I haven't written for a while, because I've been really busy and preoccupied. After almost a year of not being able to work, I had a call in early August by an old customer if I would write two articles by the end of September - one 500 and the other 2500 words long. I said yes without hesitation. It was only after I've put the phone down that I asked myself: how the..... am I going to do this?
I can't remember if I already explained that I am a writer. I started in 1970, as a Hungarian language broadcaster at the Voice of America in Washington DC, then trained as an English features and documentary writer and moved into various other positions until, in 1987, I ended up as VOA's senior medical writer and worked in that position until I migrated to Australia in 1991 (way back in history, I was a would be bacteriologist, so I had some credentials). Since then, I've been a freelance science/medical/industrial/consumer magazine writer and magazine editor. In 2002, I went back to my first love, writing film documentaries, screenplays, short stories and short dramas for the stage. None of these have borne much fruit, but not for want of trying. I continued to freelance and also had (still have) an office temping job for when there's a dry season in freelancing. Then, in 2006, the cancer bug hit and the rest is Boobs Blues history.
So, having caught up on my background, let's get back to the subject at hand. Here I am, sitting next to the phone, wondering how I was going to write 3000 words in about six weeks, with a 4-week chemo cycle (during which I will be 'brainless' for two weeks) and not being able to drive long distances to do interviews. This is where years' of the habitual routine of being a journalist kicked in.
First of all, I took stock of what I was doing (besides the cancer treatment). At that time I was just gearing up to take a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) in Data Driven Journalism offered by the Knight Centre for Journalism in the Americas at the University of Texas in Austin. I knew nothing about the subject, but was hoping it would help me organise the data I was collecting for an essay on asylum seekers that I began to work on for a competition from the day Prime Minister Kevin Rudd announced his PNG Policy. This new policy would send asylum seekers coming to Australia by boat to Papua New Guinea for processing. It's a very controversial subject that I won't go into here, just to say that I totally oppose it.
So, here I was submerged in two projects already when the phone call came. Which to drop? The essay went on the back-burner, except for keeping track of media reports. That was doable with a quick, daily internet search. However, after the first two weeks I dropped the MOOC course as well, but did save all the class notes and discussions for later use.
In the meantime, I scheduled interviews by phone for the two weeks off of my chemo cycle, which was the two weeks after the call came in. As a former radio reporter I am in the habit of recording all my interviews, so this was no exception. I made two recordings of each - one with the iProRecorder app on my iPad and one with the internal mike on my Macbook Pro - in case one got fouled up, as I had no window of opportunity to redo interviews. I transcribed the interviews during the 'brainless' two weeks when I had no energy to think, just do routine tasks. I delivered the 500 word article the day before the next chemo cycle and repeated the routine during the second. When interviews I was hoping for did not materialise, I did not panic, just did more readings. When the brain didn't work, I rested and relied on my knowledge of how long it would take me to write 2500 words in the shortest time. I estimated two days. At the end I did it and submitted the article on the day of my next chemo, but it was really pushing it. Had I not had the experience, I would not have been able to do it.
So, why am I going into such detail? Because I am hoping to be helpful to others who may be in a similar situation. One of the hardest things for me is to find a happy medium between doing too much or too little. Having no full-time employment doesn't help. I have to keep to long-established routines that need self motivation. How can you be motivated when your eyes are blurry, your head is spinning as you stand up, and you wobble when you walk from your bed to your computer desk? Not to mention the nausea pills, double vision, etc.
Journalists keep daily notebooks on what they do and think, writers do the same for ideas and notes. I modified this by writing down every day certain aspects of the treatment (pills taken, side effects, etc) and organising a To Do list at the end of every day. This includes everything, not just 'work'. During the day, when I can't remember what I did two hours before, I check the list and see if it has been ticked off. Routine.
If I have some ideas, these also go in the notebook, whose pages I number. I create a Content page at the end of the book. I do this by sitting down at the end of every week to see what are the important things I have to remember from all these notes and put them down next to the page number. This way, when I want to see what I noted during the article research, it's right there and I don't have to flick through every page.
As I write this, I have four more days of taking cyclophosphamide pills in this current chemo cycle, which has been particularly tough. I haven't been feeling well at all. Finishing that long article seems years away already. For the past two days I've been a TV couch potato, watching 5 episodes of Beauty and the Beast each day. It made me forget the discomfort of my body. Today, the body is better and I watched only one episode, which I found too much. It's not going to be a favourite show, it seems. Amazing how one's taste changes with being ill. But it served it purpose and now that I am coming towards the end of these hard two weeks, I look forward to the next two when my brain will be working and I can power ahead with my 3000+ word essay. Relying on my proven routines, I am sure I will make the deadline, which is two months away. I can hardly wait.
