You Never Know

Funny, but I've gone weeks without writing (except in the blog).

At one point, I swore I wouldn't write in the blog until I wrote on my novel.

Didn't work.

Then I rushed to get all the house stuff done so that I'd have no more excuses. But houses, well, they tend to keep coming up with maintenance issues, and this house is no exception. I still don't have new countertops, and the dining room, writing room, and breakfast nook lights still need replacing...

Didn't work.

And then, like a miracle, I woke this morning at 4:45 a.m. I could feel sleep had left me, but an idea had not. I came down the stairs to my computer, opened it, started writing...

A few hours and 19 pages later, I had half a play. Script Frenzy is this month, with the goal, I think, being to write a play of 90-100 pages. At this pace I'll be done in five days.

Something must have worked. I only wonder what it was.

Makes me also wonder what tomorrow morning will bring. I just hope I'm ready for it.

Still Not Writing

I'm sorting through some personal stuff right now--filling my life with Zumba in hopes of finding myself happily satisfied with my own psyche, goals, body, etc.

I am also doing research--of the Oxford kind--to finish with a final library book so that I can return it several weeks after it has been due (yikes!)... once the research is done, will I actually work on my novel? No idea.

It's disheartening. I clean out the refrigerator to avoid writing. I Febreze the whole house. I weed. I cut out and sew a new dress (I'm on #3 in just a few weeks). I check my e-mail for the seventh time in a day (no new mail). I do everything I possibly can to avoid writing.

If I knew why I was avoiding it, I'd take steps to stop myself. I just don't know. So many negative voices are drifting around in my head--not just about writing, but about every aspect of my life--and though writing sounds fantastic, when I sit down to do it, I suddenly would rather polish the wood floors.

I hope this ends soon. It's not like me, and I only have two months before my teaching starts up again. I'd like to have something to show for it.

Writer's Block

I worked very hard this academic year. I taught twelve classes, four of them completely new, and I have worn out my grading hand pretty thoroughly. I thought when summer came that I would want nothing more than to write.

I guess I was wrong.

Over the past four weeks (yes, FOUR), I've managed to do dishes, play piano, do laundry, go shopping, sweep, and even vacuum more than write. I think I have spent more time cleaning out the cat box than I have writing. I have used every excuse there is, but the truth is, I've had a bit of a block.

For perhaps the third time in my life, I have writer's block.

It doesn't feel good. My stomach squirms, I spend far too much time playing free games on Yahoo, I eat more, I'm bored, and I feel pretty foolish.

I have done writing-related activities. I just finished going through my fourth resource for the Oxford play I'm planning (discussed in an earlier blog). But research isn't writing, and my doctorate is no indication that I love research. The books on Oxford so far--barring one--have been pretty lame, too, filled with assumed information in much the same way that biographies of Shakespeare are filled with assumptions. Every author is snide, too. The Stratfordians sneer at the likelihood of Oxford (or anyone else) authoring a single word of the plays, and the Oxfordians sniff back. It isn't pretty, it isn't nice. Furthermore, it isn't me. That's why I'm not writing a stuffy textbook expounding to the world the "truth" that I have "discovered." I make no assumptions about what the truth is in this case, mainly because until I die and go talk to all of these people myself, I won't know what really happened. (It kind of reminds me of faith--I can't fault someone's beliefs just because they don't coincide with mine, for I can't know that I'm right.)

Anyhow, while I'm slogging through the research, I'm not loving it, and it's causing me to avoid the computer, the books, everything to do with writing.

Solutions? I'd love it if you have some. I certainly don't want to start teaching in late September only to realize that I didn't write a word all summer.

I've decided to skip the research for a week. I can renew the books indefinitely (it's not like anyone else wants to read them), so they can be waiting when I actually want to "work" on writing. For now, I'm going to play. I'm going to plan out adventures, revise my novels until they are bright and shiny and ready for publication. And if I get in a rut, I won't let it last. I'll just switch gears and find something I want to write instead.

What do you do when you get stuck? How do you resolve writer's block?

Down Time

I woke up this morning, and for the first time in several weeks, I didn't have a huge list of things to do for teaching. Okay, I did, but the list is for a class I start in three weeks, so I can't say I feel the tremendous heat of fire under me to get the stuff done. 

I know, I know, I will regret this soon. 

Still, it meant I had most of the day without anything pressing on me. I called a few people I hadn't spoken with in far too long, cleaned the kitchen, and then told myself, "Hey, self, you could finally write something!" 

Oh, to write after so many dry months of not having the time. Oh, to pick up my laptop, and instead of logging into my four different e-mail accounts (I'm not kidding), just avoid the Internet completely, opening up my play about two people at an airport and working on it, or planning out more of my revision of my Thomas novel, or even revising my Ark novel (I've been waiting to do this since June)! 

But that's not what I did. I played games, I played around, I read books to my kids (Okay, that's a good thing to do), I made dinner, I set myself out on a blanket on the lawn and read the last few pages of David Copperfield. Only after I'd put my kids to bed did I try to write.

That would be an okay ending, if I spent the next few hours writing. But I didn't work. I read through the short play so far--and I still like it--but when I sought the next real shift, the next touch of dialogue, my mind came up blank. Suddenly I felt like the last place in the world I wanted to be was here, with the laptop in front of me. I didn't want to write. Even setting this down, I admit I feel a bit writhe-ish (I must be taking a page from Uriah Heep), and all I want to do is go upstairs to bed--and not write tomorrow, either.

I can't say I know for certain, but I don't think this writer's block is going to be good for me long term. Any ideas for how I can get myself out of this writing funk?