The 500 Word Experiment
I like the phrase freewrite.
I’ve been using that recently. In thinking about what I will be writing about. Often, most of the time I have something specific in mind, that I want to share. Even right now, there are several things that I am thinking about, that I would like to write about. And yet, I’ve noticed that when I just… freewrite, the writing… well, things come up that I wouldn’t have expected, sometimes, and the way I write about them is natural, as a flow of thought, and that’s often even more interesting than me just writing about a specific topic.
It’s good to just have a topic in mind, and something to write a whole piece around. There doesn’t have to be any specific way that you go about writing things for your blog, anyways. You still can do whatever you want.
I was having a good time trying to meet that 500 word cutoff, for a while. Did I even make it a week with that? It’s not my style. I’m simply too meandering and loquacious. I simply have too much to unload, in most cases, that I sit down at the computer, or with my pen and paper, and start going crazy. 500 words is a sneeze.
However, the 500 word experiment was very interesting. I hacked and slashed some of my pieces to death, to near death. I didn’t allow anything to die, and that’s why I ended up mostly being unable to reach the 500 word cutoff. There’s only so much you can say in 500 words. But, if you can say something in 500 words, but you’re saying the same thing in 700, or 1000, then you should really consider cutting that down, think carefully about those extra 300 or 500 words.
That’s how I felt about the experiment. I did feel that everything I posted benefitted from at least some degree of serious pruning, and often, even ruthless cutting helped the piece. But when pushing it to the limit, you see what is too much, when you’ve overcut and done damage, what can’t be cut away. Where to draw the line.
I really thought about Hemingway when writing like this, and editing in such a manner. I do use a lot of fluff. Even in that sentence, I realized it as I wrote it. I do use a lot of fluff. Now, do you see the fluff there? It immediately stands out. And I’m in the habit of using immediately as a filler word, as I just did again. Immediately can often be cut.
I just like to add words, and in conversation we do add a lot of words and use a lot of filler, and especially in a piece like what I’m writing now, a freewrite, where I’m writing as I’m thinking, that’s fine, even important. For the tone and voice. But there are cases where you don’t want that, and where it would be better not to have it. The point is that you are choosing to be terse, or fluffy, loose with your wordage and writing, intentionally. As Hemingway chose.
The fluff in that sentence was the do. Why do we need do in that sentence? We don’t need it. But if I were speaking, I would probably add the do, and say, “I do use a lot of fluff.”
How many words have we got here?
577, so far.
New Experiment: No (BAD) Artificial Light
The 500 word experiment was fun and useful. This is why we like to do experiments. They show you things. And, they are fun. Usually. I don’t know what experiment I’ve done that wasn’t fun.
I’m currently on a new one, that y’all don’t even know about yet, which is that I’m trying my best to avoid artificial light at night. I am shocked that it took me so long to get around to this one.
I’ve known that blue light was bad for the eyes, and screentime is a problem for the circadian rhythm, tricking your body into thinking it’s still daytime, throwing off your cortisol production. But I wasn’t taking it that seriously. Well, Rachel offhandedly made a comment about artificial light being a problem, the other week, and it stuck with me. It sat in my brain, it hit me at the right time. It was something I had been meaning to research.
I only had to read about three articles full of facts and data, to sufficiently shock and horrify me, and outrage me, and put me on the right and true path. I could share that data with you, possibly in another post. I’m freewriting, not writing an inspirational piece or anything here. You might not need all that data anyways, but data is what gets me to take action. Data, fact, reports, they are all what move me. And they are what convinced me of the bane on our existence that is artificial light.
Now, fire is also artificial light. I had to Google that after my first night by the candle. I spent the night thinking, “Is this artificial light?” Having an internal debate. The answer is yes, but it’s nothing like LED light, or light from screens. I am tempted to look some things up here — I won’t do it. But fire is low on the spectrum, the wavelengths are longer, and carry less energy. (Something like this.) It is not so intense on your eyes. I just read that firelight mimics sunlight, which is telling your brain that it’s time to wind down. So at least if you are burning a candle until 3 am, binging on Harry Potter and The Goblet Of Fire, your body and mind are basically already primed to go to bed whenever you decide that it’s best if you finally put the book down now, or you become so absolutely exhausted that you’re dropping the book on yourself or rereading the same page seven times in a row.
Candles are fun. We all know that, right? We are all in agreement of this fact. So, having more reasons to use candles is always great. I think that half of me is adhering to my no artificial light policy (I’m excluding candles from inclusion in my artificial light definition, here, because it’s really not a bad one) because it gives me an excuse to use candles.
It’s a good thing to be doing, a no artificial light (after sunset) policy, because it is like a soft ban on lots of bad things. Things that you aren’t supposed to be doing at night, that keep you up late. Phone, computer, gaming, TV. Even just getting up to shennanigans in your room, even reading, it will be easier to stay up later when you bask in your artificial light glow in your room, in your kitchen. However, when that sun goes down, FIRE UP THE CANDLES. It’s creepin’ time. There’s not much you can do then, or you have to really want it. You have to want it so badly that you’ll do it under conditions of severe low light, and possibly risk an injury, and experience frustration.
