Resistance

I am a delinquent. I admit it. I should be writing in my novel, and instead I am drafting a new post for this blog. This isn't getting me any closer to finishing. It certainly isn't bringing me closer to a book deal, yet here I sit, writing something else.

I’ve been avoiding my novel for weeks. I visit it reluctantly. I stay a brief time and then I leave via a back door, looking cautiously up and down the street, pulling my hood down so my face can’t be seen. What am I ashamed of? Why can’t I sit comfortably at the keyboard and play in the world I’ve created without feeling uneasy and irritated? Why am I avoiding the characters that I love and know so well? What the hell happened? Am I blocked? Have I written myself into a corner? Am I bored? Is the story lame? Will anyone else enjoy it? Have I wasted my time?

As it stands, my novel fills 1 and ¾ of two 5 inch three-ring binders. I have lost track of how many pages that works out to be, and not every page I’ve written has been printed. It's safe to say that I have played a role in the death of at least one tree during my lifetime as a writer; one entire branch was devoted to printing my novel. Am I proud of this? I’m not sure.

Even this post is hard to write. I type and then I stop, sit leaning on the arm of my desk chair and twist my lower lip. The words are not coming easy, the fear or shame or denial or apathy or inertia, whatever it is that is gnawing at me, is fighting hard against the movement of my fingers across the keys, the flashes of creative electricity along neurons, the snap of an idea across the synapse.

This feels like war. Like I’m the general staring at a battlefield map and pondering troop movements, calculating casualties, anticipating counter attacks, attempting to orchestrate a reversal of fortune. I’m not pleased with the current outlook. At the moment it feels like there will be more troops lost, more energy wasted, less gained for the effort. I feel like I’m dug in at the base of the hill and the enemy is situated behind strong fortifications at the top, with a clear field of view and a mile of barbed wire between “them” and me; whoever “they” are.

Lives are going to be lost. In this war that translates to pages, scenes, narrative, and characters. I’m not feeling very good about being the general and choosing the battalion that will lead the charge up the hill and pay the price for the capture of a strategic target. I don’t want to be the one to choose who might perish and who might survive. What if I choose wrong? What if I make a colossal mistake and we all die? It would be so much better if someone else made the choice. If nothing else, I wouldn’t bear the responsibility if it all goes to hell. But can I accept another person’s decision, another person’s belief or idea about what stays and what goes? No. At the core of it all I know I have to do this - me and me alone.

Sacrifices must be made. Pages must be cut. And I must do it.

~ Peace, perseverance, and resilience