Bedtime is perhaps the trickiest moment of the day. It’s where we lay our heads down onto our pillows, trying to untangle our minds from anything that happened during the day. Whether it was a dispute with a colleague, a laugh with another, or even a development in the story that occurred, that your mind is still trying to comprehend, figure out the little details. What starts off with a genuine attempt at getting some – well deserved – sleep, quickly turns into something more than that.
It starts with that little voice in your head, it’s not the sound of your own voice that’s going through your mind, but it’s that of one of the characters that you have spent the evening writing for. The thoughts start flowing in wild and free and before you know it an hour has passed and you’re staring at the ceiling, feeling the distinct urge to get out of bed and write this down for your co writer, knowing that if you don’t, there is a very big and very distinct change of this very thought being forgotten through the rest of the fairly restless night. Which, I will be the first to admit, happens nine out of ten times, for me at least!
Our work is constantly evolving and changing, just when we think we have all of our little details in place, something like this happens. It starts off as a single thought, one man in the middle of all of this, but is he in the right place for his story to unfold? What starts off as a single and relatively simple thought escalates into another session of plotting and planning, as changing the location of that one person, also happens to change the lives of 20 others. An unforeseen challenge in an otherwise simple and harmless little thought.
One of the many reasons why our life’s work has taken us so long, it’s not something as simple as having an idea for a book and writing. It’s not as simple as just telling yourself that you need to get from A to Z and this is how we’re going to do that. No, because as soon as we think we have it all figured out, that is when the restless nights start happening. That’s when no matter how hard you try to close your eyes at night to sleep, there is that voice that makes you question what you’re doing with a particular character.
The added difficulty also adds in excitement, because even though you think you have it all under control, and that after the last batch of sorting and ensuring things are on track the way you want them to be, you come to realize that this change, this tiny thing that ended up throwing your world back around and twice over, was actually worth the effort that it ended up being. It is worth it, watching our people come to life a little more each day, and our world grow bigger, brighter, and stronger with each passing day.
It has been a long journey to get here, and we both had our fair share of sleepless nights, itching to grab the phone and text one another to share all of these thoughts, but not quite wanting to wake the other who might not have a case of being kept up by the story today. And when all of the little folds and creases are smoothed back out that the ripple of a little thought implemented in the grand scheme of things.. When the sun has set once more and it is time to call it a night after a long day of plotting and planning, wishing and writing, we’re grateful for the tiny thought that we had because it made everything just a tad better, flow a bit easier, and make just a little more sense.
Well, that and we ask kindly if the other can please stop thinking and just sleep already!
Charlotte
Charlotte and Clara 