Life: It Really DOES Get in the Way

Well. I've almost got Pink Bandana Girls up to the point where I can continue where I left off last November. I needed to take out some elements that were really overdone and cliche, and make it a little bit special, which was pretty fun. All that encouragement definitely helped, but the chaotic air of the past few days has not.

I think it's weird how everything happens at once. A few weeks ago, I might've said I was bored with my life. HA! Silly me.

A friend's dad got critically ill, and I was busy meeting her for coffee when she could take a break from the hospital. Then Thunder in the Valley, which really isn't stress but is chaos, with the 16 million bikes in town (ours, of course, being one of them). Then, on Tuesday, I spent most of the day cleaning, and decided I'd spend the evening writing.

How stupid of me.

You see, I got a new phone on Saturday, after my old one broke. I wasn't able to retrieve my contact list, so I had to input the numbers by hand. And I made a mistake, and subsequently sent a few text messages to a wrong number, thinking it was my friend. They were fairly innocuous, slightly amusing messages: one regarding my neighbors playing very loud music, and another regarding our plan to combat that by having a lawn mower and power washer party. Then another with our plans for the evening.

I realized my mistake later that night, and promptly fixed the number. I thought that was it. Three days passed.

Just before I sat down to write on Tuesday, I started getting calls. The first, I noticed, was from the number I'd accidentally texted. I figured that if they had something to say to me, they could say it in a voicemail. After that, they were blocked. As they were from a blocked number, I ignored them.

I couldn't ignore the voicemails, though. They contained a special brand of drunken psychosis that can't really be ignored. Especially after the eighth call in four hours, with three very lovely voicemails calling me all sorts of pretty names. On the eighth call, I allowed a friend to answer, as by that time I was shaking with anger and anxiety and didn't think I'd be able to stay calm.

His end of the conversation was actually rather hilarious. The caller kept trying to talk over him, and he'd say, "N-no. N-no. YOU listen. N-no." My other friend said he sounded like the b*tchy flight attendant from SNL. "Buh-bye. Buh-bye."

And then I called the police. I put it off for as long as I could, hoping that the caller would decide enough was enough, or maybe pass out or take her meds or something. But at that point, I figured two calls an hour for four hours, frequently coming within a few minutes of each other, was my breaking point.

Then I got a text from my friend--her dad would not make it through the night.

I think, between all this happening, I wrote about 200 words. I did manage to get some brainstorming done, and I have a better idea of where I want this novel to go. But this was all done between my shaking and ranting and pressing "ignore" on my phone and listening to cracked-out voicemails, and then being sad for my friend.

I guess what happened is that the phone I accidentally texted was owned by a male. His girlfriend got her hands on his phone and--three days after the fact--decided to take matters into her own hands. This was according to the voicemail I got from the police at 7 a.m. the next day. So, as far as I can tell, it's over.

I'm going to try to write tonight. I'm pretty excited, actually--I can't wait to get immersed in the story again, to really feel my characters and be part of that again. I miss it SO MUCH.

There's a pretty good chance I'll be turning my phone off before I even start.