It is very, very strange to be back here; a feeling akin to visiting the place of one’s upbringing, eerily familiar yet disorienting. Perhaps it was the two Atavan and two bottles (mini!)of wine I had during the course of the seven-step journey: 2 x car rides, 1x 280 kph train ride, 1x bus ride and 3 different planes. Needless to say that all went by in an easy flash.
Unfortunately I seem to have a bad case of jet-lag, something I don’t usually experience coming in this direction. I have been awake until 5 am. most nights. Even though I don’t go to bed that early, my body is wondering what on earth I am trying to do urging it to sleep. So I spend my days fighting off the urge to fall asleep and not feeling much like working. The upside of so many hours awake in the wee sma’ hours is that my brain defaults to working out plot points despite my desperation for it to stop and get some sleep. So all has not been lost on the work front. I am only 1 day behind my schedule of a minimum of 4 new pages a day. So it’s been a bit tough to get settled and the weather hasn’t helped. It has rained every day, the wind is strong and cold and we had a terrific storm on Thursday with thunder and lightening. So I have been cooped up and it’s left me wondering why I have come this far to have a) sleepless nights, b) constant fatigue, c) pressure to get my head down and d) miserable weather. The only up side is that I am writing a section which takes place in November 1916 when the weather was particularly cruel I comfort myself knowing I am not sleeping outdoors in a muddy trench and am not in danger of frostbite or getting shot at. And I have a hot water bottle! I guess I should be grateful that my current mood is in tune with my characters. Another good thing is I am reading The War of Art -Break through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield who wrote The Legend Of Baggar Vance. It’s by far the best book I have picked up on procrastination and other writerly battles. However . . at 1pm this afternoon, the rain stopped, the wind died down and I walked for over an hour to the next village and back, feeling warm for the first time since I came and was quite happy getting back to my computer. It’s interesting watching all the hoop-la in the run-up to the final stage of the Presidential election (next Sunday). It’s down to 2: Nicholas Sarkhozy, the current president and Francois Hollande, the socialist challenger. Everyone I have spoken to here is mad keen for Hollande to win. The champagne is already chilling. I’ll be happy with warm weather and a productive week. (But I won’t refuse any champagne on offer).
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May 2012
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