how's my new story coming along?

It's been almost a year since i posted anything about my new book - Millie.

Maybe i shouldn't call it my new book - since it's not yet one. it's a new story. it's around 30,000 words. that's damn long by my standards.

If I had created a facebook account for Millie, the protagonist of my story, which i thought to do as a troublesome publicity stunt, my current relationship with her would reflect "it's complicated". then again, what isn't complicated nowadays?

I used to think that dying isn't so complicated. Maybe at this time last year, i didn't think that dying was so complicated. It was an abstract construct for me, and i thought i'm damn open-minded, and i can accept the idea of death. Like, i can imagine myself dead and being cool with being dead, man.

"die, then die lor."

but no, sorry, actually i'm just trying to be funny. if i'm dead i won't be around to be cool with anything anyway. and i'm not that shallow. Sometimes, I purposely make myself sound silly simply because i like to be ridiculous and say ridiculous things.

if you are familiar with my flash stories, you know that i have a tendency with ending them with characters dying. they are usually without frills. so and so died. and so, he died. or he drifted off to sleep and never woke up. or she lao sai until she died. she died of a toothache. things like that.

i put it matter-of-factly to point out that another death doesn't really matter to the universe and the earth continues to spin spin rotate roll around in space.

but to come straight, i did think that dying and death was quite complicated, but I just didn't think it's so complicated.

my grandmother, who is arguably my bestest best friend, died last year. I don't think i am really ready to write that down because frankly speaking i still can't quite accept that she's... like dead.
so before i think too much and backspace away the admission, i shall move on.

so, that's how i learnt that death is a damn lot more complicated. for example, in the past i wouldn't have problem to say so and so died. now i prefer to say so and so passed away. it's more gentle. and i need to be more gentle because i recognise that it's complicated and difficult for people to hear that their loved one... passed away.

If not for being occupied with Millie, i would have written a lot of stories about my grandmother's passing by now.

So, when my friends, Sharile and Shelley, asked me over lunch on Friday if i have a new book/story/project coming up after Millie, i replied, yes. But i didn't tell them then that i just want to write be a lot of grandmother stories. whether it becomes a book or just a bunch of self-centred nostalgic vain, flash fiction on my blog / facebook, i don't know yet. so that's my next projecy idea - something for people to read about my grandmother - and something for people who didn't have the good fortune to get close with their grandmothers to read. But that's the idea for my next project.

how is Millie coming along?

Millie... is a pretty complicated story. Actually it's so complicated that it's kind of a weird story. Whether it's weirder than anything else i've ever written, i don't know, 'cos i've written some pretty weird shit, you know. but, this is definitely the most complicated story i've ever written.

I went to the kabuki with gary and don last evening. and come to think about it, kabuki - a kind of japanese opera - is generally a theatrical display of pretty weird and ancient japanese shit. and the theatre was packed with audience. so i guess i feel encouraged. Weird shit also got people want to watch mah.

Plus, don said he's looking forward to reading my story because it'll be different from the ang moh existentialist shit. indeed, indeed. If anything, Millie is definitely Singaporean. Singaporean existentialist shit. Gary, who is my official patron, ever so encouraging and kind, said, it's not shit la. Gary's read the draft a lot so you know, maybe he knows better. ~_~

Well, I don't know if it's like ever going to be a piece of work that is beautiful like... say the sunrise at mount fuji or a sprig of cherry blossoms. that's akutagawa's kind of writing. I'm currently going through the grueling editing process with my editor, Janet, and you know, it's really hard work man. editing can feel like having food poisoning - you lao sai until nothing to lao already but cannot - you still must try to lao something out.

All in all, I've written and re-written the story i think more than 5 times - lost count - and the symbolism and meaning is folded double folded triple folded... Okay, imagine if you knead two pieces of plasticine together - red and blue - and then you will get the swirling swirling pattern - red in blue, or blue in red right? uh, then that's how my story looks like la.

it's easier to understand my story if you don't treat it like a traditional novel, but treat it more like a contemporary art show (i recommend The Singapore Show: Future Proof at Singapore Art Museum btw). Just that, for the story, the gallery is in your head, and you are the curator in charge of setting up the art pieces according to the materials and instructions in the story with your imagination, for yourself to be the audience.

