On the 5th of July

On March 22nd I was given the task to finish 12 - 22 minutes scripts for a children's educational  animation series and the deadline was 25th of June.

I thought it would be okay since I have about a week to finish each script, more or less. But when I sat in front of my laptop to begin the journey I realized writing for children is one thing. Writing an educational children's series is another. And writing for children about science with an animated pace and humor is completely a whole new ballgame.

With discipline, I seated myself everyday for the next 3 months to write and write and write. There were times when everything was good but there were times when nothing went my way. One of the worst experiences in writing educational materials is the research, which isn't too hard, but the contradictory conclusions, debatable theories and opinionated ideas were of no help. While one scientist or researcher believes in one thing, another says something altogether. I had to filter all the findings and decide on the safest or more accurate hypothesis.

Another tough nut to crack is the one liners, humor or comic relief. And on top of that, mind you, it's for kids. Luckily, after writing several scripts I feel so blessed to have watched hundreds and thousands of movies and series and read tons of materials that helped with my writing. I could repeat the same formula for each episode but I wanted more, just like how I want more from the TV series I watch.

Some scripts took me only a few sittings but some took weeks. Whenever a script passed the deadline I had to start the next one to even out the flow. I did not have the pleasure to wait around for ideas to fall from the sky when I was groping in the dark, I had to write everyday no matter what. Some days, some really bad days, I wrote only a line. Yes, one single line. But the good days could fill up to ten pages.

Although I completed all the scripts on the given deadline I wasn't satisfied with the last three and extended another 2 weeks to polish and fine tune what was missing. And on this day, on the 5th of July, I sent the last three scripts and completed my contract of twelve.

I have never been happier and exhausted from the brain draining sessions everyday. Waking, sleeping and dreaming about the plots, punch lines and messages to get across. If you've been there, you would know how I feel. The elation, the ecstasy, the Rapture.

Though it was challenging, took a big chunk out of my life and drove me up the walls at times, I am so thrilled I managed to handle this genre and got a good feedback for them too. The first thing I did was to celebrate the joy with friends. The second thing I did was to go back to my hometown to veg out, and the third is to blog again. And I'm wondering what next? I know I have another series of children's books to look into, an indie movie script, a new short story collection and a novel that is begging to be written. What can I say? To relax in between scripts I play code breaker puzzles, scrabble, text twist and sudoku.