I think I’m heading into the homestretch with a new manuscript. I qualify that because you never know when you might be derailed, when your confidence goes south or a story line collapses like a junky’s vein. I try to plug away for at least an hour a day, more when I can, to keep at least the illusion of forward motion. For me, I think the worst part is the mind games. One day, I’ll think, yeah, this book rocks. The next, I crash against those same rocks. There are days when I think I could make my life easier and give it all up, but something always pulls me back.
What pulls you back?
Filed under: Uncategorized |
Betsy Lerner 
Mortality…now or never.
To my astonishment, I keep writing for me. The pleasure of finding the perfect voice for the perfect project. I really don’t care about publishing anymore, or being read. I thought I cared beaucoup. And, of course, I once did. No more. My newest is a self-help memoir called MAKE ME A F*CKING MIRACLE, which I’m planning to self-publish. It turns out this is the miracle! I write for moi!
I’m Anonymous #2 above. I don’t know why it doesn’t take my name …. unintentional on my part. It’s Josephine Carr.
what pulls me back to my writing desk is an unwavering sense of my own literary brilliance, and the fact that the world needs my stories in order to survive. My stories are oxygen for the world, memory. What brings me back to my desk is fighting and combating historical global amnesia, especially for the Jews since I’m the child of Holocaust survivors.
only kidding. that was a dream of my narcissistic self Musing on some cloud in the sky that anything I write matters.
mostly it’s just an erotic compulsion to put pen to paper and write and write and write hoping that’s something like a decent sentence will form.
Damn those rocks
I get pulled back in even if the surface feelings are conflicted with doubt chatter because somewhere beneath, if I stop writing too long, a kind of bereftness seeps in because I’m not connected to the mysterious order of art-making. Jennifer K
The clock
The clock. And how late I came to this party. My close readers talking me off the ledge.
Nothing’s pulling me back. For the first time in 6 years I’m starting to believe that no one is going to take this book. Congratulations on your progress, I’m genuinely happy for you!
What pulls me back on hard days is knowing that not writing will make me feel even worse.
“What pulls you back?”
I don’t know. Habit? Knowing myself? Being true to myself? Some part of the Unmoved Mover?
Not any question I need to answer. The creative spirit in me is a spark that will not be extinguished until I die. And if it should flicker out while I am still above ground, know then that I am little more than an animated corpse.
Keeping in mind that the past is close behind. The ever changing Muse never escapes my mind, no matter the shade I’m tangled up into. The carpenter’s wife and I, now we had a few laughs and the mathematician and I figured a few things out, but, as always, I’m just looking for another joint.
Hi. Great to hear you’re exploring new turf. I have finally realized that I have some form of OCD. Regardless of the financial deficit (not homeless or foodless) and the continuous mental anguish, I am drawn to the words that seem to be forming story.
I have to admit that all the readers and those uninformed about the writing process and publishing nightmare, who say Wow! you’re a writer, sort of keep me going too. I may also just be certifiably nuts. But…I seem to be having more fun than most people I meet. So I keep writing.
Thanks for taking my pulse, Betsy. And all the best in your newxquest.
Keep going Betsy! Shred Sisters is one of my comp titles and a favorite read. Thanks to other commenters, especially Josephine Carr!
I keep writing because of those moments when I get the same feeling of oneness and peace with this broken world that I get with my dog when we’re on the agility ring- when we’re totally in tune and he follows where I want him to go with perfect synchrony.
It’s my hope that there are people out there for whom my words will resonate the same way- who will see themselves or others they love and understand they are not alone. To fear less and hope more. Donna Barten