I’m determined to clear out most of my WIPs this year. I’ve let too many good ideas languish because I was afraid — afraid of the scabs that would be picked off, afraid of the wounds that would ooze thick and dark all over my pages. Afraid to let myself fully heal. Afraid of true contentment.
Life ain’t all sprinkles and glitter. Some can attest to that more than others. *raises hand* There is always light and hope, though. As the saying goes, without darkness, one cannot appreciate the light.
Somehow I was inspired to tell a tale of survivor’s remorse jumbled up in a young man whose only wish is to join his best friend who passed away suddenly. I’m not sure when I started writing this story or why, but my goal (and since I’ve put it on the Internet for all to see and judge) is to have this novella published by early February 2017.
In the meantime, wet your whistle with my Pinterest board for the story, and here’s an unedited snippet:
“I carry you,
Like a scrap of paper or a lunch receipt.
Folded up neat but buried in this sack I call a body,
Mixed in with bits of Faulkner and Dr. Seuss,
Wood chips and pumpkin seeds,
Sugar cookies crumbs and tinsel.
You’re there.
Always
This piece of you I carry is all I have left.
What is left of you is me.
But what am I?
Who do you see?”
Julian stepped away from the mic and walked off the stage just as quietly as he arrived. Hollow. Every poem was the same, he just used different words. But the words had run out.
Blessings, y’all.
Daphne Marie 
I’ve found that if a WIP is not ready (if I’m not ready, actually) then trying to “finish” it leads to a poorly realized story rather than what might have been worthy had I let it percolate longer. I’ve had story ideas in mind for years before I took them up and started writing them. Maybe my creative mental process is different from yours, but I can’t just “finish” something if it’s not ready to be finished.
Good luck to you, though.
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I wholeheartedly agree, Paul. We are definitely on the same wavelength, and I hadn’t been ready to deal with this story for a long time. Skills/experience didn’t match the needs of the project yet, etc. And maybe that’s still the case as I add the resolution that I’ve had outlined for years but been too afraid to commit to the page. I find myself avoiding this yet again. Mail to be sorted, floors to be mopped, you know, the standard work avoidance. However, my goal to finish is more about me sitting down and doing the work every day, seeing a project through to completion instead of stopping just before the resolution like I usually do.
Thanks for the well wishes, Paul, and best of luck to you, as well.
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And I should confess that many times when I tell myself the story (or myself) is “not ready” it’s another form of work avoidance. I use that to avoid the sometimes hard, hard work of being creative long enuf to finish the job. Goes both ways for me.
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