my experience of NaNoWriMo 2009 in general:

Since my hands are completely destroyed from typing so much at the write-in tonight, I’ve decided to do today’s blog post as a two part video blog.  The short version is that the write-in tonight was one of the more fun, surreal experiences I’ve ever had doing NaNoWriMo.  There was salsa dancing, the sexiest man in the world and violent dragon attacks.  It was truly an entertaining evening of writing and general mayhem.

So last night I discovered the least fun way both to spend Halloween and to start NaNoWriMo. Around 5:30pm, Missy and I were getting ready to go to a Halloween party, when I passed Eris, our twelve year old orange tabby, while he was lying in his bean bag chair. I petted him and said Hi and then paused, looking at him more closely.

He was moving his head back and forth from left to right, over and over again, as if he were searching for something on the floor. I watched him doing this, petting him and talking to him, for a couple minutes, the realization dawning on me that something unusual was going on. No matter what I did or said, he continued moving his head back and forth, over and over.

So I called Missy upstairs to look at him and she knelt down in front of him and waved her hand in front of his eyes. When he didn’t react at all, we both realized, with no small degree of horror, that he was unable to see. It was as if he were searching for the light.

Eris has been diabetic for two years and we know that one of the complications of diabetes can be blindness. However, we’ve maintained excellent control of his blood sugar for the last several months and acceptable control before that, while we and our vet were figuring out the insulin dosage. He has had no other symptoms and was perfectly normal just an hour or two earlier. So we were very perplexed about what could be going on. Carrying him to the car, Missy and I rushed him immediately to Veterinary Specialists, formerly Animal Emergency Clinic, where he was examined by a very nice vet who commented what a well-behaved cat he is.

And then, while she ran tests, we waited in the waiting room, trying desperately not to cry, wondering if the problem might be neurological, unsolvable, ultimately leading to some kind of very difficult decision. After a while, however, the vet came out and told us he appears to have hypertension unrelated to his diabetes, had suffered retinal detachment and would have to go on blood pressure meds immediately. She saw no reason to keep him at the clinic so she would give us the meds and send us home. At which point, I asked her to talk more about the retinal detachment, what did that mean and what were the ramifications.

Total blindness. Possibly, but not likely, reversible. Then she explained how well cats adapt to blindness, especially in a familiar environment, since they are able to rely on their other senses which are also more developed than in humans. So we carried Eris to the car, noting that he was still doing the Stevie Wonder thing, and felt our hearts break for him. There had been one moment of hope. When we carried him into the examination room, he stopped the head movement for a moment, looked straight up at the light and then directly at me. Unfortunately, the moment had passed and we were unsure if he was reacting to a sound or was, in fact, regaining some vision.

So we took him home, placed him carefully on the floor and let him begin the process of re-exploring the house using his remaining senses. I went outside and sat on the step and felt hope wash away into the deepening night, along with some tears, while the space it left filled in with despair and compassion for my little friend.

So I went back inside and tweeted briefly about what was happening, why we would miss the party to which we were headed when this all began.

That’s when something hopeful happened. A close friend of ours, a cat lover in the truest sense of the word, wrote back advising us to use a certain blood pressure medicine as it had been known to reverse blindness in cats. She explained that it was critical to start it as soon as possible so as to prevent retinal degeneration. Missy brought me the bottle and it turned out the blood pressure med was the exact one our friend had mentioned. I think we both felt something like hope tugging at the edge of our minds just then.

At that point, it was approaching 10pm. Missy and I discussed whether I should start NaNoWriMo at all, midnight fast approaching. She argued that we had done everything we could for Eris, that my writing at midnight certainly wouldn’t hurt him and getting my mind off of the situation for a couple hours might improve my mood, giving me more energy to be there for my friend. I hesitated and sat on the floor next to Eris, waving my hands in front of his eyes idly. That’s when I noticed something strange. His head was still. I waved my finger in front of his eyes and he blinked. I couldn’t believe it at first. So I kept testing, trying to find ways to confirm whether he could see or not. That’s when Missy convinced me I needed to get out for a couple hours and write. Otherwise, I would obsess and spend the rest of the night conducting primitive eye tests on our poor, exhausted cat, looking for any sign of hope.

