I’ve been feeling really jealous of a lot of other writers lately. Great and talented people are getting published in America, not even people I know but people I respect, and I sit here feeling all sulky when I could be doing what would get me published and known, that is, writing so that one day all my writing practice will segue into writing great fiction. I write dribs and drabs and then get annoyed and watch Netflix.
Someone I know wrote a book and I would love to hate it, except it is a good book (a little too much slut-shaming in some parts). So I write positive reviews for it on librarything and goodreads and sulk some more. I eat stale gingersnaps and cross my arms and stare out the window.
I go back and forth on giving up. I say I’ll take a break and then think of a story idea and write a short story about Jersey cows. I think Maybe I should stick with short fiction then spend six hours on two pages of Come From Away, which is now fifty thousand words, because I simply can’t let that one go. I tell myself YA is the way to go as my YA faerie story veers further and further from YA and into adult territory. I decide that listening to myself is not what I should be doing.
I read books by amazing writers. You know how they got to be amazing writers? I ask myself. Not by watching Netflix all day. Not by planning a birthday party for a five year old for more time than it should take to plan a birthday party for a five year old. Not by sulking how the receptionist at the car dealership wasn’t as friendly to you this time as last time. Not by still being hurt that a family member forgot their birthday when it is October and the forgotten birthday was in July and it’s a bit too late now to bring up forgetting their birthday. Amazing writers actually write stuff down. Then they rewrite and reframe and move all the parts around and get a story. That is what writers do.
So I should write. But oh my goodness, I found an advent calendar tutorial and I’ll likely distract myself with that instead.