Carly Consultation & Fifth Prompt - Lessons from Carly's Responses (26/08)

In Retrospect 18

This post was originally part of [CLASS/ESSAY/PROMPT 5] #22: Friday August 21st & Wednesday 26th Classes / Fifth Prompt - Essay Feedback & My Remarks. It has been split into two halves and possibly streamlined. The original post was uploaded on 27/08/20, but has been corrected here to 26/08/20.

I consulted with Carly on Wednesday, 26/08/20. We discussed the First Draft, and the Second Draft which I was working on. I was pleased with the progress I was making on developing it further following the submission. I was also quite happy with the reaction received, knowing I could write raw emotion and an intriguing story. I wanted to expand on this further with my later pieces. I was granted the word count to do this when I was later told to skip over the academic bit and wound up centralising the piece around the G date.

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Section 3 (Wednesday): Consultation with Carly

I went into this consultation having sent 1000 words plus a plan for the rest of my close-to-final draft on Tuesday morning, in time for her to look over the changes I had made by Wednesday.

• Touch is an interesting theme, it resonates with others. 
• Good to bring my LDR experience into it.
• Factoids will give strong signals about where the essay is going to go.
• Carly liked that I dived into the date story sooner.
• Carly liked the new structure.
• Factoids - As long as they're well chosen and correlate with the theme and connect well with the piece, I don't need to worry about them being the same size as the writing (factoid vs personal experience). It's important that they're nicely curated and placed well.
• The restructure is great. The structure tells its own story. The themes have an emotional trajectory, an arc just like my experience. I should play with that, and the narrative in structure. In my dealing with Covid, I was optimistic, and then the full weight sank in...
• The headings are okay, and a way to organise things (for me, they "answer" the title's trailing off). For the moment, if I want, I can leave them in and remove them later when I'm doing the copy edit if I want to then. Their grammar style is fine.
• Carly liked my idea about book ending with the calendar. It connects my personal timeline with a broader timeline (personal experience to the broader experience).
• Suggestion: I should put in the adult store sales and cyber sex line back in (I had already put it in in my close-to-final draft, so it's already there~!)
• The most important part of my essay is the touch deprivation. It humanises lockdown, and makes it a unique experience. This is especially due to the fact that I've been in an LDR before lockdown, which makes me a kind of authority figure on it. I bring knowledge about it OUTSIDE of the Covid context.

Overall, I'm very happy with the way my piece is travelling. As of now, it's sitting at around 2200 words, which is admittedly worrying me. I feel that 200 means there's some things I can cut out. I put in as much as I could in terms of content for Friday's workshopping! I'll be working on it over the break... I hope I can get it to about 2000ish words by the due date! I hope my classmates take my piece well.

Section 4: Blog Prompt - Lessons from Carly's Responses

"Take as a starting point, reflecting on what you've learnt from your editor's response to [the first draft of] your essay..."

Uh... I think a major thing I've learnt is that I can write raw emotion, and a really intriguing self that will resonate with the reader. It's been a huge boost to my confidence as a writer, knowing my writing has been able to connect with others (even if they are technically required to do so, ehehe~). It doesn't seem like much of a lesson, more an affirmation, but it means a lot to me, sincerely.

I've also learnt to recognise what I'm knowledgeable in, and hearing Carly say that I'm an "authority figure" on a subject was a strange feeling! I wouldn't call me an authority figure on anything. So it was very surprising and striking to hear that. Like yeah, you know what? I do know a lot about long-distance relationships and how they feel! I am able to say stuff about it that I think and feel and believe!

I haven't fully grasped it yet but I want to understand more of what Carly meant when she said my themes travel an emotional trajectory too. It makes me feel as though I'm managing two stories/arcs at once! It's always surprising to hear you're doing something that you don't realise you're doing. I think in the future, I should study my stories from the future to see what I might be doing with it, where it's going. It's usually easier to do this once I've attained some distance from it, usually time. Then it just feels like somebody else wrote it.

Oh! I've also learnt that I've created an "itch" in my piece, due to its storyline. Hehe! I'm really glad that has happened. I like that readers get a tantalisingly descriptive, yet short glimpse into my life, which is constantly moving - it hasn't stopped like in a fiction piece! It's great to leave them in mystery with some unresolved questions, because that's how life is.

I don't think I've really "learnt" anything, more picked up on stuff and agreed with things.

It's good that I'm being encouraged to be un-self-conscious and more bold in my piece. I'm glad there isn't any judgement of my "sins" or whatever, I'm glad that my writing has been relatable, human, complicated (in terms of human emotion, which is a good thing) and has the ability to really reach other people's hearts. I hope to make this even stronger in my piece.

It makes me smile thinking about how different our pieces are. From the informative ones like Angus', to the deeply memoir ones like Chloe H's, I'm so excited to get a copy of the published book and read through them all in one sitting! I wonder where my piece is going to be placed in the order of them? Hehe! I can't wait to find out.