Sometimes the pressure of writing for someone ELSE makes writing loose it shine.
Last week I spent many glorious hours writing junk.
I'm serious. No one must ever see the majority of what I wrote.
Ah, but that was fun.
Like eating donuts even though I know they are bad for me.
This week, I've been telling myself to get back to the real writing. Like the stuff I have to send to my critique group in just a week or so.
Instead, I read all the wonderfully fun junk I've written in that book.
Maybe I should have edited while I was reading. Or something. Oh, and then I told myself to find out the real truth about all those medical issues I happily wrote junk about.
I'm so good at making up stuff! It doesn't even have to be true!
But researching is fun, too.
But not as fun as finding photos of things from your book. Like the characters. And the character's doing what they love. And what the character would look like starved on a deserted island vs when they return and put on a little weight. Or if they were, hypothetically speaking, to be filmed in a movie. (Can I cast Meryl Streep and Dakota Fanning in my next novel, please?)
Then when you have files of photos, and lists of all the terrible true things that happen to persons who have said medical issues, then you feel obligated to make files with titles. Something like: Character Sketches, Story Outline, Medical Information, Magic System, 2nd Story Outline, Pictures to Use In Other Book, Pictures to Make a Book About, Medical Issues to Use Later, and my ever favorite Snippets, which happens to be bits of everything I take out of my book because it's junk, and I won't let anyone see it, but I spent so much time writing it in oblivious enjoyment, I can't bare to part with it.
So the truth is, when something is hard, sometimes you need a donut. And you don't eat the donuts necessarily because you don't like salads (I've had some really good salads.) The truth is whole wheat pancakes make you really happy, and you love all those fresh fruits coming back in season. So you aren't entirely giving yourself over to ruin and gluttony.
You're just enjoying the donuts. And sometimes we need donuts. Because they are good. And because they remind you to stop being so crazy about being perfect all the time. And also because they remind you that while good, a donut isn't going to get you were you need to be.
So you do the serious stuff again. And you like that too, because you realize you just really like food.
And writing.
Which is good.
Because you need a little bit every day.