So even if it's not the mount-fuji-kind-of-beautiful, Millie is at least interesting la. I think it's interesting like... a sink-hole, or like a deep-sea cave. Like, come on man, have you ever read Singaporean existentialist... Hey, you know, Gary is right after all, it's not shit man! Since it's singaporean, we should call it sai. Singaporean existentialist sai. And why should you be interested in reading that? It could be like why a lot of people want to watch kabuki and other weird shit out there - because it prompts you to think differently? and it makes you think of how life is complicated? and it reminds you of blah blah... that said, it's really up to you, you know. if you're open-minded and curious enough to read in between the swirling swirling lines - i can promise you that there's a lot of nifty ideas and concepts to uncover. so, like with everything else, it's interesting to the extent that you are interested in such things.

As i've told sharile and shelley, my dateline with NAC is in april. (if you don't know/forgot, they are providing me with some funding to subsidise and support the production of the completed manuscript for Millie.) I've extended it from last year maybe because my grandmother passed away and I was sad and sian. but more because Millie's just so complicated that i needed more time.

i don't get more money for the extension, so please don't worry about it, beloved tax-payers. in fact you're getting a better value for your money because version 5 is more better than version 1, 2, 3, 4. actually i could've fufilled my obligations at least three times liao you know - i could have just handed in version 2, 3, or 4. I just didn't 'cos i just wanted to give you better value. and just in case, when i say it's sai, i also didn't mean it literally ok. it doesn't mean that I don't take the project seriously. i'm just trying to be funny by being ridiculous again. but then again, if you're the type to pick on the words instead of reading in between the lines, then maybe you won't think it's funny. but hey hey, you're not the type, right?

To put it across straight forwardly: My new story, Millie, is coming along fine. It is about a woman named Millie and her dreams. It is targeted at open-minded folks who like to read in between the lines, so much so that it is actually about reading in between the lines. it invites the reader to think about that which is true and false. thank you for your concern and support.

Just one more month to go!

Millie Milestone Draft

Thanks to the wealth of encouragement especially those on this facebook thread (i've pdfed and printed it out and put it on my wall of writing encouragement next to NAC's email on the OK on my grant), I've somehow managed to finish my 1st draft.

Or it could be the fourth.

I put 3 sequences of little stories together (they ranged from about 10,000 to 30,000 words) and i dumped the first two "raws" (read third time lucky) and didn't have time to redo the 3rd sequence... so... I had to use it and then yeah. That's why maybe this is the 4th draft! (sounds better la.)

Surely now i have to go through with drafts 5,6,7,8 up to 30. but damn! I'm glad!

Alright, maybe it's just celebrating this small tiny accomplishment - i mean it's just a draft la.

But i'm high because i was racing for time and didn't think that i was going to finish it before my No Pay Leave (3 months) end. Now my last day of leave is tomorrow and going back to work on Friday, so I'm feeling damn lucky to have finished it in time!

Now I have 1 day to catch up on my sleep, eat, (i still shit regularly, no worries about that) and well, all the other things that i oughta be doing but haven't been doing. *blush*

Last week I was lying in bed - caffeine intoxication (coffee was not enjoyable for me anymore and i also had gastric pains last month), and my muscles lamed out (the lie in bed and cannot move type) - and thinking why the hell i have to torture myself like that - if i just work and watch tv everyday, i'd be richer and more relaxed and not so uptight and pleasant and likeable and go drinking with friends and worry about the ribbons in my hair. I was happier when i was like that in year 1 before all the people imagine..!

So i conclude (again) - that i'm irrational and unreasonable.

Therefore, I need these little irrational and unreasonable yays along the way.

Thanks again for your encouragement k! Really couldn't have done it without you.

Postmodern Trauma - So far so good?

A month into my thankful and appreciative "third-time lucky" post. I am perhaps half-way into my third new draft. Maybe i'm a little more than halfway, but the story keeps growing in my head and it gets longer and longer so maybe i'm a little less than halfway!

I have more or less put in some big pieces about the story of Millie - the real person, and now I'm working on/in the dream-world. Feeling like i'm getting lost in this world that's in Millie's head.

