I used to write about things. I used to spout off my leftie opinions, get combative with the page, ruminate about the sky and the darkness, lilt lyrical about rain.
And then my book happened.
Now I feel like all I do is post promotional stuff about the nice things people are saying about the book. Which is important, of course. But I also want to just be and write and wax rhapsodic and get mad about why everyone is searching for one plane (god rest all their souls) but no one is talking about the fact that scientists are now saying that we are 25 years too late to avoid dangerous and permanent changes to our climate that will affect billions of people and put a third of the world’s species at risk of extinction. (Click here if you want to be terrified about your old age).
I tell myself have no time for well-researched diatribes and poems and silly posts. But then this weekend I had to write something for work. It turned out to be 9200 words (to put it in perspective, a YA novel is about 60,000 words) and I churned it out in a bit over a day. So, at that rate, that would mean I could write a whole novel in about 6 days. (Which, if you know the story, is almost what I did with the first draft of THE SECRET SIDE OF EMPTY). So, emboldened and reminded of my marathon-writing abilities, I wrote 3,000 words of novel #3.
So it’s not time I lack. It’s not motivating. It’s that velvet vacuum, the sacred space in which to wait and let the words come. Writing requires silence, a lack of activity. The opposite of what I have now. But, somehow, I have to find the way.
