Servant To My Imagination

I'm procrastinating my way in a different direction than this latest story I've been writing for the past week or so. I promise you, this post will have no structure or definite point. I'm here when I should be on that story. I do this sometimes, stop with a story at the exact moment it starts gaining momentum during a writing session. I have no idea why.

It's really humming along this evening. The scenes are spilling out with conversational ease and without many hiccups along the way, characters are developing before my very eyes, there's even the glint of an ending becoming a little brighter up ahead. Of course I should stop. What's wrong with me?

Thing is, I don't actually question my process. If my instincts say move away, that's what I do; if my instincts say push and push and push even though nothing feels like it's sparking, that's what I do. I'm a servant to my imagination. It's only when I lose confidence in this approach that I lose the thread of a story and have to send it limping off to the potter's field. It sincerely is like a dance for me that way, balancing my own movements with the movements of the narrative. It's not magic by any stretch, but it's not mere drudgery either. It's why I can't understand formulaic narrative, why I can't imagine being a writer who would engage in that kind of behavior. 

The story is getting a bit longer than I usually write, though. And I'm trying to not get caught up thinking about this. I'm trying to block out that thought altogether, in fact. I hate that I still, after writing for 30 years, concern myself with page count. I only do that with short stories, never with novels. When I'm writing a novel I already know that it's coming in under 200 to 225 pages. I don't sweat that. But with a short story, a form I focus more fully on and with more energy and, frankly, hold in much higher regard, I get that old nagging feeling once I vault past about page 10. It is what it is.

And here I'm starting to feel a nudge to head back to the manuscript. Like I said, I knew this post wasn't going to come out nicely formed and neat. I knew I'd have to go when my gut said go. Nothing personal, dear friends. And thanks for listening.