28. Hartland

On a bright day, I realized that
if the god's are angry, they
are shouting over the same cold plate;
the familiar carrot children, the cob
the greasy chicken fresh from the grill, among it

hair fell from my shoulders as I saw a leg 

jabbed here and there, above the barber,
and I felt it inside me. The places where
the gravy pools, with a kernel of corn,
sitting condemned by the white peaks,
who never laid low or were ever glazed;
"We've kept our shape, we've kept our shape!"
they holler, "purity!", they holler, "high pride";

unaffected as they are, they are, ignorant of the potato, 

and their darker ground years, before they were dug. 

On a bright day, I realized
if the god's are angry, they
may very well also be quite hungry. 

Writing Log XVII

The first draft is finished! It don't quite feel like it has sunk in yet. A little more when I just started writing this, in the pit of my stomach I just felt a little something, but I might just be hungry. The initial thought after I finished Chapter 25 was, Is it really over? Is a novel really ever done? I feel like I always could make changes to it, even after the final draft is finished. Strange feeling. I know I should feel really proud, and I am, it just doesn't feel like I'm done writing it, haha. My mom has started reading the manuscript and says she likes it, which is good lol. The final word count of the first draft is: 132,661.

Writing Log XVI

Alright. Chapter 20 is done. I've struggled with it since I first got out of school, and its finally done. It is officially the longest chapter in the entire book, 17,554 words, leading up to the climax that will come in Chapter 21. The entire word count of the novel now stands at, 118,254. Quite happy, I'm not even done writing today. Its entirely possible I'll finish Chapter 21 tonight in one sitting. The time has come to climax.

Jess is in the Netherlands, and writing helps me out with that. I'm excited to have something done and huge to show her when she gets back. I've been working on this novel for three years now, and I've loved every minute of it, stressful or not. It's interesting to look back at what I've written earlier in the book, and its like going back through time a little bit. I feel like it's solid history for what I've been writing recently, and something the reader can look back on with the characters and feel like they've travel a bit of distance.  I love it.