Something like this happened to me the last time I escaped to Xanadu (my 1 week writing retreat). I emerged from the hibernation feeling alienated from my real world and it took me a few days to get used to going back to my previous routine.

The current version of my story is... much more complicated than the first version. It is rich in symbolism and references. And it requires me to do a lot of research and learn things that i didn't know before. Surely what i'm learning and thinking will affect me fundamentally and chemically. I shouldn't be emerging from this cocoon to become who I used to be? I'm not insinuating that i'm going to be as graceful as a butterfly, but lots of things come out of cocoons. Like...cicadas.

Okay.

Now the challenge is time.

A dear and concerned friend consoled me, and told me to take a break, change my pace, that I shouldn't be made to feel like i need to churn it out like that. Sometimes I'm afraid of burning out too. But I am running out of time. 1 more month until the end of NPL. I've already asked for extension from NAC for my draft.

Even if I finish drafting, i don't know how am I going to finish editing in time.

haha.

My reply to my dear friend was with blind optimism - "can one, i can do this. I'm a product of this churning system so i can churn this out." somemore my book is about churning.

The only thing is, for me, it is difficult to write what I write when I don't have enough sleep - so I can't burn the midnight oil. Tsk.

Sometimes I imagine someone asking me "How do you come up with things like that?"
and I will be honest and reply, "because i'm crazy."
"Why did you want to write a book like this?"
"I can't explain it, my craziness compels me to do crazy things. Writing it all down is the least destructive thing I can do already."

And I haven't started with editing. Editing would be sure to drive me even more crazy - like adding fuel to fire. hahaha!

Pressing on: Third time lucky!

My facebook status says this: writing is writhing rewriting.

That's because i decided, yesterday, to re-write my 2nd draft. I wrote my first draft more than 3 mths ago. Word count, about 25k words. 2nd draft, so far, word count, 10k words. Now, restart. A 3rd draft. I'm back to 2k words.

Why?

I must be crazy. Even I think I'm crazy. Okay.

NAC people would be worried? Why? They might ask. Did you not plan properly?

I tried. so hard. I'd sob, remorsefully. Boohoo.

Just read Late Bloomers by Malcolm Gladwell in What the Dog Saw. He quoted Franklin Roger's description on Mark Twain's "trial-and-error method":

"His routine procedure seems to have been to start a novel with some structural plan which ordinarily soon proved defective, whereupon he would cast about for a new plot which would overcome the difficulty, rewrite what he had already written, and then push on until some new defect forced him to repeat the process once again."
Twain fiddled and despaired and revised and gave up on Huckleberry Finn so many times that the book took him nearly a decade to complete.

This is normal, this really is. Some people can write a story and have a day job and be wonderful at both. Some people are born with good grammar. Some people know what they're doing with their lives.
Okay.
Some people are like Mark Twain.

I only hope I won't take a decade.

In case I lose my mind, I would like to say Thanks to my family and Gary, who are my resident patrons, all my friends encouraging my writing, NAC, and even my organisation that for letting me go on No Pay Leave, for allowing me to exist in this bubble of clueless faith, for allowing the completion of one and half useless manuscripts for one and a half lousy novellas that will never ever get to meet the eyes of another person if I can help it.

I assure myself that the quality of writing is not measured by word count. It pains me more than anyone to waste 40k words worth of effort. But that heartbreak would be nothing compared to that if my next 30k words are... Touch wood!

I must press on. key by key. letter by letter. tick tock. Third time HENG! SOON! LUCKY! okay!

Obliques

I am finally on the no-pay-leave from work. It lasts from 1 Apr to 30 Jun. During which i must finish my draft for millie. Ideally, it should have begun from March, to meet the timeline i previously set. This means, I've been waking up everyday feeling pressure. From the passing of time.

Just from the passing of time.

hm.

The problem with writing, is that there can't be too much stress. Too contrived - the work gets.

SO, I shall try to take it easy. and forget about the timeline.

That's partially why I haven't really been on the M project, but I have spent the last week, re-arranging (de-frag-ging) my thoughts and sentiments. Tried not to think about work. Tried to summarise what work was like for the past 2 years and what impact it had on me generally. And tried not to begin my sentences with a verb, and silent "I".

