I try to make this blog about the truth of the writing process and the influences that conspire to build story in my head. This is a tough but honest truth to share: I have a novella due tomorrow and I am not going to make that deadline. I am burned out today. I struggle from a mix of anger flare ups as a result of lack of sleep and a basic disconnect from the voice and place of the character. When I write I need to feel I am right there next to the character, experiencing the situation alongside them. Right now I feel like I am watching the character through a dirty sheet where it is all shapes cast through the light of the space which he is in and I am not. This is the toughest time in the writing process, because I don’t know how to write through it. I just know that I don’t know what to do other than try to go about my evening, which on the outset feels ruined by the experience.
Tomorrow I will start fresh. Tomorrow I will struggle to balance the responsibilities of being a good partner with being a good writer, and making certain I don’t tip too deeply towards hermitage as is my way. Balance is a terribly difficult thing to achieve and perhaps moreso as a writer than as a fairy on the tip of a needle.
Of course, that could also be the fatigue speaking–reaching up through the concrete towards my feet to drag me down into a certain blissful oblivion.