I haven't been posting any updates on my blog for weeks because I have been busy devoting time to a meaningful endeavor. A year after being affected by this ongoing lockdown, and after lengthy evening conversations with my friend Beth, I am finally taking a big leap.

I finally started a writing project after setting the plan aside for more than a year.  

While I have only started this endeavor around a month ago, doing this project has taught me several things. I remember telling Beth just days back, how this has gotten me involved. Despite having an unfinished assignment of the same kind around 15 years back, this is the first time that I took it seriously, applying a piece of practical advice I learned from a webinar that I attended last year: Write one chapter a day. 

I know you may think, writing a chapter is tough, what more is doing it every single day. Of course, I still take breaks every now and then. But the best part of religiously trying to follow that advice is getting a particular sense of accomplishment whenever I get to complete one.

This project drove me to use my mind creatively. Despite being unable to leave the house to do the things I usually do such as traveling to places and going to the beach for some dose of vitamin sea, it is through the power of imagination I got to write about a particular event properly. On a rather funnier note, it seemed that the power of creative imagining is teaching me well to describe events and people vividly. From how it is to be brought home drunk and wasted (when I don't drink to oblivion in real life), to describing a good-looking guy on the beach topless and with abs! (when I don't even care about it even if I've seen a lot of those in Korean dramas!). 

But of course, I also do some research like when a particular scene in one chapter happened in a foreign land, Google Earth became helpful for me to aptly describe a particular landmark as I draft the "potential scene" that will happen there. While there are some element of personal (as in real life) experiences in the assignment that I am currently working on, there still some scenes or events that I am not sure how to write about or do in writing so in this case, the notes I read in Beth's website as well as how-to pointers on Youtube became a good reference just to provide some idea. 

Another thing I enjoyed while doing this project is I learned to plot how the chapters and the whole story will go. It's challenging and sometimes, exhausting but of a good kind -- enough to let me sleep well at night. It has also allowed me to find inspiration even in simple, even old things. From old photographs, daily tasks, even conversations. The third one especially is what I loved most because, in this writing project, I use some of the conversations I had with real people to breathe life into the characters in a story. In a way, it shouts the reality in what I recently read: We write to tell the truths we wish we could say out loud. As I learned to befriend the characters, it feels as if I am finally getting to have that conversation I have always wanted to have with someone and telling that person the kind of truth that I have always wanted to say

It's only been a month since I began and I have hit the 15,000-word mark that I originally set for myself to accomplish. The work is progressing well and my beta-reading group is giving me the help and feedback that I need. While I don't have concrete plans yet on what to do next (as my plan, for now, is to finish the said assignment and give it an interesting, satisfying outcome), who knows, one day that will just appear on one platform. Possibilities are endless after all. 

My friend Beth and I decided to meet up on short notice over the weekend. It was unplanned, and if there was something good about giving in to this last-minute invitation, next to being able to have a three-hour conversation over coffee (for the first time since we first met in January!), is to finally get the old books which we've been discussing two months back. Those were old books from her bookshelf that I agreed to adopt and make room in mine. 

But what made me more excited aside from those old books is because she gave me a copy of one of her works, Come and Rescue Me. I've gushed about how I enjoyed reading her other work, Right Where You Left Me but Beth recommended that I try to read this one too -- if that was for the sake of comparison or something else, well, I simply didn't know. For a bibliophile like me, so long as it's a book, I would be glad to let my senses devour on it.

Her second book published under Lifebooks, Come and Rescue Me is a story revolving around the characters of an independent girl named Belle, a young neurologist named Joseph, and how a supposedly fun night out in a resort with Belle's girl friends ends in an emergency that would eventually lead to the discovery of an illness that is still kind of unknown to many -- Guillain-Barré Syndrome. Whether their accidental meeting was just to find the cure to Belle's mysterious illness or if there's more to it than just healing is something that readers would understand as they read through each chapter.

Despite being composed of 19 chapters, I was able to finish the book in four hours (I normally finish reading a book in two days!). While the author once told me that she felt that her ideas in writing this book were a bit "scattered", I never felt it to be like that. Reading the book allowed me to go through different kinds of emotions with the events associated with the story. From joy, kilig, sadness, and even the pain that Belle went through as a neurology ward patient. In a way, I could relate to that part of her character because I was once a familiar face in a neurology ward back when I was younger. Just like her, I too was a victim of a neurological disease that exhibited mysterious symptoms at first before my neurologist arrived with a diagnosis. There was even a particularly painful scene that rehashed the same level of pain in my mind because I also went through such a necessary medical procedure back when I was around the age of 11. The only difference is that compared to the character of Belle, there was no one like Joseph who exists in my memory at that time as I go through the same ordeal as hers. 

There were also heartfelt scenes that got me a bit teary-eyed while reading the book. I guess, events unfolding inside the confines of an ICU leave everyone feeling gloomy because that book made me feel that. It was the scene between Belle and an office mate that involved seeking forgiveness from a past offense and providing such despite the absence of words that pulled one of my heart's weakest strings. 

On the other hand, Joseph's character also deserves credit for his calming and compassionate persona. He is the kind of person any patient going through a hard time would wish to see in someone who professionally looks after them and their health concerns-- because admit it or not, at some point, we all find doctors to be either strict or intimidating and finding one who has more than just those "awkward" traits is a rare occurrence. 

Aside from giving the reader a bit of idea about what GBS is about, Come and Rescue Me imparts in its scenes the importance of the friends we keep (in the case of Belle, it's her friends Callie and Jean!),  and why we should appreciate moments, experiences, and even the people we cross paths with. This book is a light read but it's something I would love to read several times more. 

You can find out more about Beth and her works by visiting her blog, or by dropping her a shoutout on her Facebook page.