Also, wrote a lot of other things. I have this thing, this technique that i have to spend myself writing non-stop for days then my pen and thoughts - or my thoughts wld directly transfer to the written word - without going through my pre-frontal lobe? or the thoughts come from my pre-frontal lobe directly to my hand to put it out?

Oh whatever, I forget by anatomy and lobotomy.

It's just some secret technique that I use, that works for me and i'm proud of it, but maybe it's not v interesting to write about since i know it. would I forget it one day? haven't forgotten for 5 years. around. so it should continue to work - until i forget to practice it?

enough.

this should be enough to remind me of it anyway.

Summarising the effect of working for 2 years straight:

1) the invincible invisible pressure of completing things by datelines. Actually there's no datelines to life. I feel that i still need to accomplishing certain things by certain time. why? i dunno why.

2) opportunity cost? the neuron connection or learning that i need to unlearn is to measure opportunity costs by a quantifiable measure - or monetary costs. This is wrong. A taboo trade-off. It should not be measured. measures helps to communicate/translates the value of one thing, by approximating it into something else. a standard. It's not really the value of one thing at all. e.g. what's the value of a table? $100? No. that's a price perhaps. The value of the table is a relationship between user and the table. So, it depends on the user and the table.

What's the length of the table? 2 metres? No. the length of the table is actually how long it is. the value of the length is how much things you want to put on it. again, depends on the user, perhaps.

so, what's the cost of my no-pay-leave per day? $(gross monthly + employer CPF)/ days in a month? No. that's just daily wage. It's the value of things i would do if I were working (which includes earning daily wage and the things I could do with the daily wage)

But what's the opportunity cost of working/day? it's the value of the things I would do if I were not working?

I think maybe working is not the default state. The blank slate. The blank slate, or zero, is not doing anything. So, working was a 0+1. Not working returns me back to 0. writing is a +1 again. Doing what other people do is a +1. it's a choice exercised to plus that one.

What's my point? maybe I have no point.
Or my point is that i am changed, and worried about making choices and worried about money, and worried about not doing what other people are doing. Is it because i'm growing up? or i've learnt fear? like a babe learns to be afraid of being close to knives or cockroaches from how the adults reacts to knives and cockroaches. But maybe that's not due to work or NPL, but due to realisation that life is short and unpredictable (japan quake) and approaching 30.
But maybe I have no point.

3) I think in obliques. or the slash. In my head, i don't say or anymore. like, louis likes daisy, donald and or susan. with an awkward pause between and and or, to denote a mental slash. I attribute that to work emails. why do we do that at work emails? may people feel safer when they get more options. You may/can/will do this or that, please consult Ms A/ Ms B / Mr C for this/that. Something like this/that.

Maybe i feel better giving more options.

4) Mellow. I'm less excitable, more mellow. is that the right use of the word?

5) Health. I'm more concerned about my health nowadays.

this is getting boring.

Back to Millie project. though i said I haven't been on the project, I have been recuperating from work and then this morning/noon, i wrote a not bad portion. so thats' good. and the ideas from my writing the past week can also be incorporated into the book. I have the most interesting ideas when I'm not consciously thinking.

It comes from a mad side of my pre-frontal cortex. most probs.

Last night, though, i dreamt of going back to work to get something done. It's from a dunno what side of my brain most probs - that i've been trying to de-frag.

Mention in NAC Instep Magazine (Nov-Dec 10)

Millie and I - in NAC art creation fund article for their Instep magazine (Nov-Dec 10 issue).
Read it in full here.

Also, here's wishing you a happy lunar new year.

Progress update - 2 months

2 months since the last update?
Time flies, especially december time. But i no longer have a proper fix on the passing of time.

What have I done?

I've written an outline - did it in a flash - i think it's not very good now - boo - too contrived.

So I decided to let it lie down for a while and look for my voice. Read a lot as usual, and continued to write somewhere sometime later.

hm. my bits and pieces, drips and draps are more inspired, and they sound better. I like them more. But i can only produce 700 words of this inspired stuff per day. If i want to put together a novella of 35,000 words (aim to put in more words then can cut later, if need), then, I'd need to put togehter about 50 days. plus minus a bit here and there right. It's about 2 months.

