I found this diary entry on 1/11/21, a year after I’d written it, right in the middle of the pandemic, 2626 days (7 years 70 days) after I started writing ALL IS SILENCE on 11/1/12 [Wow, I like number patterns and these are kind patterny numbers].
I had come up with the basic concept and written a scene about Lizzie and Lima Beans on 8/12/11. So in my head I placed my pandemic start date as August 12th 2019. [Actually the first draft had it set in 2018, but I changed that date by the time I published in early 2014.
On Lizzie Goodin-Guerrero’s fictional 19th birthday, 1/11/2020, the New York Times published this article in the International Section: China Reports First Death From New Virus. This is the teaser under the headline: “The coronavirus, which surfaced in the city of Wuhan, has put the region on alert, but there is no evidence that it can spread among humans.”
Sadly, both I and the New York Times were wrong. Happy birthday, Lizzie. Glad we both survived, though not unscathed.
When I wrote this entry, a Washington state man was visiting family in China. January 19, four days after he returned, 66 miles south of my home, he was diagnosed with Covid 19.
During a podcast recording this week with Kobo Writing Life folks, they asked about how I dealt with much of my fictional universe becoming true in our real world. After writing this entry, I managed to write approximately 10,000 words until Lockdown. And another 10,000 before May 15th. On that Sunday, when I pulled the newspaper out of the box, I stopped writing Deserted Lands fiction for most of two years. It was too close to reality. That’s how I dealt with it. Well, that and a bunch of other unhealthy behaviors. It’s good to be coming Straight Out Of Darkness . . .
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