Coronavirus - stay home (and write)

Hi everyone.

It's been a very long time.

With the coronavirus – Covid-19 – outbreak, here in UK we are confined to our homes.  For the past 10 days I have been unable to leave my home, but luckily, apart from the symptoms of a severe cold and cough, I have been keeping well. My family is scattered across the UK, but all seem fit and well with the notable exception of my husband.

He has the virus (although we are not testing in UK so I cant say with medical certainty). I have never seen him this ill, not even when as an adult he got chicken pox. He has been ill for 11 days. His temperature spikes over 38.4 and the pain is unmanageable. He constantly coughs and that wreaks havoc on his headaches. I’m a huge Terry Goodkind fan and read the Sword of Truth novels with a passion (obsessively some might say!). In those stories the hero, Richard, suffers from headaches so severe they will kill him. Terry’s description of how they affect his character could have been written from life – the life of my husband. It’s terrifying.

All I can do is provide drinks, a little food and pain relief. I cant hug him or stroke his face. Not because I’m heartless but because I am in a high risk category. I suffer with a blood-clotting problem and have had clots on my lungs and this is a  respiratory virus. I daren’t do anything that means I may get it.

What am I doing to keep sane? I decided to go back to my writing, which had been on pause whilst I settled into a new job and recovered from major surgery. I promised myself I’d write at least a few words everyday. I did that through January. Then the  virus began to take hold around the globe and things began to change. 

So, today, 10 days into my house confinement I have picked up my lap top, cleared a work space and begun writing again.

As you may recall, I tend to write multiple projects at the same time. Not sure why, but that’s me! The work I picked up this morning was “Mergers and Acquisitions” a sci-fi novel I began several years ago and have never really been happy with. The characters seemed unreal to me and the scenario flipped from trite to too far-fetched (is that even possible for sci-fi?). The theme? How a hidden cabal of corporate interests cashes-in on a word-wide pandemic to take control of our planet. Now,  I can re-write portions of that with real life experience. Not what I would have wanted by a long way, but, writers should write from experience as well as imagination.

In between sneezes, coughing and aching limbs I will set my self the task of completing and publishing this short novel. I will let you know when its available.

Stay well. stay safe, and stay indoors.