It’s the first blog post of the new year. About this time last year and a half dozen others over the last couple, I was going to quit.
Quit writing.
Quit creating.
Just… stop.
Little Miss Muse sits on the edge of my desk as I type this, rolling her eyes. “You’re not gonna quit. Not after all the work I’ve put into you.”
“Hush. I’m contemplating. It’s the first blog of the year, and I’m working junk out.”
She rolls her eyes the other way to keep things even.
Life’s heavy, and my head’s a mess more often than not. Forget about concentrating or contemplating for very long at all. Four or five paragraphs into a scene, and I’m off, away from the screen, doing something else.
My poor cats can’t keep me in line. Trudi, the Office Goose in charge of Marketing, sits on her wooden scooter twirling her feathers and waiting for me to hand her a project—any project. Zeppo and the Jiggle Dragons are happy to just hang out, but they’re much more vibrant when they see words popping onto the screen.
And Little Miss Muse has quit, ran away with the Tooth Fairy, come back, and now…
“My absence, although very brief, gave you some space to figure stuff out? Didn’t it?”
My turn to roll my eyes.
But yes, I did have a realization.
Each week, when the desire to roll up the keyboard and throw in the monitor became unbearable, something—I’m not even sure what—would break and another blog post would pop out. Or another short story. Or a tiny step forward on the editing.
It’s ingrained.
I write to process.
I write to know what I think.
I write better than I speak.
I write to hide from this world and to create worlds I don’t have to hide from.
I’ve done that for as long as I can remember.
Little Miss Muse frequently reminds me that she has been with me for as long as I’ve existed. That she’s the one who turns on the magic.
I have no evidence to counter this.
I do wonder if it’s in my DNA. Woven in between the compounds, twisted all up inside, ink and typeface and story. Lots and lots of stories.
Even on those days I wanted to quit, I could not turn off the dialogue beats and settings and scenes running through my head. Author brain is on 24/7.
Forcing it to stop would be like trying to unravel DNA code. Or muzzle Little Miss Muse. It’s not done.
“You bet Trudi’s bikini you can’t muzzle me.” She cocks her head. “I didn’t tell you this, but I mouthed off to the Tooth Fairy and that’s why I’m back so soon.”
She pouts a little. I think she had fun collecting teeth. A nice little adventurous vacation from her wrung-out writer.
“So… I can’t escape writing, and you can’t escape your attitude. Both ingrained.”
“Seems like.”
As I look back on 2024 (and even before), the blog has served as a time capsule. I’ve recorded the highs and lows of becoming a writer and of life in general. Both have had flat tires. Detours. Laugh-out-loud moments. Greif and despair, then a brief high mountaintop.
A birds-eye view shows the pattern I hadn’t seen before. When I felt like giving up, I was dealing with deep-seated life and emotional issues. When I hit traction, life had “eased up” and I would cram words down quickly, because certainly, another shoe would drop soon and the season of “ease” would disappear.
Considering this pattern, I’ve decided 2025 needs a gentler approach. I usually barrel into a new season with lofty goals and impossible-to-reach standards. And then, like most resolutions, life happens (or all the emotions—I blame Couch Lady for this dam breaking), and I fall flat. Yeah, some words get wrestled down, but not nearly to the degree I wanted.
I believe I overestimate my mental and emotional capacity to imbue my characters with mental and emotional depth for thousands of words a day. It takes it out of me.
Then there’s all the life stuff.
A different method is needed.
The goal for 2025 isn’t some lofty daily word count or challenge that hangs over my head and reminds me each day I’m not gonna make it. It’s doable, consistent quotas. Gentle approaches and time in between to fill the well.
A little art.
A little cookie decorating (yeah, that was a thing for a few weeks).
A little solo adventuring around to places I’ve never been. (Like an audition for a play—more on that later…)
A breather from the screen to fill the artist well and give Little Miss Muse something to play with.
“For me?” She brightens up.
“Yes, all for you.”
“Even the trip to the fudge factory?” She eyes me sideways.
“Well, that was for me. One must have fudge to make it through the blizzard.”
She eyes the stash of calories and carbs next to the keyboard. “One must also apparently have Milanos, Hammond’s chocolate bars, Lindt truffles, and Smarties to make it through a blizzard.”
“You don’t have to tell the readers everything , you know…”
She pops her grape bubble gum in my face. “At least I’m easy to please.”
I refrain from arguing with her. Her stash is far more expensive and extensive than mine. Mine at least fits next to the keyboard and doesn’t require lighter fluid.
She nudges a jar over to me. “And this is Zeppo’s Biscoff Butter.”
“He told me I could have it.”
We both look back at Zeppo, who’s busy wooing his new girl.
My office staff is a disaster. Trudi shakes her beak at me. She’s donned her astronaut costume over the top of her bikini. This is how she will remain dressed until I give her a project to promote. I’m not going to argue with this goose…
It’s time to wrap up this contemplation. It went off the rails about 500 words back. I feel the pull to do a stent of fiction.
Little Miss Muse lights the fuse of her bottle rocket and sprinkles a fresh batch of lavender glitter over the keyboard. She hands me a caramel Lindt. I untwist the wrapper, pop the ball into my mouth, and close my eyes as the chocolate melts.
Dialogue. Setting. Scenes. Coming to life. Twisting and twirling. I can feel it take shape from somewhere deep within…
Like it’s ingrained or something.
