The Day
Rolled out about 2. Checked emails and comments on Facebook (posted some things about the trip). I did walk today, but keep it short at just over 3 miles.
Had a trip to Sierra Vista for two new tires and an oil change for the pickup. Ugh. But it was necessary with a long trip coming up.
Stopped in at the mall and talked very briefly with the Marine recruiter, a young veteran of the goings-on in Iraq. He was wounded. He was also stout, staunch, and upright. He is a protector. Many of the protected do not deserve his fine defense. I hope he never wakes up to feel that everything he and his friends have given was in vain. I hope he never feels his nation abandoned him.
Topic of the Night: Fiction as Escape
Certainly fiction is an escape for the reader. Maybe it’s an escape for the writer too. Maybe it’s a way to write what ought to be instead of what is.
I suspect Tim McCanlies, the screenwriter who wrote lines for Uncle Hub in the film Secondhand Lions, was thrilled to write what ought to be:
That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil; and that love, true love, never dies. … Doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. A man should believe in those things because those are the things worth believing in.
Now the protagonist isn’t perfect. He isn’t all good. He or she is an ordinary human being who does extraordinary (and extraordinarily good) things.
And the antagonist isn’t all bad, unless he’s Hitler or Charles Manson or an insane religious freak who will behead women and children while the nation that holds itself up as the beacon of the world apologizes for him and strives not to “offend” him. But I digress.
You are fortunate, folks. If you are writers, you are fortunate. You get a chance to write what ought to be. You get a chance to escape the insanity for a little while, and write what ought to be.
Today’s Writing
I wrote a bit here and a bit there, before my walk, after my walk, and after the trip to SV. Bits and pieces here and there. Kind’a had the air taken out of me when I talked with my young brother in arms.
Fiction words: 1083
Writing of Book 8 in the Wes Crowley saga
Day 1…… 4125 words. Total words to date…… 4125
Day 2…… 2624 words. Total words to date…… 6749
Day 3…… 2766 words. Total words to date…… 9515
Day 4…… 1412 words. Total words to date…… 10927
Day 5…… 3441 words. Total words to date…… 14368
Day 6…… 1052 words. Total words to date…… 15420
Day 7…… 2486 words. Total words to date…… 17906
Day 8…… 3201 words. Total words to date…… 21107
Day 9…… 3186 words. Total words to date…… 24293
Day 10… 1585 words. Total words to date…… 25878
Day 11… 2178 words. Total words to date…… 28056
Day 12… 1730 words. Total words to date…… 29786
Day 13… 1083 words. Total words to date…… 30869
Total fiction words for the month…………… 21603
Total fiction words for the year……………… 427286