It’s 2014! CRIPES!

Has your writing ever come to a screeching halt and froze at a point just before impact? Days follow that turn into weeks and soon, not only has a month gone by, but you are into the next year already. Cripes! A new year already? What to do? You have already circled your desk 60 times and opened your laptop 12. Your masterpiece lays in darkness, waiting to come back out and see the light. Your mind has been occupied by an evil entity forcing you away from your desk to do any, and all, of those wonderful things that lurk around the house. The dishes are piled in the sink, the mounds of laundry are rolling out the door, the vacuum is collecting dust which is curling into dust bunnies, and the teetering piles of paper must be put away immediately. Oh, and let’s not forget the dreaded bathroom! Hey, any excuse to keep the writing at bay.

Does any of this sound familiar? Call it writer’s block, call it procrastination, or call it “I don’t want to write today so I’m going to do all the dreaded things I have been avoiding since my last writing binge.” Charles Bukowski said it well:

“writing about a writer’s block is better than not writing at all”
― Charles Bukowski, The Last Night of the Earth Poems

I recently recovered from this dreaded phenomenon that afflicts most writers (and to those who have never suffered from it….I hate you!). I’m here to tell you that there is no cure but time and a few nudges (ok, they were full on slug fests) from good friends and fellow writers. I was running full steam toward the end of 2013 and pounded out some amazing scenes in two novels that I had been working on. Then the holidays hit right along with some pretty awesome excuses to put off writing. After all, how could I sit down to focus on writing when the dogs needed special ribbons to reflect the joy of the season?

Depression quickly set in as I stared at the computer. NOTHING! I cursed the curser (yep, I just wrote that….get over it). I sat at my computer at the beginning of January and started this tirade and now it is the end of the month and I think I can actually finish it and move on. I quit compulsively cleaning and decided it was high time to just spit some words out.

As I slop out this last paragraph I am feeling refreshed. The words are slowly coming back and the gloom of winters deep freeze seems to be thawing a bit. I like the feeling of my butt in the chair and the sound of the keyboard. The block from the holidays has finally released its grip and I am ready to go. I can only hope that at the end of 2014 I don’t find myself in this same situation and having to say, “CRIPES! It’s 2015 already!?”