Writing Again

Sometimes it's easy.

Sometimes it feels like the story is writing itself, like it's all already there and you just have to record it.  Every word it perfect, every plot twist just the way it has to be, the characters developing in new and exciting directions so fast you can barely keep up.  It's like something is burning inside you, just under the ribcage.  It's like being horny; that maddening need to be with the story, to let it consume you.

Other times it's hard.  So hard, you don't want to face it.  You look at what you've written, and you wonder "How did I come up with that shit?" and it doesn't seem worth it to fix any of the millions and millions of problems with the text.  The characters are flat, the whole concept is unoriginal.  Your story is boring.  Your initial creative rush has died to a trickle of foul sludge.  New, exciting ideas hover at the edge of your mind, and you want to leave this one behind and chase them, even though you know it will all end the same, and that you won't be able to commit until you finish this one, and maybe, just maybe, a part of you still believes in that boring old story.

It is this that separates the writers from the dreamers.  Even when you don't want to face the story, you do it anyway, and stare at the document for hours, forcing out a sentence every few minutes.  Then it feels like the story is there again, but trapped behind a glass wall, and it can't get out.  Still, you plow on ahead.

Even when your mother walks into your room and asks "Oh, what are you doing?  Are you writing?"  "Yes."  "Is it for your blog?"  "No."  "Oh, do you have some sort of project, a story?"  "I don't really want to talk about it."  "Well, you could just say a manuscript," as she goes off in an offended huff, because even though we usually get along great, if there is a problem with our relationship then it's always my fault, and she never bothers to ask me if maybe I'm being belligerant because I'm upset about something, and what might that be?  Not unless I have a complete emotional breakdown and burst into tears, and even then it's hard to get her to actually listen.  Note to self:  When you start seeing a counselor in the fall, make sure to bring up your crapsaccharine relationship with your mother.

And then you're all frazzled and can't concentrate, and feel oddly violated and raw, so you maybe force out another sentence or at least finish the one you were on, then close down and let the story recover.  But it is still there, that nagging, unfinished business that you cannot quite leave behind you.  And you're going to have to go through it all over again tomorrow.

This is what separates the writers from the dreamers.