So what do you do…

C.E. Grundler

… when your writing hits a dead-end? When you have nothing to write. Well, technically not nothing. I’ve got plenty to write, and I’ve been doing just that, at all hours of the day and well into the night. But not for posting here. Plot-wise, madness and mayhem-wise, I have a wonderful multicolored Scrivener binder full of notes, drafts, and happy chaos. But as for today’s post, nope. Nada. Nothing. Simply put, I’m drawing a great big blank.

So let’s think. Topics. Hmmm.

I could talk about the weather. It’s still cold. Not freezing anymore, so that’s good, but it’s still well below proper epoxy-working ranges. Which means there’s nothing much to report in the boat-restoration department either. And as for writing — well, there’s far to much to even know where to begin. So here’s the Reader’s Digest version, for those of you who have written me, wondering what’s going on in that realm of my existence.

I’m writing.

I’m writing a lot.

A real lot.

And this time I’m keeping my laptop by my side day and night, and I’m keeping all my notes on my laptop, not a desk that a tree can flatten. And backed up on two separate flash drives, and a cloud, just for good measure. Yes, I’m WAAAAAAAY behind schedule, but gaining headway fast. In hindsight, I’m glad Sandy decided to send me back to GO, less the $200, but with a mailbox full of reality checks instead. I’m in a different place than I was, pre-storm, and my characters gained plenty of insight in the process. It would have been hard to scrap a nearly completed story, and for more time than I should have, I tried to resurrect something that I now see was headed the wrong direction. It took a while, but once I reached that realization, once I let it go and stopped trying to rebuild something shaky at best, suddenly my muses were happy to talk to me once again.

So, in answer to my original question, you just keep writing. The words will come. Sometimes, (such as today,) you’ll end up with a post after all. Sometimes you’ll end up with a chapter, or a nearly complete draft. Just write. It might be great. It might be terrible. A tree may fall on it. And if you’re lucky, if you step back long enough to see it, you’ll eventually realize that tree was very lucky.

 

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