So, hesitating and resisting, I went and joined a couple friends just before midnight, receiving from them some of the warmest, most needed hugs I think I’ve ever received in my life. At midnight we started writing, coordinating our efforts with the virtual write-in that was taking place in Des Moines.

Something inside me lit up despite my exhaustion. I don’t know if it was the little ragged shred of hope I’d found that Eris might be able to see again or if it was the company of friends or the supportive tweets I received on Twitter and comments on Facebook but I found something like a voice and wrote in a mad frenzy. We wrote in two half hour sessions, my goal for each being 1500 words. During the first session I wrote 1447 words. During the second, 1210. So I’m about 1000 words ahead of today’s goal of 1667. The prose quality is awful but I’m happy with where the story is going.

Then the monster turned and stared down at Alex, red and orange flames filling its black eye sockets, black and red horns twisting upward from its simian, grinning skull. Huge fangs descended from its sneering upper lip, glittering darkly and reminding Alex of nothing so much as the documentaries he’d seen about deep sea creatures, their strange primordial toothy mouths, the way they seemed to personify evil.

“Muhahahahahahahaahaa!!!” the monster laughed, the force of the air issuing from its mouth forcing Alex to roll involuntarily backward in his chair, the growing distance causing him some slight though mostly insignificant relief. “MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHHAHAAA!!!”

It lifted one massive arm, its index uncurling slowly from its fist light a snake preparing to strike, and pointed it directly at Alex.

“YOU SHALL BE MY MINION! KNEEL BEFORE ME AND WEEP AT MY AWESOME, NIGHTMARISH GLORY, YOU PITIFUL HUMAN FLESH BAG OF MOSTLY FEAR!!!” it said, its voice booming so loudly at drywall instantly powdered and blew outward from the surrounding office walls, opening huges holes into the offices next door. Alex’s hair whipped violently around his face as he stared through the holes to the terrified office works suddenly revealed in the offices beyond.

All too soon, it was time to leave my friends and return home. To Eris. To whatever Missy might tell me about his condition during the two hours I had been gone.  The drive was too long so I called her on the way and she told me that she thought he had regained some vision, that he had not done the head wave since I’d left and that he was doing things that were normal for him.

I arrived home and found Eris in a state of relative relaxation and happiness I had not seen for hours.  It certainly did appear that he could see me as he would walk directly to me and rub against my leg.  Still, I was suspicious, knowing that cats can react to sounds, whiskery vibrations and some sixth sense that allows them to pounce on things they cannot see.  How to know for sure that he could see?  Waving my hands in front of his face was not a good test.  He might react to air currents.  Shining a light in his eyes wouldn’t work. Cats don’t track things the same way humans do and you can’t tell them to follow the light.

Then it dawned on me that I had at my disposal a sure-fire test.  A grabbed a little laser pointer that we sometimes use to create a small red dot on the floor for the cats to follow.  They generally track it, swiveling their heads, chase it around the room and sometimes pounce on it.

When I put the light in front of Eris, he swiveled his head around, tracking it as I moved it around on the floor in front of him.  It was unmistakable. Eris had regained at least some eyesight!  I was absolutely overjoyed, saying it over and over again to hear the words, “Eris can see.”

So, for the moment, he’s a much happier cat, probably due to the blood pressure medication but also, I believe, thanks to all the prayers from friends and our own silent pleas.  We still have to find out what’s causing the hypertension and keep him on the blood pressure medicine so we don’t have a repeat of last night’s events.  We’re not out of the woods yet but we can at least see the edge.

In the meantime, I’ve managed to write 2657 words on day one of NaNoWriMo and I still have another write-in to attend at 2pm.  I hope to see you there!  If I brought Eris with me, I’m so unbelievably happy to say he would be able to see you too.  Though he’d probably just meow at you and wonder if you had some cat treats.