Sometimes, it's good to have life and literature mix.
My new novel has been calling me from beyond the computer screen. I hear nothing but silence from the street, which is so foreign compared to the normal bustle of honks and rolling engines.
The songbirds fly back and forth, signing, and my ears keep discovering new sounds, which get added to the permanent repertoire. These days, being a winged creature is splendid.
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I look back at my own launchpad. Everything there is still not moving, waiting for my momentum for the moment that the scaffolding would be hidden and the plot would look like it had written itself.
Meanwhile, outside there is a new push to fix infrastructure and complete the paving of new roads, taking advantage of the situation.
The newspaper headlines are very appropriate: "Number of sick rises"; "Follow instructions"; "Restart"; "Total isolation". All this immediately trickles into the world of fiction.
Writing a novel requires a mental lockdown. Time and again I discover that time is such an expensive resource. If I get tempted to look at my inbox, the little concentration that I have accumulated will disappear.
Maybe I would be able to recite the number of patients in each city, and say what their status is and recall their pre-existing conditions, but nothing of value will have been written by doing so.
The quiet and the singing of the birds encourage me to sever my internet connection. Just in case, I also turn off my router and then start doing some infrastructure projects of my own: reassessing the novel and a rigorous examination of the chapter structure.
The outside threat, "every third person," threatens the fragile and internal lockdown, and I take pains to channel it to literary action: the register; creating a credible basis for the plot.
As the news fade in the background, I look at the manuscript and try and breathe some new life into it; a life that has nothing to do with what's unfolding outside.
The fewer the real flesh-and-blood people are on the streets of Jerusalem, the greater the control imaginary figures have over my mind.
One evening I hear heavy knocks on my door. I look through the peephole and open the door with a sigh: The character that I had taken out from my second book insists on making it into the manuscript.
It threatens me that it would not keep a safe distance! Every time I work on a new book, it reappears and makes demands. I have always rebuffed it, but this time, perhaps because the media is reporting this situation as a "ticking timebomb", I give it a small role, just so it would leave me alone.
I get a message saying my package is waiting for me at the post office. I go on a journey. The road is blocked because of infrastructure works, so I go on a detour until I finally make my way forward to the post office.
And there, as if nothing has changed, the post office's manager gives me my parcel. I look at the book, bemused.
I am overcome with joy. Someone real has actually wrapped the book I had ordered and put a stamp on it. The book managed to traverse the ocean and reach a small office in a small city in a small country.
This small act of kindness by the universe fills my heart with a wild rush of blood. Upon my return home, I cannot feel the obstacles on the road.
Galit Dahan Carlibach is the author of seven books. She is currently working on a new novel.
