things today. I have been counting quarrels and trips. I need to put more order into what I remember. The order is difficult. It has been the most difficult thing about this book. Actually, my doubt has been more difficult, but my doubt about the order has been the worst. I donât mind working hard, but I donât like not knowing what I am doing, or not knowing if what I am doing is the right thing to do.
I have tried to find a good order, but my thoughts are not orderlyâone is interrupted by another, or one contradicts another, and in addition to that, my memories are quite often false, confused, abbreviated, or collapsed into one another.
I have trouble organizing things in my life anyway. I donât have the patience to try very hard. One reason this book has taken so long to write is that instead of thinking it through and organizing it beforehand, I have simply kept trying, blindly and impulsively, to write it in ways that werenât possible. Then I have had to go back and try to write it in a different way. I have made many mistakes, and couldnât see them until after I had made them.
I still find myself forgetting things I had intended to do, and doing things I had not planned to do. I find myself doing things sooner than I had planned to do them: Oh, I say to myself, so Iâm already at this stage.
I complained to Ellie a few weeks ago that although the novel was intended to be short, it had been growing and growing and was clearly going to become quite long before I could cut it down to the size it should be. But she said this seemed like a perfectly reasonable way to proceed. She had done the same thing with her dissertation all those many years ago, she said. That reassured me for a while. But now I am worried all over again. If it grows any more, will I still have time to cut it back before I run out of money?
I canât stop translating altogether. Recently I tried to figure out how much money I spent each month, how much I had on hand at present, and how much I needed to earn over the next few months to supplement that. Pleased with myself, I went downstairs and explained to Vincent that I seemed to spend about $2,300 per month, and had enough to last for about a year if I translated just a little. But Vincent reminded me that my calculations are often wrong. I often forget what he calls hidden costs. And I forget that I will have to pay taxes on what I earn.
I am not very good at managing my money. One problem is that when Iâm paid for my work, the payment always comes in a single lump sum so large it seems limitless. I begin spending it, and each thing I buy seems to be the only thing I will buy, each small sum seems like the only sum. I donât understand that one sum will be added to the next until the original sum is all gone.
Now and then a day comes when I have almost nothing left, and no prospect of work either. I am afraid. It is not that Vincent would not try to make up the difference if I ran out of money altogether, but if I donât pay a share of our expenses we canât maintain what we have. At this point I look at what money is left and at last, because I have no choice, make a budget and try to live within it.
Sometimes, then, the phone rings and I hear the voice of a cheerful person who wants to pay me to translate a book. Because I speak to her in a calm, professional way, she has no idea of the despair that had surrounded me until that moment, there at the other end of the line.
Iâm not tired of translating, though I probably should be. Maybe I should also be embarrassed that Iâm still translating after all these years. People seem surprised that a woman my age is a translator, as though it is not wrong to translate when you are still a student, or just out of school, but you should have stopped by the time you are older. Or it is fine to translate poetry but not prose. Or it is all right to translate prose if you do it as a pastime or
I have tried to find a good order, but my thoughts are not orderlyâone is interrupted by another, or one contradicts another, and in addition to that, my memories are quite often false, confused, abbreviated, or collapsed into one another.
I have trouble organizing things in my life anyway. I donât have the patience to try very hard. One reason this book has taken so long to write is that instead of thinking it through and organizing it beforehand, I have simply kept trying, blindly and impulsively, to write it in ways that werenât possible. Then I have had to go back and try to write it in a different way. I have made many mistakes, and couldnât see them until after I had made them.
I still find myself forgetting things I had intended to do, and doing things I had not planned to do. I find myself doing things sooner than I had planned to do them: Oh, I say to myself, so Iâm already at this stage.
I complained to Ellie a few weeks ago that although the novel was intended to be short, it had been growing and growing and was clearly going to become quite long before I could cut it down to the size it should be. But she said this seemed like a perfectly reasonable way to proceed. She had done the same thing with her dissertation all those many years ago, she said. That reassured me for a while. But now I am worried all over again. If it grows any more, will I still have time to cut it back before I run out of money?
I canât stop translating altogether. Recently I tried to figure out how much money I spent each month, how much I had on hand at present, and how much I needed to earn over the next few months to supplement that. Pleased with myself, I went downstairs and explained to Vincent that I seemed to spend about $2,300 per month, and had enough to last for about a year if I translated just a little. But Vincent reminded me that my calculations are often wrong. I often forget what he calls hidden costs. And I forget that I will have to pay taxes on what I earn.
I am not very good at managing my money. One problem is that when Iâm paid for my work, the payment always comes in a single lump sum so large it seems limitless. I begin spending it, and each thing I buy seems to be the only thing I will buy, each small sum seems like the only sum. I donât understand that one sum will be added to the next until the original sum is all gone.
Now and then a day comes when I have almost nothing left, and no prospect of work either. I am afraid. It is not that Vincent would not try to make up the difference if I ran out of money altogether, but if I donât pay a share of our expenses we canât maintain what we have. At this point I look at what money is left and at last, because I have no choice, make a budget and try to live within it.
Sometimes, then, the phone rings and I hear the voice of a cheerful person who wants to pay me to translate a book. Because I speak to her in a calm, professional way, she has no idea of the despair that had surrounded me until that moment, there at the other end of the line.
Iâm not tired of translating, though I probably should be. Maybe I should also be embarrassed that Iâm still translating after all these years. People seem surprised that a woman my age is a translator, as though it is not wrong to translate when you are still a student, or just out of school, but you should have stopped by the time you are older. Or it is fine to translate poetry but not prose. Or it is all right to translate prose if you do it as a pastime or
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