Like I said, I no longer have a proper fix of time.
If I did, I'd know that the 700 words of this inspired stuff cannot be squeezed out like that. No point in measuring it like that.

Where is Mr Goon? - the ACF 2010 announcements

Maybe people who make more important things happen will laugh at how I'm getting thrills being mentioned here and there for receiving the Arts Creation Fund (ACF) grant.

And the mentions aren't even really about the quality of my work. It's about my potential to produce. Hm. They're saying, here you go, I'm investing some faith and interest in you. They're not even saying, good job, you really wrote a good book or something like that. They're saying, here you go, you seem to have potential to write something interesting. Potential only mah.

But remember (well, if you had known in the first place) that I grew up in English remedial class. Spending some time during the most formative years of my self-confidence in bloody english remedial... it put me in my place alright. Luckily, the teachers were very good. Anyone knows where's Mr Goon (yes his real name)? He's a riot. And luckily I also made good friends there, one of my best - incredible is the bind of collective boredom to young minds.

I'm not brandishing my embarrassing past like it's an excuse for my bad grammar and bad sentence structure. (At least, not this time.) It's an excuse for my excitement in being mentioned here and there. :)

I mean, I'm in a Press Release!
Last week, NAC finally released information on the Arts Creation Fund 2010. And got my name inside, leh. With the Millie Project. Even in my CPFable job, I come from the corner of organisations that only ever release announcements to internal staff only - on updates to policies blah blah. So being in a press release... hee hee. It feels funny.

And just before, also on the ACF and Millie, 8 Nov 10, For Art's Sake, Today Online betted that I'm "gonna go places" leh.

Am I being self-indulgent? Then again, can it be like how some people celebrate getting a job. Or it's how... somebody celebrates getting selected for the national team of some sports? Maybe? Celebrating having potential? Probably?

Well, it's perhaps at least good not to take it for granted. Or at least to remember to treasure the opportunity and work hard. Write a good book eh. And get mentioned for having made "more important things happen".

Then maybe Mr Goon would be proud of me. After all, he got me out of English remedial. But then again, maybe he'd be unimpressed. But most probably he'd be nice. He's a little like Kurt Vonnegut you know. That is, who I imagine Kurt Vonnegurt to be like with the Mr Goon I imagine to have been like. I wish I was older when I knew Mr Goon. Not the unappreciative daft kid in English remedial class. The best of teachers waste their personality on stupid kids.

There are a lots of other people, besides Mayo Martin (Today) and Mr Goon (my imagination), who'd bet that I'm gonna go places too, I know. I'm very very grateful for them too. In fact I even wrote a long article on how I'm grateful - but it's a bit too personal to publish on the www. This essay is also personal. But less. I'm forcing myself to reveal more about myself you know - I came across some writer's advice to writers to dare to use "I", dare to reveal details about myself. So I'm training myself to be daring like that.

What do you think? Does it make me sound more interesting?
Let me know, please, I don't want to embarrass myself

Vacillating between Insecurity and Aspiration

I just came back from the park where I went to read two Akutagawa short stories. I wonder how long it took for him to write them. But I suppose it also doesn't matter.

The latter of the two stories was about a writer. No, wait. Both stories were about writers. The first one was about the passing of Basho, the haiku master. The second one was about Bakin, or something like that, a fiction writer, who took 28 years to write a 3,000 page long story about a eight dogs.

I wonder how big each page was.

In between turning the pages, I was thinking of my own story, The Millie, that I started drafting, 2 days ago. How much can I finish writing in the 10 days that I am not working?

Goh Poh Seng said that he finished what was said to be "Singapore's first novel" in two weeks. either two weeks or ten days. I dont' know how that's possible. Although I am hoping to finish drafting my story in the same span of time.

I feel like I need to finish drafting it in at one go - so that it maintains a consistent tone of voice. That sounds stupid. I have been "writing" for several years now, and only at the brink of completing a novel, am I trying to develop and maintain a consistent tone of voice?
A bit too late, isn't it?