That’s how the reading has been. My candle barely casts enough light to illuminate the pages. It’s probably terrible for my eyes, having to squint so hard, but my eyes are already so terrible that at this point… they can get worse. I mean, if it comes to it, I’ll use a magnifying glass if I have to. We’ll cross that bridge when it comes. But this reading, you would be amazed to see all the various positions that I have come up with, the seatings and arrangements, the tactical candle placements, the ingenious schemes to angle the book so that it receives more light.
It took me three nights to come up with my second best idea, which was to place the candle in a drawer in my desk. I have an old wooden desk, and it sits right next to my bed. Reading from bed is more comfortable, especially at night, although I like to also sit at the desk and read. I have been starting at the desk, and then moving to the bed. Sometimes I’ll switch between them, and actually I have been doing that, to give my body a break from being stuck in a single position for too long. So, sitting at the desk could be tiring, as I have to prop the book up in my hands, on my elbows. That has to be done to ensure enough light hits the page.
The angle of the light is very important, and unfortunately most of my candle light is shooting straight up, and is wasted. So, wherever my book is in relation to the candle, it must be above the candle. I have to get that light. That’s why, after two nights, my genius was not to raise the book up, but to lower the candle, by putting it in an open drawer. That makes it lower than the surface of the desk, putting it on the right level for me and my book. It also allowed me to read from the bed, while sitting propped up against the pillows, because my bed height is slightly lower than the desk height.
I thought that this was a good lesson in how time can reveal solutions and solve your problems. You do not immediately see all the improvements, you do not strike on all the best methods at once. You inevitably get tired of the problem, you get so tired of the problem, and you constantly scheme ways to solve it, until you do.
It took me about five nights before I found the best, most comfortable solution yet. It was also, however, the most fraught with risk, as I found out. By placing the candle at the side of my hip, directly on my bed with me in my bed, I was able to have the light so close, and receive a majority of the beaming photons, wonderfully lighting up the pages of my book. They would shoot right up into the book, that I could hold in a natural position, right on my lap, as I lay there in the bed, and I could see every word, on both pages, clearly, from a perfectly comfortable position. How wonderful!
Yet, the problem as you can imagine, is that I am laying down, sharing my bed with a precariously placed flame, and a basin of hot, liquid wax.
It was some night where I was reading the Order of the Phoenix, deep into the trials and tribulations, and I just wanted it to be over, I wanted to get through it, but the book was defeating me, all 900-something pages of it. This was no Chamber of Secrets, this was no Prisoner of Azkaban. I was pushing it up to my limit, playing with fire, literally (yes I had to write that)…! And I was falling asleep at the wheel, and the third or fourth time I nodded off on the page, I was jolted awake, feeling my side suddenly become wet and hot, and saw that the candle flame was now sideways, and the hot wax was spilling out everywhere. That’ll wake you up.
You know what? I just remembered. I wasn’t falling asleep. I remember that, I was just deeply engrossed, and forgot about the candle, and adjusted myself. I know I wasn’t falling asleep, because I remember what I did afterward: I took off my pajama pants, now covered in hot wax, I changed my undies (had a little hot wax on ’em too), and then I promptly sat down at my desk and kept reading. When I went back to bed, I checked to see if the wax had cooled, and it had. There was a hard, waxy patch now on the side of my comforter and bedsheet.
That patch lasted for about five days, by the way. I just washed the sheets today.
One week of no artificial light: Results
I was just tempted to let that be the last line, but I should tell you about the big reason to avoid bad artificial light, which is quality of sleep. And I have found that since I’ve started doing this no artificial light thing, I have really been getting great sleep, and I have been enjoying these evening, reading-by-candlelight sessions. It’s got me waking up at the crack of dawn again. I find that even if I stay up late, as I have been, because I have been gripped by a sickness of Harry Potter fever, it’s not as punishing to stay up reading by candlelight, than by browsing the internet on the laptop, watching YouTube or whatever it is that I’m doing with that thing.
It also removes all temptation, and pressure. Maybe I’m pressured to take care of some business? Do it tomorrow. Have to message someone? Nope. Check email, bank accounts, Google something that I absolutely need to get to the bottom of, such as “Is fire artificial light?” It can wait. (It took all of my self-control not to look this one up, that first candlelit night.)
It makes it easier to say no to all of these things because of the clear rule. When the goes down, artificial light is BANNED. That’s it. Simple.
I would recommend anyone to try this out.
(Shoutout to Parker for discovering the unscented $1.99 candles hidden on the very bottom rack in the candle aisle at Kroger, that comes with no plastic except the tiny sticker, that looks exactly like a large glass of milk, and makes this foray into candlelight living much more economically bearable.)
HAKUMUSU 