Notes from Maine - 2022/06/05

I thought it would be over by now. On May 23, I tested positive for COVID. The test was just a formality at that point. With the headache, coughing, congestion, cold hands and feet, and fever, I knew what I had. The severity of it surprised me. A friend said something like, “I thought if we got our shots, it was supposed to be minor.” 

Here’s the thing—what if this is the minor version? Plenty of people have died. Maybe without the vaccinations, I would be one of those. I have a breakthrough case. The vaccination is not 100% effective at eliminating breakthrough cases, but it’s 97% effective in keeping people out of the hospital and 99.9% of people stay alive. Count me as one of those. I’m still functioning. I’ve been able to keep doing my chores and I’ve been mostly comfortable for the past two weeks. Mostly comfortable.

This morning, I had a coughing fit bad enough that my vision swam and I had trouble staying upright. After nearly a week of my temperature being normal, I’m currently running a fever. I tested myself at 11 days and I was still positive. According to the CDC, I’m cleared to return to normal society now, but I have no reason to do that. I’ll stay isolated until I’m negative. There’s no reason not to.

Aside from horse chores, I’ve been doing very little except sleeping and watching TV. I went to the doctor a fews days in (at their insistence) and they pronounced me to be in good shape. I guess after two full years of being completely healthy, I’ve forgotten how to be sick. This should be a minor inconvenience, but it doesn’t feel that way.

I believe that my brain is still operating just fine. Wouldn’t I be the last to know? There was an interesting study a number of years ago where they conducted an analysis of Agatha Christie’s book “Elephants Can Remember.” The data show a striking decrease in her vocabulary and sentence complexity that revealed her cognitive decline as she succumbed to dementia. I wonder if I could compare books I wrote fifteen years ago to the ones I’m producing today. It feels like writing is easier and easier, but maybe I’m just simplifying things to rudimentary language. I’ll have to look for software that does that kind of analysis. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it somewhere.  

I found it. I found a website with a “Readability Analyzer.”

One of my early books (Lies of the Prophet) has a Flesch Reading Ease score of 88.16 (higher is easier), and a Fry Readability Grade Level of 5.

Elder (fairly recent book) shows a Flesch of 84.82 and a Readability Grade Level of 5 again.

This letter you’re reading ranks at 70.53 and 8th Grade.

Great Expectations (Dickens) is 54.14 and 10th Grade.

So, I guess that tells me that my stuff is pretty easy to read, and it’s staying about the same as time goes on. I’ll have to run the test again on my next novel. 

It’s been a while since I wrote a book with a lot of moving parts. The Rainman had lots of little sub-plots, but they were pretty self-contained. I didn’t expect anyone to track lots of things happening at once. If you got to the end of the chapter, you really only had one overall plot to concern yourself with. A while back, Succinct was both long and complicated. A few people mentioned that it was difficult to keep track of all the characters and what was going on. I agree—it was difficult.

For me, the hardest thing to keep track of is multiple characters experiencing transformations at the same time. Viewpoints and motivations evolve as people live their lives. They’ll have an argument in chapter four and then be on a different page by chapter eight. When I find characters have flipped sides, it’s jarring. I’ll often go back and reassess if I really believe the things they’re saying. If I can’t convince myself, I’ll rewind and take another run.

I guess I’ll be doing a lot of that in the coming months. 

I’m wrapping up this letter the day after I started writing it. I feel pretty good today.