I hope not.

As I went to the park, I passed by a delegate from N-parks, or a delegate of a delegate of theirs, i.e. a worker for the subcontracter, most probably. He was in a flourescent green vest (which by the way, who was the one who decided they should all wear flourescent green vests anyway?) and talking to an ah-ma (old lady) who wore a cool pair of very dark sunglasses.

He was speaking to her, in hokkien, something about how working to maintain the park and keeping it in orde so that people can come here and feel happy, then they (his colleague and himself) would be satisfied.

I stole these words - as I nodded my head respectfully in their direction, as I would with some strangers - and kept it at a back pocket of my head so that I could ruminate upon them, as I am ruminating now.

Simple, it is, an aspiration of a gardener, who probably did not receive high-level education, and so humble that it might even seem noble. I recognise it as that.

How is it that as a writer, who writes in hopes of readers coming to read and feel entertained, or dare I say "happy" (?), I can feel so insecure about my aspiration?

Maybe the worker was trying to sound good. To impress the ah-ma? Maybe not.

I started drafting 2 days ago, and have vacillated about twice between thinking this is not good enough - nevermind, just do your best, ju-lyn - this is not good enough - nevermind, just try your best, ju-lyn...

Last week, I decided to go on a long leave from work, at the last minute, because the "exigencies of service" suddenly permitted me to go. Because of the suddenness, I also feel rather ill-prepared for this long retreat. A bit being caught unaware by myself.

Having only a limited number of leave / year, I am obliged or pressured to spend it wisely. Ration it properly. Roll-over as many days of entitlement as I can roll-over to next year.

I'm worried, that since I'm a little unprepared, that in suddenly taking these several days off now, I am not investing my "opportunity to take several days off" wisely.

Not being at work this monday, or tomorrow, or the day after, also makes me feel out of place. Insecure.

I take breaks between reading the pages of Akutagawa to look at the trees around me in the park. It was so peaceful that I could count the number of different bird-calls if I had wanted to.
At one point, my eyes focused on a butterfly resting on a leaf (?) of a branch of a tree some distance away from me.

Recalling a book I had read recently detailed how the uncle of the narrator would encouraged people to appreciate good moments in life, I thought to myself, "Well if this isn't nice, I don't know what is." The book is Timequake by Kurt Vonnegut. I read it in the park too.

If I'm insecured, like a butterly resting tenderly on a leaf, then the leaf would then be my story?

No wait, a butterfly could easily fly away. The analogy doesn't work.

Maybe if I wouldn't be so out of place if I had booked myself a ticket to bali or Bangkok, to live for two weeks with my friend. Like, I wouldn't be here around familiar surroundings to feel unfamiliar?

Or maybe I would feel even more out of place.

I would have to wash my own clothes, and maybe helped to mop the floor. Worse is if I wanted to refer to a book that I knew was on the shelf in my room, but I couldn't because my home is in Singapore and I would be in Bangkok.

So I'd just stay here, I guess. And try to ignore the uncomfortable feeling that threatens to swallow me. Maybe.

And try to enjoy the process, or something. Or at least appreciating the butterflies I notice. Or whatever.

This insecurity is mundane. I felt it too when I quit my job sometime back. I wrote a lot then. Some of the most inspired short short stories, I think. I felt it too, whenever I considered the plausiblity of my proposed plot for Millie. But I think this is not a good time to delve into other things to be insecured about.

Okay. I can do this. Or I shall die trying.

See. I vacillate.

Notice how I do it so skillfully? It's almost an art, I tell you.

I wrote another essay about the progress on the Millie project about two weeks ago. I feel it required editing, but I didn't have the time to edit it to my satisfaction.

Ceriph Issue 1

Seeing my stories in Ceriph Issue 1 - I realised that it's still difficult to read my work in print. Regardless, it's great. That my work is brought to new readers? Thanks, Ceriph.

The stories featured are: Iced honey latte and Emotional Blackmail.
On hindsight, maybe I should have submitted stories that were more contrasting? Then again, with similarity there can be contrast...since the works were similar/parallel, both being caricature of characters/meekfreaks. Oh well. We'd see how next time.