It’s been a bumpy couple of months over here. Health crises, work crises, yadda yadda. I haven’t been writing much, and I’ve been feeling this unbearable misery build. This always happens: I start missing my writing goals and then I get surprised by how unhappy I am. Then I start writing again and I feel myself start to even out.

I’m starting to think that the process of writing a novel is the process of understanding which parts are frustrating and being okay with that. Which is to say — certain parts are just great! So fun! Words flowing! Fun surprises!  

And other parts are like being lost in the forest when it’s pouring rain. It’s dim, dark, mucky, you hate the thing you’re carrying around with you. 

Yesterday I restarted after ten days away. The section I was working on seemed dull and lifeless, I had no idea where to go next.  I wrote for seven minutes.  

But I also realized, even as I was poking around in that dark wet forest of confusion, that this was pretty normal. Perhaps even expected. I’ve let the world of the novel slip out of my working memory. I need to load it back up. I need to write every day. Even just for seven minutes.

I’m learning to ignore the panic lizard in my brain, the one who screams, “YOU AREN’T CUT OUT FOR THIS!” I wish I’d learned to ignore the panic lizard about twenty years ago, but you know, here we are. Each in our own time.