Writing is HARD!

WRITING IS HARD!

I guess if writing were easy, everyone would do it. Sometimes it is. The 'flow' happens and one can muse magically for hours. Even long minutes are noted and appreciated. Then there are the serious parts, the ones laden with emotion, or poignant memory, that stick us on stuck. Stuck. Stuck Stuck!

I've read so many books on how others do it, that my head swirls with the do's, the don'ts, and the never's. Along with the always', the should's, and the maybe's...that the keys are within, the words come down, not to be pulled up, as Julia Cameron eloquently elaborates...

She's right. Of course. The words are there. Just not when I ask them to be. They come in the middle of the night – causing me to fumble in darkness to scribble what I won't decipher in the mornings light. They come while I'm driving, causing me to swerve over to the side of a barren road to make a quick jot, that I will not remember the context of when I go to transcribe it into my book. I carry a little notebook for when someone says something, or I see something, or read something that urges me to make a note, because that, that right there and then sounds so good! Watching television, I hear all the right phrases spoken or think of just the right segue for where I'm stuck. Worst is while I'm exercising or walking...the best, brightest ideas flow like syrup in perfect sweetness and sanity, only to be quickly vanished when I finally make it home to notate my minds brilliance.

If you're a writer too, then this is all familiar and frustrating for you as well. Trying too hard, trying to say it all just right, and on command, at a specified time or interval, trying to hone the craft while keeping grammar and structure on target – well, it's all too much. Because writing is hard.

It's not supposed to be perfect, I know. The 're-writing' is where the real work is. The original is just a draft. The trouble is the draft is full of holes, like the draft of air that's puffing through the room right now, but not directly at me, where it should be, in the intensity of a southern summer heat.

A big project, like a book, stays on one's mind constantly. Through sleep, through chores, through grocery lines, through conversations, through every thought about everything. It's maddening! Maybe it gets easier by book number 200? I don't know – I'll have to ask Nora Roberts about that one.

Or maybe the attendant on the psyche ward I end up on will have a pre-printed handout on this very subject. With wide enough margins for me to make notes, of course. The diagnosis will be simply stated - “Writers Block. Mandatory Medication”.

Just Another Lori Story.