4, 24, 40!
[Writing ask game]
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4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?
Oh there are a lot, I like words,,, but the moment I read this all of them flew out of my head because of course they did JGKFDGD.
I can say that I tend to like words that are very visceral ("visceral" is kind of one of them actually, on that note). I want words that I can taste, words that sound like they feel.
...
Alright I sat on this question a bit and 30 minutes later finally remembered something. The word "despite" is one that I just. Adore. I have to fight not to overuse it. It is so versatile and it can swing from being incredibly tragic to overwhelmingly hopeful; the constant is that it always implies a similar sense of struggle in my mind. I have a lot of emotions about this word. More emotions than I thought I did, actually.
Related: I love swear words. There's a certain oomph that can be carried by a well-placed "fuck".
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24. How much prep work do you put into your stories? What does that look like for you? Do you enjoy this part or do you just want to get on with it?
I tend to get very bogged down in making sure I know exactly what is going on and what I want to do. This usually take the form of very scattered notes of plot points I need to hit or events that need to happen, or at least mapping out in my mind what will happen and when. I don't always know how things will end exactly but because I work very sequentially with my plots, lots of A happened which lead to B which created C, I usually want to make that very solid foundation first.
... However. I will often find that I end up with exactly how I want a scene to go before I've worked out any of the connecting elements, and then desperately want to go write that right now out of fear I will either forget or lose the fire. And then suddenly there is a massive amount of text in front of me that was entirely unplanned and I am not fully certain of how it even got there.
So! I suppose overall it's kind of situational whether I say "if I don't pre-plan exactly how many hairs are in this background character's beard then I'll die" or "hold my flower I'm going to black out for three hours while I slam out 4k words of action off the dome". But it does tend to be either all or nothing when it happens lmao. Most of the things I do are like that to be quite honest.
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40. Please share a poem with me, I need it.
Here and Away by Neil Hilborn [discusses mental health and self-isolation]
I like a lot of poetry, but I especially have a soft spot for spoken word and slam poetry. Neil Hilborn is one of my favorite poets in that area and I own exactly one physical poetry book and it is Our Numbered Days, which I purchased several years ago while travelling to attend my uncle's funeral.
Oh boy, was it a time to get that book in particular!
Many of the poems have a focus on Neil grappling with grief and the inevitability of death, as well as general mental health struggles. But this one in particular, Here and Away, hit me like a freight train because I related to it immensely.
Some lines I would very much like to highlight in particular:
"It takes so much less energy to not exist than it does to exist and get burned. I've been burned so much I'm not me anymore."
"Whatever you are feeling right now, there is a mathematical certainty that someone is feeling that exact same thing. This is not to say you aren't special. This is to say thank god you aren't special."
"Build a house, even if every wall leans to the left. [...] Love how you hate yourself sometimes, because goddamn, at least there's still something to hate."
"But I hear the world is ending soon. When we go, and we're all going to go, I will be part of it."
