challenges

I feel bled dry of words. All of the pretty words that usually swim in my head seem to have drowned or have gotten out of the pool in my thoughts. I have this horrible habit of stopping writing when I feel like what I am writing is crap. I know it’s a process. I know it will not be Gatsby on the first draft. I know that this is a challenge to get words on paper so I can move forward from there. But I feel dried out and like I’m sabotaging myself.

Writing a novel is hard. It’s tedious and draining. Not every word is beautiful, not all the dialogue is clean. I never understood when authors said it took them years to get a novel ready for publication and that by the time they got to their final draft so much had changed. But now I do. John Green said that in his first draft of Looking for Alaska, there was not even a hint of Pudge’s obsession with last words. THIS IS A CENTRAL THEME IN THE BOOK. I couldn’t imagine the book without it. How far that book came. How far mine will come.

It’s amazing. Even when I feel bled dry of them, I find my solace in words. I write out my frustrations. I read books for more. I listen to music, engraining the lyrics on my skin. I want to talk to people. Watch words form on their lips. Trace them against their skin.

I guess I’m a writer after all.