A couple weeks ago I spent the weekend writing. It was my turn to work on our WIP and I was so excited. My word bees were buzzing in my brain and I was ready to go. My husband was out of town so as soon as I put my girls to bed I stationed myself at my computer and typed the night away. Shortly after midnight I clicked "save" for the hundredth time and said good night to my WIP. I was so happy with what I had done. I had read through our WIP, done some editing, and typed over 1,000 words of new story. I felt I had made some serious progress on a portion of our story that had, up to this point, been left as a big gaping hole in our timeline.
The next day we had a storm blow in and our power was out for most of the morning. Around lunch time when our power came back on I sat down at my computer expecting to see those glorious words waiting for me. However, I could not find them. I could not find the document. It was gone. I searched every nook and cranny of my computer and was unable to find it. I was devastated and felt sick to my stomach. All I could do was ask myself over and over "Where could it be? How could it disappear?" I know the obvious answer would be, "Well, did you save it?" I sure did. Over and over. See, I am kinda paranoid about losing any tidbit I type (go figure) so I am constantly clicking the save button any time I finish a paragraph.
With a heavy heart I texted my sister to let her know what happened. She told me that maybe this was a good thing, that perhaps the next time I type it up it would come out even better. I was doubtful. I had been so happy with it the way I had typed it. I found myself cursing this stupid technology for letting me down. How could this technology that, up to this point, had been so reliable and something I really have a fondness for let me down in such a way? I was so frustrated. I guess maybe I have a harder time accepting loss than I thought, but I was completely bummed. Over the next few days I tried to sit down and recreate the scene I had written but, whether because of my sulky mentality, or my muse was still on summer vacation I struggled to come up with anything I could compareto my previous segment.
I'm still working on bringing back those words and the overall picture I had created. I am hopeful that it will all come together in the end.
Have any of you lost chunks of your work? How did you manage? Were you happy with the outcome in spite of the loss?
I have had that happen before, and it can be devastating! You kind of have to invoke the Serenity Prayer at a time like that- “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” I just give myself a moment to grieve (and mutter a few choice words) then I take a deep breath and remind myself everything happens for a reason and I move on. And yes, I would say that usually some kind of goodness comes out of it- sometimes it’s better writing, sometimes it’s the message that my attentions are more needed elsewhere, and sometimes it’s just to make me a little bit more humble.
ReplyDeleteHang in there!
Moments like those I really struggle to contain my inner toddler, who would like to kick and scream and throw a fit until someone fixes my hurt.
ReplyDeleteI lost 11 pages on my novel once. It was crushing. I discovered it pretty soon after I lost it, so I sat down and rewrote it, as close to the original as possible. I'll never know if I matched it, but redoing it close to the "losing it" time helped. It's awful to lose a chunk of work - it feels like a small death!
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